FRIENDS AND PARISHIONERS, THE following discourse was delivered with a view to aid your seasonable improvement of the late alarming event, which has greatly agitated the public mind. For it required but little discernment, in consequence of the political connexion of the Combatants and the jarring state of the community to anticipate a partial and dangerous construction of the Combat. This evil which increases the darkness, in which the Union is deeply involved, we cannot but experience and depre cate. Your expressive concurrence with the design of the discourse, in requesting a copy for the Press, excites a trembling hope that my calculation was in a measure correct, and that the publication will prove more or less useful. Relying, therefore, on the candor of the Public, the influence and impartiality of all good men, who are under the guidance of heaven; to you, my friends, the Sermon which was composed amid toral avocations, is respectfully inscribed BY YOUR FRIEND pas AND HUMBLE SERVANT, THE AUTHOR. Wormser- Jan 14, 1946 A DISCOURSE, &c. EXODUS XX. 13. THOU SHALT NOT KILL. To folemnize and deeply imprefs the mind of man with the rule of life, God published the mor al law in the most awful and majestic manner. Hav. ing previously instructed Mofes to make all neceffary. arrangements and regulations amid the trembling congregation, at the foot, of Mount Sinai which was in vefted with the flame of his glory, the Lord defcend ed and delivered the Ten Commandments. The preface and the contents harmonize: "I am the Lord thy God." The Four first commands difplay the duty of man towards his Maker; and the fubfequent ones his duty towards his fellow-creatures. This divifion of moral precepts conftitutes what divines have ftyled the firft and fecond Tables of the Law. The diftinction is not useless for it marks a peculiar difference. Ac cordingly when Chrift gives us a fummary of the moral law, he says: "Thou fhalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart; and thy neighbor as thy felf." |