der revelation, must be tried and judged by the fame principle. No revelation can dispense with virtue and holiness; for it may as reasonably dispense with our believing the being of a God, as with our believing that he can or would vacate the obligations to virtue and holiness: for to remove God out of the world, and to change the effential properties of his nature, is one and the fame thing. We may be fure then that all fuch doctrines, all fuch rites and ceremonies, as tend to fubvert true goodness and holinefs, are not of God's teaching or introducing.

Nor is there, I believe, a more certain way to keep ourselves steadfaftly in the purity of the Gospel, than by keeping our eye conftantly on this rule. Could enthusiasm, or deftructive zeal, ever have grown out of the Gofpel, had men compared their practices with the natural fenfe they have of God? Would they not have seen, that to defend even religion by cruelty and bloodshed must be hateful in the fight of God? Could religion ever have degenerated into fuch folly and fuperftition, as in fome places it has done, had the true notions of God been preserved, and all religious actions examined by

it ?

On the other hand, fome there are, who, taking religion to be what it appears to be in the world, find fo much folly, and fuperftition, and uncertainty in it, that they have chofen, as the safer way, to reject all religion: but could men have judged thus perverfely, had they attended to the true rule, and formed their notions of religion from the nature and wifdom of God, and not from the follies and extravagancies of men? How does the folly and perverfe

ness of others affect your duty to God? or, how came you abfolved from all religion, because others have corrupted theirs? Suppofe the people deceived, and the priests either ignorant or fuperftitious; what then? Does the error of one, or the ignorance of the other, destroy the relation between you and God, and make it reasonable for you to throw off all obedience? The fear of God will teach you another fort of wisdom. This therefore you ought to cultivate and improve, and preferve free from error or corruption, as your fureft guide in all doubts, and as the true principle of religious wifdom.

DISCOURSE LV.

PART I.

LUKE X. 29.

But he, willing to juflify himself, faid unto Jefus, And who my neighbour?

is

THE precepts of the Law and of the Gospel being

conceived in general terms, and expreffed in the most easy and familiar manner, men of speculative minds, whose business is rather inquiry than practice, have taken so much pains to adjust the limitations and restrictions which they conceive to be applicable to the general rule, that in many cafes the duty has been loft in the explication; and the precept has been so pared and cut to the quick by exceptions, that it is no longer of any use or service in common life.

The law of God commands us to love our neighbours as ourselves; the interpretation of which will better come from our hearts than our heads; for we cannot help feeling the sense of our duty as long as we attend to the motions of nature within ourselves: our own wants and infirmities will fhew us the matter and the extent of our obedience; and felf-love

will direct us in the practice and execution: but when men come to fpeculate upon the point, and to define the exact bounds of love, and to determine nicely how far the notion of neighbourhood is to be extended, the event too commonly is, that there is but very little love left to be difpofed of among our neighbours, and, that it may the better hold out, but very few neighbours left to fhare in our love. Call a covetous man to the exercise of this duty in an instance of charity; fhew him a man oppreffed with poverty and hunger, clothed in rags, and deftitute of all the comforts and fupports of life, and bid him love this wretch as himself: he will tell you, per

poor

haps, the law is excellent and good, and he does love the man, and pities his misfortunes; but he has nothing to fpare: he is not obliged to love another better than himself; and therefore it is unreasonable to expect that he should ftraiten and pinch himself to enlarge the conveniencies of others: he grudges him no degree of love, and heartily wishes him at ease and in plenty; but cannot afford any thing towards it out of his little. Or perhaps he will queftion upon what title this man pretends to be his neighbour: he is fure he never faw him before, nor ever heard that he lived near him; and if every body that will may claim to be his neighbour, there will be no end of it; and he may foon give his neighbours all he has, if every one that begs must be his neighbour. There is room in all other inftances of our duty for the like fubterfuges; and as long as men find comfort in fuch excufes for their negligence and difobedience, they will never want invention to furnish them.