12.  This is the surest as well as the noblest way of drawing the sting out of a reproach, and a true method of preparing a man for that great and only relief against the pains of calumny, ‘a good conscience.’

13.  I designed in this essay; to shew, that there is no happiness wanting to him who is possessd of this excellent frame of mind, and that no one can be miserable who is in the enjoyment of it; but I find this subject so well treated in one of Dr. Soulh’s sermons, that I shall fill this Saturday’s paper with a passage of it, which cannot but make the man’s heart burn within him, who reads it with due attention.

14.  That admirable author, having shewn the virtue of a good conscience, in supporting a man under the greatest trials and difficulties of life, concludes with representing its force and efficacy in the hour of death.

15.  The third and last instance, in which above all others this confidence towards God does most eminently shew and exert itself, is at the time of death; which surely gives the grand opportunity of trying both the strength and worth of every principle.

16.  When a man shall be just about to quit the stage of this world, to put off his mortality, and to deliver up his last accounts to God; at which sad time his memory shall serve him for little else, but to terrify him with a frightful review of his past life, and his former extravagancies stripped of all their pleasure, but retaining their guilt; what is it then that can promise him a fair passage into the other world, or a comfortable appearance before his dreadful Judge when he is there?

17.  Not all the friends and interests, all the riches and honours under heaven can speak so much as a word for him, or one word of comfort to him in that condition; they may possibly reproach, but they cannot relieve him.

18.  No, at this disconsolate time, when the busy temper shall be more than usually apt to vex and trouble him, and the pains of a dying body to hinder and discompose him, and the settlement of worldly affairs to disturb and confound him; and in a word, all things conspire to make his sick-bed grievous and uneasy:  nothing can then stand up against all these ruins, and speak life in the midst of death, but a clear conscience.

19.  And the testimony of that shall make the comforts of heaven descend upon his weary head, like a refreshing dew, or shower upon a parched ground.  It shall give him some lively earnests, and secret anticipations of his approaching joy.  It shall bid his, soul to go out of the body undauntedly, and lift up his head with confidence before saints and angels.  Surely the comfort, which it conveys at this season, is something bigger than the capacities of mortality, mighty and unspeakable, and not to be understood till it comes to be felt.

20.  And now who would not quit all the pleasures, and trash, and trifles, which are apt to captivate the heart of man, and pursue the great rigours of piety, and austerities of a good life, to purchase to himself such a conscience, as at the hour of death, when all the friendship in the world shall bid him adieu, and the whole creation turns its back upon him, shall dismiss the soul and close his eyes with that blessed sentence, ’Well done thou good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.’