even fo do unto them: what is this, but, in other words, thus fpeaking to us: Love thyself O man, and I will reward thee for it; promote as much as poffible thy own interest and happinefs, that happiness to which but one way can lead thee, the love of thy God and of thy neighbour. This furely, is not the language of a cruel tyrant, or an unkind master, it is the tender goodness of an indulgent father, who exhorts his beloved fons to use all the means in their power to make themselves happy; who himself lays down rules for their conduct, points out the direct path, and leads them into it; and after all, defires no reward for this unfpeakable tenderness but reciprocal love and affection; no return, but the pleasure and fatisfaction of seeing them in the full enjoyment of that bliss which himself had taught them to obtain. Religion is pleasant, because it gives room for the exercife of every humane and every focial virtue; there is not a paffion of our mind productive of joy and happiness which it does not raise and inflame. If love, friendship, gratitude, charity, justice, or benevolence, have any pleasures to beftow, they are all owing to Religion, which teaches, which infpires, which encourages them. Befides the natural complacency and fatisfaction which attends the performance of any noble action, must it not be an additional joy to reflect, that religion fanctifies, that heaven approves of it; that God himfelf has commanded, and will hereafter reward us for it? It is pleasant, fays the orator, to be virtuous and good, for that is to excel many others; it is pleafant to mortify and fubdue our lufts, for this is victory; it is pleasant to command our appetites and paffions, and keep them within the bounds of reason and religion, for this is empire. What pleasure then can equal that which thus fatisfies every defire of our fouls, fooths our pride, flatters our ambition, and rewards our felf-love. We have seen, then, what thofe duties are which religion enjoins; all plain, eafy, and practicable; but to men fwallowed up in luxuries and debaucheries the eafieft talk may feem burthenfome; the mind as well as the body, by long difufe, may be rendered unfit to bear the smallest exercife: floth and indolence will reduce it to a ftate of weakness and delicacy, that fhall make it feel the weight of a feather. But if what religion enjoins be eafy, no lefs reasonable is what the forbids; injuftice, cruelty, avarice, intemperance, hatred and uncharitablenefs. And are these the ways of pleafantnefs? Can any of thefe adminifter any real or folid fatisfaction? Are not remorfe, difeafe, and infamy, the offspring of avarice and intemperance? Does not luft carry a fcorpion in its bofom to fting and torment itself? Does not injuftice return the poifoned cup to our own lips? Does not hatred and uncharitableness banish peace and tranquility? Or do thofe ever tafte of happiness themselves, who procure mifery to others? The ways therefore of religion religion must be the ways, the only ways of pleasantness, since the least step we take out of them leads us into the road of pain, guilt, and mifery; and if the needed a further recommendation, a greater could not be added than what follows, All her paths are peace. Great peace have they, fays the pfalmift, which love thy law; a peace which can be understood by thofe only who have themselves felt it: and furely, were it not a pleasure which the bad man had either never tafted or utterly forgot, he would not mifs it for all the imperfect, unfatisfactory and tranfient joys which fenfe could beftow. And as that peace which religion alone can infure to us, is a happiness which the world cannot give; fo is it a blessing which the world cannot take away; when riches are flown from us, when health and profperity are gone, and ficknefs and misfortune vifit us; when our friends defpife and defert us, and our enemies laugh us to fcorn, this laft kind guest still remains, to raise, to invigorate, and fupport us: even when the ways of pleasure are no more, when pain and adverfity have driven out every gay and chearful thought, and despair feems ready to feize on and torment us, Peace fteps in, and faves us from deftruction; fends her daughter Hope to comfort and relieve us; and when she can no longer preferve us here, conveys us with a chearful refignation to her own native feat, the regions of blifs and immortality. Let us then endeavour to make that which is our duty and our intereft, our pleasure and our happiness: as God loveth the chearful giver, fo doubtless will he praise the chearful receiver alfo. Melancholy and difcontent, fears and despondency, were fent to appal the guilty, and deprefs the heart of the wicked and deceitful man; the Lord is with us, of whom then fhall we be afraid; Let us come before him with thanksgiving, and fhew ourselves glad in him. When we fee men bleft with all the good things of this life, even in the bofom of plenty and profperity, given up a prey to melancholy and defpair, is it not greatly to be feared that there is fomething wrong within, fome deadly guilt that weighs upon the heart, fome inveterate poison which the antidote of riches can never cure, which the pomp of this world can never remove? Will not the force of fuch examples terrify and alarm us? will it not, ought it not to convince mankind, that to be happy, we must be good; and to be at peace, we must be innocent? The fear of the Lord maketh a merry heart; and he that hath a merry heart hath a continual feaft. Joy and happiness are ever in the dwellings of the righteous. Let us then endeavour to perform the eafy duties of our religion with a decent and a manly order, not like the flaves of barbarians tug the oar and drag the chains of fervitude in fullen filence, but like happy and contented fervants, whofe pleasure, whofe privilege, and happinefs it is to obey a generous and a noble mafter; one who is not extreme to mark what is done amifs; who is omnifcient to know all our actions, and omnipotent to reward them; a mafter, a mafter, who, when our fervice is finifhed, will in the great day, if we have fhewn the leaft pleasure in ferving him, falute us with, "Well have ye done my good and faithful fer. vants, enter ye into the joy of Lord." your ON THE POOR IN SPIRIT. SER Blessed are the OUR MO MATTHEW V. 3. poor in Spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. UR bleffed Saviour's fermon on the mount, of which the beatitudes (the fubject of our prefent confideration) form fo distinguished a part, hath ever been looked upon as the great rule and standard by which Chriftians are to direct their life and conduct, and as it contains the fum and fubftance of that new law which Chrift came down from heaven to inculcate and enforce a law which differed as much from the Mofaic difpenfation in the manner of its delivery, as in the subject-matter of it. The law given from Mount Sinai was attended, we know, by a train of circumftances fo awful and tremendous, as to ftrike terror and aftonifhment into the hearts of all who heard it; with thunder and lightning, and the voice F of |