fpirit, and dignity of mind. Vain pomp, luxury, and extravagance, are styled taste, elegance, and refinement. Sordid avarice, and love of money, calls itfelf prudence, frugality, and good management. Levity, folly, and even obfcenity, is often called innocent liberty, chearfulness, and good humour. So great is the deceit, and fo fecure does the fin ly un der its difguife, that a minifter may preach with the utmost severity against these several vices, and the guilty perfons hear with patience or approbation, and never once think of applying it to themselves.

This deceit difcovers itself alfo by its counterpart. How common is it to ftigmatize and disparage true piety and goodness by the most opprobrions titles. Tenderness of confcience, is, by many, reproached under the character of precifenefs and narrowness of mind. Zeal against fin, and fidelity to the fouls of others, is called fournefs, morofenefs, and ill-nature. There was never yet a faithful reprover, from Lot in Sodom to the present day, but he suffered under the reproach and flander of those who would not be reclaimed. I might eafily run over many more inftances in both thefe kinds; for, to fay the truth, the whole ftrain of fashionable converfation is often nothing else but an illufion put upon the mind, that it may lofe its horror of vice; and it is greatly to be lamented, that this is done with fo much fuccefs. In many cafes, young perfons especially, are inspired with a hatred and averfion at true and undefiled religion, and that under the most plausible pretences. Many, my brethren, there are who are far from thinking it themselves, and yet fall under the depun

ciation of the Prophet Ifaiah, v. 20,-24.

< unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for fweet, and fweet for bitter. Wo un• to them that are wife in their own eyes, and pru' dent in their own fight. Wo unto them that are

mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to ⚫ mingle strong drink: which juftify the wicked for reward, and take away the righteoufnefs of the righteous from him. Therefore, as the fire devoureth the ftubble, and the flame confumeth the chaff, fo their root fhall be as rottennefs, and their ⚫ bloffom fhall go up as duft; because they have caft away the law of the Lord of Hofts, and defpifed • the word of the holy One of Ifrael.

(3.) But the highest degree of this branch of the deceitfulness of fin, is, when it not only puts on a decent and lawful appearance, but affumes the garb of eminent piety and worth. There is nothing impoffible in this. As Satan fometimes transforms himfelf into an angel of light, fo fome of the greatest fins will take the name, and arrogate the honour, of the moft diftinguished virtues. I do not here mean the cafe of grofs hypocrify; that is foreign from the prefent fubject. Hypocrites know their own infincerity well enough, and only put on an appearance of piety, to deceive others. But even when there is no known or deliberate hypocrify, fin may infinuate itfelf under the appearance of the most important duties. Men may indulge the most hateful paffions with the greater liberty, when they think they are doing what is acceptable to God.

The crofs of our bleffed Mafter is full fraught with inftruction of every kind. It gives us, particularly, a ftriking example of what I have now faid. His enemies, who perfecuted him with unrelenting malice through his life, and at laft prevailed to have him hanged on a tree, did it, (fome, no doubt, from a pretended, but) many of them, from a misguided zeal for religion. He was crucified as a deceiver, and a blafphemer; and that in this they were mifled, appears from the language of his prayer for them on the crofs, 'Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.' What a conviction fhould this give us of the deceitfulness of fin; that the greatest fin that ever was committed on earth, was yet confidered, by the guilty, as a duty!

Let us alfo confider our Saviour's remarkable prediction on the fame fubject, and how often it hath been fulfilled: John xvi. 2. They fhall put you ⚫ out of the fynagogues; yea, the time cometh, that • whofoever killeth you, will think that he doth God * fervice.' My brethren, think a little on the many dreadful perfecutions which good men have endured for confcience fake; the terrible tortures they have been expofed to, in which the utmost invention of the human mind has been employed to aggravate their diftrefs. Think, in particular, of the horrible tribunal of Inquifition, which is, to this day, in full authority in countries not very diftant; and does it not infpire you with the higheft deteftation of the bloody tyrants? But there is another reflexion not fo frequently made, yet at least equally proper. How great is the deceitfulness of fin in the human heart,

that can make men fuppofe that fuch atrocious crimes are acceptable to God? Yet they certainly do fo. Neither would it be poffible for them, fo entirely, to divest themselves of every fentiment of humanity, if they were not inflamed by the rage of bigotry and falfe zeal. Let not any imagine, that thefe are dreadful crimes, but which they are not in the leaft danger of. We ought to maintain the greateft watchfulness and jealousy over our own spirits. It may yery easily, and does very frequently happen, that an apparent zeal for religion is more than half composed of pride, malice, envy, or revenge.

Nor is this all. In the above cafes, by the treachery of the human heart, fins are changed into duties, and, in many others, every day, duties are changed into fins, by the perverfion of the principle from which they ought to flow. Many a fober, tempe rate perfon oweth his regularity more to a luft of gold, than to any fenfe of duty, and obedience to God. The defire of praife, or the fear of reproach, is many times a reftraint more powerful than the apprehenfion of eternal judgment, Men may put one duty alfo in the place of another, and by that means convert it into fin. Nay, with regard to all our duties, we may be tempted to place that truft and dependence on them which is only due to our Redeeníer's perfect righteousness; and, instead of acts of obedience, make them idols of jealoufy before God.

How great then the deceitfulness of fin, which is capable of putting on fo many and fo artful difguifes, and even to counterfeit true piety, which stands in the most immediate and direct opposition to it!

There are more ways than I can poffibly enumerate, by which men deceive themselves, and become obstihate and incorrigible in what is evil, by mistaking it for what is good. Juftly does the Apostle, in this paffage, warn Christians against being hardened; for if fin can hardly be reftrained, even by the moft constant vigilance, and the most steady resistance, what progrefs will it not make, what ftrength must it not acquire, when it is approved and cherished, nay, when it is profecuted with all that care and attention which ought to have been employed for its utter deftruction?

2. In the fecond place, The deceitfulness of fin, appears from its forming excufes for itself, and thereby extenuating its guilt. That it is natural for finners to form excufes for themselves, and endeavour to extenuate their guilt, daily experience is a fufficient proof. Nay, it is ufual to obferve, how able, and ingenious, perfons, otherwife of no great capacity, are in this art; even children discover the greateft quickness and facility in it, and are no fooner challenged for any thing that is amifs, than they are ready to produce an apology. The difpofition, indeed, feems to be hereditary, and to have been handed down to us from the first parents of the human race. On their being challenged for their difobedience, each of them confeffes the fact, but imme diately adds an excufe, Gen. iii. 11, 12, 13. Haft ⚫ thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee, that thou fhouldeft not eat? And the man faid, the woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat. And the Lord