the highest pin of meditation on these fubject, our Thoughts, after a very little stay there, presently fall down again: We are impatient and uneafy under the ftretch, and care not perhaps how foon business, or company, or the like, step in and fet us at liberty; fo averfe naturally are our Thoughts, unless God has fanctified our hearts, to converfe with holy objects.

III. OUR Thoughts in regard of holy duties are apt to mif-time and mif-place themselves, when tho' they may be materially lawful and good in themselves; yet they intrude impertinently, at a time not proper for them, when they are not called upon, and have no bufinefs in the mind; like an over-officious friend, who, tho' he means well, yet marrs a matter through the unfeafonableness of his interpofal. To every thing, fays Solomon there is a time and feafon and 'tis the right ordering of things, as to time as well as place, that renders them proper and decent, and agreeable. A foldier may mean very well, and do some acceptable service by leaving his rank, or quitting the post affing'd him; and yet, for all his fuccefs, he becomes a tranfgreffor; and may be called to an account for fo doing: And just so it is with

our

our Thoughts, I mean particularly, in our religious performances: They may be truly good in themselves, yet if they are foreign to the matter in hand, ftep in unfeasonably, and break their ranks, they are criminals. So that when we are at our devotions, 'tis not a cnough to bar out all finful and worldly conceits, from crowding in upon us, but we must guard against all other Thoughts that relate not to the matter in hand: For though a Thought, for inftance, or purpose of doing fome good work, be in itself divine; yet 'tis a queftion whether or no the fpirit that fuggefts that time be divine; because it tends then only to distract us, and marr the performance we are about, as colour mil-placed in the face does the beauty: So then, God's worship must be performed, not only externally, but internally too, in decency and order: And we muft not offer that great majefty, who made all things in weight and measure, a tumultuary jumble of Thoughts in our homage to him. But as, in the words of the apoftle, He that is engaged in the miniftry must wait on his miniftering, and he that teacheth on teaching, and he that exhorteth on exhortation, &c. So he that is at his prayers, fhould attend to his prayers, to the particular petition before him;

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he that is giving thanks, to his thankf giving; he that is at confeffion, to his confeffiing, &c. directing all his Thoughts ftrait upwards towards heaven; and he that is at fermon, ought, for that time to apply his whole Thoughts to what is offered; and and if any other Thoughts, how soever lawful and good, pretend to interpofe, must bid them come another time; for that he is now otherwise engaged, and not at leisure.

IV. 'Tis another finful infirmity in our thinking power, that tho' we are willing to entertain pious objects in our hearts, yet we care not to dwell long upon them, fo that they leave not thofe prints and impreffions. behind them that flick and abide by us; perfume not the heart with that due fragrancy and favour they ought to leave behind them, when they are paft and gone: For tho' we may not be fo bad as thofe, of whom it may be affirmed, with the Pfalmift, that God is not in all their Thoughts; yet of well-difpofed minds it may be faid that he is not much at a time there: 'Tis long 'ere we can get fight of him through the optick glafs of contemplation; and when we do, our hands fhake, or fomething interpofes; fo that ever and anon we lofe fight of

⚫ him again: And this levity of mind, as it is feen in our contemplations upon any object, fo more especially in the performance of holy duties. We fet forth in prayer, it may be very well, with a due compofure of mind, and humble fenfe of our obligations to God, and dependance on him: But perhaps 'ere we are got half way on with our work, our Thoughts, which fet out with our lips, have given them the flip, and left them to go on by themselves; whilst they in the interim have rambled perhaps from one corner of the earth to another, and made the grand tour of the world: When we fhould earneftly feek God by prayer, and our fouls and fpirits fhould afcend ftrait upwards in direct rays of fervent devotion; behold them toffed like a dried leaf before the wind, or as an empty cafk upon the waves: For, instead of good, evil is prefent with us and we cannot do the things that we would: But the world and the devil knock at the door of our hearts, flep in and defire to fpeak with our Thoughts, divert them from their business, and make a man's heart go after covetoufness, as the prophet speaks; after his pleasure, his fins, or his fecular employments: Any thing that was forgot before, will be fure then

to

to prefent itself to the mind, and fue for audience. Nay, many times foreign Thoughts corne about us, like bees, as David fpeaks of his enemies, in whole fwarms together, and with their humming noise distract our attention; or, like Abraham's fowls, in flocks, to peck at and deform our facrifice. And thus, again, it is in that other branch of religious duty, hearing of the word; for no doubt but any man, upon a juft recollection of his Thoughts, will find they were out of church feveral times whilst his person was there; at home, in the fhop, or the coffer, or indeed any where, but where they should have been: In fine, either out of doors, or at play perhaps within, as much as the children generally are without. But then take any other fort of objects, pleafureable, or profitable, or honourable, and your Thoughts fhall dwell, and hover, and brood over them all the day, yea in the night too, difturb your repofe, and awake you; for the abundance of the rich, to use the wife man's inftance, will not fuffer him to fleep. And fo it is of any other wordly project, gratifying men's lufts, or the like: Of the latter of which, the fame wife man fpeaks; They fleep not except they have done mifchief, and their fleep is taken away unless

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