XXIV.

MATT. vi. 2.

VERILY I SAY UNTO YOU, THEY HAVE THEIR REWARD.

UR Saviour is here confidering the motives of prayer, and afcribing to each motive that return which it must expect. The pious prayer, which is poured out to God in fecret, finds its way directly to the throne of Grace; while the prayer of the hypocrite meets alfo with its reward: but that reward consists only in the praise of men.

Now what our Saviour obferves of prayer, may be observed of every action of our lives, in which morality is concerned. It may be dedicated, if I may fo fpeak, either to God or man. An act of temperance, for inftance, performed on a principle

of

of pleafing God, becomes an act of religion. But if it is performed merely for the fake of procuring health and spirits, the motive is not bad, and it may still have its reward; but it is a reward of a lower kind. It may procure us health and spirits, but it has no connection with religion.

Thus again, when a man behaves decently merely for the fake of his character, the motive is allowable; but there is no religion in it. Nothing will be carried to a religious account, but what proceeds from a religious motive.

The great conclufion is, that if we could perfuade ourselves to make all our actions, in which morality is concerned, acts of religion, as well as acts of prudence, they might receive, at the fame time, both their heavenly and their earthly reward.

XXV.

PSALM Ciii. 13.

LIKE AS A FATHER PITIETH HIS OWN CHIL

DREN; SO IS THE LORD MERCIFUL TO THEM THAT FEAR HIM.

THE

HE justice and mercy of Almighty God are those attributes, with which our future hopes and fears are most concerned; and the great danger lies in refting on the latter, without paying a fufficient attention to the former.

But yet, on the other hand, many a pious foul, full of fenfibilities, may be more dejected with the fears of the Almighty's justice, than it reafonably need be.

Far fhould I be from fuggesting falfe hopes to any perfon on a fubject fo near him, as the falva tion of his foul; and to fay the truth, it is a more dangerous

I I

dangerous extreme to indulge falfe hopes than false fears. Yet when we fee pious people making their lives miferable with fears, which feem to have no foundation in religion, we cannot help, in Christian charity, endeavouring to administer fome comfort to them.

Now the text I have just read, and many other paffages of a fimilar kind, may be offered as cor. dials to a mind thus diftempered with fuperftitious fears. From fuch paffages we may speak in this language:

Confider how you yourself would act as a father. If your fon's filial piety, in the general conduct of his life, led him to be affectionate and obedient to you; though he might, in some instances, either not comprehend your meaning, or be fomewhat remifs in his obfervance of it, would not you be inclined to pass over fuch negligences, if you saw plainly, that in his general conduct he endeavoured to please you, and was always hurt when be found he had displeased you?

Can you conceive then, that the God of mercy will treat you with less kindness than you would treat your fon?-God calls himself our Father. Our bleffed Saviour, in the prayer he has given us for daily use, enjoins us to call God our Father:

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and

and shall not we believe he will act like a Father?

are we to suppose he is a mere nominal Father, without the affections of one? It is, in a degree, impious to believe it. It is calling God's word in question.

If then you are conscious that you live in the habitual practice of no known fin- if you feel that in the general conduct of your life you are defirous to please God, and always hurt when you do any thing that you think will difpleafe him, why may you not trust his mercy with your falvation? The merits of Chrift are of no avail, if they do not atone for those ignorances and negligences, which are inherent in human nature. Like as a father, therefore, pitieth his own children; fo is the Lord merciful to them that fear him. Pity and mercy belong to failings. If we had no failings, we should want neither.