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ner of fin, and the most powerful incitement to every part of our duty.

This would deter us even from the most fecret fins, and influence us as much in our closest retirement, as when we act in the public view of the world. Had we no other spectators than men, it might be fufficient to maintain a fair outfide, because that only falls under their obfervation: but there is no covering fo thick as to hide us from God; the moft fecret deviation of the heart is fubject to his cognifance, as much as the most open tranfgreffion of the life; and fins committed in the deepeft fhades of darkness, are as perfectly known to him, as thofe committed in the clearest noon-day. None of the fprings from whence they proceed can efcape his notice, nor the temper of mind with which they are done; which give the trueft light into their nature, and determine the precife degree of their malignity. What reason, then, have we to keep our hearts, as well as our lives, with all diligence, and to dread a fin in privacy, no less than when we know that many eyes are upon us?

With respect again to the practice of our duty, the influence of a realizing faith of the divine omnifcience is fo apparent, that it needs no illuftration. "I have kept thy "statutes and thy teftimonies," said David; "for all my ways are before thee." Were God habitually present to our minds, we fhould think nothing too much to be done, or too hard to be endured, in his fervice. A holy ambition to approve ourselves to him, by whofe final fentence we must stand or fall, would render us fuperior to every trial, and carry us forward in the way of his commandments with increafing vigour. and alacrity: we should never “ think that

we had already attained, either were al"ready perfect; but forgetting the things "which are behind, and reaching forth

to those things which are before, we "fhould prefs towards the mark for the "prize of the high calling of God in Chrift Jefus."

Upon the whole, then, let us earnestly pray God, that he, by his grace, may strengthen our faith of this important truth, that the eyes of the Lord are in every place, be

bolding

bolding the evil and the good: and enable us fo to fet him before us during all the days of our pilgrimage on earth, that hereafter we may be admitted into his immediate prefence; where, in the happy fociety of angels and faints, we fhall enjoy the unclouded light of his countenance without interruption and without end. Amen.

SER

M

EMORABLE is that faying of the Apostle Paul," I had not known fin "but by the law." We can never judge aright of our temper and practice, till we prove them by this unerring rule. Many objects appear to have a strong resemblance while we view them apart, and at a distance from each other; which, in almost every feature, are found to difagree when they are brought together and examined with accuracy. Thus there is a feeming conformity to the divine law, an image of sanctity, which very often paffeth for real holinefs, and leads men " to think of them"felves more highly than they ought to "think."- -Paul" was alive without the

"law

but when the commandment fin revived, and he died."

"law once; came,

So

long as he knew only the letter of the law, and was a ftranger to its fpiritual meaning and just extent, he imagined that his prayers, his faftings, and his alms, accompanied with fome pieces of bodily exercife, and an abstinence from the groffer acts of fin, were fufficient to recommend him to the friendship of God, and would certainly intitle him to the joys of immortality: but "when the commandment came" in its native purity, and entered into his heart with light and power, he foon discovered his mistake, and was convinced, that his feeming virtues were no more in reality than "dead works ;" his pharifäical righteoufness a mere painted outfide, the delufive picture or "form of godlinefs."

In like manner, the author of this Pfalm, after a devout contemplation of the divine law (which he had magnified in the foregoing verfes, by a juft and animated detail of its amiable properties and falutary effects), turning his eyes inward, is ftruck with a fenfe of his own guilt and pollution:

"Who,"