no way nice about his conscience, or character. The sober part of the world look on the drunkards as madmen; and the drunkards are at no small pains to set themselves out as a honest undesigning sort of men, who hurt nobody, but themselves. Yet they gladly run in debt where they have credit, and never pay till they are forced. They make no scruple of fleecing every one under their power, till they are as bare as themselves. How can their tenant, or their servant, take this ill, since they do not treat their own wives and children a whit better? Notwithstanding all this, we must take it for granted, they are very honest men, for no one is hanged for such things as these, nor for combining over a bottle, and spending the night in forming schemes of iniquity, in which they unite their interests and strength with a kind of cunning, that often proves too hard for the prudence of wiser men, whose hands are tied up by a real regard to truth and justice. It would be endless to run over the malicious scandals that are born, the filthy jobs that are formed, and the unfair advantages that are pursued and carried, in bargains, in references, and in all sorts of business, by the assistance of this fruitful vice.

As hard drinking is not more apt to stifle reason, than it is to banish all sense of shame, and modesty from the mind of the drunkard, while it heats his lustful passions and lewd desires to a peculiar rage, it drives him into fornication, adultery, and every act of pollution, the corrupt imagination of man is capable of conceiving. It turns out the lascivious brute without a bridle, and hurries him into such a sink of uncleanness, as decency forbids description to approach. Hence it is that lewd houses are always furnished with strong liquors; that in case the wretch, who resorts to these porches of hell, hath not yet dosed himself sufficiently, he may there find wherewithal to give him a taste gross enough for the dung, and a stomach strong enough for the poison, with which he is to be regaled. Nowhere on earth, and hardly in hell, is there any thing to be found more odious, more detestable, and more shocking, than a lewd and shameless woman. Besides it is generally known, or believed, that she is a lump of painted rottenness, of perfumed stench, and that she brings with her a deadly infection, to the body, as well as the soul of him, who touches her. What is it now

that can lead a reasonable creature into her snare? Nothing, absolutely nothing. A man must have lost his reason, and become a brute, before he can so much as think of turning his eyes towards a sight so detestable. To what a pitch must a man's blood be fired! to what a depth must his taste be lowered! to what a distraction must his understanding be driven, either by the devil, or strong liquor, before he is capable of taking such a fiend for an angel, or an object of love and desire!

In this respect the effects of drunkenness in women are still more shameful and shocking than in men. To see that person, which nature intended for neatness and sweetness, all loose and filthy; that face which should be the seat of comeliness and beauty, all bloated and distorted; and those eyes, in which modesty and chastity should sit enthroned, staring impudence, and goggling lust; which is remarkably the case of a woman flustered with liquor, is a thing shocking, abominable, horrible, beyond all imagination or description. Yet horrible as it is, I am sorry to say it, such sights are of late by no means uncommon. I should be also infinitely surprised, that men could for a moment, endure them, or forbear flying from them to the ends of the earth, did I not consider, that what they are so easily reconciled to in themselves, they must be well enough prepared to tolerate in the other sex. But men in their senses cannot forbear pronouncing him miserable, who hath such a wife, and them unhappy, who have such a mother; for neither to him, nor them, can she in any sort discharge the duties of the place she is in.

Nothing but reason can give a man a right sense of his own infirmity and vileness, and teach him that humility, which becomes so dependant, so guilty, a creature. But when this is banished by strong liquor, and the spirits begin to mount on its fiery vapours, then pride rises with them, and lords it over the heart. The drunken dunce applauds his own understanding, and betrays that want of sense, which sober, he might have concealed. The coward conceits himself an hero, and engages in a quarrel, which must cost him a shameful submission to-morrow. The beggar, now grown a lord, must drink and pay according to his new title, though hunger and rags are immediately to follow.

Pride soon begets insolence and rudeness; insomuch that every one will give the greatest, and none bear the slightest, affront. The most unmeaning, and often the kindest expressions, are wrested and resented. In the midst of harsh gibing, loud laughing, and boisterous talking, resembling, to a sober ear, the quarrelling of a parcel of dogs, it would be very surprising, if anger should not be roused by such a cry; or, when roused, if it should not vent itself in bitter reproaches, broils, broken heads, bloodshed, and even murder.

You see, by this time, that drunkenness travels with a huge train of other vices, and requires the whole width of the broad way to give it room. Where its journey is to end, you know; so that if the guilt and misery which attend it here, be not enough, there, at least, the drunkard having to his horror, opened his eyes, and recovered the use of his reason, will perceive the truth of my text, and acknowledge, that great, beyond all power of conception, is the woe denounced against them that are mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to mingle strong drink.'

It is a common remark, whether strictly true or not, I shall by no means stay to inquire, that no drunken woman was ever reformed. It is however certainly true, that the vice of drunkenness is itself much harder to be reformed, and makes all the other vices of the drunkard much more difficult to be subdued, both in men and women, than any other kind of wickedness whatsoever. How this comes to pass, is easily conceived. Other vices leave a man the use of his reason, and consequently some handle for advice and reflections to lay hold of. But this having degraded him to a senseless brute, makes it almost as ridiculous to reason with him, as with an ass or a swine. And as to the hope of reformation from the grace of God, it shocks common sense, and all our notions of religion, even to conceive, that the Holy Spirit should come to, or remain in, a man who is often drunk. No: such a habitation is fitted up for another kind of spirit.

However, it may not be altogether useless to preach on this subject, since, by so doing, they who are not addicted to the vice, may be prevented from falling into it; and he who is but lately fallen, may be snatched from the

mouth of this gulf. To such a one as this, let me 'cry with a lamentable voice,' like that of Darius, when he called to Daniel in the lion's den, O thou servant of the living God,' is thy infinitely gracious Master willing to deliver thee from that lion, that goeth about seeking whom he may devour,' and hath unhappily got thee into his den? Or, hast thou thyself sense enough left to know where thou art, and what sort of company thou art in? Wilt thou not come forth while God still offers thee his help, and thou hast yet some strength to fight thy way.

If you have ears to hear, let them hear.' God gave you reason that you might know and practise your duty. To stupify it with strong liquor will not excuse you, for that is itself a very provoking sin; and one sin can never be made a cloak, or an apology, for another; it can only increase the guilt, and double the punishment. God gave you natural spirits to be as cheerful as he approves of, or as a due sense of your sins should suffer you to be. Let those content you; and pray consider, that a poor guilty wretch, like you, hath no right to a high excess of mirth, were that mirth ever so innocent in its kind. Hear what Solomon says in this case, It is better to go to the house of mourning, than to the house of feasting, Sorrow is better than laughter. The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning; but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth.' God gave you health that you might turn it to his service, your own comfort, and the good of the community; particularly of your own family: do not apply it to the very contrary ends; do not sacrifice it to the devil. God hath put it in your power to provide necessaries for your family; perhaps to relieve the distresses of the poor; do you think this wise Master, who would by no means excuse your wrapping it in a napkin, will suffer you to go unpunished, if you make use of it to destroy all your other talents of health, time, understanding; to promote all other vices, lust, wrath, oppression, perhaps murder; to turn yourself from a rational creature into a brute, from a Christian into a devil, or rather into such a mixture of brute and devil, as the swine were, when a legion of evil spirits had entered into them, and were hurrying them down the precipice to death and destruction? If God sends the sunshine and rain on your fields,

and blesses your labours with a plentiful increase; or, if he prospers you in the way of trade; shall you immediately 'forget who gave you all this abundance,' and, in a fit of drunkenness, offer up to the devil the first-fruits of God's bounty to you? You see I speak to you on a supposition that you have gathered what you have by the blessing of God on your industry, or other fair and lawful methods. But if you have got it by fraud or oppression, no part of this discourse is intended for you. The devil hath a sort of a right to expect from you a profitable return on one vice, out of that which he helped you to by another; and God will admit no offerings nor services from substance so acquired, till repentance and restitution have put it into the hands of the right owners. You wish, perhaps, in some fit of sickness, pray, for health; will you endeavour to drink it away when you have got it? Would you have God work a miracle to restore the health, and prolong the life, of so perverse a fool, only that you may be drunk by the year, or by the century? Do you ever, in a lucid interval, go on your knees? If you do, what is it you ask of God? Give me leave to guess. Perhaps you sometimes pray for wisdom, in imitation of David, who said, 'O give me understanding, and I shall live;' and of Solomon, who chose it rather than riches.' But how can you, who labour to destroy your reason, desire wisdom? Do you think this gift of God, also may be employed in procuring money to be expended on your detestable vice? You pray likewise for 'your daily bread;' but is it to impose on Providence, by drinking instead of eating it? Do you ask' the necessaries of life to consume them on your lusts?' If thus 'you ask bread,' will not God. serve you right, if he give you a stone? If thus 'you ask an egg,' can you complain, if he should give you a scorpion?"

Diogenes threw on the ground a large vessel of wine, that was bestowed him; and when the giver took it amiss, 'Why,' said this heathen, 'if I had drank it, I had but spilt it, and myself too into the bargain.' Shall he not rise in judgment against the men of this generation, and condemn them, to whom Christ, both by precept and example, preaches not only temperance, but abstinence? How shall you, a Christian drunkard (O the contradictory expression!) hold up your face at the last day, before that other heathen philosopher,