1. To speak properly, there are not several perfections in God; but there is one single excellence, inclusive of every other, that arises from all his perfections, but of which it is not possible that we can either form any complete ideas, or easily express by any name: in general, it may be called order, or love of order. Order, in regard to finite and dependent beings, is that disposition, which induces them to act agreeably to their relations to other intelligent beings; to the faculties which the Creator has given them; to the talents that they have received; and to the circumstances in which they are placed. Order, in regard to God, who is an infinite and an independent Intelligence, is that disposition, which induces him always to act agreeably to the eminence of his perfections. 2. Although God has only a general excellence, yet it is necessary for us to divide it into several particular excellences, in order to the obtaining of some knowledge of an objeet, the immensity of which will not allow us to comprehend it at once. We are obliged to use this method in studying finite objects, whenever their sphere extends beyond the comprehension of a single act of the mind: and, if finite objects can be known only by this method, for a much stronger reason we must be allowed to use the same method of obtaining the knowledge of the great and infinite Being.

3. The general excellence of God being thus divided into parts, each part becomes what we call a perfection, or an attribute of God, as vengeance or justice, and goodness: but each particular attribute will be still mistaken unless we subdivide it again into other, and still more contracted spheres. Thus, when God sends rain and fruitful seasons, we call the blessing simply bounty. When he delivers us out of our afflictions, we call it compassion. When he pardons our sins, we call it mercy. But as all these particular excellences proceed from that general attribute which we call goodness, so that attribute itself proceeds, as well as his justice, from an excellence more general still, which we have denominated order or love of order.

4. Perfections that proceed from the same perfection, or rather, which are the same perfection applied to different subjects, can. not be contrary to each other. Strictly speaking, God is no more just than good, no more good than just. His goodness is restrained by his justice, his justice by his goodness. He delights as much in the exercise of his justice, when order requires it, as in the exercise of his goodness, when order requires him to exercise it: or, to express the same thing more plainly, that which is goodness, when it is applied to one case would cease to be goodness, were it applied to a different ease, because, in the latter, goodness would not be restrained by justice: or, to express myself more plainly still, because order, which allows the exercise of goodness in the first case, does not allow the exercise of it in the last, so that what would be fit, or agreeable to order, in the first case, would be unfit or disorderly in the last.

To conclude. God is as amiable and adorable when he exercises his justice, as when

ho exercises his goodness. That which makes me adore God, believe his word, hope in his promises, and love him above all things, is the eminence of his perfections. Were not God possessed of such an eminence of his perfections, he would not be a proper object of adoration. I should be in danger of being deceived were I to believe his word, or to trust his promise; and I should be guilty of idolatry, were I to love him with that supreme affection, which is due to none but the Supreme Being. But, the goodness and justice of God being equal emanations of the eminence of his perfections, and of his love of order, I ought equally to adore and love him when he rewards, and when he punishes; when he exercises his justice and when he exercises his goodness: because, in either case, he alike displays that general excellence, that love of order, which is the ground of my love and obedience. I ought to adore and love him, as much when he drowns the world, as when he promises to drown it no more; when he unlocks the gates of hell, as when he opens the doors of heaven; when he says to the impenitent,' Depart, ye cursed, to the devil and his angels, Matt. xxv. 41, as when he says to his elect, Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world,' Matt. xxv. 34.

The justice and the goodness of God, then, are in perfect harmony; the gospel of last Lord's day, and the gospel of this day, entirely agree; the prophet and the apostle preach the same doctrine, and the two texts rightly understood,' God is a consuming fire; The Lord will abundantly pardon:' both these texts, I say, present the same object to us, tho eminence of the divine perfections, God's love of order. This is what we proposed to prove.

Let us now apply this general harmony of the goodness and severity of God, to the removing of a seeming inconsistency in the conduct of your preachers and casuists, who first use every effort to alarm and terrify your minds with the idea of a death-bed repentance, and afterward take equal pains to comfort you, when ye have deferred your repentance to that time, and when your caso appears desperate.

Why do we not despair of a man who delays his conversion till the approach of death? Why did we tell you last Lord's day, that God pardons not only the sins of months and years, but of a whole life? Because that order which constitutes the eminence of the divine perfections, does not allow that a sincere conversion, a conversion that reforms the sin, and renews the sinner should be rejected by God. Now we cannot absolutely deny the possibility of a sincere death-bed conversion for the following reasons.

1. Because it is not absolutely impossible that a violent fit of sickness, or an apprehension of death, should make deeper impressions on the mind, than either sermons, or exhortations, or books of devotion, could ever produce. This reflection is the more solid, because the phrase, an unconverted man, is extremely equivocal. We call him an unconverted man, who profanely rushes into all sorts of sins, and who never made one sacri

fice to order; and we also, with great reason, call him an unconverted man, who has renounced all sins except one. Now the idea of death may finish, in the souls of people of the latter sort, a work which they had indeed neglected, but which, however, was actually begun.

2. Because we are neither so fully acquainted with other people's hearts, nor indeed with our own, as to determine whether sin have so entirely depraved all the faculties of the soul, that it is past remedy; or, whether it have arrived at that precise degree of corruption, to which the eminence of the divine perfections does not allow a display of that efficacy, which is promised to those who desire the grace of conversion.

3. Because we find, in the holy Scriptures, that some have obtained mercy, after they had committed the very crimes, the remembrance of which, we have said, ought not to drive any to despair. We meet with at least one example, which affords a probability (I do not say a demonstration,) that the eminence of the divine perfections does not always require, that a man, who has spent his life in robberies, should be excluded from the mercy of God. We find there a thief who was condemned to be crucified, and who said to the companion of his iniquities and miseries, we receive the due rewards of our deeds,' Luk. xxiii. 41; but who, notwithstanding all the misery of his case, applied to Jesus Christ, and, from his adorable mouth, received this comfortable promise, Verily I say unto thee, to-day shalt thou be with me in paradise,' Luke xxiii. 43. 4. Because we still see people, who, having lived thirty, yea fifty years in sin, have been converted in a time of sickness, and who, being restored to health, give full proof of the reality of their conversion. Such examples, I own, are rare, and almost unheard of, yet we could, perhaps, mention two or three, out of twenty thousand sick people, whom we have visited, or of whom we have heard, in the course of our ministry. Now the examples of two or three, who have been converted on a sick-bed, out of twenty thousand who have died without conversion, are sufficient to prevent our saying to one dying man, who should have put off his repentance to the last hour, that it is impossible for him to be converted.

5. Because God works miracles in religion as well as in nature, and because no man has a sufficient knowledge of the nature of God's perfections to enable him to affirm that a miracle cannot, or ought not to be wrought in behalf of such a sinner.

6. Because we cannot find, that your pastors have any authority from their Bibles to say to a penitent sinner, at any time, there is no more hope for thee; thou hast exhausted the mercy of God; thou art gotten to that period, in which we have no other morality to preach than this, he that is unjust, let him be unjust still; and he that is filthy, let him be filthy still,' Rev. xxii. 11. On the contrary, all the directions in the holy Scriptures, that relate to the exercise of our ministry, engage us to pray for a sinner, as long as he has a spark of life; to endeavour to convince him as long as he is capable of reason

ing; and, till he is past feeling the force of motives to conversion, to do every thing, that is in our power, to convert him. But does not all this conduct suppose that which we have been endeavouring to prove? That is, that to what degree soever a sinner have carried his sin, how long soever he may have lived in it, there will always be a sufficiency of pardon, where there is a certainty of conversion; agreeably to the gospel that we preached to you on the last Lord's day, Seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him: and to our God for he will abundantly pardon.' For my thoughts of grace and mercy must not be measured by the ideas of the finest reasoning powers; much less by those of a gloomy desponding mind. My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord: For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.' This was the gospel of last Lord's day.

The gospel of this day is, 'our God is a consuming fire.' But these two gospels entirely agree, and our endeavours to comfort you, after ye have deferred your conversion to a death-bed, are not inconsistent with our endeavours to terrify and alarm you, when we perceive that ye obstinately determine to defer your repentance to that time. Moreover, the same reasons which prevail with us to comfort you in that sad period, prevail with us to give you a salutary alarm before the fatal moment comes.

It is true, God's thoughts are not our thoughts; and it is possible that the approach of death may make deeper impressions on you, than either sermons or pious books have made; but yet' our God is a consuming fire." What a time is a dying illness for the receiv ing of such impressions! I omit those sudden and unexpected deaths, of which we have so many yearly, or rather daily, examples. 1 omit the sudden deaths of those, who, while we were conversing and transacting business with them, were seized with violent pains, turned pale, and died, and were instantly stretched on a bier. I pass those, who went to bed healthy and well, who quietly fell asleep, and whom we have found in the morning dead and cold. All these melancholy examples we omit, for one would imagine, considering your conduct, and hearing your conversation, that each of you had received a revelation to assure him of an exemption from sudden death. But what a time is a dying illness for renovation and conversion! Would not one suppose, that those, who hope to be converted then, have always lived among immortals, and have neither heard of death, nor seen a person die? Ah! What obstacles! What a world of obstacles oppose such extravagant hopes, and justify the efforts of those who endeavour to destroy them! Here is business that must be settled; a will which must be made; a number of articles that must be discussed; there are friends, who must be embraced; relations, that must

should be either strangers in the land of CaBaan, the conquest of which should be reserved for them, or subject to the Egyptians for the space of four hundred years: that, at the expiration of that period, they should quit their slavery, laden with the spoils of Egypt: that, in the fourth generation,' they should return into the land of Canaan, where Abraham dwelt, when the Lord addressed these words to him; that then they should conquer the country, and should be the ministers of God's vengeance on the Canaanites, whose abominations even now deserved severe punishments, but which God would at present defer, because the wretched people had not yet filled up the measure of their crimes.

This is a general view of our text in connexion with the context. Know of a surety, that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them, and they shall afflict them four hundred years. And also that nation whom they shall serve, will I judge; and afterward shall they come out with great substance. And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again; for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.' If ye would understand these words more particularly, attend to a few remarks, which we shall only mention in brief, because a discussion of them would divert our attention too far from the principal design of this dis

course.*

We include in the four hundred years,' mentioned in the context, the time that the Israelites dwelt in Canaan from the birth of Isaac, and the time which they dwelt in Egypt from the promotion of Joseph. Indeed, strictly speaking, these two periods contain four hundred and five years. But every body knows that authors, both sacred and profane, to avoid factions, sometimes add and sometimes diminish, in their calculations. In the twelfth chapter of Exodus, ver. 40, Moses says, The children of Israel dwelt in Egypt four hundred and thirty years; but it is beyond a doubt, that he uses a concise way of speaking in this passage, and that the Seventy had reason for paraphrasing the words thus: The sojourning of the children of Israel, in the land of Canaan, and in the land of Egypt was four hundred and thirty years.' If the reasonableness of this paraphrase be allowed, there will still remain a difference of thirty years between the time fixed in Genesis by the Lord for the conquest of Canaan, and the time mentioned by Moses in Exodus, but it is easy to reconcile this seeming difference, for the calculation in Genesis begins at the birth of Isaac, but the other commences at Abraham's arrival in Canaan. The reckoning is exact, for Abraham dwelt twenty-five years in Canaan before Isaac was born, and there were four hundred and five years from the birth of Isaac to the departure out of Egypt. This is the meaning of the passage quoted

This whole subject is treated at large in Mons. Saurin's xivth Dissertation on the Bible. Tom. Prem.

from Exodus, and, as it perfectly agrees with our context, we shall conclude that this first article is sufficiently explained.

Our second regards the meaning of the word generation, which is mentioned in the context. This term is equivocal: sometimes it signifies the whole age of each person in a succession; and in this sense the evangelist says, that from Abraham to David are fourteen generations,' Matt. i. 17. Sometimes it is put for the whole duration of a living multitude; and in this sense Jesus Christ uses it, when he says that this generation, that is, all his cotemporaries, shall not pass away, till his prophecies concerning them were fulfilled. Sometimes it signifies a period of ten years; and in this sense it is used in the book of Baruch, ch. vi. 2; the captivity in Babylon which continued we know, seventy years, is there said to remain seven generations.

We understand the word now in the first sense, and we mean that from the arrival of the Israelites in Egypt, to the time of their migration, there were four successions: the first was the generation of Kohath, the son of Levi: the second of Amram, the son of Kohath; the third was that of Moses and Aaron; and the fourth was that of the children of Moses and Aaron, Ex. vi. 16. 18. 20, &c.

Our third obscrvation relates to the word Amorites in our text. The iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.' The word Amorites has two significations in Scripture; a particu lar and a general meaning. It has a particular meaning when it denotes the descendants of Hamor, the fourth son of Canaan, who first. inhabited a mountainous country westward of the Dead Sea, and afterward spread themselves eastward of that sea, between the rivers Jabbok, and Arnon, having dispossessed the Amorites and Moabites. Sihon and Og, two of their kings were defeated by Moses, Gen. x. 16; and Josh. xii. 23.

But the word Amorites is sometimes used in a more general sense, and denotes all the inhabitants of Canaan. To cite many proofs would divert our attention too far from our principal design, let it suffice therefore to observe, that we take the word in our text in this general meaning.

But what crimes does the Spirit of God include in the word iniquity? The iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.' Here, my brethren, a detail would be horrid, for so great were the excesses of these people, that we should in some sense partake of their crimes, by attempting to give an exact list of them. So excessive was the idolatry of tho Canaanites, that they rendered the honours of supreme adoration not only to the most mean, but even to the most impure and infamous creatures. There inhumanity was so excessive that they sacrificed their own children to their gods. And so monstrous was their subversion, not only of the laws of nature but even of the common irregularities of human nature, that a vice, which must not be named, was openly practised: and, in short, so scandalous was the depravation of religion and good manners, that Moses, after he had given the Israelites laws against the most gross idolatry, against incest, against bestiality, against that other crime, which our dismal circum