and pious, will be poor orators. And it always happens, in a very large body of men, that some are idle and irreligious; though circumstances may have led them to assume a profession where carelessness and impiety are doubly culpable. But such is the present state of human nature. He who demands more perfection than experience has ever yet known, is unreasonable and over-righteous. If some men have less pretension, and less vehemence than those who are called the OVER-RIGHTEOUS, they have probably less hypocrisy, less folly, and less spiritual arrogance. Overrighteousness, with all its pretensions to humility, is the parent as well as the child of pride.

After all, let us remember that there is an underrighteousness (if I may use the term) as well as an overrighteousness; and that mankind are much apter to err from defect than excess. While hypocrisy and fanaticism are avoided, let us not, in the present times, be alarmed at danger from excessive piety.

SECTION XL.

All extravagant and selfish Pretensions to the Spirit to be anxiously avoided, as they proceed from and cherish Pride, and are frequently accompanied with Immorality.

OSTENTATIOUSLY to pretend to greater

portions of the Spirit than others, is alone a very unfavourable symptom, as it is a presumptive proof of two wants, not compatible with the Spirit's benignant influence: the want of humility, and the want of charity. It is no wonder, therefore, that those who have made such pretensions, have disgraced them by the wickedness of their lives; and have induced ill-judging men hastily to

consider the whole doctrine of divine assistance as a mere delusion.

Hypocrites, in fanatical times, when the appearance of extraordinary piety was conducive to advancement in wealth and honours, were sure to go farther in their pretensions, than the modesty of true professors could permit or excuse: but that deceitfulness of heart which produces hypocrisy, leads to all other bad conduct; and religion has been disgraced by the singular profligacy of ostentatious professors.

Knaves of the very worst kind, who have no other object than to avail themselves of the credulity of others, are likely at all times to put on a cloak and a mask, which may render them externally respectable, and facilitate their purposes of deceit. Nothing seduces the ignorant and unexperienced so easily as the appearance of extraordinary sanctity; and nothing has been more frequently assumed, for the accomplishment of ambitious and lucrative designs. When these designs have been accomplished, the cloak and the mask have been thrown aside, as useless incumbrances, and the villain has stood forth in his proper shape and colour.

Men of weak heads and warm hearts have proceeded to the most extravagant lengths in pretensions to sanctity; and at the same time, from the want of solid virtue, have fallen into deplorable sins. Their sins derived additional deformity in the eyes of the people, from the contrast of assumed sanctity; and the world was ready to exclaim that all religion must be vain, if, in men who display so much of it, it contributes so little to wisdom and virtue.

Great sinners, unwilling to tread the rugged road of virtue, have thought it an easier and pleasanter mode of avoiding the consequences of their enormities, to persuade themselves of sudden conversions, and peculiar favour from heaven; and to compensate for inward

impurity by outward sanctity, and for disobedience in things essential, by intemperate zeal in things indifferent, formal, and merely ostentatious.

Thus spiritual pride, want of charity, hypocrisy, knavery, folly, and extreme wickedness, have given rise to extraordinary pretensions to the Spirit, and verified the observation, that the wickedest of mankind have been among those who displayed the appearance of goodness and piety in the EXTREME.

"The gradation has been," (says Dr. Trapp,) righte"teous overmuch in practice-righteous overmuch in "practice and doctrine-immoral and profligate in both; "and this still with pretensions to extraordinary mea66 sures of the Holy Spirit."

But to what should a conviction of this truth lead the sober Christian? Certainly not to deny the doctrine of supernatural assistance, which he finds in the gospel; but to avoid all extravagance of pretension, all boasting, all over-righteousness, all preference of himself to others, on account of spiritual gifts, lest he also should find himself deceived and a deceiver.

The religion of Christ is of a retired and reserved nature. Its most important transactions are in the recesses of the heart, and in the closet. It loves not noise nor ostentation. Let him, therefore, who wishes to know whether he really has the Spirit, examine whether his virtues and good dispositions abound in retirement, and without the least parade whatever, or the smallest applause or reward of men. If he does good privately, and avoids the eyes of admirers, I think he may entertain an humble confidence that he has the favour of God. He has, in consequence, a source of joy within him, which no man taketh away. He has the bread of life, and feeds on it in his heart by faith with thanksgiving. He is silently and unostentatiously happy, neither courting the notice of the world, nor regarding its unjust

censure. He is particularly careful, that no ill-treatment shall cause him to violate the law of charity. His chief concern is to bear and yet forbear; to be rather than to seem good.

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SECTION XLI.

Affected Sanctity, Demureness, Canting, Sourness, Censoriousness, ignorant and illiterate Preaching, no marks of a State of Grace, but contribute to bring the whole Doctrine of Divine Energy into Contempt, and to diffuse Infidelity.

RELIGION is lovely. Her voice is melodious, and her aspect delightful. How has she been deformed! She has been taught to utter jargon with the hoarse croaking of the portentous raven, or to scream with the terrific howlings of the bird of night. Her face has been changed from the face of an angel to a gorgon's head, surrounded with snakes. She has been rendered a bugbear, terrifying all who approach her, instead of a gentle nursing mother, inviting wretched mortals to her fostering bosom, by the tenderest blandishments of maternal love.

Men of natural sense, improved by a learned education, and polished by all the elegancies of cultivated life, have turned from her, thus disguised as she appears, with disgust and horror. They have devoted themselves to a seducing philosophy, and left religion thus disfigured, to the gross vulgar, whom they erroneously conceived were naturally attached to the horrors of a cruel and gloomy, as well as a silly, superstition.

Is it not desirable to vindicate Christianity from such dishonour? to shew that her most important doctrine,

the doctrine of divine energy, leads to every disposition that is gentle, amiable, and beneficent; that it exalts, refines, and mollifies the human bosom; and while it kindles a lively and pleasant hope of future felicity, improves every real enjoyment of the present life? Such a representation, and it certainly is a just one, must invite every man, who feels duly for himself or others, within the Christian pale.

The spirit is a spirit of truth, and therefore must be adverse to all affectation of sanctity, all studied severity of aspect and demeanour, intended only to excite external respect, and to impress on the spectators, often for the sake of interest, as well as from vanity, an idea of spiritual pre-eminence. The Spirit is a loving spirit, and therefore very unlike that of the sour, censorious pretenders, who condemn all innocent amusements, and think none capable of divine favour but themselves, and those who entertain their sentiments on points perfectly indifferent in the sight of God, and of every reasonable man. The Spirit is a spirit of wisdom, which implies a due degree of knowledge and ability for every undertaking we voluntary engage in, and therefore cannot approve the preaching of illiterate persons, who are unacquainted, not only with the languages in which the scriptures are written, but often with their own; whọ are fitter to be catechumens than catechists; to sit at the feet of Gamaliel, than to usurp his chair. Learning may not be requisite in the pious hearer, but is certainly so in every one who assumes the office of an instructor. He is not an honest man, who professes and is paid to instruct others, without having exerted himself to the utmost to procure a competent store of knowledge. The operations of the Holy Spirit, accom panying his endeavours, may make a good Christian in his private capacity: may give him faith and knowledge sufficient for his salvation; but they do not, since the