regard to this important article, as the whole bent of our future conduct may in a great measure depend upon it: according to the connections we form, and the friendships we contract in our youth, will be found, for the moft part, the whole tenor of our lives.

66

But to crown the glory of friendship, to fet this grand specific against every human evil in its true and higheft light; let us add, that it is as it were an attribute of the Deity, an emanation of the divine Being. God's friendship towards man is vifible throughout his whole divine difpenfation; " in our creation, our "in prefervation, and all the bleffings of this "life;" his tender and providential care of us in our earlier years, his conftant benevolence, indulgence and forgivenefs; that kind intercourfe and communication carried on by his divine grace; but above all, that fignal inftance of his friendship to mankind, fo eminently fhewn by fending down his beloved Son; that Son, who became man only that he might be a friend; that he might intercede for us with his almighty Father; might bear our burthens, and fuffer for our iniquities: and as he was a real friend to us, he expects us to be fuch to him: I call you not fervants, fays he, for the fervant knoweth not what his Lord doth; but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father, have I made known unto you. But alas! like many other true and fincere friends, he met with an ungrateful return for all his kindness; a fad reward for all his fincerity: his friends but ill repaid his

goodness,

goodnefs, and but poorly recompenfed his generofity: thofe difciples whom he fo loved and trufted, meanly betrayed, and faithlessly deferted him in the hour of adverfity and forrow, and at the approach of his final diffolution, even those who had not long before left all to follow him, at laft, we are told, forgot their friend and benefactor, and inftead of comforting or affifting, forfook him and fled: inftead of the medicine of life, he met the cup of death; that cup which he fo carneftly prayed might be removed from him, and which perhaps the rich cordial of friendship might have rendered lefs bitter and lefs difguftful to him.

Some have entertained an abfurd and ridiculous notion, that private friendfhip is deftruc tive of public benevolence: the fallity of which is fufficiently evinced in the character and conduct of our bleffed Saviour himself while upon earth: who, though his own life was, in regard to the public, one continued act of love and friendship, was notwithstanding, more nearly connected with, and more intimately attached to one favourite individual. St. John is defcribed to us in the New Teftament, as that disciple whom above all Jefus loved; on whose bofom he leaned, and in whofe breaft he reposed trust and confidence. Paul was his con. vert, Matthew was his follower, Peter was his difciple; but John alone was his particular friend. Amongst many other inftances of the mutual tendernefs and affection between them, let us call to mind that melancholy fcene where, with the utmoft filial piety, we find

our

our gracious Redeemer recommending his mother to the care and protection of his friend. When Jefus faw his mother, and the difciple flanding by whom he loved, he faid unto his mother, Woman, behold thy fon! Then faith he to the dif ciple, Behold thy mother! Here we fee all the beauty and usefulness of true affection; all the confidence of facred and invic'able friendship; the new relation is immediately formed, and the effects immediately vifible; for the difciple, we are told, took her from that hour to his own home.

Shall we then defpife a paffion attended with fuch peculiar pleasures, and fuch noble benefits? Shall we contemn a virtue which our Saviour practifed, or neglect a duty which he performed? Shall we not endeavour to follow fo bright an example? Shall we not study to be friends? friends to ourfelves, to our relations, to our neighbours? and above all, fhall we not be friends to him who hath thus loved us? If thy brother, fays God himfelf in the book of Deuteronomy, the fon of thy mother, or thy fon or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bofom, or thy friend, which is as thy own foul, entice thee to ferve other gods, thou shall not confent unto him. Here we fee the friend is placed above all the ties of kindred and relation; he indeed who performs this office with zeal, truth and integrity, is far above them all.

Let the hopes therefore of meeting with this great reward, animate us in all our toils and labours through the wearifome pilgrimage of this life and encourage us in the practice

of

of thofe virtues that may render us deferving of it; let us rife from the love of man to the love of God; and let us fo cultivate human friendship, as at length to make us worthy of the divine.

Such, after all, is the weakness, and fuch the ingratitude of mankind, that how well foever we may merit, we may never meet with this inestimable bleffing here on earth; but if we do not find it below, we muft look for it above those that feek the Lord, will never want a good and faithful friend.

Take then, O man! this friend into thy heart; ferve, revere, love and cherifh him; ferve him with all thy powers, revere and love with all thy faculties this friend; and this friend fhall own thee in thy loweft condition, fpeak comfort to thee in all thy forrows, counsel thee in all thy doubts, fupply all thy wants, and, in a word, will never leave thee or forfake thee; but when all the promises of a deceitful world have failed, will take thee to his bofom, love, cherish, and support thee; and, as the Pfalmift expreffes it, will guide thee with his counfel here, and afterwards receive thee into glory. Which may God of his infinite mercy grant to us all.

SERMON

ON THANKSGIVING.

SERMON

I THESS. V. 16.

Rejoice evermore.

XIII.

HIS fhort precept of the holy apoftle is

THI

of fo fweet and amiable a nature, that one would almost be induced to think there was no neceffity of any arguments to recommend, or any authority to enforce it: a command to love ourselves, to be eafy and happy, to promote our own comfort and fatisfaction, feems indeed fuperfluous; and yet experience will convince us, that this eafy injunction is feldom obeyed. St. Paul moft certainly did not mean by the words of my text, that we should rejoice at all times and in all places, at the expence of our innocence and virtue; that we fhould rejoice with the profligate and the epicure: he did not mean that we fhould be always in a fashionable round of worldly pleasures, in idle fcenes of noisy and outrageous mirth, in chambering and wantonnefs, in riot and debauchery; in fuch laughter, (or at leaft foon after it) the heart is forrowful, and the end of such mirth is heavinefs: this is that kind of falfe joy, which in the language of Solomon, like the crakling of thorns, burns for a little time with

great