Those that depend upon the strength of faith, though they neglect not means, yet they are not curious in the proportion of outward means to the effect desired. Where the heart is armed with an assured confidence, a sling and a stone are weapons enough: to the unbelieving, no helps are sufficient. Goliath, though he were presumptuous enough, yet had one shield carried before him, another he carried on his shoulder; neither will his sword alone content him, but he takes his spear too. David's armour is his plain shepherd's russet, and the brook yields him his artillery; and he knows, there is more safety in his cloth than in the other's brass; and more danger in his pebbles, than the other's spear. Faith gives both heart and arms. The inward armour is so much more noble, because it is of proof for both soul and body: if we be furnished with this, how boldly shall we meet with the powers of darkness, and go away more than conquerors! Neither did the quality of David's weapons evince more confidence than the number. If he will put his life and victory upon the stones of the brook, why doth he not fill his scrip full of them? Why will he content himself with five? Had he been furnished with store, the advantage of his nimbleness might have given him hope; if one fail, that yet another might speed: but now this paucity puts the despatch to a sudden hazard, and he hath but five stones cast either to death or victory: still the fewer helps, the stronger faith. David had an instinct from God that he should overcome; he had not a particular direction how he should overcome. For had he been at first resolved upon the sling and stone, he had saved the labour of girding his sword. It seems, while they were preparing him for the combat, he made account of handblows: now he is purposed rather to send, than bring death to his adversary; in either, or both, he durst trust God with the success, and before-hand (through the conflict) saw the victory it is sufficient, that we know the issue of our fight. If our weapons and wards vary, according to the occasion given by God, that is nothing to the event: sure we are, that if we resist, we shall overcome; and if we overcome, we shall be crowned. When David appeared in the lists to so unequal an adversary, as many eyes were upon him, so in those eyes diverse affections. The Israelites looked upon him with pity, and fear, and each man thought, Alas, why is this comely stripling suffered to cast away himself upon such a monster? Why will they let him go unarmed to such an affray? Why will Saul hazard the honour of Israel on so unlikely an end? The Philistines, especially their great champion, looked upon him with scorn, disdaining so base a combatant; Am I a dog, that thou comest to me with staves? What could be said more fitly? Hadst thou been any other than a dog, O Goliath, thou hadst never opened thy foul mouth to bark against the host of God, and the God of hosts. If David had thought thee any other than a very dog, he had never come to thee with a staff and a stone. 6 The last words, that ever the Philistine shall speak, are curses and brags: come to me, and I will give thy flesh unto the fowls of the heaven, and the beasts of the field.' Seldom ever was there a good end of ostentation. Presumption is at once the presage and cause of ruin. He is a weak adversary, that can be killed with words. That man, which could not fear the giant's hand, cannot fear his tongue. If words shall first encounter, the Philistine receives the first foil, and shall-first let in death into his ear, ere it enter into his forehead. Thou comest to me with a sword, and a spear, and a shield; but I come to thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the host of Israel, whom thou hast railed upon. This day shall the Lord close thee in my hand, and I shall smite thee, and take thine head from thee.' Here is another style, not of a boaster, but of a prophet. Now shall Goliath know whence to expect his bane, even from the hands of a revenging God that shall smite him by David; and now shall learn, too late, what it is to meddle with an enemy, that goes under the invisible protection of the Almighty. No sooner hath David spoken, than his foot and hand second his tongue: he runs to fight with the Philistine. It is a cold courage that stands only upon defence: as a man that saw no cause of fear, and was full of the ambition of victory, he flies upon that monster, and, with a stone out of his bag, smites him in the forehead. There was no part of Goliath that was capable of that danger, but the face, and that piece of the face; the rest was defended with a brazen wall, which a weak sling would have tried to batter in vain. What could Goliath fear, to see an adversary come to him without edge or point? And, behold, that one part hath God found out for the entrance of death. He, that could have caused the stone to pass through the shield and breast-plate of Goliath, rather directs the stone to that part whose nakedness gave advantage. Where there power or possibility of nature, God uses not to work miracles, but chooses the way that lies most open to his purposes. is The vast forehead was a fair mark; but how easily might the sling have missed it, if there had not been another hand in this cast' besides David's! He, that guided David into this field, and raised his courage to this combat, guides the stone to its end, and lodges it in that seat of impudence. There now lieth the great defier of Israel, grovelling and grinning in death, and is not suffered to deal one blow for his life, and bites the unwelcome earth, for indignation that he dies by the hand of a shepherd! Earth and hell share him betwixt them. Such is the end of insolence and presumption. What is flesh and blood to God, who can make a little pebble-stone stronger than a giant, and, when he will, by the weakest means, can strew his enemies in the dust! Where now are the two shields of Goliath, that they did not bear off this stroke of death? or wherefore serves that weaver's beam, but to strike the earth in falling? or that sword, but to behead its master? What needed David load himself with an unnecessary weapon? one sword can serve both Goliath and him. If Goliath had a man to bear his shield, David had Goliath to bear his sword, wherewith that proud blasphemous head is severed from his shoulders. Nothing more honours God, than the turning of wicked men's forces against themselves. There is none of his enemies, but carries with them their own destruction.-Thus didst thou, O son of David, foil Satan with his own weapon, that whereby he meant destruction to thee and us, vanquished him through thy mighty power, and raised thee to that glorious triumph and exaltation wherein thou art, wherein we shall be with thee! SERMON XC. FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY. MAHOMETANISM. Luke v. 10.-Fear not: from henceforth thou shalt catch men. 6 THE gospel for this day relates the manner of calling four great apostles, who were main pillars of the Christian Church. As the draught of fishes was miraculous, so the success which attended their future labours in catching men,' equally attested a divine power, communicated to the apostles by a co-operating Saviour. These triumphs of the gospel could not have been achieved by mere human means: so that the Christian may confidently reckon the establishment of the gospel, under circumstances the most adverse to its reception, among the strongest testimonies to the truth of his Holy Faith. The only event, in the history of the human species, which admits of comparison with the propagation of Christianity, is the success of Mahometanism; but we shall find, upon due enquiry, that the establishment of Mahomet's religion was effected by causes which, in no degree, appertain to the origin of Christianity. During the first twelve years of his mission, Mahomet had recourse only to persuasion. This is allowed. And there is sufficient reason from the effect to believe that, if he had confined himself to this mode of propagating his religion, we of the present day should never have heard either of him or it. "Three years were silently employed in the conversion of fourteen proselytes. For ten years, the religion advanced with a slow and painful progress, within the walls of Mecca. The number of proselytes in the seventh year of his mission may be estimated by the absence of eighty-three men and eighteen women, who retired to Ethiopia." Yet this progress, such as it was, appears to have been aided by some very important advantages, which Mahomet found in his situation, in his mode of conducting his design, and in his doctrine. 1. Mahomet was the grandson of the most powerful and honourable family in Mecca: and although the early death of his father had not left him a patrimony suitable to his birth, he had, long before the commencement of his mission, repaired this deficiency by an opulent marriage. A person considerable by his wealth, of high descent, and nearly allied to the chiefs of his country, taking upon himself the character of a religious teacher, would not fail of attracting attention and followers. 2. Mahomet conducted his design, in the outset especially, with great art and prudence. He conducted it as a politician would conduct a plot. His first application was to his own family. This gained him his wife's uncle, a considerable person in Mecca, together with his cousin Ali, afterwards the celebrated caliph, then a youth of great expectation, and even already distinguished by his attachment, impetuosity, and courage. He next expressed himself to Abu Beer, a man amongst the first of the Koreish in wealth and influence. The interest and example of Abu Beer drew in five other principal persons in Mecca, whose solicitations prevailed upon five more of the same rank. This was the work of three years; during which time, every thing was transacted in secret. Upon the strength of these allies, and under the powerful protection of his family, who, however some of them might disapprove his enterprise, or deride his pretensions, would not suffer the orphan of their house, the relict of their favourite brother, to be insulted, Mahomet now commenced his public preaching. And the advance which he made, during the nine or ten remaining years of his peaceable ministry, was by no means greater than what, with these advantages, and with the additional and singular circumstance of there being no established religion at Mecca at that time to contend with, might reasonably have been expected. How soon his primitive adherents were let into the secret of his views of empire, or, in what stage of his undertaking, these views first opened themselves to his own mind, it is not now easy to determine. The event however was, that these, his first proselytes, all ultimately attained to riches and honours, to the command of armies, and the government of kingdoms. 3. The Arabs deduced their descent from Abraham through the line of Ishmael. The inhabitants of Mecca, in common probably with the other Arabian tribes, acknowledged, as, I think, may clearly be collected from the Koran, one supreme |