let that be a reafon; but better give none at all; for that is worse than none. We do know the fovereign authority of reafon, and thereto we owe fubjection ; but it is a grievous thing, to be subject to another's will, or humour; it is certainly the highest ufurpation upon mankind, agere pro arbitrio & non pro ratione rei; the greatest flavery in nature, to be fubject to will and humour. And I muft obferve, that will undirected by reason, in this case the order of nature is wholly inverted, when the judgment of mind goes not before, and the motions of the will follow after. We know where to have men, when guided by reafon; for as to the reafon of things, another man may judge as well as he : but from will, when no reason is given, no body knows what he may be fure of, or what he may expect. If fo be men fet up either will or humour, none can know what will be done : for a creature that is finite and fallible, to fet up will for a light, is as wild-fire.

3. The affections and paffions; these are to be ftill and quiet, till after judgment and choice. For their place is only in pursuance; no place in determination. By judgment we find out our way, and by our paffions we are expedite in it; movemus per intellectum, currimus per affectus; we move by the guidance and direction of judgment and understanding; and when we are in motion, our affections give expedition. Affections are not for direction of what is to be done, but they are only for expedition and quickning. The reafon of the mind is all in all determination ; not what we would do, nor what we have a mind to do, but what is just and fit, what is

beft

best in the competition. This is not difcernable by mens paffions, and affections; this is only discernable in the use of reason and understanding. Affections are blind things of themselves, and they must only follow. There are two things requifite in this cafe, if a man will approve himself in refpect of his paffions and affections. 1. That the paffion and the object do fit. 2. That the proportion be observed between the act and the object. 1. For the firft, we are not to love what is hateful, nor hate what is lovely. Wherefore the apoftle faith, love not the world, i. e. the lufts of the flesh, the lufts of the eye, and the pride of life. Here the paffion and object do not fit. 2. The proportion is to be obferved; to wit, the degrees of the act, to the quality of the object. If an inferior good; we must not be too intent upon it, we must not extend our affections to many fuch things, we must not continue too long; nec nimis intensè, nec nimis extensè, nec nimis protense. Our higheft faculties are too large to be fatisfied or employed about any object inferior to God himself; our highest facultics, those whereby we are constituted in the kind of human nature, thofe in refpect of which we bear the image of God, are too fublime, too noble, too high, too large, either to be fatiated, or fully employed, in any object lefs than God himself.

These things have I fuggefted to you, for the government of the inward man. When I gave you an account of fobriety and moderation, then I was wholly taken up about what was outward and vifible; moderate use of eating, drinking, and fleeping. But now I have gone clofe here, touching the very inVOL. IV..

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ward man, the sense of a man's foul; what is his inward sentiments, what fenfe he hath of God, of things of the world, of virtue and of vice; what he makes his choice and delight, what he doth pursue with his affections, wherein he is paffionate in his defires. I add upon the whole. If we confider the principles whereof we do confift, we may discover that all these duties lie upon us. For if we know ourselves, and what is becoming reasonable nature; we fhall have a rule to guide us in respect of all moral good and evil. For fuch a nature as the nature of man is, intellectual nature, it gives law to itself, and carries a law with it, and is made with the law, and the law is in its own bowels, and is never extirpated while it continues in being: the law of reason is inherent to human nature.

The effects of wisdom and virtue, which do belong to intellectual nature, they give fecurity to our minds, and settle them in a right ftate; whereas vice and works of iniquity, which are the diseases of such a nature, they do alter and fpoil our temper and conftitution. Wifdom and virtue are fuitable and connatural, and they are confervative and productive of all acts that are truly the acts of a man, as a man ought to be. And on the other fide, fin is the difeafe and diftemper of fuch a nature, as men confift of; it alters, poifons, and destroys the right temper and conftitution thereof; it weakens and infeebles it.

It is base and unworthy, to live below the dignity of our nature; to the difhonour of a creature that bears the image of God. What a fhame is it for us to live in contradiction to the end of our being, to

what

what our nature appointed us? They degenerate into carnality, who use their minds and reasons to fuch low and bafe ends and purposes, as better become the natures below us. Thefe men neither know nor confider themselves, they have no reverence for themfelves; who employ themselves as if they were invefted with the nature of creatures below them. Do acts worthy of reafon and understanding, and refer yourselves to God as judge.

Can we flatter ourfelves fo far, or perfuade ourfelves, but that God will fooner or later require an account of the use of these divine faculties that God hath given us, mind and understanding; which certainly are for better purpose, than for the flavery of fin, and for the drudgery of the world? If we were made for this purpose, it had been better we had been lefs. We ought not then to have born the image of God at all. For is it not quite otherwife in the hea venly state? And ought not the higher ftate to give law and rule to this inferior ftate? Ought not things here below to be fubject to the things above? And ought not this lower world to refemble and imitate the higher world? The rule fhould be taken from, above; the law of heaven fhould be the law of the world; and the employment of mind and understanding in eternity, fhould be the employment that we should use and addict ourselves mainly to

here.

But I will advance and give you an argument that will command. Doth God himself lay or impofe upon us any other law, than what he himself doth ob ferve? And doth he require of us to do, what he himfelf

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himself doth not choose to do? For a being that is infinitely perfect, doth act agreeably to the highest wisdom and greatest goodness; for his throne is established in righteousness. Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. Thus it becomes us who are endued with reafon and understanding, to act conformably to the original of our being, fuitable to the principles of the natures whereof we do confift; both as to the choice of things, and as to the principles of our natures; ad dei exemplar, according to God's example. This cannot be looked upon by any man that is fober and confiderate, as a hard law impofed upon us by arbitrary will or power; but a law that of itself commands, and by its nature and quality recommends it felf to us. It is not impofed by will and arbitrary power, to do as God himfelt doth; be ye holy, as I am holy; be ye followers of God.

Senfe of a deity is inherent in intellectual nature. There is no inftinct ftronger in any nature, than the fenfe of a deity is in rational nature; and neglect of God, is an act as of the greateft deformity, fo of greatest force and violence in the world. It is worse than for a man to offer violence to his body by fword or knife, to alienate his mind and understanding from God. For there is a peculiarity between the mind and understanding, and God. It is alienation and facriledge, to live without God in the world.

Now if we find it otherwise, the consequence muft be very bad. For there cannot but be great unquietnefs and diffatisfaction in ourselves. There is great pain, if joint do not answer to joint, if there be a diflocation as much diffatisfaction certainly and

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