can act; and its decisions must correspond with its light. Why is it then that men so often act in opposition to correct moral and religious principles? Because, in the first place, passion blinds the judgment. When a dense vapor arises from the earth and obscures the sun, we do not say that his light is extinguished, or that we have lost the power of vision. It is so in many instances with regard to moral discernment. The passions become inflamed, they impetuously urge their claims, and man is hurried along the forbidden path. Thus it is, that many, who intellectually acknowledge the authority of religion, find a law in their members warring against the law of their minds. They bind themselves down to the slavery of passion, and habitually live without God in the world. When this servitude has been long endured, the moral taste becomes impaired, and the conscience is seared as with a hot iron. But this is no evidence of the want of such a monitor within, nor is it any security, that, at some awful hour, when the fascinations of earth are withdrawn, this minister of God will not put forth his power, make his voice to be heard, and the guilty to tremble and to suffer. There are fearful examples on record, which ought to make every slave of passion and appetite tremble at the prospect before him.

Again, you find that actions, which are deemed to be sins by one class of men, are regarded as virtues by another. Theft is now generally branded with infamy; yet the Spartan parent taught his children to steal, and undiscovered theft was regarded as a virtue to be rewarded by public honors. Christians consider it to be a religious duty for the mother, who is deprived of the father of her children, to guard and guide them with increased carefulness and zeal; the Hindoo mother is taught by her religion to abandon her children, to leave them unprotected in the season of calamity, and to offer herself up as a victim upon the funeral pile of her husband. But what are the

circumstances, under which these different moral sentiments are called forth? Did the Spartan lawgiver commend evil, as evil? No. He was a member of a small warlike state, encompassed on every side by powerful enemies. He considered patriotism as a virtue. It was a virtue. But the security of his country he regarded as depending upon the expertness of the people in every stratagem of war. To cherish skill, he encouraged theft. But it was to be so adroitly committed, as to escape detection. Otherwise the delinquent was severely punished. Here evil, as evil, was not commended or encouraged. In an action of a complex character the mind fixed upon a result deemed good; and on this ground the conscience decided. This affords no evidence of the want or the capriciousness of moral feeling; but of an imperfect analysis of moral actions.

The Hindoo mother is not to be supposed destitute of the sympathies of a mother. She regards the sacrifice of herself, and the abandonment of her children, as a duty commanded by the God whom she adores. Religion leads. her to the funeral pile, and supports her in her last agonies. There is no evidence here of the destitution of moral feeling, but merely of incorrect intellectual views. Her God, she thinks, demands from her the sacrifice, and she makes it; and what sacrifice ought not any man to make, when he believes that God calls him to make it? Here is the most decisive of all evidences of the strength of the tie which binds the soul to God. It is powerful enough to sunder all other ties, and, when rightly formed, to lead on the soul to immortal glory.

But we must for the present leave our subject here. We have not time to pursue it. We leave it with this single appeal. You individually feel that there is a distinction between right and wrong. You have not the same consciousness after a day devoted to guilty pleasures, as after one consecrated to duty and to God. Passion may con

fuse and bewilder your minds, yet you are not suffered to pass without some admonitions of what is right and what is wrong. Remember then that the time is rapidly approaching when the delusions of passion will cease, when the pure light of truth will come unobscured to your minds. What will conscience then be to the guilty? It will be the worm, which never dieth.

SERMON XI.

SOLICITUDE FOR THE REVIVAL OF RELIGION.

PSALM LXXXV. 6.

WILT THOU NOT REVIVE US AGAIN, THAT THY PEOPLE MAY REJOICE IN THEE?

THE Psalm, of which these words are a part, is supposed to have been written immediately after the deliverance of Israel from their seventy years' captivity. It celebrates the goodness of God in sending them deliverance; and yet it contains expressions of sorrow, and petitions, which seem to indicate, that they were as yet not in the perfect possession of their long lost privileges. Both the thanksgiving and the prayer are suited to the actual condition, in which the people of God found themselves. They had indeed received signal favors; yet, in laying the foundations of the temple of their God, they were opposed both by treachery and force. To them the restoration of civil liberty could not yield happiness, unless they were permitted again to enjoy their distinguishing religious privileges. These were threatened; and those who dearly prized them, in sorrow raised the prayer: Turn us, O God of our salvation, and cause thine anger toward us to Wilt thou be angry with us forever? Wilt thou draw out thine anger to all generations? Wilt thou not revive

cease.

us again, that thy people may rejoice in thee? Show us thy mercy, O Lord, and grant us thy salvation.

I have thought the prayer contained in the text a suitable guide to the meditations of God's house this day. It seems adapted to suggest to Christians the propriety of fervent prayer and persevering efforts, for the advancement of the interests of pure religion. We have reason to rejoice in the abounding goodness of God. He has in his infinite mercy granted to us the instructions of a pure and benevolent religion. We have cause to rejoice in the belief, that the influences of this religion have reached with divine power the hearts of not a few of those, who are accustomed here to bow before the altar of God; that many are truly hungering and thirsting after righteousness, and preparing to enter with joy upon the inheritance of the saints in light. But there is reason too to fear, that not a few among us are yet strangers to the peculiar joys which animate the Christian's soul; that many are devoting themselves solely to earthly objects, and closing their hearts against the high and holy motives of the gospel. While then we rejoice in the smiles of heaven, in the virtues and hopes of the true disciples of Christ, it is our duty to pray that sinners be converted unto God, and to put forth our efforts in a spirit of kindness to lead them to the waters of life. It will be the object of this discourse to show why we ought to labor and pray for the conversion of sinners; and to bring into view the manner in which our efforts ought to be put forth, in order that we may consistently hope for a revival of the interests of genuine godliness among us. I am aware, that I am entering upon topics, on which great sensibility at present exists throughout our land. All that I ask is seriousness and candor. I am not about to call up party animosities; but, as I hope, to allay them, and to direct your attention to plain, serious, practical views.

I remark then, in the first place, that the best state of