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CHRISTIAN M6RALITY,
VIZ.
DERM.
xxI
whereas a man
who is
much engaged
in
crafty
designs,
will
now
and then
be
tempted to
intrench upon
truth, and
come
nearer the
brink
of
lying,
to
carry
on and
cover all
his
secret pùrposes.
Methinks
I
could pity
rathtr
than
envy
the
high
sta-
tion
of
courtiers. How
often they
are constrained
to
put
on disguise, to
colour or
to
conceal
their real
designs
!
How near they walk to the borders
of
falsehood,
and
tread
hourly upon the
very edge
of
a lie
!
David,
the
Man
after
God's
own
heart,
while he
kept
his
father
"s
sheep,
was
more secure
from this
temptation
;
but
when
he
became
a
courtier
and a
king, he
was
often exposed,
and therefore
he
begs
earnestly,
that God
would
remove
from
him the
way
of
lying,
Psalm
cxix.
29..
He
had felt
the
mischievous influence
of
this snare,
and dreaded
the
pernicious
power
of
it.
To
be
ever
practising the poli-
tician
at
home
or abroad,
is
a
constant snare
to
sincerity
;
and
to live
as
a spy in
a foreign court,
may
be
a post
of
service to
our
own
nation; but it
is
exceedingly
danger
-
Qus
to virtue
and truth.
IV.
Have
a
care
of
indulging any violent passion, for
that
will
tempt
the tongue
to
fly
oút
into extravagance
of
expression, and
out-run
the settled
judgment of
the mind.
Whether
it
be
grief
or impatience, or anger and resent-
ment,
it
will
engage the soul
to form
ideas
far above and
beyond,
the
truth
of
things,
and
often
arm the tongue
with
unruly
expressions,
even beyond
the sentiments
of
the
heart:
Strife
and contention,
and
noisy
quarrels, are
very
dangerous
enemies to
truth.
And upon
this
account; above
all things,
I
would
warn
young christians
to
avoid the excessive zeal
of
a
party
-
spirit
in
the lesser
differences
.
of
religion.
There
has
been often
a
great
deal
of
darkness, and
fire,
of
rage,
and deceit
and falsehood
in
such
sort
of quarrels
as these.
Men
of natural
warmth,
animated
by
an
honest zeal for
God
and
religion,:
taking it into their
head,
that
every
doctrine
besides
their
own
is
damnable
heresy,
and
all
forms
of
worship different
from
their
own,
are supersti-
tious or schismatical, and abominable
in
the sight
of
God;
they
have,
under
the influence
of
these
principles,
kindled
their
passions-to a
flame
:
and to secure the
re-
putation of their
own
party,
or
vindicate
all
their princi-
ples
and
practices, they have made shameful inroads