"concern to disentangle my thoughts from this "world, and fix them upon another another, a "better world befides this "This thought opens a new fcene of hope and confolation to the unfortunate and as the perfuafion of a Providence reconciles him to the evils he has fuffered,--this profpect of a future life gives him ftrength to defpife them, and efteem the light afflictions of this life as they are not worthy to be compared to what is referved for him hereafter.

Things are great or finall by comparison-and he who looks no farther than this world, and balances the accounts of his joys and fufferings from that confideration, finds all his forrows enlarged, and at the clofe of them will be apt to look back, and caft the fame fad reflection upon the whole, which the patriarch did to Pharaoh," That "few and evil had been the days of his pilgrim" age." But let him lift up his eyes towards heaven, and ftedfaftly behold the life of immortality of a future ftate,he then wipes away all tears from off his eyes for ever and ever;-like the exiled captive, big with the hopes that he is returning home he feels not the weight of his chains, or counts the days of his captivity; but looks forward with rapture towards the country where his heart is fled before.

These are the aids which religion offers us towards the regulating of our spirit under the evils of life;but, like great cordials, they are feldom ufed but on great occurrences. In the leffer evils of life we seem to ftand unguarded, and our peace and contentment

are overthrown, and our happiness broke in upon by a little impatience of spirit, under the cross and untoward accidents we meet with.-Thefe ftand unprovided for, and we neglect them as we do the flighter indifpofitions of the body-which we think not worth treating seriously-and fo leave them to nature. In good habits of the body, this may do ;and I would gladly believe, there are fuch good habits of the temper, fuch a complexional ease and health of heart, as may often fave the patient much medicine.-We are ftill to confider that however fuch good frames of mind are got-they are. worth preferving by all rules :-Patience and contentment, which, like the treasure hid in the field, for which a man fold all he had to purchase-is of that price that it cannot be had at too great a purchafe-fince, without it, the beft condition in life cannot make us happy, and with it, it is impoffible we should be miserable even in the worst.

-Give me leave therefore to close this discourse with fome reflections upon the subject of a contented mind-and the duty in man of regulating his fpirit, in our way through life ;-a fubject in every body's mouth-preached upon daily to our friends and kindred-but too oft in fuch a ftyle, as to convince the party lectured, only of this truth,That we bear the misfortunes of others with excellent tranquillity.

I believe there are thoufands fo extravagant in their ideas of contentment, as to imagine that it muft confift in having every thing in this world turn out the way they wish-that they are to fit

down in happinefs, and find themfelves fo at ease in all points, as to defire nothing better and nothing more. I own there are inftances of fome, who feem to pass through the world as if all their paths had been ftrewed with rofe-buds of delight;but a little experience will convince us 'tis a fatal expectation to go upon. We are born to trouble; and we may depend upon it, whilst we live in this world, we shall have it, though with intermiffions— that is, in whatever ftate we are, we shall find a mixture of good and evil; and therefore, the true way to contentment, is to know how to receive these certain viciffitudes of life,the returns of good and evil, fo as neither to be exalted by the one, or overthrown by the other, but to bear ourselves towards every thing which happens, with fuch ease and indifference of mind, as to hazard as little as may be. This is the true temperate climate fitted for us by nature, and in which every wife man would wish to live. GOD knows, we are perpetually ftraying out of it, and, by giving wings to our imaginations in the transports we dream of, from fuch or fuch a fituation in life, we are carried away alternately into all the extremes of hot and cold; for which, as we are neither fitted by nature, or prepared by expectation, we feel them with all their violence, and with all their danger too.

GOD, for wife reafons, has made our affairs in this world almost as fickle and capricious as ourfelyes Pain and pleasure, like light and darkness, fucceed each other; and he that knows how to accommodate himself to the periodical returns, and.

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can wifely extract the good from the evil-knows only how to live ;-this is true contentment, at least all that is to be had of it in this world and for this every man must be indebted, not to his fortune, but to himself.. And indeed it would have been ftrange, if a duty fo becoming us as dependent creatures- -and fo neceffary befides to all our wellbeings, had been placed out of the reach of any in fome measure to put in practice-and for this reafon, there is scarce any lot fo low, but there is fomething in it to fatisfy the man whom it has befallen; Provdience having fo ordered things, that in every man's cup, how bitter foever, there are fome cordial drops-some good circumftances, which, if wifely extracted, are fufficient for the purpose he wants them, that is, to make him contented, and if not happy, at leaft refigned. May God blefs all with his Spirit, for the fake of Jefus Christ! Amen.

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SERMON XVI.

The Character of Shimei.

2 SAMUEL XIX. 21. 1ft Part.

But Abishai faid, Shall not Shimei be put to death for this?

-Ir has not a good afpect-This is the fecond time Abifbai has propofed Shimei's destruction; once in the 16th chapter, on a fudden transport of indignation, when Shimei curfed David," Why Should

this dead dog, cried Abishai, curse my lord the king? "Let me go over, I pray thee, and cut off his head.” This had fomething at least of gallantry in it; for in doing it he hazarded his own; and befides, the offender was not otherwife to be come at: the fecond time is in the text, when the offender was abfolutely in their power-when the blood was cool; and the suppliant was holding up his hands for mercy.

-Shall not Shimei, answered Abishai, be put to death for this? So unrelenting a purfuit looks less like justice than revenge, which is fo cowardly a paffion, that it renders Abishai's first instance almost inconfiftent with the fecond. I fhall not endeavour to reconcile them; but confine the difcourfe fimply