Page:Sermons preached in the African Protestant Episcopal Church of St. Thomas', Philadelphia.djvu/123

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ser. vi.]
retributive justice of god.
119

clearly illustrates the truth that the Lord is slow to anger.

Again. The character of the Gentiles, contrasted with God's conduct towards them, is a further confirmation of the first proposition of the text. A very startling, but graphic picture of their wretchedly depraved character is drawn by the Apostle Paul in the opening of his masterly epistle to the Romans. "Being filled" says he, "with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God; despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding; covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful: who knowing the judgment of God, that they, which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them."[1] Here then, we have the moral

  1. Rom. i., 29, 32.