The sovereign and final happiness of man with the effectual means to obtain itThe soveraign and final happiness of man with the effectual means to obtain it

'Tis observable what is reported of a^† noble Foreigner, that reflecting upon his Birth-day, and the Age of his Life, he was surprised with grief, and struck with Astonishment, that without a due Sense of the proper Business and End of Life, he was arrived to that Age, when our Days begin to decline. In an instant all things seemed to change appearance in his view. Then first (says he) I perceived I was a Man, for before ⟨p. 207⟩I had not resolved for what I should employ my Life. The issue was, his serious Resolution unfeignedly to honour God, sincerely to confess Christ, to place his Felicity in Holiness of Life, and most zealously to follow it. Let any one that is not of a reprobate Mind, and an incorrigibly depraved Heart, duly consider the sublime and supernatural End of Man. O what a marvellous change will it make in him, of Carnal into Spiritual? nay it would be a kind of Miracle if he continued in his sinful State. How will it transform him into another Man, with new Valuations, new Affections and Resolutions, as if he were born again with a new Soul? How will it amaze him that his whole course has been a contradiction to the wise and gracious design of God, that all his Industry has been a race out of the way, a perpetual diversion from his main Business, that his Life has been fruitless and dead to the true End of it? How will he be confounded at his former Folly? Then alone we act with Understanding, when moved by our blessed End, and our Actions by a strict tendency without variation issue into it.

'Tis observable what is reported of a^† noble Forreigner, that reflecting upon his Birth-day, and the Age of his Life, he was surpriz'd with grief, and struck with Astonishment, that without a due Sence of the proper Business and End of Life, he was arrived to that Age, when our Days begin to decline. In an instant all things seem'd to change appearance in his view. Then first (says he) I perceived I was a Man, for before ⟨p. 207⟩I had not resolved for what I should employ my Life. The issue was, his serious Resolution unfeignedly to honour God, sincerely to confess Christ, to place his Felicity in Holiness of Life, and most zealously to follow it. Let any one that is not of a reprobate Mind, and an incorrigibly depraved Heart, duly consider the sublime and supernatural End of Man. O what a marvellous change will it make in him, of Carnal into Spiritual? nay it would be a kind of Miracle if he continued in his sinful State. How will it transform him into another Man, with new Valuations, new Affections and Resolutions, as if he were born again with a new Soul? How will it amaze him that his whole course has been a contradiction to the wise and gracious design of God, that all his Industry has been a race out of the way, a perpetual diversion from his main Business, that his Life has been fruitless and dead to the true End of it? How will he be confounded at his former Folly? Then alone we act with Understanding, when mov'd by our blessed End, and our Actions by a strict tendency without variation issue into it.