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the fatherless, and him that hath none to help him; let him be eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame, and a father to the poor; the cause that he knows not, let him search it out; let him break the jaws of the wicked, and pluck the spoil ont of his teeth, that the blessing of him who was ready to perish may come upon him, and that the widow's heart may sing for joy.' Let him resolutely plead the cause of the helpless, and without hire; and generously stand between him and his persecutors of all kinds, cold, hunger, and oppression; and, for his reward, he shall not want an advocate to plead an infinitely more important cause for him, against his own sins, and the accusations of his

enemy.

Shall one man cry out in anguish and misery, and another not feel? Shall one neighbour see another sinking under affliction, and not stretch out his hand to support him? Shall one shiver with cold, and there be none to clothe him? Shall another pine away with hunger, and there be none to feed him, of all those whose fortunes enable them to flaunt in finery, and surfeit in luxury? Shall the poor call out for help, and humanity refuse it? Shall God sue for a share of his own, and religion give him a denial? Shall heaven be set to sale for a mite, and there be none found to purchase?

These things shall not, cannot be, if there are the least remains of compassion towards men, or love towards God, or sense of our greatest interest, left among us. If the rich, who never felt the extremities of cold or hunger, could conceive what they are, and suppose themselves in the places of the poor, they would be more ready to conform themselves to the royal law, and to do as they would be done by.' But, though they have never been in this sort of distress, have they not eyes? Can they not see the houses of the poor, open to every injury of the weather; their wretched beds of straw, to which sleep and rest must be strangers; their tattered clothes, hardly sufficient for decency; their scanty meal of tasteless and unwholsome trash; their faces pale, and worn to the bone, for want of bread; their languid eyes, sunk deep into their heads, and dimmed, as it were, with the shadows of death? Can they not hear the cries of their starving children, re-echoed, in a melan

choly concert, by the groans of parents, enfeebled, to an impossibility of affording help, by want of nourishment, or by distempers, perhaps by both? If they can see and hear these things, have they not bowels to tell them, this is misery? Or have they neither bowels nor conscience, to rouse them to the relief of this misery, suffered by their poor fellow-creature, the creature of that God who gave them all their wealth?

I know the good-natured heart that hears me, not only pardons the pains I take on this most affecting subject, but melts at every touch of a discourse like this, and wishes for one of more power in speaking, who could force a passage to hearts less sensible and tender. I will not apologize for what I have said to the man of humanity, because his goodness supersedes the necessity of recommending the poor to his compassion. And as for the hard and the insensible, for whom, I own, this discourse was intended, he will hear my apology, and know my reasons for thus speaking, when his poor brother and he meet before the throne of God.

In the mean time, let us beseech the good God to 'take from us the heart of stone,' and to 'give us one of flesh,' that may feel the distresses of our fellow-creatures, for the sake of Christ Jesus our Redeemer; to whom, with God the Father of the poor, and God the guardian and comforter of the afflicted, be all might, majesty, dignity, and dominion, now, and for evermore. Amen.

DISCOURSE XLVI.

THE BIRTH AND GROWTH OF FAITH.

ROM. I. 17.

Therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith.

THE light of the natural day is so ordered by Providence as not to fall on the eye, all at once, in its full lustre, but rises and increases by insensible degrees, lest that organ of sight should either be forced to shut itself up in voluntary darkness, or be exposed to the danger of losing its power of vision. In like manner, he who is stiled the East, the Light, and Righteousness, breaks not forth on us, at first in all his brightness, but discovers himself, here a little, and there a little,' and so, shineth more and more unto the perfect day' of that evangelical knowledge, which lays open too deep and too glorious a mystery of wisdom, power, and love, to be endured by the human mind, were it not gradually dispensed. Reason, weak reason, must have fled from, or been lost in, a light so over-powering, had it burst at the first moment in its full noon of brightness, on that naturally benighted and enfeebled faculty. From the beginning, therefore, it did but dawn on the world through an obscure, but consolatory prophecy; shone somewhat more clearly through the promise made to Abraham; emitted a still more distinguishable and steady ray through the typical institutions, and vicarious sacrifices of the Mosaical law; became more characteristical in the prophecies of David, Isaiah, and others; marked out the time of its own meridian in those of Daniel; grew more diffusive, in the repeated captivities of the Jews; and being preceded by its' morning star' the Baptist, had its'day-spring' in the birth, and arose to its full height in the miracles, preachings, sufferings, and resurrection of Christ. Even in this fullest display of itself, a singular simplicity and plainness of dress, allaying its heat, and veiling its brightness, presents it to the mind through a Chili sky, so tempered as neither to scorch'nor glare.

Thus was the gospel intoduced; and thus in that gospel, was the righteousness of God revealed in Christ,' whereby not only the rectitude, but the mercy also, of his dealings with men, is fully justified to us, and we to him. Here we see, how from the lowest degree of faith, excited by the least striking lights or proofs, a yet higher and stronger is produced, as the lights advance in number and force.

Parallel to this progress of faith among mankind in general, is another, made in the breast of every individual Christian, who first believes in the gospel history, as he does in any other, on the strength of the testimony afforded by its witnesses; then resigning his heart to that which his judgment had pronounced so true, and so replete at the same time with God's infinite goodness to him, he soon finds his rational or human, improved into divine faith by the demonstration of the spirit.' He, like the church of God, is trained by dimmer lights to bear the more vivid; and as the eye of his mind is more and more familiarised to the light, that light pours on him in a stronger beam, and opens to his view the incomprehensible wonders of that original righteousness, which interposing between the divine and human nature, justifies God to the reason of man, and man to the mercy of God.

If the faith of a Christian can be vindicated as rational, and well founded in the first step of its progress, and, in the second, as productive of real goodness and solid happiness, wherever it takes place; I hope, it will be amply vindicated at the same time against the cavils of those infidels, who, to run down Christian faith, treat faith in general as a weak credulity, vilify both as not founded on argument, and endeavour to represent the former as rather a vice, if not supported by evidence; at least as no virtue, if countenanced by that which is sufficient.

This good design, together with another, namely, to make faith somewhat more intelligible, than it is at present, among the professors of Christianity, will be attempted in a short series of discourses on that subject, which I intend, with God's permission, to deliver from this place. Whether the one or the other of these designs is of the greater consequence to truth, will not be known, till it is determined, which of the two, our senseless controversies about faith, or

the artful attacks made on it by our common adversaries, have been the more fruitful source of confusion.

Faith, as an inlet to, or a branch of knowledge, is well enough defined, and distinguished from the other inlets and branches, by logicians. But to this definition and distinction, our controvertists on the subject of faith seem to pay little or no regard. Yet till knowledge, in its several branches, and in this particularly, is carefully analysed, and closely considered, there will be no end of mistakes. That we may not therefore continue to talk at random on a subject of such infinite moment,

Let us first briefly delineate these branches, as distinct from one another, that we may see their mutual connexions, and find out the comparative dependence which we may safely have on each.

After this, let us lay down such rules for regulating our belief in all cases, as may distinguish, in the clearest manner, the credible from the contrary reports.

The use, nay the absolute necessity of doing both, will evidently appear by applying that delineation, and these rules, to Christian faith in particular.

In the first place then, there are certain luminous truths, which we either receive through our senses, or more inwardly feel the force of, by immediate contact, as it were, with the very faculties of our minds. These truths of both sorts, which I call primary, carry their own evidence with them, and produce full conviction, without the help of borrowed lights or proofs. At the same time that they discover themselves to all capacities by their own native lustre, they also enlighten and prove such other points, not evident in themselves, as are naturally connected with them, and can be brought by the mind within the influence of their light. To give an instance of each; one thing I know,' saith he in the gospel, whom Christ cured of his blindness, that whereas I was blind, now I see. God heareth not sinners' (the vilest impostors he means), so as to work miracles at their request.

This kind of knowledge, by an expression taken from a particular sensation applied to all our immediate perceptions of truth, whether external or internal, is called intuitive; is in its outward and proper sense enjoyed by man in common

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