tated the passions of others; we have alienated a friend; we have embittered an enemy; we have sown the seeds of future suspicion, malevolence, or disgust. He that is hasty in his spirit, exalteth folly.

8. It makes us unlike the meek and lowly Jesus. -That mind which was in him should be in us. He was patient under the rudest injuries and most barbarous treatment: the vilest affronts were offered to him, and yet he was meek as a lamb. When he was reviled, he reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not. He gave his back to the smiters, and his cheeks to them that plucked off the hair; he did not hide his face from shame and spitting. For the greatest evil he returned the greatest good: he shed his blood, and gave his life to redeem those from hell who treated him with disdain. And while they mocked his dying agonies, shot out the lip, and wagged the head, he cried, Father, forgive them, they know not what they do. While we admire this amiable and lovely part of the dear Redeemer's conduct, let us remember that he has left us an example that we should walk in his steps. But ah, how unlike him are we, when we suffer angry passions to rise on the most trifling occasions!

No harshness, no pride, no stately distance of behaviour appeared in our divine Master, during his intercourse with men upon earth. He was

of access, mild in his answers, condescending, wly and obliging in his whole demeanour. This distinguishing part of his character was so generally known, that the apostle Paul in order to gain the hearts of his followers, and engage them to a compliance with what he proposes, uses this form of address: I beseech you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ. Let us cultivate a humble, kind, gentle temper. This was the temper of our divine leader; this is the temper of the inhabitants of heaven. Let this temper also be in us: then shall we escape the miseries which always accompany an arrogant and resentful mind.

The religion which Jesus established has this distinguishing peculiarity, that it teaches all who profess it to forgive their enemies, and to love those that hate them. How unworthy shall we be of the name of christians, and followers of Christ, if we give way to fretfulness, anger, and a revengeful spirit! Let us love our enemies, bless them that curse us, and pray for them who despitefully use us+ and persecute us.

9. It makes us resemble madmen and devils. The Latins call a meek person, mansuetus; q. d. used to the hand. The allusion is to the nature of the contrary disposition, which makes a man like a furious wild beast, a lion or a tiger, or the swift dromedary traversing her ways. (Jer. ii. 23, 24.) Whereas when the grace of meekness reigns, it

transforms the lion into a lamb: we then are used to the hand, we submit to management; the leopard lies down with the kid, and a little child may lead them. Isa. xi. 6.

Saul, the king of Israel, when the violence of his passion prevailed, appeared like a fury. When David was absent, he stormed and raged with the fierceness of a lion; when present, he whirled his javelin at him to smite him against the wall. We see also the distraction which violent anger occasions in the character of Haman. We can scarcely conceive a person more thoroughly wretched than he appears to have been, even when surrounded with power, opulence, and pleasure. One private man, who despised his greatness, and disdained submission, while a whole kingdom trembled before him, made him completely miserable. He was lost to all enjoyment, through the fierceness of his passion; he was stung by disappointment, torn and distracted by rage, beyond what he was able to bear. He made that humiliating confession: All this availeth me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai, the Jew, sitting at the king's gate. This was not a private soliloquy of Haman's within himself, but a confession which he made to others; and as such, it proves that his misery was become insupportable. Every man strives to conceal such shocking agitations of mind, as he must know they are a dishonour to him: the violence of anguish alone can drive him to confess a passion which

renders him odious and despicable. Yet Haman breaks through all restraints, and publishes his shame even to his own family and friends, from whom every man is naturally disposed to conceal his dishonour: a striking proof of the height of his distraction and disorder.-Violent and unguarded anger makes a man a fool, to cast firebrands, arrows and death, in the sport of his fury.

10. It is cruel and murderous. We have a striking instance of this in the first family of mankind. Cain was angry with his brother Abel, because his own works were evil, and his brother's righteous. Heaven smiled upon the one, and frowned upon the other. Cain cherished his resentment to that degree, that he thirsted for Abel's life, and at last imbrued his hands in his own brother's blood. Many of the evils to which the life of man is exposed arise from anger protracted into malevolence, and exerted in revenge. Many of the dreadful calamities which fill the histories of past ages have originated here. We could scarcely read these accounts without some doubt of the veracity of the historians, did we not see the same causes still tending to the same effects. What tides of human blood have been shed, how many cities have been desolated, and how many nations massacred, to gratify this cruel and furious passion!

How solemn and striking is the exclamation of the dying patriarch Jacob, concerning his two sons! Simeon and Levi are brethren; instruments of cruelty are in their habitations. Oh my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united; for in their anger they slew a man, and in their self-will they digged down a wall. Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel. I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel, (Gen. xlix.) The wrathful man is cruel to his neighbour; as in the case above, and in that of Jezebel with Naboth. He is cruel to his children and servants: he is cruel to the very beast which carries him, and does his drudgery. A good man regards the life of his beast; but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel. Thus Balaam only wished for a sword that he might slay his innocent beast. How many excellent and useful creatures groan under the cruelty of furious men! When they

exert themselves to the utmost stretch of their ability, they are still beaten without mercy. We need not indeed wonder at the wrathful man's cruelty to his beast, since his cruelty has been displayed against his Saviour, in whom innocence and perfection shone in their brightest lustre. When they heard these things, they were filled with wrath, and rose up, and thrust him out of the city, and led him to the brow of the hill, that they might cast him down headlong. (Luke iv. 27-29.) The wrathful man is cruel even to himself: many have