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" and I a Samaritan.-But are we not still both men; " partakers of the same nature- and subject to the " same evils ! Let me change conditions with "him for a moment, and confider, had his lot be" fallen me as I journeyed in the way, what mea" fure I should have expected at his hand. Should "I wish, when he beheld me wounded and half"dead, that he should shut up his bowels of com" paffion from me, and double the weight of my " miseries by passing by and leaving them unpitied? "But I am a stranger to the man; be it fo

" but I am no stranger to his condition- misfor

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tunes are of no particular tribe or nation, but belong to us all; and have a general claim upon us, " without diftinction of climate, country, or reli

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gion. Besides, though I am a stranger'tis no "fault of his that I do not know him, and therefore

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unequitable he should fuffer by it: - Had I known "him poffibly I should have had cause to love and pity him the more-For aught I know, he is fome

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one of uncommon merit, whose life is rendered " still more precious, as the lives and happiness of " others may be involved in it: perhaps at this in"stant that he lies here forsaken, in all this mifery,

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a whole virtuous family is joyfully looking for his return, and affectionately counting the hours of " his delay. Oh! did they know what evil had "befallen him how would they fly to fuccour "him! Let me then hasten to fupply those ten" der offices of binding up his wounds, and carry

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ing him to a place of fafety or, if that affitt ance comes too late, I shall comfort him at least " in his last hour-and, if I can do nothing else, "I shall foften his misfortunes by dropping a " tear of pity over them."

'Tis almost necessary to imagine the good Samaritan was influenced by some such thoughts as these, from the uncommon generosity of his behaviour, which is represented by our SAVIOUR operating like the warm zeal of a brother, mixed with the affectionate difcretion and care of a parent, who was not satisfied with taking him under his protection, and supplying his present wants, but in looking forwards for him, and taking care that his wants should be supplied when he should be gone, and no longer near to befriend him.

I think there needs no stronger argument to prove how universally and deeply the seeds of this virtue of compaffion are planted in the heart of man, than in the pleasure we take in such representations of it: and though some men have represented human nature in other colours (though to what end I know not), yet the matter of fact is so strong against them, that from the general propenfity to pity the unfortunate, we express that sensation by the word humanity, as if it was inseparable from our nature. That it is not inseparable, I have allowed in the former part of this difcourse, from some reproachful in. stances of selfish tempers, which seem to take part in nothing beyond themselves: yet I am perfuaded, and affirm 'tis still fo great and noble a part of our nature, that a man must do great violence to himself, and fuffer many a painful conflict, before he has brought himself to a different difpofition.

'Tis observable in the foregoing account, that when the priest came to the place where he was, he passed by on the other fide He might have passed by, you'll say, without turning afide. No, there is a secret shame which attends every act of inhumanity, not to be conquered in the hardest natures; fo that, as in other cases, so especially in this, many a man will do a cruel act, who at the same time will blush to look you in the face, and is forced to turn afide before he can have a heart to execute his purpose.

Inconfiftent creature that man is! who at that instant that he does what is wrong, is not able to withhold his testimony to what is good and praiseworthy.

I have now done with the parable, which was the first part proposed to be confidered in this discourse; and should proceed to the second, which so naturally falls from it, of exhorting you, as our SavioUR did the lawyer upon it, to go and do so likewise; but I have been so copious in my reflections upon the story itself, that I find I have insensibly incorporated into them almost all that I should have said here in recommending so amiable an example; by which means I have unawares anticipated the task I proposed. I shall therefore detain you no longer than with a fingle remark upon the subject in general, which is this: 'Tis obfervable in many places of scripture, that our blessed SAVIOUR, in defcribing the day of judgment, does it in such a manner, as if the great inquiry then, was to relate principally to this one virtue of com. paffion and as if our final fentence at that folemnity was to be pronounced exactly according to

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the degrees of it. " I was a hungered and ye gave

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me meat-thirty, and ye gave me drink-naked, " and ye clothed me I was fick, and ye visited me "-in prifon and ye came unto me." Not that we are to imagine from thence, as if any other good or evil action thould then be overlooked by the eye of the All-feeing Judge, but barely to intimate to us, that a charitable and benevolent disposition is so principal and ruling a part of a man's character, as to be a confiderable test, by itself, of the whole frame and temper of his mind, with which all other virtues and vices respectively rise and fall, and will almost neceffarily be connected Tell me therefore of a compaffionate man, you represent to me a man of a thousand other good qualities on whom I can depend-whom I may safely trust with my wife-my children, my fortune and reputation 'Tis for this, as the Apostle argues from the fame principle " that he will not commit adultery-that he will not "kill that he will not steal that he will not bear "falfe witness." That is, the forrows which are stirred up in men's hearts by such trespasses, are fo tenderly felt by a compaffionate man, that it is not in his power or his nature to commit them.

So that well might he conclude, that charity, by which he means the love to your neighbour, was the end of the commandment, and that whosoever fulfilled it, had fulfilled the law.

Now to God, &c. Amen.

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SERMON IV.

Self-Knowledge.

2 SAMUEL XII. 7. Ift part.
And Nathan said unto David, Thou art the man.

THERE is no historical passage in scripture which gives a more remarkable instance of the deceitfulness of the heart of man to itself, and of how little we truly know of ourselves, than this; wherein David is convicted out of his own mouth, and is led by the prophet to condemn and pronounce a severe judgment upon another, for an act of injustice, which he had passed over in himself, and possibly reconciled to his own confcience. To know one's felf, one would think, could be no very difficult lesson :-for who, you'll fay, can well be truly ignorant of himself and the true disposition of his own heart? If a man thinks at all, he cannot be a stranger to what paffes there he must be confcious of his own thoughts and desires, he must remember his past pursuits, and the true springs and motives which in general have directed the actions of his life: he may hang out false colours and deceive the world, but how can a man deceive himself? That a man can

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