flew that their fatisfaction might be brought from thence; and accordingly it does afford them what is commenfurable to their appetite: but the erect figure of man's body, which looketh upward, thewed him, that his happiness lay above him in God; and that he was to expect it from heaven, and not from earth. Now this fair Tree, of which he was forbidden to eat, taught him the fame lesson; that his happiness lay not in enjoyment of the creatures, for there was a want even in Paradife: fo that the forbidden Tree was in effect the hand of all the creatures, pointing man away from themselves to God for happiness: It was a fign of emptiness hung before the door of the ereation, with that infcription, This is not your reft.

:

Fourthly, As he had a perfect tranquillity within his own breast, so he had a perfect calm without: His heart had nothing to reproach him with; confcience then had nothing to do, but to direct, approve and feaft him and without, there was nothing to annoy him': The happy pair lived in perfect amity; and tho' their knowledge was vaft, true and clear, they knew no fhame: Tho' they were naked, there were no blushes in their faces; for fin, the feed of thame was not yet fown, Gen. ii. 25. and their beautiful bodies were not capable of injuries from the air; so they had no need of clothes, which are origi nally the badges of our fhame: They were liable to no diseases, nor pains; and tho' they were not to live idle; yet toil, wearinefs, and fweat of the brows, were not known in this state.

Fifthly, Man had a life of pure delight, and undreggy pleasure in this state: Rivers of pure pleafures run through it: The earth, with the product thereof, was now in its glory; nothing had yet come in, to mar the beauty of the creatures. God fet him down, not in a common place of the earth; but in Eden, a place eminent for pleasantnefs, as the name of it imports: nay, not only in Eden, but in the garden of Eden; the most pleasant fpot of that pleafant place: a garden planted by God himself, to be the manfion-houfe of this his favourite. As, when God made the other living creatures, he faid, Let the water bring forth the moving creature, Gen. i. 20. And, Let the earth bring forth the living creature, ver. 24. But when man was to be made, he faid, Let us make man, ver. 26. So, when the rest of the earth was to be furnished with herbs and trees, God faid, Let earth bring forth grafs, and the fruit-tree, Gen. i. 11. But of paradife it is faid, God planted it, chap. ii. 8. which cannot but denote a fingular excellency in that garden, beyond all other parts of the then beautiful earth. There he wanted neither for neceffity nor delight: for there was every tree that is pleasant to the fight, and good for food, ver. 9. He knew not thefe delights which luxury has invented for the gratifying of lufts: but his delights were fuch as came out of the hand of God; without paffing thro' finful hands, which readily leave marks of impurity on what they touch. So his delights were pure, his pleafures refined. And yet may I now fhew you a more excellent way: wifdon bad entered into ais heart: furely then knowledge was pleafant unte

his foul. What delight do fome find in their difcoveries of the works of nature, by the fcrapes of knowledge they have gathered! but how much more exquifite pleasure had Adam, while his piercing eyes read the book of God's works, which God laid before him, to the end he might glorify him in the fame; and therefore he had furely fitted him for the work! but above all, his knowledge of God, and that as his God, and the communion he had with him, could not but afford him the moft refined and exquifite pleafure in the innermoft receffes of his heart. Great is that delight which the faints find in these views of the glory of God, that their fouls are fometimes let into, while they are compaffed about with many infirmities; but much more may well be allowed to finlefs Adam; no doubt he relifhed thefe pleafures at another rate.

Laftly, He was immortal: He would never have died, if he had not finned; it was in cafe of fin that death was threatned, Gen. ii 17. which fhews it to be the confequent of fin, and not of the finless human nature. The perfect conftitution of his body, which came out of God's hand very good; and the righteoufnefs and holiness of his foul, removed all inward causes of death: nothing being prepared for the grave's devouring mouth, but the vile body, Philip iii. 21. And those who have finned, Job xxiv. 19. And God's fpecial care of his innocent creature, fecured him againft outward violence. apostle's testimony is exprefs, Rom. v. 12. By one man fin entered into the world, and death by fin. Behold the door by which death came in! Satan wrought with his lies till he got it opened, and fo death entred; and therefore is he faid to have been a murderer from the beginning. John viii. 44.

The

Thus have I fhown you the holiness and happiness of man in this ftate. If any fhall fay, What's all this to us, who never tafted of that holy and happy ftate? They must know it nearly concerns us, in fo far as Adam was the root of all mankind, our common head and reprefentative; who received from God our inberitance and flock to keep it for himself and his children, and to convey it to them. The Lord put all mankind's flock (as it were) in one fhip and, as we ourfelves fhould have done, he made our common father the pilot. He put a bleffg in the root, to have been, if rightly managed, diffused into all the branches. According to our text, making Adam upright, he made man upright; and all mankind had that uprightnefs in him; for, if the root be holy, fo are the branches. But more of this afterwards. Had Adam ftood, none would have quarrelled the representation.

USE I. For Information. This thews us, (1) That not God, but man himself was the caufe of his ruin. God made him upright: his Creator fet him up, but he threw himself down. Was the Lord's directing and inclining him to good the reafon of his woful choice? Or did heaven deal fo fparingly with him, that his preffing wants fent him to hell to feek fupply? Nay, man was, and is, the cause of

his own ruin. (2.) God may moft juftly require of men perfect obedience to his law, and condemn them for their not obeying it perfectly, tho' now they have no ability to keep it. In fo doing, he gathers but where he has strawed. He gave man ability to keep the whole law; man has loft it by his own fault: but his fin could never take away that right which God hath to exact perfect obedience of his creature, and to punish in cafe of difobedience. (3) Behold here the infinite obligation we ly under, to Jefus Chrift the fecond Adam; who with his own precious blood has bought our efcheat, and freely makes offer of it again to us, Hof. xiii. 9. and that with the advantage of everlafting fecurity, that it can never be altogether loft any more, John x. 28, 29. Free grace will fix thofe, whom free-will fhook down into a gulf of mifery.

USE II. This reacheth a reproof to three forts of perfons. (1.) To thefe, who hate religion in the power of it, where-ever it appears; and can take pleasure in nothing, but in the world and their lufts. Surely thofe men are far from righteouinefs; they are haters of God, Rom. i. 30. for they are haters of his image. Upright Adam in, Paradife, would have been a great eye-fore to all fuch perfons; as he was to the ferpent, whofe feed they prove themselves to be, by their malignity. (2.) It reproves thofe who put religion to fhame, and those who are athamed of religion, before a graceless world. There is a generation who make fo bold with the God that made them, and can in a moment cruih them, that they ridicule piety, and make a mock of ferioufnefs. Against whom do ye port yourselves? Against whom make ye a wide mouth, and draw out the tongue? Ifa. Ivii. 4. Is it not againit God himself, whofe image, in fome meafure repaired on fome of his creatures, makes them fools in your eyes? But be ye not mockers, left your bands be made strong, Ifa. xxviii. 22. Holiness was the glory God put on man, when he made him: but now fons of men turn that glory into fhame, because they themfelves glory in their fhame.--There are others that fecretly approve of religion, and in religious company will profefs it; who at other times, to be neighbour-like are alhamed to own it; fo weak are they, that they are blown over with the wind of the wicked's mouth. A broad laughter, an impious jeft, a filly gibe out of a prophane mouth, is to many an unanfwerable argument against religion and ferioufnefs; for in the caufe of religion, they are as filly doves without heart. O that fuch would confider that weighty word! Mark viii. 38. Whosoever therefore fhall · be ashamed of me, and of my words, in this adulterous and finful generation; of him alfo fhall the Son of man be afhamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels. (3.) It reproves the proud felf-conceited profeffor, who admires himself in a garment he hath patched together of rags. There are many, who, when once they have gathered fome fcrapes of knowledge of religion, and have at, tained to fome reformation of life, do fwell big with conceit of themfelves; a fad fign that the effects of the fall ly fo heavy upon them,

that

that they have not as yet come to themselves, Luke xv. 17. They have eyes behind, to fee their attainments; but no eyes within, no eyes before, to fee their wants, which would furely humble them: for true knowledge makes men to fee, both what once they were, and what they are at prefent; and fo is humbling, and will not suffer them to be content with any measure of grace attained; bnt puts them on to prefs forward, forgetting the things that are behind, Philip. iii. 13, 14. But thofe men are fuch a fpectacle of commiferation, as one would be, that had fet his palace on fire, and were glorifying in a cottage he had built for himself out of the rubbish, tho' so very weak, that it could not stand against a storm.

USE III Of lamentation. Here was a stately building, man carved like a fair palace, but now lying in afhes: let us ftand and look on the ruins, and drop a tear. This is a lamentation, and fhall be for a lamentation. Could we chufe but to weep, if we faw our country ruined, and turned by the ene:ny into a wildernofs? If we faw our houses on fire, and our houtholds perishing in the flames? But all this comes far fhort of the difmal fight, man fallen as a star from heaven! Ah! may not we now fay, O that we were as in months past, when there were no ftains in our nature, no clouds on our minds, no pollution in our hearts. Had we never been in better cafe, the matter had been lefs: but they that were brought up in scarlet, do now embrace dung-bills. Where is our primitive glory now! Once no darkness in the mind, no rebellion in the will, no diforder in the affections. But, ah! How is the faithful city become an harlot? Righteoufnefs lodged in it; but now murderers. Our filver is become drofs, our wine mixed with water. That heart which was once the temple of God, is now turned into a den of thieves. Let our name be Ichabod, for the glory is departed. Happy waft thou, O man, who was like unto thee! No pain or fickness could affect thee, no death could approach thee, no figh was heard from thee, till these bitter fruits were plucked off the forbidden tree. Heaven thone upon thee, and earth smiled: thou watt the companion of angels, and the envy of devils. But how low is he now laid, who was created for dominion, and made lord of the world! The crown is fallen from our head: wo unto us that we have finned. The creatures that waited to do him service, are now, the fall, fet in battle-array against him; and the least of them having commiflion proves too hard for him. Waters overflow the old worid, fire confumes Sodom; the stars in their courses fight against Sifera ; frogs, flies, lice, &c turn executioners to Pharaoh and his Egyptians; worms eat up Herod: yea, man needs a league with the beafts, yea, with the very ftones of the field, Job. v. 13. having reason to fear, that every one that findeth him will flay him. Alas! how are we fallen? How are we plunged into a gulf of mifery! The fun has come down on us, death has come in at our windows; our enemies have put out our two eyes, and fport themselves with our miseries. Let us then ly down in our fhame, and let our confufion cover us.

fince

Nevertheless there is hope in Ifrael concerning this thing. Come then, O finner, look to Jefus Chrift the fecond Adam: quit the first Adam and his covenant: come over to the Mediator and Surety of the new and better covenant: and let our hearts fay, Be thou our ruler, and let this breach be under thy hand. And let your eye trickle down and ceafe not without any intermiffion, till the Lord look down and behold from heaven, Lam. iii. 49, 50.

STATE II.

NAMELY,

XX

The State of Nature, or of Entire Depravation.

And GOD faw that the wickedness of Man was great in the Earth, and that every Imagination of the Thoughts of his Heart was only Evil continually.

W

:

A7E have feen what man was, as God made him, a lovely and happy creature: let us view him now as he hath unmade himfelf and we fhall fee him a finful and miferable creature. This is the fad state we were brought into by the fall: a state as black and doleful as the former was glorious; and this we commonly call The fate of nature, or Man's natural ftate, according to that of the apoftle, Eph ii. 2. And were by nature the children of wrath even as others. And herein two things are to be confidered; ft, The finfulness; 2dly, The mifery of this ftate, in which all the unregenerate do live. I begin with the finfulness of man's natural fate, whereof the text gives us a full, tho' fhort account: And God faw that the wickedness of man was great, &c.

The scope and defign of these words is, to clear God's juftice, in bringing the flood on the old world. There are two particular taufes of it taken notice of in the preceeding verfes. (1.) Mixt marriages, ver. 2. The fons of God, the pofterity of Seth and Enos, profeffors of the true religion, married with the daughters of men, the profane, curfed race of Cain. They did not carry the matter before the Lord, that he might chufe for them, Pfal. xlviii. 14. But without any respect to the will of God, they chofe; not according to the rules of their faith, but of their fancy: they faw that they were fair;

and