souls hath, therefore, furnished us with a noble prescription. It is at hand. You have it in my text: and, if you are humble and patient of instruction, you cannot but derive confiderable advantages from it. "Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright; for "the End of that man is Peace."

The words are elegantly expressive of the way and means, by which alone we can obtain an undisturbed peace and serenity of mind through life, and an unshaken firmness and confolation in death. This being the great and important lesson which they inculcate, I shall naturally be led from them to set before you the LIFE and DEATH of the RIGHTEOUS MAN; only making this previous observation, that by the words "perfect" and " upright" here made use of, we are to understand, that degree of holiness and perfection, which

it

it is possible for every one of us to attain on this fide the grave.

I am speaking to a Christian audience; and, as a Christian minister, I am bound to give you the Life and Character of the Righteous Man, agreeable to that glorious system of Divine Truth, which God hath been gracioufly pleased to reveal to mankind, by his own Well-beloved SON.

According to this Word of Truth, the Righteous Man is he, whose actions are conformable to the WILL of God, have an immediate tendency to promote the GLORY OF GOD, and flow from no other motive than the LOVE OF GOD. But, if these things are so, if it requires all this to be righteous, who is he that shall be faved? Does not this far surpass the natural strength of man? Ask the experienced Christian,

Christian, and you will find him at no lofs for an answer.

Born in fin, and laden with actual tranfgreffion, poor guilty man cannot advance one single step in the paths of righteousness, till he lays hold by Faith on the hand of a REDEEMER. Secure of this, with humble confidence he approaches the Throne of Grace, and asks of his Heavenly Father, that sanctifying SPIRIT, which he hath promised to bestow liberally upon all those, that believe on his SON. Here then is a rich fountain opened to the house of David: here is the pure and inexhaustible Source, from whence alone true Holiness can flow. "He that is "born of God overcometh the world." "The love of GOD is shed abroad in

our hearts by the SPIRIT, which he "hath given us." Till we are born of this Spirit, all our righteousness is but unrighteousness: till we have this

principle principle of Love in our fouls, all our doings are nothing worth. That Image of God, which man lost by his first disobedience, can only be renewed by the fame creating energy, that "breathed into his nostrils the breath " of life." "It is the SPIRIT alone, "who beareth witness to our spirit, "that we are the children of GOD."

Actuated by this Divine Principle, "the good man, out of the good treasure " of his heart, bringeth forth good "things." His actions must be conformable to the Will of God, they must have a tendency to promote the Glory of GOD, they must flow from a Love and Veneration for God, because they are immediately inspired by the Spirit of GOD, even by that Spirit which "worketh in us to will and to "do, according to his good pleasure."

"Except

"Except your righteousness shall ex"ceed the righteousness of the Scribes " and Pharisees," says our BLESSED LORD. "ye cannot enter into the King"dom of Heaven." These Scribes and Pharifees were extremely rigid and exact in their obfervance of the ceremonial law, and so very minute as to pay tithes of mint, and annise, and "cummin." Whence is it, then, that

our

SAVIOUR so repeatedly condemns them? Why, because their fole motive to this practice, was finful and worldly: they "did it, that they might "be seen of men;" that they might be diftinguished by greetings in all public places, and honoured with the venerable appellation of "Rabbi, "Rabbi!"

I would fain hope, that, among Chriftian societies, there are few, who are actuated by this Pharifaical principle. But I fear, that there are too many, VOL. II.

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