SERMON XXXIV.

Preached before the King, March 12, 1769.

TRUE CHRISTIANS, THE SALT OF THE
EARTH.

MATT. V. 13.

YE ARE THE SALT OF THE EARTH; BUT IF THE SALT HAVE LOST ITS SAVOUR, WHEREWITH SHALL IT BE SALTED? IT IS THENCEFORTH GOOD FOR NOTHING, BUT TO BE CAST OUT, AND TO BE TRODDEN UNDER FOOT.

UR Blessed Master hath here, in an happy union of scientific and popular instruction, arising from the joint aid of the sentiment and the expression, supported a particular truth on à general principle.

The particular truth is, that the loss of the Salt, or genuine spirit of Christianity, cannot be supplied by any human expedient whatsoever and it is VOL. X. Ꮣ supported

supported on this general Principle, that every thing hath its Salt or essential quality, which makes it to be what it is; and, without which, it is no longer the same, having degenerated into another thing.

Much of our blessed Master's instruction pointed to future corruptions in his holy Religion; for at the time when he first impregnated the world with, what he here calls, the salt of the Earth, there could be little danger of its losing its savour during that. generation.

The observation was made to be recorded by the sacred Penmen; that when this loss or decay of sacour should arrive, we might remember (to use his own words) that he had told us of it.

And it is one of the miserable Prerogatives that we, the Ministers of his word in these latter ages, have to boast of, above our happier Predecessors, that we are able to illustrate the divinity of our holy Faith by the completion of many Prophecies, which foretold the degeneracy of the Christian Church.

But though I shall not forget the particular Truth inculcated in my Text, yet it is my purpose, first of all, to shew from the general maxim on which it is supported, that the gracious warning, contained in the observation, holds good with regard to every state and condition of human life, as well civil as religious; that where the Salt or essential quality of a thing, that which constitutes its being what it is, happens to be lost or depraved, nothing can prevent the destruction of the subject in which that quality resided: no succedaneum, no adventi

tious quality, having the virtue or efficacy to supply its place.

To explain my meaning by the trite example of the Body-natural, employed, on all occasions, to illustrate the various fortunes and situations of the Body-politic.

"In the human frame, the essential quality of the eye is its capacity of vision; of the ear, to receive and modulate sounds; of the palate, to distinguish savours; and so of the rest. Now when the qualities appropriated to each organ of sense are lost or depraved, we find it impossible for their functions to be discharged, or their defects to be supplied by any succedaneum whatsoever. The vitiated part must for ever lie useless, till the mischiefs attending the cessation of its functions end in the destruction of that body which such parts were formed and designed, by the divine Architect, to serve and support.

Just so it is in the several orders and stations of Society; which are the members, as it were, of the great Body-politic.

Suppose then the Salt or essential qualities of one of these members be Frugality and Simplicity; of another, Learning; of another, Wisdom; and of the twofold Body itself, in one part, Love of our Country; in the other, Piety: When all, or any of these, no longer operate by their respective faculties, the common Eody to which they belong will soon fall into a consumptive decay.

This scrious and melancholy truth our divine

Master hath plainly intimated, in that elegant figure of Salt which hath lost its savour.

I shall therefore first endeavour to explain the importance of his words, as they are founded on the general Principle, in their more enlarged and general sense: By which you may understand the helpless condition of Society, when any of its capital members are deprived of their essential qualities. So that, in whatsoever part you find this Salt to have lost, or to be in danger of losing, its savour, you may hasten to restore it, or to preserve it in its natural state, instead of hoping by quack inventions to supply its place.

I. To begin with the PEOPLE. The Salt of this gross Body, that by which it is kept sweet, are modesty, industry, parsimony, and simplicity of manners.

How far these qualities now make, or mark, the characteristic of the People, we all see.

Instead of that modesty, by which the English Populace, till of late, have been so advantageously distinguished, a censorial spirit, not of their hearts but of their heads, hath got possession of them. They erect themselves into Controllers of the conduct of their Governors; they prescribe laws to the Legislature; and rise in tumults against the sentence of Public Justice. In prosperity, they are insolent; in adversity, outrageous. A People turbulent and servile; mutinous and corrupt; impatient in want; improvident in abundance; and equally unawed by the uplifted hand of Heaven and the Magistrate.

That