The _Hypocrite_.
There happen’d a Discourse in very Good Company, upon the Subject of
_Religion_ and _Hypocrisie_; and how hard a Matter it was, in the Case
of an Artificial Disguise, to know the One from the Other; though the
Scripture Allows us, and in truth Obliges us, to Judge of the _Tree_
by its _Fruits_. _Well_, says One to his Next Man, _Do you know such a
Person?_ Oh very well, says t’other; _he’s one of the Holiest Men to
Heaven-ward that ever you met with, but the Arrantest Rascal among his
Neighbours in the whole Parish_.
The MORAL.
_’Tis not the Name, the Semblance, or the Ostentation of Religion and
Holiness that will Attone for the Abuse on’t: In making God the Author,
the Director and the Abettor of those Flagitious Villanies in Christians,
that Pagans Themselves would have an Abhorrence for. But when All comes
to All, a Knave in his Practice, is a Knave in his Heart too._