and they meet with success and encouragement in the world, may make a profession, and appear to others, and think themselves religious, but like seed sown on hard, stony ground, which, though it springs up, and looks green for a while, yet, when the sun shines hot and bright, soon withers for want of root; they cannot stand in the day of adversity and trouble: for when tribulation, or persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by they are offended.

The third kind of hearers, are those who seem to receive the word of God with great earnestness and attention; but however they may be delighted with it in the house of God, they do not carry a savor of it into the world. In some, the toil, trouble, care, and vexation arising from their circumstances in the world, so fill the mind, engage the attention, overwhelm the spirit, and oppress the heart, that, like a plant incumbered and surrounded with rank, poisonous weeds, the word of God, which they have heard, cannot grow; the noble truths of the gospel cannot have their proper influence on the mind, but gradually sink and decline till at last they are disbelieved, or totally forgotten. Others, who meet with their desired success in their worldly cares, are so assidious in the pursuit and so entirely devoted to the acquisition of wealth, that every thing to them seems little and low which does not produce some temporal advantage: as riches increase, they set their hearts upon them, and a worldly spirit choaks the word, and it becometh unfruitful.

In opposition to those unprofitable hearers of the word, a fourth sort are represented in this parable, whose hearts, by the Holy Spirit, are prepared for the reception of divine truth; for, as the best of ground, except it be ploughed, harrowed and cleansed by the husbandman, will not receive the seed, nor produce a plentiful harvest; so the heart of man, except it be changed by divine power, will not receive the word of God, nor produce such fruit as the gospel requires:

but, when the heavenly seed falls on those hearts which have been wrought upon and prepared by the Divine Spirit, the word is received with gladness, it takes deep root in the mind, it operates on all the powers and faculties of the soul, it terminates in obedience to the precepts of the gospel, and brings forth fruit to the honour and interest of the cause of CHRIST, in proportion to the capacities and circumstances of the different subjects on which it falls, in some an hundred fold, in some sixty, and some thirty.

Our great Redeemer, having finished his explanation of the parable of the sower, turned to his disciples, and explained to them, by the similitude of a lighted candle, the use they were to make of the knowledge which they would acquire by conversing with him, and receive his divine instructions. Is a candle, said he, brought to be put under a bushel, or under a bed, and not to be set on a candlestick? For there is nothing hid which shall not be manifested, neither was any thing kept secret, but it should come abroad. By which the divine Instructor gave them to understand, that, though now these heavenly truths were veiled in shades and figures, and taught to mankind in parables, the time would come, that they would be more clearly revealed, and, as a lighted candle, exalted on high, illuminates the whole apartment where it is placed, so shall the brightness of divine truth, by their preaching, be spread abroad, and enlighten the dark nations of the earth: therefore, as the disciples of CHRIST were intended to convey the precepts of heavenly instruction to the dark, unenlightened nations of the world, our Lord reminded them, that it was a matter of the highest importance, that they should be rightly and fully taught those truths they were to bear to the remotest nations; and, therefore, it behoved them to hear him with the utmost care and attention. Take heed, said he, what ye hear; with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you; and unto you that hear shall more be given.

Z

After our Lord had been thus discoursing to his dis ciples, he turned to the multitude on the shore, and, addressing them in the most pleasing and powerful manner, he delivered to them the parable of the enemy's sowing tares amongst the wheat. The kingdom of heaven, said he, is likened to a man which sowed good seed in his field: but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares amongst the wheat, and went his way. But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. So the ser

vants of the husbandman came and said unto him, Sir didst not thou sow good seed in thy field? from whence then hath it tares? He said unto them, an enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? But he said, Nay; lest, rohile ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. Let both go together until the harvest and in the time of harvest, I will say unto the reapers, Gather ye the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them but gather the wheat into my barn.

This parable, as our Lord afterwards explained it to his disciples, relates to the different states of men at the end of the world. The husbandman is our great Redeemer himself; the field is the christian church, planted in various parts of the world; those Christians who are enabled by the Holy Spirit to love the Lord JESUS CHRIST, and bring fruit worthy their high profession, are the wheat; and those who make an empty profession without knowing the power of true religion, are the tares. These are seduced into the paths of wickedness by the enemy of God and man; and the parable elegantly represents the mixed state of the professing church on earth, and the deplorable end of the hypocrite and those who know not God. Such characters as these may mix with the real Christians, and may deceive for a time, by assuming the appearance of superior sanctity and strictness of life; yet they will not fail sooner or later, to betray themselves, and make it manifest that they are but

tares amongst the wheat. Yet we are taught by this parable, how sincerely soever we may wish to free the church from all corruption both in doctrine and practice; it is not lawful for us to assume the prerogative of the great Judge of heaven and earth, by persecuting, or following with any corporeal punishment, any whom we apprehend to be hypocrites and corrupters of true religion. The tares and the wheat are to grow together till harvest, they are not to be separated, lest by mistaking the character of their persons, we bestow the censure on the true Christian, which belongs to the hypocrite: but the harvest will come when they will be separated by our great Redeemer himself, and his attending angels: then the tares will be bound up in bundles and burnt, but the wheat carefully gathered into the barn. For at the end of the world, our great Redeemer will distinguish between the pretended and the real Christian; the wicked will be condemned to eternal torment, but the righteous will be received to life eternal; when they shall shine forth, as the sun, in the kingdom of their Father.

The next parable which our exalted Redeemer thought fit to propose to the listening multitudes, was that of the seed which sprang up and grew imperceptibly. So is the kingdom of God, said he, as if a man should cast seed into the ground, and should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up he knoweth not how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of itself; first the blade and then the ear. But when the fruit is brought forth immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come. This beautiful picture represents the gradual and silent progress of the gospel in the heart of man; as the husbandman does not by any power of his own, cause the seed to grow when he has sown it, but the blade and fruit are produced by the power of the great Creator, and by those laws of nature which he hath established in the vegetable creation: so the seed of divine truth does not thrive in the heart of man by the power of the

preacher, but by the silent and efficacious energy of the Spirit of God. Thus JESUS and his apostles, having preached the gospel in the world, and taught the doctrines of true religion, gave no commission to any to use the terrors of fire and sword to propagate them, but left it to the silent and secret influence of the Holy Spirit. And it is very probable that the blessed JEsus spoke this parable to convince the Jews of their mistake, in supposing that their Messiah would set up a temporal kingdom, and advance his dominion by the means which are used in the world to rise to sovereign greatness: and also it might be intended to quiet the minds of his disciples, and prevent them from being discouraged when they saw that an immediate and rapid success did not attend their labours in the gospel.

The next parable which JESUS spake to the multitude was that of the grain of mustard seed, which in Palestine and other parts of the East, rises from a small seed to a large spreading tree. The kingdom of heaven, said the divine Instructor is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field; which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof. This may be considered as a continuation of the subject of the former parable; for though the gospel seed may at first seem small and contemptible, arising from the crucifixion of its divine author, the inveterate hatred and final unbelief of the Jews, the mortifying nature of its precepts, the weakness of the persons employed to propagate its divine truths, and the small number and meanness of those who first received it, yet being founded on eternal truth, and supported by divine power, it would increase to a surprising exten, and greatness, filling the whole world, and affording divine instruction and comfort to persons of all nations, who should enjoy the high privileges of the Messiah's kingdom, while