youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thy heart, and in the sight of thine eyes : but KNOW THOU, that, for all these things, God will bring thee into judgment 1.

f Eccles. e. xi.

SERMON XXVIII.

PREACHED MAY 28, 1769.

ECCLESIASTES vii. 21, 22

Take no heed unto all words that are spoken, lest thou hear thy servant curse thee. For oftentimes, also, thine own heart knoweth, that thou thyself, likewise, hast cursed others.

THE royal author of this book has been much and justly celebrated for his wise aphorisms and precepts on the conduct of human life. Among others of this sort, the text may deserve to be had in reverence; which, though simply. and familiarly expressed, could only be the reflexion of a man who had great

experience of the world, and had studied with care the secret workings of his own mind.

The purpose of it is, to disgrace and discountenance that ANXIOUS CURIOSITY (the result of our vanity, and a misguided self-love) which prompts us to inquire into the sentiments and opinions of other persons concerning us, and to give ourselves no rest till we understand what, in their private and casual conversations, they say of us. aft

"This curious disposition, says the preacher, is by all means to be repressed, as the indulgence of it is both FOOLISH) and UNJUST ; as it not only serves to embitter your own lives by the unwelcome discoveries ye are most likely to make; but at the same time to convict your own consciences of much iniquity; since, upon reflexion, ye will find that ye have, yourselves, been guilty at some unguarded hour or other, of the same malignity or flippancy towards other men over zevont si Ifi sfoore ok yenebust a H ez qyền gromet to In these Two considerations is comprised whatever can be said to discredit this vice: the one, you see, taken from the preacher's knowledge of human life; the other, from his intimate acquaintance with the secret depravity and corruption of the human heart,

men.

FIRST

Permit me, then, to enlarge on the w topics; and, by that means, to open to You more distinctly the WISDOM, and the EQUITY of that conduct, which is here fecommended to us, of not giving a sollicitous attention to the frivolous and unweighed tênsures of other hammaso 92. Sta suppai of eu aiqmorq Das 43 gimteorno ancareq redro to anoiniqo 2¤¶Faké no heed, says the preacher, to all words that are spoken, LEST THOU HEAR THY SERVANT CURSE THEE. This is these vadi son which he assigns for his advice. redosenq ant evez norizoqaib auoiruo eidT » - The force of it will be clearly apprehended, *if we reflect (az the observing author of the Text had "certainly done) that nothing is thofe Hippant nothing more unreasonably and Aaccountably petulant, than the tongue of mani! ponte hapin down to 29oneisand aw wy «VIt is so fittle under the controuf I do not say of candour, or of good-nature, but of coinmon prudence, and of common justice, that it moves, as it were, with the slightest breath of rumour; nay, as if a tendency to speak ill of others were instinctive to it, it waits frany times for no cause from without, but is prompted -as we mdys say, by its own restlessness ‹ d -volubility to attack the thardetess of thos chance to be the subject of discourse? WiffiArned namuud edt to noitqurros bas

ΠΟ

out provocation, without malice, without, so much as intentional ill-will, it echoes the voice of the present company; vibrates with the prevailing tone of conversation; or takes occasion from the slightest occurrence, from some idle conceit that strikes the fancy, from the impulse of a sudden and half-formed suggestion, that stirs within us, to exercise its activity in a careless censure of other men...

Nay, what is more to be lamented, the sagacious observer of mankind will find reason to conclude, that no zeal for our interests, no kindness for our persons, shall at all times restrain this unruly member, the tongue, from taking unwelcome freedoms with us. The dearest friend we have, shall at some unlucky moment be seduced by an affectation of wit, by a start of humour, by a flow of spirits, by a sudden surmise, or indisposition, by any thing, in short, to let fall such things of us, as have some degree of sharpness in them, and would give us pain, if they were officiously reported to us.

This

appears to have been the sentiment of the wise preacher in the text. Avoid, says he, this impertinent curiosity, lest thou hear thy servant curse thee; lest the very persons that