handle not. It lays a tie and a restraint upon his practice, and enslaves him to the prejudice of a mistaking conscience, under no less a penalty than that of the divine wrath and eternal damnation; bonds not to be shook off, and fences not to be broke through, by any one who values the eternal welfare of his soul.

Now from these three things put together, I conceive we may collect this full description of a weak conscience; namely, that it is such an one as obliges a man to forbear any thing or action, from a suspicion that it is unlawful, or at least an ignorance that it is lawful; which suspicion or ignorance was not caused or occasioned by his own will, but either by the natural weakness of his understanding, or the want of such means of knowledge as were absolutely necessary to inform him.

This description ought well to be observed and remembered in the several parts of it; as being that which must give light into all the following particulars.

And thus much for the first thing proposed, which was, to shew what this weak conscience is. I proceed now to the

Second, which is, to shew what it is to wound or sin against it. It implies, I conceive, these two things:

First, To grieve, afflict, or discompose it; or, in a word, to rob it of its peace. For there is that concernment for God's honour dwelling in every truly pious heart, which makes it troubled at the sight of any action by which it supposes God to be dishonoured. Rivers of tears, says David, run down my eyes, because men keep not thy statutes;

and am I not grieved with those who rise up against thee? Every sin directly strikes at God, but collaterally the scandal of it reaches all about us. And as piety commands us not to offend God, so charity enjoins us not to grieve our neighbour.

Secondly, The other thing implied in the wounding of a weak conscience, is, to encourage or embolden it to act something against its present judgment or persuasion: which is, in other terms, to offend, or cast a stumblingblock before it; that is, to do something which may administer to it an occasion of falling, or bringing itself under the guilt of sin. So that as the former was a breach upon the peace, this is properly a wound upon the purity of the conscience.

Now the conscience may be induced to act counter to its present persuasion two ways:

1st, By example. 2d, By command.

First. And first for example; which is the case here expressly mentioned, and principally intended. According to that of the apostle in the 10th verse of this 8th of 1 Cor. where he says, that the conscience of him who is weak is emboldened to eat things offered unto idols, by seeing him who has knowledge sit at meat in the idol's temple: so that it is the seeing of another do so, which makes the weak person conclude that he may do so too. Now the reason of that persuasive force which is in example, is from a kind of implicit faith in the goodness and lawfulness of another's actings, grounded upon a supposal of his piety and judgment, which, in the weak conscience of one who beholds him, naturally frames such a kind of ratiocination as this: "I, for "my part, by the best of my understanding, can be

"no way satisfied of the lawfulness of my doing "such an action; nevertheless, such an one, whom I "esteem a person truly pious and more judicious "than myself, makes no scruple of doing it at all, "which surely he would, if it were indeed unlawful: "and therefore, if it be lawful for him to do thus "and thus, why may it not be so likewise for me, "albeit my own reason, I confess, would persuade "me otherwise ?"

So that here is the force of example to persuade, and thereby, in this case, to wound; in that it induces a man to act by an implicit faith in the private judgment of another, against the express dictates and persuasions of his own; a thing directly against the law of God and nature, which has appointed every man's reason or conscience to be the immediate guide or governor of his actions.

Secondly. The second way by which the conscience may be induced to act contrary to its present persuasion, is by command; as when a person in power enjoins the doing something, of the lawfulness of which a man is not persuaded: but concerning this, these two things are to be observed:

First, That it is not so clear that a mere command can wound the conscience this way; that is, by emboldening it to act against its present persuasion : for so to embolden it, is to make it willing to act in this manner; but a command as such, makes not a man willing to do the thing commanded, but lays only an obligation upon the action that is to be done. Nevertheless, since a command seldom comes proposed naked in itself, but with the conjunction of reward upon performance of the thing commanded, or of penalties upon the omission; one whereof

works upon a man's hopes, the other upon his fears; by both of which ways the will of man is apt to be prevailed upon; therefore in this sense a command enjoining a man to do something against his judgment, may be said to wound his conscience: not as a bare command, (for so it has nothing to allure or gain the will, and it is certain that it cannot force it,) but as a command attended with those things which are apt to entice and gain upon it. Add to this also, that a command coming from a person noted for his piety and knowledge has the force of an example; forasmuch as the reputation of the person derives the same credit upon his law.

Secondly, The other thing here to be observed is, that a command may be considered two ways:

First, As descending from one private person upon another, as from a father upon a son, from a master upon his servant, from a guardian upon his pupil, or the like. And I question not but the principal design of the apostle in this chapter extends not beyond private persons; but directly proposes rules only for the charitable and inoffensive deportment of one private person towards another. Nevertheless, since by manifest analogy of reason the case of magistrates or public persons may here come into consideration; therefore, in the

Second place, a command may be considered as descending from a magistrate or public person upon persons under his jurisdiction. And so I affirm that the supreme magistrate, in the making of laws, or giving out commands, stands not under any obligation from his office to frame those laws to the good or advantage of any particular persons, but only of the community or majority of the people, which are

properly the trust committed to him. So that if his reason or conscience, upon the best information he can get, tells him that the making of such or such a law tends to the good of these, and that so apparently, that without it they would be unavoidably hurt in matters of the greatest moment; if this law now becomes an occasion of sin to some particular persons, its being so is wholly accidental and extrinsic to the design of the law, and consequently concerns not the civil magistrate, nor makes him chargeable with those sins in the least: for surely where the public good of all or most of the people comes into competition with the private good of some particulars, so that both cannot possibly be served by the same means, there charity, as well as bare reason, will teach, that the private must stoop to the public, rather than the public be made a sacrifice to the private. In God's government of the world, it is the public concern of mankind, that there should be summer and winter in their respective seasons, and yet there are millions of sick and weak persons to whose distempers the approach of either of those seasons will prove certainly mortal. Is it now, think we, rational, that God should suspend a summer or a winter only to comply with the distemper of those crazy, bodily-weak brethren, and thereby to incommode all the world besides ?

The case is much alike here: however this indeed must be confessed, that if the magistrate or supreme power should make a law which he knew would be a direct occasion of sin to the generality or majority of his people, the making of such a law would be in him a sin, and a breach of his trust; but still I affirm, that his office obliges him only to provide for the