Twenty-Four Short Sermons On The Doctrine Of Universal Salvation | Page 4

latter, for in it are mingled the bitter drugs
of misery. Be temperate in eating and drinking. Be temperate in all
your pursuits in life, and in all your desires. Be temperate in your
conduct; and (as an able writer observes) pitch upon that course of life
which is the most excellent, and habit will soon render it the most
delightful. Avoid not only every word and action that may lead to
discord and contention, but, as our text says, depart from evil and do
good, seek peace, and pursue it. Let us do good to all our fellow
creatures, and endeavor to overcome their hatred with love, and their
evil with good.
Yes, my young friends, affectionately and solemnly would I urge you
to begin early to curb your passions, and to study sweetness of
disposition. It will soon become to you perfectly natural, and thus you
will lay the foundation for a virtuous and tranquil old age. But, asks the
youth, shall I live longer for subduing my passions and doing good, for
seeking peace and pursuing it? Certainly. Our text teaches this; so does
philosophy, and the scriptures generally. Jesus Christ says, "Blessed are
the meek, for they shall inherit the earth." That is, they shall long enjoy
it. "Blessed are the peace-makers for they shall be called the children of
God." The fifth Commandment says, "Honor thy father and thy mother,
that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth
thee." By honoring our parents, we are to understand a filial and
submissive obedience to their precepts by not departing from that way
in which with many exhortations, prayers and tears, they sought to train
us up. In this case, honoring them would of course require us to walk in
the paths of virtue and temperance, and to live an honest, quiet and
peaceable life which would ensure the promise, and give us many days.
Not only do the scriptures promise long life to the peaceable, temperate
and meek, but they on the other hand just as solemnly declare that "the
wicked shall not live out half their days." This passage has occasioned
much dispute among religious denominations; one affirming that every

man's time is appointed in the counsels of heaven by the decree of God,
who "declares the end from the beginning;" and another affirming that
it is not, for the above passage teaches that the life of man may be
shortened. But there is no occasion for dispute on this point, for they
are both right, as we have seen in the course of our remarks. This
passage is but the counterpart of our text. It is the decree of God that
the wicked, the abandoned shall not reach the extreme of human life,
because they indulge in those very crimes, which, in the constitution of
things, must inevitably carry them to an early tomb. Of the truth of this
we see thousands of instances in the world. And God has decreed that
the meek, the peaceable shall reach the extreme of life, because they
pitch upon that happy course of conduct which naturally leads to it. All
that we are to understand by his decree, is that he has inseparably
connected the end with the means by so constituting our natures, and so
ordering his providence that _sin, dissipation, anger,_ and revenge shall
not only destroy happiness, but shorten life, so certain as men pursue
such a wretched course. And that the opposite course of conduct shall
not only communicate happiness, but protract life so certain as they
engage in it.
Here then, my young friends, you may readily perceive how God
punishes vice and rewards virtue. He does not do it by any abstract law,
or arbitrary mode of procedure, but lie has in infinite wisdom
interwoven, the whole in the very constitution of our natures, so that
the wicked cannot go unpunished, nor the righteous unrewarded. To
teach that man can indulge in vice, and yet escape its punishment by
future repentance, is not only dangerous to the morals of society, but is
a direct impeachment of the divine administration, as it must in such
case, be defective. And to teach that men may live righteously and
godly and yet go unrewarded, is equally dangerous to the morals of the
community, as it is but discouraging them from engaging in a virtuous
course of conduct. To teach that men are to be rewarded in a future
world for their goodness here, is but in substance saying that virtue is
attended with mental misery, and so far as it fails of rewarding its
possessor here, the balance is to be made up hereafter. And to teach
that men are to be punished in a future state for