II. Though all sinners contract guilt, expose themselves to misery, and will sooner or later be filled with distress and sorrow for what they have done against God; yet many have no sense thereof at present, nor repentance, or remorse for it. These are described as _past feeling_, Eph. iv. 19. and _hardened through the deceitfulness of sin_, Heb. iii. 13. as obstinate, and having _their neck as an iron sinew, and their brow as brass_, Isa. xlviii. 4. And there are several methods which they take to ward off the force of convictions. Sometimes they are stupid, and hardly give themselves the liberty to consider the difference that there is between moral good and evil, or the natural obligation we are under to pursue the one, and avoid the other. They consider not the all-seeing eye of God, that observes all their actions, nor the power of his anger, who will take vengeance on impenitent sinners; regard not the various aggravations of sin, nor consider that God will, for those things, bring them to judgment. So that impenitency is generally attended with presumption; whereby the person concludes, though without ground, that it shall go well with him in the end; such an one is represented, as blessing himself in his heart, saying, _I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination_; or, as it is in the margin, in the stubbornness _of mine heart, to add drunkenness to thirst_, Deut. xxix. 19. Or if, on the other hand, he cannot but conclude, that with God is terrible majesty, that he is a consuming fire, and that none ever hardened themselves against him, and prospered, and if he does not fall down before him with humble confession of sin, and repentance for it, he will certainly be broken with his rod of iron, and dashed in pieces, like the potter’s vessel, broken with a tempest, and utterly destroyed, when his wrath is kindled; then he resolves, that some time or other he will repent, but still delays and puts it off for a more convenient season, and though God gives him space to do it, repenteth not, Rev. ii. 21. Thus he goes on in the greatness of his way, till God prevents him with the blessings of his goodness, and brings him to repentance. And this leads us to consider,