"Wo unto you scribes and pharifees, hypocrites, for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excefs.-Ye are like unto whited fepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleannefs; even fo ye alfo outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrify and iniquity. Mat. xxiii. 25. 27.

And more particularly that ftrong expreffion, (Mat. v. 28.) "Whofoever looketh on a woman, to luft after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart."

There can be no doubt with any reflecting mind, but that the propenfities of our nature must be subjected to regulation; but the question is, where the check ought to be placed, upon the thought, or only upon action. In this queftion, our Saviour, in the texts here quoted, has pronounced a decifive judgement. He makes the control

of thought essential. Internal purity with him is every thing. Now I contend that this is the only difcipline which can fucceed: in other words, that a moral fyftem, which prohibits actions, but leaves the thoughts at liberty, will be ineffectual, and is therefore unwife. I know not how to go about the proof of a point, which depends upon experience, and upon a knowledge of the human conftitution, better than by citing the judgement of perfons, who appear to have given great attention to the fubject, and to be well qualified to form a true opinion about it. Boerhaave, speaking of this very declaration of our Saviour, "Whofoever looketh on a woman to luft after her, hath already committed adultery with her in his heart," and understanding it, as we do, to contain an injunction to lay the check upon the thoughts, was wont to fay, that "our Saviour knew mankind better than Socrates." Haller, who has recorded this faying of Boerhaave's, adds to it the following remarks of his own * : "It did not escape the obser* Letters to his Daughter.

vation of our Saviour, that the rejection of any evil thoughts was the best defence against vice; for when a debauched person fills his imagination with impure pictures, the licentious ideas which he recalls, fail not to ftimulate his defires with a degree of violence which he cannot refift. This will be followed by gratification, unless some external obftacle should prevent him from the commiffion of a fin, which he had internally refolved on. ""Every moment of time (fays our author) that is spent in meditations upon fin, increases the power of the dangerous object which has poffeffed our imagination." I suppose these reflections will be generally affented to.

III. Thirdly, had a teacher of morality been asked concerning a general principle of conduct, and for a fhort rule of life; and had he inftructed the perfon who confulted him "conftantly to refer his actions to what he believed to be the will of his Creator, and constantly to have in view, not his own intereft and gratification alone, but

the

the happiness and comfort of those about him," he would have been thought I doubt

not, in any age of the world, and in any even the most improved state of morals, to have delivered a judicious anfwer: because, by the first direction, he fuggefted the only motive which acts fteadily and uniformly, in fight and out of fight, in familiar occurrences and under preffing temptations; and in the fecond, he corrected, what, of all tendencies in the human character, ftands moft in need of correction, felfishness, or a contempt of other men's conveniency and satisfaction. In eftimating the value of a moral rule, we are to have regard, not only to the particular duty, but the general spirit; not only to what it directs us to do, but to the character which a compliance with its direction is likely to form in us. So, in the present inftance, the rule here recited will never fail to make him who obeys it confiderate, not only of the rights, but of the feelings of other men, bodily and mental, in great matters and in small; of the eafe, the accommodation, the felf-compla

cency of all with whom he has any concern, efpecially of all who are in his power, or dependent upon his will,

Now what, in the most applauded philofopher of the most enlightened age of the world, would have been deemed worthy of his wisdom, and of his character, to fay, our Saviour hath faid, and upon just such an occasion as that which we have feigned.

"Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and faying, Mafter, which is the great commandment in the law? Jefus faid unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy foul, and with all thy mind; this is the first and great commandment and the fecond is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." Mat. xxii. 35-40. ]

The fecond precept occurs in St. Matthew, on another occafion fimilar to this