SERMON I'.

1 THESS. iv. 9.

But as touching brotherly love, ye need not that I write unto you; for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another.

THE duty of brotherly love, which throughout the Holy Scriptures is recommended to us from various arguments and many considerations, the Apostle here enforces from one, which plainly refers to, and in effect includes, them all. He tells his disciples, that they had no need of being instructed by him in this point: that they were themselves taught of God to love one another :" that it was a duty both in its general and particular obligation so clear and plain; a duty which God had so evidently required of them, by forming their nature, and directing their reason to the performance of it; by enjoining it as his express will and command in every Revelation which he had made of

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1 Preached at St. Nicholas's church, in Newcastle, before the Governors of the Infirmary for the counties of Durham, Newcastle, and Northumberland, on Thursday, June 23, 1757, being their Anniversary Meeting. By Robert Lowth, D.D. Prebendary of Durham. Published at the request of the Governors. Newcastle, 1757, 4to.

himself, more particularly in the Gospel; and even by infusing the Holy Spirit of love into the hearts of all true believers; that it wanted not, and scarcely admitted of, any further illustration or enforcement; and that to tell them, that they ought to love one another, was no more than telling them, that they were men, and that they were Christians.

Now, though concerning brotherly love neither need ye, brethren, that I speak unto you; seeing that not only you, the generous promoters of the charitable institution which is the occasion of our present assembling together, still pursue this your pious and beneficent design of relieving the poor, labouring under diseases or bodily accidents; but that the charity and liberality of all of this place hath abounded upon all occasions and in every good work; so that by your labour of love the sick are visited, the hungry are fed, the ignorant are instructed, the children of the poor are trained up to virtue, piety, and industry suffer me nevertheless to lay before you some of the chief motives that recommend and enforce the practice of these duties, that you may receive the testimony and the applause of your own consciences, and "that your love may abound yet more and more.'

And to this end, in discoursing upon the words of the Apostle, I shall first briefly consider what is implied in the expression of being "taught of God" and shall then endeavour to show, that by whatever methods God may be said to teach mankind, he has in all of them most plainly and expressly taught us "to love one another."

We may be said to be taught of God, whensoever he has afforded us all the necessary means of attaining to a clear and certain knowledge of his will. Now God has, in the first place, given us the light of nature to guide us to the knowledge of himself. Our reason informs us, that God, the creator and preserver of the world, is a being of absolute perfection; and consequently of infinite righteousness, holiness, goodness, and truth. As by this means we are so far informed of his nature, so we have at the same time very clear manifestations of his will also as to many important particulars. If we are persuaded, that God is himself a being of absolute righteousness, we cannot doubt, but that it must be his will, that all rational creatures, whom he has created after his own image, and endued with faculties to enable them to distinguish between right and wrong, good and evil, should endeavour, according to the measure of their frail nature, to imitate him in the exercise of this glorious attribute, and conform all their actions to those plain rules of equity and justice, which their reason discovers to them. If it appears to us, that He is of infinite holiness and purity, it must likewise be most apparent that He is of purer eyes than to behold with approbation any manner of impurity; and that it must be his will, that we should be holy as He is Holy. If it is manifest that He is of infinite goodness, and that his mercy is over all his works, it cannot but be plainly his will, that we should, by mutual love and benevolence, permit and assist each other to enjoy in particular the several blessings which he

has graciously bestowed on us in general, and show mercy to one another, as he has been merciful to us all. As God is a God of truth, we have the greatest assurance, that we cannot possibly be deceived in these great and fundamental principles of our duty, which he has made so evident to our understandings, and has in a manner written on our hearts. From these and many other such considerations, it appears, that God has in some measure taught mankind his will by the light of their reason, and that what we call the dictates of nature are really no other than the instructions of God.

But it has also pleased God, in compassion to the infirmities of our nature, fallen as it appears from its original uprightness, to give us still more immediate and express declarations of his will, not only unfolding to us his gracious dispensations, the mystery of his love to mankind, but giving us a clearer knowledge of His nature and our own; and further instructing us even in the plain duties of natural obligation; enlarging them in their extent, and adding new motives to enforce the observance of them. And this he has done by many express revelations of his will; speaking to us by his servants the prophets, and at length by his Son; and sending also his Holy Spirit to guide us, by enlightening our understandings and purifying our affections. God therefore having taught mankind by the light of nature and Revelation, I shall show, that by each of those methods he has most clearly and expressly taught us to love one another.

And first, let us consider how God has taught us

to love one another by the motives suggested to us by the light of nature.

If we look on mankind merely as a number of our fellow-creatures, obliged to the same great Author as ourselves for their being, and designed no doubt like ourselves to be happy in the enjoyment of that being; we are even in this view, in gratitude to our common Author, bound to promote that design, and assist them in the pursuit of happiness. This consideration lays us under a very clear obligation of treating at least with tenderness and compassion those creatures who are so far partakers of our nature, as to have life and sense in common with us: much stronger and more extensive will that obligation be with regard to those that have the same share with us of the Divine endowment of reason; and still more forcible yet, when we consider, that the greatest part of that happiness, for which we were all alike in our present state designed, can only arise from a kind intercourse of mutual good offices. Man is brought into the world in so helpless a state, that he plainly appears to be placed under the care, and intrusted to the kindness, of man. And this is not only his condition in the very first stage of life; in which too we find no other animal so utterly destitute of all means of preserving itself; the duration also of which helpless state in no other animal bears so large a proportion to the whole time allotted to it: this, I say, is not only his condition in the very first stage, but is continued in a great degree the same far into his life, and in some measure carried through the whole. He is obliged to the care of

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