not attributed to the death or sufferings of any other person, however patiently undergone, or undeservedly inflicted; and secondly, that this efficacy is quite consistent with our obligation to obedience; that good works still remain the condition of salvation, though not the cause; the cause being the mercy of Almighty God through Jesus Christ. There is no man living, perhaps, who has considered seriously the state of his soul, to whom this is not a consoling doctrine, and a grateful truth. But there are some situations of mind which dispose us to feel the weight and importance of this doctrine more than others. These situations I will endeavour to describe; and, in doing so, to point out how much more satisfactory it is to have a saviour and redeemer, and the mercies of our Creator excited towards us, and communicated to us by and through that saviour and redeemer, to confide in and rely upon, than any grounds of merit in ourselves.

First, then, souls which are really laboring and endeavouring after salvation, and with sincerity; such souls are every hour made sensible, deeply sensible, of the deficiency and imperfection of their endeavours. Had they no ground, therefore, for hope, but merit, that is to say, could they look for nothing more than what they should strictly deserve, their prospect would be very uncomfortable. I see not how they could look for heaven at all. They may form a conception of a virtue and obedience which might seem to be entitled to a high reward; but when they come to review their own performances, and to compare them with that conception; when they see how short they have proved of what they ought to have been, and of what they might have been, how weak and broken were their best offices; they will be the first to confess, that it is infinitely for their comfort that they have some other resource than their own righteousness. One infallible effect of sincerity in our endeavours is to beget in us a knowledge of our imperfections. The careless, the heedless, the thoughtless, the nominal Christian, feels no want of a saviour, an intercessor, a mediator, because he feels not his own defects. Try in earnest to perform the duties of religion, and you will soon learn how incomplete your best performances are. I can hardly mention a branch of our duty which is not liable to be both impure in the motive, and imperfect in the execution; or a branch of our duty in which our endeavours can found their hopes of acceptance upon any thing but extended mercy, and the efficacy of those means and causes, which have procured it to be so extended.

In the first place, is not this the case with our acts of piety

and devotion? We may admit, that pure and perfect piety has a natural title to reward at the hand of God. But is ours ever such? To be pure in its motive, it ought to proceed from a sense of God Almighty's goodness towards us, and from no other source, or cause, or motive whatsoever. Whereas even pious, comparatively pious men, will acknowledge, that authority, custom, decency, imitation, have a share in most of their religious exercises, and that they cannot warrant any of their devotions to be entirely independent of these causes. I would not speak disparagingly of the considerations here recited. They are oftentimes necessary inducements, and they may be means of bringing us to better; but still it is true, that devotion is not pure in its origin, unless it flow from a sense of God Almighty's goodness, unmixed with any other reason. But if our worship of God be defective in its principle, and often debased by the mixture of impure motives, it is still more deficient, when we come to regard it in its performances. Our devotions are broken and interrupted, or they are cold and languid. Worldly thoughts intrude themselves upon them. Our worldly heart is tied down to the earth. Our devotions are unworthy of God. We lift not up our hearts unto him. Our treasure is upon earth, and our hearts are with our treasure. That heavenlymindedness which ought to be inseparable from religious exercises does not accompany ours; at least not constantly. speak not now of the hypocrite in religion, of him who only makes a show of it. His case comes not within our present consideration. I speak of those who are sincere men. These feel the imperfection of their services, and will acknowledge that I have not stated it more strongly than what is true. perfection cleaves to every part of it. Our thankfulness is never what it ought to be, or any thing like it; and it is only when we have some particular reason for being pleased that we are thankful at all. Formality is apt continually to steal upon us in our worship; more especially in our public worship; and formality takes away the immediate consciousness of what we are doing; which consciousness is the very life of devotion; all that we do without it being a dead ceremony.

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No man reviews his services towards God, his religious services, but he perceives in them much to be forgiven, much to be excused; great unworthiness as respecting the object of all worship; much deficiency and imperfection to be passed over, before our service can be deemed in its nature an acceptable service. That such services, therefore, should, in fact, be allowed and accepted, and that to no less an end and purpose

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than the attainment of heaven, is an act of abounding grace and goodness in Him who accepts them; and we are taught in scripture, that this so much wanted grace and goodness abounds towards us through Jesus Christ; and particularly through his sufferings, and his death.

But to pass from acts of worship, which form a particular part only of our duty to God; to pass from these to our general duty, what, let us ask, is that duty? What is our duty towards God? No other, our Saviour himself tells us, than to love him with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength, and with all our mind.' Luke, x. 27. Are we conscious of such love, to such a degree? If we are not, then, in a most fundamental duty, we fail of being what we ought to be. Here, then, as before, is a call for pardoning mercy on the part of God; which mercy is extended to us by the intervention of Jesus Christ; at least so the scriptures represent it.

In our duties towards one another, it may be said, that our performances are more adequate to our obligation, than in our duties to God; that the subjects of them lie more level with our capacity; and there may be truth in this observation. But still I am afraid, that both in principle and execution our performances are not only defective, but defective in a degree which we are not sufficiently aware of. The rule laid down for us is this; to love our neighbour as ourselves;' which rule, in fact, enjoins, that our benevolence be as strong as our self interest; that we be as anxious to do good, as quick to discover, as eager to embrace, every opportunity of doing it, and as active and resolute, and persevering in our endeavours to do it, as we are anxious for ourselves, and active in the pursuit of our own interest. Now is this the case with us? Wherein it is not, we fall below our rule. In the apostles of Jesus Christ, to whom this rule was given from his own mouth, you may read how it operated; and their example proves, what some deny, the possibility of the thing; namely, of benevolence being as strong a motive as self interest. They firmly believed, that to bring men to the knowledge of Christ's religion was the greatest possible good that could be done unto them, was the highest act of benevolence they could exercise. Aud, accordingly, they set about this work, and carried it on with as much energy, as much ardor, as much perseverance, through as great toils and labors, as many sufferings and difficulties, as any person ever pursued a scheme for their own interest, or for the making of a fortune. They could not possibly have done more for their own sakes than what they did for

the sake of others. They literally loved their neighbours as themselves. Some have followed their example in this; and some have, in zeal and energy, followed their example in other methods of doing good. For I do not mean to say, that the particular method of usefulness, which the office of the apostles cast upon them, is the only method, or that it is a method even competent to many. Doing good, without any selfish worldly motive for doing it, is the grand thing; the mode must be regulated by opportunity and occasion. To which may be

added, that in those, whose power of doing good, according to any mode, is small, the principle of benevolence will at least restrain them from doing harm. If the principle be subsisting in their hearts, it will have this operation at least. I ask therefore again, as I asked before, are we as solicitous to seize opportunities, to look out for and embrace occasions, of doing good, as we are certainly solicitous to lay hold of opportunities of making advantage to ourselves, and to embrace all occasions of profit and self interest? Nay, is benevolence strong enough to hold our hand, when stretched out for mischief? Is it always sufficient to make us consider what misery we are producing, whilst we are compassing a selfish end, or gratifying a lawless passion of our own? Do the two principles of benevolence and self interest possess any degree of parallelism and equality in our hearts, and in our conduct? If they do, then so far we come up to our rule. Wherein they do not, as I said before,

we fall below it.

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When not only the generality of mankind, but even those who are endeavouring to do their duty, apply the standard to themselves, they are made to learn the humiliating lesson of their own deficiency. That such our deficiency should be overlooked, so as not to become the loss to us of happiness after death; that our poor, weak, humble endeavours to comply with our Saviour's rule should be received and not rejected; say, if we hope for this, we must hope for it, not on the ground of congruity or desert, which it will not bear, but from the extreme benignity of a merciful God, and the availing mediation of a redeemer. You will observe that I am still, and have been all along, speaking of sincere men, of those who are in earnest in their duty, and in religion; and I say, upon the strength of what has been alleged, that even these persons, when they read in scripture of the riches of the goodness of God, of the powerful efficacy of the death of Christ, of his mediation and continual intercession, know and feel in their hearts that they stand in need of them all.

In that remaining class of duties which are called duties to ourselves, the observation we have made upon the deficiency of our endeavours applies with equal or greater force. More is here wanted than the mere command of our actions. The heart itself is to be regulated; the hardest thing in the world to manage. The affections and passions are to be kept in order; constant evil propensities are to be constantly opposed. I apprehend, that every sincere man is conscious how unable he is to fulfil this part of his duty, even to his own satisfaction; and if our conscience accuse us, 'God is greater than our conscience, and knoweth all things.' If we see our sad failings, He must.

God forbid that any thing I say, either upon this, or the other branches of our duty, should damp our endeavours. Let them be as vigorous and as steadfast as they can. They will be so if we are sincere; and without sincerity there is no hope; none whatever. But there will always be left enough, infinitely more than enough, to humble self sufficiency.

Contemplate, then, what is placed before us; heaven. Understand what heaven is; a state of happiness after death, exceeding what, without experience, it is possible for us to conceive, and unlimited in duration. This is a reward infinitely beyond any thing we can pretend to, as of right, as merited, as due. Some distinction between us and others, between the comparatively good and the bad, might be expected; but, on these grounds, not such a reward as this, even were our services, I mean the service of sincere men, perfect. But such services as ours in truth are, such services as in fact we perform, so poor, so deficient, so broken, so mixed with alloy, so imperfect both in principle and execution, what have they to look for upon their own foundation? When, therefore, the scriptures speak to us of a redeemer, a mediator, an intercessor for us; when they display and magnify the exceedingly great mercies of God, as set forth in the salvation of man, according to any mode whatever which he might be pleased to appoint, and therefore in that mode which the gospel holds forth; they teach us no other doctrine than that to which the actual deficiencies of our duty, and a just consciousness and acknowledgment of these deficiencies, must uaturally carry our own minds. What we feel in ourselves corresponds with what we read in scripture.