that which the majority pursues? Which is the party of the reprobate? Is it not the multitude? You do nothing but what others do: But thus, in the time of Noah, perifhed all who were buried under the waters of the Deluge: All who, in the time of Nebuchadnezzar, proftrated themfelves before the golden calf: All who, in the time of Elijah, bowed the knee to Baal: All who, in the time of Eleazar, abandoned the law of their fathers. You only do what others do; but that is exactly what the Scriptures forbid: Do not, fay they, conform yourselves to this corrupted age: Now, the corrupted age means not the small number of juft, whom you endeavour not to imitate; it means the multitude whom you follow. You only do what others do: You will confequently experience the fame lot. Now, Mifery to thee, (cried formerly St. Augustine,) fatal torrent of human cuftoms; wilt thou never fufpend thy "courfe? To the end wilt thou drag in the children of "Adam to thine immense and terrible abyss ?”

In place of faying to ourselves, "What are my hopes ? "In the church of Jefus Chrift there are two roads; one "broad and open, by which almost the whole world passes, "and which leads to death; the other narrow, where few in"deed enter, and which conducts to life eternal; In which " of these am I? Are my morals the ufual ones of persons of "my rank, age, and fituation in life? Am I with the great "number? Then I am not in the right path: I am losing "myself: The great number in every ftation is not the party of the faved." Far from reasoning in this manner, we say to ourselves, "I am not in a worse flate than "others; thofe of my rank and age live as I do: Why "should I not live like them ?" Why, my dear hearer ? For that very reason: The general mode of living cannot

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be that of a Chriftian life: In all ages, the holy have been remarkable and fingular men: Their manners were always different from those of the world; and they have only been faints, because their lives had no fimilarity to thofe of the reft of mankind. In the time of Efdras, in spite of the defence against it, the custom prevailed of intermarrying with stranger women: This abuse became general: The priests and the people no longer made any fcruple of it: But what did this holy restorer of the law; or did he follow the example of his brethren? Did he believe , that guilt, in becoming general, became more legitimate ? No. He recalled the people to a sense of the abuse: He took the book of the law in his hand, and explaining it to the affrighted people, corrected the custom by the truth. Follow, from age to age, the history of the just; and see if Lot conformed himself to the habits of Sodom, or if nothing diftinguifhed him from the other inhabitants: If Abraham lived like the reft of his age: If Job resembled the other princes of his nation: If Efther conducted herfelf in the court of Ahafuerus like the other women of that Prince: If many widows in Ifrael refembled Judith: If, among the children of the captivity, it is not faid of Tobias alone, that he copied not the conduct of his brethren; and that he even fled from the danger of their commerce and fociety. See, if in those happy ages, when Chriftians were all faints, they did not shine like stars in the midst of the corrupted nations; and if they served not as a spectacle to angels and men, by the fingularity of their lives and manners If the Pagans did not reproach them for their retirement, and fhunning of all public theatres, places, and pleasures: If they did not complain that the Chriftians affected to distinguish themselves in every thing from their fellow-citizens; to form a separate people in the midst of

the

the people; to have their particular laws and customs; and if a man from their fide embraced the party of the Chriftians, they did not confider him as for ever loft to their pleasures, affemblies, and customs: In a word, fee, if in all ages, the faints whofe lives and actions have been transmitted down to us, have resembled the rest of mankind.

You will perhaps tell us, that all these are fingularities and exceptions, rather than rules which the world is obliged to follow They are exceptions, it is true; but the reason is, that the general rule is to throw away falvation; that a religious and pious foul in the midst of the world, is always a fingularity approaching to a miracle. The whole world, you fay, is not obliged to follow these examples ; but is not piety the general duty of all? To be saved, must we not be holy? Muft heaven, with difficulty and fufferance, be gained by fome; while with ease by others? Have you any other gofpel to follow; other duties to fulfil; other promises to hope for, than those of the Holy Bible? Ah! Since there was another way more easy to arrive at salvation, wherefore, ye pious Chriftians, who at this moment enjoy in heaven, that kingdom, gained with toil, and at the expence of your blood, did ye leave us examples fo dangerous and useless ?

Wherefore have ye opened for us a road, rugged, difagreeable, and calculated to reprefs our ardour, feeing there was another you could have pointed out, more easy, and more likely to attract us, by facilitating our progress ? Great God! how little does mankind confult reafon in the point of eternal salvation!

Will you confole yourselves after this with the multitude, as if the greatnefs of the number could render the guilt un

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punished, and the Almighty durft not condemn all those who live like you? But what are all creatures in the fight of God? Did the multitude of the guilty prevent him from deftroying all flesh at the Deluge? From making fire from heaven defcend upon the five iniquitous cities? From burying in the waters of the Red Sea, Pharaoh and all his army? From ftriking with death all who murmured in the defert? Ah! The kings of the earth may have regard to the number of the guilty, because the punishment becomes impoflible, or at leaft dangerous, when the fault is become general. But God, who wipes the impious, fays Job, from off the face of the earth, as one wipes the dust from off a garment; (God, in whose fight all people' and nations are as if they were not, numbers not the guilty: He has regard only to the crimes; and all that the weak and miferable finner can expect from his unhappy accomplices, is to have them as companions in his mifery. So few are faved; because the maxims most universally adopted, are maxims of fin: So few are faved, because the maxims and duties moft univerfally unknown, or rejected, are those most indispensable to falvation. Last reflection, which is indeed nothing more than the proof, and the explanation of the former ones.

What are the engagements of the holy vocation to which we have all been called? The folemn promises of baptifm. What have we promised at baptism? To renounce the world, the devil, and the flesh: These are our vows: This is the fituation of the Chriftian: These are the effential conditions of our covenant with God, by which eternal life has been promised to us. These truths appear familiar, and deftined for the common people; but it is a mistake: Nothing can be more fublime; and alas ! nothing is more generally unknown: It is at the court of kings, and to

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the princes of the earth, that without ceafing we ought to announce them. Alas! They are well inftructed in all the affairs of the world, while the first principles of Christian morality are frequently more unknown to them than to humble and fimple hearts. At your baptifm, you have then renounced the world. It is a promise you have made to God, before the holy altar; the Church has been the guarantee and depofitory of it; and you have only been admitted into the number of believers, and marked with the undefeasible feal of falvation, upon the faith that you have fworn to the Lord, to love neither the world, nor what the world loves. Had you then anfwered what you now repeat every day, that you find not the world fo black and pernicious as we say; that after all it may innocently be loved; and that we only decry it so much, because we do not know it; and fince you are to live in the world, you wish to live like those who are in it: Had you answered thus, the Church would not have received you into its bofom; would not have connected you with the hope of Christians, nor joined you in communion with those who have overcome the world: She would have advised you to go and live with those infidels who know not our Saviour. For this reafon it was, that, in former ages, thofe of the Catechumen, who could not prevail upon themselves to renounce the world and its pleasures, put off their baptifm till death; and durft not approach the holy altar, to contract by the facrament, which regenerates us, engagements of which they knew the importance and fanctity; and to fulfil which, they felt themselves ftill unqualified. You are therefore required, by the most facred of all vows, to hate the world; that is to fay, not to conform yourselves to it: If you love it, if you follow its pleasures and cuftoms, you are not only, as St. John fays, the enemy of VOL. I.

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