and want of happiness as of inevitable evils, as neceffary confequences of the prefent constitution of things. No, Lord, thou art righteous, thou art benignity and love, but we think and act often foolishly, often confound fpecious appearance with reality, and feek not fo much what is really true and good and remains true and good forever, as what glitters and fhines, and promises us tranfient, fuga. cious joys and advantages. God, do thou thyself reclaim us continually more from these deviations. Teach us rightly to think and to judge of what has a tendency to render us happy or unhappy, and to chufe between them with true chriftian wisdom. Let thy light, the light of truth, irradiate our minds, and thy fpirit guide and conduct us in all our ways. Biefs, to the furtherance of thefe defigns, the exercife of reflection we are now about to begin on these important subjects. Let thy holy fpirit in all things direct and rule our hearts, and hearken to our prayer through Jefus Chrift, our bleffed lord, in whofe name and words we address thee as we ought: Our father, &c.

PROV. iv. 20, 21, 22.

My fon, attend to my words; incline thine ear unto my fayings. Let them not depart from thine eyes; keep them in the midst of thine heart. For they are life unto those that find them, and health to all their flesh.

COULD I call your attention, and make it a mat

ter of confequence to you, my pious hearers, to remark the difference between fome few words and the objects they denote, which in all languages are more or less confounded, and used as fynonimous, I think I fhould very much contribute to your moral improvement and your happiness. These words are: Prosperity and Happiness, Adverfity and Unhappiness, Fortunate and Happy, Unfortunate and Unhappy. That the objects thereby fignified are materially different, may and must be presently dif covered by every reflecting perfon. Thoughtful however as well as thoughtless persons but too frequently confound words and things in their minds and judgments, in their difcourfes and actions; and thus the former as well as the latter, though in an inferior degree, are led into numberless errors, false and fhallow judgments, into tranfgreffions and follies, into anxieties and troubles. Whoever should constantly avoid this confufion, avoid it in thinking as well as in speaking, in common life as well as in fcientific

2

scientific exercises; whoever in this refpect should think precisely and fpeak precisely: fuch an one would certainly, in point of fatisfaction and happinefs, of wisdom and virtue, far excel every other who should not do fo. The fubject therefore well deserves that we should employ ourselves fomewhat longer upon it. It seems at first to relate merely to words; but they are words that have an extraordinary influence on morals, that create far, far more good or harm among mankind, than is ufually imagined. And therefore the fignification and use of them is not an object of idle curiofity, but muft ftand in the clofeft connection with the grand concerns of life. May these remarks awaken your attention, your continued attention to my present difcourse and induce you to make a diligent application of it! My defign is accurately to state the manifold and effential difference between profperity and happiness and the words and objects relating to them; and then point out to you, what a beneficial infuence this diftinction must have on your judgments, difpofitions and actions. If, in pursuance of the admonition in our text, in this refpect too, we let not wisdom depart from our eyes; if we hearken to her dictates, and follow her precepts, we fhall be happy and prudent, or intelligent persons.

By profperity, my pious hearers, we understand all outward privileges and endowments, all viciffitudes and events that are correfpondent with our wifhes and views, that have a tendency to promote

our

our welfare, that promife us the gratification of our wants, or the removal of our troubles and the ceffation of our fufferings, or means of accommodation, of pleasure and fatisfaction; and the greater and more covetable these things appeared to us, the more we felt the want of them, the less reason we had to expect them, and the more unexpectedly they fell to our lot: fo much the greater in our estimation, is the prosperity that we experience. To fuch goods of fortune belong riches, fuperfluity, station, rank, eminence, power, honour, authority, health, ftrength, fuccefs in our bufineffes and undertakings, deliverance from danger and distress, execution of our projects, attainment of our views, and the like. Adversity is the reverse of all this. It is lofs of our property and advantages, loss in health and strength, in influence and power: it confists in adverse events, unforeseen obstructions and difficulties, in pain and sicknesses, enemies and perils, and the like. - Happiness or unhappiness on the contrary is the state of pleasure or discomfort, of content or of difcontent, in which the man is; and which is principally determined by the thoughts, fentiments, defires, propenfities, views, appetites, that predominate in him and over him, by the degree of his moral goodness and perfection. Hence, my pious hearers, it is already apparent, that profperity and adverfity, happiness and unhappiness, are not neceffarily connected together, that they are not the fame things, that they rather are effentially

different

different from each other. There are cafes enough where every man makes the proper diftinction between these words, because there the mutual interchange of them would be too glaringly abfurd; and this fhews, that they are really distinct from each other, and in like manner in all other cafes ought to be distinguished. Let us now confider this difference on feveral other fides, in order to imprint it the more deeply on our minds, and then proceed to draw from it consequences of the utmost importance to us, which may have the most influence on our judgments and on our behaviour.

Profperity and adverfity are fomewhat without us; happiness and unhappiness fomewhat that is within us. Riches and poverty, elevated and humble ftation, health and fickness, progrefs and oppofition, are without us, relate to our outward condition, to the relations and habitudes in which we ftand to the reft of mankind and vifible things, to our body, which is not our proper self, but which our foul at prefent inhabits and employs as its inftrument. Pleasure and discomfort on the other hand, content and discontent, are within us, relate to our internal condition, to the temper and difpofition of our foul, to its relation to truth and virtue, to God its creator, and the invifible the fpiritual world: they are peculiar to our spirit, and determine its being, its life, its activity.

Again: Profperity and adverfity depend not always, and never entirely on ourfelves, on our own

Volition