that strike you. O fatal victory! O'bloody gloa ry! you are not fruits of righteousness.

Chriftians, if our joy be mixed, it is becaufe our righteousness is mixed. Let us not fearch for our misfortunes in any other caufe. Let us do, when any thing is wanting to complete our joy, what the ancient people of God did, when ever they were conquered. The congregation was affembled, the ephod was put on, the oracle was confulted, inquifition was made from tribe to tribe, from family to family, from houfe to houfe, from perfon to perfon, who it was, whofe fin had caufed the lofs of the victory, or the lofs of a regiment, and when he was difcovered he was put to death. Jofhua, after he had met with a repulfe before Ai, and had loft thirty-fix men, rent his garments, and lay on his face upon the earth before the ark of the Lord. In like man.. ner, let us, my brethren, at the remembrance of infected countries, fields of battle covered with carcafes, rivers of blood dying the foil, confufed heaps of dead and dying fellow-creatures, new globes of fire flying in the air, let us examine ourfelves, Happy, if, as in the cafe juft now mentioned, only one criminal could be found among many thoufands of innocent perfons ! Alas! we are obliged, on the contrary, to lament, that there is hardly one innocent among thoufands of the guilty.

Where is the Achan, who imbitters the glori ous and immortal victories, which God grants to Ifrael? What tribe, what family, what house, fhall be taken? Is it the magiftrate? Is it the people? Is it the paftor? Is it the flock? Is it the merchant? Is it the foldier? Ahl my brethren! do you not hear the oracle of the Lord anfwering from the terrible tribunal erected in your own confciences? It is the magiftrate; it is the people; it is the paftor; it is the flock; it. is the merchant; it is the foldier.

It is that magistrate, who, being required to have always before his eyes that God, by whom kings reign, and that throne, before which the greatest monarchs of the world must be judged, is dazzled with his own grandeur, governed by a worldly policy, and hath more at heart to enforce the obfervation of his own capricious orders,than thofe rules of eternal rectitude, which fecure the fafety and happiness of a nation.

It is that people, who, instead of confidering the felicity of that nation whose God is the Lord, are attempting to be happy independently of God; choofing rather to facrifice to blind chance, than to him who is the bappy God, and who alone difpenfes profperous and adverfe circumftances.

It is that minister, who, inftead of confining, his attention to the discharge of all the duties of his office, performs only fuch parts as acquire him a popular reputation, neglecting private, duties, fuch as friendly and affectionate remouftrances,. paternal advice, private charities, fecret vifits, which characterize the true, minifters of the gofpel..

It is that congregation, which, inftead of regarding the word difpenfed by us as the word of Ged, licentioufly turns all public miniftrations into ridicule, and under pretence of ingenuity and. freedom of thought, encourages, infidelity and ir religion; or, at best, imagines that religion confifts more in hearing and knowing than in practice and obedience.

It is that soldier, who, though he is always at war with death, marching through fire and flames, hearing nothing but the found of warlike inftruments crying to him with a loud and dreadful voice, remember, you must died yet frames, a morality of his own, and imagines, that his profeffion, fo proper intitself to incline him to, obey the maxims of the gofpel, ferves to free him, from all obligation to obedience.

Ah!

Ah! this it is, which obfcures our brightest: triumphs; this ftains our laurels with blood; this. excites lamentations, and mixes them with our fongs of praife. Let us fcatter these dark clouds.. Let us purify our righteousness in order to purify our happiness. Let religion be the bridle, the rule, the foul of all our councils; and fo may it procure us unalterable peace, and unmixed pleaf ure! or rather, as there is no fuch pleasure on earth, as imperfection is a character effential to human affairs, let us elevate our hearts and minds. to nobler objects, let us figh after happier periods,. and let each of us feek true glory in the enjoyment of God. God grant us this grace! To, him be honor and glory for ever, Amen.

CHRISTIAN HEROISM.

PROVERBS XVI. 32.

He that ruleth bis spirit, is better than he that taketh a city.

WERE we to judge of these words by the firft impreffions they make on the mind, we should place them among fuch hyperbolical propofitions as imagination forms to color and exceed truth. The mind on fome occafions is fo ftruck as to magnify the object in contemplation. The more fufceptible people are of lively impreffions, the more fubject they are to declamation and hyperbole. We find the fe maxims fometimes neceffary in explaining the facred authors. Were we to adhere fcrupuloufly to their words, we fhould often mistake their meaning, and extend their thoughts beyond due bounds. The people of the caft feldom exprefs themselves with precifion. A cloud intercepting a few rays of light is the sun darkened: A meteor in the air is the powers of the beavens shaken: Jonah in the belly of the fish is, a man down at the bottom of the mountains : Thunder is the voice of Jehovah, powerful and full of majesty, dividing flames of fire, breaking cedars of Lebanon, making Syrians skip, and stripping forests bare: A fwarm of infects is a nation set in battle array, marching every one on bis ways, not breaking their ranks, besieging a city, baving the teeth of a lion, and the cheek teeth of a great lion, Joel i. 6. and ii. 79.

If we be ever authorized to folve a difficult text, by examining the licenfe of hyperbolical ftyle: if ever it be neceffary to reduce hyperbole to precifion, is it not so now in explaining the

text before us? He that ruleth bis spirit, is better than he that taketh a city. What juftnefs can there be in comparing a man, who by reflection corrects his paffions, with an hero, who, in virtue of concerted plans, great fatigues, spending days and nights on horfeback, furmounting difficulties, enduring heats and colds, braving a variety of dangers, at last arrives, by marching through a fhower of fhot darkening the air, to cut through a fquadron, to fcale a wall, and to hoift his flag in a conquered city?

But however juft this commentary may appear, you will make no ufe o of it here, unless you place chriftianity in the exercife of eafy virtues, and after the example of most men, accommodate religion to your paffions inftead of reforming your paffions by religion. Endeavor to form principles, refift fashion and cuftom, eradicate prejudice, undertake the conquest of yourself, carry fire and fword into the moft fenfible part of your foul, enter the lifts with your darling fin, mortify your members which are upon earth, rife above flesh and blood, nature, and felf love, and, to say all in one word, endeavor to rule your spirit; and you will find, that Solomon hath rigorously obferved the laws of precifion, that he hath spoken the language of logic and not of oratory, and that there is not a fhadow of hyperbole or exaggeration in this propofition, He that ruletb his spirit, is better than be that taketh a city.

But to what period fhall we refer the explication of the text? We will make meditation fupply the place of experience, and we will eftabJith a truth, which the greateft part of you have not experienced, and which perhaps you never will experience. This is the defign of this dif courfe. Our fubject is true heroifm, the real hero.

I enter into the matter. The word beroism is borrowed of the heathens. They called thofe

men'