infinitely pure and holy character in which he has made himself known,-in his spirituality, omnipresence, omniscience, wisdom, and power,-in all the moral perfections of his nature,-as God the Creator, Preserver, and Redeemer ;-whom alone we are to worship and glorify as God, by giving him the homage of our whole hearts, by exercising the affections of love, trust, resignation, and dependence, in regard to him, and by making him our ultimate end in all things.

This duty so very obviously arises out of the relations which man bears to God, that a law expressly enjoining it might seem superfluous. Is it possible for human beings to confound the Creator with the creature; the God of all perfection, with a created, finite, and dependent being, or to give to the one the homage which is exclusively due to the other? Experience proves that this is not only possible, but that such is the proneness of mankind to idolatry, and to substitute objects of supreme regard and esteem in room of God, that they have not been preserved from this folly and abomination by the powerful motives and threatenings of Revelation. They have given to the meanest of his works the worship and service which are due to God; and thus have been guilty of conduct which includes in it almost every sin. Nor are idolaters exclusively chargeable with this wickedness; but all who give to any object that supreme devoted regard which alone belongs to God,-the sensual, the covetous, the ambitious, and profane,nay, all who bestow on what is lawfully beloved an inordinate and supreme affection.

The violation of the duty enjoined in this command, implies a denial of the perfection of God; a withholding from him that which is his due; and a substitution of the creature in his room.

I. It is a denial of the perfections of God. It is a practical falsehood in regard to his being, almighty power, omniscience, omnipresence, and all the moral excellences of his nature. It is, what the Apostle terms, changing the truth of God into a lie. Do they acknowledge him to be what he is, the only living and true God, the fountain of being and of happiness, who give their homage and their hearts to idols? Is not this to commit the two great evils mentioned by the prophet, to forsake God, the fountain of living waters, and to hew out unto themselves broken cisterns that can hold no water? Is it not a denial of his creating and preserving power, of his supreme authority as the only moral governor and judge, of his bounty in supplying the wants of every thing that lives, and of his sovereign right to command the obedience of his creatures, and to do what he will with his own? For a creature voluntarily to act thus towards the Creator, towards God, the centre and the sum of all perfection and blessedness, is doing the highest dishonour to Him of which he is capable.

II. It is, in addition to a denial of his perfections, a withholding from him that which is his due, and that which he claims. No right can be more manifest, and none more unalienable, than that of God to the love of the heart, to the voluntary obedience of the life, to direct and govern his creatures according to his good pleasure. He is pleased with their love and

obedience, as they are the means of promoting his glory; and he is displeased and dishonoured when their love and obedience are withheld. "A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master: if then I be a father, where is mine honour, and if I be a master, where is my fear? saith the Lord of hosts.' Every breach of the duty enjoined in the first commandment, is a wilful refusal of the honour, worship, and fear, which every intelligent being is bound to render unto God. When we consider how worthy God is of being beloved, on account of the boundless excellences of his nature, the unnumbered benefits which every moment he bestows, and of which He alone can be the author, and that true and permanent happiness is to be enjoyed only in obeying his commandments, the act of withholding from him the love and homage which are his due, is full of wickedness and criminality.

III. But it is an aggravation of this conduct, that it elevates a mere creature to the place of God. However exalted that creature may be, it is nothing more than a dependent, finite being, without power, or goodness, or happiness, but as they come to him from God. To give him religious homage, or even to give him that supreme regard and reverence which God claims as his, is to affirm that he is more excellent, more deserving of the love and confidence of the heart, than is the Lord and Creator of all. It is to deny divine perfections to God, and falsely to impute them to a weak and fallible creature; it is to withhold from God the love and the acknowledgment which are due to him, and to give them to some object raised into his

room. Is there not in this a complication of baseness, falsehood, injustice, and ingratitude, far beyond the power of human language adequately to express ? What are the evils which this sin does not include? It is practical atheism; it is adding impiety to the guilt of denying the being and attributes of God; and it is saying to the Almighty, Depart from us, for we will not own nor serve thee, and we desire not the knowledge of thy ways.

But we are not only bound to make God alone the object of our adoration and worship; we are to render him this adoration and worship in the way which he prescribes. The design of the second commandment is to make this known to us. The first prohibited the acknowledgment of false Gods; the second prohibits the worshipping of idols, and even the professed worshipping of the true God through the medium of idols. "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, nor any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow thyself down to them, nor serve them; for I, the Lord thy God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; and shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments."

Though this commandment consists in a prohibition, the duty implied in it is as fully enjoined as though it were expressly mentioned. That is, that God is to be worshipped spiritually, according to his nature and attributes. It is that which our Lord points out as

being required in acceptable worshippers: "The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth."

That spiritual worship only is that which is suitable to God, may be inferred from the light of nature. That he is infinite in the perfections of his nature, and therefore not material, is known just as clearly as that he is God. But if he is spiritual in his nature, and infinite in his perfections, the only worship which is suitable to him, and which he can accept from his intelligent creatures, is that of the understanding and the heart. It is not more manifest that it is our duty to worship him at all, than that it is our duty to give him that kind of worship which his nature and ours render necessary, the one from the other. Besides, we are surely bound to offer unto God the best that we are capable of giving.

This, accordingly, is what he has always commanded to be given him; under the patriarchal and Mosaic economy, not less than under the gospel dispensation. The rites prescribed in the worship were various, but so indispensably requisite were the love and homage of the heart, that, without them, the observance of the outward ordinances was regarded as hypocrisy. Hence the terms in which God speaks by the prophet Isaiah of those institutions which he himself had appointed, when observed in a vain and formal manner, and not as the medium of conveying the devout affection, esteem, reverence, and