in private, and when they may be made public without detracting from the merit of the action, if indeed they the Author of our religion having delivered a rule upon this subject which seems to enjoin universal secrecy: "When thou doest alms, let not thy left hand

ever may;

know what thy right hand doeth; that thy alms may be in secret, and thy Father, which seeth in secert, himself shall reward thee openly." (Matt. vi. 3, 4.) From the preamble to this prohibition, I think it, however, plain, that our Saviour's sole design was to forbid ostentation, and all publishing of gcod works which proceeds from that motive. "Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them; otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven; therefore, when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do, in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward."-ver. 1, 2. There are motives for the doing our alms in public, beside those of ostentation, with which therefore our Saviour's rule has no concern: such as to testify our approbation of some particular species of charity, and to recommend it to others; to take off the prejudice which the want, or, which is the same thing, the suppression, of our name in the list of contributors might excite against the charity, or against ourselves. And, so long as these motives are free from any mixture of vanity, they are in no danger of invading our Saviour's prohibition; they rather seem to comply with another direction which he has left us :-"Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven." If it be necessary to propose a precise distinction upon the subject, I can think of none better than the following: When our bounty is beyond our fortune and station, that is, when it is more than could be expected from us, our

charity should be private, if privacy be practicable: when it is not more than might be expected, it may be public for we cannot hope to influence others to the imitation of extraordinary generosity, and therefore want, in the former case, the only justifiable reason for making it public.

Having thus described several different exertions of charity, it may not be improper to take notice of a species of liberality, which is not charity, in any sense of the word: I mean the giving of entertainments or liquor, for the sake of popularity; or the rewarding, treating, and maintaining, the companions of our diversions, as hunters, shooters, fishers, and the like. I do not say that this is criminal; I only say, that it is not charity; and that we are not to suppose, because we give, and give to the poor, that it will stand in the place, or supersede the obligation, of more meritorious and disinterested bounty.

III. The pretences by which men excuse themselves from giving to the poor.

1. "That they have nothing to spare,” i. e. nothing for which they have not provided some other use; nothing which their plan of expense, together with the savings they have resolved to lay by, will not exhaust: never reflecting whether it be in their power, or that it is their duty, to retrench their expenses, and contract their plan, "that they may have to give to them that need:" or, rather, that this ought to have been part of their plan originally.

2. "That they have families of their own, and that charity begins at home." The extent of this plea will be considered, when we come to explain the duty of parents.

3. "That charity does not consist in giving money, but in benevolence, philanthropy, love to all mankind, goodness of heart," &c. Hear St. James :-"If a bro

ther or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto them, Depart in peace; be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?" (James ii. 15, 16.)

4. "That giving to the poor is not mentioned in St. Paul's description of charity, in the thirteenth chapter of his First Epistle to the Corinthians." This is not a description of charity, but of good-nature; and it is not necessary that every duty be mentioned in every place.

5. "That they pay the poor-rates." They might as well allege that they pay their debts: for the poor have the same right to that portion of a man's property which the laws assign to them, that the man himself has to the remainder.

6. "That they employ many poor persons:"-for their own sake, not the poor's; otherwise it is a good plea.

7. "That the poor do not suffer so much as we imagine; that education and habit have reconciled them to the evils of their condition, and make them easy under it." Habit can never reconcile human nature to the extremities of cold, hunger, and thirst, any more than it can reconcile the hand to the touch of a red-hot iron: besides, the question is not, how unhappy any one is, but how much more happy we can make him.

8. "That these people, give them what you will, will never thank you, or think of you for it." In the first place, this is not true: in the second place, it was not for the sake of their thanks that you relieved them.

9. "That we are liable to be imposed upon." If a due enquiry be made, our merit is the same: beside that the distress is generally real, although the cause be untruly stated.

10. "That they should apply to their parishes." This is not always practicable: to which we may add, that there are many requisites to a comfortable subsistence, which parish relief does not supply; and that there are some, who would suffer almost as much from receiving parish relief as by the want of it; and, lastly, that there are many modes of charity to which this answer does not relate at all.

11. "That giving money encourages idleness and vagrancy." This is true only of injudicious and indiscriminate generosity.

"That we have too many objects of charity at home, to bestow anything upon strangers; or, that there are other charities, which are more useful, or stand in greater need." The value of this excuse depends entirely upon the fact, whether we actually relieve those neighbouring objects, and contribute to those other charities.

Beside all these excuses, pride, or prudery, or delicacy, or love of ease, keep one half of the world out of the way of observing what the other half suffer.

CHAP. VI.

RESENTMENT.

RESENTMENT may be distinguished into anger and

revenge.

By anger, I mean the pain we suffer upon the receipt of an injury or affront, with the usual effects of that pain upon ourselves.

By revenge, the inflicting of pain upon the person who has injured or offended us, farther than the just ends of punishment or reparation require.

Anger prompts to revenge; but it is possible to

suspend the effect, when we cannot altogether quell the principle. We are bound also to endeavour to qualify and correct the principle itself. So that our duty requires two different applications of the mind; and, for that reason, anger and revenge may be considered separately.

CHAP. VII.

ANGER.

"BE ye angry, and sin not; " therefore all anger is not sinful, I suppose; because some degree of it, and upon some occasions, is inevitable.

It becomes sinful, or contradicts, however, the rule of Scripture, when it is conceived upon slight and inadequate provocations, and when it continues long.

1. When it is conceived upon slight provocations: for, "charity suffereth long, is not easily provoked.""Let every man be slow to anger." Peace, longsuffering, gentleness, meekness, are enumerated among the fruits of the Spirit (Gal. v. 22.), and compose the true Christian temper, as to this article of duty.

2. When it continues long: for, "let not the sun go down upon your wrath."

These precepts, and all reasoning indeed on the subject, suppose the passion of anger to be within our power; and this power consists not so much in any faculty we possess of appeasing our wrath at the time (for we are passive under the smart which an injury or affront occasions, and all we can then do is to prevent its breaking out into action), as in so mollifying our minds by habits of just reflection, as to be less irritated by impressions of injury, and to be sooner pacified.

VOL. I.

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