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paffes that of their bodies, the flames of their paffions those of their raging thirst. In a word, tho they are brought up in the fchool of poverty and patience, they feldom learn the first alphabet, which is to turn neceffity into virtue. Why was the apoftles abandoning their poffeffions fo pleafing to God, that he promis'd them heaven; and the philofopher's forfaking his, unregarded? Because they stripp'd themselves of all for Christ's fake, and he for the meer fake of learning.

To give an alms out of a natural compaffion, is not bad; but yet it deserves not one grain of glory; but if it be directed to a higher end, to God's honour, fcripture affures us, it blots out fins, it draws down his mercy and grace upon us in fine, it intitles us to a reward in heaven. That we may not therefore lose the fruit of all our actions, and go out of the world as unprovided almost of good works, as we entered into it, St. Paul exhorts us to direct all our words, and works, to the honour of Jefus Chrift, even the most ordinary. Whether you eat, or drink, labour, or divert yourself, let it be to God's glory.

This fupernatural intention raifes thefe mean actions above their ordinary level, enhances their value, and while we ferve nature, we ferve God at the fame time; we refresh our bodies, and feed our fouls, and prepare them for a happy eternity. Nay, Providence has fo ordered things, that every chriftian's perfection confifts in the due performance of thofe actions his ftate requires; and this runs through every station from the prince to the peafant. God commands not princes to retire from business,

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give themselves up to meditation, to macerate their bodies with extraordinary fafts, or to give audience in hair and fackcloth. They may live up to the dignity of their station, and carry all the marks of majefty about them; they may ride at the head of K 2

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armies, and declare war, when juftice requires it. In fine, they may be gallant princes, and pious Chriftians alfo, if they perform all the duties of royalty with a fincere intention to please God, and to quit the debt they owe their fovereign mafter, as well as that they owe to their fubjects.

Soldiers fo freely tranfgrefs all the precepts of Christianity, that one would think they received of God a patent of exemption, when they enter into the fervice of their prince. They pretend, virtue lies out of their road, and that vice alone has liberty to follow the camp: but their pretenfions are injurious to God, and prejudicial to themselves. The ftate is not answerable for the extravagancies of the men, and tho' they often fall into fin, they as often find occafions of practifing virtue, and had they the wit to improve them (as they suffer the torments of the martyrs here) fo they might fhare in their glory hereafter. In fpite of precaution, they are expofed to all the rigours of heat and cold, of hunger and thirft, and expofe their lives, as often as they come within the reach of muskets or cannons, and commonly they die as miferably as they live, and leave the world as void of merit as of money. Whereas, did they but fanctify their fufferings by a christian patience, and hallow them by a holy intention to please God, they might lay up treasures of merit in the next world, equal to those of the moft mortify'd confeffors. Nor would this leffen their pay, or lower their courage; they would fight more like men, and die lefs like beafts.

This doctrine takes in the judge on the bench, the lawyer at the bar, the mafter in his family, and the clown at the plough. Let them but keep the commands God has impofed on all men, and difcharge their employments with an unfeigned defire to please him, and they have attained the perfection he requires at their hands.

I know it is hard for people in the world to stand fo conftantly on their guard, as to be able to renew their oblation, at the beginning of every action: yer a little practice, efpecially continued, would diminifh the difficulty, and perchance render that eafy which feems half impoffible. Cuftom has a ftrange afcendant over men, and we often experience a great difficulty even to fhake off thofe habits we at first contracted with pain and violence. At least so foon as you are dress'd in the morning, you may breathe from the bottom of your heart this fhort ejaculation: Oh God! thou art my beginning and my end; I was created to ferve thee in this world, and to enjoy thee in the other. All my actions therefore, all the motions of my foul, are a debt I owe thy greatness and goodness. To thy glory therefore I confecrate all the actions of my life, and particularly thofe of this prefent day, and I defire thee to accept this fmall mark of fubmiffion and homage, which I pay with an humble and contrite heart.

Such an act is neither hard, nor tiresome; it takes not up time, nor withdraws from bufinefs or honeft recreations; and it is probable, it influences all the indifferent actions of the day, and raises them to a fupernatural end, and will receive a reward; unless by finning you tacitly recall it. But to make fure in a matter of this concern, renew it as often as you can. Now this practice being fo beneficial, and withal fo eafy; what can hinder a Christian from spending his time to advantage, and from making the most of his life, but a fupine negligence, and an extreme folly? Here is no embargo put upon your liberty, no new burthen. Do but your ordinary actions well, not out of a frolick, or a mere impulfe of nature, to please fenfe or to gratify an extravagant humour, but to pleafe God, who will reward a cup of cold water given in his name,

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GOSPEL of St. Matthew, Chap. xiii. Verse

24. Another parable put he forth unto them, faying, the kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which owed good feed in his field :

25. But while men slept, his enemy came, and fowed tares among the wheat, and went his way.

26. But when the blade was fprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares alfo.

27. So the fervants of the boufholde came, and faid unto him, Sir, didft not thou fow good feed in thy field? from whence then bath it tares?

28. He faid unto them, An enemy hath done this. The fervants faid unto him, wilt thou then that we go and gather them up?

29. But he faid, Nay, left while ye gather up the tares, ye root up alfo the wheat with them.

30. Let both grow together until the harvest; and in the time of harveft I will fay to the reapers, gather ye together firft the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn.

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The MORAL REFLECTION.

T was ordinary in Palestine and Syria, as St. Jerome notes, to deliver inftructions under the cover of fome allegory or parable. It is certain, nothing makes a deeper impreffion on the minds of men, or comes more lively, nay, or more welcome to their understanding, than thofe inftructions or reproofs, that are conveyed to them by glances, innuendoes, and fymbols. David was immediately not only brought to a fight, but even to a deteftation of his adultery and murder, by a story at a distance, of a rich man that had many fheep himself, and yet forced away a poor man's only lamb, that he

loved as his own foul, 2 Kings. Downright admonition is generally ill taken; it looks rather like the blunt reproaches of an enemy, than the advice of a friend; at least, it seems but the good office of one, who frames a difadvantageous opinion of us; and merely fuch a conceit renders us incapable of following, and fometimes even of hearing good counfel; but when we wrap up admonitions in mystery and circumlocution, men are parabled (if I may fay fo) out of their faults, without being told of them; for the very story flashes the light of their own conscience in their faces, and forces them to turn the application upon themselves.

Our bleffed Saviour himself not only recommended but inculcated this way of inftruction and reproof, both in his doctrine and example, as the means God had pitch'd upon for bringing the idolaters and infidels over to the chriftian faith.

You have read the parable he propofed in the paffage we are confidering, and the doctrine it contains is fo clear, that it is ftrange the apoftles fhould defire an explication. However, our bleffed Lord condefcended to their defire; he took off the veil, and exposed the myfteries to the view of his auditory. He, who fows, is the Son of God; the field is this world; the good feed are the virtuous; the tares, the wicked; the enemy, who fowed them, is the devil; and the harveft is the end of the world, and last period of time. The angels are the reapers, whom the Son of man will fend to remove all scandals; they will affemble all the finners and caft them into a furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

This is the explication our Saviour was pleased to make, and he has left it to pofterity for our inftruction. Every paffage furnishes a fubject worthy of contemplation: We fee Chrift's endeavours to fave the devil's to damn him, and above all, God's K 4

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