ing is only a way which God hath ordained, wherein we wait for his unmerited mercy; and wherein, without any desert of ours, he hath promised freely to give us his blessing.

3. Not that we are to imagine the performing the bare outward act will receive any blessing from God. "Is it such a fast that I have chosen, (saith the Lord:) a day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him?" Are these outward acts, however strictly performed, all that is meant by a man's "afflicting his soul?-Wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the Lord?" No surely. If it be a mere external service, it is all but lost labour. Such a performance may possibly afflict the body. But, as to the soul, it profiteth nothing.

4. Yea, the body may sometimes be afflicted too much, so as to be unfit for the works of our calling. This also we are diligently to guard against for we ought to preserve our health, as a good gift of God. Therefore care is to be taken, whenever we fast, to proportion the fast to our strength. For we may not offer God murder for sacrifice, or destroy our bodies to help our souls.

But at these solemn seasons, we may, even in great weakness of body, avoid that other extreme, for which God condemns those who of old expostulated with, him for not accepting their fasts. "Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not?-Behold in the day of your fast you find pleasure, saith the Lord." If we cannot wholly abstain from food, we may, at least, abstain from pleasant food; and then we shall not seek his face in vain.

5. But let us take care to afflict our souls as well as our bodies. Let every season, either of public or private fasting, be a season of exercising all those holy affections, which are implied in a broken and contrite heart. Let it be a season of devout mourning, of godly sorrow for sin such a sorrow as that of the Corinthians, concerning which the Apostle saith, "I rejoice, not that ye were made sorry, but that ye sorrowed to repentance. For ye were made sorry after a

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godly manner, that ye might receive damage by us in nothing. For godly sorrow" (n xara EOY AUT) the sorrow which is according to God, which is a precious gift of his Spirit, lifting the soul to God from whom it flows, "worketh repentance to salvation, not to be repented of." Yea, and let our sorrowing after a godly sort, work in us the same inward and outward repentance; the same entire change of heart, renewed after the image of God, in righteousness and true holiness; and the same change of life, till we are holy as he is holy in all manner of conversation. Let it work in us the same carefulness, to be found in him, without spot and blameless; the same clearing of ourselves, by our lives rather than words, by our abstaining from ali appearance of evil; the same indignation, vehement abhorrence of every sin; the same fear of our own deceitful hearts: the same desire to be in all things conformed to the holy and acceptable will of God; the same zeal for whatever may be a mean of his glory, and of our growth in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ: and the same revenge against Satan and all his works, against all filthiness both of flesh and spirit, 2 Cor. vii. 9, &c.

6. And with fasting let us always join fervent prayer, pouring out our whole souls before God, confessing our sins with all their aggravations, humbling ourselves under his mighty hand, laying open before him all our wants, all our guiltiness and helplessness. This is a season for enlarging our prayers, both in behalf of ourselves and of our brethren. Let us now bewail the sins of our people, and cry aloud for the city of our God: that the Lord may build up Zion, and cause his face to shine on her desolations. Thus we may observe the men of God, in ancient times, always joined prayer and fasting together. Thus the Apostles in all the instances cited above: and thus our Lord joins them in the discourse before us.

7. It remains only, in order to our observing such a fast as is acceptable to the Lord, that we add alms thereto; works of mercy, after our power, both to the bodies and souls of men. "With such sacrifices also God is well pleased."

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Thus the angel declares to Cornelius, fasting and praying in his house, "Thy prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial before God," Acts x. 4. And this God himself expressly and largely declares, "Is not this the fast that I have chosen? To loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out, to thy house? When thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thy own flesh? Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily; and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the Lord shall be thy rereward. Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer: thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here I am.-If [when thou fastest] thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul: then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon-day. And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make thy bones fat: and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose waters fail not,” Isa. lviii. 6, &c.

SERMON XXX.

DISCOURSE VIII.

ON OUR LORD's SERMON ON THE MOUNT.

Lay

MATTHEW VI. 19-23.

not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:

"But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:

"For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. "The light of the body is the eye: if therefore, thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. “But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is within thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!"

1. FROM those which are commonly termed Religious Actions, and which are real Branches of true Religion, where they spring from a pure and holy intention, and are performed in a manner suitable thereto, our Lord proceeds to the actions of common life, and shews that the same purity of intention, is as indispensably required in our ordinary business, as in giving alms, or fasting, or prayer.

And without question, the same purity of intention, "which makes our alms and devotions acceptable, must

also make our labour or employment, a proper offering to God. If a man pursues his business, that he may raise himself to a state of figure and riches in the world, he is no longer serving God in his employment, and has no more title to a reward from God, than he who gives alms that he may be seen, or prays that he may be heard of men. For vain and earthly designs are no more allowable in our employments, than in our alms and devotions. They are not only evil when they mix with our good works, with our religious actions, "but they have the same evil nature when they enter into the common business of our employments. If it were allowable to pursue them in our worldly employments, it would be allowable to pursue them in our devotions. But as our alms and devotions are not an acceptable service, but when they proceed from a pure intention, so our common employment cannot be reckoned a service to him, but when it is performed with the same piety of heart."

2. This our blessed Lord declares in the liveliest manner, in those strong and comprehensive words which he explains, enforces, and enlarges upon, throughout this whole chapter. "The light of the body is the eye. If therefore, thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light; but if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness." The eye is the intention: what the eye is to the body, the intention is to the soul. As the one guides all the motions of the body, so does the other those of the soul. This eye of the soul is then said to be single, when it looks at one thing only; when we have no other design, but to "know God, and Jesus Christ whom he hath sent :" to know him with suitable affections, loving him as he hath loved us to please God in all things: to serve God (as we love him) with all our heart, and mind, and soul, and strength and to enjoy God in all,—and above all things, in time and in eternity.

3. "If thine eye be thus single," thus fixed on God, "thy whole body shall be full of light." "Thy whole body,"-All that is guided by the intention, as the body is by