to his master's will, or of an express attention to his interest; and your best old servants are of this sort: but then he must have served for a length of time under the actual direction of these motives, to bring it to this; in which. service his merit and virtue consists. There are habits, not only of drinking, swearing, and lying, and of some other things, which are commonly acknowledged to be habits, and called so; but of every modification of action, speech, and thought. Man is a bundle of habits. There are habits of industry, attention, vigilance, advertency; of a prompt obedience to the judgment, occurring or of yielding to the first impulse of passion; of extending our views to the future, or of resting upon the present; of apprehending, methodizing, reasoning; of indolence and dilatoriness; of vanity, selfconceit, melancholy, partiality; of fretfulness, suspicion, captiousness, censoriousness; of pride, ambition, covetousness; of overreaching, intriguing, projecting; in a word, there is not a quality or function, either of body or mind, which does not feel the influence of this great law of animated nature. II. The Christian religion has not ascertained the precise quantity of virtue necessary to salvation. This has been made an objection to Christianity; but wihout reason. For, as all revelation, however imparted originally, must be transmitted by the ordinary vehicle of language, it behoves those who make the objection, to show, that any form of words could be devised, which might express this quantity; or that it is possible to constitute a standard of moral attainments, accommodated to the almost infinite diversity which subsists in the capa cities and opportunities of different men. It seems most agreeable to our conceptions of justice, and is consonant enough to the language of Scripture,* to suppose, that there are prepared for us rewards and punishments, of all possible degrees, from the most exalted happiness down to extreme *"He which soweth sparingly, shall reap also sparingly ; and he which sow"eth bountifully, shall reap also bountifully." 2 Cor. ix. 6." And that servant "which knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to . "his will, shall be beaten with many stripes: but he that knew not, shall be "beaten with few stripes." Luke xii. 47, 48.-"Whosoever shall give you a "cup of water to drink in my name, because ye belong to Christ; verily I say "unto you, he shall not lose his reward;" to wit, intimating that there is in reserve a proportionable reward for even the smallest act of virtue. Mark, ix. 41. See also the parable of the pounds, Luke, xix. 16, etc., where he whose pound had gained ten pounds, was placed over ten cities; and he whose pour had gained five pounds, was placed over five eities. misery; so that "our labour is never in vain;" whatever advancement we make in virtue, we procure a proportionable accession of future happiness; as, on the other hand, every accumulation of vice is the "treasuring up of so much wrath against the day "of wrath." It has been said, that it can never be a just economy of Providence, to admit one part of mankind into heaven, and condemn the other to hell; since there must be very little to choose, between the worst man who is received into heaven, and the best who is excluded. And how know we it might be answered, but that there may be as little to choose in their conditions? Without entering into a detail of Scripture morality, which would anticipate our subject, the following general positions may be advanced, I think, with safety. 1. That a state of happiness is not to be expected by those who are conscious of no moral or religious rule. I mean those who cannot with truth say, that they have been prompted to one action or withheld from one gratification, by any regard to virtue or religion, either immediate or habitual. There needs no other proof of this, than the consideration, that a brute would be as proper an object of reward as such a man, and that, if the case were so, the penal sanctions of religion could have no place. For, whom would you punish, if you make such a one as this, happy ?-or rather indeed religion itself, both natural and revealed, would cease to have either use or authority. 2. That a state of happiness is not to be expected by those who reserve to themselves the habitual practice of any one sin or neglect of one known duty. Because, no obedience can proceed upon proper motives, which is not universal; that is, which is not directed to every command of God alike, as they all stand upon the same authority. Because such an allowance would, in effect, amount to a toleration of every vice in the world. And because, the strain of Scripture language excludes any such hope. When our duties are recited, they are put collecSvely, that is, as all and every of them required in the Chrstian aracter. "Add to your faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge temperance, and to temperance patience, and to patience godliness, and to godliness brotherly kindness, and **to brotherly kindness charity."* On the other hand, when vices. 2 Pet. i. 5, 6, 7. are enumerated, they are put disjunctively, that is, as separately and severally excluding the sinner from heaven. "Neither for"nicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abu"sers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor "drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the "kingdom of heaven."* as Those texts of Scripture which seem to lean a contrary way, "that charity shall cover the multitude of sins;" that "he "which converteth a sinner from the error of his way, shall hide "a multitude of sins;"‡ cannot, I think, for the reasons abovementioned, be extended to sins deliberately and obstinately persisted in. 3. That a state of mere unprofitableness will not go unpunished. This is expressly laid down by Christ, in the parable of the talents, which supersedes all further reasoning about the matter. "Then he which had received one talent, came and said, Lord, "I know thee that thou art an austere man, reaping where thou “hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strewed; and "I was afraid and hid thy talent in the earth: Lo, there thou "hast that is thine. His lord answered and said unto him, Thou "wicked and slothful servant, thou knewest (or knewest thou?) "that I reap where I sowed not, and gather where I have not "strewed; thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the "exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received "mine own with usury. Take therefore the talent from him, and "give it unto him which hath ten talents: for unto every one that "hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance; but from him "which hath not, shall be taken away even that which he hath; "and cast ye that unprofitable servant into outer darkness, there "shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth."\ III. In every question of conduct, where one side is doubtful, and the other side safe, we are bound to take the safe side. This is best explained by an instance; and I know of none more to our purpose than that of suicide. Suppose, for example's sake, that it appear doubtful to a reasoner upon the subject, whether he may lawfully destroy himself. He can have no doubt but that it is lawful for him to let it alone. Here therefore is a case, in which one side is doubtful, and the other side safe. By virtue therefore of our rule, he is bound to pursue the safe side, that is, to * 1 Cor. vi. 9. 10. † 1 Pet. iv. 8. James v. 20. § Mat. xxv. 24, etc. forbear from offering violence to himself, whilst a doubt remains upon his mind concerning the lawfulness of suicide. It is prudent, you allow, to take the safe side. But our observation means something more. We assert that the action, concerning which we doubt, whatever it may be in itself, or to another, would, in us, whilst this doubt remains upon our minds, be certainly sinful. The case is expressly so adjudged by Saint Paul, with whose anthority we will for the present rest contented. "I know and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is "nothing unclean of itself; but to him that esteemeth any thing "to be unclean, to him it is unclean.-Happy is he that condem"neth not himself in that thing which he alloweth ; and he that “doubteth is damned (condemned) if he eat, for whatsoever is "not of faith, (i. e. not done with a full persuasion of the lawfulness of it) is sin."* * Rom. xiv. 14. 22, 23. BOOK II. MORAL OBLIGATION. CHAPTER I. THE QUESTION WHY AM I OBLIGED TO KEEP MY WORD? WHY am I obliged to keep my word? Because it is right, says one.-Because it is agreeable to the fitness of things, says another.--Because it is conformable to reason and nature, says a third.—Because it is conformable to truth, says a fourth. Because it promotes the public good, says a fifth. ----Because it is required by the will of God, concludes a sixth. Upon which different accounts two things are observable :FIRST, That they all ultimately coincide. : The fitness of things, means their fitness to produce happiness, the nature of things, means that actual constitution of the world, by which some things, as such and such actions, for example, produce happiness, and others misery; reason is the principle by which we discover or judge of this constitution; truth is this judgment expressed or drawn out into propositions. So that it necessarily comes to pass, that what promotes the public happiness, or happiness upon the whole, is agreeable to the fitness of things; to nature, to reason, and to truth; and such (as will appear byand-by) is the divine character, that what promotes the general happiness is required by the will of God, and what has all the above properties, must needs be right; for right means no more than conformity to the rule we go by, whatever that rule be. And this is the reason that moralists, from whatever different principles they set out, commonly meet in their conclusions; that is, they enjoin the same conduct, prescribe the same rules of duty, and, with a few exceptions, deliver upon dubious cases, the same determinations, |