a Means of attaining to Wifdom. 299 done, the offices of civil friendfhip with S E R M. fcandalous chriftians ; not that we fhould XII. implicitly follow the decrees of the church, and than the company of thofe the excom- municateth ; but every man judging for himfelf, purfuant to the rule in my text, is for his own fake to avoid the intimate converfation of thofe whom he plainly feeth to be wicked, that fo he may efcape the contagion of fin : And yet when the apoflle direffeth chriftians to fhun the company of the vicious, that muff not proceed from ill will, nor fhould be attended with bitter wrathful reproaches, and marks of contempt, which are very oppofite to the fpirit of chri- ftianity ; it fhould rather flow from a cha- ritable defign to reclaim the offender, for thus he elfewhere dire teth, 2 `.chef. iii. 14. If any man obey not our word by this epßle (that is, the moral precepts of the gofpel which he had recommended) note that man and have no company with him, that he may be afhamed; yet count him not as an enemy, but admonifh him as a brother. But in the place before referred to, r Cor. v. the apoffle plainly theweth, that he did not mean to forbid all kind of correfpondence with, or denying the offices of humanity to bad men, only that we fhould for the honour of our pro- 2 feflion
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