Jins make only one wicked person: their example

makes thousands.

Am I too fevere? Let me bring the matter home to your own feelings. Suppose any of you had a fon, whom you should fee enticed, and led away to his ruin by wicked companions-fuppofe they should teach him by their example to drink and game, and fpend your fubftance in extravagance-what would you fay of the perfons who had thus diftreffed you, and ruined your fon? Would you gently fay, they had injured only themselves? or would you not rather fay, that in your own estimation, they could not have done you a greater injury?-And think you not, that our heavenly Father will confider all wicked corrupters in the fame light? and that his all-pure eye will fee the guilt of corrupting innocence as forcibly as any earthly father can do? No doubt, he will; and call the offender to a very fevere

account.

Confidering then all these things, let me once more exhort every one of you, my brethren, who nameth the name of Christ, to depart from iniquity. With what face can we continue in our fins-our known

and wilful fins, and profefs feriously we believe a religion, that has, in the plainest manner, denounced damnation upon fuch fins?-Do you not believe it?-Then indeed no more is to be faid. But if you do believe it, and have faith in that Saviour, who threatens it, you fee how inconfiftently you act.-You fear the laws of the land; and I will tell you why you fear them. You have faith in them. You believe they will execute what they threaten. You believe they will punish wicked actions, when discovered: and therefore you do wicked actions as privately as you can.-But if you had the fame faith in the Gospel, as in the laws of the land, you would be equally afraid of committing a wicked action even in thought. Your actions, you may depend upon it, will always be guided by your faith. Would you know what a man believes; attend to what he does, not to what he says. The pretended Chriftian, who leads a bad life, is much more an infidela downright difbeliever-than he, who, though in words he deny the Gospel, leads a moral life.

Shew then your faith by your practice. If you call yourselves Chriftians, live like Chriftians. Get the better of your finful habits. Let the fear of God

God purify your thoughts. Let the faith of Chrift rule in your hearts. Shew it by its fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Be juft, and charitable to your neighbour. Do to others, as you would have them do to you. Let us do these things, and then let us call ourfelves Christians: evermore joining, both in heart, and actions, in that expreffive prayer of our Church-that all, who profefs, and call themselves Chriftians, may be led into the way of truth; and bold the faith in unity of Spirit-in the bond of peace -and in righteousness of life.

SERMON

III.

MAT. XVI. 26.

WHAT IS A MAN PROFITED, IF HE SHALL GAIN
THE WHOLE WORLD, AND LOSE HIS OWN
SOUL ?

IF you fhould fee a man placed in fome dangerous fituation-on the edge of a precipice, for inftance; while the ground was crumbling away under his feet-and yet totally unconcerned, you would think no name but that of madness could belong to him. It is not often however that we see men running these furprising risks in worldly affairs. Danger is commonly an alarming circumftance; and, in general, people are cautious enough in avoiding it.

But there is another kind of danger ftill greater, into which we are all apt to run, without the leaft· apprehenfion-that of destroying-not our lives in this world; but our fouls in the next.

How

How is it then, while we are thus prudent in worldly matters, that we are continually neglecting things of fo much greater importance ?-that we are, on all occafions fhewing our care for a life that perishes, and pay fo little attention to a life which is to laft for ever?

Should you be asked, whether you would be at more expence and labour in improving an eftate, of which you had only a very short leafe; or of one, which you might poffefs as long as you lived; you would think the question fcarce deferving an answer. Yet your fouls, and your bodies, you well know, bear the fame relation to each other, that these two different kinds of poffeffion do? These bodies, you know, are only leafes, which muft quickly expire: your fouls, if I may fo exprefs myfelf, are tenures for life.

We fhould be furprized to be afked ferioufly, whether we believed we had fouls to be faved?And yet if we had full faith in the article--if we were thoroughly convinced that our fouls can never die, but must live for ever, either in a state of happiness or of mifery; and that this ftate, through God's mercy in Chrift, depends entirely on ourfelves, we could not well, one fhould think, be fo negligent about them.