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"their hope in God, and not forget the Disc. "works of God, but keep his command"ments". d "

Had this divine injunction been obeyed, religious knowlege would have been regularly tranfmitted by parents to their children, from generation to generation. But that knowlege once loft (as from various causes it has been loft) by parents, ignorance must thenceforward be tranfmitted in the place of it. In the present state of things among us, many are the parents, who can neither teach their children, nor afford to pay for their being taught. How melancholy, and in the end how fatal to fociety must be the confequences, unless the cause be taken up by the charitable and well difpofed !-Bleffed be God, it has been taken up by Britons, in a manner unknown to any other age or nation. At the yearly meeting in the Cathedral of the metropolis, 6000 poor children, neatly clothed in the uniform of their respective schools, are seen

DISC. arranged in rifing circles, and heard founding forth together the praises of God. Struck with what they saw and heard (and I suppose the like never was feen or heard), two noblemen of the kingdom of Portugal, and confequently of the Romish perfuafion, were overheard to exclaim, at one of thefe folemnities" This is life indeed"We never lived before !"-"Out of the "mouth of babes and fucklings was praise "thus perfected!"

Children clothed and inftructed in other parts of the kingdom, cannot meet in this world; but all, if they make a proper ufe of what they learn, will meet in the next, to give thanks to God, and acknowlege the kindness of their benefactors. A more powerful confideration cannot be urged (and therefore no other needeth to be urged) to encourage all parties concerned in these charities, to perform their refpective dutiesthose who have ability, to give liberally; thofe who teach, to do it with fidelity; those who learn, with diligence.

DISCOURSE IV.

CONSIDERATIONS ON THE SEA.

PSALM XCV. 5.

The Sea is bis, and be made it.

WHEN

HEN man was first formed, crea- DISC. tion was his book, and God his

preceptor. The elements were fo many letters, by means of which, when rightly understood, and put together, the wisdom, power, and goodness of the great Creator became legible to him.

The proficiency made by Adam under his heavenly teacher, appears from the circumstance of his impofing upon the creatures,

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when

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DISC. when they were brought to him for that

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purpose, names expreffive of their natures; a task which he could never have performed, unless, by the affiftance of his divine guide, he had first been introduced to an intimate acquaintance with those natures.

Happy the times, when all knowlege thus lay in one volume; when the pursuit of wisdom was attended by pleasure, and followed by devotion! For who doth not find delight in contemplating the works of the Lord? Who, when he hath duly contemplated the works, can forbear to praise the Workmaster ?

The great and learned champion of the Roman church, who spent the best part of his life in fifting the disputes between the catholics and proteftants, compofed, towards the close of his days, a small treatise upon the afcent of the foul to God by meditation on the creatures, which, from thenceforth, he made his conftant companion, and was wont to say, it was more fatisfac

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tion to him to have been the author of DISC. that, than of all his large volumes of controverfy.

The raptures with which the penmen of the holy Scriptures expatiate upon the perfections of God, as difplayed in the creation, are well known. And could we bring our minds habitually into the fame train of thinking, every walk we take would begin with admiration, and end with praise. We should always, upon fuch occafions, think, what the pfalmift has fo finely expressed, after a furvey of the heavens above, and the earth beneath-O Lord, how manifold are thy works! In wisdom haft thou made them all; the earth is full of thy riches! And who, that looks around him from the delightful place where we now are, can forbear to add, So is this great and wide fea alfo! For of this truth let us never be unmindful, that wonderful as the fea is in itfelf, and beneficial as it is to the fons of men, all it's wonders and all it's benefits

This Difcourfe was compofed at Brighthelmstone.

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