lowly Jefus. It is natural to man to think highly of himfelf, and what is his own; for the ftroke he has got by bis fall in Adam, has produced a falfe light, whereby mole-hills about him appear like mountains; and a thoufand airy beauties prefent themselves to his deluded fancy. Vain man would be wife, (fo he accounts himself, and fo he would be accounted of by others) though man be born like a wild afs's colt. Job xi. 12. His way is right because it is his own: for every way of a man is right in his own eyes. Prov. xxi. 2. His ftate is good, because he knows no better: he is alive without the law, Rom. vii. 9. and therefore his hope is ftrong, and his confidence firm. Is is another tower of Babel reared up against heaven; and fhall not fall while the power of darknefs can hold it up. The word batters it yet it ftands; one while breaches are made in it, but they are quickly repaired; at another time, it is all made to shake; but ftill it keeps up; till either God himself by his Spirit, raise an heart-quake within the man, which tumbles it down; and leaves not one stone upon another, (2 Cor. x. 41, 5.) or death batter it down and raze the foundations of it, Luke xvi. 23. And as the natural man thinks highly of himself, so he thinks meanly of God, whatever he pretends, Pfal. 1. 21. Thou thoughteft that I was altogether fuch an one as thyself. The doctrine of the gospel and the mystery of Chrift are foolishness to him; and in his practice he treats them as fuch, 1 Cor. i. 18. and . 14. He brings the word and the works of God in the government of the world, before the bar of his carnal reafon; and there they are presumptuoufly cenfured and condemned. Hof. xiv. 9. Sometimes the ordinary reftraint of providence is taken off, and Satan is permitted to flir up the carnal mind; and in that cafe it is like an ant's neft, uncovered and disturbed; doubts, denials, and hellish reasons crowd in it, and cannot be laid by all the arguments brought against them, till a power from on high captivate the mind, and fill the mutiny of the corrupt principles.

Thus much of the corruption of the understanding: which altho' the half be not told, may discover to you the abiolute neceffity of regenerating grace. Call the understanding now Ichabod; for the glory is departed from it. Confider this, ye that are yet in the ftate of nature, and groan ye out

DA

your

State your cafe before the Lord, that the fun of righteousness may arife upon you, before you be shut up in everlafting darkness. What avails your worldly wisdom? What do your attainments in religion avail, while your understanding lies yet wrapt up in its natural darkness, and confufion, utterly void of the light of life? Whatever be the natural man's gifts or attainments, we must (as in the cafe of the leper Lev. xlii. 24) pronounce him utterly unclean, his plaque is in his bead. But that is not all; it is in his heart too, his will is corrupted, as I fhall fhew anon.

Of the Corruption of the Will.

II. The will, that commanding faculty, (which fometimes was faithful, and ruled with God) is now turned traitor, and rules with, and for the devil. God planted it in man wholly a right feed; but now it is turned into the degenerate plant of a ftrange vine It was originally placed in à due fubordination to the will of God, as was fhewn before, but now it is gone wholly afide. However, fome do magnify the power of free-will, a view of the fpirituality of the law, to which acts of moral difcipline do in no ways answer; and a deep infight into the corruption of nature, given by the inward operation of the Spirit, convincing of fin, righteoufnefs and judgment, would make men find an abfolute need of the power of free grace, to remove the bands of wickednefs from off the free will. To open up this plague of the heart, I offer thefe following things to be confidered.

First, There is, in the unrenewed will, an utter inability for what is truly good and acceptable in the fight of God; The natural man's will is in Satan's fetters; hemmed in, within the circle of evil, and cannot move beyond it, more than a dead man can raise himself out of his grave, Eph. ii. 1. We deny him not a power to chufe, pursue and act,› what on the matter, is good: but though he can will what is good and right, he can will nothing aright and well. John xv. 3. Without me, i. e. feparate from me, as a branch from the ftock, (as both the word and context do carry it) ye can do nothing; to wit, nothing truly and fpiritually good. His very choice and defire of fpiritual things is carnal and selfish, John vi. 26. Ye Jeek me because ye did eat of the loves and

were

were filled. He not only comes to Chrift, but he cannot come, John vi. 44. And what can one do acceptable to God, who believeth not on him whom the Father hath fent? To evidence this inability for good in the unregenerate, confider thefe two things.

Evidence 1. How often does the light fo fhine before mens eyes; that they cannot but fee the good they should chule, and the evil they should refuse; and yet their hearts have no more power to comply with that light than if they were arrested by some invifible hand? They fee what is right; yet they follow, and cannot but follow, what is wrong. Their confciences tells them the right way, and approves of it too; yet cannot their will be brought up to it: their corruption fo chains them, that they cannot embrace it; fo they figh, and go backward, over the belly of their light. And if it be not thus, how is it that the word, and way of holiness meets with fuch entertainment in the world? How is it that clear arguments and reason on the side of piety and a holy life, which bear in themselves even on the carnal mind, do not bring men over to that fide? Altho' the being of a heaven and a hell, were but a may be, it were fufficient to determine the will to the choice of holiness, were it capable to be determined thereto by mere reafon : but men, knowing the judgment of God, (that they which commit fuch things are worthy of death) not only do the fame, but have pleasure in them that do them, Rom. i. 32. And how is it that these who magnify the power of free will do not confirm their opinion before the world, by an ocular demonstration, in a practice as far above others in holiness, as the opinion of their natural ability is above others? Or is it maintained only for the protection of lufts, which men may hold fast as long as they please; and when they have no more ufe for them, can throw them off in a moment, and leap out of Delilah's lap into Abraham's bofom? Whatever use some make of that principle: it does of itfelf, and in its own nature, caft a broad fhadow for a fhelter to wickedness of heart and life. And it may be observed, that the generality of the bearers of the gospel, of all denominations are plagued with it: for it is a root of bitterness, natural to all men; from whence do fpring fo much fearlessness about the foul's eternal state; fo many delays and off-puts in that weighty matter, whereby much work is laid up for a death

State II. bed by fome; while others are ruined by a legal walk, and noacquaintedness with the life of faith, and the making use of Chrift for fanctification; all flowing from the perfuafion of fufficient natural abilities. So agreeable is it to corrupt

nature.

Evid. 2. Let thofe, who, by the power of the fpirit of bondage, having had the law laid out before them, in its fpirituality, for their conviction, fpeak and tell, if they found themselves able to incline their hearts towards it, in that cafe; nay, if the more that light fhone into their fouls, they did not find their hearts more and more unable to comply with it. There are fome, who have been brought unto the place of the breaking forth, who are yet in the devil's camp, that from their experience can tell, light let into the mind, cannot give life to the will, to enable it to comply there with; and could give their teftimony here, if they would. But take Paul's teftimony concerning it, who, in his unconverted ftate, was far from believing his utter inability for good; but learned it by experience, Rom. vii. 9, 10, Ii, 13. I own, the natural man may have a kind of love to the law but here lies the ftrefs of the matter, he looks on the holy law in a carnal drefs; and fo, while he hugs a creature of his own fancy, he thinks he has the law, but in very deed he is without the law: for as yet he fees it not in its fpirituality: if he did, he would find it the very reverse of his own nature, and what his will could not fall in with, till changed by the power of grace.

Secondly, There is in the unrenewed will an averfeness to good. Sin is the natural man's element; he is loath to part with it, as the fishes are to come out of the water into dry land. He not only cannot come to Chrift, but he will not come, John v. 40. He is polluted, and hates to be washen, Jer. xiii. 27. Wilt thou not be made clean? When shall it once be? He is sick, but utterly averfe to the remedy: he Joves his disease fo, that he loaths the Phyfician. He is a captive, a prisoner, and a slave; but he loves his conqueror, his jailor and mafter he is fond of his fetters, prison and drudgery; and has no liking to his liberty. For evidence of this averfenefs to good, in the will of man, I shall intance in fome particulars.

:

Evidence 1. The untowardness af children. Do we not

fee

The

fee them naturally, lovers of finful liberty! How unwilling are they to be hedged in? How averfe to restraint ? world can bear witness, that they are, as bullocks unaccuftomed to the yoke; and more, that it is far easier to bring young bullocks tamely to bear the yoke; than to bring young children under discipline, and make them tamely fubmit to the restraint of finful liberty. Every body may fee in this, as in a glass, that man is naturally wild and wilful, according to Zophar's obferve, Job xi. 12. that man is born like a wild afs's colt. What can be faid more? He is like a colt, the colt of an afs, the colt of a wild afs. Compare Jer. ii. 24. A wild afs ufed to the wilderness, that fnuffeth up the wind at her pleasure, in her occafion who can turn ber away?

Evid. 2. What pain and difficulty do men often find in bringing their hearts to religious duties? And what a task is it to the carnal heart to abide at them? It is a pain to it, to leave the world but a little, to converfe with God. It is not easy to borrow time from the many things, to beflow it upon the one thing needful. Men often go to God in duties, with their faces towards the world; and when their bodies are on the mount of ordinances, their hearts will be found at the foot of the hill, going after their covetousness, Ezek. xxxiii. 31. They are foon wearied of well-doing; for holy duties are not agreeable to their corrupt nature. Take notice of them at their worldly business, fet them down with their carnal company, or let them be fucking the breafts of a luft; time seems to them to fly, and drive furiously, fo that it is gone ere they are aware. But how heavily does it drive, while a prayer, a fermon, or a fabbath lafts? The Lord's day is the longest day of all the week with many; and therefore they muft fleep longer that morning, and go fooner to bed that night, than ordinarily they do; that the day may be made of a tolerable length: for their hearts fay within them, when will the fabbath be gone? Amos viii. 5. The hours of worship are the longeft hours of that day: hence when duty is over, they are like men eafed of a burden; and when fermon is ended, many have neither the grace nor the good manners to stay till the bleffing be pronounced, but like the beafts, their head is away as foon as one puts his hand to loose them; why, but because while

they