are an abomination to the Lord." "A lying tongue is but for a moment." "What shall be given unto thee, or what shall be done unto thee, thou false tongue ?" "All liars shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone; which is the second death." This is a vice, therefore, most abhorrent to the nature of Deity; and which shall be assuredly visited with his severest indignation. Nor can we be astonished at this, when we turn from the consideration of the divine character to contemplate its action upon society: the very foundations of which are removed in the destruction of individual confidence. Speech is so far from being a blessing, that in this case it scatters wide and unsparingly the seeds of suspicion, alienation, and ruin. Every species of insincerity, practised by ourselves, or encouraged in others, falls under the censure: for they are numbered among the enemies of God and of all goodness, who" flatter with their tongue."

Slander is a vice of the tongue of the most pernicious quality. Next to inventing falsehood of another, is the crime of admitting it without scruple, and giving it circulation. Some persons seem to live for no other purpose than either to tell or to hear some new thing :" but, from a moral obliquity, they can see nothing amiable in another, hear nothing favorable, and tell nothing honourable. They visit, converse, I had almost said, worship, for no other end; and the very sanctuary becomes

sometimes, and with some professors, the mart where reputations are bartered, and the altar on which character is sacrificed by looks, by whispers, by insinuations. An adjournment from the pew to the tea-table removes all restraint from the tongue, and gives all scope to the rancorous principle. Those also who will not lie, will defame. If they shrink from calumny, they have skill at detraction and effect as much in depreciation of character, as others in a more direct attack upon it. Such employment of the tongue is odious in all men -most inexcusable in professors—but detestable beyond all reach of censure in ministers. The wicked, whom God repels from his altar, are charged with this gross offence. "Thou givest thy mouth to evil, and thy tongue frameth deceit. Thou sittest and speakest against thy brother-thou slanderest thine own mother's son."

Allied with this is the spirit of intermeddling with the affairs of others, and the never-resting and poisonous tongue of the tale-bearer. "Withal they learn to be idle, wandering about from house to house; and not only idle, but tattlers also, and busybodies, speaking things which they ought not." It is astonishing the mischief that one such person will do in a family, a church, a neighbourhood ; and if he be a political meddler, in a country.

Provocation and violence are among the offences of the tongue. Oh, what fatal effects might have been avoided, in many a desolated family, if its

inmates had respectively learned the great lesson taught by the wise man-" A soft answer turneth away wrath." The husband might have won his wife, the wife retained her husband; the master might have governed and reformed his servant, and the servant have learned to reverence his master; the child would not have been provoked to anger, and would have repaid in the homage of affection, more filial reverence than could be commanded by fear, and extorted by force. But the licentiousness of the tongue causes a breach that cannot be closed; and its tauntings on every side inflict a wound that cannot be healed. Like the barbed arrow, it breaks when it is solicited, and can never be extracted.

Levity appears a venial offence, but it may have a disastrous issue. Trifles in themselves become of serious consequence in their results. Lightness of speech has sometimes terminated fatally. An unguarded expression has led to murder: a sarcasm has implanted in the offended bosom implacable hatred: and general levity of speech both indicates a trifling spirit, and induces pernicious effects upon the moral feeling. It is worthy remark, in what a dark association the apostle places habitual jesting. "Fornication and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not once be named among you, as becometh saints. Neither filthiness" -impure conversation-"nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient." He that ac

customs himself to habitual levity of speech, encourages a licentiousness of spirit, which will render him familiar with evil: and may, by degrees, initiate him into the darkest mysteries of practical impurity.

GOD'S LAW THE ONLY TRUE STANDARD OF MORALS.

Morals have been a subject of anxious inquiry in all ages. They include the duties which we owe to God, to ourselves, and to each other, arising out of the constitution of our nature, our mutual relations, and the intellectual energies of our being. I have, therefore, unhesitatingly called them Duties -and because our object is to inquire after the moral obligations enforced in the Bible-they are distinguished as SCRIPTURE DUTIES. This is now distinctly stated to escape the necessity of future remark and to point out clearly, the track which is to be followed.

The ancients distributed morals into three classes: as affecting the individual-family-relations -and jurisprudence. The first they denominated Ethics-the second, Economics--the third, Politics. The term, Ethics, was also a general term; because the individual cannot stand alone-he must be necessarily connected with society, from its centre to its circumference: he is himself the cen

tre, to himself, and as it regards his personal ob、 ligations, of the entire circle; and that which affected himself more immediately, became, therefore, generally applied to the whole.

The term, Ethics, signifying manners, or the personal deportment of the individual, especially towards others, insinuated the influence of the internal moral principle upon the habits and conduct of its possessor. The relation of man to his Creator being demonstrated by the very evidence which led him to the conclusion that there is a God, and obviously inseparable from this earliest concession of the human mind to the existence of a First Cause-and his connexion with his fellow men being as clearly manifested in the organization of society, and the state of constant dependence upon others, of which he cannot but be conscious, from his infancy to his last breath-an inquiry after his corresponding duties, became one of the most important subjects which could occupy his attention. He gathered his impressions relative to his moral obligations, as well as he could, from the scattered intimations of their character around him, and within him. He deduced them from the harmonies of the visible creationthe varied forms of society-the constitution of his own nature—the testimony of his conscience— and, still more largely, from traditions every where prevailing, although none could trace them to their origin-and making their way by their adaptation to society, their appeals to the judg,