This fifth Sermon, excellent in parts, is yet on the whole the least excellent of Leighton's works,--and breathes less of either his own character as a man, or the character of his religious philosophy. The style too is in many places below Leighton's ordinary style--in some places even turbid, operose, and catechrestic;--for example,--"to trample on smilings with one foot and on frownings with the other." Ib. p. 77. Serm. VI. Leighton, I presume, was acquainted with the Hebrew Language, but he does not appear to have studied it much. His observation on the 'heart', as used in the Old Testament, shews that he did not know that the ancient Hebrews supposed the heart to be the seat of intellect, and therefore used it exactly as we use the head. Ib. p. 104. Serm. VII. This seventh Sermon is admirable throughout, Leighton throughout. O what a contrast might be presented by publishing some discourse of some Court divine, (South for instance,) preached under the same state of affairs, and printing the two in columns! Ib. p. 107. Serm. VIII. In all love three things are necessary; some goodness in the object, either true and real, or apparent and seeming to be so; for the soul, be it ever so evil, can affect nothing but which it takes in some way to be good. This assertion in these words has been so often made, from Plato's times to ours, that even wise men repeat it without perhaps much examination whether it be not equivocal--or rather (I suspect) true only in that sense in which it would amount to nothing--nothing to the purpose at least. This is to be regretted--for it is a mischievous equivoque, to make 'good' a synonyme of 'pleasant,' or even the 'genus' of which pleasure is a 'species'. It is a grievous mistake to say, that bad men seek pleasure because it is good. No! like children they call it good because it is pleasant. Even the useful must derive its meaning from the good, not 'vice versa'. Postscript. The lines in p. 107, noted by me, are one of a myriad instances to prove how rash it is to quote single sentences or assertions from the correctest writers, without collating them with the known system or express convictions of the author. It would be easy to cite fifty passages from Archbishop Leighton's works in direct contradiction to the sentence in question--which he had learnt in the schools when a lad, and afterwards had heard and met with so often that he was not aware that he had never sifted its real purport. This eighth Sermon is another most admirable discourse. Ib. Serm. IX. p. 12. The reasonable creature, it is true, hath more liberty in its actions, freely choosing one thing and rejecting another; yet it cannot be denied, that in acting of that liberty, their choice and refusal [A] follow the sway of their nature and condition.