Spirit of Christ; and so make fearful approaches to the unpardonable sin: while they reproach his motions, as enthusiastic fancies; and his operations, as frantic notions; and all his graces and influences, as dreams and delusions.

4. His word is reproached; " But when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy, and spake against those things which were spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming," Acts xiii. 45. Atheists speak against the authority of the scriptures: Papists speak against the perspicuity of the scriptures, and receive unwritten traditions with the same reverence and affection. Some profanely jest with the words of the scripture; making themselves merry with scripture language, Jer. vi. 10." The word of the Lord is to them a reproach." Profligate wits relish no jests better, than those which ridicule the sacred word: as no cups could please Belshazzar better, in his drunken frolics, than the sacred vessels of the temple. But, he that sits in heaven will laugh at them, and hold them in derision; and, in spite of impotent malice, will magnify the law, and make it honourable.

5. His religion and doctrine is spoken against and reproached. The truth of it, and of the gospel, are many times reproached, ridiculed, and contradicted, as false and groundless; even as the mediation, and the resurrection of the dead was mocked at by the Athenian philosophers. The laws of it were accounted grievous and unreasonable, as hard sayings. The ordinances of it despised as mean, and having no form and comeliness; hence came in the gaudy ornaments of human invention, in the worship of God. Sabbaths and sacraments were mocked at and contemned. Primitive Christianity was industriously calumniated, because it overthrew idolatry; for, when the devil was silenced, in his oracles, he opened his mouth in lies and slanders: Julian discharged the Christians to be called any other thing than Galileans. And the reformed religion, in like manner, was reproached: Where was your religion, say the Papists, before Luther and Calvin? Why, it was still in the Bible, where Popery never was: though it main

tains all that doctrine, which Christ and his apostles preached; yet, the professors and preachers of it, are called schismatics and heretics. And even amongst those who profess the reformed religion, how is the flower of godliness contradicted and contemned, by those that rest only in a form! They that are fervent in spirit, serving the Lord, must expect to be evil spoken of, by such as affect luke-warmness, and indifference in religion; and so,

6. His servants and people are also reproached. The preachers of Christ are, with a distinguishing enmity, every where spoken against. 2 Cor. vi. 16. They have been trampled upon as the filth of the world, and the offscouring of all things, Ezek. xxxiii. 30, 31, 32. The standard-bearers have been most struck at.-The professors of religion also, have been reproached, reviled, and persecuted, Matth. v. 11, 12.-God's heritage hath been always a speckled bird; and his children for signs and wonders; and those who are the greatest blessings of the age, branded as troublers of Israel. And, indeed, if they called the Master of the house Beelzebub, no nick-name fastened upon his followers can seem strange. But this leads,

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III. To the Third thing, which was to inquire into some of these marks of reproach and contempt that uses to be cast upon Christ and his friends, in the world. It is a true saying that the apostle hath, with respect to the children of God: " If in this life only we have hope, we are of all men the most miserable." This he speaks with reference to the trials that they must lay their account with, in the world; for, they must be the butt of the malice of the world, and the subject of the mockery of the wicked: yea, of many professors in Israel; "Behold, I and the children, whom the Lord hath given me, are for signs and for wonders in Israel." There are these, and the like following marks of reproach that are cast upon them.

The first mark of reproach is, That sometimes they are held for monsters and prodigies of folly and impudence; 1 Cor. iv. 10. "We are fools for Christ's sake;" i. e. we are thus reckoned in the judgment of the world;

because we prefer affliction before sin; and because we fear God more than man; and the wrath of God more than the wrath of a king. The world reckons it is a folly for men to choose affliction rather than sin. No doubt, the three children were reckoned fools, to expose themselves to the king's fiery furnace: but surely it was more wisdom than to expose themselves to God's fiery furnace, whose wrath is more terrible than all the fury of the kings of the earth. The world thinks Moses's choice a folly; what! to prefer afflictions with the people of God, before all the pleasures of sin, and grandeur

of Pharaoh's court!

The Second mark of reproach is this, They are sometimes held for monsters and prodigies of wickedness, monsters of villany. Christ himself was reproached as the most arrant villain, upon the face of the earth; a man in compact with the devil: his followers were stigmatized with the greatest of wickedness; their religious meetings and conventicles for divine worship, were reproached as being cloaks for covering the design of whoredom and uncleanness. Papists have looked upon Protestants as the worst of devils incarnate: and do not loose-living persons look upon those that are strict, to be nothing but base persons, a pack of hypocrites, liars, and deceivers? They put them in bear skins, and then bark at them, and worry them. You will get a wretched, graceless, cursing, ranting debauchee, that, in some company, will persecute a child of God, and make him as hell, if you will believe him; and, if you observe attentively, you may see just the devil, the father of lies, and accuser of the brethren, speaking out of him; and his tongue to be the instrument of calumny, while he represents them as enemies to the law and holiness. See Acts xviii. 13.

The Third mark of reproach is, That they are sometimes held as monsters of injuriousness and hurtfulness: though even for their sakes the world is upheld, and for their sakes the wicked have many mercies continued with them; yet they are many times looked upon as the troublers of church and state: thus Elijah was the man that most lamented the sins of Israel, and yet he is

called the troubler of Israel, 1 Kings xviii. 17. Thus they are reproached sometimes with rebellion, and as enemies to civil government, having laws different from all people, Esth. iii. 8. " And Haman said unto the king Ahasuerus, There is a certain people scattered abroad, and dispersed among the people, in all the provinces of thy kingdom, and their laws are diverse from all people, neither keep they the king's laws; therefore it is not for the king's profit to suffer them." While they hold by the laws of king Jesus, in opposition to all the laws of earthly government, that seem to clash with the law of God, then they are treated as lawless persons. When Amos was reproving the sins of Israel, the priests of Bethel complain upon him to the government, Amos x. 11. 13. Thus were the Christians reproached, Actsxvii.7.

These are they, say the wicked Jews, that have turned the world upside down:" and these all do contrary to the decrees of Cæsar, saying, "That there is another king, one Jesus." Thus the builders of the walls of Jerusalem were accused and charged with rebellion against the government, Neh. ii. 19. "They laughed us to scorn, and despised us, saying, What is this ye do? Will ye rebel against the king?"

The Fourth mark of reproach is this, They are sometimes held as monsters of pride and self-conceit; as men affecting singularity; as men who think themselves wiser than others, and as a sect and faction preferable to all others, Acts xxviii. 22." As for this sect, we know, that everywhere it is spoken against:" where the godly were represented under the invidious name of a sect, or a party that affected singularity.-The masters and maintainers of sects are looked upon as enemies to the great corporation of mankind: but there is not the least colour to put this scandalous character upon the true professors of Christianity, or followers of Christ: for, it establishes that which is of general concern to all mankind.

We read, indeed, of the sect of the Sadducees, who justly deserved that character; because they overturned the foundation of religion, by denying a future state, and the immortality of the soul whereas, the gospel, and true religion, establish those principles that concern

man's everlasting welfare.Also it cannot be called a sect, because it hath a native tendency to the uniting the children of men to the Son of God, and to one another in him, by love. Christ died to break down partition-walls, and to slay all enmity; and taught all his followers, not only to love one another, but to love their enemies. And his gospel, and the believers of it, are far from being a sect, which is supposed to lead to division, and sow discord. It is true, the preaching of the gospel hath been the occasion of much contention in the world and hence the preachers of the gospel have been branded as men of contention, Jer. xv. 10. where the prophet says, he was born a man of strife, and a man of contention to the whole earth; on which account Christ says, he came not to send peace, but a sword; and to set men at variance one against another, Mat. x. 34, 35. intimating, what occasion of contention the gospel would be; and what a load of reproaches might thereupon be cast upon its followers, as if they were contentious persons, and division makers; but whatever division or contention it be the occasion of, yet it is nowise the cause of contention; for, it was intended to be the cure of it and so far as gospel truth and principles do powerfully prevail, upon the hearts of men, so far doth it make them meek and quiet, and of a loving disposition; for, the wisdom that is from above, is pure and peaceable; and the gospel proclaims peace on earth.— In a word, true gospel-believers are so far from being a divisive sect, that, whereas the authors of sects use to be governed by secular interest, and to aim at wealth, honour and grandeur; true religion, instead of preferring a man to honour, lays him open to disgrace; and lays him obnoxious to fines and forfeiture, to flames and faggots, racks and imprisonments, when religion is persecute openly, as was the common lot of the primitive Christians, and of several after-ages of the church; and hath been the lot of some in Britain, yea, in Scotland, since the Reformation: and that it is not the lot of our day, is owing to restraining Providence; but how soon it may be your lot, is hard to tell. However, in this respect, it is far from being a sect governed by secular interest.