piety. Notwithstanding their affumed audacity, fomething within ftill fecretly mifgives them, and mixes an uneafy doubt at the bottom of their pleasures. The apprehenfions of guilt require, the influence of numbers to allay them, and to restore confidence to the heart. The finner is a coward who often depends for his fecurity and courage on the example of others. Hence that fcandalous zeal which the profligate frequently discover to scatter the contagion of irreligious principles and to fpread the infection of licentious manners.-But, not a few, ftill more malignant, ftudy to corrupt the morals of others through enmity to the pure and humble spirit of piety. The bitterness of their hearts they vent in keen reproaches, and infulting fcoffs-by feducing the unwary, and offering themselves as leaders to those who are yet but juft entering on the paths of vice. Above all, if they can fhake the faith of a believer in Chrift, or corrupt one whofe firft inclinations were in favour of religion, with what malicious fatisfaction they contemplate, or with what infolent mirth they triumph over, their deluded prey! It is not their own enjoyment which they feek in particular acts of vice,

nor the heightened enjoyment which affociates in iniquity confer, but they derive an infernal pleasure from the ruin of innocence itself. Their malignity is gratified by being themselves the inftruments of corrupting it.

-This appears to be the laft ftage of impiety upon earth, and contains the most open, daring, and criminal hoftility against truth and virtue.

In this class of finners may be ranked, likewife, those numerous writers and artifts who endeavour to currupt the public motals by debauching the imagination, or by vitiating the public tafte for amufement and pleasure. In the former, we often fee vice rendered more feductive by an enchanting brilliancy of genius. The latter go directly to deprave the heart through the organs of the fenfes. Seducing images, indecent pictures, loofe fcenes, and an immodeft wit contribute their aid to spread the infection of vice. Even thofe low diverfions, which in many places are fo eagerly fought after, by affembling the idle, the thoughtlefs, and the diffipated, and debafing the tafte, are haftening the degeneracy of manners.-But what fhall we fay of thofe brothels of loose plea

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fure, and those places of ruinous gaming where youth fo often throw away virtue, and honor and estate and health? Temples are they of iniquity-houses of peftilence whence the most dire contagion is fpread through fociety. How criminal are the leaders and actors in these scandalous and corrupting fcenes! Nor are those who encourage them by their presence, or support them by their contributions, free from a deep guilt.

To these pernicious corrupters of mankind are to be added the pretended philofophers who, in the present age, are so affiduously striving to undermine the foundations both of natural, and of revealed religion. And for what end? Is it for the love of virtue? Alas! the very basis of virtue is deftroyed when religion is taken away-Is it, as they so often profess, through regard to the interests of society, and the happiness of mankind? Ah! fociety without religion would foon become a chaos of paffions and of crimes. What then is the motive of all this ingenious but perverted industry? Is it not to be found in enmity of heart against that purity and holiness

which religion requires? Is it not fome vice of character that renders them obnoxious to the awful fanctions of religion. But, whatever it be, no fins can be more fatal in their confequences, or draw after them a greater train of ruin. Youth is corrupted --the foundations of fociety are fhakenreverence for the Deity is annihilated-his providence is denied his juftice fet at defiance-his love in the redemption of the world profaned and infulted-the blessed Saviour again rejected of men!—If a zeal to make profelytes to the pernicious cause of impiety and vice is among the highest degrees of open and prefumptuous finning -if a fatal fuccefs aggravates the guilt, how criminal are you ye corrupters of the age! If the bleffing of those who are ready to perifh fhall come upon the good man who hath contributed to their falvation, furely upon you fhall come the blood and the curfe of thousands who have been destroyed by your influence!

The illuftration of this subject has run into fo great length that your exhausted time will not permit me to make the numerous reflections that naturally arise from it, and

might be profitably improved. I fhall content myself with one or two.

The firft idea that fuggefts itself is the infidious nature, and the dangerous progreffion of vice. No man becomes abandoned at once. Secret faults precede open, and public vices-and, among these last there is a wide distance between the firft violations of known duty, and that hardened profligacy which learns at length to fin without fhame. Beware, therefore, of the beginnings of vice-they are like the letting out of water which foon encreases to a mighty flood. Its habits are inceffantly advancing, and men frequently arrive, in the progrels of time, calmly to perpetrate crimes on which they would once have looked with a degree of horror. Break off, in season, your fins by repentance, and return unto the Lord and he will have mercy upon you, and to our God and he will abundantly pardon you. But remember that there is a point of impiety beyond which there is no more facrifice for fins.-Deplorable is his ftate who has corrupted, or filenced the judge within him-who has torn away all the reftraints of that internal law in his own