idleness; they inflame inquisitiveness; they betray secrets; they excite quarrels; they prolong dissentions. Hear with what accuracy they are characterized in the Scriptures. "A serpent will bite; and a babbler is no better. The words of a talc-bearer are wounds. A tale-bearer revealeth secrets. He that repeateth a matter separateth very friends." "Where no wood is, the fire goeth out: so where there is no tale-bearer, the strife ceaseth." Hear the positive commands of God. "Thou shalt not go up and down as a tale-bearer among thy people." "Let none of you suffer as a busy-body in other men's matters. Study to be quiet and do your own business." The constant object of Jesus Christ was to be employed about that great business for which his Father had sent him into the world. Let it be your constant object to attend to that momentous concern, for which our Father who is in heaven hath sent you into the world. Repeat not the proceedings or the purposes of your neighbor, except in such a manner as may tend to edification. "The Lord hateth him that soweth discord among brethren." "For every idle word that men shall speak they shall give an account in the day of judgment." VII. We are now to consider those offences, which fall under the general description of deceit. Of these the most prominent is open falschood. It is by the bands of truth that society is held together. It is in sincerity and truth that we are to serve God. The liar destroys the foundation of all confidence, whether in the public dealings of men one with another, or in the retirement of domestic life. The evils which the violation of truth produces are so manifest; the difficulty of guarding against its effects is so great; and the indignation with which men, with whatever indifference they behold their neighbor's sin as committed against God, condemn it when prejudicial to themselves, is so prompt; that he who is notoriously guilty of lying is held in general abhorrence; and even those who abandon themselves to other branches of wickedness, and scarcely pretend to pay an exterior regard to religion, are solicitous to maintain a character for veracity, and resent the imputation of a lie as the grossest of injuries. But the opinions of men concerning offences against men are of little importance, when compared with the estimation in which breaches of the Divine law are viewed by Almighty God. God is a God of truth. He requires truth in the inward parts, in the heart. Every departure from truth he marks as a sin

against Himself. "Ye shall not deal falsely, nor lic one to another: I am the Lord."

The falsehood, however, of the lips frequently shows itself in the form of slander. The obnoxious individual who could not be ensnared or deceived by an open breach of truth, may be overwhelmed by secret calumny. Evil reports may be raised and privately diffused concerning him: reports, which, while their author lies concealed, may execute their office abroad in open day; and hastening from lip to lip, from door to door, from circle to circle, may undermine his good name, defeat his honest undertakings, blight his reasonable hopes, inflame his ancient adver saries, embody a new host of foes, and poison the minds of his nearest friends with suspicion and distrust. Slander is but a more refined, and therefore a more mischievous mode of lying. Are you then surprised at the decision of the wise king: "He that hideth hatred with lying lips, and he that uttereth a slander, is a fool?" Well may he be pronounced memorable for folly, who remembereth not that the words of his lips are recorded against the day of retribution. Do you wonder at the declaration of the Psalmist, that "whoso privily slandereth his neighbor shall be cut off" that if any man would dwell in the presence of the Most High, he must be one who "backbiteth not with his tongue, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbor?" Is not the language of the New Testament on this subject full of agreement. with that of the Old? Does not St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Romans, name "backbiters" among the greatest offenders? Does not he expressly warn the Corinthians against "backbiting" as a great offence? Does not he pointedly express both to Timothy and Titus the sinfulness of "false accusers?"

What were the engines of sin by which ruin was brought upon mankind? An open falschood and a disguised slander. An open falsehood: for the devil unequivocally averred, that man should not dic, though he should eat of the fruit of the forbidden tree. A disguised slander: for the insinuating tempter imputed to God other motives than the true one, motives even of jealousy and selfishness, for prohibiting man from cating of it. Hence the devil is pronounced by our Saviour to be a liar, and the father of lies. Hence, too, the Jews, as liars, are pronounced to be the children of the devil. As the imitators, the slaves, the children of the devil, all liars, whether they deal in open falschood, or in

lurking slander, are objects of detestation to Almighty God."A lying tongue the Lord hateth: lying lips are an abomination to the Lord." "All liars shall have their part in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone."

There is yet another garb which deceit wears, that of flattery. In this garb you veil deceit, when you ascribe to another that praise to which you do not believe him to be entitled: or convey to him in any manner tinctured with insincerity the applause which you apprehend him to deserve. In the first case, the flattery is direct lying: in the second if not in the first also, it is hypocrisy. The flatterer exaggerates the excellence of the persons whom he purposes to conciliate; knowingly represents them as more virtuous, or more powerful, or more wise, or more useful, or more valued, than he deems to be the fact: approaches them with looks and gestures of studied complaisance; addresses them with an assumed air of humility, admiration or attachment; and hesitates not, for the sake of forwarding his own selfish designs, to fawn upon their humors, to encourage their prejudices, to affect their opinions, to aggravate their resentments, to slander any object of their dislike, or even to panegyrize and stimulate their vices. He utters smooth words to deceive. The "words of his mouth" will be "smoother than butter" when "war is in" his heart: his words will be "softer than oil," when they are intended to act as drawn "swords." "He speaketh vanity with his neighbor: with flattering lips and with a double heart doth he speak." But his doom is already on record: "All flattering lips the Lord shall cut off."

My brethren; you affirm yourselves to be the disciples of Christ Jesus. Look then to your pattern. He did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. If you would love life and see good days; refrain your tongue from evil, and your lips that they speak no guilc. Of those who are described in the book of Revelations as redeemed from among men, the first-fruits unto God and the Lamb, one characteristic is, that "in their mouth was found no guile." And in the same portentous book the world is repeatedly forewarned that "whosoever loveth and maketh a lie," shall not enter into the New Jerusalem, the kingdom of the Lord Jesus.

VIII. Let me, in the next place, call upon you to unite in detesting all sins of the tongue which are violations of modesty. On a subject so disgusting I shall not enlarge. But I must

solemnly deliver to you the testimonies of the Scriptures against every one who is guilty of such offences. Indecent conversation is stigmatized in Holy Writ by the name of "filthiness." "Put off all filthy communication from your mouth. Let not filthiness once be named among you." There is indeed no sin which is more odious in its nature, more expressive of a depraved and polluted heart. Let not any one imagine that the offence is diminished in the sight of God, when the licentious meaning is obscured by ambiguous language, or lurks under distant allusions. God looks into the bosom, and sees all its abominations. Christ hath called you unto holiness. You are required to be holy, as he was holy; pure, as he was pure. A true Christian will not only watch over his lips, that he may not inadvertently overstep the bounds of delicacy, nor approach so near to them as to be in danger of trespassing: but he will shun and discountenance all discourse, which leads to temptation. "It is a shame," saith the Apostle, "to speak of such things as are done in secret,” by the wicked. "No unclean person hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God."

IX. I close the gloomy catalogue of sins of the tongue with one, which in presumption exceeds all others, profaneness.

This sin comprehends every irreverent expression concerning the Deity, his titles, his attributes, his providence, his revciation, his judgments. Sometimes it exercises itself in speaking against the Most High, in vilifying Him by scofling at his laws, sneering at his ordinances, deriding the doctrines of his inspired Word. Sometimes it displays itself in malice against men; in calling down vengeance from heaven on those who are made after the similitude of God. It fills every degree in the scale of guilt, from the slightest word of contempt against religion, and of disrespect towards God, to the most daring blasphemy: from the most careless expression implying a wish that a small evil from above may overtake another, to the deepest curses of everlasting damnation. Murder, perjury, and atheism are in its train. Its language is fit to be the language only of fiends. Its path leads to the habitation of the fiends.

"Above all things," my brethren, "swear not: that ye fall not into condemnation." "Let your communication be yea, yea, nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these, cometh of evil." "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain: for

the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.” There are persons who persuade themselves that they disapprove profaneness, and seem to hold themselves guiltless, while they persevere in the daily, perhaps hourly practice of it. Who are thesc self deceivers? They who introduce the names of God and of Christ, and other kindred terms, in fashionable asseverations, or in exclamations of surprise, of hope, of disappointment, or in some other light manner, into their ordinary discourse. Do they affirm that the offence with which they are charged is but an idle habit: that the objectionable words drop from their tongues without intentional irreverence, without being perceived? Miserable and vain excuses! How hackneyed in profane irreverence is your tongue, if the most awful expressions are become familiar expletives! How reiterated has been the sound, if your ear is dead to the impression! If a lively fear and a fervent love of your Maker and your Redeemer prevailed in your bosom; it is impossible that you could thus trifle with their sacred names. Your heart would smite you at the thought. The sound would die away upon your lips. If you can use such expressions yourself; if you can hear them used without pain: examine your breast. There is delusion on the surface; it is well if there be not hypocrisy at the bottom.

Consider, ye who are guilty of any species of profaneness, the example of Him of whom you repute yourselves the disciples. In public and in private, how replete with reverence and love to God was his conversation! With what high respect did He always mention the Scriptures! How truly did the language of His lips accord with his practical benevolence to men! Will He receive to himself the blasphemer, the scoffer, the man whose mouth poureth out curses, or him who obstinately persists in irreverent discourse? "The law," the law of condemnation, "is made for the unholy and the profane."

Suffer me to add, in conclusion, some few general remarks, relating to all offences of the tongue, and leading to a due application of the text.

Though for the sake of clearness I have treated separately concerning separate sins of the tongue, it is seldom that any one of them comes singly. Or if at first unattended, it does not long continue solitary. The evil spirit which has occupied the mansion prepares it for others worse than himself. Thus the impatient