and while yet one throb belongs to virtue, turn back from the verge of deftruction. Think of the joyful morning that rifes after a victory over fin,, reflection thy friend, memory stored with pleasant images, thy thoughts like good angels announcing peace and prefaging joy.

Or, if that will not fuffice, turn to the fhades of the picture, and behold the ruin that falfe pleasure introduces into human nature. Behold a rational being arrested in his course. A character that might have fhone in public and in private life, caft into the fhades of oblivion; a name that might have been uttered with a tear, and left as an inheritance to a race to come, configned to the roll of infamy. All that is great in human nature facrificed at the fhrine of fenfual pleasure in this world, and the candidate for immortality in the next, plunged into the irremediable gulf of folly, diffipation and endless mifery.

Cætera defunt.

SERMON

DANIEL XI. 32.

XXVII.

The people that do know their God shall be strong.

THE follies and vices which disfigure human life, do not always proceed from a principle of depravity. The thoroughly abandoned, who fin from forethought and contrivance, who commit iniquity upon a fixed plan, and who are wicked merely from a love of wickedness, I hope and believe are not a numerous clafs. The indifcretions and vices into which men fall, I am apt to imagine proceed often from a weakness of mind rather than from a badnefs of heart. There is a certain feebleness in the fprings of actions, a facility of difpofition, a filliness of foul,, which marks the character, and runs through the life of many men, as pernicious to them in the conduct of life, as a principle of actual depravity could be. Perfons of this clafs, properly fpeaking, fuftain no character at all. They affert not the rights of an independent being, they make no original efforts of mind, but patiently furrender themselves to accident, to be guided by events, and to be fashioned by those with whom they live. They have not strength of mind to stand alone, they dare not walk in a path unless it is beaten. Feebleness, fluctuation, timidity, irrefolution, fill up the period of their infignificant days, and often betray, them in. to crimes as well as indifcretions.

R R

This weakness of mind is not only pernicious but criminal. There are mental defects that are inconfiftent with a state of virtue. The Sacred Scriptures never draw the line of diftinction between intellectual and moral qualities, but prefcribe both as requi fite to form the character of the righteous man. Hence a found mind, as well as a good heart is mentioned as an ingredient in the character of a faint. Hence, in the facred books, religion and virtue go under the name of wisdom, vice and wickednefs under the name of folly. Hence intellectual qualities become the fubject of divine precept, and we are called upon to be wife and to be ftrong, as well as to be holy and to be pure. In oppofition to the feeble-minded, it is faid in the text, that they who know their God, or are truly religious, are ftrong. Religion, when rightly understood, and virtue, when properly practifed, give nerves and vigour to the mind, infuse into the foul a fecret ftrength, and, prefenting a future world to our faith, make us fuperior to the dangers and temptations of the present.

To fhow what this ftrength is, I fhall fet before you fome of the most remarkable fcenes in human life in which the feeble-minded give way, and in which they who know their God are ftrong. This ftrength then inspired into the mind by the knowledge of God, makes us fuperior to the opinion and fashion of the world, fuperior to the difficulties and dangers of the world, 'fuperior to the pleasures and temptations of the world, and fuperior to defponding fears at our departure from the world.

In the first place, It makes us fuperior to the opinion and fashion of the world.

To fuftain an amiable character fo as to be belov ed by those with whom we live, to maintain a facred regard to the approbation of the wife and good, and to follow those things which are of good report, when at the same time they are pure and lovely and honourable, is the duty of every honest man. But unhappily the bulk of the world is not compofed of the wife and good; religion and virtue are not always in the fashion; to fix the rule of life, therefore, by the public approbation or dislike, is to make the ftandard of morality uncertain and variable. According to this doctrine, the Christian life would be the work of mere caprice, there would be a fashion in morals as well as in dress, and what is virtue, or vice in one age or country, would not be fo in another. In fuch critical cafes, when truth is to be defended, or integrity to be held fast against the current of popular opinion, the feeble-minded are apt to make shipwreck of the faith. The feeble-minded man refts not upon himself, he has nothing within to fupport him, he thinks, and acts, and lives by the opinion of oth"What will the world fay?" is the question that he puts to himself on all occafions. Thou fool! look inwards, thine own heart will tell thee more than all the world. This pufillanimous deference to the opinions of others, this criminal compliance to the public voice, will make you lose your all, your foul.

ers.

Hence, in certain companies, men are afhamed of their religion. They lend a pleased ear to arguments that shake the foundations of their faith: they join in the laugh that is raised at the expence of all that they hold facred and venerable, and themselves

affume the fpirit, and speak the words of profaneness, while the heart often fecretly agonizes for the liberties of the tongue. In oppofition to fuch characters, the man who is truly religious, performs his duty through bad report as well as through good. The applause of such fools as make a mock at fin, he defpifes. His ftandard of moral conduct, is his own confcience well informed by the word of God. He knows that the fashion of the world paffeth away, and vice or folly is not recommended to him by being practifed by others. He remembers the words of his Master, "Whosoever fhall be afhamed of me, of him "fhall the Son of man be afhamed." He dares to be fingular and good: "Though all men forfake "thee, yet will not I."

In the second place, This ftrength inspired by true religion, makes us fuperior to the difficulties and dan-. gers we meet with in the world.

The feeble-minded man is intimidated upon the flightest occafion: he starts at difficulties, and fhrinks from dangers, whenever they prefent themselves. Happy to catch at any fubterfuge, he finds or makes a thousand obftacles to the discharge of his duty; and when any thing great is to be done, there is “a "lion in the way. "" What infinite mifchief has this pufillanimity done in the world! How often has the best and most generous caufe been loft by the weakness of its defenders! How often have the most innocent and worthy characters fuffered by the fhameful cowardice of their friends! How often have men purchased to themselves an inglorious ease, an infamous tranquillity, at the expence of character and confcience, and every thing great and good!