tihvavy of Che trheolo^icd Seminar;? PRINCETON • NEW JERSEY PRESENTED BY Rufus H. LeFevre .5.f6>\ Of P m^ ■^^' I ^ FEB 11 1953 ^ APPEAL ^*''" ""^ TO MATTER OF FACf AHD COMMOtT SENSE OR, A RATIONAL DEMONSTRATION OF MAN'S CORRUPT AND LOST ESTATE, BY J. FLETCHER. The Son of man is come to seek and to save tliat which was lost. — Luke xix. 10. NEW AND REVISED EDITION. WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY DAVID EDWARDS. DAYTON, O. PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE TRUSTEES OF THE PaiNTIN« ESTABJ.ISHMENT OF THE UNITED BRETHREN IN CHRIST. 1855 stereotyped at the TTNITED BRETHREN STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY, Corner of Main and Fourtli Streets, Dw'TON, Ohio. CONTENTS AN INTRODUCTION. FIRST PART. 1 flE dpctrine of man's corrupt and lost estate is stated at laM-ge, in the words of the Prophets, Apostles, and Jesuri Christ. SECOND PART. Man is considered as an inhabitant of the natural world, and his fall is proved bj arguments deduced from the misery, in which he is now undeniably involv- ed : compared with the happiness of which we cannot help conceiving him possessed when he came out of the hands of his gracious Creator. A view of this misery in the following jparticulars : I, The disorders of the globe we inhabit, and the dreadful scourges with which it is visited. II. The deplorable and shocking circumstances of our birth. III. The painful and dangerous travail of women. IV. The untimely dissolution of still-born or new-born chil- dren. V. Our natural uncleanness, helplessness, igno- rance, and nakedness. VI. The gross darkness in which we naturally are, both with respect to God and a future state. VII. The general rebellion of the brute creation against us. VIII. The various poisons that lurk in the animal, vegetable, and mineral world, ready to destroy us. IX. The heavy curse of toil and sweat, to which we are liable ; instances of which are given in the hard and dangerous labors of the author's parishion- ers. X, The other innumerable calamities of life. And, XI. The pangs of death. THIRD PART. Man is considered as a citizen of the moral world, a free agent, accountable to his Creator for his tempers and con- duct ; and his falHs farther demonstrated by arguments drawn from — XII. His commission of sin. XIII. His omission of duty. XIV, The triumphs of sensual ap- petites over his intellectual faculties. XV. The cor- ruption of the powers that constitute a good head ; the understanding, imagination, memory, and reason. XVI. The depravity of the powers which form a good heart ; the win, conscience, and affections. XVII. His mani- (3) 4 ^ONTiiNTS. fest alienation from God. XVIII. His amazing disr« gard even of his nearest relatives. XIX. His unac countable unconcern about himself. XX. His detesta- ble tempers. XXI. The general outbreathings of hu- man con'uption in all individuals. XXII. The uni- versal overflowing of it in all nations ; five objections answered. XXIII. Some striking proofs of this de- pravity in the general propensity of mankind to vain, irrational, or cruel diversions. And, XXIV. In the universality of the most ridiculous, impious, inhuman, and diabolical sins. XXV. The aggravating circum- stances attending the display of this corruption. XXVI. The ni9.ny ineffectual endeavors to stem its tor- rent. XXVII. The obstinate resistance it makes to Divine grace in the unconverted. XXVIII. The amazing struggles of good men with it. XXIX. The testimony of the heathens and Deists concerning it. And after all, XXX. The preposterous conceit which the unconverted have of their own goodness. FOURTH PART. Man is considered as an inhabitant of the Christian world ; and his fallen state is further proved by six Scriptural arguments. The heads of these arguments are, XXXI. The impossibility that fallen, corrupt Adam should have had an upright, innocent posterity ; with an- swers to some capital objections. XXXII. The spirit- uality and severity of God's law, which the unrenewed man continually breaks. And, XXXIII, Our strong propensity to unbelief, the most destructive of all sins, according to the Gospel. XXXIV. The absurdity of the Christian religion with respect to infants and strict mor- alists. XXXV. The harshness and cruelty of Christ's fundamental doctrines. And, XXXVI. The extrava- gance of the grand article of the Christian faith, if mankind are not in a corrupt and lost estate. FIFTH PART. The doctrine of man's fall being established by such a variety of arguments ; first, a few natural inferences are added : secondly, various fatal consequences attend- ing the ignorance of our lost estate : thirdly, the un- speakahle advantaqcs arising from the right knowledge of it INTRODUCTION TO REVISED EDITION, Of all the writers wlio have taken part in the great " conflict of ages " on the question of human depravity, none have excelled John Fletcher in plainness and sim- plicity of style and force of argument. His " Appeal to Matter of Fact " has never been answered. Thous- ands have been rescued by it from the various labyrinths of the Pelagian heresy and led to embrace the doctrine of man's native depravity. This little volume has been in circulation for nearly a centuiy, and it is as popular now as when it was first presented to the public. It is one of the few productions which, like " Paradise Lost " and " Pilgrim's Progress " is destined to live and exert a powerful influence long after the immediate causes which gave rise to it have been forgotten. To those who are acquainted with this work and ap- preciate the sentiments advocated by it, no apology is needed for presenting to the public a new and revised edition. No change has been attempted in the author's style or arrangement, nor have his sentiments been al- tered. Some matter which did not strengthen the argu- ment nor bear particularly upon the main design of the work has been left out. The most important omisions (5-) 6 INTRODUCTION TO REVISED EDITION. were, the arguments from the ritual of the Church of England, to which Mr. Fletcher belonged, and a digres- sion on the evidences of the truth of the Bible. As now presented, it is a plain, straight-forward, and it might be added, unanswerable treatise upon man's fallen state. The doctrine dfecussed in these pages should not be viewed as a merely speculative sentiment for the trial of the skill of theologians ; it is of the utmost practical importance to the cause of religion, as the following brief remarks will show : A denial of the doctrine of man's total depravity pre- pares the way for almost all other gross errors. Wrong views upon this subject almost inevitably lead to wrong views upon other truths of vital importance to the Chris- tian system. Hence nearly all classes of errorists that are fundamentally and practically wrong on other points, deny the doctrine advocated in these pages. I refer par- ticularly to such as are skeptical in reference to the Bible, the new birth, or the agency of the Holy 'Spirit in man's salvation. Deists, Universalists, Disciples, [ or Campbellites ] and the various classes of Unitarians deny, in whole or in part, the natural corruptions of the human heart ; while on the other hand, it has always been a leading sentiment in the creeds of those bodies of christians most distinguished for their usefulnesss in turning men from darkness to light and from sin to holi- ness. I'o this there may be exceptions ; some persons INTRODUCTION TO RKVISED EDITIGX. / «rf good hearts who were unsound on the doctrine of buman depravity may have been to some extent useful ; arid some churches of note that have held this doctrine, have embraced errors, and by sinful alliances lost their power to accomplish good. But this by no means de- stroys the position here assumed, viz., that those persons most distinguished in history as great religious re- formers, and those churches which have been known as the most evangelical in spirit and practice, have held the doctrine of man's coniplete depravity as a fundamen- ts,! principle. This may be set down as an argument for the truth of the docti'ine in question, as well as an evidence of its practical importance in preserving the mind from dangerous errors. Our appreciation of the richness and abundance of the grace of Christ depends very much upon the views we entertain of man's lost estate. If he is but partially fallen, or, what amounts to the same thing, hias been really restored ages before he was born, he needs the less grace to save him. His dependence on Christ for salva- tion can not be greater than the consciousness of his necessities. If he is totally fallen he needs a complete Savior. So far is this doctrine from undervaluing the grace cf Christ in the atonement, that it magnifies it. None exalt Jesus more than those who advocate this sentiment ; none cleave to him more closely, nor trust him more unwaveringly than those who admit that they 8 INTEODUCTION TO REVISED EDITION. have no nioral strength or goodness of their own. The very fact of their deeply fallen state induces them, as by a moral necessity, to cast all their cares and burdens upon him. Finding no help in themselves, they turn to the cross as the only hope of a lost world, saying, peni- tently and believingly, " 'Tis all my hope and all my plea. For me the Savior died." Their practical creed on this point may be summed up in two brief sentences — " withpift Christ we can do nothing, — ^but with him we can do all things" They sing the God-honoring song of grace, grace, grace I at every step of progress in the work of their ssdvation, from its first foundation to the topstone. This doctrine has an important bearing upon personal experience. No person can seriously seek for that which is already in his possession ; no one will seek for a degree of holiness which he is not conscious of need- ing. Therefore, in proportion to the degree of moral strength and holiness he possesses by nature will be his eflEbrts for purifying grace. New discoveries of the de- pravity of the heart both precede and follow every ad- vance step in true holiness. A sight of our natural corruptions will lead the soul to unite with the Psalmist in his fervent supplications for a clean heart and a right spirit ; and then again, the new light which is reflected back upon the heart from the divine holiness as we ap- INTRODUCTION TO REVISED EDITION. 9 proacli nearer the throne, brings to view hitherto onseeD formB of refined selfishness, — which in their turn show the necessity of another, and another approach to the fountain that cleanses from all sin. In this way those who see and deplore their inbred corruptions are led for- ward from step to step ; while those who deny the natu- ral inherent corruption of their nature are generally satisfied with the forgiveness of sins, without subse- quently seeking to be cleansed from all the filthiness of the flesh and spirit, — for the very good reason that they acknowledge no such pollution. The character of revivals is also much affected by the doctrine of depravity. That preachir^ which either discards man's total helplessness and corruption, or places it in the back ground as an unimportant senti- ment, will produce but superficial results. The more thoroughly the hearts of sinners are probed and search- ed by the humiliating truth, that they are entirely undone and altogether filthy, the more deep and thorough will their repentance and conversion be, and consequently, the more lasting the fruits of revivals. It is owing to the want of such preaching that many of the converts of modern revival efforts are so sickly and short-lived. We need more of the searching, apostolic preaching of olden times, to lay open the hearts and arouse the sleeping consciences of sinners. Men must be made to see their depravity, the deceit and desperate wickedness of their 10 INTRODUCTION TO REVISED EDITION. hearts before they will cry out as they did tinder the pun- gent preaching of the apostles, " Men and Brethren, what shall we do?" A proper presentation of the plain truths contained in this " Appeal " would produce sim- ilar results in this age. The doctrine of the fall of man has been fruitful in controversies. Good men have diflFered widely as to the extent and degree of man's depravity. And it is to be sincerely regi'etted, that some have given too much evi- dence of the existence in their own hearts of the very evil about which they were disputing. In numerous instances, charity has been lost, confidence destroyed, and the Church of Christ made to suffer, while satan has gained a victory over both parties. 0 for the tears of a Jeremiah, to weep day and night oVer the desolations ot Zion in consequence of the bitterness and selfishness ':al to [paj^t n. trample down, or destroy part of the fmit of his rural labor. In warmer climes, armies of locusts, liiore terrible than hosts of men, frequently darken the air, or covei the ground, and equally mock at human power and craft. Wherever they light, ail verdure disappears, and the summer's fruit- fulness is turned into wintry desolation. If locusts do not reach this happy island, caterpillars, and a variety of other seem- ingly insignificant, but really formidable insects, make a more constant, though less general, attack upon our trees and gardens. In vain are they destroyed by millions — they can not be fully conquered ; and the yearly returning plague forces the consid- erate spectator to acknowledge the finger of a sin-avenging Providence. Happy would it be for man if rebellious animals were satisfied with the produce of his fields and orchards ; but, alas ! they thirst after his blood, and attack his person. Lions, tigers, rattlesnakes, crocodiles, and sharks, whenever they have an opportunity, impetuously attack, furiously tear, and greedily devour him. And what is more astonishing, the basest reptiles are not afi'aid to breed in his stomach, to live in his very bowels, and to consume his inward pans , while swarms of fiying, leaping, or creeping insects, too vile to be named — but not to humble a proud apostate — have tha PAKT II.J MA-rrKR OF FACT. 5l insolence to lix upon bis skin, and, by piercing or furrowjng his tlesli, suck bis blood, and feast upon him from bis cradle to his grave. Domestic animals, it is true, do man ex^ Cellent service; but is it not because he either forces or bribes them to it, by con- tinual labor and expense, with which he breaks and maintains them ? What busi- ness liave multitudes of men, but to serve the drudges of mankind ? What are smiths, farriers, farmers, servants, grooms, hostlers, etc., but tlie slaves of brutes — washing, currying, shoeing, feeding, and waiting up- on them botti by day and by night? And yet, notwithstanding the prerogative granted to Noalrs piety. Gen. ix, 2, and the care taken of domestic animals, do they not rebel as often as they dare? Here sheep, deemed the quietest of all, run astray, or break into the fields of a litigious neighbor: there, the furious bull pursues and gores, or the raging dog sets upon the inoffensive traveler. To-day you read that an impetu- ous, foaming steed, hath humed away, thrown off, and dragged along his unfortu^ nate master, whose blood, sprinkling the dust, and brains dashed upon the stones, direct the search of liis disconsolate friend : and to-morrow, you may hear that a vicious hoi-se has darted his iron-fenced hoof into 52 AN APPEAL TO [pAiiT IL his altendaDt's breast or forehead, and has lamed or killed him on the spot. And would the wise Governor of the •World, the kind protector of his obedient creatures, permit this rebellion, even of the tamest animals and basest vermin, against man, if man himself was not a daring rebel against him ? EIGHTH AKGUMENT. That a contemptible insect should dare to set upon, and be able to devour a proud monarch, a Herod in the midst of his guards, is terrible: but the mischief stops not here. Numerous tribes of other base animals are armed with poisonous tongues or stings, and use them against mankind with peculiar rage. To say nothing of mad dogs, have not asps, vipers,* tarantulas, scorpions, and other venomous serpents and insects, the destructive skill of extracting the quintessence of the curse which sin, our moral poison, hath brought upon the earth? When we come within their reach, do they not bite or sting us with the utmost fury ? and, by infusing their subtile venom in our blood, spread they not anguish and destruc- tion through our agonizing frame? Au- * Some will say that viper's flesh is useful in physic. I grant it, but is the poison of that creature useful ? I'his must be proved before the argument can be inval- idated. PABT II.] MATTER OF FACT. 53 swer, ye thousands who died in the wilder- ness of the bite of fiery serpents ; and ye multitudes, who, in almost all countries, have shared their deplorable fate. Let us descend to the vegetable world. How many deceitful roots, plants, and fruits, deposit their pernicious juices in the stomach of those who unwarily feed upon them? Did not Elisha and the sons of the prophets narrowly escape being poisoned altogether, by one of them fatally mistaking a pot-herb ? And do not many go quickly or slowly to their grave by such melancholy accidents ? Minerals and metals are not the last to enter into the general conspiracy against mankind. Under inoffensive appearances, do they not contain wiiat is destructive to the animal Irame^ And have not many fallen a sacrifice to their ignorance of the mischief lurking in arsenic, and other min- eral productions^* ^N'or are metallic efiiu- via less hurtful to hundreds ; and the health of mankind is, perhaps, more injured by copper alone, tiian it is preserved by all the mineral waters in the world. It is acknow- ledged that numbers are poisoned by food * It is objected that excellent remedies are prepared with antimony and mercury. But it is well known that the persons who use them only expel one poison with another ; as the decayed constitutions of those who have frequent recourse to such violent medicines abundantly prove. 54 AN APPEAL TO [PAKT II. prepared in utensils made of that dangerous metal ; and how many are insensibly Inirt by the same means, is only known to a wise and righteous Providence. Thus, God leaves us in the world, where mischief lurks under a variety of things ap- parently useful without giving us the least intimation of destruction near. To say that infinite goodness can deal thus with inno- cent creatures, is offering violence to our reason, and an afiront to Divine justice. Conclude, then, with me, reader, that we have lost our original innocence, and for- feited our Creator's favor. NINTH ABGUMENT. But if the generality of mankind escape all the various sorts of poison, do they es- cape the curse of toil and sweat ? And is not a great majority of them reduced to such sordid want, and pressing necessity, as to be obliged to do the greatest drudgery for a wretched maintenance? When God made them to have dominion over the works of his hands — when he put all things in subjection under their feet, and crowned them with glory and honor, they filled up each happy hour in eviden- cing their love to him and to each other; they spent their golden moments in admi- ring the variety and beauty of his works, finding out the divine signature impressed PABT II. J MATTER OF FACT. 65 upon them, swaying their mild scepter over the obedient creation, and enjoying the rich, incorruptible fruits, which the earth spon- taneously produced in the greatest perfec- tion and abundance. Thus their pleasure was without idleness or pain, and their em- ployment without toil or weariness. But no sooner did disobedience open the floodgates of natural evil, than arduous la- bor came in full tide upon mankind ; and a thousand painful arts were invented to mit- igate the manifold curses which sin had brougiit upon them. Since the fall, our bodies have become vulnerable and shameiully naked: and it is the business of thousands to make, or sell, all sorts of garments for our defense and or- nament, the earth has lost her original fertility ; and thousands more with iron in- stiTiments open her bosom to force her to yield us a maintenance; or with immense labor secure her precarious, decaying fruits. Immoderate rains deprive her of her solid- ity, and earthquakes or deluges destroy her evenness ; numbers, therefore, are painfolly employed in making or mending roads. — Each country iiffords some only of the ne- cessaries or conveniences of life ; this obliges the mercantile inhabitants to transport, with immense trouble and danger, the produce of one place to supply the wants of another. We are exposed to a variety of dangers ; ^ AN APPEAL TO [PART U, our persons and property mnst be secnred against the inclemency of the weather, the attacks of evil beasts, and assaults of wick- ed men; hence the fatigue of millions of workmen in wood and stone, metals and minerals ; and the toils and hazards of mil- lions more who live by making, wearing, or using the various instruments of war and slaughter. Disorder and injustice give rise to gov- ernmentj politics, and a labyrinth of laws ^ and those employ myriads of officers, law- yers,, magistrates, and rulers. We are sub- ject to a thousand pains and maladies ; hence myriads more prescribe and prepare remedies, or attend and nurse the sick. Our universal ignorance occasions the tedious labor of giving and receiving instruction in all the branches of human and Divine knowledge. And to complete the whole, the original tongue of mankind is confound- ed, and even neighboring nations are bar- barians to each other ; from hence arise the painful lucubrations of critics and linguists, with the infinite trouble of teaching and learning various languages. The curse introduced by sin is the occa- sion of all these toils. They are soon men- tioned ; but, alas ! how long, how grievous do they appear to those that feel their sever- ity? How many sighs have they forced from the breasts, how much sweat from the PART II.] MA'ITEE OF FACT. 57 bodies of mankind? Unite the former, a tempest might ensue ; collect the latter, it would swell into rivers. To go no farther than this populons par- ish, w4th what hardships and dangers do our indigent neighbors earn their bread ! See those who ransack the bowels of the earth to get the black mineral we burn • how little is their lot preferable to that of the Spanish felons who work the golden mines 'i They take their leave of the light of the sun, and, suspended by a rope, are let down many fathoms perpendicularly toward the center of the globe ; they traverse the rocks through which they have dug their horizon- tal ways ; the murderer's cell is a palace in comparison of the black spot to which they repair ; the vagrant's posture in the stocks is preferable to that in which they labor. Form, if you can, an idea of the misery of men kneeling, stooping, or lying on one side, to toil all day in a confined place, where a child could hardly stand ; while a younger company, with their hands and feet on the black, dusty ground, and a chain about their body, creep and drag along, like four-footed beasts, heavy loads of the dirty mineral, through ways almost impassable to the cm-ious observer. In these low and dreaiy vaults all the elements seem combined against them. — 58 AN APPEAL TO | PAKT II. Destructive clamps, and clouds of noxious dust infect the air they breathe. Sometimes water incessantly distills on their naked bodies ; or bursting upon them in streams, drowns them and deluges their work. At other times, pieces of detached rocks crush them to death, or the earth, breaking in up- on them, buries them alive. And fre- quently sulphureous vapors, kindled in an instant by the light of their candles, form subterraneous thunder and lightning. What a dreadful phenomenon ! how impetuous is the blast ! how tierce the rolling flames ! how intolerable the noisome smell ! how dreadful the continued roar! how violent and fatal the explosion ! Wonderful Providence ! some of the un- happy men have time to prostrate them- selves— the fiery scourge gi-azes their backs, the ground shields their breasts ; they es- cape. See them wound up out of the bla- ding dungeon, and say if these are not brands plucked out of the fire. A pestifer- ous steam, and clouds of suflbcating smoke pursue them. Half dead themselves, they hold their dead or dying companions in their trembling arms. Merciful God of Shadrach ! Kind Protector of Meshech ! — Mighty Deliverer of Abednego ! Patient Preserver of rebellious Jonah ! Will not these utter a song — a song of praise to thee — praise, ardent as the flames they es- PAET II.] MATTER OF FACT. 59 cape — lasting as the life thou prolongest ! — alas ! they refuse ! and some — O, tell it not among the heathens, lest they forever abhor the name of Christian — ^some return to the very pits, where they have been branded with sulphureous fire by the warning hand of Providence ; and there, sporting them- selves again with the most infernal wishes, call aloud for a fii-e that can not be quench- ed, and challenge the Almighty to cast them into hell, that bottomless pit whence there is no retm-n. Leave these black men at their perilous work, and see yonder bargemen hauling that loaded vessel against wind and stream. Since the dawn of the day, they have wrestled with the impetuous current ; and now that it almost overpowers them, how do they exert all their remaining strength, and strain then- eveiy nerve ! how are they bathed in sweat and rain! Fastened to theii- lines as horses to their traces, wherein do they difier from the laborious brutes ? — Not in an erect posture of body, for in the intenseness of their toil they bend forward, their head is foremost, and their hands upon the ground. If there is any difference, it consists in this : horses are indulged with a collar to save their breasts ; and these, as if theirs were not worth saving, draw without one; the beasts tug in patience, silence, and mutual harmony; but the men with 60 AN APPEAL TO [PART H. loud contention and horrible imprecations. O, sin, what hast thou done! is it not enough that these drudges should toil like brutes ; must thej also curse one another like devils ^ . If you have gone beyond the hearing of their impious oaths, stop to consider the sons of Yulcan confined to these forges and furnaces. Is their lot much preferable? a sultry air, and clouds of smoke and dust, are the element in which they labor. The confused noise of water falling, steam hiss- ing, fire-engines working, wheels turning, fires creaking, hammers beating, ore bm'st- ing, and bellows roaring, form the dismal concert that strikes the ears, while a con- tinual eruption of flames, ascending fi'om the mouth of their artificial volcanoes, daz- zle their eyes with a horrible glare. Massy bars of hot iron are the heavy tools they handle, cylinders of the first magnitude the enormous weights they heave, vessels full of melted metal the dangerous loads they carry; streams of the same burning fluid the fiery rivers which they conduct into the deep cavities of their subterraneous molds ; and millions of flying sparks, with a thou- sand drops of liquid hissing iron, the hor- rible showers to which they are exposed. — See them cast ; you would think them in a bath, and not in a furnace ; they bedew the burning sand with their streaming sweat; t»AtiT II.] MATTER OF FACT. 61 nor are their wet garments dried up, either by the fierce fires that they attend, or the fiery streams which they manage. Cer- tainly, of all men, these have reason to re- member the just sentence of an ofiended God : In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat thy bread all the days of thy life. All, indeed, do not go through the same toil ; but all have their share of it, either in body or in mind. Behold the studious son of learning; his intense application hath wasted his fiesh, exhausted his spirits, and almost dried up his radical moisture. Con- sider the man of fortune ; can his thousands a year exempt him from the cm-se of Adam? No: he toils perhaps harder in his sports and debaucheries, than the poor plowman that woTks his estate. Yiew that corpulent epicure, who idles away the whole day between the festal board and the dozing couch. You may think that he, at least, is free from the curse which I describe : but you are mistaken ; while he is living, as he thinks, a life of luxurious ease and gentle inactivity, he fills himself with crude humors, and makes way for the gnawing gout and racking gravel. See even now, how strongly he perspires, and with what uneasiness he draws his short breath, and wipes his dewy, shining face ! Surely he toils under the load of an indigested meal. A porter carries a bur- 62 ' AN Appeal to [part ii. den upon his brawny shoulders, but this wretch has conveyed one into his sick stom- ach. He will not work ; let him alone ; and ere long acute pains will bathe him in as profuse a sweat as that of the liirnace man; and strono^ medicines will exercise him to such a degree, that he will envy even the collier's lot. It is evident, therefore, that mankind afe imder a curse of toil and sweat, according to the Divine sentence recorded by Moses ;* and that they are frequently condemned by Providence to as- hard labor for life, as wretched felons rowing in the galleys, or digging in the mines. t But, as it is abso- lutely incredible, that a good God, who by a word can supply the wants of all his crea- tures, should have sentenced innocent man- kind to these inconceivable hardships, to procure or enjoy the necessaries of life, it is evident they are guilty, miserable offenders. * It has been asserted that the short pleasure of eat- ing and drinking makes amends for the severest toil. The best way to bring such idle, sensual objectors to reason, would be to make them earn eveiy meal by two or three hours' threshing. Besides, what great pleasure can those have in eating, who actually starve, or just stay gnawing hunger by food coarser than that which their rich neighbors give to their dogs ? f God's image disinherited of day. Here plunged in mines foi'gets a sun was made. There, beings deathless as their haughty lord. Are hammer'd to the galling oar for life. And plow the winter's wave, and reap despair. YOUNO. PART II.] MATTER OF FACT. ^3 TENTH ARGUMENT. Hard Jabor and sweat make up but one of the innumerable calamities incident to the wretched inhabitants of this world. — ^ Turn your eyes which way you please, and jou will see some flying irom, others groan- ing under, the rod of God ; and tlie greatest number busily making a scourge for the backs of their fellow-creatures, or their own. To pass over the misery of the brute crea- tion; to say nothing of the subtlety and rapaciousness with which — after the exam- ple of men * — they long wait for, and prey upon one another ; to cast a vail over the agonies of millions, that are daily stabbed^ strangled, shot, and even flayed, boiled, or swallowed up alive, for the support of man's life, or the indulgence of his luxury; and not to mention again the almost uninter- rupted cries of feeble infancy ; only take no* tice of the tedious confinement of childhood, the blasted schemes of youth, the anxious cares of riper years, and the deep groans of wrinkled, decrepit, tottering old age. Fix Eager ambition's fiery chase I see ; I see the circling hunt of noisy men. Burst law's inclosure, leap the bounds of right. Pursuing and pursued, each other's prey ; As wolves, for rapine ; as the fox, for wiles ; Till Death, that mighty hunter, earths them all. Young. 64: AN APPEAL TO fpART H* your attention upon family trials; here a prodigal father ruins his children, or undu- tiful children break the hearts of their fond parents ; there an unkind husband imbitters the life of his wife, or an imprudent wife stains the honor of her husband ; a servant disobeys, a relation misbehaves, a son lies ill, a tenant breaks, a neighbor provokes, a rival supplants, a friend betrays, or an enemy triumphs ; peace seldom continues one day* Listen to the sighs of the afflicted, the moans of the disconsolate, the complaints of the oppressed, and shrieks of the tor-' tured ; consider the deformity of the faces of some, and distortion or mutilation of the limbs of others; to awaken your compas- sion,* here a beggar holds out the stump oi a tliigh or an arm ; there a ragged ^Tetch hops after you, upon one leg and two crutches; and a little farther you meet with a poor creature, using his hands in- stead of feet, and dragging through the mire the cumbrous weight of a body with- out lower parts. Imagine, if possible, the hardships of those who are destitute of one uf their senses ; here, the blind is guided by a dog, or gropes his w^ay in the blaze of noon; * Some for hard masters broken under arms, In battle lopp'd away, with half their limbs. Beg bitter bread through realms their valor saved. Young. FAKT II. ] MATTER OF FACT. 65 there, the deaf lies on the brink of danger, inattentive to the loudest calls; here, sits the dumb, sentenced to eternal silence; there, dribbles the idiot, doomed to perpet- ual childhood ; and yonder, the paralytic shakes without intermission, or lies sense- less, the frightful image of a lifeless corpse. Leaving these wretched creatures, con- sider the tears of the disappointed — the sor- rows of the captive — the anxieties of the ac- cused— the fears of the guilty, and teiTOrs of the condemned. Take a turn through jails, inquisitions, houses of correction, and places ot execution. Proceed to the mourn- ful rooms of the languishing, and w^earisome beds of the sick; and let not the fear of hu- man woe, in some of its most deplorable appearances, prevent you from visiting hos- pitals, i»nfirmaries, and bedlams: A place Before your eyes appears, sad, noisome, dark, A lazar-liouse it seems, wherein are laid Numbers of all diseased : all maladies Of ghastly spasm, or racking torture, qualms -Of heart-sick agony, all fev'rous kinds. Convulsions, epilepsies, fierce catarrhs. Intestine stone, and ulcer, colic-pangs, Demoniac frenzy, moping melancholy, And moon-struek madness, pining atrophy, ^ Marasmus and wide-wasting pestilence. Dropsies, and asthmas, and joint-racking rheums Dire is the tossing ! Deep the groans ! Despair Attends the sick, busiest from €ouch to couch ; And over them, triumphant Death his dai't Shakes ; but delays to strike, though oft invoked With vows, as their chief good and final hope. MlLT02f. ia6 AN APPEAL TO [PAKT IIv To close the horrible prospect, view the ruins of cities and kingdoms — the calami- ties of wrecks and sieges — the horrors of sea-fights and fields of battle, with all the crimes, devastation, and cruelties, that ac- company revenge, contention, and war, and you will be obliged to conclude, with Job^ that corrupt man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward; with David, that the earth is full of darkness and cruel habita- tions; and with every impartial inq^uirer, that OUT depravity and God's justice concur to make this world a vale of tears, as well as a field of toil and sweat ; a vast prison for rebels already " tied witli the chains of their sins," a boundless scaiibld for their execution, a golgotha, an aceldama, an im- mense field of torture and blood. Some will probably say, " This picture of the world is drawn with black lines, but a kinder Providence blends light and shade together, and tempers our calamities with numberless blessings." I answer — it can not be too thankfully acknowledged, that while patience suspends the stroke of jus- tice, God, for Christ's sake, restores us a thousand forfeited blessings, that his good- ness may lead us to repentance. But, alasl what is the consequence, where Divine grace does not prove victorious over corrupt •nature ? To all our sins, do we not add the crime of either enjoying the fevors of Prov- FABT n.] MATTER OF FACT. 67 idence with the greatest ingratitude, or of abusing them with the most provoking in- solence ? Our actions are far more expressive of our real sentiments than our words. Why this variety of exquisite food ? says the vo- luptuary whose life loudly speaks what his lips dare not utter. Why this abundance of delicious wines, but to tempt my un- bridled appetite, and please my luxurious palate? Would God have given softness to silks, brightness to colors, and luster to diamonds? says the self-applauding smile of a foolish virgin who worships herself in a glass ; would he have commanded the white of the lily thus to meet the blush of the rose, and highten so elegant a propor- tion of features, if he had not designed t^t the united powers of art, dress and beauty, should make me share his divine honors ? Why are we blessed with om* dear children and amiable friends, says the ridiculous be- havior of fond parents and raptm-ed lovers, but that we should suspend our happiness on their ravishing smiles, and place them as favorite idols in the shrine of our hearts ? And why has Heaven favored me both with a strong constitution and an affliient for- tune, says the rich slave of brutish lusts, but I may drink deeper of earthly joys and sensual delights? Thus blessings, abused or unimproved, 68 AN APPEAL TO [PAKT H. become curses in our hands. God's indul- gence encourages us to offend him ; we have the fatal skill of extracting poison from the sweetest Howers ; and madly turn the gifts of Providence into weapons to attack our Benefactor, and destroy ourselves. That there are, then, such perverted gil'ts, does not prove that mankind are innocent, but that God's patience endureth yet daily, and that a Savior ever liveth to make interces- sion for us. Should it be farther objected, that ''our pleasures counterbalance calamities," I an- swer, the greatest part of mankind are so oppressed with want and cares, toil and sickness, that their intervals of ease may rather be termed ^'an alleviation of misery,'' than an "enjoyment of happiness.'' Our pains are real and lasting — our joys imagi- nary and momentary. Could we exercise all our senses upon the most pleasing ob- jects, the toothache would render all insipid and burdensome ; a fit of the gout alone damps every worldly joy, while all earthly delights together can not give us ease under it — so vastly superior is the bitterness of one bodily pain to the sweetness of all the pleasures of sense ! If objectors will urge that " sufferings are needful for our trial," I reply, they are ne- cessaiy for our punishment and correction, but not for our trial. A good king can try PAKT II.J MATTER OF FACT. 61) the loyalty of his subjects without putting them to the rack. Let Nero and Bonner try the innocent by all sorts of tortures, but let not their barbarity be charged upon a God strictly just and infinitely good. However, '' calamities prove a blessing to some." And so does transportation. But who ever inferred from thence, that reform- ed felons were transported for the trial of their virtue, and not for the punishment of their crimes? I conclude, therefore, that our calamities and miseries demonstrate our corruption as strongly as the punishment of the bastinado and pillory, appointed by an equitable judge, prove the guilt of those on whom they are frequently and severely in- flicted. ELEVENTH ARGUMENT. Would to God the multiplied calamities of life were a sufficient punishment for our desperate wickedness ! But, alas ! they only make way for the pangs of death. Like traitors, or rather like wolves and vipers, to which the Son of God compares natural men, we are all devoted to destruction. — Yes, as we kill those mischievous crea- tures, so God destroys the sinful sons of men. If the reader is offended, and denies the mortifying assertion, let him visit with me the mournful spot where thousands are-daily 70 AN APPEAL TO [PAKT II. executed, and where hundreds make this moment their dying speech. I do not mean what some call "the bed of honor" — a field of battle — but a common death -bed. Observing, as we go along, those black trophies of the king of terrors, those escutch- eons, which preposterous vanity tixes up in honor of the deceased, when kind charity should hang them out as a warning to the living, let us repair to those mournful apart- ments where weeping attendants support the dying, where swooning Iriends embrace the dead, or whence distracted relatives carry out the pale remains of all their joy. Guided by their groans and funeral lights, let us proceed to the dreary charnel-houses and calvaries, which we decently call vaults and church-yards ; and, without stopping to look at the monuments of some, whom my objector remembers as vigorous as himself, and of others, who were, perhaps, his part- ners in nightly revels, let us liasten to see the dust of his moldered ancestors, and to read upon yonder coffins the dear name of a parent, a child, perhaps a wife, turned off from his bosom into the gulf of eternity ! If this sight does not convince him, I shall open one of the noisome repositories, and show him the deep hollows of those eyes that darted tender sensation into his soul, and odious reptiles fattened upon the once charming, now ghastly, face he doated PART II. J MATTER OF FACT. 71 upon ! But metliiuks he turns pale at the very proposal, and., rather than be confront- ed with such witnesses, acknowledges that he is condemned to die, w^ith all his dear relatives, and the whole human race. And is this the case? Are we, then, un- der sentence of death ? How awful is the consideration ! Of all the things that na- ture dreads, is not death the most terrible? And is it not — as being the greatest of tem- poral evils — appointed by liuman and di- vine laws lor the punishment of capital of- fenders, whether they are named felons and traitors, or more genteelly called men and sinners? Let matter of fact decide. \\ hile earthly judges condemn murderers and traitors to be hanged or beheaded, does not the Judge of all sentence sinful man- kind either to pine away with old age, or be wasted with consumptions, burned with fevers, scalded with hot humors, eaten up with cancers, putrefied by mortifications, suflbcated by asthmas, strangled by quin- seys, poisoned by the cup of excess, stabbed with the knife of luxury, or racked to death by disorders as loathsome, and accidents as various, as their sins? If you consider the circumstances of their execution, where is the material difi'erence between tJie malefactor and the sinner ? The jailer and the turnkey confine the one to his cell; the disorder and the physician 72 AN APPEAL TO [PARJT II. confine the other to his bed. The one lives upon bread and water; the other upon draughts and boluses. The one can walk with his fetters ; the other, loaded with blis- ters, can scarcely turn himself. The one enjoys freedom from pain, and has the per- fect use of his senses ; the other complains he is racked all over, and is frequently de- lirious. The executioner does his office upon the one in a few minutes ; but the physician and his medicines make the other linger for days, before he can die out of his misery. An honest sheriff, and constables armed with staves, wait upon one ; while a greedy undertaker and his party, with like emblems of authority, accompany the other: and if it is any advantage to have a numer- ous attendance, without comparison the felon has the greater train. When the pangs of death are over, does not the difierence made between the corpses consist more in appearance than reality? — The murderer is dissected in the surgeon's hall, gratis ; and the ricli sinner is embow- eled in his own apartment at great expense. The robber, exposed to open air, wastes away in hoops of iron ; and the gentleman, confined to a damp vault, molders away in sheets of lead: and while the fowls of the air greedily prey upon the one, the vermin of the earth eagerly devour the other. And if you consider thern as launch-.ng PABT II.] MATTER OF FACT. 73 into the world of spirits, is not the advan- tage, in one respect, on the malefactor's side ? He is solemnly assured he must die; and when the death-warrant comes down, all about him bid him prepare, and make the best of his short time : but the physician and chaplain, tiiends and attendants, gen- erally flatter the honorable sinner to the last. And what is the consequence? He either sleeps on in carnal security, till death puts an end to all his delusive dreams, or, if he has some notion that he must repent, for fear of discomposing his spirits, he still puts it ofi' till to-morrow ; and, in the midst of his delays, God says, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee. — What wonder is it then, if, when the con- verted thief goes from the ignominious tree to paradise, the impenitent rich man passes from his purple bed into an awful eternity, and there lifts up his eyes in ud expected torments % K these are truths too obvious to be de- nied, wilt thou, sinner, as the thoughtless vulgar, blunt their edge by saying, with amazing unconcern, "Death is a debt we must all pay to nature?" Alas! this is granting the point ; for if all have contract- ed so dreadful a debt, all are in a corrupt and lost estate. Kor is this debt to be paid to nature, but to justice ; otherwise, dying would be as easy as sleeping, or any other 74 AN APPEAL TO [part II. natural action : but it is beyond expression terrible to thee, Irom whose soul the Ke- deemer has not extracted sin, the monster's sting ; and if thou dost not see it now, in the most alarming light, it is because thou either imaginest it at a great distance, or the double vail of rash presumption, and brutish stupidity, is yet upon thy hardened heart. Or wilt thou, as the poor heathens, com- fort thyself with the cruel thought, that "thoushalt not die alone?" Alas! dying companions may increase, but can not take ofi'the horror of dissolution. Besides, though we live in a crowd, we generally die alone: each must drink that bitter cup, as if he were the only mortal in the universe. What must we do, then, in such deplora- ble circumstances? What, but humble om-- selves in the dust, and bow low to the scep- ter of Divine justice ; confessing that, since the righteous God has condemned us to cer- tain death, and, in general, to a far more lingering and painful death than murderers and traitors are made to undergo, we are certainly degenerate creatures and capital offenders, who stand in absolute need of an almighty Redeemer. Permit me now, candid reader, to make a solemn appeal to thy reason, assisted by the fear of God. From all tliat has been advanced, does it not a|)pL'ar that man is no PART III.] MATTER OF FACT. 75 more the favored, happy, and innocent crea- ture he was when he came out of the hands of his infinitely gi-acious Creator? And is it not evident that, whether we consider him as born into this disordered world, or dying out of it, or passing from the womb to the grave under a variety of calamitous circumstances, God's providential dealings with him prove that he is, by nature, in a corrupt and lost estate? A part, how small, of tliis terraqueous globe Is tenanted by man, the rest a waste. Rocks, deserts, frozen seas, and burning sands. Wild haunts of monsters, poisons, stings, and death ; Such is earth's melancholy map ; but far More sad, this earth is a true map of man ; So bounded are its haughty lord's delights ; So wide woe's empire, where deep troubles toss, Loud sorrows howl, enveuom'd passions bite, Ravenous calamities our vitals seize, And threat'ning fate wide opens to devour. — Young. THIRD PART. "We have hitherto considered man as a miserable inhabitant of a wretched world. We have seen him surrounded by multi- tudes of wants-^pursued by legions of dis- tresses, maladies, and woes^ — aiTCsted by the king of terrors — cast into the grave, and shut up there, the loathsome prey of coi*- niption and worms. Let us now consider 76 AN APPEA.L TO [PART III. him as a moral agent ; and, by examininaj his disposition, character, and conduct, let us see whether he is wisely punished, ac- cording to the sentence of impartial justice ; or wantonly tormented, at the caprice of arbitrary power. We cUn not help acknowledging, it is highly reasonable, first, that all intelligent creatures should love, reverence and obey their Creator ; because he is most eminently their Father, their Master, and their King : secondly, that they should assist, support, and love each other, as fellow-subjects, fel- low-servants, and children of the same uni- versal parent : and, thirdly, that they should preserve their souls and bodies in peace and purity ; by which means alone they can be happy in themselves, profitable to man, and acceptable to God. This is what we gen- erally call natural religion ; which is evi- dently founded upon eternal reason, the fit- ness of things, and the essential relations of persons. The propriety of these sanctions is so self- evident, that the Gentiles, who have not the written law, are a law to themselves, and do — ^but, alas ! how seldom, and from what motives :— the things contained in the law ; thus showing that the work, the sum and substance ot the law, though much blotted by the fall, is still written in the heart. — IN or will it be erased thence, in hell itself; PART III.J MATTER OF FACT. 77 for . nothing but a sight of the equity of God's law can clear his vindictive justice in the guilty breast, give a scorpion's sting to the worm that gnaws the stubborn offender, and arm his upbraiding conscience with a whip of biting serpents. Since the moral law so strongly recom- mends itself to reason, let us see how uni- versally it is observed or broken ; so shall matter of fact decide, whether we are pure and upright, or polluted and depraved. TWELFTH ARGUMENT. Those who reject the Scriptures, univer- sally agree that all have sinned, and that in many things we offend all. Hence, it appears that persons of various constitutions, ranks, and education, in all nations, reli- gions, times, and places, are born in such a state and with such a nature, and they infallibly commit many sins in thought, word, or deed. But one transgression would be sufficient to render them obnoxious to God's displeas- ure, and to bring them under the fearful curse of his broken law ; for, even according to the statutes of this realm, a man who once robs a traveler of a small sum of money, forfeits his life, as well as the bloody high- wayman, who for years barbarously murders all those whom he stops, and accumulates immense wealth by his repeated barbarities. 78 AN APPEAL TO [PART m. The reason is obvious: both incur the penalty of the law which forbids robbery ; for both eflectually break it, though one does it oftener, and with far more aggra- vating circumstances than the other. So sure, then, as one robbery deserves the gallows, one sin deserves death ; for the soul that sinneth, says God's law, and not the soul that committetli so many sins, of such or such a heinousness, it shall die. Hence it is that the first sin of the first man was punished both with spiritual and bodily death, and with ten thousand other evils. The justice of this sanction will appear in a satisfactory light, if we consider the follow- ing remarks : 1. In our present natural state, we are such strangers to God's glory and the spir- ituality of his law, and we are so used to drink the deadly poison of iniquity like water, that we have no idea of the horror which should seize upon us after a breach of the divine law. We are, tlierefore, as unfit judges of the atrociousness of sin, as lawless, hardened assassins, who shed hu- man blood like water, are of the heinious- ness of murder. 2. As every willful sin arises from a dis- regard of that sovereign authority, which is equally stamped upon all the command- ments, it hath in it the principle and nature PART m.] MATTER OF FACT. * 79 of all possible iniquity ; that is, the disre- gard and contempt of the Almighty. 3. There is no proper merit before God in the longest and most exact course of obedi- ence, but infinite demerit in one, even the last act of willful disobedience. When we have done all that is commanded us, we are still unprofitable servants ; for the self-suflfi- cient God has no more need of us, than a mighty monarch has of the vilest insect that creeps in the dust beneath his feet: and our best actions, strictly speaking, deserve abso- lutely nothing from our Creator and .Pre- server, because we owe him all we have, and are, and can possibly .be. But if we transgress in one point, we ruin all our obedience, and expose ourselves to the just penalty of his broken law. The following example may illustrate this observation : K a rich man gives a thousand meals to an indigent neighbor, he acts only as a man — he does nothing but his duty — and the Judge allows him no reward. But if he gives him only one dose of poison, he act& as a murderer, and must die a shameful death ; so greatly does one act of sin out- weigh a thousand acts of obedience 1 How exceedingly absurd, then, is the common notion, that our good works counterbalance our bad ones ! Add to this that, 4. Guilt necessarily rises in proportion to the baseness of tlie ofiender, the gi-eatness 80 * AN APPEAL TO [PAET m. of the favors conferred upon him, and the dignity of the person offended. An insult- ing behavior to a servant is a fault, to a magistrate it is a crime, to a king it is trea- son. And what is willful sin, but an injury offered by an impotent rebel, to the infin- itely-powerful Lawgiver of the universe, to the kindest of benefactors, to the gracious Creator and Preserver of men — an insult given 10 the supreme Majesty of heaven and earth, in whose glorious presence the dignity of the greatest potentates and archangels as truly disappears as the splendor of the stars in the blaze of the meridian sun? Sin, therefore, flying into= the face of such a Lawgiver, Benelactor, and Monarch, has in it a kind of infinite demerit from its infinite object; and rebellious, ungrateful, wretched man, who commits it a thousand times with a thousand aggravations, may, in the nerv- ous language of our Church, be said, in some sense, to deserve a thousand hells, if there were so many. THLBTEENTH ARGUMENT. Our natural depravity manifests itself by constant omissions of duty, as much as by flagrant commissions of sin, and perhaps much more. Take one instance out of many that might be produced. Constant displays of persevering goodness, and presents unde- servedly and uninterruptedly bestowed upon PART III.] MATTER OF FACT. 81 ms, deserve a perpetual tribute of heart-felt gratitude ; God demands it in his law ; and conscience, his agent in our souls, declares it ought in justice to be paid. But where shall we find a Deist properly conscious of what he owes the supreme Being for his "creation, preservation, and all the blessings of his life ? " And where a Christian, duly sensible of "God's inesti- mable love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ?" A due sense of his ever-multiplied mercies would fill our souls with never-ceasing wonder, and make our lips overflow with rapturous praise. The poet's language would suit our grateful sen- sations, and, without exaggeration, paint the just ardor of our transports : " Bound, every heart, aud every bosom burn ; Praise, flow forever, (if astonishment Will give thee leave,) my praise, forever flow- Praise ardent, cordial, constant," etc. Is not any thing short of this thankful frame of mind a sin of omission, a degree of ingratitude, of wnich all are naturally guilty, and for which, it is to be feared, the best owe ten thousand talents both to Divine goodness and justice? Throw only a few bones to a dog, and you win him; he follows you; your word becomes his law ; upon the first motion of your hand he flies through land and water to execute your commands : obedience is his 6 82 AN APPEAL TO [PART III. delight, and your presence his paradise : he convinces yon of it by all the demonstra- tions of joy which he is capable of giving ; and if he unhappily loses sight of you, he exei-ts all his sagacity to trace your foot- steps ; nor will he rest till he finds his bene- factor again. Shall a brute be so thankful to a man for some offals, while man himself is so lull of ingratitude to God who created him, pre- serves his life from destruction, and hourly crowns him with mercies and loving-kind- ness ? How should shame cover our guilty faces ? Surely, if the royal prophet could say he was as a beast before God, may we not well confess that, in point of gratitude, we are worse than the dullest and most stupid part of the brute creation ? For even the ox, says the Lord, knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib; but Israel doth not know me, my people doth not consider my daily favors. And if the very heathens affirm, that to call a man ungratefal to a human benefactor, was to say of him all. possible evil in one word,* how can we ex- press the baseness and depravity of man- kind, who are universally so ungrateful to so bounteous a benefactor as God himself. * Ingratum si dixeris, omnia dicis. — Juv. i»AET III.] MATTEU OF 1- Act. 831 FOURTEENTH ARGUMENT. But though we seem made of cold inat- tention, when the sigjit of Divine mercies should kindle our hearts into gratitude and praise, we soon get out ox this languid frame of mind ; for, in the pursuit of sensual grat- ifications, we are all activity and warmth; we seem an ardent compound of life and fire. What can be the reason of this amazing difterence? What but rebelJious sense and wanton appetite, raised at the sight or idea of some forbidden object! The bait of pleas m-e appears — corrupt nature summons all her powers — every nerve of expectation is stretched — every pulse of desire beats high — the blood is in a general ferment — the spirits are in a universal hurry — and though the hook of a fatal consequence is often apparent, the alluring bait must be swallowed. The fear of God, the most in- estimable of all treasures, is already gone • and ii' the sinful gratification cannot be en- joyed upon any other term, a good reputa- tion shall go also. Reason, indeed, makes remonstrances ; but the loud clamors of flesh and blood soon drown her soft whis- pers. The carnal mind steps imperiously upon the throne ; sense, that conquers the greatest conquerors, bears down all opposi- tion ; the yielding man is led captive hy a 84 AN APPEAL TO [part Hi brutish lust ; and while angels blush, there ants to know tlie English of these words, he may find it in Rom. vii, 15. PART III.] MATTER OF FACT. 93 about mere trifles; it either strains at a gnat, or swallows a camel; when it is alarmed, in some it shows itself ready to be made easy by every wrong method; in oth- ers, it obstinately refuses to be pacified by the right. To-day, you may with propriety compare it to a dumb dog, that does not bark at a thief; and to-morrow, to a snarl- ing cm-, that flies indifferently at a friend, a foe, or a shadow, and then madly turns upon himself, and tears his own flesh. K conscience, the best power of the un- converted man, is so corrupt, good God! what are his affections? Almost perpetu- ally deficient in some, and excessive in others, when do they attain to, or stop at, the line of moderation? Who can tell how oft he has been the sport of their irregularity and violence? One hour we are hurried into rashness by their impetuosity : the next, we are bound in sloth by their inactivity. Sometimes every blast of foolish hope, or ill-grounded fear ; every gale of base desire, or unreasonable aversion ; every wave of idolatrous love, or sinful hatred ; every sm-ge of misplaced admiration, or groundless hor- ror; every billow of noisy joy, or undue sorrow, tosses, raises, or sinks our soul, as a ship in a storm, which has neither rudder nor ballast. At other times we are totally becalmed ; all our sails are furled ; not one breath of devout or human affection stirs in 94 Aif APPEAL TO [PAKT II!* our stoical, frozen breast- and we remain stupidly insensible, till the spark of tempta- tion, dropping upon the combustible matter in our hearts, blows us up again into loud passion ; and then how dreadiul and ridicu- lous together is the new explosion ! If experience pronounces that these reflect tions are just, the point is gained. Our whole heart is faint, through the unaccount- able disorders of our will, the lethargy or boisterous fits of our conscience, and the swooning, or high fever, of our affections; and we may, without hypocrisy, join in our daily confession, and say, '^ There is no health in us." SEVENTEENTH ARGUMENT* The danger of these complicated maladies of our souls, evidences itself, by the most fatal of all symptoms, our manifest aliena^ tion from God. Yes, shocking as the con- fession is, we must make it, if truth has any dominion in our breast: unrenewed man loves not his God. That eternal beauty, for whose contemplation, that supreme good, for whose enjoyment he was created, is gen- erally forgotten, despised, or hated. If the thought of his Holy Majesty presents itself he looks upon it as an intruder; it lays him under as disagreeable a restraint as that which the presence of a grave, pious master, puts upon a wanton, idle servant ; nor can ^ABT m.] MATTEJt OF FACT. 95 he -quietly pursne his sinftil courses, till he has driven away the troublesome idea; or imagined, with the epicure, a careless God, who wants resolution to call him to an ac- count, and justice to punish him for his iniquity. Does any one offer an indignity to his favorite friend, or only speak contemptuously of the object of his esteem, he feels as if he was the person insulted, and reddening with indignation, directly espouses his cause ; but every body, the meanest of his attendants not excepted, may with impunity insult the King of kings in his presence, and take the most profane liberties with his name and word, his laws and ministers ; he hears the wild blasphemy, and regards it not; he sees the honid outrage, and resents it not; and yet, amazing infatuation! he pretends to love God. If he goes to the play, he can fix his roving eyes and wandering mind, three hours together upon the same trifling object, not only without weariness, but with un- common delight. If he has an appointment with the person whom he adores as a deity, his spirits are elevated — expectation and joy flutter in his dilated breast — he sweetly anticipates the pleasing interview, or impa- tiently chides the slowly-flowing minutes ; his feelings are inexpressible. But if he attends the great congregation, which he too 96 AN APPEAL TO [PART Ifl* often omits upon the most frivolous pi;e- tenses, it is rather out of form and decency, than out of devotion and love ; rather with indifference or reluctance, than with delight and transport. And when he is present there, how absent are his thoughts 1 How wandering his eyes ! How trifling, supine, irreverent * his whole behavior ! He would be ashamed to speak to the meanest of his servants with as little attention as he some- times prays to the Majesty of heaven. Were he to stare about when he gives them orders, as he does when he presents his supplica- tions to the Lord of lords, he would be afraid they would think he was half drnnk, or had a touch of lunacy. Suppose he still retains a sense of out- ward decency, while the church goes tlirough her solemn oflices ; yet how heavy are his spirits ! how heartless his confessions ! how cold his prayers! The blessing comes at last, and he is blessed indeed — not with the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost ; for that he gladly leaves to ''poor enthusiasts" — but with a release from his confinement and * Men homage pay to men, Thoughtless beneath whose dreadful eye they bow In mutual awe profound, of clay to clay. Of guilt to guilt, and turn their backs on Thee, Great Sire ! whom thrones celestial ceaseless sing ; To prostrate angels an amazing scene! — Young PART III.J MATTER OF FACT. 97 tedious work. And now that he has "done : is duty, and served God," he hastens away to the company that suits his taste. See him there. Do not his very looks declare he is in his own element? With what eagerness of spirit, energy of gesture, and volubility of tongue, does he talk over his last entertainment, chase, or bargain? Does not the oil of cheerfulness make all his motions as free and easy as if weight and friction had no place at all in his light and airy frame? • Love of God, thou sweetest, strongest of all powers, didst thou ever thus metamor- phose his soul, and impart such a sprightly activity to his body? And you that con- verse most familiarly with him, did you ever hear him say, Come, and I will tell you what the Lord has done for my soul: taste, and see how good the Lord is? No, never; for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh ; nor can it be expected that God, wlio hath no place in his joyous reflec- tions, should have one in his cheerful con- versation. On the contrary, it will be matter of surprise to those who introduce the delightful subject of the love of God, if he does not waive it ofi", as dull, melancholy, or enthusiastical. But as he will give you to understand " he is no hypocrite, and, therefore, confines de- votion to his oloset," follow him there. Alafil 9o AN APPEAL TO [PABT IH. he scarce ever bends the knee to Him that sees in secret : or, if he says his prayers as regularly as he winds his watch, it is much in the same spirit ; for suppose he does not hurry them over, or cut them as short as possible, yet the careless, formal manner in which he offers them up, indicates as plainly as his public conduct, the aversion lurking in his heart against God : and yet he fan- cies he loves him: with a sneer that indi- cates self- applause, and a pharisaic contempt of others, *■' Away with all your feelings- and raptures," says lie; "this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments." But, alas! which of them does he keep? Certainly not the first ; for the Lord is not the supreme object of his hopes and fears, his confidence and joy ; nor yet the last ; for discontent and wrong desires are still in- dulged in his selfish and worldly heart. How unfortunate, therefore, is his appeal to the commandments, by which his secret en- mity to the law, govermnent, and nature of God, is brought to the clearest light. EIGHTEENTH ARGUMENT. But as the heart-felt love of God is sup- posed to bft downright enthusiasm by some moralists, who, dashing in pieces the first table of the law against the second, pretend that all our duty to God consists in the love of our neighbor, let us examine the ua- PART III.] MATTER OF FACT. 99 converted man's charity, and see whether he bears more love to his fellow-creatures than to his Creator. Nothing can be more erroneous than his notions of charity. He confounds it with the bare giving of alms ; not considering that it is possible to do this kind of good from the most selfish and uncharitable motives. — Therefore, when the fear of being accounted covetous, the desire of passing for generous, the vanity of seeing his name in a list of noble subscribers, the shame of being out- done by his equals, the teazing importunity of an obstinate beggar, the moving address of a solicitor, whom he would blush to deny, Or the pharisaic notion of making amends for his sins, and purchasing heaven by his alms — when any, I say, of these sinister motives sets him upon assisting industrious poverty, relieving friendless old age, or supporting infirm and mutilated indigence, he fancies that he gives an indubitable proof of his charity. Sometimes, too, he affixes to that word the idea of a fond hope that every body is going to heaven : for if you intimate that the rich voluptuary is not with Lazarus, in Abra- ham's bosom, and that the foolish virgins are not promiscuously .admitted to glory with the wise, he wonders at " your unchar- itableness," and thanks God " he never en- 100 AN APPEAL TO [PART Efl. tertained such unchristian thoughts of his neighbors." He considers not that charity is the fair offspring of the love of God, to which he is yet an utter stranger; and that it consists in a universal, disinterested benevolence to all mankind, our worst enemies not excepted — a benevolence that sweetly evidences itself by bearing with patience the evil which they do to us, and kindly doing them all the good we possibly can, both with respect to their soul and body, their property and reputation. K this is a just definition of charity, the unrenewed man has not even the outside of it. To prove it, I might appeal to his impa- tience and ill-humor, his unkind words and cutting raileries, ( for I suppose him too moral ever to slander or curse any one;) 1 might mention his supercillious behavior to some, who are entitled to his affability as men, countrymen, and neighbors ; I might expatiate on his readiness to exculpate, en- rich, or aggrandize himself at the expense of others, whenever he can do it without exposing himself. But, waiving all these particulars, I ask, Whom does he truly love'^ You answer, " Doubtless the person to whom he makes daily protestations of the warmest regard." But how does he prove this regard? Why, perhaps, with the most artlul insinuations, PAET ni.] MATTER OF FACT. 101 and clauojerous attempts to rob her of her virtue, rerhaps lie has ah'oady gained his end. Unhappy Magdalen! How much better would it have been for thee to have fallen into the hands of a highwayman I Thou wouldst only have lost thy money, but now thou art despoiled of the honor of thy sex, and the peace of thy mind: thou art robbed at once of virgin innocence, a fair reputation, and possibly a healthy constitu- tion. If this is a specimen of the uncon- verted man's love, what must he his hatred? But I haply mistake : " He is no libertine ; he has a virtuous wife, and amiable children, and he loves them," say you, "with the tenderest afiection." I reply, that these re- lations, being immortal spirits, confined for a few years in a tenement of clay, and con- tinually on the remove for eternity, his laudable regard for their frail bodies, and proper care of their temporal prosperity, are not a sufficient proof that he loves them in a right manner. For even according to wise heathens, our soul is our better part, our true self.* And what tender concern does the unrenewed man feel for the soul of his bosom friend? Does he regard it more than the body of his groom, or the life of his horse? Does he with any degree of impor- tunity, carry it daily in the arms of love and * Ifos non corpora sumus : Corpus quidem vas est aut aliquod animi receptaculum. — Cic. Tusc. Qucest., lib. 1. 102 AN APPEAL TO [PAET m. prayer to the throne of grace for life and salvation? Does he, by good instructions, and a virtuous example, excite his children to secure an eternal inheritance; and is he at least as desirous to see them wise and pious; as well-bred, rich, handsome, and great? Alas! I fear it is just the reverse. He is probably the first to poison their ten- der minds with some of the dangerous maxims that vanity and ambition have in- vented; and, supposing he has a favorite dog, it is well if he is not more anxious for the preservation of that one domestic ani- mal, than for the salvation of all their souls. K these observations are founded upon matter of fact, as daily experience demon- strates, 1 appeal to common sense, and ask. Can the natural man, with all his fondness, be said to have a true love even for his nearest relatives? And is not the regard that he manifests for their bodies more like the common instinct by which doves cleave to their mates, and swallows provide for their young, than like the generous aifection which a rational creature ought to bear to immortal spirits^ awfully ' hovering in a scale of probation, which is just going to turn for hell or heaven ? NINETEENTH ARGUMENT. Nor is it surprising that the unrenewed man should be devoid of all true love to his PART ni.] MATTER OF FACT. 103 nearest relations ; for he is so completely fallen, that he bears no true love even to himself. Let us overlook those who cut their throats, shoot, drown, or hang themselves. Let us take no notice of those who sacrifice a year's health for a night's revel ; who in- flame their blood into fevers, or drive putre- faction into their bones, for the momentary gratification of a shameful appetite ; and are so hot in the pursuit of base pleasure, that they leap after it even into the jaws of an untimely grave: let us, I say, pass by those innumerable, unhappy victims of intemper- ance and debauchery, who squander their money upon panders and harlots, and have as little regard for their health as for their fortune and reputation ; and let us consider the case of those good-natured, decent per- sons, who profess to have a real value for both. Upon the principle laid down in the last Argument, may I not ask. What love have these for their immortal part, their true self? What do they do for their souls ? Or, rather, what do they not leave undone? And who can show less concern for their greatest in- terest than they? Alas! in spiritual matters, the wisest of them seem on a level.with the most foolish. They anxiously secure their title to a few possessions in this transitoiy world, out of which the stream of time carries them with 104 AN APPEAL TO [PAUT m. unabated impetuosity ; while they remain * stupidly thoughtless of their portion in the unchangeable world, into which they are just going to launch ; they take particular notice of every trivial incident in life, every idle report raised in their neighborhood, and supinely overlook the great realities of death and judgment, hell and heaven. You see them perpetually contriving how to preserve, indulge, and adorn their dying bodies, and daily neglecting the safety, wel- fare, and ornament of their immortal souls. So great is theii* folly, that earthly • toys make them slight heavenly thrones! So willful their self-deception, that a point of timef hides from them a boundless eternity I • Time flies, death urges, knells call, heaven invites. Hell threatens ; all exert ; in effort all : More than creation labors ! labors more ! And is there in creation, what, amidst This tumult universal, wing'd dispatch, And ardent energy, supinely yawns ? Man sleeps — and man alone ; and man, whose fate — Fate irreversible, entire, extreme. Endless, hair-hung, breeze-shaken — o'er the gulf A moment trembles — drops ! and man, for whom All else is in alarm — man, the sole cause Of this surrounding storm ! — and yet he sleeps. As the storm rocked to rest. — Young. t And is it in the flight of threescore years To push eternity from human thought. Ana bury souls immortal in the dust ? A soul immortal spending all her fires. Wasting her strength in strenuous idleness ; Thrown into tummt, raptured, or alarm'd, PART III.] MATTER OF FACT. 105 So perverted is their moral taste, that they nauseate the word of tmth, the precions food of souls, and greedily run upon the tempter's hook, if it is but made of solid gold, or gilt over with the specious appear- ance of honor, or only baited with the pros- pect of a favorite diversion. And while, by uneasy, Iretful tempers, they too often im- pair their bodily health, by exorbitant affec- tions, and pungent cares, they frequently break their hearts, or pierce themselves through with many sorrows. Does such a conduct deserve the name of well-ordered, self-love, or preposterous self- hatred? O man, sinful man, how totally art thou depraved, if thou art not only thine own most dangerous enemy, but often thy most cruel tormentor ! TWENTIETH ARGUMENT. This depravity is productive of the most detestable brood. When it has suppressed the love of God, perverted the love of our neighbor, and vitiated self-love, it soon gives birth to a variety of execrable tempers and dire affections, whicli should have no place but in the breast of fiends, no outbreaking but in the chambers of liell. If you ask their name, I answer, Pride, At aught this scene can threaten or indulge, Resembles ocean into tempest wrought To waft a feather or to drown a fly. — Young. 106 AN APPEAL TO [PART Hi. that odious vice, which feeds on the praises it slyly procures, lives by the applause it has meanly courted, and is equally stabbed by the reproof of a friend, and the sneer of a foe. The spirit of Independence, which cannot bear control, is galled by the easiest yoke, gnaws the slender cords of just au- thority, as if they were the heavy chains of tyrannical power; nor ever ceases strug- fling till they break, and he can say : " Now am my own master." Ambition and Van- ity, which, like Proteus, take a thousand shapes, and wind a thousand ways, to climb up the high seat of power, shine on the tot- tering stage of honor, wear the golden badge of fortune, glitter in the gaudy pomp of dress, and draw, by distinguishing appear- ances, the admiration of a gaping multitude. Sloth, which unnerves the soul, enfeebles the body, and makes the whole man deaf to the calls of duty, loth to set about his busi- ness— even when want, fear, or shame drives him to it — ready to postpone or omit it upon any pretence, and willing to give up even the interests of societ}^, virtue, and religion, so he may saunter undisturbed, doze the time away in stupid inactivity, or enjoy himself in that dastardly indolence, which passes in the world for quietness and good- nature. Envy, that looks with an evil eye at the good things our competitors enjoy, takes a secret pleasure in their misfortunes. PABT ni.] MATTER OF FACT. 107 under vanous pretexts exposes their faults, slyly tries to add to our reputation what it detracts from theii-s, and stings our heart when they eclipse us by their greater suc- cess or superior excellencies. Covetousness, which is always dissatisfied with its por- tion, watches it with tormenting fears, in- creases it by every sordid means, and turn- ing its own executioner, justly pines for want over the treasure it madly saves for a prodigal heir. Impatience, which frets at every thing, finds fault with every person, and madly tears herself under the distress- ing sense of a present evil, or the anxious expectation of an absent good. Wrath, which distorts our faces, racks our breasts, alarms our households, threatens, curses, stamps, and storms, even upon imaginary or trifling provocations. Jealousy, that through a fatal skill in diabolical optics, sees contempt in all the words of a favorite friend, discovers infidelity in all his actions, lives upon the wicked suspicions it begets, and turns the sweets of the mildest passion into wormwood and gall. Idolatrous love, which preys upon the spirits, consumes the flesh, tears the throbbing heart, and when it is disappointed, frequently forces its wretched slaves to lay violent hands upon themselves. Hatred of our fellow-creatures, which keeps us void of tender benevolence, a cJiief ingredient in the bliss of angels, and 108 AN APPEAL TO [PAKT III. fills US with some of the most unhappy sen- sations belonging to accursed spirits. Mal- ice, which takes an unnatural, hellish pleas- ure, in teasing beasts, and hurting men, in their persons, properties, or reputation. And the offspring of malice. Revenge,* who al- ways thirsts after mischief or blood; and shares the only delight of devils, when he can repay a real or fancied injury sevenfold. Hypocrisy, who borrows the cloak of reli- gion ; bids her flexible muscles imitate vital piety ; attends at the sacred altars, to make a show of her fictitious devotion ; there raises her affected zeal in proportion to the number of the spectators; calls upon God to get the praise of man ; and lifts up adul- terous eyes and thievish hands to heaven, to procure herself the good things of the earth. And Hypocrisy's sister, narrow-hearted Big- otry, who* pushes from her Civility and Good-nature, stops her ears against argu- ments and entreaties ; calls Huguenots, in- fidels, Papists, or heretics, all who do not * Man hard of heart to man ! of horrid things Most horrid ! Midst stupendous, highly strange I Yet oft his courtesies are smoother wrongs ; Pride brandishes the favors he confers, And contumelious his humanity: What then his vengeance ! Hear it not, ye stars" And thou, pale moon ! turn paler at the sound, Man is to man the sorest, surest ill Heaven's Sovereign saves all beings but himself, That hideous sight, a naked human heart. — Young. PART m.] MATTER OF FACT. 109 directly subscribe to her absurd or impious creeds; dogs them with a malignant eye; throws stones or dirt at them about an empty ceremony, or an indifferent opinion ; and at last, if she can, sets churches or kingdoms on fire, about a turban, a surplice, or a cowl. Perfidiousness, who puts on the looks of true benevolence, speaks the lan- guage of the warmest affection ; with solemn protestations invites men to depend on her sincerity, while she lays a deep plot for their sudden destruction ; and, with repeat- ed oaths, beseeches Heaven to be witness of her artless innocence, while she moves the centre of hell to accomplish her dire de- signs. The fatal hour is come — her strata- gem has succeeded — and she now Idsses and betrays, drinks health and poisons — ^of- fers a friendly embrace, and gives a deadly stab. Despair, who scorns to be beholden to Mercy, gives the lie to all the declara- tions issued from the tlirone of grace, obsti- nately turns his wild eyes from the great expiatoiy sacrifice ; and at last, impatient to drink the cup of trembling, wildly looks for some weapon to destroy himself. De- traction, begotten by the shocking mixture of two or more of these infernal passions, raised to the highest degree of extravagance — disti'action, that wrings her hands, tears her disheveled hair, fixes her ghastly eyes, turns her swimming brains, quenches the 110 AN APPEAL TO [PART IH. last spark of reason, and, like a fierce tiger, must at last be chained by the hand of cau- tion, and confined with iron bars in her dreary dwelling. And to close the dismal train, Self-murder, who always points wretched mortals to ponds and rivers, or presents them with cords, raz- ors, pistols, daggers, and poison, and perpet- ually urges them to the choice of one of them, " You are guilty, miserable creatures," whis- pers he : ^' the sun of prosperity is forever set, the deepest night of distress is come upon you ; you are in a hell of woe ; the hell prepared for Satan cannot be worse than that which you feel, but it may be more tol- erable; take this, and boldly force your passage out of the cursed state in which you groan." He persuades, and his desperate victims, tired of the company of their fel- low-mortals, fly for reftige to that of devils ! they shut their eyes, and, horrible to say! but how much more hori'ible to do ! delib- erately venture from one hell into another, to seek ease ; or, to speak with more truth, leap, with all the miseries of a known hell, into all the horrors of one which is un- known. And are your hearts, O ye sons of men, the favorite seats of this infernal crew! Then shame on the wretch that made the first panegyric on the dignity of human na- PABT m.] MATTEK OF FACT. Ill ture ! He proved my point : he began in pride, and ended in distraction. Detestable as these vices and tempers are, where is the natural man that is always free from them ? Where is even the chHd ten years old, who never felt most of these vipers, upon some occasion or other, shoot- ing their venom tln-ough his lips, darting their balefiil inflence tin-ough his eyes, or at least stirring and hissing in his disturbed breast ? If any one never felt them, he may be pronounced more than mortal ; but if he has, his own experience furnishes him with a sensible demonstration, that he is a fallen spifit, infected with the poison that rages in the devil himself. TWENTY-FIKST ARGUMENT. Bad roots, which vigorously shoot in the spring, will naturally produce their danger- ous Iruit in summer. We may, therefore. go one step farther, and ask, where is the man thirty yeai's old, whose depravity has not broken out into the greatest variety of sinfal acts? Among the persons of that age, who never were esteemed worse than their neighbors, shall we find a forehead that never betrayed daring insolence? A cheek, that never indicated concealed guilt by an involuntary blush, or unnatural pale- ness? A neck, that never was stretched out in pride and vain confidence ? An eye> 112 AN APPEAL TO [PART IH. that never cast, a disdainful, malignant, or wanton look ? An ear, that an evil curios- ity never opened to frothy, loose, or detam- ing intercourse ? A tongue, that never was tainted with unedifying, false, indecent, or uncharitable language ? A palate, that nev- er became the seat of luxurious indulgence? A throat that never was the channel of ex- cess ? A stomach, that never felt the op- pressive load of abused mercies? Hands, that never plucked or touched the forbidden fruit of pleasing sin ? Feet, that never once moved in the broad, downward road of ini- quity? And a bosom, that never heaved under the dreadful workings of stoe exorb- itant passion ? Where, in short, is there a face, ever so disagreeable, that never was the object of self- worship in a glass? And where a body, however deformed, that never was set up as a favorite idol by the fallen spirit that inhabits it? If iniquity thus works by all the powers, and breaks out through all the parts of the human body, we may conclude, by woeftil experience, not only that the plague of sin is begun, but that it rages with universal ftiry ; and to use again the evangelical prophet's words, that from the sole of the foot, even to the head of the natural man, there is no spiritual soundness in him, but wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores. PAKTm. 1 MATTER OB' FACT. 113 TWENTY-SECOND ARGUMENT. What can be said of each individual, may with the same propriety, be affirmed of all the different nations of the earth. Let an impartial judge take four unconverted men or children, from the four parts of the world. Let him examine their actions, and trace them back to their spring ; and, if he makes some allowance for the accidental difference of their climate, constitution, taste and ed- ucation, he will soon find their disposition as equally earthly, sensual, and devilish, as if they had all been cast in the same mold. Yes, as oak-trees are oaks all the world over, though by particular circumstances some grow tallei- and harder, and some more knotted and crooked than others, so all un- regenerate men resemble one another ; for all are proud, self-willed, impenitent, and lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. Do not sloth, gluttony, drunkenness, and uncleanness ; cheating, defrauding, stealing, and oppression; lying, perjury, treachery, and cruelty, stalk openly or lurk secretly every- where? Are not all these vices pre- dominant among black and white people, among savages and civilized nations, among Turks and Jews, heathens and Christians, whether they live on the banks of the Gan- ges or the Thames, the Mississippi or the 114 AN xYPPEAL TO [pART tlL Seine? whether they starve in the snows of Lapland, or burn in the sands of Guinea? O sin! thou fatal. pest: thou soul-destroy- ing plague ! would to God thy fixed abode were only in the Levant! and that lilc^ th« external pestilence, thou wert chiefiy con- fined to the Turkish dominions ! But alaa I the gross immorality and profaneness — 'the various crimes and villanies — the desperate impiety and wild blasphemy, under which every kingdom and city has groaned, and still continues to do night and day, over the face of the whole earth, are black spots so similar, and symptoms so equally teri'ible, that we are obliged to confess they must have a common internal principle — which can be no other than a bad l^abit of soul — a fallen, corrupted nature. Yes, the univer- sality and equality of the effects show to an unprejudiced mind that tlie cause is univer- sal, and equally inlerwoven with the nature which is common to all nations, and remains the same in all countries and ages. FIVE OBJECTIONS. I. If the self-righteous moralist answers that "sin and wickedness are not so univer- sal as this argument supposes," I reply that the more we are acquainted with ourselves, ■^tl the hisfoiy of the dead, and secret transactions of tlie living, the more we are convinced, that if all are not guiij i/f tut- PART III.] MAITEE OF FACT. Il5 ward enormities, all are deeply tainted with spiritual wickedness. Even those excellent persons who, like Jeremiah, have been in part sanctified be- fore they came forth out of the womb, can, from sad experience, confess with him that the heart is deceitful above all things, and Bay, with David, my heart showeth me the wickedness of the ungodly. Thousands, indeed, boast of the goodness of their hearts ; they flatter themselves that to be righteous, it is enough to avoid gross acts of intemperance and injustice ; with the Pharisees, they shut their eyes against the destructive nature of the love of the world^ the thirst of praise, the fear of men, the love of ease, sloth, sensuality, indevotion, self-righteousness, discontent, impatience, selfishness, carnal security, unbelief, hard- ness of heart, and a thousand other spiritual evils. Full of self-ignorance, like Peter, they imagine there is no combustible mat- ter of wickedness in their breasts, because they are not actually fired by the spark of a suitable temptation. And when they hear what their corrupt nature may one day prompt them to do, they cry out with Ha- zael. Am I a dog, that I should do this thing? Nevertheless, by and by they do it, if not outwardly, as he did, at least in their vain thoughts by day, or wicked, lewd im- aginations by night. So true is the wise 116 AN APPEAL TO [piRT lit* man's saying, He that trusteth his own heart is a fool. II. " If histories give us frequent accounts of the notorious wickedness of mankind — ■■ say the advocates of human excellence — it is because private virtue is not the subject of history ; and to judge of the moral rec^ titude of the world by the corruption of courts, is as absurd as to estimate the health of a people from an infirmary." And is private vice any more the subject of history than private virtue? If it were, what folios would contain the fulsome and black accounts of all the lies and scandal—^ the secret grudges and open quarrels — the filthy talking and malicious jesting — the unkind or unjust behavior — the gross or re^ fined intemperance, which deluge both town and country? Suppose the annals of any one numerous family were published, liow many volumes might be filled with the detail of the undue fondness, or forbidden coldness — the vari- ance, animosity, and strife, which break out between husbands and wives, parents and children, brotliei-s and sisters, masters and domestics, upper and lower servants, &c.? What ridiculous, impertinent scenes would be opened to public view ! What fretfulness, dissimulation, envy, jealousy, talebearing, deceit ! What concealed suspicions, aggra- vated charges, false accusations, underhand PART m.] MATTER OF FACT. 117 dealings, imaginaiy provocations, glaring partiality, insolent behavior, loud passions ! Was even the best moralist to write the memoirs of his own heart, and give the public a minute account of all his imperti- nent thoughts and wild imaginations, how many paragraphs would make him blush ! How many pages, by presenting the aston- ished reader with a blank or a blot, would demonstrate the tnith of St. Paul's asser- tion. They are all gone out of the way, there is none that doeth good, none but spoils his best works by a mixture of essential evil ! Far, then, from finding* ''those vastly su- perior numbers, w^ho in safe o])scurity are virtuously and innocently employed,^' we may €very-w4iere see tlie truth of the con- fession which our objectors make in the church, " There is no liealth in us." I say eveiy-where ; for is cabal confined to court, any more than lewdness to the army, and profaneness to tlie navy? Does not the same spirit of sell-interest and in- trigue which iniiuences the choice of minis- ters of state, preside also at the election of members of Parliament, mayors of corporate towns, burgesses of boroughs, and petty ofii- cers in a country parish? We may, then — - notwithstanding the unlortunate comparison on which this objectioi is founded — con- * See the note on page 47. 118 AN APPESkL TO [part IH. elude, without absurdity, that, as all men, sooner or later, by pain, sickness, and death, evidence their natural weakness and mortal- ity— whether they live in infirmaries, pal- aces, or cottages —so all men, sooner or later, by their thoughts, words, and actions, demonstrate their natural corruption,whether they crowd the jail yard, the drawing-room, or the obscure green of a country village. Ill, The same objectors will probably re- ply: "K corruption is univei-sal, it can not be said to be equal ; for numbers lead a very harmless, and not a few a very useful life." To this I answer, that all have naturally an evil heart of unbelief, forgetful of, and departing from the living God. In this respect, there is no difference ; all the world is guilty before God. But, thanks be to the Father of mercies! all do not remain so. Many cherish the seed of supernatural grace, which we have from the Kedeemer; they bow to his scepter, become new creatures, depart from iniquity, and are zealous of good works. And the same gracious pow- er which has renewed them is at work upon thousands more, hourly restraining them from much evil, and daily exciting them to many useful actions. With respect to the harmlessness, for which some unrenewed persons are remark- able, it can not spring from a better nature than that of their fellow-mortals; for the PART III.] MATIER OF FACT. 119 nature of all men, like that of all wolves, is the same throughout the whole species. It must then be owing lo the restrain!^ grace of God, or to a happier constitution, a sti'ider education, a deeper sense of decency, or a greater regard for their character ; per- haps only to trie fear of consequences, and to the want of natural boldness, or of a suitable temptation and fair opportunity to sin. Nor are there few who pass for temperate, merely because the diabolical pride, lurking in their hearts, scorns to stoop so low as to indulge their beastly appetites: while others have the undeserved reputation of being good-natured, because they find more delight in quietly gratifying their sheepish indolence or brutal desires, than in yielding to the uneasy, boisteraus tempers, which they have in common with devils. As to the virtues by which some of the unconverted distinguish themselves from others, they either spring from God's pre- venting grace or are only vices in disguise. The love of praise, the desire of honor, and the thirst of gold, excite thousands to laud- able designs and useful actions. "Wicked men, set on work by these powerftil springs, do lying wonders in the moral world, as the magicians did in the land of Egypt. They counterfeit divine grace, and for a time seem even to outdo believers themselves. Hence it is, that we frequently see the indolent in- 120 AN APPEAL TO [PAKT III. dustrioiis, the coward brave, the covetous charitaj|le, the Pharisee religious, the Mag- dalen modest, and the dastardly slave of his lusts a bold asserter of public liberty. But the Searcher of heai-ts is not deceived by fair appearances : he judges of their actions according to the motives whence they springy and the ends for which they are performed. You are, says he to all these seemingly- vir- tuous sinners, like whited sepulchers, which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but within are full of dead men's bones and of all uncleanness. Were I to describe these saints of the world by a comparison, I would say that some of them resemble persons who artfully conceal their ulcers, under the most agreeable ap- pearance of cleanliness and health. Many that admire their faces and looks, little sus- pect what a putrid, virulent fluid runs out of their secret sores. Others of them, whose hypocrisy is not of so gross a kind, are like persons infected with a mortal disease, who, though the mass of their blood is tainted, and some noble part attacked, still walk about, do business, and look as fresh -colored as if they were the picture of health. Ye sons of ^sculapius, who, without feeling their pulse, and carefully weighing every symptom, pionounce them very well upon their look alone, do ye not blunder in physic, just as my objectors do in divinity? PART III.] MATTER OF FACT. 121 lY. But still they urge, that " it is wroDg to father our sinfulness upon a pretended natural depravity, when it may be entirely owing to the force of ill example, the influ- ence of a bad education, or the strong fer- ments of youthful blood." All these, I reply, like rich soil and rank manure, cause original corruption to shoot the higher, but do not form its pernicious seeds. That these seeds lurk within the heart, before they are forced up by the heat of temptation, appeai-s indubitable, if we con- sider, 1. That all children, on particular occa- eions, manifest some early inclinations to those sins, which the feebleness of their bod- ily organs, and the want of proper ferments in their blood, do not permit them to com- mit: 2. That infants betray envy, ill-humor, impatience, selfishness, anger, and obsti- nacy, even before they can take particular notice of ill examples, and understand bad counsels: and 3. That though uncleanness, fornication, and adultery, on account of the shame and danger attending them, are committed with so much secrecy, that the examples of them are seldom, if ever given in public, they are firevertheless some of the crimes which are most universally or eager- ly committed. Besides, if we were not more inclined to vice than virtue, good examples would be as common, and have as much force, as bad 122 AN APPEAL TO [PART IB ones. Tlierofore, the generality of bad ex- amples can not arise but from the general sinfulness of man ; and to account for this general sinfulness hy the generality of bad examples, is begging the question, and not proving the point. Add to this, that as weeds, since the curse, grow even in fields sown wdth the best wheat, so vice, since the fall, grows in the midst of the best examples, and the most excellent, education : witness the barbarous crimes committed by pious Jacob's children, and penitent Adam's eldest son. Y. ''But if Cain sinned," say our object- ors, "and all mankind sin also, it is no more than Adam himself once did by his own free choice, though he was created as exempt from original depravity as an angel. What need is there then to suppose that he communicated to his posterity an inbred proneness to sin ? " To this I reply: it is not one accident or single event, but a continual repetition of the same event, that proves a proneness. If a man, who is perfectly in his senses, by some unforeseen accident falls into a fit of madness, we may accoujit for his misfortune from that accident ; and no certain judgment can be formed of the bodily habit of his family. But if all his children, through a hundred generations, are not only Eubject to the same n^ ad f^ts. but also die in conse- PART m.] MATTER OF FACT, 123 quence of them, in all sorts of climates, and under all sorts of physicians, common sense will not allow us to doubt, that it is now a family disorder, incurable by human art. The man is Adam, the family mankind, and the madness sin. Reader, you are desired to make the application. TWENTY-THIRD ARGUMENT. "But all are not employed in sin and wickednesp, for many go through a constant round of innocent diversions ; and these, at least, must be innocent and happy." Let us then consider the amusements of mankind: or, rather, without stopping to look at the wise dance of the Israelites round the golden calf, and the modest, sober, and humane diversions of the heathens, in the festivals of their lewd, drunken, and bloody gods, let us see how far our own pleasures demon strate the innocence and happiness of man- kind. How excessively foolish are the plays of children ! How full of mischief and cruelty the sports of boys ! How vain, foppish, and frothy the joys of young people ! And how much below the dignity of upright, pure creatures, the snares that persons of different sexes perpetually lay for each other ! When they are together, is not this their favorite amusement, till they are deservedly caught 124 AN APPEAL TO [PART IH. in the net which they imprudently spread ? But see them asunder. Here, a circle of idle women, supping a decoction of Indian herbs, talk or laugh all together, like so many chirping birds or chattering monkeys, and, scandal excepted, every way to as good purpose ; and there, a club of grave men blow, by the hour, clouds of stinking smoke out of their mouth, or wash it down their throat with repeated draughts of intoxicating liquors . The strong fumes have already reached their heads ; and while some stagger home, others triumph- antly keep the held of excess; though one is already stamped with the heaviness of the ox, another worked up to the fierceness and roar of the lion, and a third brought down to the filthiness of the vomiting dog. Leave them at their manly sport to follow those musical sounds, mixed with a noise of stamping, and you will find others profusely perspiring, and violently fatiguing them- selves, in skipping up and down a room for a whole night, and ridiculously turning their backs and faces to each other a hundred different ways. Would not a man qf sense prefer running ten miles upon a useful er- rand, to this useless manner of losing his rest, heating his blood, exhausting his spir- its, unfitting himself for the duties of the following day, and laying the foundation of a putrid fever or a consumption, by breath- PAET in.] MATTER OF FACT. 125 ing the midnight air coriTipted by clouds of dust, by the unwholesome fames of candles, and by the more pernicious steam that issues from the bodies of many persons, who use a strong exercise in a confined place? In the next room, indeed, they are more quiet; but are they more rationally em- ployed? Why do they so earnestly rattle those ivory cubes, and so anxiously study those packs of loose spotted leaves ? Is hap- piness graven upon the one, or stamped up- on the other? Answer, ye gamesters, who curse your stars as ye go home, with an empty purse and a heart foil of rage. " We hope there is no harm in taking an innocent game at cards," reply a ridiculous party of superannuated ladies ; " gain is not our aim, we only play to kill time." You are not, then, so well employed as the fool- ish heathen emperor, who amused himself in killing troublesome flies and wearisome time together. The delight of rational crea- tures, much more of Christians on the brink of the gi'ave, is to redeem, improve, and solidly enjoy time; but yours, alas! con- sists in the bare, irreparable loss of that in- valuable treasure! O, what account will 3^ou give of the souls you neglect, and the talents you bury ! And shall we kill each day ! If trifling kill, Sure vice must b\itcher. 0 ! what heaps of slain Call out for vengeance on us ! Time destroy'd Is suicide, where more than blood is spilt. — Youno. i^ AN APPEAL TO [part 111. And are public diversions better evidences of our innocence and happiness I Let rea- son decide. In cities, some are lavish of the gold which should be laid by for payment of their debts, or the relief of the poor, to buy an opportunity of acting, under a mask, an impertinent or immodest part without a blush; and others are guilty of the same injustice or prodigality, that they may be entitled to the honor of waiting upon a company of idle bufibons, and seeing them act what would make a modest woman blush, or hearing them speak what persons of true piety, or pure morals, would gladly pay them never to utter. Are country amusements more rational and innocent? What shall we say of those Christian, or rather heathenish festivals, called wakes, annually kept in honor of the saint to whom the parish church was form- ally dedicated? Are they not celebrated with the idleness, vanity, and debauchery of the floMia — with the noise, riots, and frantic mirth of the bacchanals — rather than with the decent solemnity, pious cheerful- ness, and strict temperance, which charac- terize the religion of the holy Jesus ? The assizes are held, the judge passes an awful sentence of transportation or death upon guilty wretches who stand, pale and trembling, before his tribunal ; and twenty couple of gay gentlemen and ladies, as if i»ART m.] MATTER OF FACT. l2t they rejoiced in the infamy and destruction of their fellow-mortals, dance all night, per-^ haps in the very apartment where the dis- tracted victims of justice a few hours before wrung their hands and rattled their irons ! The races are advertised — all tlie country is in motion — neither business, rain, nor storm, can prevent thousands from running for miles, and sometimes through the worst of roads, to feast tlieir eyes upon the danger of their fellow-creatures, and divert them- selves with the misery of the most useful animals. Daring mortals hazard their necks upon swift coursers, which are tortured by the severest lashes of the whip, and inces- sant pricks or tearing gashes of the spur, that they may exert their utmiost force, strain every nerve, and make continued efforts even beyond the powers of nature ; whence — to say nothing of the fatal accidents, which yet, alas ! too frequently happen — • they sometimes pant aw^ay their wretched lives in a bath of sweat and blood ; and all this, that they may afford a barbarous pleas- m-e to their idle, wanton, and barbarous beholders. In one place, the inhuman sport is afforded by an unhappy bird, fixed at a distance, that the sons of cruelty may long exercise their merciless skill in its lingering and painful destruction, or by two of them trained up and high fed for the battle. The hour fixed 128 A^ APPE^vL TO [part m. for the obstinate engagement is come; and, as if it was not enough that they should pick other's eyes out with the strong bills nature has given them, human malice, or rather diabolical cruelty, comes to the assistance of their native fierceness. Silver spurs, or steel talons, sharper than those of the eagle, are barbarously fastened to their feet ; thus armed, they are excited to leap at each other, and, in a hundred repeated onsets, to tear their feathers and flesh as if they were contending vultures; and if, at last, one, blinded, covered with blood and wounds, and unable to stand any longer the metalic claws of his antagonist, enters into the ago- nies of death, the numerous ring of stamp- ing, clapping, shouting, eagerly-betting, or iiorribly-cursing spectators, is as highly de- lighted as if the tortured, dying creature was the common enemy of mankind. In another place, a mulitude of spectators is delightfully entertained by two brawny men, who unmercifully knock one another down, as if they were oxen appointed for the slaughter, and continue the savage play till one, with his flesli bruised and his bones shattered, bleeding and gasping as in the pangs of death, yields to his antagonist, and thus puts an end to the shocking sport. But it is, perhaps, a difierent spectacle that recommends itself to the bloody taste of our baptized heathens. Fierce dogs are J»AET in.] MA-rrEK of fact. 129 excited by fiercer men, with fury to fasten upon the nose, or tear out the eyes, of a poor confined animal, which pierces the sky with its painful and lamentable bellowings, enough to force compassion from the heart of barbarians not totally lost to all sense of humanity; while, in the mean time, the surrounding savage mob rend the very hea- vens with the most horrid imprecations and shouts of applauding joy; sporting them- selves with that very misery which human nature^were it not deploi*ably corrupted — ■ would teach them to alleviate.* These are thy favorite amusements, O England, thou center of the civilized world, * " I ever thouglit," says Judge Hale, in his Contem- plations, "that there is a certain degree of justice due from man to the creatures, as from man to man ; and that an excessive use of the creature's labor is an injus- tice for which he must account. I have, therefore, al- ways esteemed it as a part of my duty, and it has always been my practice, to be merciful to my beasts ; and upon the same account I have declined any cruelty to ■any of thy creatures, and, as much as I might, prevent- ed it in others as a tyranny. I have abhorred those sports that consist in the torturing of thy creatures ; and if any noxious creature must be destroyed, or crea- tures for food must be talten, it has been mv practice to do it in the manner that may be with the least torture or cinielty to the creature ; ever remembering that though God has given us a dominion over his creatures, yet it is under a law of justice, prudence, and moderation ; otherwise we should become tyrants and not lords over God's creatures ; and therefore those things of this na- ture, which others have practiced as recreations, I have avoided as sins." 130 AN APPEAL TO [PAKT III. where reformed Cliristiaiiity, deep -thinking wisdom, and p'.>llte haming, with all its re- finements, liave fixed their abode! But, in the name of common sense, how can we clear them from the imputation of absurdity, folly, and madness? And by what means can they be reconciled, I will not say to the religion of the meek Jesus, but to the phi- losophy of a Flato, or calm reason of any thinking man ? How perverted must be the taste, how irrational and cruel the diver- sions of barbarians in other parts of the globe ! And how applicable to all the wise man's observation: "Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child, and madness in the breasts of the sons of men." TWENTY-FOURTH ARGUMENT. The total corruption of our nature ap- pears not only in the inclination of mankind to pursue irrational and cruel amusements, but in their general propensity to commit the most unprofitable, ridiculous, inhuman, impious, and diabolical sins. 1. The most unprofitable; for instance, that of sporting in profane oaths and curses, with the tremendous name of the supreme Being. Because of swearing the land mourneth, said a prophet, thousands of years ago ; and what land, even in Christendom, yea, what parish in this reformed island mourns not, or ought not to mourn, for the PARt m.J MATTER OF FACT. 131 same provoking crime? a crime which is the hellish offspring of practical Atheism and heathenish insolence — a crime that brings neither profit, honor, nor pleasure to the profane wretch who commits it— a crime for which he may be put to open shame, forced to appear before a magistrate, and sent for ten days to the house of correction, unless he pays an ignominious fine; and w^hat is more awful still, a crime which, if persisted in, will one day cause him to gnaw liis impious tongue in the severest torments. Surely man, who drinks this insipid, and yet destructive iniquity like water, must have his moral taste strangely vitiated, not to say diabolically perverted. 2. The most ridiculous sins. In what country, town, or village, do not women be- tray their silly vanity ? Is it not the same foolish disposition of heart, which makes them bore their ears in Europe, and slit their noses in America, that they may unnaturally graft in their fiesh pieces of glass, shining pebbles, glittering gold, or trink:ets of mean- er metals? And when female Hottentots fancy they add to the importance of their filthy person by some yards of the bloody intestines of a beast twisted round their arms or necks, do they not evidence the very spirit of the ladies in our hemisphere, who too often measure their dignity by the yards of colored silk bands with which they crown 132 AN APPEAL TO [PAET Itt. themselves, and turn the grave matron into a pitifiil May queen ! 3. The most inhuman sins. " A hundred thousand mad animals, whose heads are covered with hats," says Yoltaire, " advance to kill, or to be killed, by a like number of their fellow-mortals, covered with turbans. By this strange procedure, they want, at best to decide whether a tract of land, to which none of them all lays any claim, shall belong to a certain man whom they call Sultan, or to another whom they name Cesar, neither of whom ever saw, or will see, the spot so furiously contended for; and very few of those creatures who thus mutually butcher one another, ever beheld the animal for whom they cut each other's throats. From time immemorial this has been the way of mankind almost over all the earth. What an excess of riiadness is this! And how deservedly might a superior Being crush to atoms this earthly ball, the bloody nest of such ridiculous murderers ! " The same author makes elsewhere the following reflections on the same melan- choly subject. "Famine, pestilence, and war, are the three most famous ingredients of this lower world. The two first come from God ; but the last, in which all three concur, comes from the imagination of princes or ministers. A king fancies that he has a right to a distant province. He rAET m.] MATTER OF FACT. 133 raises a multitude of men, who have nothing to do, and nothing to lose, gives them a red coat and a laced hat, and makes them wheel to the right, and wheel to the left, and march to glory. Five or six of these bellig- erent powers sometimes engage together, three against three, or two against four ; but whatever part they take, they all agree in one point — which is, to do their neighbor all possible mischief. The most astonishing thing belonging to their infernal undertak- ing is, that every ringleader of those murder- ers gets his colors consecrated and solemnly blessed in the name of God, before he marches up to the destruction of his fellow- creatm'es. If a chief warrior has had the good fortune of getting only two or three thousand men shiughtered, lie does not think it worth while to thank God for it ; but if ten thousand have been destroyed by fire and sword, and it, to complete his good for- tune, some capital city has been totally overthrown, a day of public thanksgiving is appointed on the joyful occasion. Is not that a fine art which carries such desolation through the earth, and one year with another, destroys forty thousand men out of a hun- dred thousand ! " 4. The most impious sins; for instance, that of idolatry. '^ Before the coming of Christ," says a late divine, " all the polite and barbarous nations among the heathens 134 AN APPEAL TO [PART III. plunged into ii with equal blindness. And the Jews were so strongly wedded to it, that God's miraculous interposition, both by dreadful judgments and aston'shing mer- cies, could not for eight hundred years re- strain them from committing it in the grossest manner." Nor need we look at either heathens or Jews, to see the proneness of mankind to that detestable crime: Christians alone can prove the charge. To this day, the greatest part of them pray to dead men and dead women, bow to images of stone and crosses of wood, and make, adore, and swallow down the wafer god ; and those who pity them for this ridiculous idolatry, till convert- ing grace interposes, daily set up their idols in their hearts, and, without going to the plain of Dura, sacrifice all to the king's golden image. And, 5. The most diabolical sin : perse- cution, that favorite offspring of Satan, transformed into an angel of light. Perse- cution, that bloody, hypocritical monster, which carries a Bible, a liturgy, and a bun- dle of canons, in one hand, with fire, fagots, and all the weapons invented by cnielty in the other; and with sanctified looks, dis- ti-esses, racks, or murders men, either be- cause they love God or because they can not all think alike. PART III.] MATTER OF FACT. l85 Time would fail to tell of those who, on religions aecoiints, have been stoned and sawn asunder by the Jews, cast to the lions and burnt by the heathens, strangled and impaled by the Mohammedans, and butch- ered in all manner of ways by the Christians. Yes, we must confess it. Christian Eome hath glutted herself with the blood of mar- tyrs, which heathenish Rome had but com- paratively tasted ; and when Protestants fled from her bloody pale, they brought along with them too much of her bloody spirit: prove the sad assertion, poor Servetus. When Romish inquisition had forced thee to fly to Geneva, what reception didst thou meet with in that reformed city ? Alas ! the Papists had burned thee in effigy, the Pro- testants burned thee in reality, and Moloch triumphed to see the two o^Dposite parties agree in oflering him tlie human sacrifice. So universally restless is the spirit of persecution, which inspires the unrenewed pait of mankind, that when people of the same religion have no outward opposer to tear, they bark at, bite, and devour one another. Is it not the same bitter zeal that made the Pharisees and Saducees among the Jews, and now makes the sects of Ali and Omar among the Mohammedans, those of the Jasenists and Molinists among the Papists, and those of the Calvinists and Armiuians 136 AN APPEAL TO [pART m. among the Protestants, oppose each other with such acrimony and virulence? But let us look around us at home. "When persecuting Popery had almost expired in the fires in which it burned our first church- men, how soon did those who survived them commence persecutors of the Presby- terians ? When these, forced to fly to Kew England for rest, got there the staff of pow- er in their hand, (Ed they not, in their turn, fall upon, and even hang the Quakers? And now that an act of toleration binds the mon- ster, and the lash of pens, consecrated to the defense of our civil and religious liberties-, makes him either afraid or ashamed of roar- ing aloud for his prey, does he not show, by his supercilious looks, malicious sneers, and settled contempt of vital piety^ what he would do should an opportunity offer? And does he not still, under artful pretenses, go to the utmost length of his chain, to wound the reputation of those whom he can not de- vour, and inflict at least* academic death upon those whose person is happily secured from his rage? O, ye unconverted among mankind, if all these abominations every-where break out upon you, what cages of unclean birds, what nests swarming with cruel vipers, are your deceitfiil and desperately-wicked hearts I * See Pietas Oxoniensis. •ART III.] MATTER OF FAGl'. 137 TWENTY-FIFITI ARGUMENT. How dreadfully fallen is man, if he has not only a propensity to commit the above- mentioned sins, but to transgress the Divine commands with a variety of shocking ag- gravations! Yes, mankind are prone to sin: I. Immediately, by a kind of evil instinct; as children wh-o peevishly strike tlie -very breast they suck, and betray the rage of their little hearts by sobbing and swelling some- times till, by forcing their bowels out of their place, they bring a rupture upon them- selves ; and frequently till they are black in the face, and almost suiFocated. II. Delib- erately ; as those who, having life and death clearly set before them, willfully, obstinately, choose the way that leads to certain destruc- tion. III. Repeatedly; witness liars, who, because their crime costs them but a breath, frequently commit it at every breath. IV. Continually; as rakes, who would make their whole life one uninterrupted scene of debauchery, if their exhausted strength, or purse, did not force them to intermit their lewd practices, though not without a prom- ise to renew them again at tlie first conve- nient opportunity. Y. Treacherously; as those Christians who forget Divine mercies, and their own repeated resolutions, break 138 AN APPEAL TO [PART III. through the solemn vows and promises made in then' sacraments, and, sinning with a high hand against their profession, perfidi- ously fly in the face of their cojiscience, the Church, and their Savior. VL Daringly ; as those who steal under the gallows, openly insult their parents or their king, laugh at all laws, human and divine, and put at defi- ance all that are invested with power to see them executed. YIL Triumphantly; as the vast " number of those who glory in their shame, sound aloud the trumpet of their own wickedness, and boast of their horrid, repeated debaucheries, as admirable and praiseworthy deeds. VIII. Progressively; till they have filled up the measure of their iniquities, as individuals; witness Judas, who, from covetousness, proceeded to hy- pocrisy, theft, treason, despair, and self- murder; or, as a nation, witness the Jews, who, after despising and killing their proph- ets, rejected the Son of God, affirmed he was mad, stigmatized him with the name of deceiver, said he was Beelzebub himself, offered him all manner of indignities, bought his blood, prayed it miglit be on tliem and their children, rested not till they had put the Prince of Life to the most ignominious death, and, horrible to say ! made sport with the groans which rent the rocks around them, and threw the earth into convulsions under their feet. IX. Unnaturally ; I . By PART in.J MATTER OF FACT. ISS astonishing barbarities, as the women who murder their own children, the Greeks and Romans, who exposed them to be the living prey of wild beasts, the savages, who knocK their aged parents on the head, the canni- bals, who roast and eat their prisoners of war, aud some revengeful people, who, to taste all the sweetness of their devilish pas- sion, have murdered their enemy, and eaten up his liver and heart. 2. By the most diabolical superstitions; as the Israelites who, when they had learned the works of the heathenSjSacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils, and, by the horrible practices of witchcraft, endeavored to raise, and deal with infernal spirits; and 3. By the most preposterous gratification of sense ; witness the incests* and rapes committed in this land, the infamous fii'es which drew fire and brimstone down from heaven upon ac- cursed cities, and the horrid lusts of the Canaanites — though, alas ! not confined to » The reason which engaged the publisher of these sheets to preach to some of the colliers in his neighbor- hood, was the horrid length they went in immorality. One of them, whose father was hanged, upon returning himself from transportation, in cold blood, attempted to ravish his own daughter in the presence of his own wife, and was just prevented from completing his crime, by the utmost exertion of the united strength of the mother and child. When brutish ignorance and hea- thenish wickedness break out into such uimatuial enor- mities, who would not break through the hedge of canonical regularity ? 140 AN APPEAL TO [PART Ili. Canaan — which gave birth to the laws re- corded, Lev. xvii. 7, 23, and xx. 16 * — laws that are at once the disgrace of mankind, and the proof of my assertion. X. What is most astonishing of all, by apostasy; as those who, having begun in the spirit, and tasted the bitterness of repentance, the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, make shipwreck of the faith, deny the Lord that bought them, account the blood of the covenant, wherewith they were sanctified, an unlioly thing, and so scandal- ously end in the flesh, that they are justly compared to trees withered, plucked up by the roots, twice dead, and to raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever. Good God ! what line can fathom an abyss of cori-uption, the overflowings of which are more or less attended with these multiplied and shocking aggravations? TWENTY-SIXTH ARGUMENT. If the force of a torrent may be known by the hight and number of the banks which it overflows, the strength of this corruption will be rightly estimated from the high and * In the last century, an Irish bishop was cleai'ly convicted of the crime forbidden in those laws, and suf- fered death for it. PART III.] MATTER OF FACT. 141 numerous dikes raised to stem it, which it nevertheless continually breaks through. Ignorance and debaucheiy, injustice and impiety, in all their shapes, still overspread the whole earth, notwithstanding innumera- ble means used in all ages to suppress and prevent them. The almost total extirpation of mankind by the deluge, the fiery showers that con- sumed Sodom, the ten Eg}^ptian plagues, the entire excision of whole nations who were once famous for their wickedness, the captivities of the Jews, the destruction of thousands of cities and kingdoms, and mill- ions of more private judgments, never fully stopped immorality in any one country. The strikiug miracles wrought by proph- ets, the alarming sermons preached by di- vines, the infinite number of good books published in almost all languages, and the founding of myriads of churches, religious houses, schools, colleges, and universities, have not yet caused impiety to hide its bra- zen face anywhere. The making of all sorts of excellent laws, the appointing of magis- trates and judges to put them in force, the forming of associations, for the reformation of manners, the filling of thousands of pris- ons, and erecting of millions of racks and gallowses, have not yet suppressed one vice. And what is most amazing of all, the life, miracles, suflerings, death, and heavenly 142 AN APPEAL TO [PAET III. doctrine of the Son of God ; the labors, wri- tings, and martyrdom of his disciples ; the example and entreaties of millions that have lived and died in the faith ; the inexpressi^ ble horrors and frightful warnings of tliou- sands of wicked men, who have testified in their last moments, that they had worked out their damnation, and were just going to their own place ; the blood of nn^riads of martyrs, the strivings of the Holy Spirit, the dreadful curses of the law, and the glorious promises of the Gospel — all these means to- gether have not extirpated immorality and profaneness out of one single town or vil^ lage in all the world ; no, nor out of one single family for any length of time. And this will probably continue to be the des- perate case of mankind, till the Lord lays to his powerful hand ; seconds these means by the continued strokes of the sword of his Spirit ; pleads by fire and sword with all flesh, and, according to his promise, causes rigteousness to cover the earth, as the wa- ters cover the sea. Is not this demonstration founded on mat- ter of fact, that human corruption is not only deep as the ocean, but impetuous as an overflowing river which breaks down all its banks, and leaves marks of devastation in every place? This will still appear in a clearer light, if we consider the strong op- position which our natural depravity makes to divine grace in the unconverted. PAET m.] MATTER OF FACT. 143 TWENTY- SEVENTH AEQUMENT. When the Lord, by the rod of affliction, the sword of the Spirit, and the power of his grace, attacks the hard heart of a sinner, how obstinately does he resist the sharp, though gracious operation ! To make an honorable and vigorous defense, he puts on the shining robes of his formality ; he stands firm in the boasted armor of his moral pow- ers ; he daubs with untempered mortar the ruinous wall of his conduct ; with self-right- eous resolutions, and pharisaic professions of vii'tue, he builds, as he thinks, an im- pregnable tower ; must ers and draws up in battle array his poor works, artfully putting in the tront those that make the hnest ap- pearance, and carefully concealing the vices which he can neither disguise nor dress up in the regimentals of virtue. In the meantime he prepares the carnal weapons of his wartare, and raises the bat- tery of a multitude of objections to silence the truth that begins to gall him. He af- firms '' the preachers of it are deceivers and madmen," till he sees the Jews and heath- ens fixed even upon Christ and St. Paul the very same opprobrious names ; he calls it a "new doctrine," till he is obliged to ac- knowledge that it is as old as the reformers, the apostles, and the prophets ; he says " it 144: AN APPEAL TO [PART HI* is fancy, delusion, enthusiasm," till the blessed effects of it on true believers con- strain him to drop the trite and slanderous assertion ; he declares that " it drives peo- ple out of their senses, or makes them mel- ancholy," till he is compelled to confess that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and that none are so happy and joyfiil as those who truly love and zealously serve God ; he urges that '^ it destroys good works," till a sight of the readiness of be- lievers, and of his own backwardness to perform them, makes him ashamed of the groundless accusation; he will tell you twen- ty times over, '' there is no need of so much ado," till he discovers the folly of being careless on the brink of eternal ruin, and observes that the nearness of temporal dan- ger puts him upon the utmost exertion of all his powers. Perhaps, to get himself a name among his profane companions, he lampoons the Scriptures, or casts out firebrands and arrows against the despised disciples of Je- sus : " They are all poor, illiterate," says he, "fools or knaves, cheats and hypocrites," etc., till the word of God stops his mouth, and he sees himself the greatest hypocrite with whom he is acquainted. When by such heavy chai'ges he has long kept off the truth from his heart, and the servants of God from his company, this kind of ammunition begins to fail ; and he bari- PART m.] MAITEK OF FACT. 145 cades himself with the fear of being undone in his circumstances, till experience con- vinces him that no good thing shall God withhold from them that live a godly life, and that all things shall be added to them who seek first the kingdom of God. He then hides himself in the crowd of the un- godly, and says, '' if he perishes, many will share the same fate," till he sees the glaring absurdity of going to hell for the sake of company. He shelters, at last, under the protection of the rich, the great, the learned despisers of Christ and the cross, till the mines of their wickedness springing on all sides around him, makes him fly to the sanctuary of the Lord ; and there he sees the ways and undei-stands the end of these men. When all his batteries are silenced, and a breach is made in his conscience, he looks out for some secret way to leave Sodom, without being taken notice of, and derided by those who fight under Satan's banner; and the fear of being taken for one of them that fly from the wrath to come, and openly take the part of a holy God against a sinM world, pierces him through with many sor- rows. Are the outworks taken, has he been forced to part with his gross immoralities, he has generally recourse to a variety of stratagems. Sometimes he publicly dis- 10 146 AN APPEAL TO [pART m. misses Satan's garrison — fleshly lusts which war against the godly, and keep under the ungodly soul ; but it is only to let them in again secretly, either one by one or with forces seven times greater, so that his last state is worse than the first. At other times he hoists up the white flag of truth, appar- ently yields to conviction, favors the minis- ters of the Gospel, admits the language of Canaan, and warmly contends for evangeli- cal doctrines ; but, alas ! the place has not surrendered, his heart is not given to God; spiritual wickedness, under fair ahows of zeal, still keeps possession for the god of this world ; and the shrewd hypocrite artfully imitates the behavior of a true Israelite, just as Satan transforms himself to an angel of light. Is he at last deeply convinced, that the only means of escaping destruction and capitulating to advantage is, to deliver up the traitor sin ! Yet what a long parley does he hold about it ! . What a multitude of plausible reasons does he advance to put it off from day to day 1 " He is yet young — the Lord is merciful — all have their foibles — • we are here in an imperfect state' — it is a little sin — it may be consistent with loyalty to God — it hurts nobody but himself — many pioiiri men were once guilty of it — by and by he will repent as they did," etc. When louder summons and increasing fears com- PABT m.] MATTEB OF FACT. 147 pel him to renounce the lusts of the flesh, how strongly does he plead for those of the mind ! And after he has given up his bo- som sin with his lips, how treacherously does he hide it in the inmost recesses of his heart ! Never did a besieged town dispute the ground with such obstinacy, and hold out by such a variety of stratagems, as corrupt man stands it out against the repeated at- tacks of truth and grace. K he yields at all, it is seldom before he is brought to the greatest extremity. He feeds on the dust of the earth : he tries to till his soul with the husks of vanity, and fares hard on sounds, names, forms, opinions, withered experience, dry notions of faith, and empty professions of hope, and fawning shows of love, till the mighty famine arises, and the intolerable want of substantial bread forces him to sur- render at discretion, and without reserve. Some stand it out thus against the God of their salvation ten or twenty years ; and others never yield till the terrors of death storm their affighted souls, their last sick- ness batters down their tortured bodies, and the poison of the arrows of the Almighty drinks up their wasted spirits. What a strong proof is this of the inveteracy and the obstinacy of our corruption ! 148 AN APPEAL TO [PART IfT. TWENTY-EIGHTH ARGIJMENT. But a still stronger may be drawn from the amazing struggles of God's children with their depravity, even after they have, through grace, powerfully subdued, and glo- riously triumphed over it. Their Redeemer himself is the Captain of their salvation; they are embarked with him and bound for heaven ; they look at the compass of God's word; they hold the rudder of sincerity; they crowd all the sails of their good reso- lutions, and pious affections, to catch the gales of Divine assistance; they exhort one another daily, to ply the oars of faith and prayer with watchful industry ; tears of deep repentance and fervent desire often bedew their faces in the pious toil; they would rather die than draw back to perdition ; but, alas ! the stream of corruption is so impetu- ous, that it often prevents their making any sensible progress in their spiritual voyage ; and if in an unguarded hour they drop the oar, and faint in the work of faith, the pa- tience of hope, or the labor of love, tli ey are presently carried down into the dead sea of religious formality, or the wdiirjpools of scandalous wickedmss. Witness the luke- warmness of the Laodiceans — the adulteiy of David — 'the perjury of Peter — the final apostasy of Judas, and tlie shameful flight of all tiie disciples. PART m.] MATTER OF FACT. 149 TWENTY-NINTH AKGUMENT. When evidences of the most opposite in- terest agree in their deposition of a matter of fact, its truth is greatly corroborated. To the last argument, taken from some sad ex- periences of God's people, I shall, therefore, add one drawu from the religious rites of Paganism, the confessions of ancient hea- thens, and the testimony of modern Deists. When the heathens made their temples stream with the blood of slaughtered heca- tombs, did they not often explicitly depre- cate the wrath of Heaven and impending destruction ? And was it not a sense of their guilt and danger, and a hope that the pun- ishment they deserved might be transferred to their bleeding victims, which gave birth to their numerous expiatory and propitiatory sacrifices? If this must be granted, it is plain those sacrifices were so many proofs that the considerate heathens were not utter strangers to their corruption and danger. Bui let them speak their own sentiments. Not to mention their allegorical fables of Prometheus, who brought a curse upon earth by stealing fire out of heaven, and of Pan- dora, whose fatf^l curiosity let all sorts of woes and diseases loose upon mankind, does not Ovid, in his Metamorphoses, give a striking account of the fall and its dreadful consequences? Read his description of the 150 AN APPEAL TO [part IH. golden age, and you see Adam in Paradise ; proceed to the iron age, and you behold the horrid picture of our consummate wicked- ness. II' the ancients had no idea of that native propensity to evil which we call original depravity, what did Plato mean by our nat- ural wickedness?* And Pythagoras, by the fatal companion, the noxious strife that lurks within us, and was born along with us ? f Did not Solon take for his motto the well-known saying which, though so much neglected now, was formerly written in gol- den capitals over the door of Apollo's tem- ple at Delphos, Know thyself? J Are we not informed by the heathen historians that Socrates, the prince of the Greek sages, ac- knowledged lie was naturally prone to the grossest vices ? Does not Seneca, the best of the Roman philosophers, observe. We are born in such a condition, that we are not subject to fewer disorders of the mind than of the body?§ Yea, that all vices are * Kakia en phusei. Hence that excellent definition of true religion. Therapeia psuches. The cure of a dis- eased soul. t Eurethre gar sunopados eris hlaptousa leletheu Sumphtuos. Aur. Carm. { Gnothi seauton. § Hac conditione nati suraus. Animalia obnoxia noi> paiicioribus animi quara corporis morbis. PART III.] MAITER OF FACT. 151 in all men, though they do not break out in every one : * and that to confess them is the beginning of our cure?t And had not Cicero lamented before Seneca, that men are brought into life by nature as a step-mother, with a naked, frail, and infirm body, and a soul prc>ue to divers lusts ? Even some of the sprightliest poets bear their testimony to the mournful truth I con- tend for. Propertius could say. Every body has a vice to which he is inclined by na- ture.J Horace declared, that no man is born free from vices, and that he is the best man who is oppressed with the least ;§ that mankind rush into wickedness, and always desire what is forbidden ; || that youth hath the softness of wax to receive vicious im- pressions, and the hardness of a rock to re- sist virtuous admonitions ;•[[ in a word, that we are mad enough to attack heaven itself, and that our repeated crimes do not suffer * Onmia in omnibus vitia sunt, sed non omi>ia in singulis extant. t Vitia sua confiteri sanitatis principium est. $ Unicuique dedit vitium natura creato. § Nam vitiis nemo sine nascitur, optitnus ille est. Qui minimis urgttur. II Gens humana ruit per vetitum nefas, Nitimur in vetiLum semper cupimusque negata. If Cereus in vititum flccti, monitoribus asper. 152 AN APPEAL TO [PART m. the God of heaven to lay by his wrathful thunderbolts.* And Juvenal, as if he had understood what St. Paul says of the carnal mind, af- firms that nature, unchangeably fixed, tends, yea, runs back to wickedness, as bodies to their center. f Thus the very depositions of the heathens, in their lucid intervals, as well as their sac- rifices, prove the depravity and danger of mankind. And so does liKewise the testi- mony of some of our modern Deistical philosophers. The ingenious author of a book called Philosophical Inquiries concerning the Americans, informs us, it is a custom among some Indians, that as soon as the wife is de- livered of a child, the husband must take to his bed, where he is waited on by the poor woman who should have been brought there ; and that to this day, the same ridic- ulous custom prevails in some parts of Prance. ''From this and other instances," says our Inquirer, "we may collect that, howevtT men may differ in other points, there is a most striking contbrmity among them in absurdity ^ * Ccelum ipsum petiinus stultitia ; neque Per nostrum patiraur scelus Iracunda Jovem ponere fulinina. fAd mores natiira recurrit Damnatos. fixa et mutari nescia. PART ra.] MATTER OF FACT. 153 The same philosopher, who is by no means tainted with what some persons are pleased to call enthusiasm, confirms the doctrine of our natural depravity by the following an- ecdote, and the ironical observation with which it is closed. The Esquimaux — the wildest and most sottish people in all Amer- ica— call themselves men, and all other na- tions barbarians. "Human vanity, we see, thrives equally well in all climates ; in Lab- rador as in Asia. Beneficent nature has dealt out as much of this comfortable qual- ity to a Greenlander, as to the most con- summate French petit maitre." The following testimony is so much more striking, as it comes from one of the great- est poets, philosophers, and Deists of this present fi-ee-thinking age. "Who can with- out horror consider the whole earth as the empire of destruction! It abounds in won- ders, it abounds also in victims ; it is a vast field of carnage and contagion. Every species is, without pity, pursued and torn to pieces through the earth, and air, and water. In man there is more wretchedness than in all other animals put together; he smai-ts continually under two scourges, which other animals never feel — anxiety, and a listless- ness in appetence, which makes him weary of himself. He loves life, and yet he knows that he must die. If he enjoys some tran- sient good, for which he is thankful to hea- 154 AN APPEAL TO [PAKT HI. ven, he suffers various evils, and is at last devoured by worms. This knowledge is his fatal prerogative : other animals have it not. He feels it every moment rankling and cor- roding in his breast. Yet he spends the transient moment of his existence in diffus- ing the misery that he suffers — in cutting the throats of his fellow-creatures for pay — > in cheating and in being cheated — in rob- bing and in being robbed — in serving that he may command, and in repenting of all that he does. The bulk of mankind are nothing more than a crowd of wretches, equally criminal and unfortunate, and the globe contains rather carcasses than men. I tremble, upon a review of this dreaM picture, to find that it implies a complaint against Providence, and I wish that I had never been born." — Voltaire's Gospel of the Day* - * Wild error is often the guide, and glaring contra- diction the badge, both of those who reject revelation, like Voltaire, and of those who indirectly set aside one- half of it, like the Pharisees and Antinomians around us. See a striking proof of it. This very author, in another book — 0 ! see what antichristian morality comes to — represents the horrible sin of Sodom as an excusa- ble mistake of nature, and assures us, that, " At the worst of times, there is at most upon the earth, one man in a thousand that can be called wicked." Now for the proof ! Hardly do we see one of those enormous crimes that shock human nature committed in ten years, at Rome, Paris, or London, those cities where the thirst of gain, which is the parent of all crimes, is carried to the highest pitch. If men were essentially wicked, we PAET m.] MATTER OF FACT. 165 THIRTIETH ARGUMENT. And yet, O strange infatuation! vain man will be wise, and wicked man pretends to be righteons ! Far from repenting in the dust, he pleads liis innoceiicw, and claims the re- wards of imaginary merit! Incredible as should find eveiy morning husbands murdered by their •wives, etc., as we do hens killed by foxes." According to this apostle of the Deistical world, it seems, that the most intense thirst of gold is no degree of wickedness ; that a woman to be very good, needs only not to cut her husband's throat while he is asleep ; and that it even little matters whether she omits the dire murder out of regard to his life, or her own. What moral philosophy is nere ! Why, if the sin of Sodom is a pecadillo, or frolicsome mistake, and nothing is wickedness but a treacherous cutting of a husband's or a parent's throat, I extend my charity four times beyond thee, 0 Voltaire, and do maintain that there is not one wicked man in five thousand. I insert this note to obviate the charges of severe crit- ics, who accuse me of di^aling in "gross misrepresenta- tions, false quotations, and forgeries," because I quote some authors, when they speak as the oracles of God ; and do not swell my book with their inconsistencies, when they contraaict the Scriptures, reason, and the truths which they themselves have advanced in some happy moments ; and because I cannot force my reason to maintain with them both sides of a glaring contra- diction. 0, ye Deistical moralists, let me meet with more can- dor, justice, and mercy from you, than I have done from the warm opposers of the second Gospel axiom. It is enough that you discard Scripture ; do not, like them, make it a part of your orthodoxy to murder reason , and kick common sense out of doors. 166 AN APPEAI. TO [part III. the assertion is, a thousand witnesses are ready to confirm it. Come forth, ye natural sons of virtue, who, with scornful boasts, attack the doc- trine of man's depravity ! To drown the whispers of reason and experience, sound each your own trumpet — thank God that you "are not as other men " — inform us you "have a good heart'' and "a clear con- science;" assure us, you "do your duty, your endeavors, your best endeavors," to please the Author of your lives ; vow you " never were guilty of any crime, never did any harm ; " and tell us, you hope to mount to heaven, on the strong pinions of your "good works and pious resolutions." vVhen you have thus acted the Pharisee's part before your fellow-creatures, go to your Creator, and assume the character of the publican. Confess with your lips, you are miserable sinners, who have done what you ought not to have done, and left undone what you ought to have done. Protest, there is no health in you ; complain that the re- membrance of your sins is grievous to you, and the burden of them intolerable. But remember, O ye self-righteous formalists, that by this glaring inconsistency you give the strongest proof of your unrighteousness. You are, nevertheless, modest, when com- pared with your brethren of the Romish Church. PART m.] MATTER OF FACT. 157 TheBe, far from thinking themselves un- profitable servants, fancy they are literally righteous over much. Becoming merit- mongers, they make a stock of their works of supererogation, set up shop with the righteousness they can spare to others, and expose to sale indulgences and pardons out of their pretended treasury. Nor are there wanting sons of Simon, who, with ready money, purchase, as they think, not livings in the Church below, but, what is far pre- ferable, seats in the Church above, and good places at the heavenly court. Was ever a robe of righteousness — I had almost said a fool's coat — so coarsely woven by the slaves of impostm'e and avarice ! And so dearly bought by the sons of superstition and credulity ! O, ye spiritual Ethiopians, who paint yourselves all over with the corroding white of hypocrisy, and, after all, are artful enough to lay on red paint, and imitate the blush of humble modesty — ye that borrow virtue's robes to. procure admiration, and put on re- ligion's cloak to hide your sliameful deform- ity— ^ye that deal in external righteousness, to carry on. with better success the most sordid of all trades, that of sin ; of the worst of sins, pride ; of the worst of pride, which is spiritual — ^ye numerous followers of those whom the prophet of Christians called crafty serpents, and soft brood of vipers — 158 AN APPEAL TO [PART IV. ye to whom he declared that publicans and harlots shall enter into the kingdom of hea- ven before you ; if I call you in last to prove the desperate wickedness of the human heart, it is not because 1 esteem you the weakest advocates of the truth I contend for, but because you really are the strongest of my witnesses. And now, candid reader, forget not plain matter of fact, recollect the evidence given by reason, pass sentence upon these last ar- guments which I have offered to thy consid- eration, and say, whether man's disposition and conduct to his Creator, his fellow-crea- tures, and himself, do not abundantly prove that he is by nature in a fallen and lost es- tate. FOURTH PART. The preceding arguments recommend themselves to the common sense of think- ing heathens, and the conscience of reason- able Deists, as being all taken from those two amazing volumes, which are open and legible to all — the world and man. The following are taken from a third volume, the Bible, despised by the wits of the age, merely because they study and understand it even less than the other two. PAJRT IV.] MATTER OF FACT. 169 THIRTY-FIRST ARGUMENT. The spiritual life of the soul consists in its union with God, as the natural life of the body does in its union with the soul : and as poison and the sword kill the latter, so unbelief and sin destroy the former. The fii-st man was endued with this two- fold life. God, says the divine historian, breathed into him the brtath of life, and he became a living body and a living soul ; he had both an annual life in common with beasts and a spiritual life in common with angels. St. Paul, who calls this angelical life the life of God, intimates that it consist- ed both in that experimental knowledge of our Creator, wherein " standeth our eternal life,^' and in righteousness and true holiness, the moral and most glorious image of the Supreme Being. To suppose man was created void of this essential knowledge and holy love, is to suppose he came very wicked out of the hands of the Parent of all good ; for what is a rational creatare that neither knows nor loves his Creator, but a monster of stupidity and ingratitude, a wretch actually dead to God, and deserving present destruction ? When the Lord therefore said to man, in the day that thou eatest thereof, that is, in tiie day that thou sinnest, thou ghalt surely 160 AN APPEAL TO [PAET IV. die, it was as if ho had said, '' in that very day sin shall assuredly separate betweei thee and the God of thy life ; thou shalt cer- tainly lose the glorious view which thou nast of my boundless goodness and and infinite perfections ; thou shalt infallibly quench the spirit of ardent love, and stop the breath of delightful praise, by which thou livest both to my glory and thy com- fort ; and thy soul, dead in trespasses and sins, shall remain in the filthy prison of a mortal body, till death breaks it open, to remove thee to thy own place." And was not this Adam's case after his fall 'i Did he not know that he was naked — stripped of the glorious image of his Cre- ator? Did not guilty shame immediately prompt him to hide and protect, as well as he could, his degenerate and enfeebled body ? Devoid of the ardent love he felt for God before, and of the pure delight he enjoyed in him, was not he left the wretched prey of tormenting fears ? Did he not evidence his hatred of his heavenly Benefactor, by dread- ing his voice, and flying from him as hasti- ly as he should have fled from the infernal serpent ? Was he not deprived of the knowledge by which, at fii-st sight, he discovered the na- ture of Eve, and gave to all living creatures names expressive of their respective proper- ties ? Was he not, I say, deprived of that PAiar IV.j MATTER OF FACT. 161 intuitive knowledge and excellent wisdom, when he foolishly hid himself among the trees from his all-seeing, omnipresent Crea- tor ? And is it not evident that he was lost to all sense of filial fear toward God, and conjugal love toward E^'e, when, instead of self-accusations, penitential confessions, and earnest pleas for mercy, he showed nothing ■at his trial but stubbornness, malice, and in- solence ? Such was the state of corruption into which Adam had deplorably fallen, before he multiplied the human species. Now, ac- cording to the invariable laws of Provi- dence, an upright, holy nature can no more proceed from a fallen, sinful one, than gentle lambs can be begotten by fierce tigers, or harmless doves b}^ venomous ser- pents. Common sense, therefore, and natural philosophy, dictate that our first parents could not communicate the angelical life which they had lost, nor impart to their children a better nature than their own, and that their depravity is as much ours by na- ture, as the fierceness. of the first lion is the natural property of all the lions in the world. FOUR OBJECTIONS. I. Should it be said, that " this doctrine reflects on the attributes of God, who, as the wise • and gracious Governor of the 11 162 AN Al'PEAL TO [PART tV world, should have foreseen and prevented the fall of Adam." I answer, 1. God made man in his image, part of which consists in free agency, or a power to determine his own actions. And if creating a free agent is not repngnant to Divine wisdom and goodness, the wrong choice, or sin of a free agent, can be no impeachment of those perfections in th<^ Deity.* * God answers thus for himself in Milton : Man will fall, He and his faithless progeny. Whose fault ? Whose but his own V Ingvate ! he had of me All he could have : I made him just and right ; Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall. Such I created all th' ethereal powers : Freely they stood who stood, and fell who fell. Not free, what proof could they have given sincere Of true allegia.nce, constant faith or love. Where only what they needs must do appear'd ; Not what they would ? What praise could they receive ? What pleasure I from such obedience paid, When will and reason, (reason also is choice,) Useless and vain, of freedom both despoiled. Made passive both, had served necessity, Not me ? They, therefore, as to right belong'd So were created, nor can justly, accuse Their Maker, or their making, or their fate. As if predestination overruled Their will, disposed by absolute decree, Or high foreknowledge. They themselves decreed Their own revolt, not I : if I foreknew. Fore knowledge had no influence on their fault, Which had no less proved certain unforeknown. Young expresses the same sentiment, with his pecu- liar boldness and energy. l*ARt IV.] MATTER OF FACT. 16^ 2. Suppose man liad not b^en endued with freedom of choice, he would only have ranked among admirable machines, and nothing could liave been more absurd than to place him in a state of probation. And suppose, when he was in that state divine Power had irresistibly turned the scale of his will to obedience, the trial w^ould have been prevented, and the counsel of divine "Wisdom foolishly defeated. 3. God did all that a wise and good rulet of rational and free creatures could do to prevent sin. He placed in Adam's heart a vigorous principle of holiness ; he gi'anted him sufficient strength to continue in obedi- ence: he indulged him with his blessed presence and converse to encourage him in the way of duty ; he strictly forbade him to sin ; he enforced the prohibition by the fear- ful threatening of death ; he promised to crown his continuance in holiness with a Blame not the bowels of the Deity : Man shall be bless'd as far as man permits. Not man alone, all ratioj)als, Heaven arms With an illustrious, but tremendous power, To counteract its own most gracious ends ; And this of strict necessity, not choice ; That power denied, man, angels were no more but passive engines, void of praise or blame. Heaven wills our happiness, allows our doom : Invites us ardently, but not compels : Heaven but persuades, almighty man decrees ; Man is the maker of immortal fates, Man falls by man, if finally he falls 164 AN APPEAL TO [PAET IV^ glorious immortality, and gave him the tree of life as a pledge of this inestimable bless- ing. . To have gone farther would have been entirely inconsistent with his wisdom ; an absolute restraint being as contrars^ to the liberty of a moral agent, and the nature of the divine law, as chaining down a harm- less mail that he may not commit murdef, is contrary to the freedom of Englishmen, and the laws of this realm. ]Nor can we, either with reason or decency, complain that God. did not make us absolutely immutable and perfect like himself; this is charging him with folly, for not enduing us with in- finite wisdom, and knowledge every way boundless ; that is, for not making us gods instead of men. 4. In case man fell. Divine mercy had decreed his recovery by Jesus Christ ; and when the Almighty Redeemer shall have brought life out of death, and light out of darkness, the mysterious drama of creation and redemption, of which we see but one or two acts, will appear, even to our objectors, every way worthy of its infinitely-wise and gracious Author. II. In the meantime, they will still urge that " Adam's posterity [then unborn] could not justly partake of the consequences of his transgression." But shall cavils over* throw matter of fact? Do not we see in every unrenewed person, the unbelief, pride^ PART IV.] MArrER OF FACT. 165 sinful curiosity, sensuality, and alienation from God, to which our lirst parents were subjected at their fall ? Do not women tear children -^ith sorrow as well as Eve ? Is the ground less cursed lor us than for Adam ; and do we not toil, suffer, and die, as he did? If this order of things were unjust, would the righteous God have permitted its continuance to the present time ? Besides, Adam contained in himself, as in miniature, all his posterity. The various nations of men are nothing but different branches growing from that original root. They are Adam, or man, existing at large ; as the branches of a spreading oak, with all the acorns that have grown upon, and drop- ped from them, during a long succession of summers, -are nothing but the original acorn, unfolding and multiplying itself with all its essential properties. It is, then, as ridicu- lous to w^onder that t4rc sons of depraved Adam should naturally be depraved, as that an acorn should naturally produce an oak, and a poisonous root a malignant plant. Again : Adam was the general head, representa- tive, and father of mankind ; and w^e suffer for his rebellion legally ; as the children of those who have sold themselves for slaves are born in a state of wretched slavery ; and as the descendants of a noble traitor lose the title by their ancestor's crime ; naturally, 166 AN APPEAL TO [PART IV. as the sons of a bankrupt suffer poverty for their father's extravagance, or as Gehazi's leprosy clave to him and his seed forever ; and unavoidably, as an unborn cl\ild shares the fate of his unhappy mother, when she inadvertently poisons, or desperately stabs herself. III. " But," say the same objectors, sup- posing it be granted, that we are naturally depraved, yet, if our depravity is natural, it is necessary ; and we are no more blamal3le for it than lions for their fierceness, or Ethi' opians for their black complexion." 1. Our objectors would not, I presume, be understood to insinuate, by blamable," that our depravity does not render us detestable in the eyes of a holy God, or that it is not in itselt blameworthy. Do they less dislike the complexion of the Ethiopians, or less detest the destructive rage of lions, because it is natm'al to them ?- If moral dispositions ceased to be worthy of praise or dispraise as soon as they are rooted, morally necessary, and in that sense natural, what absurd con sequences would follow ? Sinners would be come guiltless by arriving at complete im penitency ; and God could not be praised for his holiness, nor satan dispraised for hia sinfulness — holiness being as essential to God, by the absolute perfection of his na ture, as sin is morally necessary to the devil by the unconquerable habit which he ha* PART IV.] MATTER OF FACT. 167 willfiilly contracted, and in which he obsti- nately remains. 2. Should they mean, that " we are not answerable, or accountable for our deprav- ity," I reply, though 1 grant — which I am very far from doing * — that we are no way accountable for our moral infection, yet it can not be denied tl lat we are answerable for our obstinate refusal of relief, and for the willful neglect of the means found out by Divine mercy for our cure. Can we justly charge God with either our misfortune or our guilt ? Do not parents, by the law of nature, represent their unborn posterity ? K Adam ruined us by a common transgression, has not Christ, the second Adam, provided for us a common salvation? Jude 3: Heb. ii. 3. If, by the offense of one, [Adam,] * We can easily conceive how all men can be involved in tlie consequences of Adam's sin, so as to possess a depraved nature, inclined only to evil -without the grace of God ; but cannot receive the idea that personal guilt can be attached to any man for an act which transpired before he was born. " This is the condemnation ; that light has come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light." Man's guilt and final ruin are wholly in consequence 9f his own act, in obstinately rejecting the only saving remedy. Hence, strictly speak- ing, no one can be " accountable for his depravity " un- til he voluntarily endorses it by preferring it to the righteousness of Christ. By rejecting the offer of the gospel to pardon his sins and to cleanse him from all unrighteousness, he becomes accountable, not oidy for his sinful acts, but for the indwelling disposition which prompts to the acts. He might have a clean heart and a right spirit, but he pref'^rs the old depraved nature. — Ed. of Rev. Edition. 168 AN APPEAL TO [PART IV. judgment came upon all men to condemna- tion, by the righteousness of one, [Christ, } is not the free gift come upon all men to justification of life? Rom. v. 18. And since God has declared that the son shall bear the iniquity of the father beyond the short period of this transitory life, if any sufier after death, is it not entirely for their unbelief and peculiar sins?* Compare John iii. 18, 19, and Mark xiv. 16. But what follows completely vindicates our Cre- ator's goodness. 3. Do sin and misery abound by our fall in Adam ? Grace and glory abound much more by our own redemption in Jesus Christ. Rom. t. 20. And ''it mu«t be owing to our own perverseness, or our own negligence" — says the ingenius Hervey, with great truth — ^"if we do not levy a tax * Milton introduces God speaking thus to the Mes- siah: Man shall not quite be lost, but saved who wilU Yet not of will in him, but grace in me Freely vouchsafed : once more I will renew His lapsed powers — ^yet once more he shall stand On even ground against his mortal foe. By me upheld. Be thou in Adam's room Tlie head of all mankind, though Adam's son. As in him perish all men, so in thee, As from a second root, shall be restored, As many as are restored, without thee none. His crimes make guilty all his sons ; thy merit Imputed shall absolve them, M^ho renounce Their own both righteous and unrighteous deeds^ And live in thee trans|)lanted, and ftom thee Receive new life. PART IV.] MATTER OF FACT. 169 apon our loss, and rise even by our fall."* This leaves us not the least shadow of reason to complain of the Divine proceedings re- specting us. We may, then, conclude that a moral de- pravity, which comes upon us by the willful choice of a parent, in whom we seminally and federally existed — a depravity which cleaves to us by an obstinate neglect of the infinitely precious means provided to remove it — a depravity \\^ich works now by our own personal choice, and to which we daily give our assent by the free commission of Bins that are avoidable, leaves us not only accountable, but inexcusable before God. ly . However, the advocates for the nat- ural purity of the human race — endeavoring to clog with difficulties what they can not disprove to be matter of fact- — still assert, "As we have our souls immediately from God, if we are born sinful, he must either create sinful souls, which cannot be suppos- ed without impiety, or send sinless souls into sinful bodies, to be defiled by the unhappy union, which is as inconsistent with his * Creation's great superior, man, is thine : Thine is Redemption. How should this great truth Raise man o'er man, and kindle seraphs here! Redemption ! 'Twas Creation more sublime : Redemption ! 'Twas the labor of the skies : Far more than labor — it was death in heaven. A truth so strange ! 'Twere bold to think it true ; If not far bolder still to disbelieve.^youNo. 170 AN APPEAL TO [part IV. goodoess as his justice. Add to this," say the objectors, ''that nothing can be more unphilosophical than to suppose that a body, a mere lump of organized matter, is able to communicate to a spirit that moral pollution of which itself is as incapable as the mur- derer's sword is incapaJjle of cruelty." This specious objection, which Dr. Watts acknowledges to be " the very chief point of difficulty in all the controversies about original sin," is wholly founded upon the vulgar notion, that we have our souls imme- diately from God by infusion ; it will there- fore entirely fall to the ground, if we prove that we receive them, as well as well as our bodies, by traduction Irom Adam ; and that this is a tact, appears, if I am not mistaken, by the following arguments : 1." We have no ground, from Scripture or reason, to think that adulterers can, when they please, put God upon creating new souls to animate the spurious fruit of their crime. On the contrary, it is said that God rested on the seventh day from all his work of creation. 2. Eve herself was not created but in Ad- am ; God breathed no breath of life into her, as he did into her husband, to make him a liv- ing soul. Therefore, when Adam saw her, he said, she shall be called woman, because she — her whole self, not her body only^ was taken out of man. If then, the soul of PART IV.] MATTER OF FACT. 171 the first woman sprang from Adam's soul, as her body from his body, what reason have we to believe that the souls of her posterity are immediately infused, as Adam's was when God created him ? 3. All agree that, under God, we receive life from our parents ; and if life, then cer- tainlv our soul, which is the principle of life. " 4. Other animals have power to propa- gate their own species after its kind ; they can generate animated bodies. Why should man be but half a father ? When did God stint him to propagate the mere shell of his person, the body without the soul? Was it when he blessed him, and said. Be ye fruit- ful and multiply? When he spoke thus, did he not address himself to the soul, as well as to the body? , Can the body, alone, either understand or execute a comm^and? Is it not, on the contrary, highly reasonable to conclude, that by virtue of the Divine appointment and blessing, the whole man can be fruitful and multiply, and the soul, under proper circumstances, can generate a soul, as a thought begets a thought ; and can kindle the flame of life, as one taper lights another, without weiakening its im- mortal substance, any more than God the Father — if I may be allowed the compari- son— impairs the Divine essence by the eternal generation of his only-begotten Son? 172 AN APPEAL TO [PABT IV. 5. Does not matter of fact corroborate the preceding argument? A sprightly race- horse generally begets a mettlesome colt; while a heavy cart-horse begets a colt that bears the stamp of its sire's dullness. And is it not so with mankind in general? The children of the Hottentots and Esquimaux are commonly as stupid, while those of the English and French are usuall}^ as sharp, as their parents. You seldom see a wit spring- ing fi'om two half-witted people, or a fool descended from very sensible parents. The children of men of genius are frequently as remarkable for some branch of hereditary genius, as those of blockheads for their na- tive stupidity. Nothing is more common^ than to see very passionate and flighty pa- rents have very passionate and flighty chil- dren. And I have a hundred times discov- ered, not only the features, look, and com- plexion, of a father and mother in the child's lace, but seen a congenial soul looking out, — if I may so speak — at those windows of the body which we call the eyes. Hence I conclude that the advice frequently given to those who are about to choose a com- panion for life, ''Take care of the breed," is not absolutely without foundation, although some lay too much stress upon it, forgetting that a thousand unknown accidents may form exceptions to the general rale, and not considering that the peculiarity of the TAET IV.] MATTER OF FACT. 1^3 father's breed may be happily corrected by tliat of the mother, and vice versa; and that as the grace of God, yielded to, may sweeten the worst temper, so sin, persisted in, may sour the best. C). Again: Moses informs us, that fallen Adam begat a son in his own likeness and after his image ; but had he generated a body without a soul, he would not have be- gotten a son in his own likeness, since he was not a mere mortal body, but a fallen embodied spirit-. Compare Gen. v. 3, with Xlvi. 26. ^'Butupon this scheme,'' will objectors say, "if Adam was converted when he be- gat a son, he begat a converted soul." This does by no means follow; for ii' he was born of God after his fall, it was by grace through faith, and not by nature through generation ; he could not, therefore, com- municate his spiritual regeneration by nat- ural generation, any more than a great scholar can propagate his learning together with his species. Should it be again objected, that the soul is not generated, because the Scriptures de- clare, '* The Lord is tlie Father of the spirits of all flesh, and the spirit returns to God who gave it," I answer, it is also written, that Job and David were " fearfully made and fashioned by the hands of God in the womb;'' that he ''formed Jeremiah in the 174: AN Al*PEAL TO [PAKT iv. belly;" and that "we are tlie offspring of him who made of one blood all nations of men." IsTow, if the latter Scriptures do not exclude the interposition of parents in the formation of their children's bodies, by what rule of criticism or divinity can we prove, that the former exclude that interpo^ sition in the production of their souls ? ]^or can materialists, who have no ideas of generation, but such as are gross and car- nal like their own system, with any shadow of reason infer, that ''if the soul is genera^ ted with the body, it will also perish with it;" for dissolution is so far fi-om being a necessary consequence of the spiritual gen- eration of souls, that it would not so much as have followed the genei-ation of our bo- dies, if Adam had not brouglit ''sin into the world, and death by sin." Again: if wheat, a material seed which grows out of the same earthly clod with the chaff that incloses it, can subsist unimpaired, when that mean cover is destroyed, how much more can the soul — that spiritual, vital, heavenly power, which is of a nature so vastly superior to the body in which it is confined — continue to exist, when flesh and blood are returned to their native dust ! Should some persons reject what 1 say of the traduction of souls, in order to illustrate the derivation of original sin, and should they say that they have no mor-e idea of the PAUT IV. 1 MATTER OF FACT. 17^ generation than lionest Nicodemus had of the regeneration of a spirit, I beg leave to observe two things : First: If snch objectors are converted, they will not deny the regeneration of souls by the Spirit of God, since they experienced it, and our Lord speaks of it as a blessed reality, even while he represents it as a mystery unknown as to the manner of it. — ' John iii. 8-13. Now, if pious souls have been regenerated I'rom the beginning of the world, without exactly knowing how, is it reasonable to deny that souls are generated, merely because we can not exactly account for the manner in which that wonder takes place? Second: Should my objectors be versed- in natural philosophy, they need not be told, that even the kind of generation which they allow is as much a mystery to man, as the movement of a watch is to a child that just sees the case and the glass. If they will not believe me, let them believe him who '' gave his heart to search out by wis- dom coDcei'iiing all things that are done under heaveu ;" and who, touching upon our question, says, " As thou knowest not what is the w^ay of the Spirit, nor how the bones do grow in the womb of her that is with child ; even so thou knowest not the works of God, who maketh all." Eccles xi. 5. 176 AN APPEAL TO [PARt IV. For my part, I do not see why the same almighty Preserver of men, who — as St, Paul tells us — " made of one hlood the bo- dies of ail nations of men," might not, of one active thought and ardent desire^ have made the souls of all nations of men also. Have n.ot thought and desii-e as great affin- ity to the nature of the soul as blood has to that of the body? And, consequently, are not our ideas of the traduction of the soul as clear as those which we can form of the generation of tlie body ? Having dwslt so long upon the manner in which mankind naturally propagate orig- inal corruption together with their whole species, I hope I may reasonably resume the conclusion of my argument, and affirm, that if Adam corrupted the fountain of hu- man nature in himself, we, the streams, can not but be naturally corrupted. THIRTY-SECOND ARGUMENT. • God being a spirit, reason and revelation jointly inform us, that his law is spiritual, and extends to our thoughts and tempers, as well as to our words and actions. At all times, and in all places, it forbids every thing that is sinful, or has the least ten- dency to sin ; it commands all that is ex- cellent, and enjoins it to be done in the ut- most perfection of our dispensation. Therefore, if we have not always trusted PART IV. J MATTER OF FACT. l77 and delighted in God more than in all things and persons ; if for one instant we have loved or feared the creature more than the Creator, we have had another god be- sides the Lord. Col. iii. 5 ; Phil. iii. 19. — Have we once omitted to adore him in spi- rit and in tnith inwardly, or at any time worshiped him without becoming venera- tion outwardly, we have transgressed as if we had bowed to a graven image. John iv. 24. Though perjury and imprecations should never have defiled our lips, yet, if ever we mentioned God's tremendous name thoughtlessly, or irreverently, in prayer, reading, or conversation, we have taken it in vain, and the Searcher of hearts will not hold us guiltless. Phil. ii. 10. And if it has not been our constant practice and de- light to enter his courts with praise, and spend the whole Sabbath in his blessed ser- vice, we have polluted that sacred day, and the guilt of profaneness may justly be charged upon us. Isaiah Iviii. 13. Did we ever show any disrespect to our superiors, or unkindness to our equals and inferiors, we have violated the precept that commands us to honor all men, and be punctual in the discharge of all social and relative duties. 1 Pet. ii. 17. Did we ever weaken our constitution by excess, strike our neighbor in anger, or wound his char- acter with an iniurious word, or only suffer 12 178 AN APPEAL TO [PAET W hatred to rise in our breast against him, we have committed a species of murder; for, "whosoever shall say to his brother, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire;" and "whosoever hateth his brother is a murder- er. Matt. v. 22; 1 John ii. 15. Are we "the friends of the world," an apostle brands us with the name of adulterers, be- cause we are false to our heavenly bride- groom. James iv. 4. And if we liave only "looked on a woman to lust after her," Christ declares that we " have committed adulteiy with her already in our heart. — Matt. V. 28. Have we overcharged our cus- tomers, exacted upon any one in our bar- tains, insisted on a full salary for work one by halves, defrauded the king of any part of his taxes, or taken advantage of the necessity and ignorance of others to get by their loss, we swell the numerous tribe of reputable thieves and genteel robbers. — Matt. xxii. 21. Neglecting to keep our word and baptismal vow, or speaking an untruth, is "bearing false witness against our neighbor," ourselves, or Christ, who styles himself "the truth." Kev. xxii. 15. And giving place to a fretful, discontented thought, or an irregular, envious desire, is a breach of that spiritual precept, which madt! St. Paul say, " I had not known lust," or a wrong desire to be sin, "except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet." Ro- mans vii. 7. Tart iv.] matter of fact. 179 Such beiDg the extreme spirituality of the law, who can plead that he never was guilty ot breaking one, or even all of the ten com- mandments ? And if we have broken them all, either in their literal or spiritual meaning, and are threatened for every transgression with a curse suitable to the Lawgiver's infinite majesty, who can conceive the greatness of our guilt and danger? Till we find a sanc- tuary under the shadow of a Savior's wings, are we not as liable to the strokes of divine vengeance as a felon, guilty of breaking all the statutes of his country, is liable to the penalty of human laws? If this is not the case, there is no justice in the court of heaven, and the laws given with so much terror from the Almighty'8 throne, like the statutes of children, or the Pope's bulls, are only '-^hmta fulmina^'^ — words without efiect, and thunders without lightnings. Some indeed flatter themselves that " the law, since the Gospel dispensation, abates much of its demands of perfect love." But their hope is equally unsupported by reason and Scripture. The law is the eternal rule of right, the moral picture of the God of holiness and love. It can no more vary than its eternal, unchangeable Original. The Lord " will not alter the thing that has gone out of his mouth." He must cease to 180 AN APPEAL TO [PART IV. be what he is, before his law can lose its power to bind either men or angels; and all creatures shall break sooner than it shall bend; for if it commands us only to "love God with all our heart, and our neighbor as ourselves," what just abatement can be made in so equitable a precept? Therefore, man who breaks the righteous law of God as naturally as he breathes, is and must continue under its fearful curse, till he has secured the pardon and help oflered him in the Gospel. THIKTY-THLRD ARGUMENT. Nor is the Gospel itself without its threat- enings; for if the Lord, on the one hand, "opens the kingdom of heaven to all be- lievers," he declares, on the other, that "they all shall be damned who believe not the truth," when it is proposed to them with suiScient evidence; and that "he who be- lie veth not is condemned already, lecause he hath not believed on the name ot the only-begotten Son of God." 2 Thess. ii. 12; John iii. 18. From these awful declar- ations I draw the following argument: K faith is so essential a virtue, how de- praved and wretched is man who is so ex- cessively slow of heart to believe the things that concern his salvation ! Matter of fact daily proves that wo readily admit the evi- dence of men, while we peremptorily reject Part iv.J matter of fact. 181 the testimony of God. Commodore Byron's extraordinary account of the giants in Pata- gonia is, or was, every where received ; but that of Jesus Christ, concerning those who " walk in the broad way to destruction," is and has always been too generally disre- garded. Matt. vii. 13. On reading in a newspaper an anony- mous letter from Naples, we believe that rivers of liquid fire flow li-om the convulsed bowels of a mountain, and form burning lakes in the adjacent plains : but if we read in the Scripture that Tophet, the burning lake, is prepared of old for the impenitent, we beg leave to withhold our assent ; and, unless Divine grace prevents, we must fall in, and feel, before we will assent and be- lieve. Isa. XXX. 33. Who that has seen a map of Africa ever doubted whether there is such a kingdom as that of Morocco, though he never saw- it, or any of its natives? But who that has perused the Gospel, never doubted whether "the kingdom of heaven within us," or that state of ''righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost," which God opens to be- lievers upon earth, is not a mere imagina- tion? though Christ himself invites us to it, and many piuus ])ersons not only testify they enjoy it, but actually show its blessed fruits, in lieavenly tempers, a blameless life, 182 AN APPEAL TO [PART IV. and a triumphant death. Mark i. 14; Luke xvii. 21; Rom. xiv. 17; Rev. i. 6. With what readiness do we depend upon an honest man's promise, especially if it is reduced into a bond? But with what re- luctance do we rely on the "many great and precious promises'' of God, ^'confirmed by an oath," delivered before the most un- exceptionable witnesses, and sealed by the blood of Je^us Christ? 2 Pet. i. 4; 2 Cor. i. 20; Heb. vi. 17. And ye numerous tribes of patients, how do ye shame those who call themselves Christians! So entire is the trust wdiich you repose upon a physician's advice, whom perhaps you have seen but once, that you immediately abstain from your pleasant food, and regularly take medicines, which, ibr what you know, may be as injurious to your stomach as they are offensive to your palate; but we who profess Christianity generally quarrel with Christ's prescrip- tions ; and if we do not understand the nature of a remedy wliich he recommends, we think this a sufficient reason for refus- ing it. From Christ only, if we can help it, we will take nothing upon trust. One false witness is often sufficient to make us believe that a neighbor vows to do us an injury ; but twenty ministers of elesus can not persuade us God hath sworn in his PART IV.] MATTER OF FACT. 183 wrath, that, if we die in our sins, we shall not enter into his rest; Psa. xcv. 11. or that, if we come to him for pardon and life, he will in no wise cast ns out. John vi. 37. The most defamatory and improljable reports spread with uncommon swiftness, and pass for matter of fact ; but when St. Paul testifies, that if any man hath not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his, Eom. viii. 9. who believes his testimony? Does not the same mind that was open to scanda- lous lies, prove shut against such a revealed truth? Isaiah asks, ''Who hath believed our re- port?" and Jesus says, "When the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith upon the earth ?" Alas ! there would have been no room for these plaintive questions, if the word of God had not been proposed to our" faith ; for the most groundless and absurd assertions of men find multitudes of be- lievers. We see daily, that an idle rumor about a peace or a war meets with such credit as to raise or sink the stocks in a few hours. It is evident that man has a foolish and evil heart of unbelief, ready to strain out a gnat in divine revelation, while he greedily swallows up the camel of human imposture. l^ow, if it is part of the Gospel which Christ commands his ministers to preach to every creature, that he who believeth not shall be 184 AN APPEAL TO [j'AET IV. damned, Mark xvi. 16. how great is the depravity, and how imminent the danger of fallen man, who has such a strong propen- sity to so destructive, so damnable a sin as unbelief? THIRTY-FOUKTH AKGUMENT. But let us come still nearer to the point. If we are not by nature conceived in sin, and children of wrath, millions of infants, who die without actual sin, have no need of the blood of Christ to wash their robes, nor his Spirit to purify their hearts. The incarnation of the eternal Word, and the in- fluences of the Holy Spirit, are as unneces- sary to them as the visits of a physician, and his remedies, to persons in perfect health. Their spotless innocency is a suf- ficient passport for heaven ; baptism is ridic- ulous, and the Christian religion absurd, in their case. Nor does it appear, why it might not be as absurd with regard to the rest of man- kind, did they but act their part a little bet- ter ; for if we are naturally innocent, we have a natural power to remain so; and by a proper use of it, we may avoid standing in need ot* the salvation procured by Christ for the lost. Nay, if innocent nature, carefully improv- ed, may be the way to eternal life, it is cer- tainly the readiest way, and the Son of God PAKT IV.] MATTER OF FACT. 185 speaks like the grand deceiver of mankind, when he says, ''I am the way; no man cometh to the Father, but hy meP Chris- tians, let self-conceited Deists entertain the thought, but harbor it not a moment; in you it would be highly blasphemous. THIRTY-FIFTH ARGUMENT. And that you may detest it the more, con- sider farther that all the capital doctrines of Christianity are built upon that funda- mental article of our depravity and danger. If all flesh hath not corrupted its way, how severe are those words of Christ, "Except ye repent, ye shall all perish;" and, ''Ex- cept ye be converted, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven ! " K all are not carnal and earthly by their first birth, how absurd is what he said to Nicodemus: "Ex- cept a man be born again, he can not see the kingdom of heaven!" If there is any spiritual health in us by nature, how noto- riously false are these assertions ! A 11 our sufficiency is of God — Without me ye can do nothing. K every natural man is not the reverse of the holiness in which Adam was created, how irrational these and the like Scriptures : If any man is in Christ, he is a new creature / In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncir- cumcision, but a new creature. To con- clude: if mankind are not universally cor- 186 AN APPEAL TO [PABT IV rupt, guilty, and condemned, how unneces- sarily alarming is this declaration : He that believeth not on the Son of God is condemn- ed already ; the wrath of God abideth on him: and if we are not foolish, unrighte- ous, unholy, and enslaved to sin, why is Christ made to us of God, wisdom, righte- ousness, sanctification, and redemption? Take away, then, the doctrine of the fall, and the tower of evangelical truth, built by Jesus Christ, is no more founded on a rock, but upon the sand : or, rather, the stately fabric is instantly thrown down, and leaves no ruins behind it but the dry morality of Epictetus, covered with the rubbish of the wildest metaphors, and buried in the most impertinent ceremonies. THIKTY-SIXTH ARGUMENT. One more absurdity still remains. If man is not in the most imminent danger of de- struction, nothing can be more extravagant than the great article of the Christian faith, thus expressed in the Nicene creed : " Je- sus Christ, very God of veiy God, by whom all things were made, for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, was made man, and was crucified /(^r -w^." Is it not astonishing that there should be people so infatuated as to join every Lord's day in this solemn confession, and to deny, the other six, tlie horrible danger to which PART IV. J MATTER OF FACT. 18'/ they are exposed, till they have an interest Id Christ! Is not the least grain of common sense sufficient to make an attentive person see, that if He, by whom all things wore made, came from heaven for our salvation —if he was made man that he might sufFor, and be crucified for us he saw us guilty, con- demned, lost, and obnoxious to the damna- tion which we continually deprecate in the litany '\ Shall we charge the Son of God, in whom are hid all the treasures of divine wisdom, with the unparalleled folly of com- ing from heaven to atone for innocent crea- tures ; to reprieve persons uncondemned ; to redeem a race of free men ; to deliver from the curse a people not accursed ; to hang by exquisitely- dolorous wounds, made in his sacred hands and feet, on a tree more ignominious than the gallows, for honest men, and very good sort of people ; and to expire under the sense of the wrath of Heav- en that he might save from hell people in no danger of going there. Reader, is it possible to entertain for a moment these wild notions, without offering the utmost indignity-to the Son of God, and the greatest violence to common sense? And does not reason cry, as with a sound of a thousand trumpets, " If our Creator could not save us consistently with his glo- rious attributes, but by becoming incarnate, passing through the deepest scenes of hu 188 AN APPEAL TO [PAKT 17. miliation and temptation, distress and want, for thirty-three years, and undergoing, at last, the most shameful, painful, and accurs- ed death, in our place, our wickedness must be desperate, our sins execrable, our guilt black as the shadow of death, and our dan- ger dreadful as the gloom and torments of hell ?" "Shocking doctrine!" says the self-con- ceited moralist, as he rises from his chair full of indignation, and ready to throw aside the arguments he cannot answer. Eeader, if you are the man, remember that this is an appeal to reason, and not to passion — to matter of fact, and not to vitiated taste for pleasing error. You may cry out at the sight of a shroud, a coffin, a grave, " Shock- ing objects!" But your loudest exclama- tions will not lessen the awful reality, by which many have happily been shocked into a timely consideration of, and prepara- tion for, approaching death. "But this doctrine," you still urge, " drives people to despair." Yes, to a de- spair of being saved by their own merits and righteousness ; and this is as reasona- ble in a sinner wlio comes to the Savior as despairing to swim across the sea is ration- al in a passenger that takes ship. A just despair of ourselves is widely dif- ferent from a despair of God's mercy, and Christ's willingness to save the chief of sin- PART IV.] MATTER OF FACT. 189 ners, who flies to him for refuge. Thi8 hor- rible sin, this black crime of Judas, springs rather from a sullen, obstinate rejection of the remedy, than, as some vainly suppose, from a clear knowledge of the disease. And that none may commit it, Christ's ministers take particular care not to preach the law without the Gospel, and the fall without the recovery : no sooner have they opened the wound of sin, festering in the sinner's conscience, than they pour in the balm of Divine promises, and make gra- cious offers of a fi-ee pardon and full salva- tion by the compassionate Redeemer, who came to justify the ungodly, and save the lost. And, indeed,- those only who see their sin and misery, will cordially embrace the Gospel ; for common sense dictates that none care for the king's mercy but those who know they are guilty, condemned crim- inals. How excessively unreasonable it is then to object, that the preaching of man's corrupt and lost estate drives people to de- spair of divine mercy, when it is absolutely the only means of showing them their need of it, and making them gladly accept it upon God's own terms. Leaving, therefore, that trite objection to the unthinking vulgar, once more, judicious reader, summon afl your rational powers, and, after imploring help from on high to 190 AN APPEAL TO [PART IV. use them aright, say, whether these last ar- guments do not prove that no Christian can deny the complete fall of mankind, without renouncing the capital doctrines of his own religion — overturning the very foundation of the Gospel, which he professes . to receive — staining the glory of the Kedeemer, whom he pretends to honor, and impiously taking from his crown, wisdom, truth, and charity, the three jewels that are its brightest orna- ments. Sum up, then, all that has been advanced concerning the afflictive dealings of God's providence with mankind, and the base conduct, or wicked temper of mankind toward God, one another, and themselves — declare if all the arguments laid before you, and cleared from the thickest clouds of ob- jections that might obscure them, do not cast more light upon the black subject of our depravity than is sufficient to show that it is a melancholy truth — and finally pro- nounce, whether the doctrine of our corrupt and lost estate, stated in the words of the sacred writers, and of our pious reformers, is not rationally demonstrated and estab- lished upon the firmest basis in the world, matter of fact and the dictates of common Bense. PART v.] MATTER OF FACT. 191 FIFTH PART. W^HEN a doctrine has been clearly dem- onstrated, the truths that necessarily spring fi'om it cannot reasonably be rejected. Let, then, common sense decide, whether the fol- lowing consequences do not necessaiily re- sult from the doctrine of the fall, established in the preceding parts of this treatise. Inference 1. if we are by nature in a corrupt and lost estate, the grand business of ministers is to rouse our drowsy con- sciences, and warn us of our imminent dan- ger. It behooves them to cry aloud and spare not, to lilt up their voice like a trum- pet, and show us our transgressions and our sins. Nor are they to desist from this unpleasing part of their office till we awake to righteousness, and lay hold on the hope set before us. If preachers, under pretense of peace and good-nature, let the wound fester in the con- science of their hearei-s, to avoid the thank less office of probing it to the bottom — it!> for fear of giving them pain by a timely amputation, they let them die of a mortifi- cation— or if they heal the hurt of the daughter of God's' people slightly, saying, Peace ! Peace ! when there is no peace — ■ they imitate those sycophants of old, who, for fear of displeasing the rich, and offend- 1D2 AN ArrEA'L TO [fart v. ino^ the o;reat, preaclied sniiootli thiiio^s, and I'll' prophesied deceit. This cruel gentleness, this soft barbarity, is attended with the most pernicious conse- quences, and will deservedly meet with the most dreadful punishment. Give sinners warning from me, says the Lord to every minister ; when I say t6 the wicked, the unconverted, Thou shalt surely die, and thou givest him not warning, he shall die in his iniquity, in his unconverted state; but his blood will I require at thy hand. See Matt, xviii. 3 ; Ezek. iii. 18; and xii. 10. Inference 2. If we are naturally deprav- ed and condemned creatures, self-righteous- nesg and pride are the most absurd and monstrous of all our sins. The deepest re- pentance, and profoundest humility, be- come us. To neglect tliem, is to stumble at the very threshold of true religion ; and to ridicule them is to pour contempt upon reason, revelation, and the first operations of divine grace on a sinner's heart. Inference 3. K the corruption of man- kind is universal, inveterate, and amazingly powerful, no mere creature can deliver them from it. They must remain unrestored, or they must have an almighty, omniscient, omnipresent, unwearied, infinitely -patient Savior, willing, day and night, to attend to the wants and public or secret applications of millions of wretched souls, and able to PART v.] MATTEK OF FACT, l^S give them immediate assista-nce throughout the world, in all their various trials, temp- tations, and the conflicts both in life and in death. Is the most exalted creature suffi- cient for these things ? When such a vast body as mankind, spread over all the earth for thousands of years, made up of numerous nations, all of which consist of multitudes of individuals, each of whom has the springs of all his fac^ ulties and powers enfeebled, disordered, or broken — when such an immense body as this is to be restored to the image of the in- finitely-holy, glorious, and blessed God, common sense dictates that the amazing task can be performed by no other than the original Artist, the great Searcher of hearts, the omnipotent Creator of mankind. Hence it appears, that, notwithstanding the cavils of Arius, the Savior is Ood over ull blessed for ever ; all things were made by him, he upholds all things by the word of his power, and every believer may adore him, and say with the wondering apostle, when the light of faith shone into liis be- nighted soul. My Lord and my God % Inference 4. If om- guilt is immense, it ]5 iiig animals, those who afiectionately maOc you the invahmble oSer? Matt. vii. 6. But when the storm that shook Mount Sinai overtook yom* careless souls, and yo saw yourselves sinking into an abyss of misery, did ye not cry out, and say, as the alarmed disciples, with an unknown energy of desire, "Save, Lord, or we perish?" And when conscious of your lost estate, ye began to believe that he came to seek and to save that which was lost, how dear, how precious was he to you in all his offices ! How glad were you to take guilty, weeping, Magda- len's place, and wait for a pardon at your High Priest's feet! How importunate in saying to your King, as the hapless widow. Lord, avenge me of mine adversary, my evil heart of uabelief! How earnest, how unwearied in your applications to your Prophet for heavenly light and wisdom ! The incessant prayer of blind Bartimeus was then yours, and so was the gracious answer w^hich the Lord returned to him; you received your spiritual sight. And O ! what saw you then 'i The sacred book un- sealed ! Your sins blotted out as a cloud ! The glory of God shining in the face of Jesus Christ ; and " the kingdom of heaven open to all believers!" Then, and not till then, you could say from the heart, Tliis is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Jesus Christ 216 AN APPEAL TO [pART V. came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the chief. 1 Tim. 1. 15. Then you could cry out with his first disciples, 3ehold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God ! 1 John iii. 1. We are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus, whom, having not seen, we love; in whom, though now we see him not, yet believing, we rejoice with joy un- speakable and mil of glory, receiving the end of our faith, the salvation of our souls. Gal. iii. 26 ; 1 Peter i. 8. We trusted in him, and are helped; therefore our heart danced for joy, and in our song will we E raise him. Fsa. xxviii. 8. To him that ath loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Rev. i. 5. And this will also be your triumphant song, attentive reader, if, deeply conscious of your lost estate, you spread your guilt and misery before Ilim who came to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the pris- on to them that are bound ; and to comfort all that mourn, by giving them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. &a. Ixi. 1. Your sorrow, it is true, may PAKT v.] MAITER OF FACT. 217 endure for a night, but joy will come in the morning, the joy of God's salvation, and the pardon of your sins. Having much for- given you, you mil then love much, and admire in proportion, the riches of divine Wisdom, Goodness, Justice, and Power, that so graciously contrived, and so wonder- fally executed the plan of your redemption. You will be ravished in experiencing that a condemned sinner can not only escape im- pending ruin, but enter into present posses- sion of a spiritual paradise, where peace and joy blossom together, and whence welcome death, will, ere long, translate your tri- umphant soul to those unseen, unheard-of, inconceivable glories, which God hath pre- pared for them that love him. 1 Cor. ii. 9. Nor will the blossoms of heavenly peace and joy only diffuse their divine fragrancy in your soul ; all the fruits of holiness will ^ow together wdth them, to the glory of God, and the profit of mankind. And thou wilt not be the last, thou fair, thou blush- ing humility, to bend all the spreading branches of pride to the tree of righteous- ness. No, we can not be'vain, or despisers of others, when we see that we are all cor- rupted, dying shoots, of the same corrupted, dead stalk; we can not be self-righteous, when we are persuaded that the best fruit which we can naturally produce, is only splendid sin, or vice colored over with the 218 AN APPEAL TO [PART T. specious appearance of virtue : we must lie prostrate in the dust, when we consider the ignominious cross, where our divine Surety hung, bled, and died, to ransom our guilty souls. A genuine conviction of our corruption and demerit thus striking at the very root of our pride, necessarily fills our hearts with inexpressible gratitude for every favor we receive, gives an exquisite relish to the least blessing we enjoy, and teaches us to say with the thankful patriarch, I am not worthy of the least of all thy mercies : and as it renders us grateful to God, and all our ben- efactors, so it makes us patient under the greatest injuries, resigned in the heaviest trials, glad to be reproved, willing to for- give the faults of others, open to acknowl- edge our own, disposed to sympathize with the guilty, tender-hearted toward the mis- erable, incapable of being offended at any one, and ready to do every office of kind- ness, even to the meanest of mankind. Again: no sooner are we properly ac- quainted with our helplessness, than we give over leaning on an arm of flesh, and the broken reed of our own resolutions. Reposing our entire confidence in the living God, we fervently implore his continual as- sistance, carefully avoid temptations, gladly acknowledge that the help which is done upon the earth the Lord doeth it himself, FAKT v.] MATTER OF FACT. '210 and humbly give him the glory of all the good that appears in ourselves and others. Once more : as soon as we can discover our spiritual blindness, we mistrast our own judgment, feel the need of instruction, mod- estly repair to the experienced lor advice, carefully search the Scriptures, readily fol- low their blessed directions, and fervently pray that no false light may mislead us out of the way of salvation. To conclude : a right knowledge that the crown is fallen from om* head, will make us abominate sin, the cause of our ruin, and raise in us a noble ambition of regaining our original state of blissful and glorious righteousness. It will set us upon an earn- est inquiry into, and a proper use of, all the means conducive to our recovery. Even the sense of our guilt will prove useful, by helping to break our obdurate hearts, by imbittering the baits of worldly vanities, and filling our souls with penitential soitow. Before honor is humility. This happy hu- miliation makes way for the greatest exalta- tion ; for thus saith the high and lofty One, that inhabiteth eternity : " I dwell in the high and holy pla^e, with, him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to-revive the spirit of the humble, and the heart of the contrite, to fill the hungry with good things, and beautify the meek with salva- tion.'' Isaiah Ivii. 15. 220 AN APPEAL TO . rPAR'l \' 10 If' these advantages, which exceed tl worth of earthly crowns, necessarily result from the proper knowledge of our corrupt and lost estate, who, but an infatuated ene- my of his own soul, would be afraid of tliat self-science? who but an obstinate Pharisee would not esteem it, next to the knowledge of Christ, the greatest blessing which Hea- ven can bestow upon the self-destroyed, and yet self- conceited children of men? Care- less reader, if thou art the pei-son — if re- maining unshaken in thy carnal confidence, and supposing thyself wiser than seven men that can render a reason, thou not only de- spisest the testimony of the sacred writers, and our pious reformers, laid before thee in the first pai-t of this treatise, but disregard - est the numerous arguments it contains, tramplest under loot both matter of fact and common sense, and remainest unaffected by the most dreadful consequences of self-ig- norance on the one hand, and by the great- est advantages of self-knowledge on the other, I have done, and must take my leave of thee. May the merciful and holy God, whose laws thou dost daily violate, whose word thou hourly opposest or forgettest, whose salvation thou dost every moment neglect, whose vengeance thou continually provok- est, and whose cause I have attempted to plead, bear with thee and thy insults a little PART v.] MATTER OF FACT. 221 longer ! May his infinite patience yet afford thee some means of conviction more effect- ual than that which is at present in thy hands ! Or, shouldst thou look into this labor of love once more, may it then answer a better purpose than to aggravate thy guilt, and enhance thy condemnation, by render- ing the folly of thy unbelief more glaring, and, consequently, more inexcusable ! THE ENI).