felf in fpeaking against the Moft High: in vilifying Him by fcoffing at his laws, fneering 'at his ordinances, deriding the doctrines of his infpired word. Sometimes it difplays itself in malice againft men; in calling down vengeance from heaven on those who are made after the fimilitude of God. It fills every degree in the scale of guilt, from the flighteft word of contempt against religion, and of disrespect towards God, to the most daring blasphemy: from the moft carelefs expreffion implying a wifh that a fmall evil from above may overtake another, to the deepest curfes of everlafting damnation. Murder, perjury, and atheism are in its train. Its language is fit to be the language only of fiends. Its path leads to the habitation of fiends.

Above all things, my brethren, fwear not = that ye fall not into condemnation. Let your communication be yea, yea, nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than thefe, cometh of evil. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain: for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh His name in vain (p). There are perfons who perfuade themselves

(James v. 2.

Matth.. 37.

Exod. xx. 7.

that

that they disapprove profaneness, and feem to hold themselves guiltlefs, while they perfevere in the daily, perhaps hourly practice of it. Who are these self-deceivers ? They who introduce the names of God and of Christ, and other kindred terms, in fashionable affeverations, or in exclamations of furprise, of hope, of disappointment, or in fome other light manner, into their ordinary discourfe. Do they affirm that the offence with which they are charged is but an idle habit: that the objectionable words drop from their tongues without intentional irreverence, without meaning, and frequently without being perceived? Miferable and vain excufes! How hackneyed in profane irreverence is your tongue, if the most aweful expreffions are become familiar expletives! How reiterated has been the found, if your ear is dead to the impreffion! If a lively fear and a fervent love of your Maker and your Redeemer prevailed in your bofom; it is impoffible that you could thus trifle with their facred names. Your heart would fmite you at the thought. The found would die away upon our lips. If you can use such expreffions yourself; if you can hear them used without pain: examine your breast.

There

There is delufion on the surface; it is well if their be not hypocrify at the bottom.

How

Confider, ye who are guilty of any fpecies of profaneness, the example of Him of whom you repute yourfelves the difciples. In public and in private, how replete with reverence and love to God was his converfation! With what high respect did he always mention the Scriptures ! truly did the language of his lips accord with his practical benevolence to men! Will he receive to himself the blafphemer, the scoffer, the man whose mouth poureth out curfes, or him who obftinately persists in irreverent difcourfe? The law, the law. of condemnation, is made for the unholy and the profane (q).

Suffer me to add, in conclufion, fome few general remarks, relating to all offences of the tongue, and leading to a due application of the text.

Though for the fake of clearness I have treated separately concerning feparate fins of the tongue, it is feldom that any one of them comes fingly. Or if at first unattended, it does not long continue folitary. The evil spirit which has occupied the

mansion prepares it for others worse than himself. Thus the impatient man ufually. becomes contentious; the contentious pro fane: the foolish talker a talebearer; the talebearer cenforious and a dealer in falfehood. Hence the guilt attached to each diftinct clafs of the offences which we have confidered, and the great probability that he who indulges in any one will be enfnared into more, concur to establish the extreme importance of guarding the lips against all. Unless you are habitually able to command your tongue, think not that you are a Christian. You have the decifive judgement of an Apostle, that if any one among you feemeth to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue; that man deceiveth his own heart, and his religion is vain.

But mark the forcible language in which the fame Apostle represents the difficulty, nay, if we are left to our own strength, the impoffibility, of controlling this inftrument of evil. Every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of ferpents, and of things in the fea; every part of the animated world which men have encountered; is tamed, and hath been tamed, has fooner or later been fubdued, of mankind. But the tongue can no man tame: it is an unruly etil,

full

full of deadly poifon. If any man offend not in word, the fame is a perfect man, and able alfo to bridle the whole body (r). What has been our personal experience? We have acknowledged the tranfgreffions of our lips. We have refolved against the repetition of them. Again and again new relapses have covered us with fhame. To fhame has fucceeded grief; to grief determination of amendment; to determination of amendment tranfgreffion. If this then be our fituation: if there can be no religion without the subjection of the tongue, and if the tongue be unconquerable by human difcipline: what course is man to pursue? What course, but that which is pointed out in the words of the Pfalmift? What path but that,' which leads to the fure mercies of David? Let a watch be fet by Thee, O Lord, before my mouth: keep Thou, O God, the door of my lips! They who obftinately depend upon themselves shall prove by lamentable difappointments, that human nature can neither cure nor withstand its own corruption; that it is not in man, unrenewed by the Spirit of God, to govern either his actions or his words according to the law of eternal

VOL. II.

(r) James, iii. 2. 7, 8.

T

life.