is directly contrary to the prohibitions which I have read to you. It all cometh of evil, or of the evil one the devil; and will all tend to bring us into condemnation; for we are assured that God will not hold such swearers guiltless.

Another practice which I am here bound to censure, but which from its hateful nature I am unwilling to enter upon, is that of those persons, who upon the slightest provocation-oftentimes upon no provocation at all—are in the habit of pouring forth the bitterest curses and imprecations. When their anger is stirred up by any--or by no-cause, these persons are wont to call upon God to damn, or to blast, and to confound the object of their wrath. Sometimes they call down the severest infliction of the divine vengeance on their children, and on those who ought to be most dear to them;-sometimes even on themselves, and in their madness consign themselves, their own souls and bodies, to eternal perdition.

My people, says the Lord by his prophet Hosea, my people doth not consider. Surely if the persons of whom I have been speaking would but for a moment consider the dreadful meaning of the imprecations which they so heedlessly utter-the real meaning of that awful word damnation-they would shrink from using them with compunction and dismay. Cursing will happen to those who delight in cursing. May God bring them to repentance, so that they may not by sad experience feel how dreadful a thing that damnation is, which they so thoughtlessly call down!

Reflect on the frequency of this sin. If for every idle-every sinful-word that a man shall speak he shall give account thereof at the day of judgment", think what a load of guilt, what a multitude of oaths, the common swearer will have to answer for. Every single oath you utter is recorded against you in the

g Matt. xii. 36.

book of God's remembrance, and it will be brought against you at the last day, unless it shall be blotted out, upon your repentance, through faith in the atonement of Christ. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned h.

as

Reflect too on the smallness of any real temptation to this sin. Among the most powerful temptations to transgress the laws of God, are the gratification of some bodily appetite, and the advancement of some worldly interest. Neither of these temptations applies to the sin of the profane swearer. By swearing he gratifies no craving appetite, he procures from it no advantage, no earthly good whatever; but sins, properly speaking, WITHOUT TEMPTATION. The strength of a temptation must never be pleaded an excuse for doing wrong; for whatever the temptation may be, God will by his grace, if we are not wanting to ourselves, enable us to resist and to overcome it. Still, to sin without temptation, must certainly be considered as no little aggravation of guilt. For a man to hazard his eternal welfare for the greatest possible earthly advantage-to lose his own soul for the sake of gaining even the whole world, would be a most unwise bargain. But what words can express the foolishness of him, who will risk his salvation for the sake of uttering blasphemous words; who can consent by swearing to throw away his soul, though he knows that by so doing he shall gain nothing!

Let me then entreat you, if you have unhappily contracted the habit of profane swearing, to endeavour at once to break it off. Firmly resolve-be utterly purposed-that your mouth shall not offend, either in this or in any other manner. You say, perhaps, that as you swear without thinking, so you hardly know when you swear. Then desire your

h Matt. xii. 36, 37,

friends and your companions, whenever you do swear, to tell you of it, and be really thankful to them for so doing.

Above all, implore the help of God to enable you to get the better of this evil habit. Say, Set a watch, O Lord, before my lips; keep the door of my mouth. Beseech Him to grant, that the words of your mouth as well as the meditations of your heart may be always acceptable in his sight, that you may always use his holy name with reverence and honour.

The Prayer.

O Almighty God, whose name is holy, grant that I may never speak unadvisedly with my lips, but may always treat thy holy name, and all that belongs to thy honour and service, with respect and reverence. Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips. Mercifully forgive the innumerable offences of my tongue. Bless with the grace of thy Holy Spirit all those against whom I have at any time uttered imprecations, and grant that the awful curses, which in my madness I have at any time called down either on myself or on others, may be all done away, through Him who was made a curse for us, Jesus Christ our Lord.

SOBRIETY.

IN several of his Epistles, St. Paul powerfully urges the consideration of the light and privileges of the Gospel, as an argument for avoiding the sins, which were practised during the night of heathenism, which sins he accordingly terms works of darkness. At the head of these works of darkness, he names in the text rioting and drunkenness; and certainly, there

is hardly any sin more unbecoming a Christian, or more fitly called a work of darkness. They that be drunken, says St. Paul in another place, are drunken in the night. This low sin, which proceeds from the darkness of folly, and the darkness of ignorance and unbelief, ought to be ashamed to shew itself in the light of day.

The sin of drunkenness is a sin so shameful in its nature, so dangerous in its consequences, and in every way so opposite to Christian engagements, and Christian principles, and Christian hopes, that I can hardly be too anxious to guard you against it. Allow me therefore to mention to you, very shortly, some of the evils which belong to the sin, although it must be confessed that they are so plain and evident, that your own sense and observation ought sufficiently to point them out to you.

And, first, one peculiar evil attendant on drunkenness is, its tendency to stupify the mind, to deprive a man of the proper use and exercise of his reason.

Reason is that excellent faculty, which was given us for our guide through life, which enables us to distinguish evil from good, which raises us above the beasts that perish, and makes us to approach towards the image of God. For a man to deprive himself of this excellent endowment by drunkenness and excess, is to slight the best gifts of God, and to degrade, to debase, himself below the lowest of the brute creation. While he thus sins against God and his own soul, he makes himself an object of pity and contempt to his fellow creatures. Whatever his rank and station in life, whatever his qualifications, whatever his merits in other respects, may be, yet by this one vice he undoes the effect of them all, and makes himself the object of the mockery and laughter, not only of those who are in possession of the full use of that reason

a 1 Thess. v. 17.

which he has madly thrown away, but even of children who have not yet attained to, and of idiots who never possessed it. The drunkard makes himself an object of pity and contempt to all ;-of pity to the wise and good; of contempt to the unthinking, who without remorse make him the object of mockery and laughter. Pride, it is true, was not made for man; but there is a proper feeling of manliness, a sense of dignity, there is what is called an honest pride, which it might be thought would make a man shudder at exposing himself in such a situation.

Having thrown off the control of reason, the control of religion goes along with it. One of the sore evils attendant upon those, who are in the habit of following strong drink, and continuing at it till they are inflamed by it, is, that they regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands. They throw off their regard for religion, and feel no sense either of the temporal mercies and blessings which they every day receive from God, or of those far greater mercies and blessings which are offered to them through the death of Christ, the work, the operation, of the hands of God which he has wrought for the benefit of their souls.

A man who has wilfully thrown away the control of reason and the restraints of religion, cannot hope for the continuance of the preventing and assisting grace of God. The apostle admonishes us not to be guilty of drunkenness and excess, but to be filled with the Holy Spirit. These two things are placed, as it were, in opposition the one to the other. A man who is filled with the Holy Spirit, who is effectually guided and governed by the grace of God, will not, we may be sure, be guilty of drunkenness. And, on the other hand, he who gives way to this sin, shews that he is not influenced by the aid of the Spirit of God, and Eph. v. 18.

b Ps. xxviii. 6.