310 SERMON. 



in opposition to the light of y' living, and signifies no more 

 than natural death. But the word darkness here hath a 

 further meaning; and signifies a much worse thing, viz. Hell, 

 or the place appointed by God to be the prison of damned 

 Angels, and men. And in this sense Darkness is made use of 

 in other parts of S. as Jude v. 13 : "To whom is reserved y c 

 blackness of darkness for ever : " and 2 Pet. 2, " To whom is 

 reserved the mist of darkness for ever." 



Having thus explained the terms of the text, and thereby 

 shewed what will subject people to the dreadful doom of it: I 

 shall in the next place make it my business to shew more 

 particularly what those talents are by the due use of which we 

 may escape that sentence. And the Talents in general are 

 all advantages and means, endowments, gifts, and faculties, 

 whereby we may glorify God, or be beneficial to men. And 

 these are twofold, either external, or internal. The external, 

 or gifts of fortune, as some call y m are riches, honour, and 

 power. The internal, or endowments of Nature, are likewise 

 double ; either those seated in the body, as strength, and 

 beauty : or those in the mind ; as reason, and it's several 

 branches, and faculties, viz. memory, understanding, and 

 judgment. By every one of these we are put into a capacity 

 (if we will but take care rightly to apply them) of doing 

 service to God, and men ; and so of becoming profitable 

 servants. 



I begin with external gifts, or those of fortune, as some call 

 them; viz: riches, honour, and power. These, if rightly 

 understood, are all of them very considerable helps towards 

 doing good, and gaining God's love : because there are no 

 duties with which he is more pleased than with humility, con- 

 descension, charity, and mercy. But to think these talents 

 bestowed upon us only to pamper, and puff us up, and nourish 

 us to a prodigious bulk, that we may be as it were alone on 

 y e earth; such overgrown trees as eclipse all the blessings of 

 Heaven from every thing around them; and suffer nothing to 

 prosper or thrive near or under them ; is to forget that there 

 is an over-ruling power above, an higher than y e highest on 

 earth, that considers all things done here, and will call them 



