A DISCOURSE ON LIFE AND IMMORTALITY, 2 TIM. i, 10. AND HATH BROUGHT LIFE AND IMMORTALITY TO LIGHT THROUGH THE GOSPEL. AMONG the many great advantages that are conveyed unto mankind by the Gofpel of Jefus Chrift, there are thefe of principal moment : 1. A full and clear discovery, that there is a ftate of Life and Immortality of mankind, after the diffolution of the lives we enjoy in this inferior world, 2. A full and clear difcovery of the nature and kinds of this eftate of Life and Immortality, namely, that it is a state of rewards and punishments; a state of reward with everlasting life and happiness to the righteous, and a state of everlasting life and mifery to the wicked. 3. A full discovery of an eafy and effectual means of the avoiding of that future life of mifery, and of the attainment of that future eftate of life of hap piness. I fhall not enter into a large difcourfe of these excellent discoveries, but only briefly consider these things: 1. The great importance of the true and evident dif covery of thefe great truths. 2. The great deficiency that there was in thefe difcoveries before the light of the Gofpel came into the world. 3. The great discovery"made by the Gospel of thefe great and important truths. 4. The great evidences for the fatisfaction and conviction of the truths of these discoveries thus made in the Gospel. 1. Concerning the former of thefe; namely, the great importance of this evident discovery thereof. every man that doth but matter. truth, and of the full and We are born and live in this world, according to the greatest ordinary account, about threefcore and ten years, and then we die, and are no more feen in this world of what a vast momentous concernment is it for us to know, that there is an everlasting estate of happiness or mifery, according to the nature of the tranfaction of our lives here, that doth moft certainly and infallibly attend us after death? The importance of the knowledge of this is more than all the rest of our knowledge of all other things, in very many refpects: 1. The bare knowledge of the thing itself is a moft excellent fubject to be known, if there were nothing else in it. But, 2. It is a knowledge of a thing that doth most neceffarily, nearly, and intimately concern us; even much more than our very lives in this world. This life paffeth away as a fhadow, but the life of rewards and punishments is a life everlasting, and unchangeable; and therefore it is of more concernment to us, both to know it, and to know how to attain that bleffed life of happiness, than to attain all the glory and happiness that this present tranfitory life can afford. And, 3. The knowledge of this truth is of huge moment, not only for the right ordering of our prefent life here, in order to the attainment of that everlasting bleffed life, but even for a right, and wife, and comfortable management and enjoyment of the prefent life we have in this world. For most certainly, without the prospect, hope and expectation of this future ftate, the life of man is more unhappy and miferable miferable than the lives of the beafts that perish. The knowledge therefore of this great truth is of the greatest moment to the children of men; and the ignorancé thereof is the most unhappy and hurtful ignorance of any thing in the world; because it is an ignorance of that which most concerns us to know, because that knowledge is principally neceffary for the avoiding of the greatest evil, and the attaining of the greatest good that can poffibly befall us. 2. Touching the fecond; namely, the deficiency that was in the world, in order to the discovery, before the Gofpel came. This principally confifted in these things: 1. A want of a fufficient evidence, that there is anyfuch estate after death. 2.A want of afufficient light, to discover what that future eftate was to be. 3. A want of a discovery of a fufficient means, how that part of the eftate of everlasting happiness was to be attained, and the eftate of everlasting mifery to be avoided. And this deficiency in these things will appear, if we take a furvey, firft, of the ftate of the Gentile knowledge, in relation to these things. Secondly, in relation to the discoveries made to the Jews under the law. First, As to the difcoveries of thefe truths unto the Gentile. It is very true, that partly by an univerfal tradition, derived probably from the common parents of mankind, partly by fome glimmering of natural light, in the natural confciences at leaft of fome of the heathen, there feemed to be fome common perfuafion of a future estate of rewards and punishments. But, firft, it was but weak and dim, and was even in many of the wifeft of them overborn; fo that it was rather a fufpicion, or at moft a weak and faint perfuafion rather than a ftrong and firm conviction: and hence it became very unoperative and ineffectual to the moft of them, when they had the greatest need of it; namely, upon imminent, or incumbent temporal evils of grat preffure. But, where the perfuafion was firmeft amongst them, yet ftill they were in the dark what what it was; and yet much more in the dark, in reference to the means of attaining that future state of happiness; and this darkness begot in them thofe various fictions and fabulous imaginations, efpecially among the poets, that even rendered the main hypothefis more doubtful than otherwife it would have been. And thofe various fuperftitions, and idolatrous worships and rites, and performances, which they defigned as the means of attaining that future happiness, which they thus darkly, and under various fabulous difguifes,entertained. Secondly If we come to the difcoveries made unto the Jews, which were certainly much greater than those that the Gentiles had by the light of nature; yet this we have reafon to think, that although many excellent men among them did, through thofe many types, and fhadows, as it were at a diftance, fee the heavenly Canaan, and the Meffiah, through whom it was to be attained; yet the Divine difpenfation under the law was dark and obfcure in relation to the estate of future rewards and punishments, in comparison of what is revealed in the Gofpel: their promises were, for the most part, of temporal benefits, and their threatnings of temporal punishments; and their worship and services were very much under fhadows and external administrations, fo were their rewards and punishments. Yet it must be agreed, that even under that dark administration, there were greater evidences of the future life than were manifefted generally to other nations; the examples of the affumption of Enoch and Elias, the revivings of the Shunamite's fon, buried in the Prophet's grave, and the feveral paffages in Job xix. 25, Ifa. xxvi. 19. Ezek. xxxvii. Dan. xi. 2. and divers other paffages in the Old Testament; together with a common received tradition among that nation, did give them a belief or perfuafion of a life to come after this, and of the refurrection; and this the Apostle witneffeth of the patriarchs and holy men under the Old Teftament, Heb. xi. 10, 13, 14, 35, &c. And fo far this perfuafion was fettled in that people, that in the time of our Saviour, and unto this day, the per fuafion |