23. -10. For travel read labour. 47.16. read, He was wounded for our tranfgreffions 116. 13. For against read among ft. - 161. Note. For Feb. 1, 1788, read Feb. 1, 1688. 247. 1. 16. Place the inverted commas after fame, infead of death. 283, 17. For to (at the end of the line) read of. 313. Note. For Emili read Emile. SERMON I PHILIPPIANS iv. 4. REJOICE IN THE LORD ALWAY; AND AGAIN I SAY, REJOICE. A MONG the many expedients put in practice by the enemies of our Religion, to obstruct its progress, and to counteract its influence, it is no uncommon one, to fet before the eyes of mankind a most frightful picture of Christianity, and to reprefent it as a stern, auftere, uncomfortable, gloomy religion, adverse to all the innocent enjoyments of life, and to all the natural defires and propenfities of the human mind. As a proof of this, we are referred to those injunctions of mortification and felf-denial, of penitence, contrition and remorse, of abftinence from pleasure and enmity to the world, which occur fometimes in the facred writings; VOL. II. B writings; and to those seasons, which, in conformity to the fpirit of fuch injunctions, have, by the authority of particular churches, been fet apart for the purposes of retirement and abstinence, recollection and devotion. That precepts of this import are to be found in the Gospel, and that they carry with them some appearance of rigour, we do not deny. But it requires only a very small share of difcernment to perceive, and of candour to acknowledge, that this is nothing more than appearance. It is very true, it is not to be diffembled; the Gospel does most certainly require us to renounce fome things, which the man of the world may not be very willing to part with. But what are these things? They are thofe lufts which war against the foul: they are thofe felfish defires, which contract, and narrow, and harden the heart: they are those hateful and turbulent paffions, which fill the mind with difquiet, and the world with disorder: they are those predominant vices and follies, thofe dangerous and deftructive amusements, which destroy all composure of mind, all purity of fentiment and dignity of conduct, and plunge us in expence, diffipation, and ruin. These are the things we are required to to mortify, to deny, to fubdue, to repent of, to renounce; and if these are the hardships complained of, to these indeed we must fubmit. But to accuse the Gospel of severity on this account, would be just as rational and as equitable as to charge the furgeon with cruelty for amputating a gangrened limb, or the phyfician with ill-nature for prefcribing a strict regimen and a course of searching medicines to a patient bloated with disease. We have reason on the contrary to bless the skilful hand, that, by any operations, however painful, by any remedies, however unpalatable, condefcends to preferve or to restore the health of the foul. The truth is, the very cruelties of Christianity (if they may be called fo) are tender mercies. Far from infpiring gloom and melancholy, or rendering our existence uncom→ fortable, they are, in fact, the only folid foundation of true chearfulness. Of all men living, thofe are the moft wretched and comfortlefs, who are the flaves of their paffions. Slavery of every kind, and this above all others, has a natural tendency to debase and degrade the foul, and to render it abject, mean, and spiritlefs. And till (as the Gospel requires) B 2 |