gion of nature, on which they depend for justification with God. Others, though they apparently receive the Gospel, wickedly hide the talent in the earth, and make no improvement of it. They call themselves Christians, but bring not forth the good fruits which the Gospel requires, and is calculated to produce; consequently they can make no increase in holiness, nor in any Christian graces and tempers. All these, when Christ shall descend from heaven to reckon with his servants concerning the talents committed to them--the blessings and advantages of the Gospel dispensation---shall be judged by him according to the law of the Gospel. Let all, therefore, who are concerned in the process of that judgment, seriously and in time attend to it. And, that the design of the parable of the talents is to describe, and lay before us the process of the judgment of the Christian Church by Jesus Christ at the last day, is rendered highly probable by what St. Paul hath said; namely, that "as many as have sinned without law, shall also perish," that is, be condemned," without law." Where, without law, must mean, without the written, or revealed law of God. It cannot mean, without law absolutely, because sin is the transgression of the law; and where there is no law, there can be no transgression, nor any room for judgment or condemnation. Further, he saith, "As many as have sinned in," or under "the law," that is, of revelation, "shall be judged by the law" of revelation under which the providence of God placed them.* And by his reasoning on this subject, he hath led us to conclude, that the Gentiles who have not the revealed law of God for the rule of their conduct, shall not be judged by it, but by the law of conscience under which God's providence hath left them. If, therefore, they who have the revealed law of God made known to them, shall be judged by it; and they who are left under the law of conscience, shall be judg Rom. ii. 12. ed by it, and by the law of that reasonable nature which God hath given them, we have reason to conclude, that the process of judgment by laws so different, must be as different as the laws are by which it is conducted. The same consequence will follow from what our Saviour hath declared: namely, "That servant which knew his Lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes: But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes."* Here, knowing his master's will, must mean his having the benefit of divine revelation for the rule of his conduct; because he is supposed to have a superior degree of knowledge, and a plainer law to direct him, than he who knew not his Lord's will: otherwise he could not have deserved to have been beaten with more stripes, that is, to have been more severely punished. And not to know his Lord's will, must mean, the not having the advantage of divine revelation for the rule of his conduct, but being left to the law of conscience and natural reason; because, without the advantage of reason and conscience, he could not have distinguished between those things which were, and which were not worthy of punishment; and, consequently, could not have been subject either to judgment or condemnation. The reason of this distinction is that universal maxim adduced by our Saviour on this occasion; "Unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required" ....A maxim of such acknowledged justice, that "to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more." Happy would it be for them, did the plain meaning of this maxim always regulate their conduct : But it sometimes happens, that the maxim is pleaded, though its meaning is neglected. The right which evcry man claims, of choosing his own mode of religion, is sometimes carried so far, that he will renounce Christianity and become a votary of the religion of nature, or Luke xii. 47, 48. See a Sermon of Bishop Sherlock's on this subject, vol. ii. discourse vi. As deism, with as little ceremony as he would abandon one society of Christian Professors, and join another. he considers himself no longer under any obligation to believe the doctrines, and practise the duties of the Gos pel, he supposes God will regard the matter as he does; and will judge him, if he judge him at all, by the law of nature, and not by the law of the Gospel, because he did not live by it. And if it be true, that much will be required of him to whom much is given; it must also be true, that little will be required of him to whom little is given. A man, too, will be accepted according to what he hath, and not according to what he hath not. That these maxims are true, will be denied by no one but in this case they are misapplied. God did not place this man under the religion of nature, but under the revelation of the Gospel. His choosing the religion. of nature in preference to the Gospel, was his own act, for which he is accountable to God, as well as for his rejecting the Gospel. And by the Gospel he must be judged, whether he receive it or not. It is a talent which has been committed to him, and of it he must give an account. With regard to the religion of nature, or the law of reason and conscience, it must be the rule of a man's conduct where God hath given no positive revelation of his will: but where he hath, both reason and conscience require submission to it; because it will be the standard of the final judgment of God with respect to those to whom it is given, That we are born in a Christian country, and have early opportunities of being informed of the blessings of our holy religion...of being instructed in its principles, and in those things which it requires of us, ought to be the subject of our devout thanksgiving to our heavenly Father. It displays to us the greatness of God's love, and the means of obtaining his favour, both in this world and the next, far beyond the utmost stretch of reason and conscience. It also makes known to us the wrath of God against those who reject the Gospel; or who, de clining from that holy conversation which it requires, live wickedly, and die without repentance. If, then, Christians are to be judged by a different process, founded on a different law from that by which they shall be judged who never heard of the Gospel-..if the blessings and advantages of our holy religion are so many talents committed to us by God, of the improvement of which we must give an exact account in the day of judgment, and receive our sentence according as our life hath been, comparing it with the law of the Gospel; we ought to reflect on our situation, while we have time to correct what is amiss in it; remembering, that the laws of that holy religion by which we are now required to live, will be the rule by which we shall be finally judged. You may think lightly of these things at present, and explain them away by critical interpretation of Scripture, and philosophical arguments, both falsely so called. Explain them as you can, and reason about them as you will, their final issue will be awful beyond your utmost conception. Worldly cares, and pleasures, and business may engross your attention, and leave you neither time nor inclination to regard matters which appear to you to be very remote. But every thing in this world passeth quickly away and is gone. After a little time, sickness, or old age will bring eternity near, and place it before you---A little longer, and death will put you in actual possession of it. When that tremendous scene shall take place, should your lamps be gone out, for want of that holy conversation which the Gospel requires, you will, at the day of judgment, be in the same condition with the foolish virgins who were excluded from the marriage feast, and left in outer darkness. DISCOURSE XV. . THE GENERAL JUDGMENT. MATT. XXVI. 31, 32. When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the boly angels with him, then shall be sit upon the throne of his glory. And before him shall be gathered all nations; and he shall separate them, one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats. IN N discoursing on the Parable of the Talents, I endeavoured to shew, that it described the process of the last judgment as it related to Christ's own, or peculiar servants; those, namely, to whom the will of God had been made known by the promulgation of the Gospel; with a view to impress strongly upon them, the necessity of that constant state of preparation for the coming of their Lord, which was enjoined in the parable of the ten virgins, which concluded with this emphatical command, "Watch, therefore, for ye know neither the day, nor the hour, when the Son of man cometh." To impress this important lesson still more deeply on their minds, by displaying the justice and severity of God against obstinate sinners of every description, and his mercy and goodness to those who had lived according to the laws which he had given them for the rule of their conduct, Christ proceeds to describe the awful scene of the last judgment at the end of the world, as it will affect the other inhabitants of the earth, to whom VOL. I.. Nn |