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and equally intelligible application to our fellow-men. They, too, are the frequent and familiar objects of this affection, and they often are so, because they possess certain accomplishments of person and of character, by which it is excited. I love the man whose every glance speaks an effusive cordiality towards those who are around him. I love the man whose heart and whose hand are ever open to the representations of distress. I love the man who possesses such a softness of nature, that the imploring look of a brother in want, or of a brother in pain, disarms him of all his selfishness, and draws him out to some large and willing surrender of generosity. I love the man who carries on his aspect, not merely the expression of worth, but of worth maintained in the exercise of all its graces, under every variety of temptation and discouragement; who, in the midst of calumny, can act the warm and enlightened philanthropist ; who, when beset with many provocations, can weather them all in calm and settled endurance; who can be kind even to the unthankful and the evil; and who, if he possess the awful virtues of truth and of justice, only heightens our attachment the more, that he possesses goodness, and tenderness, and benignity along with them.

Now, we would have you to advert to one capital distinction between the former and the latter class of objects. The inanimate reflect no love upon us back again. They do not single out any one of their admirers, and, by an act of preference, either minister to his selfish appetite for esteem, or minister to his selfish appetite for enjoyment, by affording to him a larger share than to others, of their presence, and of all the delights which their presence inspires. They remain motionless in their places, without will and without sensibility; and the homage they receive, is from the disinterested affection which men bear to their loveliness. They are loved, and that purely, because they are lovely. There is no mixture of selfishness in the affection that is of fered to them. They do not put on a sweeter smile to one man than to another; but all the features of that beauty in which they are arrayed, stand inflexibly the same to every beholder; and he, without any conscious mingling whatever of self-love, in the emotion with which he gazes at the charms of some external scenery, is actuated by a love towards it, which rests and which terminates on the objects that he is employed in contemplating.

But this is not always the case when our fellow men are objects of this affection. I should love cordiality, and benevolence, and compassion for their own sakes; but let your own experience tell how far more sweetly and more intensely the love is felt,

when this cordiality is turned, in one stream of kindliness, towards myself; when the eye of friendship has singled out me, and looks at me with a peculiar graciousness; when the man of tenderness has pointed his way to the abode of my suffering family, and there shed in secrecy over them his liberalities, and his tears; when he has forgiven me the debt that I was unable to discharge; and when, oppressed as I am, by the consciousness of having injured or reviled him, he has nobly forgotten or overlooked the whole provocation, and persists in a regard that knows no abatement, in a welldoing that is never weary

There is an element, then, in the love I bear to a fellow man, which does not exist in the love I bear to an inanimate object; and which may serve, perhaps, to darken the character of the affection I feel towards the former. We most readily concede it, that the love of another, on account of the virtues which adorn him, changes its moral character altogether, if it be a love to him, solely on account of the benefit which I derive from the exercise of these virtues. I should love compassion on its own account, as well as on the account that it is I who have been the object of it. I should love justice on its own account, as well as on the account that my grievances have been redressed by the dispensation of it. On looking at goodness, I should feel an affection resting on this object, and finding there its full and its terminating gratification; and that, though I had never stood in the way of any one of its beneficent operations.

How is it, then, that the special direction of a moral virtue in another, towards the object of my personal benefit, operates in enhancing both the sensation which it imparts to my heart, and the estimate which I form of it? What is the peculiar quality communicated to my admiration of another's friendship, and another's goodness, by the circumstance of myself being the individual towards whom that friendship is cherished, and in favour of whom, that goodness puts itself forth into active exertion? At the sight of a benevolent man, there arises in my bosom an instantaneous homage of regard and of reverence;-but should that homage take a pointed direction towards myself,-should it realize its fruits on the comfort, and the security of my own person,-should it be employed in gladdening my home, and spreading enjoyment over my family, oppressed with want and pining in sickness, there is, you will allow, by these circumstances, a heightening of the love and the admiration that I formerly rendered him. And, we should like to know what is the precise character of the addition that has thus been given to my regard for the virtue of benevolence. We should like to know, if it be altogether a pure and a

words, it may enhance my affection for worth, without any change whatever in the moral character of that affection.

praise-worthy accession that has thus come upon the sentiment with which I now look at my benefactor, or, if, by contracting any taint of selfishness, it has lost the high Now, before we proceed to consider those rank that formerly belonged to it, as a dis- peculiar emotions which are excited within interested affection, towards the goodness me, by being the individual, in whose fawhich beautifies and adorns his character. vour certain virtues are exercised, and which There is one way, however, in which emotions are, all of them, different in kind this special direction of a moral virtue to- from the affection that I bear for these virwards my particular interest, may increase tues,-let us farther observe, that the term my affection for it, and without changing love, when applied to sentient beings conthe moral character of my affection. It sidered as the object of it, may denote an gives me a nearer view of the virtue in affection, different in the principle of its exquestion. It is true, that the virtue may just citement, from any that we have been yet be as lovely when exercised in behalf of my considering. My love to another may lie neighbour, as when exercised in behalf of in the liking I have for the moral qualities myself. But, in the former case, I am not which belong to him; and this, by way of an eye-witness to the display and the evo- distinctness, may be called the love of moral lution of its loveliness. I am a limited be-esteem or approbation. Or, my love to aning, who cannot take in so full and so dis-other may consist in the desire I have for tinct an impression of the character of what his happiness; and this may be called the is distant, as of the character of what is love of kindness. These two are often alimmediately beside me. It is true, that all lied to each other in fact, but there is a real the circumstances may be reported. But difference in their nature. The love of you know very well, that a much livelier kindness which I bear to my infant child representation is obtained of any object, may have no reference to its moral qualities by the seeing of it, than by the hearing of whatever. This love finds its terminating it. To be told of kindness, does not bring gratification in obtaining, for the object of this attribute of character so forcibly, or so it, exemption from pain, or in ministering clearly home to my observation, as to re- to its enjoyments. It is very true, that the ceive a visit from kindness, and to take it sight of what is odious or revolting in the by the hand, and to see its benignant mien, character of another, tends, in point of fact, and to hear its gentle and complacent voice, to dissipate all the love of kindness I may and to witness the solicitude of its inquiries, have ever borne to him. But it does not and to behold its tender and honest anxiety always do so, and one instance of this for my interest, and to share daily and proves a real distinction, in point of nature, weekly in the liberalities which it has be- between the love of kindness, and the love stowed upon me. When all this goes on of moral esteem. And the highest and around my own person, and within the most affecting instance which can be given limits of my own dwelling-place, it is very of this distinction, is in the love wherewith true that self is gratified, and that this cir- God hath loved the world; is in that kindcumstance may give rise to sensations, ness towards us, through Christ Jesus, which are altogether distinct from the love which he hath made known to men in the I bear to moral worth, or to moral excel- Gospel; is in that longing regard to his lence. But this does not hinder, that along fallen creatures, whereby he was not willwith these sensations, a disinterested love ing that any should perish, but rather that for the moral virtue of which I have been all should live. There was the love of kindthe object, may, at the same time, have its ness standing out, in marked and separate room and its residence within my bosom. display, from the love of moral esteem; for, I may love goodness more than ever, on alas! in the degraded race of mankind, there its own account, since it has taken its spe- was not one quality which could call forth cific way to my habitation, and that, just such an affection in the breast of the Godbecause I have obtained a nearer acquaint-head. It was, when we were hateful to him ance with it. I may love it better, because in character, that in person and in interest I know it better. My affection for it may we were the objects of his most unbounded have become more intense, and more de- tenderness. It was, when we were enemies voted than before, because its beauty is now by wicked works, that God looked on with more fully unfolded to the eye of my ob- pity, and stretched forth, to his guilty chilservation than before. And thus, while we dren, the arms of offered reconciliation. It admit that the goodness of which I am the was when we had wandered far in the paths object, originates within me certain feelings of worthlessness and alienation, that he dedifferent in kind from that which is excited vised a message of love, and sent his Son by goodness in the general, yet it may into our world, to seek and to save us. heighten the degree of this latter feeling And this, by the way, may serve to ilalso. It may kindle or augment the love Ilustrate the kind of love which we are rebear to moral virtue in itself; or, in other quired to bear to our enemies. We are re

of kindness, when he cannot, from the nature of the object, feel for us the slightest degree of the love of moral esteem. In the same manner may we feel, we are not saying towards God, but towards an earthly benefactor, the love of gratitude, when, from the nature of the object we are employed in contemplating, there is much to impair within us the love of moral esteem, or to extinguish it altogether. Is it not most natural to say of the man, who has been per

service to my family, and that I, at least, owe him a gratitude for all this,-that I, at least, should be longer than others, of dismissing from my bosom the last remainder of cordiality towards him,-that if, infamy and poverty have followed, in the career of his wickedness, and he have become an outcast from the attentions of other men, it

quired to love them, in the same way in which God loves his enemies. A conscientious man will feel oppressed by the difficulty of such a precept, if he try to put it into obedience, by loving those who have offended, with the same feeling of complacency with which he loves those who have befriended him. But the truth is, that the love of moral esteem often enters, as a principal ingredient, into the love of complacency; and we are not required, by our imitation of the Godhead, to entertain any such affec-sonally benevolent to myself, and who has, tion for the depraved and the worthless. It at the same time, disgraced himself, by his is enough, that we cherish towards them in vices, that, bad as he is, he has been at all our hearts the love of kindness; and this times remarkably kind to me, and felt many will be felt a far more practicable achieve-a movement of friendship towards my perment, than to force up the love of compla- | son, and done many a deed of important cency into a bosom, revolted by the aspect of treachery, or dishonesty, or unprincipled selfishness. There is no possible motive to excite the latter affection. There may be a thousand to excite the former: and we have only to look to the unhappy man in all his prospects, and in all his relations; we have only to pity his delusions, and to view him as the hapless victim of a sad and ruin-is not for me to spurn him instantly from ous infatuation; we have only to carry our eye onwards to the agonies of that death, which will shortly lay hold of him, and to compute the horrors of that eternity, which, if not recovered from the error of his way, It is the more necessary, to distinguish he is about to enter; we have only, in a the love of gratitude from the love of moral word, to put forth an exercise of faith in esteem, that each of these affections may certain near and impending realities, the be excited simultaneously within me, by one evidence of which is altogether resistless, in act or by one exhibition of himself, on the order to summon up such motives, and such part of the Deity. Let me be made to unconsiderations, as may cause the compassion derstand, that God has passed by my transof our nature to predominate over the re-gression, and generously admitted me into sentment of our nature: and as will assure the privileges and the rewards of obeto a believer the victory over such urgen-dience,-I see in this a tenderness, and a cies of his constitution as, to the unrenewed mercy, and a love, for his creatures, which, heart, are utterly unconquerable.

my door,-or, in the face of my particular recollections, to look unpitying and unmoved, at the wretchedness into which he has fallen.

if blended at the same time with all that is

But to resume our argument, let it be ob-high and honourable in the more august served that the kindness of God is one of the attributes of his nature, have the effect of loveliest, and most estimable of the attri- presenting him to my mind, and of drawbutes which belong to him. It is a bright ing out my heart in moral regard to him, feature in that assemblage of excellencies, as a most amiable and estimable object of which enter into the character of the God- contemplation. But besides this, there is a head: and, as such, independently altogether peculiar love of gratitude, excited by the of this kindness being exercised upon me, I consideration that I am the object of this should offer to it the homage of my moral benignity,-that I am one of the creatures approbation. But, should I be the special to whom he has directed this peculiar reand the signalized object of his kindness, gard, that he has singled out me, and conthere is another sentiment towards God, be-ceived a gracious purpose towards me, and side the love of moral esteem, that ought to in the execution of this purpose is lavishing be formed within me by that circumstance, upon my person, the blessings of a father's and which, in the business of reasoning, care, and a father's tenderness. Both the should be kept apart from it. There is the love of moral esteem, and the love of gratilove of gratitude. These often go together, tude, may thus be in contemporaneous opand may be felt simultaneously, towards eration within me; and it will be seen to the one being we are employed in contem-accomplish a practical, as well as a metaplating. But they are just as distinct, each from the other, as is the love of moral esteem from the love of kindness. We trust that we have already convinced you, that God feels towards us, his inferiors, the love

physical purpose, to keep the one apart from the other, in the view of the mind, when love towards God is the topic of speculation which engages it.

But, farther, let it be understood, that the

love of gratitude differs from the love of moral esteem, not merely in the cause which immediately originates it, but also in the object, in which it finds its rest and its gratification. It is the kindness of another being to myself, which originates within me the 'ove of gratitude towards him; and it is the view of what is morally estimable in this being, that originates within me all the love of moral esteem, that I entertain for him. There is a real distinction of cause between these two affections, and there is also between them a real distinction of object. The love of moral esteem finds its complacent gratification, in the act of dwelling contemplatively on that Being, by whom it is excited; just as a tasteful enthusiast inhales delight from the act of gazing on the charms of some external scenery. The pleasure he receives, emanates directly upon his mind, from the forms of beauty and of loveliness, which are around him. And if, instead of a taste for the beauties of nature, there exists within him, a taste for the beauties of holiness, then will he love the Being, who presents to the eye of his contemplation the fullest assemblage of them, and his taste will find its complacent gratification in dwelling upon him, whether as an object of thought, or as an object of perception. "One thing have I desired," says the Psalmist, "that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple." Now, the love of gratitude is distinct from this in its object. It is excited by the love of kindness; and the feeling which is thus excited, is just a feeling of kindness back again. It is kindness begetting kindness. The language of this affection is, "What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits?" He has done what is pleasing and gratifying to me. What shall I do to please, and to gratify him? The love of gratitude seeks for answers to this question, and finds its delight in acting upon them, and whether the answer be, this is the will of God, even your sanctification, or, with the sacrifices of liberality God is well pleased,-or, obedience to parents is well pleasing in his sight, these all point out so many lines of conduct, to which the impulse of the love of gratitude would carry us, and attest this to be the love of God, that ye keep his commandments.

knowledgment of them; and so it may be, when one looks to the venerable, and the lovely in the character of God. The more appropriate offering of the latter, is the offering of thanksgiving, or of such services as are fitted to please, and to gratify a benefactor. But still it may be observed, how each of these simple affections tends to express itself, by the very act which more characteristically marks the workings of the other; or, how the more appropriate offering of the first of them, may be prompted under the impulse, and movement of the second of them, and conversely. For, if I love God because of his perfections, what principle can more powerfully or more directly lead to the imitation of them?which is the very service that he requires, and the very offering that he is most pleased with. And, if I love God because of his goodness to me, what is more fitted to prompt my every exertion, in the way of spreading the honours of his character and of his name among my fellows,and, for this purpose, to magnify in their hearing the glories and the attributes of his nature? It is thus that the voice of praise and the voice of gratitude may enter into one song of adoration; and that whilst the Psalmist, at one time, gives thanks to God at the remembrance of his holiness, he, at another, pours forth praise at the remembrance of his mercies.

To have the love of gratitude towards God, it is essential that we know and believe his love of kindness towards us. To have the love of moral esteem towards him, it is essential that the loveliness of his character be in the eye of the mind: or, in other words, that the mind keep itself in steady and believing contemplation of the excellencies which belong to him. The view that we have of God, is just as much in the order of precedency to the affection that we entertain for him, as any two successive steps can be, in any of the processes of our mental constitution. To obtain the introduction of love into the heart, there must, as a preparatory circumstance, be the introduction of knowledge into the understanding; or, as we can never be said to know what we do not believe-ere we have love, we must have faith; and, accordingly, in the passage from which our text is extracted, do we perceive the one pointed to, as the And, indeed, when the same Being com-instrument for the production of the other. bines, in his own person, that which ought "Keep yourselves in the love of God, buildto excite the love of moral esteem, with ing yourselves up on your most holy faith." that which ought to excite the love of gratiAnd here, it ought to be remarked, that a tude, the two ingredients, enter with a man may experience a mental process, and mingled but harmonious concurrence, into yet have no taste or no understanding for the exercise of one compound affection. It the explanation of it. The simple truths of is true, that the more appropriate offering the Gospel, may enter with acceptance into of the former is the offering of praise, the mind of a peasant, and there work all just as when one looks to the beauties of the proper influences on his heart and chanature, he breaks out into a rapturous ac-racter, which the Bible ascribes to them: and

yet he may be utterly incapable of tracing that series of inward movements, by which he is carried onward from a belief in the truth, to all those moral and affectionate regards, which mark a genuine disciple of the truth. He may be the actual subject of these movements, though altogether unable to follow or to analyze them. This is not peculiar to the judgments or the feelings of Christianity. In the matters of ordinary life, a man may judge sagaciously, and feel correctly while ardently;-and experience, in right and natural order, the play of his various faculties, without having it at all in his power, either to frame or to follow a true

theory of his faculties. It is well, that the simple preaching of the Gospel has its right practical operation on men, who make no attempt whatever, to comprehend the metaphysics of the operation. But, if ever metaphysics be employed to darken the freeness of the Gospel offer, or to dethrone faith from the supremacy which belongs to it, or to forbid the approaches of those whom God has not forbidden; then must it be met upon its own ground, and the real character of our beneficent religion be asserted, amid the attempts of those who have in any way obscured or injured it by their illustrations.

SERMON X.

Gratitude, not a sordid Affection.

"We love him, because he first loved us."-1 John iv. 19.

SOME theologians have exacted from an inquirer, at the very outset of his conversion, that he should carry in his heart what they call the disinterested love of God. They have set him on the most painful efforts to acquire this affection,--and that too, before he was in circumstances in which it was at all possible to entertain it. They have led him to view with suspicion the love of gratitude, as having in it a taint of selfishness. They are for having him to love God, and that on the single ground that he is lovely, without any reference to his own comfort, or even to his own safety. Strange demand which they make on a sentient being, that even amidst the fears and the images of destruction, he should find room in his heart for the love of complacency! and equally strange demand to make on a sinful being, that ere he admit such a sense of reconciliation into his bosom, as will instantly call forth a grateful regard to him who has conferred it, he must view God with a disinterested affection; that from the deep and helpless abyss of his depravity, he must find, unaided, his ascending way to the purest and the sublimest emotion of moral nature; that ere he is delivered from fear he must love, even though it be said of love, that it casteth out fear; and that ere he is placed on the vantage ground of the peace of the Gospel, he must realize on his character, one of the most exalted of its perfections.

The effect of all this on many an anxious seeker after rest, has been most discouraging. With the stigma that has been affixed to the love of gratitude, they have been positively apprehensive of the inroads of this affection, and have studiously averted the eye of

their contemplation from the objects which are fitted to inspire it. In other words, they have hesitated to entertain the free offers of salvation, and misinterpreted all the tokens of an embassy, which has proclaimed peace on earth and good will to men. They think that all which they can possibly gather, in the way of affection, from such a contemplation, is the love of gratitude; and that gratitude is selfishness; and that selfishness is not a gracious affection; and that ere they be surely and soundly converted, the love they bear to God must be of a totally disinterested character; and thus through another medium than that of a free and gratuitous dispensation of kindness, do they strive, by a misunderstood gospel, or without the gospel altogether, to reach a peace and a preparation which we fear, in their way of it, is to sinners utterly unattainable.

In the progress of this discourse let us endeavour, in the first place, to rescue the love of gratitude from the imputations which have been preferred against it,-and secondly, to assign to the love of kindness manifested to the world in the gospel, and to the faith by which that love is made to arise in the heart, the place and the preeminence which belong to them.

I. The proper object of the love of gratitude, is the being who has exercised towards me the love of kindness; and this is more correct than to say, that the proper object of this affection is the being who has conferred benefits upon me. I can conceive another to load me with benefactions, and at the same time, to evince that kindness towards me was not the principle which impelled him. It may be done reluctantly

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