and knows his thoughts, words, and actions. It is true, that vain-glory, and oftentation, and reputation, and defigns, and ends, may many times render the outward actions fpecious and fair, when the heart runs quite another way, and accordingly would frame the actions, if those ends and defigns, and vain-glory and oftentation, were not in the way; but the fear of God begins with the heart, and purifies and rectifies it; and from the heart thus rectified grows a conformity in the life, the words and actions. 5. The great occafion and reason of the folly of mankind are, 1. The unrulinefs and want of government of the sensual appetite or lufts. Hence grows intemperance and excels in eating and drinking, unlawful and exorbitant lufts; and these exhauft the eftate, waste and confume the health, embase and impoverish the mind, deftroy the reputation, and render men unfit for industry and bufinefs. 2. The exorbitancy, and unrulinefs, and irregularity of the paffions; as, exceffive love of things that are either not lovely, or not deferving fo much love; excefs of anger, which oftentimes degenerates into malice and revenge; excess of joy, in light, trivial, inconfiderable matters; excefs of fear, where either no caufe of fear, or not cause of fo much fear is: and thefe exorbitances of paffions betray the fuccours of reafon, break out into very foolish, vain, imprudent actions, and fill the world with much of that folly and diforder that is every where obfervable. 3. Thofe difeafes and diftempers of the mind, as pride, vain-glory, ambition of honour, and place and power, infolency, arrogancy, envy, covetoufnefs, and the like; thefe, I fay, are fo many fickneffes and cankers, and rotten ulcers in the mind; and as they, like the furies that were let loofe out of Pandora's box, do raife most of those storms and tempefts that are abroad in the world, fo they disease and diforder, and befet the mind wherein they are, and make their lives a torment to them fee that it be conformable to those laws and edicts that this prince hath made. Now the great God of heaven and earth hath, in his holy word, given us laws and rules touching our words and actions; and what we are to fay or do, is to be faid or done in no less a prefence than the prefence of the ever-glorious God, who ftrictly eyes and obferves every man in the world, with the very fame advertence as if there were nothing elfe for him to obferve. And certainly there cannot be imagined a greater engagement to advertence, and attention, and confideration than this. And therefore, if the action or speech be of any moment, a man that fears God will confider, 1. Is this lawful to be done or not? If it be not, how fhall I do this great evil and fin against God? 2. But if it be lawful, yet is it fit? Is it convenient? Is it seasonable? If not, then I will not do it, for it becomes not that prefence before whom I live. 3. Again, if the thing be lawful and fit, yet I will confider how it is to be done, what are the most fuitable circumftances to the honour and good pleasure of that great God before whom I ftand. And this advertence and confideration doth not only qualify my actions and words with wisdom and prudence, in contemplation of the duty I owe to God, but it gives an excellent opportunity very many times, by giving pause and deliberation in reference to my duty to God, to discover many human ingredients of wifdom and prudence requifite to the choice of actions and words, and the manner of doing them. So that befides the greater advantage of confideration and advertence in relation to Almighty God, it doth fuperadd this advantage also, for opportunity thereby of human prudential confiderations, which otherwise by hafte and precipitance in actions or words would be loft; and it habituates the mind to a temper of caution, advertence, and confideration in matters, as well of fmaller as of greater moment, and fo make a wife, attentive, and confi derate man. 7. It mightily advanceth and improveth the worth and excellency of moft humane actions in the world, and makes them a nobler kind of a thing than otherwife without it they would be. Take a man that is employed as a statesman or politician, though he have much wisdom and prudence, it commonly degenerates into craft, and cunning, and pitiful fhuffling, without the fear of God: But mingle the fear of Almighty God with that kind of wisdom, it renders it noble, and generous, and staid, and honeft, and ftable. Again, a man that is much acquainted with the fubtler kind of learning, as philofophy, for inftance, without the fear of God upon his heart, it will carry him over to pride, arrogance, felf-conceit, curiofity, prefumption : But mingle it with the fear of God, it will ennoble that knowledge, carry it up to the honour and glory of that God that is the author of nature, to the admiration of his power, wifdom, and goodness; it will keep him humble, modeft, fober, and yet rather with an advance than detriment to his knowledge. Take a man induftrious in his calling, without the fear of God with it he becomes a drudge to worldly ends, vexed when disappointed, overjoyed in fuccefs: mingle but the fear of God with it, it will not abate his induftry but sweeten it; if he profper, he is thankful to God that gives him power to get wealth; if he mifcarry, he is patient under the will and difpenfation of the God he fears; it turns the very employment of his calling to a kind of religious duty and exercife of his religion, without damage, or detriment to it. 8. The fear of God is certainly the greatest wisdom, because it renders the mind full of tranquillity, and evennefs in all ftates and conditions: for he looks up to the great Lord of the heavens and earth, confiders what he commands and requires, remembers that he obferves and eyes all men ; knows that his providence governs all things; and this keeps him ftill even and fquare without any confiderable alteration, whatever his condition is. Is he rich, profperous, great? yet he he continues fafe, because he continues humble, watchful, advertent 1, least he should be deceived and tranfported; and he is careful to be the more thankful, and the more watchful because the command of his God, and the nature of his condition, requires it: Is he poor, neglected, unfuccefsful? yet he remains ftill patient, humble, contented, thankful, dependant upon the God he fears. And furely every man muft needs, agree, that fuch a man is a wifer man than he who is ever changed and tranfported with his condition; that if he be rich or powerful, there is nothing more vain, proud, infolent than he; and again let his condition become poor, low, defpifed, there is nothing under heaven more defpondent, difpirited, heartlefs, difcontented and tortured than fuch a man, and all for the want of the fear of Almighty God, which being once put into the heart, like the tree put by Mofes into the waters, cures the diforder and uneafinefs of all conditions. 9. In as much as the true fear of God is always mingled with the knowledge of the will of God, and that will is contained most fully in his written word, it must needs be that a man that truly fears the Lord, and inftructed in the word of God, the precepts thereof must needs be deeply digefted into his mind. Now as this word is the word of the ever-wife God, and therefore certainly must be full of moft wife directions, fo let any man but impartially and deeply confider the precepts contained in the word of God, he fhall affuredly find the best directions in the world for all kind of moral and divine wifdom: And I do confi. dently fay, that in all other books of morality there are not fo found, deep, certain, evident inftructions of wisdom (yet moft ftrictly joined with innocence and goodness), as there are in this one book, as would be easily demonftrable even to a reasonable judgment; but this is too large a theme for this place. 10. But befides all this, there is yet a fecret, but a 1 considerate. moft most certain truth, that highly improveth that wisdom which the fear of the Lord bringeth, and that is this; That thofe that truly fear God have a fecret guidance from a higher wisdom than what is barely human; namely, by the spirit of truth and wisdom, that doth really and truly, but fecretly, prevent and direct them. And let no man think that this is a piece of fanatiçifin. Any man that fincerely and truly fears Almighty God, relies upon him, calls upon him for his guidance and direction, hath it as really as the fon hath the counsel and direction of his father. And though the voice be not audible, nor the direction always perceptible to fenfe, yet is equally as real as if a man heard the voice faying, This is the way, walk in it. And this fecret direction of Almighty God is principally feen in matters relating to the good of the foul; but it may alfo be found in the great and momentous concerns of this life, which a good man, that fears God and begs his direction, fhall very often, if not at all times find. 2. Befides this direc tion, a good man, fearing God, fhall find his bleffing upon him. It is true that the portion of men fearing God is not in this life; oftentimes he meets with croffes, afflictions, and troubles in it; his portion is of a higher and more excellent ftate and condition than this life; yet a man that fears God hath alfo his blef fing in this life, even in relation to his very temporal condition: for either his honest and juft intentions and endeavours are bleffed with fuccefs and comfort; or if they be not, yet even his croffes and disappointments are turned into a bleffing; for they make him more humble and less esteeming this prefent world, and fetting his heart upon a better 1: For it is an everlasting truth, that all things fhall work together for the beft to them that love and fear Almighty God, and therefore certainly fuch a man is the wifest man. Rom. viii. 28, |