live as to enjoy the testimony of your own conscience, and so walk, " that you may be found of him in peace without spot and blameless."]
1 Cor. xvi. 13, 14. Watch ye, standfast in the faith, quit you like men, he strong. Let all your tk'mgs he done with charity.
OF all the apostolic Churches, not any one seems to have been so corrupt as that at Corinth : at least, St. Paul reproves more evils there than in any other. In this epistle to that Church he addresses himself to the consideration of several abuses which had crept in among them : and now, in the close of it, he gives them, in few words, his pastoral advice; but evidently, I think, with a special view to all his preceding remarks. They were in the midst of manifold temp- tations ; and therefore he bids them " watch." They had amongst them false teachers, who, under a specious garb of sanctity and superior illumination, sought to turn them from the truth ; and therefore he tells them to " stand fast in the faith." They had trials of various kinds to encounter ; and therefore he says to them, " Quit you like men, be strong." At the same time, there were great contentions among them ; and therefore he adds, " Let all your things be done with charity." Now, as these subjects are worthy of universal concern, we will adopt the same line of instruction as was pursued by him ; and, just changing the words, in order to convey more clearly what I conceive to be the meaning of them, I will say,
I. Guard against temptations of every kind —
[Of course, every Christian must watch against all the more open assaults of his three great enemies, the world, the flesh, and the devil : and I must therefore, in the first place,
put you on your guard against them ■ — But, as the
caution was given to persons who might be considered as on the whole pious, it may be proper rather to advert to such