These commands were the first commands that were giv en forth at Mount Sinai, before any of the precepts of the cer emonial or judicial laws. They were delivered by a great voice out of the midst of fire, which made all the people in the camp tremble, and afterwards were engraven on the tables of stone, and laid up in the ark: The first table containing the four first commandments, which teach our duty to God; the second table containing the six last, which teach our duty to man. The sum of the duties of the first table is contained in that which Christ says is the first and great commandment of the law; Matth. xxii. 37. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind." The sum of what is required in the second table, is what Christ calls the second command, like unto the first; verse 39. "The second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself."

Of the commands of this second table of the law, the first, which is the fifth of the ten, refers to that respect and honor which is due to our neighbor; the second respects his life; the third his chastity; the fourth his estate; the fifth his good name; the sixth and last respects his possessions and enjoyments in general. It is that command which respects our neighbor's estate, and which is the fourth command of the second table, and the eighth of the whole decalogue, on>› which I am to insist at this time.

Here I shall not raise any doctrine from the words, as the subject of my discourse, but shall make the command itself, as the words of it lie before us in the decalogue, my subject. And that I may treat of this command in a manner as brief as may be, I shall not stand to show," first, what duties are re-quired by the command, and then what sins are forbidden in it: But as the words of the commandment are in the form of a prohibition, forbidding a certain kind of sin; so I shall handle them, by considering particularly what it is that this command forbids. The sin that is forbidden in this command, is... called stealing; yet we cannot reasonably understand it only

of that act, which in the more ordinary and strict sense of the word, is called stealing.

But the iniquity which this command forbids, may be summarily expressed thus:

An unjust usurping of our neighbor's property, without hie

consent.

So much is doubtless comprehended in the text; yet this comprehends much more than is implied in the ordinary use of the word, stealing; which is only a secret taking of that which is another's, from his possession, without either his consent or knowledge. But the ten commands are not to be limited to the strictest sense of the words, but are to be understood in such a latitude, as to include all things that are of that nature or kind. Hence Christ reproves the Pharisees' interpretation of the sixth command, Matth. v. 21, 22; and also their interpretation of the seventh command; see ver. 27, 28; by which it appears that the commands are not to be understood as forbidding only these individual sins, which are expressly mentioned, in the strictest sense of the express ions; but all other things of the same nature or kind.

Therefore undoubtedly what is forbidden in this command is not only that private robbing of our neighbor, which is called stealing in the strictest sense of the expression; but all unjust usurpation of our neighbor's property. Here it may be observed, that an unjust usurpation of our neigh bor's property is twofold; it may be,

(1.) Either by withholding what is our neighbor's, or,

(2.) By taking it from him.

FIRST, It consists in an unjust withholding of what is our neighbor's. There are many ways in which persons may unjustly usurp their neighbor's property, by withholding what

is his due ; but I shall particularize at this time only two things.

1. The unfaithfulness of men in not fulfilling their engagements. Ordinarily when men promise any thing to their neighbor, or enter into engagements by undertaking any business with which their neighbor entrusts them, their engagements invest their neighbor with a right to that which is engaged; so that if they withhold it, they usurp that which belongs to their neighbor. So it is, when men break their promises, because they find them to be inconvenient, and they cannot fulfil them without difficulty and trouble; or merely because they have altered their minds since they promised. They think they have not consulted their own interest in the promise which they have made, and that if they had considered the matter as much before they promised as they have since, they should not have promised. Therefore they take the liberty to set their own promises aside. Besides, sometimes persons violate this command, by neglecting to fulfil their engagements, through a careless, negligent spirit.

They violate this command, in withholding what belongs to their neighbor, when they are not faithful in any business which they have undertaken to do for their neighbor. If their neighbor have hired them to labor for him for a certain time, and they be not careful well to husband the time; if they be hired to day's labor, and be not careful to improve the day, as they have reason to think that he who hired them justly expected of them; or if they be hired to accomplish such a piece of work, and be not careful to do it well, but do it slightly, do it not as if it were for themselves, or as they would have others do for them, when they in like manner betrust them with any business of theirs; or if they be entrusted with any particular affair, which they undertake, but use not that care, contrivance, and diligence, to manage it so as will be to the advantage of him who entrusts them, and as they would manage it, or would insist that it should be man aged, if the affair were their own: In all these cases they un justly withhold what belongs to their neighbor.

2. Another way in which men unjustly withhold what is their neighbors, is, in neglecting to pay their debts. Sometimes this happens, because they run so far into debt that they cannot reasonably hope to be able to pay their debts ; and this they do, either through pride and affectation of living above their circumstances; or through a grasping, covetous disposition, or some other corrupt principle. Sometimes they neglect to pay their debts from carelessness of spirit about it, little concerning themselves whether they are paid or not, taking no care to go to their creditor, or to send to him; and if they see him from time to time, they say nothing about their debts.

Sometimes they neglect to pay their debts, because it would put them to some inconvenience. The reason why they do it not, is not because they cannot do it, but because they cannot do it so conveniently as they desire; and so they rather choose to put their creditor to inconvenience by being without what properly belongs to him, than to put themselves to inconvenience by being without what doth not belong to them, and what they have no right to detain. In any of these cases they unjustly usurp the property of their neighbor.

Sometimes persons have that by them with which they could pay their debts if they would; but they want to lay out their money for something else, to buy gay clothing for their children, or to advance their estates, or for some such end. They have other designs in hand, which must fail, if they pay their debts. When men thus withhold what is due, they unjustly usurp what is not their own. Sometimes they neglect to pay their debts, and their excuse for it is, that their creditor doth not need it; that he hath a plentiful estate, and can well bear to lie out of his money. But if the creditor be ever so rich, that gives no right to the debtor to withhold from him that which belongs to him. If it be due, it ought to be paid; for that is the very notion of its being due. It is no more lawful to withhold from a man what is his due, without his consent, because he is rich and able to do without it, than it is

lawful to steal from a man because he is rich, and able to bear

the loss.

SECONDLY, The second way wherein men usurp their neighbor's property is, by unjustly taking it from him.

The principal ways of doing this, seem to be these four, by negligence, by fraud, by violence, or by stealing, strictly so called.

1. The first way of unjustly depriving our neighbor of that which is his, is by negligence, by carelessly neglecting that which is expected by neighbors, one of another, and is necessary to prevent our neighbor's suffering in his estate by us, or by any thing that is our's; and necessary in order that neighbors may live one by another, without suffering in their lawful interests, rights and possessions, one by another.

For instance, when proper care is not taken by men to prevent their neighbor's suffering in the produce of his fields. or inclosures, from their cattle, or other brute creatures; which may be either through negligence with regard to their creatures themselves, in keeping those that are unruly, and giving them their liberty, though they know that they are not fit to have their liberty, and are commonly wont to break into their neighbor's inclosures greatly to his damage; or through a neglect of that which is justly expected of them, to defend others' fields from suffering by the neighborhood of their own. In such cases men are guilty of unjustly taking from their neighbor what is his property.

It is said in the law of Moses, Exod. xxii. 5. “If a man shall cause a field or vineyard to be eaten, and shall put in his beast, and shall feed in another man's field; of the best of his own field, and of the best of his vineyard shall he make restitution." Now a man may be unjustly the cause of his neighbor's field or vineyard being eaten, either by putting in his beast, and so doing what he should not do; or by neglecting to do what he should do, to prevent his beast from getting into his field. What is said in the 144th Psalm, and two last. verses, supposes that a people who carry themselves as be