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Sermons preached to a country congregation
Sermons preached to a country congregation Author:William Gilpin Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: SERMON XII. 1 Cor. xiii. 13. AND NOW ABIDETH FAITH, HOPE, AND CHARITY, THESE THREE ; BUT THE GREATEST OF THESE IS CHARITY. WE do not often, I believe, f... more »ind in Scripture one virtue set above another. The authority of God, on which they all rest, in some degree equalises them. It was under some idea of this kind, that an inquiring lawyer asked our Saviour, which was the great commandment? Our Saviour mentioned the Jirst: but immediately subjoined, that the second was like unto it; and that equally on these two depended the law and the prophets. Yet, if he had meant to give the great commandment, at the head of Vol. in. K thethe decalogue, a distinguished place, it is only an exception we might expect. Notwithstanding however this general idea of equality, we find, in the passage I have just read, three Christian virtues compared, and one of them placed in a higher rank than the other two. This is rather singular, as it does not obviously appear, why charity should be placed before Jaith and hope. I shall endeavour therefore to explain the difficulty. â?? I shall, jirst, examine the three virtues oi'faith, hope, and charity apart. I shall, secondly, endeavour to point out a reason for the apostle's giving a preference to the last: and, thirdly, draw a conclusion from the whole. With regard to faith, some people include in it the whole range of duty both to God and man. And this is very true : for as all Christian virtues flow from it, they may all be said to be included in it. In this sense, no doubt, every good Christian will subscribe to faith, as the sum of religion. But it certainly is not always taken in this enlarged sense. St. Paul may sometimes, in a concise argument, consider faith as another word for Christianity: but in various passages, and particularly...« less