taking some share in the good work of relieving the distresses of his brethren; and it is so ordered, that even the poorest, who have little or no money to bestow, will seldom be without the power, in some way or other, of doing kind offices. But if you are one of those who do possess something beyond the calls of your own immediate necessities, yet have but little to give, be not ashamed to give of that little; remembering, that He who commended the widow's mite, looks not to the amount of the gift, but to the heart of the giver.

Many, however, are accustomed to say, too hastily, that they cannot afford to give, or that they give as much as they can afford, without enough considering how much they contrive to afford for expenses of a very different kind-for costly dress-(perhaps often beyond their station in life)-for luxury and ostentation of various kinds; and then, afterwards, they give to the poor all that they can spare-spare, i. e. from their superfluous abundance from that which they hardly know how to dispose of otherwise; instead of delighting to make some sacrifice for Christ's

sake, and to mark their love to Him, and to their brethren for his sake, by denying themselves some gratification of vanity or sensual enjoyment. Instead of fulfilling the precept, "seek ye first the kingdom of heaven," some persons rather reverse it, as if it had been," seek ye last the kingdom of heaven, after every thing else has been amply provided for."

It is impossible to lay down any rule which will apply itself to each particular case. Each best knows his own circumstances: and his own heart he will one day know, though he may not know it now. The best rule, therefore, that can be suggested is, to look forward to that day; to consider attentively, not what you are most inclined to do now, but what article of expense you will look back to with most satisfaction at the hour of death, and at the day of judgment, and thousands of ages hence, and for ever: and then give bountifully according to your means, but "not grudgingly or of necessity, for God loveth a cheerful giver." Pray then that He will give you a kind, and liberal, and Christian heart

the heart to feel highly honoured in your being thus made a fellow-labourer and companion of your Lord, in ministering to the wants of those He calls his "brethren;" and who has promised that what you shall have done for them, through love to Him, he will reckon as done unto Himself.

SERMON XV.

JAMES I. 27.

Pure religion and undefiled, before God and the Father, is this; to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

THE words of this passage are, I believe, not unfrequently so misunderstood as to be perverted to a bad use. If they do not actually lead any one into a false notion of religion, they may at least tend, when the real sense of them is mistaken, to confirm in such a notion those who may have already adopted it.

Why should we be told by divines—a man may say-of the importance of religious knowledge, and of right faith? when the Apostle himself here places the whole of religion not in

any thing to be learnt, or to be believed, but in benevolence towards the afflicted, and a life of unblemished purity. He makes religion consist, not in faith, but in practice: must we not conclude from this that all questions about Christian doctrine are mere matters of idle speculation, and that a virtuous life is every thing? Must we not, in short, assent to the poet, who tells us

"For modes of faith let senseless bigots fight;

His can't be wrong whose life is in the right.”

Though the want of sense and sound reason is often veiled by liveliness of expression and smooth versification, I can hardly think these lines would have been so often cited with approbation, and the absurdity of the principle they convey have escaped notice, had the application been made to any of the common concerns of life, to any thing, in short, but religion. He who professes to hold good conduct as every thing, and the faith, correct or erroneous, from which it springs, as nothing, would probably never think of judging so of his own friends and acquaintance, in their intercourse with himself. Common sense would teach him to distinguish,