what should we be afraid of, when we have Omnifcience for our Pilot, Omnipotence for our Convoy, and All-fufficient Goodness for our Purveyor and Caterer? By the Help of this one Confideration a Man may bid Defiance to Mifery, and stand impregnable against all the Batteries of the World.

Fourthly, and lastly, Christianity armeth us against the Evil of Misery, by affuring us of a blessed Immortality; and verily were it not for the Hope of this, Man were of all Creatures the most miserable. For his very Reason, by which he is capable of a larger Happiness, doth most commonly, in this Life, prove an Instrument of Grief and Vexation to him: And as for the Beasts they are as fenfible of fenfual Pleasures as we; they relish their Morfels with as great a Guft, and enjoy their Delights with as quick a Senfe, as the greatest Epicures in the World.Befides which, their Harmony is not mingled with the fad Difcords of a wounded Conscience, which often interrupts our Mirth, and puts a Sting to all our Pleasures: And as for Troubles the Beasts

Beafts only feel them whilst they are prefent, and are not alarmed with Fear at the Approach of them, nor vexed with Despair in the Prefence of them, nor wrack'd with fruitless Cares of removing them; to all which Inconveniences our Reafon expofeth us. So that were it not for the Hope of a future Happiness, Man, that is the top of this lower Creation, would be the most miserable part of it, and we should have reafon to envy the Happiness of the pretty Birds, that fit merrily finging on the Trees; and to wish that we could change Conditions with the Fishes, that sport and play in the filver Streams, devoid of all those Griefs and Sorrows, Cares and Anxieties with which we are wrackt, and tortured every Moment: The only thing therefore that maketh our Life defirable, and giveth it the Advantage of Non-Entity, is this, that how mean foever our Condition is here, yet we are born to higher Hopes, and are now but Candidates for an immortal Preferment; and of this the Christian Religion giveth us the most certain Affurance, even by the Resurrection of Chrift from the

dead.

dead. By this it is that we are begotten into a lively Hope of an eternal Inheritance, as the Apostle tells us, 1 Peter 1.3. and indeed this is a Proof of the Immortal State beyond all other Arguments, whether Moral, or Phyfical; for had not this Doctrine of Immortality been true, it cannot be imagined, that the God of Truth would have fealed and confirmed it, as he did, by raifing the Author of it from the dead; fince in fo doing he must have been guilty of cheating the World, and feconding the most rank Imposture, than which we cannot form a Conceit more black or incongruous to the Nature of God. Wherefore now Life and Immortali ty are as clear and evident as the Refurrection of Chrift from the dead, of which we have as full Affurance as we can poffibly have of any matter of Fact in the World: For the Eye-Witneffes of it confirmed their Teftimony with their Blood, which is the highest Pledge that a Man can give of his Honesty, and there is no Credit to be given to Men, if they may not be believed upon this Security. Thus Christianity, you fee,

hath

3

hath founded our Hopes of Immortal Happiness upon the fureft Foundations in the World which Hope is fufficient to raise any confidering Man above the reach of Mifery. For would we but keep our Thoughts within those higher and untroubled Regions, we fhould be able to look down upon these little Affairs, about which poor Mortals fcramble, with as much Contempt and Scorn, as we do upon the Toils and Labours of a little World of Ants about a Molehil, who are not altogether fo ridiculous, because they do not divide their Molehil into little Empires, nor defraud and murder, nor be false and treacherous to one another for the greater fhare; nor were they ever fo extravagant as to march out in Armies to kill their neighbouring Ants, fo to extend their Dominion over the next handful of a Turf: But he whose Hope hath mounted him to Heaven, can from thence look down and figh, and smile at all these Fooleries, and flight, and undervalue whatsoever fenfual Men, poor Souls do fear, or hope, or long for, or purfue: For he hath fuch a Glory

within the Prospect of his Faith and Hope, as doth at one Glimpfe foil all the Glory of the World, and unfting all its Miseries. The fight of that flowery Canaan of Reft and Pleasure that lieth before him, incourageth him to march on with Joy and Alacrity through this howling Defert of Sorrow and Mifery, and maketh the Wilderness to feem a Paradife to him; and at worst, all the ill Ufage that he meets with here, will but make Earth more loathfome now, and Heaven more welcome to him hereafter. When therefore he is toffed in this tempeftuous Sea, he confidereth with himself, that a few Leagues farther lieth that bleffed Port where he fhall be crowned as foon as he is landed; and concludes that when he is gotten fafe on fhore, he shall then look back with Pleasure and Delight upon those Threatning waves he now encountreth, and for ever bless the Storms and Winds that drave him thither, and fo refolveth with St. Paul, That the Sufferings of this prefent Life are not worthy to be compared with the Joys that shall be revealed, Rom. 8. 18. and thus you fee what