against drunkenness, when he himself is known to be fond of liquor or to hear him preach against covetousness, when he is rigorous and exorbitant in exacting his tithes or to hear him preach up charity, when all his neighbours know how hard-hearted he is to the poor-or to hear him recommend industry, when his own life is spent in dissipation, and frivolous amusements, is vile and abominable; and beyond the practice of any, but such as are hardened into a disgrace to their profession; such as cannot reprove the unfruitful works of darkness, because they have fellowship with them.

Laying admonition on this head therefore aside, we should wish to make a closer application to the preacher, and speak-not to his outward actions-but to his heart.

Thou then that preachest to another, a belief in Christ-a renunciation of the world-and the comforts of the gospel-is thy own faith fully established? -Dost thou take Christ

into thy heart, as thy Lord, and master? Dost thou esteem all things as naught, that thou mayest win Christ? Is the world crucified to thee, and thou to the world? Dost thou feel what it is to be a new creature? Art thou, in the apostle's language, a stranger and pilgrim

upon

upon earth?-All these things thou preachest to others; and though, as was observed before, thou canst not arrive at perfection in any of these things, yet if thou dost not make a conscientious endeavour to form thy heart after the pattern, which thou thus preachest to others, thou must surely feel the distress of self-convictionand hast passed a sentence upon thyself, which will surely, one day, appear against thee.

So much for thyself; and as to thy hearers, it will be difficult to impress them with any thing that does not come from thy heart. It will be cold, and languid, and uttered without that energy, which a conscious love of truth inspires.

XVIII.

The manifestation of the spirit is given to every man to profit withal.-1 Cor. xii. 7.

IN the chapter, from which this verse is taken, the various gifts of the spirit are enumerated, which were dispersed in an extraordinary manner at the first promulgation of the gospel. With these, at present, we are not concerned. But the text seems as applicable to the ordinary, as the extraordinary, effusions of God's spirit: and to these I mean to confine myself-those effusions of the spirit which are still given to every man to profit withal. I shall endeavour therefore to explain to you the scripture doctrine of the illumination of the spirit; and of its progress and decay in the heart of man.

My first proposition is that all mankind, universally good and bad without exception, are inspired by the holy spirit of God. The scriptures every where, I think, talk this language. What is meant by God's striving with man; and man's resisting the holy spirit of God, but

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that

that the holy spirit not only dwells with good men; but with those also, who rest, and oppose it? Thus then we suppose, that with regard to the holy spirit of God, all mankind are on an equality. The whole depends on the use they make of it.

My next proposition is, that what constitutes a good man, is his listening to the suggestions of the holy spirit of God. How the spirit of God informs our consciences-or how our consciences differ from the spirit of God-we know not. But as we are assured in scripture,-that nothing good can arise from ourselves, every good thought and good action must be suggested to us by the holy spirit of God. Our goodness therefore consists merely in listening to its sugges tions, and following them. But still this is not supposed to make a man capable of earning his own salvation, if I may so speak. Of himself he is nothing. There dwells in him no good thing. His attending however to the suggestions of the holy spirit of God; and leading in consequence a holy life are graciously accepted by God, as the means of qualifying him, in the sight of God, for the salvation offered him through Christ in the Gospel.

My last proposition is, that what constitutes a

bad

bad man is his refusing to listen to the suggestions of the holy spirit of God. So far as we do not listen to them, we are under the guidance of those wicked propensities, which we inherited from our forefather. What little goodness the bad man may have, as few men are without some good qualities, he entirely obtains, by listening to the holy spirit of God. But as he generally listens to the world, and its temptations, the voice of God's spirit within him, grows weaker and weaker; till at length it will be hardly heard. And yet we cannot suppose, that even in the most abandoned men the spirit of God is wholly extinguished. There must still remain some latent spark: otherwise (as in himself there can be no good thing) there could not, one should suppose, be any repentance.

Thus the spirit of God is given to every man to profit withal; and it is every man's own fault, if he do not profit by it.