185

SERMON I.

ON THE SIN OF ADULTERY.

EXOD. XX. 14.

Thou shalt not commit adultery.

THOSE Who expect only to find in a sermon a series of truths too incontrovertible to provoke attention, who consider the preaching of the ministers of the Gospel to be an inefficient and decent institution of the Church, will be surprised at the difficult and delicate subject I have this day chosen. Did I take up this duty as a task, it would be very easy to touch upon barren generalities in morals and religion; but as I take it up with a very awful feeling of those purposes to which this duty of the ministry may be rendered subservient, I have singled out this crime on which to speak my thoughts, that I may do that little which in me lies to strengthen the good, to reclaim the wandering, and to carry shame and sorrow into the bosom of impudent and triumphant vice.

It is painful to remark in all religious assemblies, some few individuals to whom every attempt at serious reflection is a source of levity and an object of amusement. To men of this description, I do not, of course, owe any explanation; but to every truly religious person in this congregation, I have only to say, that it is either a mere mockery of God that we should address you at all, or it is our indispensable duty to hold forth to your indignation those enormous crimes which

transgress the simplest rules of the Christian religion, which violate every principle of trust among men, and blot the fair frame of social order and public happiness.

No great steps could ever have been made in the civilisation of mankind, without the institution of marriage. The most limited observer may perceive the endless confusion that would ensue if the society of men and women were arranged by violence, satiety, or caprice; nor do we know of any civilised people who have not given to this kind of contract a greater degree of strength and of duration, by the interference of the law. In the present constitution of society every family is a little commonwealth; and every parent a legislator, who co-operates with the supreme power in cherishing the virtuous, and in repressing the bad passions of our nature. In a political view the advantages which arise from this wise contract are incalculable: it encourages economy, it sharpens invention, it calls forth the powers, it unfolds the affections of man, it binds the individual to the mass, and places before him a great and an encouraging object to live. Above all, it produces the good of education, and gives up the young and the ignorant to those whom experience has made wise, and nature tender; thus knowledge is communicated, and life goes on. To touch even slightly upon all the points where the institution of marriage bears upon the happiness of mankind and the destiny of empires, is not now possible; but if we know better how to live at this time than men knew how to live in ages past, if this science has been progressive with all others, if any thing of laudable delicacy or rational restraint has been added to human life, to the very serious light in which this contract has been considered by the greater number of European nations, is that improvement perhaps to be ascribed. This wise system of thinking and acting owes no doubt its general reception to the holy and practical doctrines of our religion; a

religion where the dearest interests of man are marked out by the purest wisdom of God.

If such be the speculative considerations which should rouse the anger of every reflecting mind against the shameful injustice, and the shameful cruelty, of this crime of adultery, let us come to a plainer and a better test to common life and daily experience;

to what we have all seen, and heard, and remarked. Who is there who has not beheld with the purest pleasure the spectacle of a well-ordered family, than which life has none more comely, more cheerful, more serene? the provident activity of a father; a mother breathing peace, and gentleness, and goodness, over all; the youthful ardour of children, their pleasant ways, their graceful shame, and their fondness, the recompence of amiable patience; then, that wise regularity which a family exhibits, that conspiracy of views and interests, and the strength of that affection, which nature teaches, and man allows and applauds. When human beings are thus gathered together, every good man wishes to them happiness and peace: they affect our feelings, they satisfy our reason, they call down our blessings and our prayers! This, then, is the pure and the holy scene upon which the adulterer breathes his polluted breath! - this is the freshness which he withers; this the fragrance which he taints: these are the children of Christ, among whom he carries anguish, and remorse, and everlasting shame! He enters into this house, as the serpent entered into God's garden, to tempt and to destroy, to banish the man and the woman from the Eden in which they dwell, and to fix a mark upon their race! The time also shall come, when God shall say to him, as he said to the serpent, "Because thou hast done this, cursed art thou above all creatures, and beyond every beast of the field." Look truly and plainly to what this crime is. A fellow-creature rendered unhappy for the rest of his existence, children banished from their home, a wretched

woman consigned to perpetual degradation and shame. No year passes away that is not marked with some such ravages on human happiness; there is no cruelty and no crime which appeals so strongly to the heart, I will not say of every religious man only, but of every plain honest man, who conducts himself respectably in life, and draws the circle of justice round all he says, and all he does. It is monstrous that society, rigidly just to female vice, should have no indignation left for such deliberate villany in men! that we should yield up our sense of right and wrong to the imposing plea of high birth and finished manners, and forgive a man for transgressing the plainest laws of God, because he falls in gracefully with all the rules and courtesies of social life. We may talk of recompence afforded by human laws, but what recompence can reach wounded affections? how can you break a man's heart, and repay him? or, count out in gold and silver the price of comfort and of peace? Give back that affection which these people swore to one another, before the altar of God; cause the man to look upon his betrothed wife as the comforter of his days; make him forget that he has been injured and disgraced; unload his heart, and light up in it, its ancient fondness: then, when you have done this, go to the victim of your passion,- she will ask of you her feelings of innocence and security; she will require at your hands her days of virtuous tranquillity, when she knew no guilt; all the joys that she felt in the bosom of her family, and the circle of her children; she will ask of you the love of her husband, the support of her friends, and the respect of the world: all these things this poor woman will require at your hands; and if there be any good left in your heart, the generous and the noble feelings of a man will rise up to judge you, and you will burn in the hell of conscience. You forget that while this crime in you is called bravery and spirit, while you are still suffered, by the laxity of