serve them, not only as disrespectful to the day and inftitution, but as proceeding from a fecret contempt of the Chriftian faith-that confequently they diminifh a reverence for religion in others, fo far as the authority of our opinion, or the efficacy of our example reaches; or rather, fo far as either will ferve for an excufe of negligence to those who are glad of any -that as to cards and dice, which put in their claim to be confidered among the harmless occupations of a vacant hour, it may be observed, that few find any difficulty in refraining from play on Sunday, except they who fit down to it, with the views and eagernefs of gamefters; that gaming is feldom innocentthat the anxiety and perturbations, however, which it excites, are inconfiftent with the tranquillity, and frame of temper, in which the duties and thoughts of religion fhould always both find, and leave usand lastly, we shall remark, that the example of other countries, where the fame or greater license is allowed, affords no apology for irregularities in our own; because a practice which is tolerated by public ufage, neither receives the fame construction, nor gives the fame offence, as where it is cenfured and prohibited.

Chapter IX.

OF REVERENCING THE DEITY.

IN many perfons, a seriousness, and sense of awe, overfpread the imagination, whenever the idea of the Supreme Being is prefented to their thoughts. This effect, which forms a confiderable fecurity against vice, is the confequence not fo much of reflection, as of habit; which habit being generated by the external expreffions of reverence, which we use ourselves, or observe in others, may be destroyed by caufes oppofite to these, and especially by that familiar levity with which fome learn to speak of the Deity, of his attributes, providence, revelations, or worship.

God hath been pleased, no matter for what reafon, although probably for this, to forbid the vain

mention of his name-"Thou fhalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain." Now the mention is vain, when it is useless; and it is useless, when it is neither likely nor intended to serve any good purpose; as when it flows from the lips idle and unmeaning, or is applied upon occafions inconfiftent with any confideration of religion or devotion, to express our anger, our earneftnefs, our courage, or our mirth; or indeed, when it is used at all, except in acts of religion, or in ferious and feafonable difcourfe upon religious fubjects.

The prohibition of the third commandment is recognized by Chrift, in his fermon upon the mount, which fermon adverts to none but the moral parts of the Jewish law. "I fay unto you, fwear not at all; but let your communication be yea yea, nay nay; for whatfoever is more than thefe, cometh of evil." The Jews probably interpreted the prohibition as reftrained to the name Jehovah, the name which the Deity had appointed and appropriated to himfelf. Exod. vi. 3. The words of Chrift extend the prohibition beyond the name of God, to every thing affociated with the idea. "Swear not, neither by heaven, for it is God's throne; nor by the earth, for it is his footftool; neither by Jerufalem, for it is the city of the Great King." Matt. v. 35.

The offence of profane fwearing is aggravated by the confideration, that in it duty and decency are facrificed to the flendereft of temptations. Suppose the habit, either from affectation, or by negligence and inadvertency, to be already formed, it must always remain within the power of the most ordinary refolution to correct it, and it cannot, one would think, coft a great deal to relinquish the pleasure and honour which it confers. A concern for duty is in fact never ftrong, when the exertion, requifite to vanquish a habit founded in no antecedent propenfity, is thought too much or too painful. A contempt of positive duties, or rather of those duties from which the reafon is not fo plain as the command, indicates a difpofition upon which the

authority of revelation has obtained little influence. This remark is applicable to the offence of profane fwearing, and defcribes, perhaps, pretty exactly, the general character of those who are most addicted to it. Mockery and ridicule, when exercifed upon the fcriptures, or even upon the places, perfons, and forms fet apart for the miniftration of religion, fall within the mifchief of the law which forbids the profanation of God's name; efpecially as that law is extended by Chrift's interpretation. They are, moreover, inconfiftent with a religious frame of mind: for, as no one ever either feels himself difpofed to pleasantry, or capable of being diverted with the pleafantry of others, upon matters in which he is deeply interefted; fo a mind, intent upon the acquifition of heaven, rejects with indignation, every attempt to entertain it with jefts, calculated to degrade or deride fubjects, which it never recollects but with seriousnefs and anxiety. Nothing but ftupidity, or the moft frivolous diflipation of thought, can make even the inconfiderate forget the fupreme importance of every thing which relates to the expectation of a future existence. Whilft the infidel mocks at the fuperftitions of the vulgar, infults over their credulous fears, their childifh errors, or fantastic rites, it does not occur to him to obferve, that the moft prepofterous device by which the weakeft devotee ever believed he was fecuring the happinefs of a future life, is more rational than unconcern about it. Upon this fubject nothing is fo abfurd, as indifference-no folly fo contemptible, as thoughtleffness and levity.

Finally, the knowledge of what is due to the folemnity of thofe interefts, concerning which revelation profeffes to inform and direct us, may teach even those who are leaft inclined to refpect the prejudices of mankind, to obferve a decorum in the ftyle and conduct of religious difquifitions, with the neglect of which, many adverfaries of Chriftianity are justly chargeable. Serious arguments are fair on all fides. Chriftianity is but ill defended by refufing

audience or toleration to the objections of unbeliev ers. But whilst we would have freedom of inquiry reftrained by no laws, but thofe of decency, we are entitled to demand on behalf of a religion, which holds forth to mankind affurances of immortality, that its credit be affailed by no other weapons than those of fober difcuffion and legitimate reafoning-that the truth or falfehood of Christianity be never made a topic of raillery, a theme for the exercife of wit or eloquence, or a fubject of contention for literary fame and victory; that the cause be tried upon its meritsthat all applications to the fancy, paffions or prejudices of the reader, all attempts to pre-occupy, enfnare, or perplex his judgment, by any art, influence, or impreffion whatsoever, extrinfic to the proper grounds and evidence upon which his affent ought to proceed, be rejected from a queftion which involves in its determination, the hopes, the virtue, and the repofe of millions-that the controverfy be managed on both fides with fincerity, that is, that nothing be produced in the writings of either, contrary to, or beyond, the writer's own knowledge and perfuafion -that objections and difficulties be propofed from no other motives, than an honeft and serious defire to obtain fatisfaction, or to communicate information which may promote the discovery and progrefs of truth; that in conformity with this defign, every thing be stated with integrity, with method, precision, and fimplicity; and, above all, that whatever is pub. lifhed in oppofition to received and confeffedly beneficial perfuafions, be fet forth under a form, which is likely to invite inquiry and to meet examination. If, with these moderate and equitable conditions, be compared the manner in which hoftilities have been waged against the Christian religion, not only the votaries of the prevailing faith, but every man who looks forward with anxiety to the deftination of his being, will fee much to blame, and to complain of. By one unbeliever, all the follies which have adhered, in a long courfe of dark and fuperftitious ages, to the popular creed, are aflumed as fo many doctrines of

Chrift and his Apoftles, for the purpofe of fubverting the whole fyftem, by the abfurdities, which it is thus represented to contain. By another, the ignorance and vices of the facerdotal order, their mutual diffenfions and perfecutions, their ufurpations and encroachments upon the intellectual liberty and civil rights of mankind, have been difplayed with no fmall triu iph and invective, not so much to guard the Christian laity against a repetition of the fame injuries, which is the only proper ufe to be made of the most flagrant examples of the paft, as to prepare the way for an infinuation, that the religion itfelf is nothing but a profitable fable, impofed upon the fears and credulity of the multitude, and upheld by the frauds and influence of, an interefted and crafty priesthood. And yet how remotely is the character of the clergy connected with the truth of Chriftianity? What, af ter all, do the moft difgraceful pages of ecclefiaftical hiftory prove, but that the paffions of our common nature are not altered or excluded by diftinctions of name, and that the characters of men are formed much more by the temptations than the duties of their profeffion? A third finds delight in collecting and repeating accounts of wars and maffacres, of tumults and infurrections, excited in almost every age of the Chriftian era by religious zeal; as though the vices of Chriftians were parts of Chriftianity; intolerance and extirpation precepts of the gofpel; or as if its spirit could be judged of, from the councils of princes, the intrigues of ftatesmen, the pretences of malice and ambition, or the unauthorized cruelties of fome gloomy and virulent fuperstition. By a fourth, the fucceffion and variety of popular religions; the viciffitudes with which fects and tenets have flourished and decayed; the zeal with which they were once fupported, the neg ligence with which they are now remembered; the little fhare which reafon and argument appear to have had in framing the creed, or regulating the religious conduct of the multitude; the indifference and fubmiffion with which the religion of the state