nd your dog has
a better errand at the Lord's table than you have. And if your minister
lets you sit down at the Lord's table without holding from time to time
some particular discourse with you about your sinful thoughts, he is
deceiving and misleading you, besides laying up for himself an awakening
at last to shame and everlasting contempt. What a mill-stone his
communion roll will be round such a minister's neck! And how his
congregation will gnash their teeth at him when they see to what his
miserable ministry has brought them!

Let a man examine himself, said Paul. What about your inward and sinful
cogitations? asked Prudence. How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge
within thee? demanded the bold prophet. Now, my brethren, what have you
to say to that particular accusation? Do you know what vain thoughts are?
Are you at all aware what multitudes of such thoughts lodge within you?
Do they drive you every day to your knees, and do you blush with shame
when you are alone before God at the fountain of folly that fills your
mind and your heart continually? The Apostle speaks of vain hopes that
make us ashamed that we ever entertained them. You have been often so
ashamed, and yet do not such hopes still too easily arise in your heart?
What castles of idiotic folly you still build! Were a sane man or a
modest woman even to dream such dreams of folly overnight, they would
blush and hide their heads all day at the thought. Out of a word, out of
a look, out of what was neither a word nor a look intended for you, what
a world of vanity will you build out of it! The question of Prudence is
not whether or no you are still a born fool at heart, she does not put
unnecessary questions: hers to you is the more pertinent and particular
question, whether, since you left your former life and became a
Christian, you feel every day increasing shame and detestation at
yourself, on account of the vanity of your inward cogitations. My
brethren, can you satisfy her who is set by her Master to hold particular
discourse with all true Christians before supper? Can you say with the
Psalmist,--could you tell Prudence where the Psalmist says,--I hate vain
thoughts, but Thy law do I love? And can you silence her by telling her
that her Master alone knows with what shame you think that He has such a
fool as you are among His people?

Anger, also, sudden and even long-entertained anger, was one of the 'many
failings' of which Christian