look, even the looking on a woman to lust after her, is a commission of adultery with her in the heart ; who has not need to humble himself before God, and to tremble for the judgment that awaits him ?
The eighth and ninth commandments must be understood as reaching, in like manner, to every in- jury that may be done to our neighbour's property or reputation ; and to every act, or word, or thought, whereby either the one or the other may be endan- gered.
But the key to the whole is the tenth command- ment. That, even in words, goes beyond the mere act, and prohibits the disposition of the mind. It was this which opened the eyes of the Apostle Paul, in reference to his state before God. Having been educated a Pharisee, he rested in the exposition which the Pharisees were wont to give of the com- mandments ; and knowing that, according to their literal import, he was innocent, he thought himself, as " touching the righteousness of the law, blame- less." But, when he came to consider more atten- tively the tenth commandment, he knew not how to withstand it, or to justify himself any longer as one who had truly observed it. He perceived that an inordinate desire of any kind was an actual violation of it ; and he was conscious, that though he had withstood any unlawful desires, he had not been free from the motions of them in his heart. Hence he was constrained to acknowledge, that he had trans- gressed the law, and was consequently condemned by it ; and needed to cry to God for mercy, as much as the vilest sinner upon earth. Hear his own account of this matter : " I was alive without the law once ; but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died : and the commandment which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death d." The law, as given to man in Paradise, was ordained to life ; but as continued to man in his fallen state, it is invariably unto death ; and every man upon the face of the whole earth is condemned by it.
d Rom. vii. 9, 10.