regular devotion, retirement, and voluntary poverty; it is because we are fallen into an age, where the love of many, is waxed cold.

I have made this appeal to antiquity, and quoted these passages of Scripture, to support some uncommon practices in the life of Miranda; and to show, that her highest rules of holy living, her devotion, self denial, charity, and voluntary poverty, are founded in the sublimest counsels of Christ and his apostles, suitable to the high expectations of another life, and followed by the greatest saints of the best and purest ages of the church. He, that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

CHAP. X.

Showing how all ranks of men and women of all obliged to devote themselves to God.

ages, are

I shall now show that this regularity of devotion, this holiness of common life, this religious use of every thing, is a devotion, that is the duty of all orders of Christian people.

Fulvius has had a learned education, and taken his degrees in the university; he came from thence, that he might be free from all rules of life. He takes no employment upon him, nor enters into any business; because he thinks every employment or business calls people to a careful discharge of its several duties. When grave, he tells you that he did not enter into holy orders, because he looks upon it to be a state, that requires great holiness of life, and that it does not suit

his temper to be so good. He tells you, he never intends to marry; because he cannot oblige himself to that regularity of life, which he takes to be the duty of those, that are at the head of a family.

Fulvius thinks that he is conscientious in this conduct, and is therefore content with the most idle, impertinent, and careless life. He has no religion, no devotion, no pretence to piety. He lives by no rules, and thinks all is well; because he is neither a priest, nor a father, nor has any family to look after.

But, Fulvius, you are a rational creature, and as such, are as much obliged to live according to reason, as a priest is obliged to attend at the altar, or a guardian to be faithful to his trust; if you live contrary to reason, you don't commit a small crime, you don't break a small trust; but you break the law of your nature; you rebel against God, who gave you that nature, and put yourself among those, whom the God of reason will punish, as apostates.

Though you have no employment; yet, as you are baptized into the profession of Christ's religion, you are are as much obliged to live according to the holiness of the Christian spirit, and perform all the promises, made at your baptism, as any man is obliged to be honest and faithful in his calling. If you abuse this great calling, you are not false in a small matter, but you abuse the precious blood of Christ; you crucify the Son of God afresh; you neglect the highest instances of divine goodness; you disgrace the church of God; you abuse the means of grace, and the promises of glory; and it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment, than for you.

It is therefore great folly, for any one to think himself at liberty to live, as he pleases, because he is not in such a state of life, as some others are; for, if there is any thing dreadful in the abuse of any trust; if there is any thing to be feared for the neglect of any calling; there is nothing more to be feared, than the wrong use of our reason; nor any thing more to be dreaded, than

the neglect of our Christian calling; which is not to serve the little uses of a short life, but to redeem souls unto God, to fill heaven with saints, and finish a kingdom of eternal glory unto God.

No man therefore must think himself excused from the exactness of piety and morality, because he has chosen to be idle and independent in the world; for the necessity of a reasonable and holy life is not founded in the several conditions and employments of this life, but in the immutable nature of God, and the nature of man. A man is not to be reasonable and holy, because he is a priest, or a father of a family; but because piety and goodness are the laws of human nature. Could any man please God, without living according to reason; there would be nothing displeasing to God in an idle priest or a reprobate father. He therefore, that abuses his reason, is like him, that abuses the priesthood; and he, that neglects the holiness of the Christian life, is as the man, that disregards the most important trust.

If a man choose to put out his eyes rather, than enjoy the light, and see the works of God; if he voluntarily kill himself, by refusing to eat and drink; every one would own, that such a one was a rebel against Ged, and justly deserved his highest indignation. You would not say, that this was only sinful in a priest, or a master of a family, but in every man as such.

Now wherein does the sinfulness of this behaviour consist? Does it not consist in this, that he abuses his nature, and refuses to act that part, for which God created him? But, if this be true; then all persons, that abuse their reason, are like this man, rebels against God, and subject to his wrath.

Let us suppose, that this man, instead of putting out his eyes, had only employed them in looking at ridicu lous things, or shut them up in a sleep; that instead of starving himself to death, by not eating at all, he should turn every meal into a feast, and eat and drink, like an epicure; could he be said to have lived more to the

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glory of God, than if he had put out his eyes, and starved himself to death?

Now do but suppose a man acting unreasonably, and living in a course of folly and impertinence, instead of starving himself to death; and then you have found out as great a rebel against God. For he, that puts out his eyes, or murders himself, has only this guilt, that he abuses the powers, that God has given him; that he refuses to act that part for which he was created, and puts himself into a state, contrary to the divine will. Surely this is the guilt of every one, that lives an unreasonable, unholy, and foolish life.

As, therefore, no particular state is an excuse for self murder; so no particular state, is an excuse for the abuse of our reason, or the neglect of holiness. For surely it is as much the will of God, that we make the best use of our rational faculties, as it is, that we use our eyes, and eat and drink for the preservation of our lives.

Till, therefore, a man can show, that he sincerely endeavours to live according to the will of God; that he is striving to live according to the Christian religion; he has all to answer for, that they have, who abuse the greatest trusts, and neglect the highest calling in the world.

Every body acknowledges, that all orders of men are to be exactly honest and faithful; there is no exception to be made in these duties, for any private or particular state of life. Now if we would attend to the reason and nature of things; if we would consider the nature of God, and the nature of man; we should find the same necessity for every other right use of our reason; we should find it as absurd to suppose, that one man must be exact in piety, and another need not, as to suppose that one man must be exact in honesty, but another need not. For Christian humility, sobriety, devotion, and piety are as great and necessary parts of a reasonable life, as justice and honesty.

On the other hand, pride, sensuality, and covetousness

are as high an abuse of our reason, and as contrary to God, as cheating and dishonesty.

Theft and dishonesty seem indeed. to vulgar eyes to be greater sins; because they are so hurtful to civil society, and are so severely punished by human laws.

But, if we consider mankind in a higher view, as God's society of rational beings, that are to glorify him by the right use of their reason; we shall find, that every temper, that is equally contrary to reason, that opposes God's designs, and disorders the beauty of the rational world, is equally sinful in man, and equally odious to God. This would show that the sin of sensuality is like the sin of dishonesty, and renders us as great objects of the divine displeasure.

Again, if we consider mankind, as å redeemed order of fallen spirits, that are baptized into a fellowship with the Son of God; to be temples of the Holy Ghost; to live according to his inspiration; to offer to God the reasonable sacrifice of a humble, pious, and thankful life; to purify themselves from the disorders of their fall; to make a right use of the means of grace, in order to be sons of eternal glory; if we look at mankind in this true light; then we shall find that all tempers, that are contrary to this holy society; all actions that make us unlike to Christ, that abuse the means of grace, and oppose our hope of glory, have every thing in them, that can make us odious unto God. So that, though pride, and sensuality, and other vices of the like kind, do not hurt civil society, as cheating, and dishonesty do; yet they hurt that society, and oppose those ends which are more glorious in the eyes of God, than all the societies that relate to this world.

Nothing therefore can be more false, than to imagine, because we are private persons, that have taken upon us no charge or employment of life, that therefore we may live more at large, indulge our appetites, and be less careful of the duties of piety and holiness; for it is as good an excuse for cheating and dishonesty. Because he, that abuses his reason, that indulges himself in lust