by being told of
the infinite and all-sufficient mercy of God in Christ; and that it is
God's manner to succeed diligence, and to bless His own means, that so
awakenings and encouragements, fear and hope, may be duly mixed and
proportioned to preserve their minds in a just medium between the two
extremes of self-flattery and despondence, both which tend to slackness
and negligence, and in the end to security. I think I have found that no
discourses have been more remarkably blessed, than those in which the
doctrine of God's absolute sovereignty with regard to the salvation of
sinners, and His just liberty with regard to answering the prayers, or
succeeding the pains, of natural men, continuing such, have been
insisted on. I never found so much immediate saving fruit, in any
measure, of any discourses I have offered to my congregation, as some
from these words, Rom. iii. 19. "That every mouth may be stopped;"
endeavoring to show from thence that it would be just with God for ever
to reject and cast off mere natural men.
As to those in whom awakenings seem to have a saving issue, commonly the
first thing that appears after their legal troubles, is a conviction of
the justice of God in their condemnation, appearing in a sense of their
own exceeding sinfulness, and the vileness of all their performances. In
giving an account of this, they expressed themselves very variously;
some, that they saw God was sovereign, and might receive others and
reject them; some, that they were convinced God might justly bestow
mercy on every person in the town, in the world, and damn themselves to
all eternity; some, that they see God may justly have no regard to all
the pains they have taken, and all the prayers they have made; some,
that if they should seek, and take the utmost pains all their lives, God
might justly cast them into hell at last, because all their labors,
prayers, and tears cannot make an atonement for the least sin, nor merit
any blessing at the hands of God. Some hav
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