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the Commandments of the second table like those of the first, and considered that if I do not love my brother whom I see with my bodily eyes, I cannot feel much affection to Him Whom I can see only with the eyes of faith?

2. Have I remembered that in most cases the only way I have of showing my love to GoD is by loving my neighbours for His sake? Have I been sufficiently thankful that when to mortal eyes He withdrew Himself from the earth, He left these behind Him as His representatives, and told me that He would consider what I did to them as if I had done it to Him?

3. Have I always remembered that the first and earliest of these representatives of GOD are my parents? Have I rendered them always such love, honour, and obedience as is due to those who to me stand in the place of GoD upon earth.

4. Have I seen the breadth of this Commandment, and considered that as a subject my sovereign, as a Christian my Bishop and the Priest of my parish, as a servant my master, as a subject the magistrates, stand to me in the light of a parent-to be honoured and obeyed not so much for their own sakes as because in obeying them I obey GOD?

5. Have I always applied to these particular cases our SAVIOUR'S general rule, and asked myself, if I were a parent, a sovereign, a priest, or a magistrate, how would I have my children, my subjects, my parishioners, or my fellow-citizens, behave to me?

Does my conscience accuse me―

(1.) Of disrespect to my parents, including sulkiness and bad temper, as well as disobedience? (2.) Of consorting with disloyal persons or reading and taking a pleasure in disloyal newspapers? (3.) Of being discontented with the minister whom GOD has provided for me, and heaping to myself teachers ?

(4.) Of schism and disloyalty to my Church, dividing that which CHRIST prayed might be one?

Have I considered this Fifth Commandment as the

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foundation of all the Commandments of the second table, and as the link which connects them with those of the first? Have I been the more careful about every thing that relates to it for this reason?

6. Have I considered that by attaching a promise to this alone of all the Commandments, GOD intended to draw my attention particularly towards it? Have I reflected on the peculiar value of that promise to a Christian, and remembered what inheritance was promised to me, and when it was promised?

LECTURE VII.

THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT.

I am afraid I am speaking to most people's experience, when I ask them if they do not remember how much more they thought of a sin the first time they committed it, than they thought of the same sin when they had committed it before, and yet the sin is the same sin in reality, and, what concerns us more, appears the same sin in the eye of GOD. We say, in common talk, that a man's conscience has got blunted, and, as it were, does not cut him so sharply, because it has been so often put to the same use before. This certainly is true, but it would be more true and more Scriptural to say that the HOLY GHOST, who, from our baptism forward, had made His abode within us, has withdrawn from us when we resisted Him, by committing the sin first; perhaps He has not altogether withdrawn or gone away, but, at all events, He is not so much present with us as He was; and therefore our conscience, which is His weapon, does not give us so much uneasiness.

This is the only way in which we can account for one sin; that is to say, the breaking of one Commandment, giving us so much more pain than the breaking of another, though we know and say all the while that there is

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no one Commandment of more consequence than another in God's sight. This is how we come to think of great sins and little sins, whereas the only difference between a great sin and a little sin in GoD's sight is, that one is a habit, and the other is a sin of infirmity. The one is a sin not repented, and the other is a sin repented; in all other respects a sin means an act of disobedience to GOD, and thus, shocking as it may be for us to reflect upon, a man who has got a habit of swearing, or a habit of lying, or a habit of petty stealing, may be in God's sight more guilty than a man who has committed a murder.

It is through God's mercy in making this sin so rare among us, that we think so much about it. I suppose if a man were murdered within ten miles of us, the whole village would be full of it, every one would be wondering how a man could be so wicked as to commit so great a sin; so far. we are quite right, it is a subject of wonder, but is it not equally a subject of wonder that there should be a great many men among us who commit sins as great by breaking other Commandments of equal value as the Sixth? and is it not a much greater cause of wonder that the only reason why we cannot see this is, that so many people are committing the same sin, that we get quite used to it? We should think just as little of murder did it happen as often.

I have just been reading an old historian, who, living in the time of Edward the Third, wrote the account of his wars in France; he tells us not only how many men were killed in this or that battle, which, if the war be lawful, may possibly be justifiable in the sight of GOD; but every now and then he tells us also such stories as that some general had some friend of his killed at the taking of such a place, and had all the women and children in it put to death. In another place we hear of a town burnt, and all the inhabitants put to death, because one great lord had a quarrel with another.

Now the wonderful thing here is, not that these great sins were committed, but that the historian, who was a clergyman, relates them as matters of course, things that must happen in every war, not indeed exactly to be ap

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proved of, but not deserving of any particular condemnation. Nor ought we greatly to blame the historian for this; a man writing now of some popular and common sin, such as the breaking of the Seventh Commandment, things that I am sorry to say we hear of and read of every day, might, and often does, write of it with as much unconcern as Froissart writes about the breaking of the Sixth Commandment in his day. Let us learn from this at least one lesson, not to think a sin great, only because it is unusual, for if we do, God may well punish us by making it common among us. We are shocked at the breaking of the Sixth Commandment; it is a very wholesome feeling, let us encourage it, for it was not so with us always; not two hundred years ago murder was a very common thing: the way to encourage it is, by guarding ourselves strictly against those things that lead to murder; that is to say, anger, jealousy, discontent at our rulers; sedition, consorting with seditious men, holding light the great peacemaker which CHRIST has placed among us, His Church. These are the things which two hundred years ago brought murder into the country, and caused it to be as lightly thought of as any other crime; and these things, if encouraged, may bring it in again, or rather, God may give us up to our own devices, and may suffer us to eat of the bitter fruit of our own planting.

Bearing in mind these things, let us ask ourselves a few questions on the manner in which we have kept the Sixth Commandment.

QUESTIONS FOR SELF-EXAMINATION.

THOU SHALT DO NO MURrder.

I thank my GOD that hitherto He has forborne to punish our grievous national sins of disrespect to His Name and His Church, as He did those of our forefathers, and that instances of murder are so rare now, that their frequency has not diminished the horror which an unblunted conscience always feels at the sight of any new sin. I thank my God, who has removed this temptation

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far from me; but have I remembered that out of the heart proceed murders?

1. Let me reflect therefore.

2. Have I ever let my temper get the better of me, and used angry and irritating words towards my neighbour, encouraging thereby bad feelings in my self, and provoking them in him. Have I ever felt a desire to return evil for evil, or railing for railing?

3. Have I ever wished evil to my neighbour, and encouraged anger in my heart though I did not show it in my outward conduct?

4. Have I, for instance, ever allowed my thoughts to run upon the evils any person has brought upon me, or the injuries he has done me, instead of submitting myself to these things, as punishments sent from GOD, like sickness or any other calamity, and forcing myself to think of evil men not as of my enemies, but as a sword of Thine ?"

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5. When therefore others spoke of me unjustly, has my first thought, after having done my best to clear my character, been, For what sin of mine has God brought this punishment on me?

6. Have I ever accustomed myself to reflect and meditate on the benefit that would or might accrue to me from the death of such and such individuals, and have I ever attempted to soften that sin to my conscience by some such conventional phrase, as "expectations" or "possible contingencies ?”

7. Have I always remembered with thankfulness that many of these things which might otherwise easily have escaped my observation, were pointed out to me by my Heavenly Master Himself? Have I shown my thankfulness for this great kindness, by attending to His explanations, and guarded against any approach to the breaking of this Commandment, the more carefully, out of respect and reverence to His gracious warning?