growth of pride; or, by increasing our good opinion of others, engaged in the same pursuits of knowledge, which must so far take from our fancied superiority over them; or, lastly, by the necessary effect of its operation, which is essentially destructive of that vicious self-love, which is the parent of such fancies -In all these respects, I say, it is clearly seen how CHARITY, whose office it is to edify others, is properly applied to the cure of that tumour of the mind, which knowledge generates, and which we know by the name of LEARNED

PRIDE.

There are many other considerations, no doubt, which serve to mortify this pride; but nothing tends so immediately to remove it, as the increase of charity. It is therefore to be wished, that men, engaged in the pursuits of learning, would especially cultivate in themselves this divine principle. Knowledge, when tempered by humility, and directed to the ends of charity, is indeed a valuable acquisition; and, though no fit subject of vain-glory, is justly entitled to the esteem of mankind. It should further be remembered, that this virtue, which so much adorns knowledge, is the peculiar characteristic grace of our religion; without which, all our attainments, of whatever

kind, are fruitless and vain. Let the man of Science, then, who has succeeded to his wish in rearing some mighty fabric of human knowledge, and from the top of it is tempted with a vain complacency to look down, as the phrase is, on the ignorant vulgar; let such an one not forget to say with HIM, who had been higher yet, even as high as the third Heaven, Though I understand all mysteries, and all "knowledge, and have not charity, I am nothinge"

66

SERMON XX.

PREACHED NOVEMBER 19, 1769.

ACTS OF THE APOSTLES, Xxvi. 9.

I verily thought with myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth.

THE

case of the Apostle, Paul, as represented by himself in these words, is so remarkable, that it cannot but deserve our attentive consideration.

The account of those many things, which he thought himself obliged to do against the name of Jesus, during his unbelieving statė, he gives us in the chapter whence the text is

taken. These things, continues he in his apology to king Agrippa, I did in Jerusalem, and many of the Saints did I shut up in prison, having received authority from the chiefpriests; and when they were put to death, I gave my voice against them. And punished them oft in every synagogue, and compelled them to blaspheme; and being exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them, even to strange cities. And then he proceeds to speak of his going, with the same authority, and the same zeal, to persecute the Christians that were at Damascus; when, in his journey thither, he was suddenly stopt in the career of his impiety by a heavenly vision, which had the effect to overturn his former persuasion, and to make a full convert of him to the Christian faith.

1. From this account of himself, we learn, that Paul, in his Jewish state, had been carried, by his zeal, into all the horrors of persecution. And these things, he says, he verily believed he ought to do, contrary to the name of Jesus.

"But what, you will ask, did this belief then justify those crimes? And, are blasphemy, murder, and persecution, innocent things, from

the time that a man persuades himself he ought to commit them? This would open a door to all the evils of the most outrageous fanaticism, and evacuate the whole moral law, under the pretence of conscience."

In general, it would do so: and we shall presently find, that St. Paul does not pretend to justify himself, notwithstanding he verily believed he ought to do these things. But to see the degree of his crime, it will be convenient, and but just to the criminal, to call to mind, in the first place, the peculiar circumstances under which it was committed.

Paul was at that time a Jew; and, as a follower of this law, his conduct, supposing his conscience to have been rightly informed, had not been blameable; on the contrary, had been highly meritorious. For the law of Moses made the restraint of opinions, in matter of religion, lawful: Heterodoxy was to a Jew but another word for disloyalty; and a zeal to see the rigour of the law executed on that crime, was the honour of a Jewish subject. Paul, then, conceiving of Jesus as a false prophet, and the author of a new worship, contrary to that of the God of Israel, Paul, I say, regarding Jesus in this light, but conformed to the spirit