to come, and every day, which revives his self-examination and repentance, makes him sensible of the worth of the doctrine of pardon brought by Jesus Christ. As he reads the Scriptures with a pure and honest intention, not only do the grace and glory of our Savior's character open more and more upon his mind, but he also feels the force and discerns the divine origin of our Savior's teaching. The rays of Christian truth, like the light of heaven, fall most abundantly on the eye that is directed upwards. As his mind is free from that exclusive attachment to particular systems, by which many ingenuous intellects are cramped or reduced, and as he regards religious truth only in its relation to practice, it is enough for him, to find that a particular explication of a theological point is not of any moral value, to believe that it may safely be disregarded as no part of the revelation of God.

There is, then, this further account to be given of the superior knowledge of a good man in all the essential truths of Christianity, that he reads the Scriptures with impartiality, honestly desirous of ascertaining what the Lord God would have him to do. It is previously to be expected, that he, who is most desirous of obeying and of imitating God, will be most likely to ascertain those truths which really bear the true stamp of divinity. If we once admit, then, that Christianity is a religion for practice, and that a good man is not infallible in the interpretation of every part of Scripture, it follows, that, to answer the promise in the text, it must be, that those mistakes, into which it is possible for a good man to fall, relate to subjects which do not belong to the essence of Christianity.

Further, if we believe in the good providence of God, extending to all mind as well as to matter, or in the real,

though imperceptible, aid of his spirit, we cannot doubt that he, who ingenuously seeks and diligently obeys the truth, as far as he discovers it, will be ultimately led into every necessary article of faith. "The meek will he guide in judgment; and the meek will he teach his way." He, who is willing to learn, is commonly taught; and he, who is disposed to obey God, may depend upon it, that he does not break any of God's commandments by disbelieving a doctrine which he cannot find in the instructions of Christ and his apostles. On the other hand, let it not be forgotten, that obscurity and incapacity of mind are infallibly promoted by the prevalence of unworthy passions and the force of sinful habits. "As they did not like to retain God in their knowledge," says the Apostle, "God gave them up to an undiscerning and injudicious mind;" and, when speaking of the corruptions which should find their way into the Christian church, the same apostle says, "the man of sin" shall come "with all deceivableness of unrighteousness, because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved."

Once more; if we believe the words of our Savior in the text, it is fair, to conclude that every man, who will do the will of God, is much more sure of the truth, by his diligent study of the Scriptures in general, or even of the words of Christ, than he can be made by any of the declarations of a church professing itself infallible, or by any of the compends of doctrines framed by art and man's device." Of course, then, it should never give a pious and humble mind a moment's uneasiness, that it cannot bring its faith to any one of the popular standards; for, if the truths, which we firmly believe, are fewer than are required by the impositions of men, yet, if our creed is the result of a fair

and rational study of the Scriptures, unbiased, as we can perceive, by any improper considerations, the man, who is conscious, I say, of this state of mind, need be under no alarm for the salvation of his soul, as far as belief can affect his salvation. His great anxiety should be to act up to the light he has received, and faithfully to fulfil the extent of his duties; for such, God be thanked! is the intimate connexion of all doctrines and duties, that the man, who religiously fulfils one branch of knowledge or practice, will have gone very far to the observance of the whole.

I will conclude the subject with a simple recapitulation of those conclusions which our text has suggested to us.

We have concluded, then, that a man may be seriously disposed to do the will of God, before he has had knowledge of the Christian revelation; and, of course, there are elements in human nature, on which Christianity may be built. We have seen, also, that the truth of his claims and the nature of his doctrines are submitted by our Savior himself to the judgment of unperverted reason.

We have seen how virtue produces belief, and vice unbelief, in the authority of Christ, or in the Christian revelation; and we know that he, who best practises Christianity, will best understand it; and that all the truth, which is essential, in Christianity, is, that which a mind, disposed to do the will of God, cannot fail to receive by the study of the Scriptures. "God giveth to a man, that is good in his sight, wisdom, and knowledge;" and may God grant, that, "the eyes of our understanding being enlightened," we may understand what is the excellency of the knowledge of the glory of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

SERMON XXII.

ECCLESIASTES I. 14.

I HAVE SEEN ALL THE WORKS THAT ARE DONE UNDER THE SUN; AND, BEHOLD, ALL IS VANITY AND VEXATION OF SPIRIT.

THERE are some maxims of practical morality, which are so common and so familiar to every man's experience that it seems idle to tell what every one knows, and superfluous to prove what it is impossible to doubt. But the effect of moral maxims is produced rather by placing them in new and striking aspects. Among those truths which all men believe, but which few practically feel, may be mentioned the utter uncertainty of human life and all its expectations and enjoyments. The experiments, which prove this fact, have been making ever since the world was made; and not an individual has entered on the stage of life and passed through the common career of worldly probation, who has not been, sooner or later, willing to confess, with Solomon, " Vanity of vanities, all is vanity."

There is a spirit of dissatisfaction pervading this whole book of Ecclesiastes, from which our text is taken, which renders the perusal of it painful and melancholy. The royal author, in the course of his luxurious life, had drained every source of pleasure, till satiety had succeeded enjoyment. He had decked himself in every flower that grew by the walks of life, and worn them, till their colors had

faded, and their perfume had been exhaled. He had intoxicated himself with every variety of sensual gratification, till, awaking, at last, from his dream of delight, he found himself sick at heart, and his spirits sunk within him to a stagnant level of discontent.

Solomon, indeed, was now suffering the misery of disappointment. He had been disappointed, not of obtaining the means of enjoyment in any particular instance, but he was blasted with excess of pleasure. He had collected around him all the means and appendages of enjoyment, but the substance had escaped him. The ingenuity and the patience of his servants had been exhausted in contrivances of new pleasures for the monarch. He had tried mirth, and it was mad; wine, and it was folly. "I made me," says he, "great works; I builded me houses; I planted me vineyards; I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kinds of fruits; I made me pools of water; I got me servants and maidens, and had servants born in my house; also I had great possessions of great and small cattle, above all that were in Jerusalem before me; I gathered me also silver and gold, and the peculiar treasure of kings and of the provinces; I gat me men-singers and women-singers, and the delights of the sons of men, as musical instruments, and that of all sorts.Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the labor that I had labored to do, and, behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun."

And this man, who had but to wish, and the means of enjoyment were collected around him, who but stretched out his hand, and pleasures dropped into it, this great monarch found, after all, that, in point of actual happiness,