SIMILAR caufes ever have produced, and ever will produce fimilar effects. You may fhift the scene from one age and country to another, but like beings, the fame fpirit, the fame paffions and purfuits arise continually to view. The difference between period and period, nation and nation, city and city, man and man, confifts merely in a few arbitrary customs, various forms of fpeech and modes of behaviour; but the great principles of human nature, the great moving fprings of human actions are univerfal and invariable. What then is fo abfurd as to tax others with abfurdity, only because their language, manners or prejudices do not exactly coincide with our own?

As the principles of our nature, fo the rules of the divine government are fimilar and uniform. The views, paffions and interests of men are the hinges on which the mighty engine revolves. Every little individual moves and acts in his own proper fphere, like the stars in the firmament of heaven, but all move and act together under the influence of one great commanding power, which animates and directs the whole, Every one poffeffes, and feels, and exercises its feparate intelligence, and all are, at the fame time, checked, impelled, fuftained by one fupreme Intelligence which is above all, through all and in all.

The juftest and most accurate, the most useful and inftructive reprefentations of human life and conduct are to be found in this divine record. The actors in this facred and interefting drama, are perfonages of the very highest distinction, patriarchs and prophets, legiflators and kings; but we are never permitted, for a single moment, to forget, that they are alfo men. In their form and features we behold our own image reflected. In the emotions by which they were agitated, in the objects which they purfued, we recognize our own averfions and defires, our own purfuits and attainments, our own mortifications and fuccefs.

We

We are now entering on the hiftory of one of the greatest among the prophets, and that history delineated by his own pencil. He begins it with a defcription of his father's family, previous to his own birth, and a faithful reprefentation of the different characters of which it was compofed. And this will furnish ample matter for the prefent Lecture,

Elkanah, the father of Samuel, from the genealogical deduction here prefented, was a Levite of the family of the Kohathites, and is denominated a man of Ramathaim-zophim, of Mount Ephraim, from his being born or refiding at that city.

Men of eminence, as has often been obferved, confer celebrity on cities and countries; but poor is that merit which is derived from no other fource but a man's parentage, or the place of his birth. The Le vitical tribe was fcattered over the whole country, and during the disorderly times which fucceeded the death of Joshua, their refidence and their fervices feem to have been regulated by no certain and fixed ftandard. His ancestors for many generations are mere names in the historic page; fhadows without a fubftance; and he himself borrows the fame and luftre in which he is tranfmitted to us, from the reputation, ability and distinction of his nobler fon; whofe children, in their turn, fink into infamy, and thence into oblivion.

The first article in Elkanah's domeftic economy presented to our confideration, is an imputation upon his wifdom, if not upon his piety. "He had two wives." Polygamy, or a plurality of wives, was a practice at that time indeed connived at, but no where, and at no period, fanctioned by a law: a practice not indeed condemned by ftatutes and punishments, but fufficiently condemned by effects and confequences. It is of very little importance to inquire whether it be forbidden, if it can be proved unreafonable, unwife, inexpedient. And for fuch proof we have but to recur to the domeftic hiftory of Abraham, of Jacob, of Elkanah, and of every family in which it

prevailed.

prevailed. Hannah was probably the prior wife, and it is presumable that the difappointment of not having children by her fuggefted the hazardous experiment of a double marriage; and the iffue demonftrated that every deviation from the path of rectitude leads directly to its own chaftifement.

The mortification of Hannah, already too much to bear, is grievoufly embittered by the affumption of a rival in the affection of her husband, and becomes intolerable by the fruitfulness of that rival. And thus, by one ill-advised ftep, all the parties are rendered unhappy, and that without any high degree of criminality on any fide. Elkanah's peace is inceffantly difturbed by the mutual jealoufy, and bitterness, and ftrife of thofe conjoined, who feparately might have contributed to foothe and foften the cares of life. The pleafure of having children is marred and impaired to Peninnah, by the ill-difguifed partiality of the father of her children, to another. The mifery of barrennefs is dreadfully aggravated to Hannah, by the cruel mocking and taunts of her mercilefs adverfary. And what became of the children all the while? Were they likely to be well and wifely educated, amidst all these domeftic jarrings? Hated and oppofed by more than a ftep-mother's rancour, fpoiled by the over indulgence of maternal tendernefs, ftriving to compenfate that rancour and hatred; fecretly careffed, openly neglected by an embarraffed father, who was now afraid to exprefs, and now to conceal the honeft emotions of nature. It is not vice only that deftroys human comfort. And if mere imprudence involves a man in fo many difficulties and diftreffes, how dreadful muft it be to bear continually in one's bofom the burning coal of an ill confcience.

Happily for Elkanah and his house, family discord did not extinguifh family religion; he went up regularly with all his household to worship the Lord at Shiloh, at the great yearly feftivals. The law commanded the attendance of the males only, on fuch occa

fions;

fions; but whether it were that a higher sense of piety induced him to appear before Jehovah rejoicing with all that were his, or whether he hoped to allay the ferment of fierce and angry fpirits, in the foulcompofing exercises of devotion, both his wives attended him to the fervice of the fanctuary, and fat down together with him at the facrifice of peace-offering. It was wifely and well intended, the fire of malignity fades and dies in prefence of the pure flame of love divine, as material fire is abforbed and extinguifhed when expofed to the rays of the glorious orb of day. It was well intended, had he not reafon to hope that Hannah would forget her mifery, and Peninnah her pride in the prefence of God; that the power of religion, and the profpects of immortality might haply unite thole whom paffion and intereft had fevered. But if fuch were his intention, he fucceeded not. And that he fucceeded not, is to be imputed, in part, to his own weakness. The beloved wife must be diftinguifhed by a "worthy portion," and to render it more infulting, at a public feftival, and before envious, watchful eyes, thofe of Peninnah, and her fons and daughters. Thus, through fome mixture of folly in ourselves, through the craftinefs and malignity of another, or through fome untowardness of arrangement, over which we had no power, and neither could foresee nor prevent, the best defigns mifcarry, medicine is converted into poifon, and religion is made a minister of wrath and unrighteousness.

Who does not here recollect a certain "coat of many colours," which coft fo dear to him who gave, and to him who wore it? Who is not warned to guard againft, or at least to conceal partial affections, where claims are equal? Who does not feel the importance of bringing to the altar of God, a fpirit elevated above all temporal confiderations!

Not only was the good-natured intention of Elkanah fruftrated, but the worship of God was profaned;

and

and wretched indeed must be the ftate of that family, where religion not only fails to conciliate, but tends to alienate, irritate and inflame. "Elkanah loved Hannah, but the Lord had fhut up her womb."The abfence of one defired bleffing renders the poffef. fion of a thousand others tastelefs and infipid. The moderating hand of eternal Providence rectifies the diforders, and counteracts the violence, of human paffion; preferves the balance from a preponderancy too great, or too lafting, on either fide; and conducts all to the happiest iffue at length.

But an evil which comes immediately from heaven is by that very confideration rendered both tolerable and falutary. The Lord can do nothing but what is right; in wrath he remembers love; "he afflicts not willingly nor grieves the children of men, not for his pleasure, but their profit." But alas, there was mingled in Hannah's cup, an ingredient which converted the whole into wormwood and gall; "her adverfary also provoked her fore for to make her fret, becaufe the Lord had shut up her womb." What relish had now the double portion, though the token of a fond husband's unabated kindness? The infulting words and looks of her pitilefs "adverfary" are as vinegar upon nitre. How dreadful to have a calamity which was inceffantly, though fecretly preying upon her vitals, inceffantly thrown in her teeth; home rendered a burthen; the place of facrifice, a habitation of difcord; fire fnatched with unhallowed hands from the altar of Jehovah to kindle the gloomy fire of hell! There needs no tormenting fiend to afcend from the bottomlefs pit, armed with fcorpions, to plague and torture wretched mortals; fee, the are armed like furies one against another, they exul in one another's pain; relentless, remorfelefs, they ay not it is enough."

Dreadful to think, this angry vengeful spirit continued to agitate and torment thefe unhappy women for many years together; and what is hell, but a state

of