where they will gather him to the bones of his fathers; he should tread in the dust of the noble, and trample on the ashes of the proud; I would heap before him sights of woe, and images of death, and terror; I would break down his stateliness, and humble him before his Redeemer, and his judge: My voice should ever sound in his ears, that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of Heaven. SERMON XIX. EXODUS XX. VERSE VII. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless, who taketh his name in vain. WHILE we are guarded against great, and daring crimes, by the disgust which their enormity excites, we remain exposed to the lesser vices, because we consider them as too unimportant for our care, and in this manner they gain a victory by our negligence, which they never could obtain from their own power. Indeed, against the greater crimes Almighty God has placed a powerful safeguard, in the admonitions of conscience, which they awaken; but when we come from crimes against feeling, to crimes against reason, the danger is greater, because the warning is less; and here we must owe to the instruction of others, and to self-examination, that innocence which we derive, on other occasions, from the loud, and irresistible cries of nature. Thou shalt not take the Lord's name in vain. To use the Lord's name in vain, is to use it on any occasion, except when called upon by the laws of our country, to offer that solemn pledge for the truth of what we say. But the misfortune is, we do not deem it in vain, if the object on which we employ it is of importance to us, and to us alone. We do not think it in -vain to call down God, armed with all his terrors, upon any accident which disturbs the cheerfulness of our lives; we think that obedient Heaven is always ready to -avenge our wrongs, and that the Deity is ever watchful to bless those whom we bless, |