bids taking "God's name in vain." The word "vain" in Scripture is often used to denote an appearance different from the reality, and signifies what is untrue, and therefore taking God's name in vain denotes principally calling on God to witness what the person knows to be a falsehood. But the expression "in vain" also in Scripture signifies needlessly, to no good purpose, and therefore this Commandment forbids likewise inconsiderate vows, unnecessary oaths, curses, and any irreverent mention of that name which should be hallowed above all. In the fifth Commandment the Scriptural meaning of the word "Honor" goes beyond the sense ordinarily attributed to it. It includes no doubt the respect and love, which together produce obedience, but it includes also support and maintenance where these are wanted, and where they can be supplied. St. Paul speaks of the Elders as entitled to "double honor,"* assigning as a reason that "the labourer is worthy of his hire:" and our Saviour, where he speaks of such as did not honor their father and mother, but pretended that what should be given for their relief had been devoted to religious purposes, fixes the meaning of the word in the Commandment† Certainly any thing short of this, is but a mockery of the precept, any thing contrary to it, * 1 Timothy v. 17.

Mark vii. 11.

any unkind behaviour of children to parents is ungrateful, uncharitable, unchristian, and unnatural. The wording of the ninth Commandment "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour," might seem to pass without censure that friendly dishonesty, which would bear false witness for him. This is however a paltry quibble, and the voice of perjury, whomsoever it may serve or whomsoever it may injure, is a breach of the Commandment. All men are our neighbours, and the false witness which is for one party is always against another. This it is in matters of civil justice: in criminal, it is an injury to society at large, giving facility to crime by the violation of truth, and thus bearing false witness against many individuals.

The Commandments contain our duty to God and our duty to our neighbour. In them is virtually included our duty to ourselves, and thus our Church requires them to be read to the Congregation, as rules under the authority of God, for the conduct of every member of a Christian community. "That we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all Godliness and honesty." St. Paul exhorts* "that supplication be made for Kings, and those in authority." With us such collect for the King has here peculiar propriety in connection with the Commandments just recited; 1 Timothy ii. 2.

*

our King as temporal head of the Church being bound to support the laws of the first table, while as supreme Magistrate of the state, it devolves on him to maintain and enforce the laws of the second. We entreat of God accordingly, that of his mercy for the whole Church, the King may be taught to know whose Minister he is, and the people to consider whose authority he bears: that the Sovereign may seek the honor of God, and the subjects faithfully serve and humbly obey him-to the maintenance of the control of the law, to the happiness of the people, and to the preservation of the general tranquillity. Persons whose delight it is to find something in our Liturgy to cavil at, object to the epithets in some parts of our service applied to the Sovereign as temporal head of our Church. These are but terms of ordinary respect and proper courtesy, and certainly in every language such terms are allowed to pass, without any very precise enquiry into their original or definite acceptation. Here they belong to the general character which the head of the Established Religion should bear, and they remind the individual of what is expected from him, and what is most suitable to the exalted office which he fills. But who ever supposed that Daniel in addressing the King of Persia in the accustomed manner "O King live for ever, was uttering a prayer that he

*Daniel vi. 21.

might be free from the ordinary fate of mortal life? Or who ever thought of looking in the life of Festus for the qualities which dignify true nobility, because St. Paul had called him "most noble Festus?"*

Many of the Commandments of the second table have been delivered in the most compressed form, and little consideration is required to see, that consistent with obedience to the precise letter, much injury might yet be done to our neighbour, and many evils against the public welfare be unforbidden and unreproved in the table of man's duty. When our Lord adverts to several of them in his Sermon on the Mount, he goes beyond the literal precept-he ascends to the source-he impresses the principle-he unfolds its extenthe justifies the analogies-he sets aside the narrow restrictions-he specifies unthought of particulars, as included in the general form. In the Church Catechism, our duties to God and to our neighbour, are given at full length, as deduced from the Commandments, and it must be evident to any person who looks into these, that many things are there required, not directly to be found in the two tables. To shew you however, that these are fairly deducible from what is directly said, may be of considerable advantage, and I shall employ the remainder of this discourse, in * Acts xxvi. 25.

shewing you the principles, according to which, the inferences are drawn. This may be useful, as a specimen of the mode in which the Commandments are to be considered, and by informing your understandings, may enable each to draw for himself that rule of duty, by which, if you would enter into life eternal, you must regulate your conduct in this present world.

FIRST.-Where any evil is specially forbidden by a Commandment, there all lesser degrees of the same evil are forbidden, as sins in a corresponding proportion. Hence it is easy to see, that the eighth Commandment which forbids stealing, forbids also all those petty tricks in dealing which take advantage of others: the principle of the Commandment being, that you are not to get into possession of what belongs to another, without that other's perfect knowledge and consent. Hence the ninth Commandment which forbids swearing falsely against your neighbour, forbids also injuring him by lies, though they be not sworn, or by any species of evil speaking: the injury inflicted in this way, being of the same kind with that noted in the Commandment. Thus also the sixth Commandment merely says, "Thou shalt do no murder," but surely no man can suppose, that it tolerates every injury and violence done to the person of another, provided it shall stop short of taking his life.