5. Another effect seems to be, direct, daily, fervent application for the supplies of the Divine Spirit, to carry on his work in our hearts.-We constantly need these supplies, to sustain us in duty, to direct and dispose us to every part of right conduct, to enable us to stand amidst temptation, and to support us under the trials of life and terrors of death. Even David, under that dispensation which was not so fully a "dispensation of the Spirit," emphatically prayed, "Teach me to do thy will, for thou art my God; thy Spirit is good, lead me into the land of uprightness." "Uphold me with thy free Spirit." Thus the Apostle prayed for his friends-and surely they might justly infer that they should often pray for themselves-that they might be "strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; "-" strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience, and long-suffering with joyfulness." When the Apostle earnestly prayed to this. purpose, he received the gracious answer, "My grace is sufficient for thee.' And thousands since have found such prayer graciously accepted. When we come to die, if left without the illuminating, consoling influences of this Spirit, our death-beds will be dark indeed; nay, the best man that ever breathed, would walk into eternity in darkness, seeing no light.

Then it is good to be daily pleading that our strength may be as our day;' that when we come to the close of life, the Spirit of God may be as a light unto our path, "witnessing with our spirits that we are the children of God," shining in upon the promises in this awful moment, and enabling us to see the promised land, even through the mists and fogs and dreariness of that gloomy and dreadful hour. That Spirit can enable us to see, by an eye of faith, our great Forerunner, and to appropriate the promises and grace to ourselves; nay, can give us "the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ; " so that, when walking through "the valley of the shadow of death," we need "fear no evil."

THE INFLUENCE OF WHAT WE CALL TRIFLES

ON OUR FUTURE STATE.

SERMON VII.

[Prcached at Kettering, May 19. 1793.]

MATTHEW XII. 36.

BUT I SAY UNTO YOU, THAT EVERY IDLE WORD THAT MEN SHALL SPEAK, THEY SHALL GIVE ACCOUNT THEREOF IN THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

THE reading of these words almost chills one's blood. There is something so alarming in the sound of them, that we think, 'If this be true, "who then can be saved?" Surely they are the most privileged persons, who have been dumb from their birth to their dying day!' And yet the words were uttered by a mouth that never told a falsehood, and merit a most serious examination and attention.

Let us think a little of the circumstances that occasioned and introduced them. The Pharisees, though they made high pretensions to sanctity

of character, yet gave an almost unbounded.

license to their tongues,

insomuch that they

miracles of Jesus Our Lord,

ventured to ascribe the
to the interference of the devil.

after expatiating on the absurdity of such a
suspicion, that Satan would work miracles, even
if he could, the direct tendency of which was to
destroy his own kingdom, warns them of the
dreadful danger of representing the operations.
of the Holy Spirit as the tricks of the Evil One,
and pronounces that particular species of sin
unpardonable; and then he exhorts them to look
well to it, lest that licentiousness of language
in which they indulged, issued from a rooted
malignity and depravity of heart; since good
trees brought forth good fruit, and corrupt trees
corrupt fruit, and what prevailed in the heart
would be most upon the tongue. "Out of the
abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh."
The treasures of a good man's heart would
furnish, in the main, good conversation; and the
evil treasures of a bad man's heart would furnish,
in the main, corrupt conversation.
And our
Lord enforces all, by the solemn idea of the
text-Every thing we say, our daily and most
common talk and conversation, will come under
the inspection and examination of our Judge at
last, and have an influence upon our final cha-
racter and doom: "For by thy words thou

shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned." Thy words, as well as thy thoughts and temper and actions, have their share in settling thy final state, and will either justify or condemn thee.

I have no particular reason for choosing this subject: it struck me by mere accident, and hung upon my mind in the course of the week, as a very weighty subject, that deserved to be fully and faithfully treated; and what I propose, is to illustrate and largely apply the subject. And for the illustration of the subject, I shall inquire,

FIRST, What is it that our Lord here censures, under the denomination of idle or unprofitable words?-Certainly, our Lord meant to go farther than profane and debauched language, taking God's name in vain, cursing and abusive railing, obscenity, blasting, and downright lying; because all this is not only idle and unprofitable, but grossly pernicious and wicked, and such as cannot be held guiltless in a more awful sense still. And yet I do not think our Lord meant to class under this description, all kinds of conversation but that which is strictly grave and solid, and upon serious and necessary subjects. As Doddridge remarks here, "Discourse tending