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SERMON XV.

Defcription of the World.

2 PETER iii. 11.

Seeing then, that all these things fhall be diffolved,-what manner of perfons ought ye to be in all holy converfation and godliness? looking and baftening unto the coming of God.

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HE fubject upon which St. Peter is difcourfing in this chapter, is the certainty of Chrift's coming to judge the world;-and the words of the text are the moral application he draws from the representation he gives of it,-in which, in answer to the cavils of the scoffers

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in the latter days, concerning the delay of his coming, he tells them, that God is not flack concerning his promifes, as fome men count flacknefs, but is long fuffering to us ward;-that the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens fhall pass away with a great noife, and the elements fhall melt with fervent beat, the earth alfo, and the works that are therein shall be burnt up.-Seeing then, fays he, all these things fhall be diffolved, what manner of perfons ought ye to be in all holy converfation and godlinefs?The inference is unavoidable,-atleaft in theory, however it fails in practice;-how widely thefe two differ, I intend to make the fubject of this

difcourfe; and though it is a melan-.

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choly comparison, to confider, what manner of perfons we really are,' with what manner of perfons we ought to be,' yet as the knowledge of the one, is at least one step towards the improvement in the other, the parallel will

not be thought to want its ufe.

Give me leave, therefore, in the first place, to recal to your observations, what kind of world it is we live in, and what manner of perfons we really are.

Secondly, and in opposition to this, I fhall make ufe of the apostle's argument, and from a brief representation of the Chriftian religion, and the obligations it lays upon us, fhew,

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what manner of persons we ought to be in all holy converfation and godlinefs, looking for and haftening unto the coming of the day of God. with Whoever takes a view of the world will, I fear, be able to difcern, but. very faint marks of this character, either upon the looks or actions of its inhabitants.-Of all the ends and pursuits we are looking for, and haftening unto,-this would be the leaft fufpected, for without running into that old declamatory cant upon the wickedness of the age, we may fay within the bounds of truth, that there is as little influence from this principle which the apoftle lays stress on, and as little fenfe of religion,as fmall a fhare of virtue (at least as

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