AN APPENDIX TO SERMONS XX. XXI. AND XXII. 315 quickly be just and universal, There is no truth in the land, as 1-los. iv. 1. There is indeed scarce any censure of a degenerate and cor- rupt age under the OldTestament, but fraud and deceit, lies and falsehood, make a considerablepart of theaccusation or complaint ; and surely God would never allow any principles or practices that have so pernicious a tendency. Hear how the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah lament their multiplied transgressions in conceivingand utteringfrom the heart words offalsehood: Truth isfallen into the street, yea, truthfi tileth, and equity cannot enter; Is. lix. This is a nation that obeyeth not thevoice of the Lord. Truth is perished, and is cut offront their, mouth. They deceive every one his neighbour, and will not speak the truth ; they bend their tongues like their bowfor lies ; Jer. vii. and ix. Now if this lieentiohs principle were allowed, neither God nor his prophets would ever want matter of complaint. By this means also it will come topass, that if a man happen once to get the name and characterof a thief or a cheat, all his neighbours will think themselves authorized to have no regard to truth or honesty in all their dealings and discourse with him ; for this rule affirms that he has no right to truth. And when any person fancies that he has seen reason to suspect or dis- believe his neighbour's honesty, he will think himself absolved from all obligationsto speak truth to him. But what a wide and dreadful flood-gate would be opened by this means, to let in an inundation of fraud and falsehood, and to practise all. manner of deceit ! Let it be remarked also, that this doctrine is near a-kin to the popish abomination, " That no faith is to be kept with heretics ; for they are a sort of dangerous men, who would ruin the church, and therefore they have no right to truth." Now what shameful and horrid perjuries, and what execrablemischiefs, have sprung from this one impious principle of the church of Rome ? The word of God gives no manner of indulgence to such licentious principles as these. We must wrongnoman, defraud no man ; we must not render to any man evil for evil, nor falsehood for falsehood, but overcome his evil with our good: andwe must provide things honest in the sight of men. It will be said, perhaps, that the scripture most frequently mentions a neighbour, or a brother, or a fellow-christian, in the prohibitions of lying and falsehood,' as in the ninth command- ment, Bear no false witness against thy neighbour. 1 Thess. iv. 6. No man defraud his brother. Eph. iv. 25. Speak every man truth tohis neighbour. Lev. xix. 11. Lie not one to another. But let it be replied, that the scripture demands righteous- ness for the strangers also; Dent, i. 16. and in several other
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