temptible and base before all the people, according as ye have not kept my ways, but have been partial in the law." Now, ministers have great reason to desire the divine presence and protection; for if God be with them, who can be against them? And they have as much reason to fear his departure and displeasure; for if God be against them, who can be for them? This serious and weighty consideration ought to make them extremely careful to regard God more than men, and never incur his displeasure, in order to gain the favor, or to avoid the frowns, of their fellow worms.

3. If ministers suffer themselves to be corrupted by the people, it destroys their usefulness. If they imbibe the spirit of the people, and feel as they feel; if they follow the example of the people, and conduct as they conduct; or if they condescend to preach smooth things to please the people; they will totally destroy their ministerial usefulness. For, as soon as the people perceive that they regard them more than God, and will prostitute their consciences to gratify their unreasonable desires, they will despise their persons and neglect their preaching. Timeserving ministers generally have but few hearers. All men, whether good or bad, inwardly despise loose and unprincipled ministers, let their talents be what they may. And the same degree of criminality, which would be scarcely observable in other men, is sufficient to destroy the character and usefulness of those who sustain the sacred office of the ministry. No men are so completely useless and contemptible, as those ministers who have lost all appearance of religion, and become visibly conformed to the spirit and manners of the world. For, as our Saviour says, "they are the salt of the earth; but if the salt ave lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceorth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden nder foot of men." Hence the dignity of their character, and e importance of their office, lay ministers of the gospel under Bemn obligations to keep themselves unspotted from the world, d to preach the preaching which God bids them, whether eir people will hear, or whether they will forbear.

I must observe once more,

If ministers suffer themselves to be carried down the stream torruption, they become not only useless, but destructive to people. Corrupt ministers are always corrupters. The whole dency of their practice and preaching is, to corrupt and troy the souls of their people. Though they have lost the er of doing good, yet they retain the power of doing evil. iny can do more than other men, to pull down the kingdom Christ, and build up the kingdom of Satan. And as they yomore capable, so they are more disposed, than other men, 15

L. I.

to stifle the spirit of religion, oppose the doctrines of the gospel, and strengthen the hearts and hands of the wicked. This is the character which God gives of the corrupt teachers in Israel. He says, "Shemaiah taught rebellion against the Lord." He says, the prophets of Samaria and Jerusalem made Israel to err, strengthened the hands of evil doers, and caused profaneness to go forth into all the land. When the people have formed their ministers after their own hearts, and made them rebellious like themselves, their ministers will then fit them fast for destruction. So God declares to Israel, by his faithful prophet Hosea: "There shall be like people, like priest, and I will punish them for their ways." And our Lord says, "If the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch." Thus ministers will destroy both their own souls and the souls of their people, if they suffer themselves to be corrupted by them. And can there be a more solemn and awful consideration than this, to constrain them to abstain from all appearance of evil, to guard against all the dangers of their office, and to discharge all the important duties of it with fidelity and zeal? This is our indispensable and infinitely important duty.

Having illustrated the danger and duty of ministers, I now proceed to a few reflections, which naturally grow out of the subject.

1. It is now a very dangerous day to ministers, in this young and flourishing republic. The people have fallen into a great and general declension. As they have increased, so they have sinned. They have lost their original piety and virtue, and become extremely loose both in practice and in principle. Every species of moral corruption has spread through every part of our nation, and seized all ranks and classes of men. Arminianism, Universalism and Deism, have more or less infected all our towns and parishes, and led multitudes to renounce those duties and doctrines of religion in which they were early educated by their pious parents and faithful ministers. This day of declension among the people, is a day of great danger to the preachers of the gospel. While iniquity abounds, and the love of many waxes cold, even the most faithful ministers of the gospel are in danger of falling into the degeneracy of the times. This is very evident from what has been said, and still more evident from the conduct of those who sustain the sacred character. Many ministers have already begun to degenerate with a degenerate people. Some have lost that spirit of devotion, that strictness of life, and that purity of sentiment, which was once so conspicuous in the preachers of the gospel. And some have begun to yield to the corrupt humors and unreasonable desires of the people, in points of serious and weighty importance.

Some yield to the vicious, and neglect to condemn and reprove their fashionable vices. Some yield to the heterodox, and neglect to condemn and expose their corrupt sentiments. Some yield to moral sinners, and neglect to preach those doctrines of the gospel which are so disagreeable to their carnal hearts. And some condescend even to dispense with the laws of Christ, and admit those to enjoy the ordinances of the gospel, who are visibly destitute of the scriptural qualifications. These are striking instances of ministers' yielding to the corruptions of the times, contrary to the dictates of their minds." And such instances as these are very numerous, and to be found all over the land. How many ministers neither preach nor practice according to their own sentiments, through fear of offending, and through desire of pleasing, the people? This conduct weakens the hands of faithful ministers, and strengthens the hands of those who wish to corrupt them. The present prospect is, that those who are the light of the world will lose their lustre, and those who are the salt of the earth will lose their savor, and there will be like people, like priest. Trying times for ministers are probably coming. And let us all, who think we stand, take heed lest we fall.

2. Ministers need, at this day, to be well qualified for their office. Though religion has decayed, yet knowledge has increased. There are men of letters, or at least men of information, in every religious society. The people in general are much more capable now, than they were formerly, of judging of the talents and qualifications of ministers. And as they are more critical in discerning, so they are more severe in censuring, every ministerial defect or imperfection. The corruption of the times appears in nothing more visibly, than in the united opposition of the people to sacred things, and to sacred persons. They seem determined to bring down ministers, and make reprisals upon them, for their having so long possessed the public esteem and confidence. Those, therefore, who enter into the ministry at such a day as this, need to be well qualified for their great and arduous work. If they assume the sacred office, without any consistent scheme of religious sentiments, or any considerable stock of theological knowledge, they will very probably injure the cause which they ought to defend and promote. For people have lost their former implicit faith in the opinions of ministers, and pay no respect to their bare assertions. They demand evidence for every thing which their teachers call upon them to believe and practice. And this renders it necessary for ministers to be mighty in the scriptures, and expert in reasoning upon divine subjects. They ought to be able to meet Deists, Universalists, and all gainsayers, upon

their own ground, and expose the fallacy and weakness of their boasted arguments. There is reason to believe that the late rapid increase of error and infidelity in this land, is partly owing to the ignorance of ministers, who have never formed any clear and consistent scheme of divinity in their own minds. They have suffered error and infidelity to take root in their own congregations, through a sense of their own insufficiency to maintain and defend the truth. And this has led infidels and others, to represent the clergy as a weak, ignorant, superstitious set of men. Hence it highly concerns the ministers of the gospel, at this day, to wipe off such aspersions from their order, by possessing and displaying that knowledge which may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men. It is presumption for any man to undertake to preach the gospel, without being able to prove the inspiration of the scriptures, and to defend the important doctrines which the Bible contains. This is what the people now justly expect; and if they are disappointed, it will injure both them and those who profess to be their religious instructers.

But prudence, as well as knowledge, is a necessary qualifi cation for a minister. He needs this to enable him to exhibit divine truth in the most profitable manner, and to escape those snares which the enemies of truth will always endeavor to lay for him. Our Lord was a prudent preacher. His prudence, however, did not consist in taking the safest methods to conceal disagreeable doctrines, but in delivering disagreeable doctrines at a proper time, and in proper expressions. How often did his enemies attempt to entangle him in his talk! And how often did he confound and silence them! There are many at this day who feel the same opposition to the ministers of the gospel that the Jews felt towards Christ; and therefore they need to be wise and prudent, as he was, in order to avoid the same snares and dangers which he by his prudence avoided. Accordingly he has expressly enjoined it upon them, to "be wise as serpents, and harmless as doves."

But ministers of the gospel, at this day of declension, need large measures of grace, as well as of knowledge and prudence. They need to be crucified to the world, and the world to them, by the cross of Christ. They ought to be willing to take up their cross daily, and endure the afflictions of the gospel. They ought to seek the honor which cometh from God, and renounce that which cometh from men. They ought to savor of the things which be of God, and not those which be of men. They ought to love God, and Christ, and the souls of men so much, as to be willing to be poor and despised and abused by men, in the faithful discharge of their duty. They

ought, in a word, to be so holy, and harmless, and pure, and heavenly minded, as to be proof against all the frowns and flatteries of those who wish to weaken their hands, discourage their hearts, and destroy their influence. If those who enter upon the ministry are possessed of these superior qualifications, they may hope, through the divine goodness, to war a good warfare, to keep the faith, and endure unto the end; so as to receive that crown of righteousness which is reserved for those who are faithful unto death. But if any presume to run before they are sent, and to preach before they are qualified, they have reason to expect that they shall one day fall into the corruption of the times, and become a reproach to the sacred order, and a stumbling to those whom they ought to have reproved and reclaimed.

3. It is the duty of all good men, at this day especially, to aid and assist the ministers of the gospel in the discharge of their office. No men have greater difficulties to encounter than ministers, and therefore no men stand in more need of assistance than they. They are pleading the cause of all good men, against the united opposition of all bad men. Good men, therefore, ought to do all in their power to countenance and assist them. And in compassion to ministers, God has been pleased to lay his special commands upon all good men to help them. The duties which good men owe to ministers are plainly pointed out, and strongly enjoined in the word of God. I will read a number of plain passages to this purpose. "The priest's lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth; for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts." "Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves; for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account." "We beseech you, brethren, to know them that labor among you, and are over you in the Lord, and admonish you; and esteem them very highly in love for their work's sake." "Remember them that have the rule over you; who have spoken unto you the word of God; whose faith follow; considering the end of their conversation." "Brethren, pray for us." "Now I beseech you, brethren, for the Lord Jesus Christ's sake, and for the love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in your prayers to God for me, that I may be delivered from them that believe not." "Finally, brethren, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may have free course, and be glorified; and that we may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men." These precepts require good men, in particular, to hear their ministers, to revere their ministers, to esteem their ministers, and to pray for their ministers. It is high time for all real christians to awake from their stupor, and by their prayers and exertions, to aid the ministers of the gos