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bour: thou shalt not murther; thou shalt SERM. not steal; thou shalt not bear false witness, fay the laws of the Almighty. The calumniator breaks through every one of these, and tramples on the commandments of his God. He who flanders, murthers, and fteals alfo, murthers the good name, and steals the reputation of his fellow-creature; and as his guilt is double, fo doubtless will be his condemnation.

There is not a stronger mark of the weakness of our nature, than that we are forced to be upon our guard even against the perfections of it: and above all the fatal pre-eminences which fome enjoy above others, wit is perhaps the moft deftructive: riches are not more apt to make men proud, nor power to beget infolence and oppreffion, than wit is to betray its poffeffor into a habit of cenfure and invective. Vanity is an idol that

delights

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SERM. delights in facrifice, and thinks no offering too precious for its votaries to beftow: friendship, honour, gratitude, all the ties of relation, all the bonds of natural affection, have been broken through and contemned, merely to fupport the character of a spritely fatirift, or, in more proper terms, of a base reviler, who, for the poor fame of being witty, would make thousands unhappy, and then laugh at them for being fo; who cafts arrows, fire-brands, and death, and then fays, Was I not in sport?

But the folly, the meannefs, and the impiety of evil-fpeaking will appear still more evident to us, if we seriously confider in what manner we ought to employ that time and thofe talents which God hath graciously bestowed upon us. We have the whole range of nature before our eyes, and the wonders of the creation

to

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to unfold; languages to enlighten, and SERM. history to improve our minds: philofophy is ever ready to make us wife, and religion to fecure our happiness. How noble a field hath the human foul to expatiate in, and with what variety may it be entertained! and yet how often, instead of bettering each other's hearts by innocent and useful converse, do we spend our hours either in liftening to the calumnies and mifreprefentations of those about us, or by dwelling ourselves on the weakneffes and imperfections of our neighbours! To leave the noble feast of nature and of reason, to feed on fuch coarse and fordid diet, is furely the mark of an appetite moft vicious and most depraved.

Raillery on the unfortunate," fays an excellent heathen author, "is inhumanity; and that reputation much too

VOL. IL

dear

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SERM. dear which is purchased at the expence of our integrity." Can any thing indeed be more inhuman, more diabolical, than to owe our pleasure to another's mifery, our happiness to his misfortune, our praise to his infamy? And yet this is the conftant diverfion which we amuse ourfelves with, this is the cruel fport we are fo fond of.

Let us then, my brethren, put the cafe home to ourselves, and afk our own hearts whether, and how often, we have been guilty of this mean and destructive vice. Reflect a little, I beseech you, on what you have often yourselves experienced; confider, in the ferenity of your morning thoughts, whence arose the mirth, the gaiety, the entertainment of the evening before: was it from the fober, ferious difcuffion of any important point in religion or morality, from the

discovery

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discovery of any thing that might pro- SERM mote the welfare of fociety, or the hap pinefs of your fellow-creatures, from the applaufes bestowed on neglected virtue, or the refolutions taken to reward it? Did it arife from mutual chearfulness, complacency and good-will one towards another? or, on the other hand, did the guilty joy you tafted fpring from the repetition of your neighbour's faults, fome cruel jeft on his misfortunes, fome unmanly triumph over his weakness? Did the laugh arife from the aggravation of another's failings, or the leffening of another's merit? Was the abfent injured, or the dead calumniated? If from fuch mean and ungenerous behaviour flowed all the pleasure you can boaft of, it was the joy of fools: and yet it is the joy perhaps of half the companies we are engaged in, the malevolent pleasure of half the world.