Mankind with a single voice have pronounced Lying to be a gross and enormous sin. This is the dictate of every other religion, and every other law, as well as of the law, and the religion, of God. To this universal testimony, the conscience of every individual unites its own solemn accord; and, whenever a lie is uttered, proclaims the guilt of the criminal with an affecting and awful voice. At the sound of this remonstrance, the soul trembles, and shrinks; and before the bar of this severe judge, is compelled to plead guilty, without a hope of escape.

Nor is it compelled only to acknowledge its guilt, but also clearly to see, and deeply to feel, its peculiar debasement. A liar is obliged irresistibly to feel, that he is sunk below the level of men. His mind is a house of pollution; a haunt of every despicable purpose, and every degrading thought. Thus his character, as scen by himself, lies upon him like a heavy burden, too grievous to be borne; a load, which he can neither carry, nor lay down.

In the mean time, Conscience, faithful to her office, holds up to his view in terrible forebodings the anger of God against ly ing lips; and presents to him alarming anticipations of the dreadful account, which he will be obliged to give at the future Judg ment. Such, I mean, is the fact, unless, through the want of a religious education, he is destitute of moral principle; or by a repetition of crimes, his Conscience has become seared, as with an hot iron.

Secondly. The Liar is continually tormented by the fear of de

tection.

A liar is never safe. It is so much the interest of mankind to expose this crime; and it is so often actually exposed; that the danger is always great, and always felt by the criminal. Should a detection take place; the consequences, he knows, must be distressing. The shame, the hatred, the contempt, and the pu nishment, which in this case will arrest him, he knows not how to meet with a steady eye. His terrified mind is, therefore, in a perpetual alarm; and sees these evils always at the door. The path of life, therefore, is to him a hedge of thorns.

Thirdly. Should he be detected, as he invariably will be, he is compelled to suffer many excruciating evils.

Particularly, he is necessitated to invent many falsehoods, to gain the object, or prevent the evils, of one.

Truth is always plain and consistent; the highway, in which the way-faring man, though a fool, need not err. Falsehood is a by-path; crooked, perplexed, and blind; in which every traveller is soon bewildered and lost. No liar can possibly foresee either the nature, or the number, of the difficulties, into which he will plunge himself by a single lie. These difficulties he will often feel himself compelled to obviate by such means, as are in his power. Usually, no other means will offer themselves to him for this purpose beside a succession of lies. Thus, one falsehood, in a sense, necessarily, draws after it another, and another. Nor is any mind, which begins this course, sufficiently comprehensive to know where it will end.

Those, whom he has deceived, also, will often resent, and often severely revenge, the abuse. In one manner, and another, he is not unfrequently punished with severity. Always he is disgraced, reproached, stung with contempt, and insulted with derision. Decent men shun his company. Parents warn their children to beware of him. The finger of scorn points him out, the hiss of infamy follows him in the street. Even villains, of most other sorts, feel themselves superior to him.

His reputation, of course, is lost. Those, whom he has deceived, will take sure and exemplary vengeance in publishing the deception to the world. His rivals will trumpet it, to rise above him his kindred villains, to turn the eyes of mankind from their own guilt. Should they even be silent, he will disclose it himself. The safety, and success, which he has found in uttering one falsehood, will embolden him to utter another, and another, until he is detected. When this is done, he sinks speedily into absolute contempt. The proverb, "once a liar and always a liar," will meet him, as a label, from every mouth in the street.

In this character, all persons will feel themselves to be his superiors; and will take effectual care to announce this superiority. The tongues of multitudes will proclaim it in the most stinging terms. The eyes of more will look down upon him with haughtiness and scorn: while the conduct of all will attest his degradation with a visible mixture of pity and abhorrence.

Of course, he will be obliged to feel, as well as to appear, only in the character of a mean, debased wretch; inferior to his kind; and to act an under, servile part in every scene of life. He can maintain no cause; assert no fact; make no promise; face no man; and meet no eye but is forced to falter, and fall, even before those, with whom he would once have disdained to acknowledge an acquaintance.

As he loses all confidence; he loses, with it, every opportunity of acquiring useful and reputable employment. None will trust him with their property; none will commit to him their business; because all will expect to be rewarded by him with baseness and treachery.

But all men are dependent on their fellow-men. Peculiarly is this true of those, who are young. Every youth is necessitated to lean in no small degree, on those, who are already in possession of the great business of mankind. Veracity, to them, is the door to confidence; confidence, to useful employment; and useful employment, to property, reputation, influence, and a prosperous and useful life. This door the liar has voluntarily shut against himself; and can be admitted neither to the good offices, nor even to the company, of those, on whom he chiefly depends, under God, for every worldly blessing.

Thus he involves himself in innumerable distresses; and exposes himself to innumerable temptations. He is poor, almost of course. Honest poverty is always, and most deservedly, respectable. But poverty, which grows out of vice, ensures contempt and abhorrence; and is encircled by numberless temptations, which honest poverty never knew. I have already observed, that the liar is almost irresistibly prompted to a succession of falsehoods, in order to escape the dangers of the first. To these he is strongly solicited to add perjury; to corrupt others, that he may countenance himself; to cheat, that he may acquire what he cannot gain by lying; and to steal, that he may possess himself of what he cannot gain by cheating.

All these scandalous vices are soon fixed into habits and these habits, every day, acquire new accessions of strength. His declension, therefore, is rapid and dreadful. From the company, conversation, and example, of good men, indulged

more or less to most sinners, he is excluded of course. Virtue may pity, but cannot consort with, him. His touch is contagious; and his very breath carries infection with it, wherever he goes. By this exclusion, he loses a blessing of more value, than all the good, which falsehood ever sought, or found.

In this manner he goes on, hardening his heart, and polluting his life. His conscience becomes seared; and, sooner than he could have originally mistrusted, he is given over to a reprobate mind. In the end, he dies a bitter death; and closes a shameful, wretched life with a miserable eternity.

The Preventives of this deplorable vice may be advantageously considered as they respect children under the education of their parents, and persons arrived at years of discretion.

The foundation of all moral good is best laid in childhood. This season, therefore, is to be regarded as of supreme importance, and husbanded for this great purpose with supreme solicitude. I shall address my observations on this subject directly to Parents. To accomplish this invaluable end, so indispensable to the present and eternal welfare of your children, Teach them,

1. Always to speak truth, by precept and example.

Inculcate on them, from the moment, in which they are able to speak at all, and inculcate daily, the immense importance of speaking truth. Truth is so much more easily, and so much more naturally, spoken than falsehood, that children usually speak truth of course. Facts always present it; the mind always perceives it; the tongue always utters it; without effort, or contrivance. Falsehood, on the contrary, must ever be invented, and continually laboured into existence. Before this labour has commenced, truth must be effectually impressed on the conscience, and instamped on the heart.

Teach them, that Veracity is inestimably useful; that it will make them loved, trusted, honoured, and befriended; and will save them from shame, neglect, reproach, and poverty, from extreme humiliation, and the terrors of a condemning conscience. Teach them, that Lying will prevent all these blessings, and entail upon them all these sufferings; that it will wither their reputation, their comforts, and their hopes; that, deformed with VOL. IV.

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this sin, they will be pitied by every good, and insulted by every bad, man; that their enemies will tread them under fool, while their friends cannot protect them; and that their character, when once habitually blackened by falsehood, can never be made white again.

Teach them, that every equivocal, every prevaricating, every evasive, expression, every thing which partakes of duplicity, is radically a lie; and that, if they indulge themselves in these humbler efforts of falsehood, they will soon sink to the lowest degra dations of villainy.

Teach them, that the Eternal God, the God of Truth, to whom lying lips are an abomination, hears, marks, and records, every thing, which they speak; and that this record will be the foundation of their final sentence at the Great Day.

Discourage in them, at all times, a propensity to idle talk; to story-telling; particularly to the telling of marvellous stories; the recital of private history; the news of the neighbourhood; and the giving of characters. Lead them carefully, whenever they converse concerning others, to such conversation, and such only, as is prudent, and kind: and accustom them to feel, that, when they cannot speak of others in this manner, it is usually both their duty, and their interest, not to speak at all. Teach them faithfully to keep, and never to betray, the secrets entrusted to them; and effectually repress in them a disposition to pry into the personal and domestic concerns of others.

What you thus communicate by your instruction, endeavour to complete by your example. Show, on all occasions, the most solemn, and the most intense, regard to truth. Speak truth to them exactly, on every occasion, whether in earnest, or in jest. Promise them nothing, which you do not faithfully resolve to fulfil. Fulfil faithfully all that you promise, however difficult, or inconvenient, may be the fulfilment. If at any time, and by any circumstances, they are led to suppose, that you have failed to perform your promise exactly; or if the performance has at any time, subsequent to the promise, become unlawful, or impossible; carefully remove every suspicion, which they may entertain concerning your veracity, by a diligent explanation of every doubtful, or unknown circumstance; and show them, that your