plaisance in his victory, this action is the commencement of his reprobation, and the Spirit of God withdraws itself from him. Joshua, on the contrary, too credulous, spares the Gibeonites, whom the Lord had commanded him to exterminate; he went not before the ark to consult him, previous to his alliance with these impostors. But this infidelity being an act of precipitancy and surprise, rather than a disobedience, and proceeding from a heart still faithful, religious, and submissive to God, it appears slight in his eyes, and the pardon almost immediately follows the crime. Now, if this principle be incontrovertible, upon what do you depend when you regard your daily and habitual infidelities as slight? Are you acquainted with all the corruption of your heart, from which they proceed? God knows it, who is the searcher and judge; and his eyes are very different from those of men. But if it be permitted to judge before the time, say, if this fund of indolence and infidelity which is in you; of voluntary perseverance in a state displeasing to God; of deliberate contempt for all the duties which you consider as not essential; of attention and care, as I may say, to labour only for the Lord when he opens before you the gates of punishment and destruction; — say, if all these can constitute in his sight a state worthy of a Christian heart; and if faults, which proceed from so corrupted a principle, can in reality be slight, or worthy of indulgences.
Paul, my brethren, that miraculous man, to whom the secrets of heaven had been revealed; Paul, who no longer lived for himself, but in whom Jesus Christ alone lived; Paul, who earnestly longed every moment for the dissolution of his earthly body that he might be clothed with immortality; this apostle, always ready to sacrifice his life for his Master, and a willing victim to faith; this elected instrument of our Lord and Saviour, whose conscience could reproach him with nothing, knew not, however, whether he merited the love or hatred of his Lord; whether he still possessed in his heart, or had forfeited, the invisible treasure of charity; and in these melancholy doubts, the testimony of his conscience was insufficient to calm his dread and uncertainty. David, that king so penitent, whose delights were centred in the constant meditation of the law of God, and whom the Holy Spirit calls a king after God's own heart; — David trembles, however, lest the iniquity of his crimes be not sufficiently known to him; lest the corruption of his heart conceals not from him their enormity. He figures to himself unknown gulfs in his conscience, which cause him to shed torrents of tears; to prostrate himself before t^ie majesty and holiness of his God, and supplicate his assistance toward his purification from secret infidelities, by making him sensible of them. And you, who watch not, nor search your hearts; you who, devoted to lukewarm and sensual habits, with deliberate coolness allow yourselves every day a thousand infidelities, upon the iniquity of which you are utterly ignorant what judgment the Almighty may form: you, who every moment experience these suspicious ebullitions of pas-
