But the capital sophistry of Sin, and that in which she most prides herself, is to strike at the foundation of morality, by discrediting the distinctions of truth and falsehood, from whence arise the differences of right and wrong. She now pretends that Nature has involved its mysteries (if any such there be) in clouds and darkness, and doomed man to a total ignorance of all things: that therefore doubt and uncertainty is the philosophy of the wise; that all distinctions of right and wrong, of good and evil, are the phantoms of metaphysic dreams; and, in fine, that Nature has opened to us no other road to happiness, than by the senses.

Such are the various deceits of sin, which, the Apostle tells us, tend to harden the heart, and thereby render all exhortations to repentance vain and fruitless. And, indeed, the nature of things considered, it is morally impossible, after a long course of vice, that it should be otherwise. Can the Ethiopian (says the Prophet) change his skin, or the leopard his spots? then may ye also do good, who are accustomed to do evil. For the deceitfulness of the pleasures of sin renders the heart unfeeling and insensible; the deceitfulness of its sophistry makes it perverse and untractable. Now these, when acting in conjunction, bring over the heart so impenetrable a cover, as to make it totally unfeeling; for perversity hinders all approaches in attempting to overcome its insensibility; and insensibility affords us no ground or footing to

combat its perversity; so that it remains equally incapable of the impressions either of reason or of grace.

Hence we understand the admirable advice of the sacred writer, in my text, to oppose sin daily, while it is called to-day; which implies, that we should not let slip the present moments, for these only are in our power, and likewise, (which the words while it is called to-day more emphatically imply,) that the fittest season for the work of repentance is while sin has not yet had time to interpose with its deceits, nor brought the heart into a slavish subjection to its dictates.

May we all therefore exercise our mutual charity to one another in hearkening to this good old advice, which, before the coming of these new instructors, our wise forefathers reverenced, and by which they profited, to exhort one another daily, while it is called to-day, least any of us be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

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SERMON VIII.

DUELLING.

James, c. iv. v. 1.

FROM WHENCE COME WARS AND FIGHTINGS AMONG YOU? COME THEY NOT HENCE, EVEN OF YOUR LUSTS?

The Apostle is here speaking of the grounds, both of public and private dissensions ;-which all who have looked into the world, as well as the Apostle, have given to the account of our inordinate lusts and passions.

The desolation brought upon mankind by our civil rulers can only be lamented. For who shall redress the disorders occasioned by those whose office it is, and who alone have it in their power to prevent them? These must be left to the judgment of Him whose substitutes they are.

But those audacious men who assume the right of sovereigns, and dare to determine their private quarrels with one another by the sword, can pretend to none of this exemption.

I shall, therefore, take upon me to censure the practice of DUELLING, as it affects civil society and religion, by shewing it to be a scandalous insult upon both.

On men's first entrance into society, they agreed to refer all their quarrels and disputes of a civil kind to a common arbiter, who was indifferent to the parties contending. And indeed to procure this great commodity was one of the principal ends of entering into society; every man's judging in his own cause being what in a little time rendered the state of nature intolerable.

Now the Duellist, by assuming the right to judge for himself, does, by his example, all in his power to bring men back again to that state of misery and confusion from which civil society has relieved them. Such an one, therefore, becomes (and should be so deemed) a declared enemy to all government and order. And what greatly aggravates the crime is this, that they who thus offend against law, (for all well-policied states have concurred to make the crime of DUELLING capital,) are generally the men whose superior stations place them amongst the framers, or at least conservators of the public laws; such who lie under particular obligations to support them in vigour, and vindicate the violation of them.

Religion, in its directions to private men and particulars, expressly forbids the shedding of man's blood, except in one only case, the repelling immediate and mortal danger from themselves; and this under the severest penalty, the forfeited blood of the offender. He that sheddeth man's

blood, by man shall his blood be shed, saith the Lord of life and death. For this crime, and this alone, the God of mercy appears inexorable; He who, with regard to all other trespasses, which we commit against one another, recommends to us mutual forbearance and forgiveness, shuts up both the doors of mercy, the human and divine. For the irremissible sentence, of offering up to eternal justice the blood of the murderer, is both a direction for human judicatories, and a declaration of His own pursuing vengeance, whereby He engages Himself so to direct the course of his Providence, that second causes shall perform the office of the fabled Furies, to hunt the offender through the world, till they have brought him to the bar of civil justice, where, if he escape, the same avengers shall still dog his footsteps, till the torments of a distracted conscience, or another murderer like himself, have rendered him up to the tribunal of Heaven.

But RELIGION, for the security of man's life, does not stop here. It does not, like human laws, do its work imperfectly, and only punish when crimes are committed: it has contrived to prevent them, by restraining the first motion towards them, and guarding the remoter remoter approaches towards their commitment.

Thus it enjoins the government of the passions; more particularly of anger and revenge. It allows us to be angry, and sin not; that is, it indulges