It is indeed true, and a truth never to be forgotten, that all pretensions to internal principles of holiness are vain when they are contradicted by the conduct; but it is no less true, that the only effectual way of improving the latter, is by a vigilant attention to the former. It was therefore our blessed Saviour's injunction, "Make the tree good" as the necessary means of obtaining good fruit; and the holy Scriptures abound in admonitions, to let it be our chief business to cultivate our hearts with all diligence, to examine into their state with impartiality, and watch over them with continual care. Indeed it is the _Heart_ which constitutes the _Man_; and external actions derive their whole character and meaning from the motives and dispositions of which they are the indications. Human judicatures, it is true, are chiefly conversant about the former, but this is only because to our limited perceptions the latter can seldom be any otherwise clearly ascertained. The real object of inquiry to human judicatures is the _internal_ disposition; it is to this that they adapt the nature, and proportion the degree, of their punishments. Yet though this be a truth so obvious, so established, that to have insisted on it may seem almost needless; it is a truth of which we are apt to lose sight in the review of our religious Character, and with which the _habit_, of considering Religion as consisting rather in external actions, than internal principles, is at direct and open war. This mode of judging may well be termed _habitual_: for though by some persons it is advisedly adopted, and openly avowed, yet in many cases for want of due watchfulness, it has stolen insensibly upon the mind; it exists unsuspected, and is practised, like other habits, without consciousness or observation.