pinefs of tafting. I defire to know now wherein confifts the fin or baseness of this care?

OTHERS live to no other purpose, than to breed dogs, and attend the fports of the field.

OTHERS think all their time dull and heavy, which is not spent in the pleasures and and diversions of the town.

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MEN of fober business, who seem to act thé part of life, generally condemn these ways of life.

Now I defire to know upon what account they are to be condemned? For produce but the true reafon, why any of these ways of life are vain and finful, and the fame reafon will conclude with the fame ftrength against every ftate of life, but that which is entirely devoted to God.

LET the ambitious man but shew the folly and irregularity of covetousness, and the fame reasons will fhew the folly and irregularity of ambition.

LET the man, who is deep in worldly bufinefs, but fhew the vanity and fhame of a life that is devoted to pleafures, and the fame reafons will as fully fet forth the vanity and fhame of worldly cares. So that whoever can condemn fenfuality, ambition, or any way of life, upon the principles of reafon and religion, carries his own condemnation within his own breaft, and is that very perfon which he despises, unless his life be entirely devoted to God.

FOR worldly cares are no more holy or virtuous, than worldly pleasures; they are as great a mistake in life, and when they equally divide or poffefs the heart, are equally vain and fhameful, as any fenfual gratifications.

Ir is granted that fome cares are made neceffary by the neceffities of nature; and the fame alfo may be obferv'd of fome pleasures; the pleafures of eating, drinking, and rett, are equally neceffary; but yet if reafon and religion do not limit these pleasures by the neceffities of nature, we fall from rational creatures, into drones, fots, gluttons, and epicures.

IN

IN like manner our care after fome worldly things is neceffary; but if this care is not bounded by the juft wants of nature; if it wanders into unneceffary purfuits, and fills the minds with false defires and cravings; if it wants to add an imaginary fplendor to the plain demands of nature, it is vain and irregular; it is the care of the Epicure, a longing for fauces and ragous, and corrupts the foul like any other fenfual indulgence.

FOR this reafon our Lord points his doctrines at the most common and allow'd employments of life, to teach us, that they may employ our minds as falfely, and distract us as far from our true good, as any trifles and vanity.

He calls us from fuch cares, to convince us, that even the neceffities of life must be fought with a kind of indifference, that fo our fouls may be truly fenfible of greater wants, and difpos'd to hunger and thirst after enjoyments that will make us happy for ever.

BUT how unlike are Chriftians to Chriftianity! It commands us to take no thought, faying what fhall we eat, or what shall we drink? yet Chriftians are restlefs and laborious till they can eat in plate.

IT commands us to be indifferent about raiment; but Chriftians are full of care and concern to be cloathed in purple and fine linnen: it enjoins us to take no thought for the morrow, yet Christians think they have lived in vain, if they don't leave eftates at their death. Yet these are the difciples of that Lord, who faith, Whosoever he be of you, that forfaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my difciple.

Ir must not be faid, that there is fome defect in thefe doctrines, or that they are not plainly enough taught in fcripture, becaufe the lives and behaviour of Chriftians is fo contrary to them; for if the fpirit of the world, and the temper of Chriftians, might be alledg'd against the doctrines of fcripture, none of them would have lafted to this day.

IT is one of the ten commandments, Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; our Saviour has in the most folemn manner forbid fwearing; yet where more fwearing than amongst Christians, and amongst fuch Christians as would think it hard to be reckon'd a reproach to the Christian name?

THE fcripture fays of Chriftians, that they are born of God, and have overcome the world; can they be reckon'd of that number, who have not so much as overcome this flagrant fin, and to which they have no temptation in nature?

WELL therefore may the doctrines of humility, heavenly-mindedness, and contempt of the world, be difregarded, fince they have all the corruptions of flesh and blood, all the innate and acquir'd pride and vanity of our nature to conquer, before they can be admitted.

To proceed:

I KNOW it is pretended by fome, that these doctrines of our Saviour, concerning forfaking all, and the like, related only to his firft followers, who could be his difciples upon no other terms, and who were to fuffer with him for the propagation of the gospel.

It is readily own'd, that there are different ftates of the Church, and that such different states may call Christians to fome particular duties, not common to every age.

Ir is own'd also, that this was the cafe of the first Christians; they differ'd from us in many respects.

THEY were perfonally call'd to follow Chrift; they receiv'd particular commiffions from his mouth; they were empower'd to work miracles, and called to a certain expectation of hatred and sufferings from almost all the world.

THESE are particulars in which the state of the first church differed from the prefent.

BUT then it is carefully to be observ'd, that this difference in the fate of the church, is a difference in the external state of the church, and not in the interF

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nal inward ftate of Chriftians. It is a difference that relates to the affairs and condition of the world, and not to the perfonal holiness and purity of Christians.

THE world may fometimes favour Christianity, at other times it may oppose it with perfecution; now this change of the world makes two different states of the church, but without making any difference in the inward personal holiness of Chriftians, which is to be always the fame, whether the world fmiles or frowns upon it.

WHATEVER degrees therefore of perfonal holiness or inward perfection was requir'd of the firft followers of Chrift, is ftill in the fame degree, and for the fame reafons, requir'd of all Christians to the end of the world.

HUMILITY, meekness, heavenly affection, devotion, charity, and a contempt of the world, are all internal qualities of perfonal holiness; they conftitute that fpirit and temper of religion, which is requir'd for its own excellence, and is therefore of conftant and eternal obligation. There is always the fame fitness and reasonablenefs in them, the fame perfection in practifing of them, and the fame rewards always due to them.

WE must therefore look carefully into the nature of the things which we find were requir'd of the first Chriftians; if we find that they were call'd to fufferings from other people, this may perhaps not be our cafe; but if we fee they are call'd to fufferings from themselves, to voluntary self-denials, and renouncing their own rights, we may judge amifs, if we think this was their particular duty as the first disciples of Christ.

FOR it is undeniable, that these inftances of making themselves fufferers from themselves, of voluntary selfdenial, and renunciation of all worldly enjoyments, are as truly parts of perfonal holiness and devotion to God, as any inftances of charity, humility, and love of God, that can poffibly be fuppos'd.

AND

AND it will be difficult to fhew, why all Chriftians are now oblig'd, in imitation of Chrift, to be meek and lowly in heart; if they, like the first Christians, are not oblig'd to these inftances of lowliness and meekness ; or if they are oblig'd still to imitate Chrift, how they can be faid to do it, if they excuse themselves from thefe plain and requir'd ways of fhewing it.

IF therefore Chriftians will fhew, that they are not oblig'd to thofe renunciations of the world, which Chrift requir'd of his first followers; they must fhew, that fuch renunciations, fuch voluntary felf-denials, were not inftances of perfonal holiness and devotion, did not enter into the spirit of Chriftianity, or conftitute that death to the world, or new birth in Christ, which the gospel requireth. But this is as abfurd to imagine, as to fuppofe that praying for our enemies is no part of Charity.

LET us therefore not deceive our felves; the gospel preaches the fame doctrines to us, that our Saviour taught his firft difciples; and tho' it may not call us to the fame external state of the church, yet it infallibly calls us to the fame inward ftate of holiness and newness of life.

Ir is out of all queftion, that this renunciation of the world was then requir'd, because of the excellency of fuch a temper; because of its fuitableness to the spirit of Chriftianity; because of its being in fome degree like to the temper of Chrift; because it was a temper that became fuch as were born again of God, and were made heirs of eternal glory; because it was a right inftance of their loving God with all their heart, and with all their foul, and with all their ftrength, and with all their mind; because it was a proper way of fhewing their difregard to the vanity of earthly comforts, and their refolution to attend only to the one thing needful.

Ir therefore we are not obliged to be like them in these respects; if we may be less holy and heavenly in