If this fad occafion which leads him there, has not done it already, take notice, to what a ferious and devout frame of mind every man is reduced, the moment he enters this gate of affliction. The bufy and fluttering fpirits, which in the houfe of mirth were wont to transport him from one diverting object to another fee how they are fallen! how peaceably they are laid! In this gloomy manfion, full of shades and uncomfortable damps to seize the foul-fee, the light and eafy heart, which never knew what it was to think before, how penfive it is now, how foft, how fufceptible, how full of religious impreffions, how deeply it is fmitten with fenfe and with a love of virtue. Could we, in this crifis, whilst this empire of reafon and religion lasts, and the heart is thus exercised with wisdom, and bufied with heavenly contemplations-could we fee it naked as it isftripped of its paffions, unfpotted by the world, and regardless of its pleasures we might then fafely reft our caufe upon this fingle evidence, and appeal to the most fenfual, whether Solomon has not made a just determination here, in favour of the house of mourning?-not for its own fake, but as it is fruitful in virtue, and becomes the occafion of fo much good. Without this end, forrow I own, has no ufe but to shorten a man's days-nor can gravity, with all its ftudied folemnity of look and carriage, ferve any end but to make one half of the world merry, and impose upon the other.

Confider what has been faid; and may God of his mercy bless you! Amen.

SERMON III.

Philanthropy recommended.

LUKE X. 36, 37.

Which now of these three thinkeft thou, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves?—And he said, He that showed mercy on him. Then faid Jefus unto him—Go, and do thou likewife.

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IN the foregoing verses of this chapter, the Evangelift relates, that a certain lawyer ftood up and tempted JESUS, faying, Mafter, what fhall I do to inherit eternal life?—To which inquiry our SaVIOUR, as his manner was, when any enfnaring queftion was put to him, which he faw proceeded more from a defign to entangle him, than an honest view of getting information-inftead of giving a direct anfwer, which might afford a handle to malice, or at beft ferve only to gratify an impertinent humour he immediately retorts the queftion upon the man who asked it, and unavoidably puts him upon the neceffity of answering himself;—and as, in the prefent cafe, the particular profeffion of the inquirer, and his fuppofed general knowledge of all other branches of learning, left no room to fufpect he could be ignorant of the true answer to this question,

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and especially of what every one knew was delivered upon that head by their great Legiflator, our SAVIOUR therefore refers him to his own memory of what he had found there in the courfe of his ftudies.What is written in the law, how readeft thou?Upon which the inquirer reciting the general heads of our duty to GOD and MAN, as delivered in the 18th of Leviticus and the 6th of Deuteronomy, namely-That we should worship the Lord our God with all our hearts, and love our neighbour as ourselves; our bleffed SAVIOUR tells him, he had answered right, and if he followed that leffon, he could not fail of the bleffing he feemed defirous to inherit.This do, and thou shalt live.

But he, as the context tells us, willing to juftify himfelf-willing poffibly to gain more credit in the conference, or hoping perhaps to hear fuch a partial and narrow definition of the word neighbour, as would fuit his own principles, and juftify fome particular oppreffions of his own, or those of which his whole order lay under an accufation-fays unto JESUS in the 29th verfe- And who is my neighbour ? Though the demand at first fight may feem utterly trifling, yet was it far from being fo in fact. For according as you underflood the term in a more or lefs reftrained fenfeit produced many neceffary variations in the duties you owed from that relation. Our bleffed SAVIOUR, to rectify any partial and per nicious mistake in this matter, and to place at once this duty of the love of our neighbour upon its true bottom of philanthropy and univerfal kindness, makes anfwer to the propofed queftion, not by any far

fetched refinement from the schools of the Rabbies, which might have fooner filenced than convinced the man-but by a direct appeal to human nature in an inftance he relates of a man falling amongst thieves, left in the greatest distress imaginable, till by chance a Samaritan, an utter ftranger, coming where he was, by an act of great goodness and compaffion, not only relieved him at prefent, but took him under his protection, and generously provided for his future. fafety.

On the close of which engaging account-our SAVIOUR appeals to the man's own heart in the first verfe of the text-Which now of these three, thinkeft thou, was neighbour unto him that fell amongst the thieves? and, instead of drawing the inference himfelf, leaves him to decide in favour of fo noble a principle fo evidently founded in mercy.The lawyer, ftruct with the truth and juftice of the doctrine, and frankly acknowledged the force of it, our bleffed SAVIOUR concludes the debate with a short admonition, that he would practise what he had approved, and go, and imitate that fair example of univerfal benevolence which it had fet before him.

In the remaining part of the difcourfe I fhall follow the fame plan; and therefore fhall beg leave to enlarge first upon the story itself, with fuch reflections as will arife from it; and conclude, as our SAVIOUR has done, with the fame exhortation to kindness and humanity which naturally falls from it.

A certain man, fays our SAVIOUR, went down from Jerufalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, who stripped him of his raiment, and departed, leav

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ing him half-dead. There is fomething in our nature which part in engages us to take accident every to which man is fubject from what cause foever it may have happened: but in fuch calamities as a man has fallen into through mere misfortune, to be charged upon no fault or indifcretion of himself, here is something then so truly interesting, that at the first fight we generally make them our own, not altogether from a reflection that they might have been, or may be fo, but oftener from a certain generofity and tenderness of nature which difpofes us for compaffion, abftracted from all confiderations of felf: fo that without any obfervable act of the will, we fuffer with the unfortunate, and feel a weight upon our fpirits, we know not why, on seeing the most common inftances of their diftrefs. But where the spectacle is uncommonly tragical, and complicated with many circumstances of mifery, the mind is then taken captive at once, and were it inclined to it, has no power to make refiftance, but furrenders itfelf to all the tender emotions of pity and deep concern. So that when one confiders this friendly part of our nature without looking farther, one would think it impoffible for a man to look upon mifery without finding himself in fome measure attached to the intereft of him who fuffers it-I fay, one would think it impoffible for there are fome tempers -how fhall I describe them ?-formed either of such impenetrable matter, or wrought up by habitual felfishness to such an utter infenfibility of what becomes of the fortunes of their fellow-creatures, as if