The Measures of Christian Obedience, Book 3 · Chapter 2
CHAP. II. Of the second qualification of all acceptable obedience, viz. integrity.
The CONTENTS.
Of the second qualification of an acceptable obedience, viz. integrity. The Notion of integrity or uprightness. A three-fold integrity. Of the integrity of our powers and faculties. Or of the obedience with our minds, affections, wills, and bodily powers. How God is to be obeyed with the first faculty, our minds or understandings. God is to be obeyed with the second faculty, our affections. This Question stated, How God and his Laws, which are spiritual things, are proportionate objects for our love and affections, which are bodily faculties. Of the difference betwixt our love of God, and of the World: that this is more warm and sensible; that more lasting and powerful. An account of what measures of obedience in our minds and affections, is necessary to the acceptance of our service. That contrivances and consultations for evil things, and such mere apprehensions as are particularly forbidden, are deadly and damning: but that all other bare apprehensions; and that all our affections after good or evil things will be rewarded or punished, not merely for themselves, but only as they are Causes and Principles of good or evil choice and practice. God to be obeyed with the third faculty, our wills. He cannot be served without them. Men are guilty of sin if they chuse it and consent to it, though they cannot act it. All this service of our inward faculties is in order to our outward works and operations.
INtegrity of obedience is such a perfection and compleatness of it, as excludes all maimedness and defects. Which is well intimated by St James, when he explains intire by wanting nothing; Let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and intire, which you will be by wanting nothing, Jam. 1.4.
And this in another word is ordinarily expressed in Scripture by uprightness. For in the most common Metaphor of the holy Books our course of life is called our way; our actions, steps; and our doing, walking. And, to carry on the Metaphor, our course of obedience is called our right or straight path; our course of sin and transgressions a crooked path; our committing sin, stumbling and falling; and our doing our duty, walking uprightly. So that for a man to be upright in God's ways, is, not to stumble or fall by sin and disobedience; i. e. to be perfect and intire, or wanting nothing in our obedient performances.
Now this integrity or uprightness which is necessary to our obedience that it may stand us in stead at the last Day, is three-fold.
1. An integrity of our powers or faculties, which I call an integrity of the Subject.
2. An integrity of seasons and opportunities, which is an integrity of Time.
3. An integrity of the particular Laws of Duty, and instances of obedience, which is an integrity of the Object.
And all these are necessary to render our performance of God's Laws an acceptable service. For if ever we expect that he should reward our obedience at the last Day, we must take care beforehand that it be the obedience of our whole man, in all times, to the whole Law of God. To begin with it.
1. That our obedience of the forementioned Laws may avail us to life and pardon at the last Day, we must take care to obey with all our powers and faculties, which is an integrity of the Subject. And for this the very Letter of the Law is express. For when the Lawyer asks, What shall I do to inherit eternal life? Christ sends him to what is written in the Law, and repeats that to him for an Answer;Mark 12.30. Thou shalt love (and serve, as it is Deut. 11.13.) the Lord thy God with all thy heart or will, and with all thy soul or affections, and with all thy strength or executive and bodily powers, and with all thy mind or understanding, Luke 10.25, 26, 27, 28. Obedience with all these powers and with our whole Nature, is the means of life, and the indispensable condition of our eternal happiness.
First, We must keep all Gods Commandments with our minds or understandings. It is a dangerous conceit for any man to phansie that he may be as sinful as he will in his thoughts, so long as he only loves and chuses, projects and contrives for the forbidden instance in his mind; but doth not proceed so far as to obey it in his outward practice. For at the last Day we must be called to account, and justified or condemned by the counsels and imaginations of our minds, as well as by the works of our lives. For not only the works and practice, but also the thoughts of the wicked, or of wickedness, are an abomination to the Lord, Prov. 15.26. The thought of foolishness is sin, Prov. 24.9. And since God forbids and hates them; as ever we hope for his favour, we must repent of them and forsake them. Let the wicked man forsake his thoughts, saith the Prophet, and turn them from his sin unto the Lord; and then he will have mercy upon him, and abundantly pardon him, Isai. 55.7. For the warfare that God has set us, after which we are to attain the reward of eternal happiness, is a casting down imaginations, as the Apostle tells us, and bringing into captivity every rebellious thought to the obedience of Christ, 2 Cor. 10.4, 5.
In particular, this obedience of our minds to the Law of God must be, as a doing what he enjoins, so likewise a keeping off from every thing which he forbids.
First, In our imaginations. We must not phansie it in our minds with love and delight, nor indulge to any thoughts of it with such pleasure as may be a bait to our choice, and weaken our aversation and hatred of it, and thereby ensnare us into the practice of it. Our warfare, as we have heard from the Apostle, must not be against actions only, but against imaginations also, and insnaring phancies of evil; casting down rebellious imaginations, and making every thought obedient to the Laws of Christ, 2 Cor. 10.4, 5. And in the old world, when the imaginations of mens thoughts were always evil, it repented the Lord that he had made man, insomuch as he resolved to destroy him, Gen. 6.5, 6, 7.
Secondly, In our counsels and contrivances. We must not study what means are fittest, what times are best, and what manner is most advantageous for the acting of our sins. They must no more have our care and contrivance, than our service and obedience. For if we cast about in our thoughts, and consult about the most commodious way of committing any sin; although all our designs be defeated before we come to any effect, yet shall we be damned for our contrivance, as well as we should for the compleat action. And this our Lord himself has plainly determined in one instance, and the Case is the same in all the rest. For of the contrivances and machinations of murther he assures us, That they, as well as murther it self, are of the number of those things which pollute a man, and so utterly unfit him for Heaven, where nothing can ever enter that is polluted or unclean. Out of the heart, saith he, proceed evil thoughts or aforeign. Which being set immediately before foreign, and the sins here being reckoned up according to the order of the ten Commandments, determine the wicked machinations to this particular, viz. murtherous only.murtherous machinations, and besides them, compleat murthers, adulteries, &c. and these defile the man, Matth. 15 19.
And as for that particular sort of contriving for sin, which is the height and perfection of villany; viz. the inventing of new, and before unknown ways of transgressing: it, of all others, is sure to meet with the severest punishment, and to thrust men down into the deepest Abyss of Hell. Of this sort are all invention of new Oaths, new Nick-names or evil speakings, new frauds and methods of couzenage, new incentives of lust, new modes of drinking, and arts of intemperance. But of these, and of all others that are like unto them, God will one day exact a most rigorous and terrible account: For he that deviseth to do evil, saith Solomon, although he himself doth not act, but only devise it, he shall be called and dealt with as a mischievous and wicked person, Prov. 24.8. And St Pauls words are full to this purpose. For he tells us expresly, that in the judgment of God inventers of evil things shall be declared worthy of death, Rom. 1.30, 32.
As for our minds or understandings then, they are one faculty which is plainly implied in the Integrity of our service, and without the obedience whereof at the last day God will not accept us.
And another faculty implied in it likewise is,
Secondly, Our Soul or Affections. It is a vain thing for any man to love and set his heart upon any particular sin, and yet for all that to expect that God should love and reward him. If I regard iniquity in my heart, saith the Psalmist, the Lord will not hear me, Psal. 66.18. No man, as our Saviour sayes, can serve two masters, for if he love the one, for his sake, when their interests enterfere, he will hate the other; so that we cannot serve God, if with our affections we continue to serve sin, Mat. 6.24. To pretend obedience to God, and yet to love what he sorbids, to make a show of his service, and yet in our very hearts to hanker after his vilest enemies whom above all things his soul abhors: this surely is not honestly to serve, but grosly to collogue, and slatly to dissemble with him. For in very deed, if any man love sin, he sides with Gods enemy; but for the service and fear of the Lord, it is to hate evil, Prov. 8.13. If ever we expect that God should accept our works, we must offer up our affections with them. For if our hearts go along with our lusts, whilst our practice is against them; we serve God only against our wills; we submit to him as a slave doth to a tyrannous Lord, not through any kindness for him, but through a hatefull fear of him. We utterly dislike what he bids us, but yet we do it, only because we dare not do otherwise. But now this is such a way of performing obedience, as God will never endure to accept of. For he scorns to be served by a slavish fear, and an unwilling mind; he will never look upon a heartless sacrifice; but it is the affection that we do it with, which makes him set a price upon any thing that we do; and our love that he regards more than our performance. For this is that very thing which was thought fit to be mentioned in the command it self. Thou shalt love the Lord with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, Mat. 22.37.
'Tis true indeed, we do not find our affection so quick and sensible for God and his Laws, as it uses to be for the things of the world, neither can we reasonably expect it should. For our affections are bodily powers, and it is their very nature, as Philosophy instructs us, to be a vehement sensation upon some certain commotions of our bodily spirits; so that God and his Laws, which are things immaterial and insensible, are no proper and proportionate object for them. For it is only matter that is able of it self to affect matter; and material and sensible objects, which can excite our material and sensitive passions and appetites. One bodily faculty is no more fit in its own nature to be moved by a spiritual object than another: and we may as well expect that our eye should see, or our fingers handle it; as that our affections should of themselves issue out upon it, either to love, or desire, or delight in it.
So that considering things barely in themselves, I say, and the natural agreeableness that is betwixt them, which is the ground of their natural operations; it is only bodily pain or pleasure that is of it self fit to move our bodily passions. But as for spiritual and insensible objects, such as God and Virtue are, whatever fitness to work upon our affections they may have upon other accounts, yet in themselves they have none. Virtue and Obedience, which are spiritual things, may gain upon our wills and understandings, which are spiritual and rational faculties; but upon our bodily appetites and affections for their own sakes barely they never can.
But that which makes our affections to issue out upon God and Virtue, is not the spiritual nature of God and Virtue themselves; but those sensible and bodily things which flow from them, and are annexed to them. For although God be immaterial in himself, yet infinite are those material and bodily delights which we receive from him. And although Virtue and Obedience are in their own natures spiritual and insensible, yet exceeding great, and exceeding many are the sensible goods and pleasures that are annexed to them. For Heaven, and eternal life, which are promised to our obedience, will give a full delight, not only to our souls and spirits, but even to all our senses likewise. It will endlesly entertain our eyes with most splendid sights and glorious objects; it will feast our ears with melodious songs, and most ravishing halelujahs, and refresh our whole bodies with a most exalted and everlasting ease and pleasure. As on the other side, hell and eternal misery, which are the established punishment of all sin and disobedience, will bring not only upon our spirits, but upon our bodies too as full a scene of most exquisite pain and sorrow. For so violent and intolerable will the torments of our bodies there be, that God could find nothing too high to set them out by, but has expressed them by one of the most raging and tormenting things in nature, eternal fire.
Now as for Heaven and Hell, they indeed are such things as can of themselves stir our affections and bodily passions with a witness. When they are set before us, they are able to make us love God and our Duty above all things else, and to hate nothing so much as Sin and Disobedience. For no Sin can promise us so much bodily delight, as is to be injoyed in Heaven; neither can Obedience in any possible instance expose us to so great bodily pains, as the damn'd for ever undergo in Hell. So that when once Heaven and Hell are proposed to our affections, and act upon them, they will prevail with them more than any thing else can, and make nothing so dear to them as the performance of their duty, nor any thing so hatefull as the transgression of it.
And thus may God and Virtue become a fit object even of our bodily passions, and a most cogent matter of love, desire and joy; as on the contrary sin and wickedness are of sorrow, slight and hatred. They are most powerfull to excite all these affections, although not in their bare spiritual selves, yet in their bodily dependants, and annexed consequences. For the greatest bodily joys shall one day crown our Obedience, and the acutest bodily torments will certainly befall us if we disobey. And these, although as yet they are at a distance, and future to us, are most fit to work upon us, and most strongly to affect us. For we are Creatures endowed with understanding, and have Reason given to us to set future things before us, and to think our selves into passions and affections, and not to be idle and altogether passive, like the brute and unreasonable Creatures, and suffer the bare force of outward and present objects to excite them in us: So that with our bodily affections we may love, and delight in God and Religion, which are spiritual things, because of their bodily joys and attendancies; and sensibly hate and grieve at our sins and disobedience, which are moral and immaterial evils; because of their sensible pains and punishment. And we may love the one and hate the other above all things else, because no bodily joys are in any the least comparison so great as those which are laid up for the good in heaven, nor any bodily pains so tormenting, as those which are prepared for the damn'd in hell. And since God has given to our bodily affections even in their own way, the greatest motives to love him above all, and above all things to hate sin; it is the highest Reason that he should require it of us, and demand the preeminent service, not only of our spirits, but also of our lower soul or affections also.
But although our bodily affections, when they are employed about Vice and Virtue which are spiritual things, by reason of this supereminence of sensitive rewards in the one, and punishments in the other, be more strong and powerfull, yet are they not, as I said, so warm and sensible as they use to be, when they issue out upon sensible and bodily objects. We feel one in our own souls, and are affected in them much more violently, than we are in the other. And that it must needs be so is plain: For our affections for worldly things are raised in us by the things themselves, and by those impressions which they make upon us; and they act to the highest, and according to the utmost of their power. But our affections for spiritual things are to be raised in us by our own Reason, we are to argue and think our selves up to them, and our thoughts are free, and go no further than we please to suffer them. And indeed we find so much difficulty in fixing them upon any thing, and there are so many other things obtruding daily upon them to divert and call them off from these; that we seldom stay so long upon them, or are so well acquainted with them, as to be wrought up into a very warm and inflamed affection for them.
Besides, what is the chief Reason of all, that Good and Evil in worldly things which affects us is present with us, and therefore our passions for, or against them are raised in us by our sense and feeling. But as for spiritual things, and those bodily joys and sorrows that are annexed to them, for the sake whereof we are sensibly affected with them; they are not present with us, but future and at a distance; and therefore our passion for them cannot be raised by our sense, whose object are only present things, but meerly by our fancy and imagination. But now as for the sensible warmth and violence of a passion, it is nothing near so quick when it is excited by fancy, as when it is produced by sense. For no man is so feelingly affected with hearing a sad story, as he would be by seeing of it. A man will be moved abundantly less by imagining a battle, a murder, or any other dreadfull thing, than by beholding it: And the reason is, because the impressions upon our sense are quick and violent, and their warmth is communicated to our affections which are raised by them: whereas our imaginations are calm and faint in comparison, and the passions which flow from them partake of their temper, and are more cold and less perceptible: So that our passions for worldly things being passions upon sense, and our passions for things spiritual with their bodily pain or pleasure annexed, being only upon fancy and imagination; we must needs be more warmly and sensibly, although not more powerfully affected with the things of this world, than of the other.
But that which is to distinguish our passion for God and Virtue above all things else, from our passion for worldly things, is not the warmth and sensibleness, but the power and continuance of it. For it must be a prevalent affection, which doth more service, although it make less noise. It must be such a setled and overpowering Love, answerable to the prevailing strength, and surpassing greatness of its motive, as gets the upper hand in competition, and makes us, when we must despise one to disregard all things else, and to adhere to Gods service, what other things soever be lost by it: What it wants in warmth, it has in permanency and power; it sticks faster to us, and can do more with us than our love of any thing besides. For in our affections we must needs prefer God and his service before every other thing when they stand in competition; or we have none of that Love with the whole soul which the Commandment requires of us; as will be shewn more fully bChap. 8.afterwards.
And because our thoughts and affections have in them a great latitude, and in a matter of so high concern every good soul will be inquisitive after some determinate accounts of that compass and degree of them which is necessary to our acceptance: before I conclude this Point, I will set down what measures of obedience in these two faculties, what thoughts and imaginations of our minds, and what degrees of love and delight in our affections, shall be judged sufficient at the last Day to save or to destroy us.
As for our thoughts, there is one more elaborate and perfect sort of them, viz. our counsels and contrivances. And when they are employed about the compassing of forbidden things, they are our sin, and, without repentance, will certainly prove our condemnation. For he that deviseth to do evil, saith Solomon, he shall be called and dealt with as a mischievous person, Prov. 24.8. The machinations of murther are joined in guilt and punishment with murtherous actions themselves, Matth. 15.19. And as for that particular sort of Contrivers, the inventers of evil things, they are pronounced by St Paul to be worthy of death, Rom. 1.30, 32.
And as for other of our thoughts which are not come up to the height of a contrivance or consultation, but are only simple apprehensions; some of them also are properly and directly good or evil, and an Article of our life or death. God has imposed several Laws, which he has backed both with threats and promises, upon our very thoughts themselves. Of which sort there are some to be met with under all the three general Parts of Duty, viz. to God, our Neighbour, and our selves. For our thoughts of God are bound up by the Law of honour, which forbids us to lessen or prophane him by dishonourable Notions and Opinions; our thoughts of our Neighbour by the Laws of Charity and Candour, which suffer us not either to reproach or injure him by under-valuing Ideas, or groundless suspicions; and our thoughts of our own selves by the Law of humility, which prohibits us to be exal…ed in our own conceits through false and over-high apprehensions of our own excellence. Pious and charitable opinions both of God and men, and humble and lowly conceits of our own selves, are Duties incumbent upon our very minds themselves. And all the opposite vices of impious and reproachful Ideas of God; of censorious, suspicious and lessening thoughts of other men; and of proud and arrogant conceits of our own worth; are transgressions within the sphere and compass even of our understandings. For the exercise of the first is not only a Cause and Principle, but a part and instance also of obedience, and an Article of life: as the exercise of the other is an instance of disobedience, and an Article also of damnation.
As for these Instances then, of bare thought and naked apprehension, they are essential parts and necessary instances of an acceptable obedience; and the wilful transgression of any one of them, without repentance, is dangerous and damning.
So that as for all our perfected and studied thoughts of evil, viz. our counsels and contrivances; and as for all such simple thoughts and …ore apprehensions as have particular Laws imposed upon them; they are not only principles, but parts and instances of disobedience; and if we are guilty of them, unless we retract them by repentance, we shall be condemned for them.
But then there are several other bare imaginations and simple apprehensions, which are not under any of these particular Laws, that are imposed upon our thoughts themselves, but are employed upon things commanded or forbidden by any of the other Laws forementioned. And as for all these apprehensions, in themselves they are neither sin nor Duty, nor a matter either of reward or punishment; but so far only as they are causes and principles either of a sinful or obedient choice and practice of those good or evil things, which they are employed upon.
In themselves, I say, these mere apprehensions are neither sin nor Duty. We may perceive sin in our minds, and have it in a thought or notion, without ever being guilty of it, or liable to answer for it. For the Sun shines upon a Dunghil without being defiled by it: and God sees all the wickedness in Hell, but is not tainted with it. And so long as we sojourn in a World of iniquity, every good man must needs know and behold all the vices of the Earth; but bare understanding of them doth not make him partake with them, or subject to be punished for them.
But to make these meer apprehensions and imaginations either of good or evil an instance of obedience or disobedience; they must be cSee this slated Lib. 5. Cap. 3.causes and principles of an obedient or disobedient choice or practice. For our inward thoughts and imaginations are Springs and Principles both of our inward choice, and also of our outward operations. And the service which God requires of them is the service of the principle. He demands the obedience of our minds as a means, and in order to a further obedience of our hearts and actions. He expects that we should think so long and so often upon the absoluteness of his authority, the kindness of his Nature, the reasonableness of his Commands, the glory of his rewards, and the terrour of his punishments; till in our hearts we chuse those things which he has commanded, and perform them in our works and practice. For our thoughts of him, and of his Laws, are not in themselves Obedience, but only a Spring and Principle of it, and a good step and degree towards it. Our knowledge shall be judged an acceptable service as it carries us on to performance, but no otherwise. For hereby alone, says St John, we know that we know him with such knowledge as shall be accepted by him, if we keep his Commandments, 1 John 2.3. And on the other side, our bare imaginations and apprehensions of some forbidden sin are then only disobedient, when they carry us on to chuse or practise those things that are sinful. We must go on from thought to choice or practice before the vices thought of become our own, and our apprehensions of sin become themselves sinful. For the thoughts of sin have the sinfulness of means and causes; they are sinful so far as they help on either our consent or performance. So our Saviour has determined in one instance, viz. that of lustful looks and apprehensions, Matth. 5. He that looks upon a woman so long as to lust after her or to consent in his heart to the enjoyment of her, he hath committed Adultery with her already in his heart, ver. 28.
As for our thoughts and imaginations then, we see what obedience in them is required to our acceptance, and when they are disobedient and will destroy us. For our counsels and contrivances of evil are always sinful; and so are all such simple thoughts and apprehensions as have particular Laws imposed upon them. And as for our imaginations and apprehensions of things commanded or forbidden by any other Laws; they are imperfect things, and not fully grown up to the perfect Stature either of obedience or of disobedience; So that they are neither punished nor rewarded in themselves; but so far only as they are causes and principles of an obedient or disobedient choice or actions.
And then as for our affections, their measures are the very same with those already mentioned of our bare imaginations and simple apprehensions. For their service and obedience is that of the principle, and their Sentence shall be according to those effects, either in our wills or practice, which flow from it.
If we love and desire obedience, so far as to chuse and act it; this degree of affection will gain us God's love and favour, and secure his rewards; but less than it no other shall. He that keeps my Commandments, saith Christ, he it is that loveth me, and they only who so love me in obeying me, shall be beloved again of my Father, and I will love them, John 14.15, 21.
But if our love and desire of evil things carry us on to dSee this stated Book 5. Chap. 3.chuse or act any instance of disobedience, for the sake of that which is loved and desired; then are our affections sinful, and such as will destroy us. The desire of evil is not so truly the state of mortal sin, as of dangerous temptation, it is not deadly in it self, but kills by carrying us on to a sinful and deadly choice and actions. For when once it has got to that degree, it is obnoxious to a dreadful Sentence. Whereof the Psalmist gives us one instance in the love of violence. Him that loveth violence, the soul of the Lord hateth, Psal. 11.5. And St John says the same of the love of lying, and the Case is alike in every other sin. Without in outer darkness, are murtherers, and whatsoever loveth or maketh a lye, Rev. 22.15.
And thus we see what measure of obedience is required in these two faculties, and what kinds and degrees of thoughts and affections are to be used or restrained to make theirs an acceptable Service. For we must abstain from all evil counsels and contrivances; from all simple apprehensions which are particularly forbidden, and put in use all such as are particularly enjoined: and as for all other our bare thoughts and imaginations, and all our affections and desires, we must fix them upon our Duty so long, till they make us perform it; and never suffer them to issue out upon evil so far, till they carry us on either to chuse or practise it.
But besides these two faculties, viz. our minds and affections, there is yet another whose service is necessary to render ours an acceptable obedience; and that is,
Thirdly, Our hearts or wills also.
It is an absurd Dream for any man to think of serving God without his will, because without that none of his actions can be called his own. For that only is imputed to us, which is chosen by us, and which it was in the power of our own wills either to promote or hinder; no man deserving praise or being liable to answer for what he could not help. But of all persons God most of all regards our hearts in all our performances. He perfectly discerns them, and he estimates our services according to them. So that it is not possible for any of us to obey him unwillingly, in regard the choice of our will and heart it self is that which renders any action a saving and acceptable obedience. For out of the heart, as Solomon saith, proceed the issues of life, Prov. 4.23.
The choice then as well as the practice of our Duty is plainly necessary to render it available to our salvation. But on the other side if we chuse sin, although we miss of opportunity to act it, the bare choice, without the practice, is sufficient to our condemnation. For even by that, when we proceed no further, our heart has gone astray from God, and we are polluted by the sin which we resolve upon in our own choice; since out of the heart, as our Saviour tells us, proceeds the pollution of the man, Matth. 15.19, 20. We may commit all sort of transgressions, and incurr the punishment of them merely by consenting to them inwardly in our hearts, without ever compleating them in our outward operation. For our Lord himself has thus determined it in one instance, and the Case is the same in all the rest. Whosoever looks upon a woman to lust after her, or so long till his heart consent to commit lewdness with her if he could, he, though he never meet with an eCum ab homine mala ressolâ necessitate non agitur, ipsa rei turpis cupi…itas pro actione damnatur, Salvian de Prov. l. 6. p. 205. Ed. Oxon.opportunity to act it, or before any, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart, Matth. 5.28.
No man then may venture to will and chuse any one sin, and yet presume he is innocent. For if fear, or shame, or interest, or other bye-motive and worldly end, or want of opportunity, hinder him from the outward acting and compleating of his sin; yet if his heart stands for it, and all the while he wills and chuses it, he is guilty in the Accounts of God as if he had committed it. We disobey in willing as well as in doing, and shall suffer for a wicked choice, as well as for a wicked practice. So that as ever we hope to have our obedience to the forementioned Laws avail us unto life and pardon at the last Day, we must take care to perform it, as with our minds and affections, so with our hearts or wills likewise.
As for these three faculties therefore, viz. our minds, our wills, and our affections; they must necessarily be devoted to God's service, to make up an intire obedience. As ever we hope for Heaven, we must employ our minds upon God and his Laws so far at least, till we love them in our souls, and chuse them in our hearts with full purpose and resolution of performing them. Our understandings must consider of our duty, and of the motives to obedience so long, and so well, till our affections are inflamed with a desire of it, and our wills are firmly resolved upon it. And as ever we expect to escape the torments of Hell, we must take care that we entertain no thoughts or desires of any sin so long, till in our hearts we become concerned for it, and willing to fulfil it. But if we will look on it, it must be in order to loath and disdain it. We must consider how disingenuous, how shameful, and how mischievous a thing it is; and indulge to no apprehensions of it in our minds, that are like to insnare either our choice or practice; nor dwell upon any but those that are apt to kindle our indignation and zeal against it, and arm our wills with full purpose to overcome it.
This must be the use and exercise of all our inward powers and principles of action. They must be used as instruments of good life, and made the great Springs and productive Causes of all vertuous practice and obedience. It is this holy and obedient practice that is the end, whereto all these obedient thoughts, desires and resolutions are directed; so that if they fall short of this, they miss of their chief effect, and appear to be weak and idle things, that are insignificant and useless.