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Scripture the WORD of GOD.

1 Theff. II. 13.•.

For this caufe alfo thank we God without ceafing, because when ye received the Word of God which je heard of us, ye received it not as the Word of Men, but as it is in truth the Word of God, which effectually worketh alfo you that believe.

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WE E are fallen into thofe Times

which our Saviour prophesied

of, Luke 18. 8. When I come again fhall I find Faith upon Earth? We have been contending about Matters of a remoter Nature, but now we are to maintain the great and neceffary Truths of Christianity, against Men whose Confidence and Crimes vie with each other. We have been difputing about

Vol. II. Rites and Ceremonies, Forms of Prayer, Circumstantials of Government, and Modes of Expreffion: But now we are to Defend the Foundation and Being of Religion, against the Affaults and Attacks of Men, who are Enemies to all Goodness and Vertue, and therefore to Divine Revelation. Nor is Religion in danger only from the Prophane, but Enthufiaft, from the Sinner and Scoffer, but also from the Zealot and Superftitious; for whilst one explodes the Scripture as False, and the other rejects it as a dead Letter, while one fets up Reason, another a private Spirit, Fancy or Tradition in the room of it; while one plainly denies its Authority, and another eludes it every way the Christian Religion is undermined, and our holy Faith, once deliver'd to the Saints, fhaken and overthrown. And where Faith decays, Iniquity must confe quently abound, and Immorality must advance the fame pace with Infidelity; for there's nothing to restrain Mens vicious Inclinations, when their Principles are deprav'd; and the Word is preach'd in vain, when it is not mixt with Faith in them that hear it. 'Tis

with design to obviate, as much as in Vol. II. me lyes, this fatal and fpreading Mifchief, and withal to prepare and difpofe the Minds of the Hearers for the better reception of those Difcourfes which are to follow here this Winter, that I have pitch'd upon this Text. The best way to give a Check to Infidelity and Immorality, being in general to establish by plain and uncontrolable Arguments the Divine Authority of Holy Writ; and the best, way to render Sermons profitable, being to poffefs the Minds of an Auditory with a firm Perfwafion, that the Doctrines Preached to them, if confonant to holy Writ, are the Truths of God.

That by the Word of God in my Text, we are to understand, not any unwritten Tradition, but the written Word, is evident from feveral Arguments, which may be deduced from the Text it felf; the Word which St. Paul preach'd every where was Repentance towards God, and Faith in our Lord Jefus Chrift, and therefore this must be the Word which the Theffalonians heard of him; this Word is faid here to work effectually in them that be

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