see you accessible, and myself successful, when I speak to you on subjects of this kind. I hope I shall always find you the same; I hope you will not be weary in well doing, 2 Thess. ii. 13. I hope the voice of so many wretched petitioners as beseech you by my mouth, will not sound in vain in this christian assembly. Hear it, you happy natives of these provinces, whom God distinguishes by so many favours. Hear it, my dear countrymen, whom heaven hath enriched in your exile, and who, after having yourselves been a long time in want of assistance, are now so able to assist others. Hear it, generous strangers, who sometimes mix your devotions with those which we offer to God in this house; contribute to our charities, and share with us the blessings which they procure. God grant us all grace to do his will. To the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, be honour and glory for ever. Amen.

SERMON III.

The Small Duties of Religion.

MATTHEW Xxiii. 23.

Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites ! for ye pay tithe of mint, anise, and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judg ment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.

IN order to form a just notion of the little duties of religion of which we are about to treat, we must avoid a disposition to fastidious nicety, and an inclination to panics, or groundless fears.

Nothing is more opposite to the genius of religion than what I call a fastidious nicety, a sort of trifling spirit. It is incompatible with the greatness of God, whom we serve, and the excellence of rational creatures, to whom religion is proposed. It is inconsist ent, too, with the importance of those engagements to which the gospel calls us, and with the magnitude of those objects which it proposes to our faith.

What condemns a trifling spirit censures also an inclination to groundless fears. For example, a christian seriously prepares himself for the Lord's supper; when he partakes of it, a wandering thought alarms him, and he is filled with terror, as if he had

committed a high crime against God. But can we imagine, that God is setting snares for us, while he is giving us tokens of his love? Who can presume to approach the table of the Lord, I do not say worthily, but possibly, if there were any ground for such panics as these? Do you think you do honour to God, by attributing to him a turn for such com paratively insignificant niceties (forgive the expression, I cannot convey my meaning without it,) a disposition, I think, which you would hardly suppose in a sensible man? Can you suppose that God loves you with less wisdom, and less condescension than you love your children? Far from us be such odious thoughts! Remember, the spirit which ye have received, is not a spirit of bondage to fear; but a spirit of adoption," Rom. viii. 15. Remember, ye are "not children of the bond woman; but of the free," Gal. iv. 31. "Stand fast then in that inestimable liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free," chap. v. 1. Give of such things as ye have, and behold all things are clean unto you," Luke xi. 41. Be fully persuaded that in a religion of love, love excuses much infirmity, and sets a value on some seemingly inconsiderable actions, which appear to have only a very remote connection with the disposition whence they proceed.

In what then, you will ask, consist what we call small or little duties? What are the less weighty things of the law, which Jesus Christ says we ought not to leave undone, after we have done the more weighty things? My brethren, the duties of which we speak to-day, ought not to be accounted little, ex

cept when they are compared with other duties, which are of greater importance; and, as we said last Lord's-day, because they are consequences more remote from original primitive right. However, though little duties do not proceed so directly and immediately as great duties do, yet do they proceed from the same origin; and though they are not the first links of the chain of christian virtues, yet they are as truly connected with the origin as the first.

Choose of the list of moral virtues any one that seems the least important, and I will justify my idea of it. For instance, to be affable and accessible, to give attention to the tiresome tale of a tedious fellow christian in some difficulty, this is one of the very least duties that we can enjoin you, this is one of the less weighty matters of the lan. Who wil pretend to compare this with what you ought to do for this man in other cases? You ought to supply his wants when he is in a sick-bed, to defend his reputation when it is attacked, to support and provide for his family when it falls to decay. This first little duty, however, small as it may appear, proceeds from the same principle of primitive law as the last great duties do. This law is expressed in these words, All things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so to them, Matt. vii. 12. Would any one of you be convinced of this? Put yourself in the place of this man. Suppose a person elevated as much above you as you pretend to

be above him, would it not mortify you if he either refused to hear you at all, or gave you only a care