Honesty is a virtue beloved by good men, and pretended to by all other persons.  In this there are several degrees:  to pay every man his own is the common law of honesty:  but to do good to all mankind, is the chancery law of honesty:  and this chancery court is in every man’s breast, where his conscience is a Lord Chancellor.  Hence it is, that a miser, though he pays every body their own, cannot be an honest man, when he does not discharge the good offices that are incumbent on a friendly, kind, and generous person:  for, faith the prophet Isaiah, chap.  XXXII. ver. 7, 8. The instruments of a churl are evil:  he deviseth wicked devices to destroy the poor with lying words, even when the needy speaketh right.  But the liberal soul deviseth liberal things, and by liberal things shall he stand.  It is certainly honest to do every thing the law requires; but should we throw every poor debtor into prison till he has paid the utmost farthing, hang every malefactor without mercy, exact the penalty of every bond, and the forfeiture of every indenture, this would be downright cruelty, and not honesty:  and it is contrary to that general rule, To do to another, that which you would have done unto you.  Sometimes necessity makes an honest man a knave:  and a rich man a honest man, because he has no occasion to be a knave.  The trial of honesty is this:  Did you ever want bread, and had your neighbour’s loaf in keeping, and would starve rather than eat it?  Were you ever arrested, having in your custody another man’s cash, and would rather go to gaol, than break it? if so, this indeed may be reckoned honesty.  For King Solomon tells us, That a good name is better than life, and is a precious ointment, and which, when a man has once lost, he has nothing left worth keeping.

CHAP.  III Of the present state of Religion in the world.

I doubt, indeed, there is much more devotion than religion in the world, more adoration than supplication, and more hypocrisy than sincerity; and it is very melancholy to consider, what numbers of people there are furnished with the powers of reason and gifts of nature, and yet abandoned to the grossest ignorance and depravity.  But it would be uncharitable for us to imagine (as some Papists, abounding with too much ill nature, the only scandal to religion, do) that they will certainly be in a state of damnation after this life; for how can we think it consistent with the mercy and goodness of an infinite Being, to damn those creatures, when he has not furnished them with the light of the gospel? or how can such proud, conceited and cruel bigots, prescribe rules to the justice and mercy of God?

We are told by some people, that the great image which King Nebuchadnezzar set up to be adored by his people held the representation of the sun in it’s right hand, as the principal object of adoration.  But to wave this discourse of Heathens, how many self-contradicting principles are there held among Christians? and how do we doom one another to the devil, while all profess to worship the same Deity, and to expect the same salvation.