SERMON LIV.

THE MORAL MARTYR.

PSALM CXIX. 46.

by them; and it would have been difficult to profess to fear him and avoid contempt.

It is not easy to determine the persons intended by the psalmist, nor is it necessary to confine the words to either of the senses given; they may be taken in a more extensive sense. The word king in the eastern languages, as well as in those of the western world, is not

I will speak of thy testimonies also before kings, confined to kings properly so called; it is

and will not be ashamed.

MY BRETHREN,

Ir is not only under the reign of a tyrant, that religion involves its disciples in persecution, it is in times of the greatest tranquillity, and even when virtue seems to sit on a throne. A Christian is often subject to punishments different from wheels, and racks. People united to him by the same profession of religion, having received the same baptism, and called with him to aspire at the same glory, not unfrequently press him to deny Jesus Christ, and prepare punishments for him, if he have courage to confess him. Religion is proposed to us in two different points of view, a point of speculation, and a point of practice. Accordingly, there are two sorts of martyrdom; a martyrdom for doctrine, and a martyrdom for morality. It is for the last that the prophet prepares us in the words of the text, and to

sometimes given to superiors of any rank. Ask not the reason of this, every language has its own genius, and custom is a tyrant who seldom consults reason before he issues orders; and who generally knows no law but self-will and caprice. If you insist on a direct answer to your inquiry concerning the reason of the general use of the term, I reply, the same passion for despotism which animates kings on the throne, usually inspire such individuals as are a little elevated above people around them; they consider themselves as sovereigns, and pretend to regal homage. Authority over inferiors begins this imaginary royalty, and vanity finishes it. Moreover, such as are called petty gentry, in the world, are generally more proud and absolute than real kings; the last frequently propose nothing but to exercise dominion, but the first aim both to exercise dominion and to make a parade of the exercise, lest their imaginary grandeur should pass unnoticed.

the same end I dedicate the sermon which I I understand, then, by the vague term kings, am going to address to you to-day. I come all who have any pre-eminence over the lowinto the place that affords a happy asylum forest orders of men; and these are they who exconfessors and martyrs, to utter in your hear-ercise tyranny, and inflict the martyrdom for ing these words of Jesus Christ, "Whosoever which the prophet in the text prepares us. In shall be ashamed of me, and of my words, in order to comprehend this more fully, contrast this adulterous and sinful generation, of him two conditions in the life of David. Remark also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when first the state of mediocrity, or rather happy he cometh in the glory of his Father with the obscurity, in which this holy man was born. holy angels," Mark viii. 38. Educated by a father, not rich, but pious, he was religious from his childhood. As he led a country life, he met with none of those snares among his cattle which the great world sets for our innocence. He gave full scope without constraint to his love for God, and could affirm, without hazarding any thing, that God was supremely lovely. What a contrast! This shepherd was suddenly called to quit his sheep and his fields, and to live with courtiers in the palace of a prince. What a society for a man accustomed to regulate his conversation by the laws of

In order to animate you with a proper zeal for morality, and to engage you, if necessary, to become martyrs for it, we will treat of the subject in five different views.

I. We will show you the authors, or, as they may be justly denominated, the executioners, who punish men with martyrdom for morality.

II. The magnanimity of such as expose themselves to it.

III. The horrors that accompany it.

IV. The obligation which engages men to truth, and his conduct by those of virtue! What submit to it.

V. The glory that crowns it.

We will explain these five ideas contained in the words of the psalmist, "I will speak of thy testimonies before kings, and will not be ashamed;" and we will proportion these articles, not to that extent to which they naturally go, but to the bounds prescribed to these exercises.

I. The authors, or as we just now called them, the executioners, who inflict this punishment, are to be considered. The text calls them kings; "I will speak of thy testimonies before kings." What king does the psalmist mean? Saul to whom piety was become odious? or any particular heathen prince, to whom the persecution of Saul sometimes drove our prophet for refuge? The name of the God of the Hebrews was blasphemed among these barbarians; his worship was called superstition

a place was this for him to propose those just and beautiful principles which the Holy Spirit teaches in the Scriptures, and which are many of them to be found in the writings of the psalmist! "I have seen the wicked in power, and spreading himself like a green bay-tree; yet he has passed away, and lo, he was not; I sought him, and he could not be found. Surely men of high degree are a lie, to be laid in a balance they are altogether lighter than vanity. I said, ye are gods, and all of you are the children of the Most High; but ye shall die like men. Put not your trust in a prince, in whom there is no help. His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth, in that very day his thoughts perish. He that ruleth his spirit, is better than he that taketh a city. My son, the son of my womb, the son of my vows, give not thy strength unto women, nor thy ways to that which destroyeth kings. It is not for

kings, O Lemuel, to drink wine, nor for princesa dagger into their bosoms; that to be so abstrong drink, lest they drink, and forget the law, and pervert the judgment of any of the afflicted." How would these maxims be received at some of your courts? They were not very pleasing at that of Saul; David was, therefore, censured by him and his courtiers for proposing them. Hear how he expressed himself in this psalm. "O Lord! remove from me reproach and contempt. Princes did sit and speak against me, because thy servant did meditate in thy statutes. The proud have had me greatly in derision; yet have I not declined from thy law," Psa. cxix. 22, 23. 51.

II. Let us pass to the second article, and consider the magnanimity of such as expose themselves to this martyrdom. This is naturally included in the former remark, concerning the executioners who inflict the punishment. My brethren it is impossible to speak of the testimonies of God before the tyrants in question, without being accused either of a spirit of rebellion, aversion to social pleasures, or rusticity and pedantry; three dispositions which the great seldom forgive.

The martyr for morality is sometimes taxed with a spirit of rebellion. Perhaps you might have thought I spoke extravagantly, when I affirmed, that most men consider themselves as kings in regard to their inferiors. I venture, however, to affirm a greater paradox still; that is, they consider themselves as gods, and demand such homage to be paid to their fancied divinity as is due to none but to the true God. I grant great men do not all assume the place of God with equal arrogance. There are not many Pharaohs who adopt this brutal language, "Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice?" Exod. v. 2. There are but few Sennacheribs, who are so extravagant as to say to the people of God, "Beware lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, The Lord will deliver us. Hath any of the gods of the nations delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria? Where are the gods of Hamath and Arphad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim?" Isa. xxxvi. 18, 19.

sorbed in forming public treatises, and in the prosperity of the states, as to lose sight of the interests of religion, is equal to placing hope in the present life, and renouncing all expectation of a life to come; that to render one's self inaccessible to the solicitations of widows and orphans, while we fill offices created for their service, is to usurp honours for the sake of emoluments; that to suffer the publication of scandalous books, and the practice of public debauchery, under pretence of toleration and liberty, is to arm God against a state, though states subsist only by his protection. Let us not repeat forgotten grievances, let us not, by multiplying these objects, run the hazard of increasing the number of arguments which justify our proposition. "To speak of the testimonies of God before kings," is to expose one's self to a charge of rebellion, and to such punishments as ought to be reserved for real incendiaries and rebels.

2. As the great men of the world would have us respect their rank, so they are equally jealous of their pleasures; and most men forming maxims of pleasure more or less lax, according as their rank is more or less eminent, licentiousness grows along with credit and fortune. A man who made a scruple of being absent from an exercise of religion, when he could hardly provide bread for the day, has not even attended the Lord's supper since he became master of a thousand a year. A man whose conscience would not suffer him to frequent some companies, when he walked afoot, is become a subscriber to public gaming houses now he keeps a carriage. A man who would have blushed at immodest language in private life, keeps, without scruple, a prostitute, now he is become a public man. Lift your eyes a little higher, lift them above metaphorical kings, and look at kings properly so called. Adultery, incest, and other abominations, more fit for beasts than men? what am I saying? abominations to which beasts never abandon themselves, and of which men only are capable, are not these abominations considered as sports But, though the great men of the world do in the palaces of some princes? This is what not always assume the place of God with so I said, licentiousness increases with credit and much brutal insolence, yet they do assume it. fortune. The maxims which men form conThough they do not say to their inferiors in so cerning pleasures, are more or less loose acmany words, Obey us rather than God, yet do cording as their rank is more or less eminent. they not say it in effect? Is it possible to op- In general, that detachment from the world pose their fancy with impunity? Is it safe to which religion proposes to produce in our establish the rights of God in their presence? hearts, that spirit of repentance with which it What success had Elijah at the court of Ahab? aims to inspire us, those images of death which Micaiah at that of Jehosaphat? John the Bap-it perpetually sets before us, those plans of fetist at that of Herod?

We need not go back to remote times. What success have we had among you, when we have undertaken to allege the rights of God in some circumstances? For example, when we have endeavoured to convince you, that to aspire at the office of a judge, without talents essential to the discharge of it, is to incur the guilt of all the unjust sentences that may be pronounced; that to stupify the understanding by debauchery, to drown reason in intemperance, to dissipate the spirits by sensual pleasures, when going to determine questions which regard the lives and fortunes of mankind, is to rob men of their property, and to plunge

licity disengaged from matter, to which it invites us; all these ideas are tasteless to the great; we cannot propose them amidst their intoxicating pleasures without being considered as enemies of pleasure, as scourges to society.

3. When we speak of the testimonies of God before the great, we are taxed with rusticity and pedantry. There is, among men, a misnamed science, without which we cannot appear great in the world; it is called politeness, or good-breeding. This science consists in adopting, at least in feigning to adopt, all the passions and prejudices of the great, in taking such forms as they like, in regulating ideas of right and wrong by their caprice, in condemn

ing what they condemn, and in approving what | this duty. You have heard, that it consists in they approve. In one word, politeness, in the urging the rights of God before great men; style of the great, is that suppleness which and, though it be at the hazard of all the comkeeps a man always prepared to change his forts and pleasures of life, in professing to resystem of morality and religion according to spect the moral part of religion. We do not their fancies. Not to have this disposition, to mean an unseasonable and indiscreet manner have invariable ideas, and invariable objects of doing so. The duty of confessing Jesus of pursuit, to be inconvertible in religion, to Christ before tyrants, in regard to his doctrines, have the laws of God always before our eyes, has its bounds; and so has that of confessing or, as the Scripture speaks, to "walk before his morality. There was more enthusiasm him," is in the style of people of the world, to than true zeal in such ancient confessors as have no breeding, to be a bad courtier, to be voluntarily presented themselves before persepossessed with that kind of folly which renders cutors, and intrigued for the glory of martyrit proper for us, though not to be confined with dom. So, in regard to the present subject, in lunatics, yet to be banished from the company our opinion, it is not requisite we should inof people of birth and quality, as they call trude into the company of the great to reprove themselves, and to be stationed in closets and them, when we have reason to believe our recells. bukes would be injurious to ourselves, and contribute nothing to the glory of religion. All the actions of a Christian should be directed by prudence. We only expect you should never blush for the precepts of your great Lawgiver, never contribute, by mean adulation, or profound silence, to the violation of them; in short, that you would openly profess to fear God always when your profession is likely to convince a sinner, or to convert a saint.

III. Thus we have seen both the executioners who punish morality with martyrdom, and the magnanimity which exposes a man to the punishment: and these are sufficient to expose our third article, the horrors, that accompany it. I have no ideas sufficiently great of the bulk of my auditors, to engage me to be very exact in expounding this third article. I fear, were I to enlarge on this part of my subject, I should raise insurmountable obstacles to the end which I should propose in opening the subject. Forgive an opinion so inglorious to your piety, but too well adjusted to the imperfections of it. We dare not form such a plan for you as Jesus Christ formed for St. Paul, when speaking of this new proselyte to Ananias, he told him, "I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name's sake," Acts ix. 16. Martyrdom for doctrines, I grant, seems at first more shocking than martyrdom for morality; but, taken altogether, it is perhaps less insupportable. To die for religion is not always the worst thing in the calling of a Christian. Virtue wakes up into vigour in these circumstances, and renders itself invincible by its efforts. Even worldly honours sometimes come to embolden. That kind of heroism which is attributed to a man making such a splendid sacrifice, supports under exquisite torments.

This duty carries its own evidence along with it. Let us here compare the doctrines of religion with the precepts of it. The precepts of religion are as essential as the doctrines; and religion will as certainly sink if the morality be subverted, as if the theology be undermined. Moreover, doctrines are absolutely useless without morality, and the doctrines of religion are only proposed to us as grounds of the duties of it. The first doctrine of religion, the foundation of all the rest, is, that there is only one God; but why does God require us to admit the doctrine of his unity? It is that we may not divide supreme love, the character of supreme adoration, between the Supreme Being and creatures; for on this subject it is said, "thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart." Now, were I to deny this second proposition, we ought not to divide between God and any creature that love which is the essence of suThere is another kind of suffering, longer preme adoration, should I be a less odious and more fatiguing, and therefore more diffi- apostate than if I denied the first? One of the cult. It is a profession, a detail, a trade of suf- most essential points of our divinity is, that fering, if I may express myself so. To see one's there is a future state. But why does God reself called to live among men whom we are al-quire us to believe a future state? It is that ways obliged to contradict upon subjects for which they discover the greatest sensibility; to be excluded from all their pleasures; never to be admitted into their company, except when they are under afflictions and restraints; to hear one's looks and habits turned into ridicule, as they said of the prophet Elisha, "He is a hairy man, and girt with a girdle of leather about his loins," 2 Kings i. 8: What a punishment! Men who have withstood all the terrors of racks and dungeons, have yielded to the violence of this kind of persecution and martyrdom. We will not be insensible of the frailty of our auditors, and therefore, we will omit a discussion of the acute and horrid pains of this kind of martyrdom.

IV. We are to treat, fourthly, of the obligation of speaking of the testimonies of God before kings. We ground this on the nature of

we should regard the present life as the least considerable period of our duration. If then I deny this practical proposition, the present life is the least considerable part of our duration, am I an apostate less odious than if I deny this proposition of speculation, there is a future state? We say the same of all other doctrines.

If it be the duty of a Christian to confess the doctrines of religion, and if a simple genuflexion, and the offering of one grain of incense, be acts of denial of these truths of speculation, I ask, are not one act of adulation, one smile of approbation, one gesture of acquiescence, also acts of denial in regard to practical truths? Most certainly. In times of persecution it was necessary to lift up the standard of Jesus Christ, to confess him before Herod and Pilate, and before all who took these persecutors of the church for their examples. In like manner,

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while the church enjoys the most profound | speak of thy testimonies before kings, and will peace, if innocence be oppressed, if we see not be ashamed," finds a rich reward, first in modesty attacked, if we hear the sophisms of the ideas which a sound reason gives him of sin, we must learn to say, each in his pro- shame and glory; secondly, in the testimony of per sphere, I am a Christian, I hate calumny, his own conscience; thirdly, in the approbaI abhor oppression, I detest profaneness and tion of good people; and lastly, in the prerolicentiousness, and so on. gatives of martyrdom. These, if I may so express myself, are four jewels of his crown.

1. Notions of shame and glory are not arbitrary, they are founded on the essence of those things to which they are related; on these relations they depend, and not on the caprice of different understandings. My first relation is that which I have to God, it is the relation of a creature to his Creator. The duty of this relation is that of the most profound submission. My glory is to discharge this duty, and it is my shame to violate it. My second relation is that which I have to men, a relation between beings formed in the same image, subject to the same God, and exposed to the same miseries. The duty of this relation is that of treating men as I wish they would treat me; or, to use the words of Jesus Christ, "of doing to them whatsoever I would they should do to me," Matt. vii. 12. It is my glory to discharge this duty, and my shame to violate it; and so of the rest. These ideas are not arbitrary, they are founded in the nature of things. No mortal, no potentate has a right to change them. If, then, the great regard me with disdain, when I answer to my relations, and discharge the duties of them, I will not be ashamed. The contempt which this conduct brings upon me, falls back upon my despiser, because shame is a necessary consequence of violating these duties, and because glory is a necessary consequence of practising them.

The further you carry this comparison of martyrdom for doctrines with martyrdom for duties, the more fully will you perceive, that the same reasons which establish the necessity of the first, confirm that of the last, and that apostates from morality are no less odious than those from divinity. Let us for a moment examine what makes the first martyrdom necessary, I mean that for doctrines. Some reasons regard the believers themselves. Our attachment to the religion of Jesus Christ may be doubtful to ourselves, before we suffer for it. Martyrdom is a trial of this attachment. "Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you," 1 Pet. iv. 12. Some regard the spectators, in whose presence God calls his children to suffer for religion. Christians have made more disciples to the true religion, by suffering persecution, than tyrants have taken from it by persecuting. This is a second view of martyrdom. A martyr may say, with his divine Master, "I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me," John xii. 32. Some of these reasons regard the honour of religion, for which God calls us to suffer. What can be more glorious for it than that peace, and joy, and firmness, with which it inspires its martyrs How ravishing is this religion, when it supports its disciples under the most cruel persecutions! How truly great does it appear, when it indemnifies them for the loss 2. The martyrdom of morality is rewarded of fortune, rank, and life; when it makes them by the testimony of conscience, and by the inefsee, through a shower of stones, the object of fable joys with which the heart is overwhelmtheir hope, and impels them to exclaim with ed. While the tribunals of the great condemn St. Stephen, "Behold, I see the heavens open- the Christian, an inward judge absolves him; ed, and the Son of Man standing on the right and the decrees of the former are reversed by hand of God!" Acts vii. 56. This is a third the latter. "Our rejoicing is this, the testimoview of martyrdom, and it would be as easy tony of our conscience. I suffer; nevertheless I increase the list as it is to make the application. Let us apply to martyrdom for duties, what we have said concerning martyrdom for doctrines, and we shall be obliged to conclude, that the same reasons establish the necessity of both.

Let us not pass lightly over this article. If there be a martyrdom of morality, how many apostles have we among us? How often have we denied our holy religion? How often, when it has been jeeringly said to us, "Thou also wast with Jesus," have we sneakingly replied, "I know not what thou sayest?"

am not ashamed, for I know on whom I have believed," 2 Cor. i. 12; 2 Tim. i. 12.

3. The moral martyr is rewarded by the approbation of good people. Indeed, suffrages will never be unanimous. There will always be in the world two opposite systems, one of virtue, another of sin. The partisans of a system of sin will always condemn the friends of virtue as the friends of virtue will always condemn the partisans of sin. You cannot be considered in the same light by two such different classes of judges. What the first account infamous, the last call glory; and the last will V. We come to our last article, the crown cover you with glory for what the first call of moral martyrdom. Here a new order of your shame. If you be obliged to choose one objects present themselves to our meditation. of the two parties to judge you, can you possiPardon me, if I cannot help deploring the loss bly hesitate a moment, on which to fix your or the suspension of that voice with which for choice? The prophet indemnitied himself by three and twenty years I have announced the an intercourse with the people of Gad, for the testimonies of God, so as to be clearly heard at injury done him, by the great. "Iain," said he, the remotest parts of this numerous auditory."a companion of all them that fear thee, and However, I will try to present to you at least a few of the truths which I dare not undertake to speak of in their utmost extent.

The martyrdom of morality! A man who ean say to God, as our prophet said, "I will

of them that keep thy, precepts," Ps. cxix. 33. Suffer me to sanctify here the profane praise which Lucan gate Pompey "The gods are

* Victrex Causa Dei. Placuit; Red Victa Catoni.

for Cesar, but Cato is for Pompey." Yes, the approbation of Cato is preferable to that of the gods! I mean those imaginary gods, who frequently usurp the rights of the true God.

SERMON LV.

BAD EDUCATION.

1 SAMUEL iii. 12, 13.

In that day, I will perform against Eli, all things which I have spoken concerning his house; when I begin, I will also make an end. For I have told him, that I will judge his house for ever, for the iniquity which he knoweth; because his sons made themselves vile and he restrained them not!

In fine, the martyr for morality is rewarded THE FATAL CONSEQUENCES OF A by the prerogatives of martyrdom. It would be inconvenient, in the close of a sermon, to discuss a question that would require a whole discourse; I mean that concerning degrees of glory, but that, if there be degrees of glory, the highest will be bestowed on martyrs, will admit of no dispute. This, I think, may be proved from many passages of Scripture. St. John seems to have taken pains to establish this doctrine in the Revelation: "He that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations, THESE words are part of a discourse which and he shall rule them with a rod of iron; as God addressed to young Samuel in a vision, the vessel of a potter shall they be broken into the whole history of which is well known to shivers," chap. ii. 26, 27. This regards mar- us all. We intend to fix our chief attention tyrs, and this seems to promise them pre-emi- on the misery of a parent, who neglects the nence. "Behold I come quickly; hold that education of his children: but before we confast which thou hast, that no man take thy sider the subject in this point of view, we will crown. Him that overcometh will I make a make three remarks tending to elucidate the pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall history. The crimes of the sons of Eli, the go no more out; and I will write upon him the indulgence of the unhappy father, and the name of my God, and the name of the city of punishment of that indulgence, demand our my God, which is new Jerusalem, which com- attention. eth down out of heaven from my God," chap. iii. 11, 12. This regards martyrs, and this seems to promise them pre-eminence. "What are these which are arrayed in white robes? and whence came they? These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the throne of God," chap. vii. 13-15. This regards martyrs, and this also seems to promise them pre-eminence.

Observe the crimes of the sons of Eli. They supported their debaucheries by the victims which the people brought to the tabernacle to be offered in sacrifice. The law assigned them the shoulders and the breasts of all the beasts sacrificed for peace-offerings: but, not content with these, they seized the portions which God had appointed to such as brought the offerings, and which he had commanded them to eat in his presence, to signify their communion with him. They drew these portions with fleshhooks out of the caldrons, in which they were boiling. Sometimes they took them raw, that they might have an opportunity of preparing them to their taste; and thus by serving themselves before God, they discovered a contempt for those just and charitable ends which God had in view, when he ordained that his ministers should live on a part of the sacrifices.God, by providing a table for the priests in his own house, intended to make it appear, that they had the honour of being his domestics, and, so to speak, that they lived on his revenue. This was a benevolent design. God also, by appointing the priests to eat after they had sacrificed, intended to make them understand that he was their sovereign, and the principal object of all the ceremonies performed in his palace. These were just views.

Christians, perhaps your minds are offended at the gospel of this day. Perhaps you are terrified at the career which we have been opening to you. Perhaps you are inwardly murmuring at this double martyrdom. Ah! rather behold "the great cloud of witnesses" with which you are compassed about, and congratulate yourselves that you fight under the same standard, and aspire at the same crown. Above all, "look unto Jesus, the author and finisher of faith, who endured such contradiction of sinners against himself;" and who, as the same apostle Paul speaks, not only endured the cross," but also "despised the shame." Hark! he speaks to you from the goal, and in this animating language addresses you, "If any man hear my voice, I will come in to him. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I The excesses of the table generally prepare also overcame, and am set down with my Fa- the way for debauchery; and the sons of Eli ther in his throne," Rev. iii. 20, 21. Happy having admitted the first, had fallen into the you, if you be accessible to such noble motives! last, so that they abused "the women that asHappy we, if we be able to say to God, in sembled at the door of the tabernacle of the that solemn day in which he will render to congregation," chap. ii. 22; and to such a deevery one according to his works, "I have gree had they carried these enormities that the preached righteousness in the great cofigrega- | people, who had been used to frequent the holy tion, Le, I have not refrained my lips, O place only for the purpose of rendering homLord, thou knowest; I freve not bid tiry righte-age to Almighty God, were drawn thither by ousness within my heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and thy salvation, I have not concealed thy loving kindness Withhold not thou thy tender mercies from me, O Lord!" God grant us this grace. Amen.

the abominable desire of gratifying the inclinations of his unworthy ministers. Such were the crimes of the sons of Eli.

Let us observe next the indulgence of the parent. He did not wholly neglect to correct his