SERMON XXI. 293 guilty of this vice deserves to be cut off' from all society with mankind, and to be thrust out of cities and families like a beast ofthe earth. The same thing may be said of an unfaithful man, a man ,who makes promises, contracts, and agreements, and takes no care to perform them. All commerce and traffic isconfounded, and the laws ofit dissolved, by a person of this shameful conduct. He that loses his credit andhonour by this sort of falsehood, cuts himself off from many of theblessings of civil society, and stands as it wereexcommunicated from the friendship, thecompany, and commerce of his neighbours among whom he dwells. His cha- racter becomes hateful among men, and his name is a word of scandal and infamy. But where a man is true to his word, and punctual in all his correspondencies, how fair is his reputation ! How honourable is his name ! And he stands entitled to all the blessings of the society where he resides. I might borrow arguments also from the light of nature, to shewwhat an excellent virtue is that of constancy ; how useful in the whole course of life ; how honourable a name does it gain a man in the world ! With what a happy regularity his affairs pro- ceed, both in hishousehold and in his shop, or businessof life ! He maintains a sacred and steady peace of mind, and all men bless him: but the character of a fickle, wavering, inconstant man, is always mean and contemptible : he is compared to a weather- cock, that is blown about by every wind : and his name is thus exalted, or stuck on high, there to become a more public mark of jest and ridicule. The third thing I proposed, is to consider what are those additional arguments that might be drawn from the gospel for the practiceof this truth andsincerity, this faithfulness andconstancy : For the gospel doth not only confirm all the duties of morality that the light of nature dictates, and establish all the reasons of them that the light of-nature more feebly proposes, but it adds also many arguments and motives to enforce the same virtuous practices, which the mere light of nature knows nothing of;, and I shall represent all these advantages of the gospel here. But I will not overload yourmemory with particulars, and there- fore I shall speak them more generally,, and heap them together ; andmay your souls andmine feel the united force ofthem ! It is a gospel of truth we profess, even the eternal truth of God revealed to men concerning our salvation and his glory. There are a multitude ofscriptures wherethe gospel itself iscalled the truth, and the word of truth ; and it is a'most inconsistent thing for the professors of this gospel to be guilty offalsehood. God the Father is the God oftruth : and never didhe givesa glorious a demonstration of the sincerity of hislove, of the faith-
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=