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rch; worldlings, tol>e ancandal to the church; 'fcrmaliats, to teach Buperatilion; and Anniuians, to ttacAt fal»e doctrine; which, having continned for a longcentnry, hath wroufcl^t miserable ba^ 932 GOi>'s coNTBovcftsr wrtH the la^d, IDii. r^nness in the body of the people; whose igDo< ranee of, and incapacity for. spiritual koowledi ift hardly tn be believed. They have a blind at< taclimL-nt to ilie cliurcb, as a Papist hatli, tbouj seldom able to render you so good an accouat it; but a; to the true doctrines of tho Gospel they know them not, and abbor them as noveltit when they hear them. And hence there beio] little or DO Oirine seed amon^t the maltttude they have fallen into that barrenne&s and wicked- nes8 which i^ so griei'ou? even to a good moralii to a spiritual man so abominable. Early and ii provident marriages proceeding for the moat out of concubinage!, and a desire of children Hti> mulatcd by the pari^ih aJlowanceft^afanuiy of pau<b pers, and not ash^iDked of it, cleaving immovabh to their parishes like limpets to the rock ; ba^ no ideas beyond catini? and drinking, and labotin ing the soil, and enjoying the paradise of an a)e< bouse. Obi what an abomination in the sight ol die Lord; what an indignation in the sight ol Christ, who hath established his church for removal of ignorance, the mother of all thetorj abominations. I tell you, brethren, there is « aecret, which your economist?, and your ex-' pedient legislators, and ymir modern philosophers, are blind to as the niole^ — the secret of making families thrive in the boscm of love and unity, of peace and plenty ; of making mere animals into godlike men, and idle women into godly mothers, and herding children into brethren dwelling in unity, and dependent paupers into industrioua citizens, and roaming vagabond)^ into settled fioot of peace: out of the union of which families' Cometh a charitable, thriving, plentiful, neigb^ HI.] OOD'j CONTHOVBltlV WITH Till: I.AVD- 98S boiirlkood; out of which neighbourhooils comcth a godly, prusfwmus, mercirul, wiue, and mighty aatioD, whose God h the Lord, whose voJct k like the word of God. and whose arm, when it is stretched out in its might, is like the very thunder of God. Into »ucb a condition was this island of North and South Britain, hut espe* lualty the North, wrought by the ministry of the church of Chriftt; and outofitgrew those achifrt'e- menu of old iimc, which make our history at home and abroad more like romance than true history'. We have been living for a century upon the mora