volatile as well as the grave, he who has reflected on happiness and explored its various fources, as well as he to whom both the term and the idea are alike unknown and strange. Every one is defirous to rejoice in the life and the faculties which he feels within him; every one to enjoy as much property, as many accommodations and pleasures, as he knows and can acquire; every one abhors and fhuns all disagreeable, painful ideas and feelings; every one wishes to augment the fum as well as the vivacity and force of his agreeable ideas and feelings. If the one acts with consciousness and confideration; the other, in the fame purfuit, follows merely an inward irresistible instinct, an obscure fenfation. If the one acts upon principles and determinate views; the other fuffers himself to be blindly led by the impreffions and collifions of outward things, or by his fenfual animal feelings. All run after the fame object: but the ways they strike into to that end, tend very far asunder. None even entirely miss of their purpose: but most of them attain to it along very toilfome roads, after long and dangerous deviations, after many vexatious disappointments; attain to it only late, only very imperfectly, and pains and forrows mark most of the steps they have made. But, fince the longing and the endeavouring after happiness is fo natural to man, and is fo intimately blended with all that he thinks and wills and does; it is undoubtedly of the utmost moment, that he should give them the proper direction; that direc tion whereby he may the most certainly, the most fafely, the most completely accomplish his defire. Whoever is once arrived at that ftage of human culture that he can reflect on happiness and mifery, and on the means and fources of it, and is frequently and cogently fummoned to reflect upon them, fhould not fatisfy himself with obfcure and confused ideas on these fubjects. Otherwise he would be still farther from the mark than his unenlightened, entirely fenfual brother. He should rather ftrive to adjust and always more accurately to adjust and to determine his ideas on this important matter. We, my pious hearers, we are at that stage of civilization as perfons who are acquainted with their intellectual faculties and understand the use of them; and as chriftians, who have a fuperior light to enlighten and to guide them on the way of truth. Let us affert our privileges by forming to ourselves just conceptions of human happiness. This is the defign of my prefent difcourfe. A man's life, fays Jefus in our text, confifts not in, no man lives, no man is rendered happy, by the abundance of his poffeffions. This expreflion of our divine teacher points out to us the track by which we are to feek, or not to feek our happiness. Let us pursue this track by circumstantially inquiring wherein our happiness consists or does not confift, and by what way we may moft furely arrive at it. Subjects of reflection certainly meriting our ut moft attention and our moft cordial participation. A man's A man's life confifts not in the abundance of his poffeffions; therefore, human happiness confifts not in the poffeffion of outward endowments and advantages, not in wealth and affluence, not in elevation and power, not in those things that mankind reckon worldly profperity. Experience teaches us that a man may have all these things, that he may poffefs them in an ample, a fuperfluous degree, and yet be unhappy; and that on the other hand he may be deftitute of all or of the greatest part of thefe things, and yet be happy. Or, are all, are even most of the rich and great and powerful happy? Are they content, pleased, fatisfied? Are they truly comfortable in what they have and poffefs? Do they find in the ufe and enjoyment of it, all that they hoped and expected from it? Do they enjoy it without apprehenfions and without cares? Do these advantages fhield them from all the troubles and vexations of life, from pains and fickneffes, from the effects of envy and jealoufy, from the pernicious violence of irregular and deftructive paffions? Are not their wants very often only fo much the more numerous and great, their defires and appetites the more violent and infatiable, in proportion as they have more means and opportunities to comply with them, and to hearken to their impetuous cravings? Does not frequently their dependence on others, their fervitude, their actual flavery, increase in proportion as they want more things and perfons to the gratification of their defires and to the execution of their projects? On the other hand, are all thofe unhappy, who live in an inferior ftation, who are deftitute of the goods of fortune and outward advantages? Are all, are many of the fources of pleafure, fhut up against them? Are peace of mind, fatisfaction, joy unknown and foreign to them? Do they not frequently enjoy them in a far fuperior degree, far more carelefsly and freely, than thofe pretended favourites of fortune? Does not the lowlinefs and obfcurity of their station fecure them from a thousand dangers and troubles? Have they not all that nature and religion offer to the man and the christian, in common with the rich and the mighty? Is not generally their tafte lefs vitiated, and their fenfibility ftronger and more lively? Is not their happiness dependent on much fewer accidental and tranfient objects? Cannot a man very often be far more blithe in himself and his exiftence, in filence and in folitude than in noife and tumult? No, my dear friends, outward welfare, wealth, fuperfluity, elevation, power, pomp and fplendour may in themfelves confift with happiness; they do not always exclude it; they have a tendency rather, when rightly estimated and ufed as fubordinate means, to promote it but they form no neceffary, no effential part of it. The abfence of them is not always, is not in moft cafes, attended by the want of happinefs. This can very well subsist without them, it is feen very often without them. Of this neither refection nor obfervation will allow us to doubt. A man's man's life confifts not in the abundance of the things that he poffeffes. Just as little neceffary is it to human happiness, my pious hearers, that all our undertakings should fucceed, that all our plans and defigns fhould be accomplished, all our wishes be fulfilled, all our defires be gratified. Our defires are but too often fordid and corrupt, our wishes foolish, our plans and defigns injurious to ourselves and others, our undertakings unjuft, or unreasonable, or imprac ticable. Were it not for the various bounds prefcribed us by the nature and the courfe of thingsand by the over-ruling providence of God, there would certainly be far more pain and fuffering, more grief and mifery among mortals; and never would creatures who fee no farther than we do be more unhappy than if all went with them according to their wishes. Were it not for the numerous obftacles and difficulties that we meet with in the world, were it not for the oppofition that checks us on all fides, and forces us to reflection and confideration, were it not for the painful experiments we fo frequently make of our weaknefs, of our temerity, of our ignorance and folly, and of the facility with which we err and are deceived, we fhould never become intelligent and wife, never rightly judge of our faculties and capacities, and never use them in the best manner, never diftinguish between femblance and reality, the shadow and the fubftance, and confequently never learn to |