the Precept has been fo pared and cut to the Quick by Exceptions, that it is no longer of any Use or Service in common Life.

The Law of God commands us to love our Neighbours as ourselves; the Interpretation of which will better come from our Hearts than our Heads; for we cannot help feeling the Senfe of our Duty as long as we attend to the Motions of Nature within ourselves: Our own Wants and Infirmities will shew us the Matter and the Extent of our Obedience; and Self-Love will direct us in the Practice and Execution: But when Men come to fpeculate upon the Point, and to define the exact Bounds of Love, and to determine nicely how far the Notion of Neighbourhood is to be extended, the Event too commonly is, that there is but very little Love left to be difpofed of among our Neighbours, and, that it may the better hold out, but very few Neighbours left to fhare in our Love. Call a covetous Man tothe Exercise of this Duty in an Inftance of Charity; fhew him a Man oppreffed with Poverty and Hunger, cloathed in Rags, and deftitute of all the Comforts and Supports of Life, and bid him love this poor Wretch as himself: He will tell you, perhaps, the

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Law w is excellent and good, and he does love the Man, and pities his Misfortunes; but he

has nothing to fpare: He is not obliged to love another better than himfelf; and therefore it is unreasonable to expect that he Thould ftraighten and pinch himself to enlarge the Conveniencies of others: He grudges him no Degree of Love, and heartily wishes him at Eafe and in Plenty; but cannot afford any thing towards it out of his Little. Or perhaps he will queftion upon what Title this Man pretends to be his Neighbour: He is fure he never saw him before, nor ever heard that he lived near him; and if every body that will may claim to be his Neighbour, there will be no End of it; and he may foon give his Neighbours all he has, if every one that begs must be his Neighbour. There is Room in all other Inftances of our Duty for the like Subterfuges; and as long as Men find Comfort in fuch Excufes for their Negligence and Difobedience, they will never want Invention to furnish them.

It may feem ftrange perhaps that the Laws of God fhould be liable to this Ufage; fince, being the Tranfcript of perfect Wifdom, and the Work of him who not only knows but forefees

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forefees the Secrets of all Hearts, we might expect to find them fo guarded and fenced about, and made fo plain and express in all Cafes, that it should have been in no Man's Power to question the Senfe or Meaning of the Precept, or to cover his Iniquity with the leaft Umbrage of an Excufe drawn from the Interpretation of holy Scripture: But there are very good Reafors to be given why the Law of God is not fo explicit and particular. Were the Scripture to defcend into the Confideration of all Cafes, and to ftate the exact Bounds of our Duty in all poffible Circumftances of Life, we might say perhaps, without being much beholden to a Figure of Speech, that the World itself could not contain the Things that should be written. A Law extending itself to fuch Variety of Cafes and Circumftances would be altogether useless, and Men might grow old in Sin and Iniquity before they could poffibly learn their Duty, or extract the Rules proper for their own Ufe out of the infinite Variety of Laws, many of which have no Respect to them or their Circumftances.

Befides, God gave every Man a Law to direct him, when he made him a reasonable Creature,

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-Creature, and expects Obedience in virtue of that Law of Nature. The Gofpel was given not to exclude, but to affift the Exercise of Reason: And therefore to require a Law fo exact and circumftantial, that there should be no Room for the Ufe or Obedience of Reason, is to preclude Men from thofe nobler Inftances of Duty which flow from the right Ufe of their Minds, and which are the proper Sacrifice offered by a rational Soul to God. The Uprightness of a Man, and the Integrity of his Mind, are as difcernible in his Application of the Rules of the Gospel, as by any outward Acts whatever. A Man who reads in the Gospel that he ought to love his Neighbour as himself, and from his own Senfe and Reason fupplies the Law with this noble Comment, That all the Sons of Men are his Neighbours, is as much a better Chriftian than the Man who extends the Law only to his Townfmen or his Countrymen, as his Neighbourhood is more univerfal.

Further, a Law defcending to every particular Cafe would be of no Manner of Service in correcting the Evil complained of: It is the Perverfeness of the Will, and not the Weaknefs of the Understanding, that teaches

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teaches Men the Evafions of the Law: Were the Law more explicit, they would only take more Pains to get rid of its Obligations; for the Plainnefs of the Law will do but little in correcting the Malignity of the Will, which yet is the only Thing that ftands in Need of an Improvement. The Command of loving our Neighbour is fo far from wanting to be enlarged, that I believe there is no right-good Chriftian who thinks any Mortal excluded from the Benefit of it, as it now ftands: To what Purpose then fhould it be enlarged? Were it expressed in never fo general Terms, it might ftill be misunderstood, or perverted, by fuch as obftinately refuse to fee. Suppofe the Law conceived in the fulleft Terms, and that it were faid that every Man in the World is to be esteemed our Neighbour, and has a Right to our Love and Affiftance, and that it is our Duty to do him good; and were this Law, fo expreffed, to be made the standing Rule of the Courts of Inquifition, what would the World be the better for it? For as long as they will maintain that the greatest Good they can do their Brother is, in order to reform his fuppofed Errors in Religion, to whip him and torment him,

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