alone which drew so many into the wilderness, for we seldom incommode ourselves to do that which we imagine to be unnecessary to our happiness, much less are we solicitous to perform that which is productive of any personal uneasiness. But it was a feeling of their condition, and an earnest desire of alleviating the oppression of their minds by a removal of the heavy burthen of sin, which led them to seek the solitude of John, and to accept the happy offer of salvation.

Amongst those who resorted to the baptism of John, we find persons of all qualities and descriptions, Pharisees and Sadducees, tax-gatherers and soldiers, the wise and the ignorant, the rich and the poor. And as the concourse was numerous, the disposition of the mind was as characteristic a mark

of their necessities, as any outward or professional distinction.

Here then I rest in meditating on the wants of penitents. I consider them as arranged before me under the following divisions, 1. in different ranks of life: 2. in different situations of body: 3. and under different dispositions of mind.

1. In encountering one of the first description, and laying before him the sin that doth so easily beset him, lie replies, « I am no sinner, I offend against "no positive law;" another informs me' that his elevated rank requires greater allowances of indulgence, as he is called

upon to accommodate himself to a variety of circumstances, unknown to, and therefore not to be conceived by, common men; that what I call sin, he considers as necessary policy, and that

what I esteem transgression, he thinks a venial fault, if a fault at all, and that the affairs of the world cannot be conducted without it. Another says, like " all the young man in the Gospel, "these commandments have I kept "from my youth up;" and if he is desired to fulfil another duty not in his catalogue, he goes away sorrowful. "Iam "poor," says another, " and the poor

K

are always objects of compassion.". -"I am ignorant," another exclaims, " and a man who does not know his

duty, will not be punished for his "transgression of it." If these are

told that though poverty in itself be no crime, it is no excuse for crime; and although it might be allowed that ig norance is not a fault, where there is no opportunity of instruction, or of attaining competent knowledge and in

formation by personal exertions, yet that it is a serious and justly punishable offence to cast away the key of knowledge, and to reject the kind offer of instruction, they turn the deaf ear, and continue poor and ignorant, and consequently wicked still. The temptations of rank, whether of high or low rank, have their peculiar attractions. The sin of the poor man is not essentially different from that of the rich. The former we address in the words of Christ, "Say not within yourselves, we "have Abraham to our father;" for neither the valour nor the virtue of your ancestors will save you. The latter we admonish not to trust to his obscurity when he

says

" no eye

shall

see me," and disguiseth his face.

"see

Every man must perish by his own sin, or be accepted, through the me

a

rits of his Saviour, by his own obedience,

2. Circumstances, or situation of body is another consideration of im portance in recalling the sinner from the error of his way. This man thinks himself so much above the law, and the other, perhaps, so much below it, that the voice of exhortation is lost in the supposed distance of the object. But there are times as well as places, in which such language must be heard, and the word of reproof and correction in righteousness cannot be without effect. Every turn of circumstance is a mean of grace, and every change of situation an admonition of reflec tion. The proud rich man, the gay unincumbered promoter of worldly pleasure, who has never thought of dying, must be laid upon a bed of