ever they may appear to be connected with truth, they in reality originate in error, and contribute to serve purposes foreign to the interests of pure Religion.

Infidelity, there is no question, is of a worse character, and more productive of mischief, than Enthusiasm. It is better to believe in Christ, though that faith be infected with error, and accompanied with extravagances, than to reject him altogether, and despise the Grace of God by which we are justified and saved. Of two evils, if one must be chosen, it is cer tainly wise to choose the less; but when there is no such alternative, it is a mark of folly to close with either. * Faith is

* It has been erroneously asserted, that the Ministers of the Established Church do not preach the Gospel. Now I will venture to say, that there is not one amongst us, who does not teach, that Faith is the grand and leading principle of Christianity, who does not maintain that no works are available to salvation without it, and who does not direct the attention of his hearers to Jesus Christ, as the only way and hope of acceptance with God. We preach Morality, it is true; and in doing so, we discharge our duty; we follow the example of our heavenly Master, who, in his admirable Sermon on the Mount, and elsewhere, with

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the grand and leading principle of Chris tianity. Believe, therefore, in Jesus Christ with all your hearts, and souls, and strength. Believe in all that he has done and undergone for mankind; in all that he has taught, in all that he has predicted, and be not *"slow of heart to believe all that the Prophets" and Apostles "have spoken.”: But while you indulge an ardent faith, take care that you do not suffer your religion to end here. "The tree is known by his fruit." Let the faith you profess

peculiar earnestness enforces the cultivation of virtuous dispositions, and the indispensable practice of good works. I readily grant, that a discourse, which contains nothing but moral lessons, is faulty; but equally so is that, which is confined wholly to faith. Faith is the foundation, Morality the superstructure. Faith shows us the Saviour, but without Morality will never conduct us to him. Both, therefore, being united and inseparable, ought to be preached. Which should be dwelt upon most is, perhaps, a matter of opinion. My idea upon the subject is this, that the major part, and particularly the latter part, of a discourse should, generally speaking, consist of practical inferences or exhortations; for it is of little use to teach men what to believe, unless we also show them how to act.

* Luke, xxiv. 25.

+ Matt. xii. 33.

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be evident in this, that it" worketh by love." Let the devotion of the inner man be proved by the external evidences of a godly, righteous, and sober life. Do not separate faith from action; for if you do, you will divide what the Gospel has united, and make your holy religion a mere speculative system of feeling, uncon nected with practical good, and beginning and ending solely in the imagination. Carry your faith with you into life. Let it not be spent in tears, and sighs, and groans, in vehement professions, in stated watchings, and in vain assurances of ac ceptance with the Father; but let it, while it exists and glows in your hearts, pervade and influence your whole conduct, regulating, governing, and sanctifying the common business of your stations, and exciting you in all things “to show yourselves approved unto God."

In your progress through life, you will, doubtless, meet with those, who ridicule the idea of God suffering in our nature for the sins of mankind; and who, in the

pride and hardness of their hearts, reject+" the Grace by which we are saved through Faith." These esteem themselves the Philosophers of the age, the Mighty in

* "A grand cause of infidelity," says that excellent Man and profound Divine, Dr. Isaac Barrow, ❝is Pride; the which doth interpose various bars to the admission of Christian truth; for before a man can believe, every height (every towering imagination and conceit) that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, must be cast down.

"He that is conceited of his own wisdom, strength of parts, and improvement in knowledge, cannot submit his mind to notions, which he cannot easily' comprehend and penetrate; he will scorn to have his understanding baffled or puzzled by sublime mysteries of Faith; he will not easily yield any thing too high for his wit to reach, or too knotty for him to unloose. How can these things be? What reason can there be for this? I cannot see how this can be true; this point is unintelligible ;-so he treateth the dictates of faith, not considering the feebleness and shallowness of his own reason. Hence, not many wise men according to the flesh (or who were conceited of their own wisdom, relying upon their natural faculties and means of knowledge,) not many Scribes or Disputers of this world did embrace the Christian truth; it ap pearing absurd and foolish to them; it being needful, that a man should be a fool, that he might (in this regard) become wise.”

+ Eph. ii. 8.

wisdom and in thought, the only men who have the courage and the sense to shake off the fetters of prejudice and superstition, to think freely and liberally for themselves, and to assert the dignity of human nature, and the rights of intellectual man.

"Come not into their secret, to their assembly let not your honour be united for there is danger in their fellowship, fallacy in their arguments, and treachery in their designs. Avoid them, as you would your bitterest enemy; for you have the Apostle's assurance, that "unto them † that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure, but even their mind and conscience is defiled."

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Finally, let it be your particular care to steer between these two extremes. not, on the one hand, suffer yourselves to be hurried away into enthusiasm by the heat of the imagination, lest, instead of passing your days in practical piety, you waste them in speculative conceits; nor, on the other, to be induced by the plausibilities of unbelief, to exalt the reason

*Gen. xlix. 6.

+ Tit, i. 15.