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SERMON XVI.

THE DOCTRINE OF REPENTANCE.

JOB Xi. 13, 14.

If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thy hands towards him; if iniquity be in thy hands, put it far away, and let not wickedness dwell in thy tabernacles.

EVER since religion was published in the world, repentance has been considered as a part of it.

We must, however, except the first publication of the will of God. Our first parents were created perfect, and if they transgressed the religious obligation which they received from their Creator, they were by no means to be excused through an act of repentance; for repentance only can be admitted in a state of imperfection.

But when this became the state of manwhen by the loss of his original innocence,

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and the high privileges of his nature, he became an easy prey to every temptation, it was necessary that the divine lawgiver should no longer be extreme to mark what was done amissthat he should accept of some sacrifice for sin, some satisfaction for the breach of those laws, which, without such acknowledgments, would have lost their authority; and, had no such acknowledgments been admitted, would have proved ministers of wrath, to establish more universally the dominion of death.

These sacrifices were at first a kind of penal task, till the improving arts of society had rendered it easy to procure them, and the increase of property facilitated the commission of sin.

Hence, in the Jewish church of old, it was as easy for a rich man to sin, and to expiate, as it is, at present, in the church of Rome.

This abuse of the original intention of sacrifices was complained of by those prophets and legislators who, being of a more liberal turn, concluded that the Almighty could no longer be pleased with any of those external atonements, which, as they were now so easily effected, could no more strengthen the authority of the laws, than they could tend to the perfection or the improvement of manners.

In the divine name, therefore, they called

upon the people to bring no more vain oblations, but to turn from their evil ways, and to offer that sacrifice to God, which alone could be acceptable to a reasonable being, a heart that repented of its former wickedness.

This is what we mean by that repentance, which, under the Christian system likewise, qualifies us for the mercies of God, and the mediation of Christ.

I have not found this duty laid down any where more regularly than in the above quoted words of Job's friend.

The whole of it is specified in four particulars:

I. The preparation of the heart.

II. The act of humiliation before God.

If thou prepare thy heart, and stretch out thy hands towards him.

III. We have instructions for our conduct, in consequence of such a preparation and humiliation.

If iniquity be in thy hands, put it far away. IV. And, lastly, an exhortation, agreeable to the former, to regard the conduct of our families.

And let not wickedness dwell in thy tabernacles.

The first mentioned, as it is the first necessary duty, is the preparation of the heart; a

́duty not less difficult in the execution, than important in the end; for the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. To unfold, and to examine clearly into all its principles, to discover and expose its reconciling arts, and to trace it through the recesses of vanity and of care, is a task for Omniscience; nor is it from the lowest conviction of the Almighty power that he is called the Searcher of hearts.

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Self examination, however necessary, is seldom agreeable: even piety is sometimes afraid of finding too many weaknesses for the divine indulgence; and it is the industry of vice to steal from conviction, and to tread softly by the sleeping lion.

Let not, however, a good man be afraid to search his heart, nor to lay open his failings before his Father who is in heaven. The God of mercies and of wisdom will not suffer his creatures to be tempted above what they are able to bear, but will, with the temptation, make a way to escape. Whoever is free from the abandoned guilt of voluntary crimes, need not doubt to find acceptance with him, whose merits have made satisfaction for the involuntary and inseparable frailties of human nature.

But shameless and obdurate vice has much more to do. He, who has been long deaf to

the remonstrances of reason and of conscience, in whom the principles of wickedness have been confirmed by habit and by time, will find it a work of labour to remove that barrier he has been so industrious to raise between himself and his salvation.

When the mind has been long enslaved by wickedness, it is in danger of losing even the liberty of changing its principles, and of rescuing itself from the tyranny of vicious habits.

Unhappy for the hardened sinner, that the work of repentance is to him so great; yet more unhappy, if he slumbers in unalarmed security, to be awaked only by the last stroke of death!

Let him whose life has resembled, but who would not wish that his last end should be like this, instantly prepare his heart for the business of repentance. Let not his aversion to religion, nor even his ease and security under his present circumstances, render him inattentive to his duty, or repress the sense of the divine disapprobation. He cannot be without a reasonable conviction, if he compare his conduct with the laws of God; and a reasonable conviction once excited, what remains but to impress the force of it on the heart?

Yet, alas! when the heart should be thus

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