"Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven." They are in the world, in qualification of a mistake, to which some Christians even now are prone, and which, though it does not carry them into Popery, withdraws them, shall I say, too much, or rather improperly, from the world. For here we may err, not only in the article of conformity, but separation; not only in our indulgence, but in our mortification; not only in our love, but in our aversion. If we are the friends of the world, we are the enemies of God; yet we are to honour all men. If we shun the course of this world, we are not to neglect their welfare. While we decline the wicked as companions, we are to attend to them as patients, and endeavour to recover and save and bless them. The ground that at present does not yield us pleasure, must furnish us with employment; that cultivating the barren and the briery soil, under the divine agency, for us—in some few spots at least-the wilderness and the solitary place may be made glad, and the desert rejoice and blossom as the rose. This brings us to the subject of our present meditation-The Christian IN THE WORLD. The theme would fill volumes; and we have only a single Lecture for the discussion of it. But let us do what we can. Let us take five views of the subject. Let us consider the Christian in the World, as In a sphere of ACTIVITY. In a sphere of OBSERVATION. In a sphere of Danger. In a sphere of SELF-IMPROVEMENT, I. In a sphere of ACTIVITY. God obviously intended us for a life of engagement; and the design is no less conducive to our own advantage individually, than to the welfare of the community in which we live. It is said, that in Turkey the Grand Seignior himself must have been articled to some mechanical trade. Paul had a learned education, yet he was taught the craft of tentmaking; and we see of what importance it was to him in a particular emergency. The Jews proverbially said, that he who did not bring up his son to some employment, taught him to be a thief. Bishop Sanderson said, that the two curses of the day in which he lived, were "beggary and shabby gentility." Beggary is too well understood, and too much encouraged; but what his Lordship very properly calls shabby gentility, means the pride of family, and the show of finery, and the expensiveness of indulgence, with insufficient means; while all aid derived from any kind of business is declined and contemned. Some, now in easy circumstances, meanly endeavour to conceal the merchandise or trade in which their parents were engaged-though it is pleasing to think the attempt is always vain; as the affectation of these people leads every one to ferret out the secret, and to exclaim, what a pity it is that any should possess property who are ashamed of the honourable way in which it was acquired for them! Of all pride, the most contemptible is that which blushes at trade; especially in a country whose greatness results so much from commerce; and "whose merchants are princes, and whose traffickers are the honourable of the earth." They only ought to blush who rise in the morning, No not knowing that they have any thing in the world to do, but to eat and drink and trifle and sleep. An angel would pray for annihilation, rather than submit to such disgracefulness for a single day. Activity is the noblest life; it is the life of the soul. It is also the most pleasant, and most healthful. drudgery equals the wretchedness of ennui. idle know nothing of recreation. Peace and content flee from their feelings. Weakness, and depressed spirits, and trembling nerves, and foolish apprehensions, haunt them: so that these people seem referable to the physician, rather than to the divine. The But the thing has a moral bearing, and so comes under the notice of the Lecturer. A life of inaction is a disuse of talents, and a perversion of faculties, for which we are responsible. It is the inlet of temptation. Our leisure days are the enemy's busy ones "For Satan finds some mischief still, "Behold, this was the iniquity of Sodom-pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness." When was David overcome? Was it not when, instead of commanding his army in the field, he was indulging himself at noon, upon the house-top? Where grossness of vice is not produced, evils of a less odious quality, but no less anti-christian, are cherished, especially the indulgence of impertinent curiosity, and whisperings, and backbitings, and slanders Withal they learn to be idle, wandering from house to house; and not only idle, but tattlers also, and busy-bodies, speaking things they ought not.' What is the prevention of these vices, and a thousand more? the Apostle too severe? "When we were with Is you, this we commanded you, work, neither should he eat. that if any would not For we hear that there are some which walk among you disorderly, working Now them that are by our Lord Jesus work, and eat their not at all, but are busy-bodies. such we command and exhort Christ, that with quietness they own bread." Thus Adam and Eve were placed in the Garden of Eden-not to live as some of you do; but to dress and to keep it. All through the Old and New Testament you will find that those to whom God appeared, to communicate information, or bestow prerogative, were all engaged, and following their occupations, at the time. If the unemployed think that He visits them, let them suspect, and inquire whether it be not another being under disguise; for ❝even Satan also transformeth himself into an angel of light." Yet it is not sufficient that we are engaged. The Christian must appear in the man of business. He is not only to have a calling, but to "abide with God in his calling."-To abide with him by the moderation of his desires and exertions: not entangling himself in the affairs of this life; diligent in business, but not, by multiplication and complexity, injuring the health of his body and the peace of his mind, and compelling himself, if not to omit, to curtail his religious duties; if not to neglect the Sabbath, and the sanctuary, and the closet, yet to render himself unable to attend on the Lord without distraction.-To abide with Him by invariable conscientiousness: doing nothing but what is conformable with truth and rectitude: not content to keep himself within the precincts of legal obligation, but shunning and detesting in all his dealings, every thing that is mean and over reaching; and exemplifying every thing that is fair and honourable.-To abide with Him by a devout temper and habit; that will remind him of the presence of God and his all-seeing eye; that will keep him from planning or achieving any enterprise without dependance upon Heaven; that will not allow him to say, "To-day or to-morrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain; while he knows not what shall be on the morrow;" but induce him to preface every project with the pious acknowledgment, "If the Lord will, we shall live and do this or that ;" practically owning the agency of his providence in all the contingencies of his affairs; in every failure and disappointment, submitting to his pleasure; in every favourable turn, in every degree of success, not sacrificing unto his own net, and burning incense unto his own drag, as if by them his pasture was made fat, and his meat plenteous; but ascribing all to the blessing of the Lord that maketh rich, and addeth no sorrow with it. Thus secular life is christianized, and the bounds of religion enlarged far beyond the district of what we commonly mean by devotion. If the Christian could abide with God only in the express exercises of worship, whether in the closet, the family, or the temple; he could be with him very little. In all situations, the cares of life demand the vaster part of his time and attention: but he may always walk before the Lord in the land of the living: and whether he eats or drinks, or whatever he does, he may do all to the glory of God. Let him, as often as he has opportunity, repair, for impression, refreshment, and aid, to the means of grace in private and publick: but |