Christianity en joins the same temper, the same, mon good; whose restlessness, indicating the spirit, the same dispositions, on all its real pro- unsatisfactoriness of all they find on earth, he fessors. The act, the performance, must depend points to a higher destination. Were total seon circumstances which do not depend on us. clusion and abstraction designed to have been The power of doing good is withheld from ma- the general state of the world, God would have ny, from whom, however, the reward will not given man other laws, other rules, other faculbe withheld. If the external act constituted the ties, and other employments. whole value of Christian virtue, then must the author of all good be himself the author of injustice, by putting it out of the power of multitudes to fulfil his own commands. In principles, in tempers, in fervent desires, in holy endeavours, consist the very essence of Christian duty.

Nor must we fondly attach ourselves to the practice of some particular virtue, or value ourselves exclusively on some favourite quality; nor must we wrap ourselves up in the perform ance of some individual actions, as if they formed the sum of Christian duty. But we must embrace the whole law of God in all its aspects, bearings and relations. We must bring no fancies, no partialities, no prejudices, no exclusive choice or rejection into our religion, but take it as we find it, and obey it as we receive it, as it is exhibited in the Bible without addition, curtailment, or adulteration.

Nor must we pronounce on a character by a single action really bad, or apparently good; if so, Peter's denial would render him the object of our execration, while we should have judged favourably of the prudent economy of Judas. The catastrophe of the latter, who does not know? while the other became a glorious martyr to that master, whom, in a moment of infirmity he had denied.

There is a class of visionary but pious writers who seem to shoot as far beyond the mark, as mere moralists fall short of it-Men of low views and gross minds may be said to be wise below what is written, while those of too subtle refinement are wise above it. The one grovel in the dust from the inertness of their intellectual faculties; while the others are lost in the clouds by stretching them beyond their appointed limits. The one build spiritual castles in the air, instead of erecting them on the 'holy ground' of Scripture; the other lay their foundation in the sand instead of resting it on the Rock of Ages. Thus, the superstructure of both is equally unsound.

God is the fountain from which all the streams of goodness flow; the centre from which all the rays of blessedness diverge.-All our actions are, therefore, only good, as they have a reference to Him the streams must revert back to their fountain, the rays must converge again to their centre.

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If love of God be the governing principle, this powerful spring will actuate all the movements of the rational machine. The essence of religion does not so much consist in actions as affections. Though right actions, therefore, as from an excess of courtesy they are commonly termed, may be performed where there are no A piety altogether spiritual, disconnected with right affections; yet are they a mere carcass; all outward circumstances; a religion of pure utterly destitute of the soul, and, therefore, of meditation and abstracted devotion, was not the substance of virtue. But neither can affecmade for so compound, so imperfect a creature tions substantially and truly subsist without proas man. There have, indeed, been a few sub-ducing right actions; for never let it be forgot. lime spirits, not touched but rapt,' who totally cut off from the world, seem almost to have literally soared above this terrene region, who almost appear to have stolen the fire of the Seraphim, and to have had no business on carth, but to keep alive the celestial flame. They would, however, have approximated more nearly to the example of their divine master, the great standard and only perfect model, had they com- The love of God, as it is the source of every bined a more diligent discharge of the active right action and feeling, so it is the only princiduties and benefices of life with their high devo-ple which necessarily involves the love of our tional attainments.

But while we are in little danger of imitating, let us not too harshly censure the pious error of these sublimated spirits. Their number is small. Their example is not catching. Their ethereal fire is not likely, by spreading, to inflame the world. The world will take due care not to come in contact with it, while its distant light and warmth may cast, accidentally, a not unuseful ray on the cold-hearted and the worldly.

But from this small number of refined but inoperative beings, we do not intend to draw our notions of practical piety. God did not make a religion for these few exceptions to the general state of the world, but for the world at large; for beings active, busy, restless; whose activity, he, by his word, diverts into its proper channels; whose busy spirit is there directed to the com.

ten that a pious inclination which has not life and vigour sufficient to ripen into act when the occasion presents itself, and a right action which does not grow out of a sound principle, will neither of them have any place in the account of real goodness. A good inclination will be contrary to sin, but a mere inclination will not subdue sin.

fellow creatures. As man we do not love man. There is a love of partiality but not of benevo lence; of sensibility but not of philanthropy; of friends and favourites, of parties and societies, but not of man collectively. It is true we may, and do, without this principle, relieve his distresses, but we do not bear with his faults. We may promote his fortune, but we do not forgive his offences; above all, we are not anxious for his immortal interests. We could not see him want without pain, but we can see him sin without emotion. We could not hear of a beggar perishing at our door without horror, but we can, without concern, witness an acquaintance dying without repentance. Is it not strange that we must participate something of the divine nature, before we can really love the human? It seems, indeed, to be an insensibility to sin,

We cannot be said to be real Christians, till religion become our animating motive, our pre-portunities he may have of doing good during dominating principle and pursuit, as much as worldly things are the predominating motive, principle and pursuit, of worldly men.

happiness and desires the salvation of all his children; who dispenses his daily munificence and bears with our daily offences; who in return for our violation of his laws, supplies our necessities: who waits patiently for our repentance, and even solicits us to have mercy on our own souls ?

What a model for our humble imitation is that Divine person who was clothed with our humanity; who dwelt among us that the pattern being brought near might be rendered more engaging, the conformity be made more practicable; whose whole life was one unbroken series of universal charity; who in his complicated bounties never forgot that man is compounded both of soul and body; who after teaching the multitude, fed them; who repulsed none for being ignorant; was impatient with none for being dull; despised none for being contemned by the world; rejected none for being sin ners; who encouraged those whose importunity others censured; who in healing sickness converted souls; who gave bread and forgave injuries!

for avoiding the next, that it is a new reason for his embarking in it. He looks not at the work which he has accomplished; but on that which he has to do. His views are always prospective. His charities are scarcely limited by his power. His will knows no limits. His fortune may have bounds: His benevolence has none. He is, in mind and desire, the benefactor of every miserable man. His heart is open to all the distressed; to the household of faith it overflows. Where the heart is large, however small the ability, a thousand ways of doing good will be invented. Christian charity is a great enlarger of means. Christian self-denial negatively accomplishes the purpose of the favourites of fortune in the fables of the nursery-if it cannot fill the purse by a wish, it will not empty it by a vanity. It provides for others by abridg ing from itself. Having carefully defined what is necessary and becoming, it allows of no encroachment on its definition. Superfluities it will lop, vanities it will cut off. The deviser of liberal things will find means of effecting them, which to the indolent appear incredible, to the covetous impossible. Christian beneficence takes a large sweep. That circumference cannot be small of which God is the centre. Nor does religious charity in a Christian stand still because not kept in motion by the main spring of the world. Money may fail, but benevolence will be going on. If he cannot relieve want, he may mitigate sorrow. He may warn the inexperienced, he may instruct the ignorant, he may confirm the doubting. The Christian will find out the cheapest way of being good as well as of doing good. If he cannot give money, he may exercise a more difficult virtue; he may forgive injuries. Forgiveness is the economy of the heart. A Christian will find it cheaper to pardon than to resent. Forgiveness saves expense of anger, the cost of hatred, the waste of spirits. It also puts the soul into a frame, which makes If this gracious Saviour has left us a perfect the practice of other virtues easy. The achieve-model for our devotion in his prayer, he has left ment of a hard duty is a great abolisher of difficulties. If great occasions do not arise, he will thankfully seize on small ones. If he cannot glorify God by serving others, he knows that he has always something to do at home; some evil temper to correct, some wrong propensity to reform, some crooked practice to straighten. He will never be at a loss for employment, while there is a sin or misery in the world; he will never be idle, while there is a distress to be relieved in another, or a corruption to be cured in his own heart. We have employment assigned to us for every circumstance in life. When we are alone, we have our thoughts to watch: in the family, our tempers; in company, our tongues.

It will be the endeavour of the sincere Christian, to illustrate his devotions in the morning by his actions during the day. He will try to make his conduct a practical exposition of the divine prayer which made a part of them. He will desire to hallow the name of God, to promote the enlargement and the 'coming' of the kingdom' of Christ. He will endeavour to do and to suffer his whole will; to forgive' as he himself trusts that he is forgiven. He will resolve to avoid that 'temptation' into which he had been praying not to be led; and he will labour to shun the 'evil' from which he had been begging to be delivered.' He thus makes his prayers as practical as the other parts of his religion; and labours to render his conduct as spiritual as his prayers. The commentary and the text are of reciprocal application.

a model no less perfect for our practice in his sermon. This Divine exposition has been sometimes misunderstood. It was not so much a supplement to a defective law, at the restoration of the purity of a perfect law from the corrupt interpretations of its blind expounders. These persons had ceased to consider it as forbidding the principle of sin, and as only forbidding the act. Christ restores it to its original meaning, spreads it out on its due extent, shows the largeness of its dimensions and the spirit of its institution. He unfolds all its motions, tendencies and relations. Not contenting himself, as human legislators, are obliged to do, to prohibit a man the act which is injurious to others, but the inward temper which is prejudicial to himself.

There cannot be a more striking instance, how emphatically every doctrine of the gospel has a reference to practical goodness, than is exhibited by St. Paul in that magnificent picture of the resurrection, in his epistle to the Corinthians, which our church has happily selected, for the consolation of survivors at the last closing scene of mortality. After an interference as triumphant as it is logical, that because Christ is risen, we shall rise also;' after the most philosophical illustration of the raising

of the body from the dust, by the process of suit; he is to keep his ground without troubling grain sown in the earth, and by the springing himself in searching after imaginary perfection. up into a new mode of existence; after describ- These frugal Christians are afraid of nothing ing the subjugation of all things to the Re- so much as superfluity in their love, and superedeemer, and his laying down the mediatorial rogation in their obedience. This kind of fear kingdom; after sketching with a seraph's pen- however is always superfluous, but most especil, the relative glories of the celestial and ter- cially in those who are troubled with the appre restrial bodies; after exhausting the grandest hension. They are apt to weigh in the nicely images of created nature, and the dissolution of poised scales of scrupulous exactness, the duties nature itself; after such a display of the which must of hard necessity be done, and solemnities of the great day, as makes this those which without much risk may be left world, and all its concerns shrink into nothing undone; compounding for a larger indulgence in such a moment, when, if ever, the rapt spirit by the relinquishment of a smaller; giving up, might be supposed too highly wrought for pre- through fear, a trivial gratification to which they cept and admonition, the apostle, wound up as are less inclined, and snatching doubtingly, as he was by the energies of inspiration, to the im. an equivalent, at one they like better. The mediate view of the glorified state-the last gratification in both cases being perhaps such trumpet sounding-the change from mortal to as a manly mind would hardly think worth immortality effected in the twinkling of an eye contending for, even were religion out of the -the sting of death drawn out-victory snatch. question. Nothing but love to God can conquer ed from the grave-then, by a turn as surprising | love of the world. One grain of that divine as it is beautiful, he draws a conclusion as un-principle would make the scale of self-indul. expectedly practical as his premises were grand gence kick the beam. and awful: Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmoveable; always abounding in the work of the Lord.' Then at once, by another quick transition, resorting from the duty to the reward, and winding up the whole with an argument as powerful, as his rhetoric had been sublime, he adds- Forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.'

CHAP. III.

Mistakes in Religion

These persons dread nothing so much as en. thusiasm. Yet if to look for effects without their predisposing causes; to depend for heaven on that to which heaven was never promised, be features of enthusiasm, then are they themselves enthusiasts.

The religion of a second class, we have already described in the two preceding chapters. It consists in a heart devoted to its Maker; in. wardly changed in its temper and disposition, yet deeply sensible of its remaining infirmities; continually aspiring however to higher improve. ments in faith, hope and charity, and thinking that the greatest of these is charity.' These, by the former class, are reckoned enthusiasts, but they are in fact, if Christianity be true, acting on the only rational principles. If the doctrines of the gospel have any solidity, if its promises have any meaning, these Christians are building on no false ground. They hope that submission to the power of God, obedience to his laws, compliance with his will, trust in his word, are through the efficacy of the eternal Spirit, real evidences, because they are vital acts of genuine faith in Jesus Christ. If they profess not to place their reliance on works, they are however more zealous in performing them than the others, who professing to depend on their good deeds for salvation, are not always diligent in securing it by the very means which they themselves establish to be alone effectual.

To point out with precision all the mistakes which exist in the present day, on the awful subject of religion, would far exceed the limits of this small work. No mention therefore is intended to be made of the opinions or the prac tice of any particular body of people; nor will any notice be taken of any of the peculiarities of the numerous sects and parties which have risen up among us. It will be sufficient for the present purpose, to hazard some slight remarks on a few of those common classes of characters, which belong more or less to most general bodies. There are, among many others, three different sorts of religious professors. The religion of one consists in a sturdy defence of what they themselves call orthodoxy, an attendance on public worship, and a general decency of beha- There is a third class-the high flown pro. viour. In their views of religion, they are not fessor, who looks down from the giddy heights a little apprehensive of excess, not perceiving of antinomian delusion on the other two, abhors that their danger lies on the other side. They the one, and despises the other, concludes that are far from rejecting faith or morals, but are the one is lost, and the other in a fair way to be somewhat afraid of believing too much, and a so. Though perhaps not living himself in any little scrupulous about doing too much, lest the course of immorality, which requires the sanc former be suspected of fanaticism, and the latter tion of such doctrines, he does not hesitate to of singularity. These Christians consider re-imply in his discourse, that virtue is heathenish, ligion as a point, which they, by their regular observances, having attained, there is nothing further required but to maintain the point they have reached, by a repetition of the same observances. They are therefore satisfied to remain stationary, considering that whoever has obtained his end, is of course saved the labour of pur36*

and good works superfluous if not dangerous. He does not consider that though the Gospel is an act of oblivion to penitent sinners, yet it no where promises pardon to those who continue to live in a state of rebellion against God, and of disobedience to his laws. He forgets to insist to others that it is of little importance even 3 H

to believe that sin is an evil (which however, much from the imprudence and enthusiasm of they do not always believe) while they persist those, who have absurdly confined it to real or to live in it; that to know every thing of duty supposed instances of sudden or miraculous except the doing it, is to offend God with an ag- changes from profligacy to piety. But surely, gravation from which ignorance itself is exempt. with reasonable people, we run no risk in as It is not giving ourselves up to Christ in a name-serting that he, who being awakened by any of less, inexplicable way, which will avail us. God those various methods which the Almighty uses loves an humble, not an audacious faith. To to bring his creatures to the knowledge of himsuppose that the blood of Christ redeems us from self; who seeing the corruptions that are in the sin, while sin continues to pollute the soul, is to world, and feeling those with which his heart suppose an impossibility; to maintain that it is abounds, is brought, whether gradually or rapid. effectual for the salvation, and not for the sanc-ly from an evil heart of unbelief, to a lively faith tification of the sinner, is to suppose that it acts like an amulet, an incantation, a talisman, which is to produce its effect by operating on the imagination, and not on the disease.

in the Redeemer; from a life, not only of gross vice, but of worldliness and vanity, to a life of progressive piety; whose humility keeps pace with his progress; who, though his attainments are advancing, is so far from counting himself to have attained, that he presses onward with unabated zeal, and evinces, by the change in his

The religion which mixes with human passions, and is set on fire by them, will make a stronger blaze than that light which is from above, which sheds a steady and lasting bright-conduct, the change that has taken place in his ness on the path, and communicates a sober but desirable warmth to the heart. It is equable and constant; while the other, like culinary fire, fed by gross materials, is extinguished the sooner from the fierceness of the flame.