onely in imagination which many mens hearts take so much pleasure in the pleasing our selves in the bare thoughts and imaginations of them this is but a shadow of these shadows that the soul should Ixion-like embrace and commit adultery with clouds onely this is a vanitie beyond all other vanities that maketh us vainer than other creatures who though subject to vanity yet not to such as this Secondly it argues our desires to be impatient to bee detained from or interrupted of their pleasures When the soule shall bee found so greedy that when the heart is debarred or sequestred from those things it desires and wants meanes or opportunities to act its lusts as not being to stay it will at least enjoy them in imagination and in the interim set fancie to entertaine the minde with empty pictures of them drawne in its owne thoughts 3. Thus they appear also to bee exceeding sinfull and corrupt an outward act of sinne it is but as an act of whoredome with the creature when really enjoyed But this is Incest when we defile our soules and spirits with these imaginations and likenesses which are begotten in our own fancies being the children of our owne hearts And yet my brethren such speculative enjoying of pleasures and acting over of sinnes the minde of man is full of as will appeare in many particulars First looke what comforts men have at present in their possession and at command what excellencies or endowments men love to be alone to study and thinke of them and when they are sequestred from the present use of them yet they will then bee againe and againe recounting and casting of them up taking a survey of their happiness in them applauding their owne hearts in their conditions And as rich men that love money love to be looking on it and telling it over so do men to be summing up their comforts and priviledges they enjoy which others want as how rich they are how great how they excell others in parts and gifts c. Oh how much of that precious sand of our thoughts runne out this way Thus he in the Gospell hee keepes an audit in his heart Soule saith he thou hast goods laid up for many yeares So Haman Ester 5. 11. takes an Inventory of his honours and goods he talkes of all the glory of his riches and all the things wherein the King had promoted him So Nebuchadnezzar Dan. 4. 30. as it may seeme hee was alone walking and talking to himselfe like a foole saying to himselfe Is not this the great Babell which I have built by the might of my power for the glory of my Majesty And as thus upon their comforts so also upon their excellencies as their learning wisdome parts c. Men love to stand looking upon these in the glasse of their owne speculation as faire faces love to looke often and long in Looking-glasses which as it ariseth from that selfe-flattery is in men so also that they might keepe their happinesse still fresh and continued in their eye which thoughts when they raise not up the heart to thankefulnesse to God and are not used to that end but are bellows of pride they are vaine and abominable in the eyes of God as appeares by Gods dealing with those fore-mentioned for to the one hee sayes Thou foole this night the other whilst the word was in his mouth giving him no longer warning hee strikes with madnesse and brutishnesse and Haman you know was like a Wall that doth swell before it breakes and falls to ruine and decay Secondly this speculative enjoying of pleasures and acting over sinnes thus in fancy doth appeare in regard of things to come which when wee have in view or any hopes of mens thoughts goe forth afore to meet them with how much contentment doe mens thoughts entertaine their desires with vaine promisings and expectations afore-hand of their pleasures that are in view and in possibility to bee enjoyed So they in Esay wind up their hearts to a higher pin of jollity in the midst of their cups in that their hearts thought and promised them To morrow shall bee as to day and much more abundant Isay 56. 12. So they Iames 4. 13. they say with themselves Wee will goe to such a City and continue there a yeare and get gaine And the promise of this and the thoughts of it afore-hand feeds them and keepes up their hearts in comfort When men rise in a morning they begin to forethinke with much pleasure what carnall pleasures they have the advousion and promise of that day or weeke as to goe to such company and there bee merry to goe such a pleasant journey enjoy satisfaction in such a lust heare such newes c. And thus as godly men live by faith in Gods promises Hab. 2. 4. Isay 38. 16. By these men live and this is the spirit of my life saith Hezechiah even what God hath spoken vers 15. So doe carnall men live much upon the promises of their owne hearts and thoughts afore-hand for to this head of vaine thoughts these vaine promisings are to be reduced Psalm 49. 11. Their inward thought is their houses shall continue for ever and this thought pleaseth them what pleasure almost is there which a man makes much account of but hee acts it first over in private in his owne thoughts and thus doe men foolishly take their owne words and promises and so befoole themselves in the end as Ieremy speakes Ierem. 17. They take up before-hand in their thoughts upon trust the pleasures they are to enjoy even as spend-thrifts doe their rents or Heires their revenews before they come of age to enjoy their lands that when they come indeed to enjoy the pleasures they expected either they prove but dreames as Isay 29. 6. they finde their soules empty or so much under their expectation and so stale as they have little in them that there still proves more in the imagination than in the thing which ariseth from the vastnesse and greediness of mens desires as the cause hereof for that makes them swallow up all at once So Hab. 2. Enlarging his desires as Hell hee heapes up all Nations swallowes them up in his thoughts So an ambitious Scholler doth all preferments that are in his view Thirdly this speculative wickednesse is exercised in like maner towards things past in recalling namely and reviving in our thoughts the pleasure of sinfull actions passed when the minde runnes over the passages and circumstances of the same sins long since committed with a new and fresh delight when men raise up their dead actions long since buried in the same likenesse they were transacted in and parley with them as the Witch Saul did with Satan in Samuels likenesse And whereas they should draw crosse lines over them and blot them out through faith in Christs blood they rather copy and write them over againe in their thoughts with the same contentment So an uncleane person can study and
here specified the vanity of your thoughts for the discovery sake of which onely I chose this Text as my ground That is it therefore which I will chiefly insist upon A subject which I confesse would prove of all else the vastest To make an exact particular discovery of the vanities in our thoughts to travell over the whole Creation and to take a survey and give an account of all that vanity abounds in all the creatures was as you know the taske of the wisest of men Solomon the flowre of his studies and labours But the vanitie of our thoughts are as multiplied much in us this little world affoords more varieties of vanities than the Great Our thoughts made the creatures subject to vanitie Rom. 8. 20. therfore themselves are subject to vanity much more In handling of them I will shew you 1. What is meant by Thoughts 2. What by vanity 3. That our thoughts are vaine 4. Wherein that vanity doth consist both in the generall and some particulars First what is meant by thoughts especially as they are the intended subject of this discourse which in so vast an argument I must necessarily set limits unto 1. By thoughts the Scriptures do comprehend all the internall acts of the minde of man of what faculty soever all those reasonings consultations purposes resolutions intents ends desires and cares of the minde of man as opposed to our external words and actions so Isay 66. 18. All acts are divided into those two I know their workes and their thoughts what is transacted within the minde is called the thoughts what thereof do manifest themselves and breake out in actions are called workes And so Genes 6. 5. Every imagination of the thoughts omne figmentum all the creatures the minde frames within it selfe purposes desires c. as it is noted in the margin are evill where by thoughts are understood all that comes within the minde as Ezech. 11. 5. the phrase is and so indeed we vulgarly use it and understand it so To remember a man is to thinke of him Gen. 40. 14. to have purposed a thing we say I thought to doe it To take care about a businesse is to take thought 1 Sam. 9. 5. And the reason why all may thus bee called the thoughts is because indeed all affections desires purposes are stirred up by thoughts bred fomented and nourished by them no one thought passeth but it stirreth some affection of feare joy care grief c. No although they are thus largely taken here yet I intend not to handle the vanity of them in so large a sense at present I must confine my selfe as strictly as may be to the vanity of that which is more properly called the thinking meditating considering power of man which is in his understanding or spirit that being the subject I have in hand Thoughts not being in this sense opposed onely to your workes but unto purposes and intents so Hebr. 4. 12. as the soule and spirit so thoughts and intents seeme to bee opposed And Iob 20. 2 3. Thoughts are appropriated to the Spirit of understanding And againe yet more strictly for in the understanding I meane not to speake of generally all thoughts therein neither as not of the reasonings or deliberations in our actions but those musings onely in the Speculative part And so I can no otherwise expresse them to you than thus Those same first more simple conceits apprehensions that arise those fancies meditations which the understanding by the helpe of fancy frames within it selfe of things those whereon your mindes ponder and pore and muse upon things these I meane by thoughts I meane those talkings of our mindes with the things wee know as the Scripture calls it Prov. 6. 22. those same parleys enterviews chattings the minde hath with the things let into it with the things wee feare with the things wee love For all these things our mindes make their companions and our thoughts hold them discourse and have a thousand conceits about them this I meane by thoughts For besides that reasoning power deliberating power whereby wee aske our selves continually what shall wee doe and whereby wee reason and discusse things which is a more inward closet the Cabinet and privie councell of the heart there is a more outward lodging that presence chamber which entertaines all commers which is the thinking meditating musing power in man which suggesteth matter for deliberations and consultations and reasonings which holds the objects till we view them which entertaineth all that come to speake with any of our affections 2. I adde which the minde frames within it self so the Scripture expresseth their originall to us and their maner of rising Prov. 6. 14. Frowardnesse is in his heart fabricatur hee forgeth mischiefe as a Smith doth Iron hammers it out and the thoughts are the materialls of this frowardnesse in us upon all the things which are presented to us the minde begets some thoughts imaginations on them and as lusts so thoughts are conceived Iames 1. Isay 59. 4. They conceive mischiefe and bring forth iniquitie and hatch Cochatrice egges and weave Spiders webbes And verse 7. hee instanceth in thoughts of iniquity because our thoughts are spunne out of our owne hearts are egges of our owne laying though the things presented to us bee from without And this I adde to sever them from such thoughts as are injected and cast in onely from without which are children of anothers begetting and often laid out of doores such as are blasphemous thoughts cast in by Satan wherein if the soule bee meerely passive as the word Buffeting implies 2 Cor. 12. 7. they are none of your thoughts but his wherein a man is but as one in a roome with another where he heares another sweare and curse but cannot get out from him such thoughts if they bee onely from without defile not a man For nothing defiles a man but what comes from within Matth. 15. 18 19. or which the heart hath begotten upon it by the devil as thoughts of uncleannes c. Wherein though he be the father yet the heart is the mother and wombe and therfore accordingly they affect the heart as naturall children doe and by that wee may distinguish them from the other namely when we have a soft heart an inward love unto them so that our hearts doe kisse the childe then they are our thoughts or else when the heart broods upon these egges then they are our thoughts though they come from without Though this is to bee added that even those thoughts wherein the soule is passive and which Satan casts in which wee do no wayes owne wherein hee ravisheth the heart rather than begets them on us if there bee not any consent to them in us then it is but a Rape as in law it is not I yeeld those thoughts are punishments often of neglect of our thoughts and of our suffering them to wander as Dinah because she went cunningly out to view the
This unsteadinesse it ariseth from the like curse on the minde of Man as was on Caine that it being driven from the presence of the Lord it proves a vagabond and so mens eyes are in the ends of the earth This foolishnesse or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is also seene in that Independence in our thoughts they hanging oft together as ropes of sand this wee see more evidently in dreames And not onely then but when awake also and that when we would set our selves to be most serious how doe our thoughts jangle and ring back-ward and as wanton Boyes when they take pens in their hands scribble broken words that have no dependence Thus doe our thoughts and if you would but looke over the copies thereof which you write continually you would finde as much non-sense in your thoughts as you find in mad mens speeches This madnesse and distemper is in the minde since the fall though it appeares not in our words because wee are wiser that if notes were taken of our thoughts we should finde thoughts so vagrant that wee know not how they come in nor whence they came nor whither they would But as God doth all things in weight number and measure so doth his Image in us so farre as it is renewed And by reason of these two the folly unsetlednesse and independence of our thoughts wee bring our thoughts often to no issue to no perfection but wilder away our time in thinking as you use to say of nothing and as Seneca sayes of mens lives as of Ships that are tost up and downe at Sea it may bee said they have beene tossed much but sayled nothing The like in this respect may bee said of the thoughts Or as when men make imperfect dashes and write non-sense They are said to scribble they doe not write So in these follies and independencies wee wilder and lose our selves wee doe not thinke But 2. on the contrary if any strong lust or violent passion be up then our thoughts are too fixed and intent and run in so farre into such sinfull objects that they cannot bee puld out againe or any way diverted or taken off which is another vanity For our thoughts and our understanding part was ordained to moderate allay and coole and take off our passions when they are a playing over to rule and governe them But now our thoughts are themselves subjected to our affections and like fuell put under them doe but make them boile the more And although our thoughts do first stirre up our feares joyes desires c. yet these being stirred up once chaine and fixe and hold our thoughts to those objects so as wee cannot loosen them again Therefore sayes Christ to his Disciples Why are you troubled and why doe thoughts arise in your hearts For perturbations in the affections cause thoughts like fumes and vapours to ascend Thus if a passion of feare bee up how doth it conjure up multitudes of ghostly thoughts which wee cannot conjure downe againe nor hide our eyes from But which haunt us and follow us up and downe where ever wee goe so as a man runnes away pursued by his owne thoughts the heart then meditates on terrour As Isay 33. 18. So when sorrow is up how doth it make us study the crosse that lights upon us which to forget would be an ease unto the minde But a mans passions makes his thoughts to con it and to say it by heart over and over againe as if it would not have us forget it So when love and desire is up bee the thing what it will wee are taken with as preferment credit beauty riches it sets our thoughts aworke to view the thing all over from top to toe as wee say to observe every part and circumstance that doth make it amiable unto us as if a picture were to bee drawn of it So when joy is up wee view the thing we rejoice in and reade it over and over as wee doe a Booke wee like and wee marke every tittle wee are punctuall in it yea so inordinate are wee herein as often we cannot sleepe for thinking on them Eccles 5. 12. Abundance of riches will not suffer him to sleepe for the multitude of thoughts in his head speaking of a man who is covetous how doe thoughts trouble the Belshazzers and Nebuchadonezers of the world Dan. 4. 19. so Proverbs 4. 16. They sleepe not unlesse they have done mischiefe if their desires remaine unsatisfied they doe disturbe their thoughts like froward children by their crying so as often these which men count free as the most doe thoughts doe prove the greatest bondage and torment in the earth unto them and doe hinder sleepe the nurse of nature eate out and live upon the heart that bred them weary the spirits that when a man shall say as Iob 7. 13. My bed shall comfort mee by putting a parenthesis to his thoughts and sad discourses which hee hath when awake yet then they haunt a man and as vers 14. terrifie him A man cannot lay them aside as he doth his cloake and when men die they will follow them to hell and torment them worse there your thoughts are one of the greatest executioners there even the worme that dies not Thirdly the vanity of the minde appeares in curiosity a longing and itching to bee fed with and to know and then delighting to thinke of things that do not at all concerne us Take an experiment of this in Schollers whose chiefe worke lies in this shop how many precious thoughts are spent this way as in curiosity of knowledge as appeares by those the Apostle often rebukes that affect as 1 Tim. 6. 4 20. oppositions of science falsely so called curiosities of knowledge of things they have not seene So Coloss 2. and 1 Tim. 4. 7. hee calls such issues of mens braines they dote on old wives fables because as fables please old wives so doe these their mindes and of that itch they have in them even as women with child in their longings content not themselves with what the place affords or the season with what may he had but often long after some unheard of rarity far fetcht or it may bee not at all to bee had Thus men not contenting themselves with the wonders of God discovered in the depth of his Word and Workes they will launch into another Sea and world of their owne making and there they saile with pleasure as many of the Schoole-men did in some of their speculations spending their pretious wits in framing curious webs out of their owne bowels Take another instance also in others who have leisure and parts to reade much they should ballast their hearts with the Word and take in those more pretious words of wisdome and sound knowledge to profit themselves and others and to build up their owne soules and whereby they may bee enabled to serve their Countrey but now what doe their curious fancies carry them unto to bee versed in
view over every circumstance passed in such an act with such a person committed so a vaine-glorious Scholler doth repeate in his thoughts an eminent performance of his and all such passages therein as were most elegant And thus men chew the cudd upon any speech of commendation uttered by others of them And all this even as a good heart doth repeate good things heard or read with the remembrance also of what quicknesse they had in such and such passages and with what affections they were warmed when they heard them or as a godly man recalls with comfort the actions of a well-past life as Hezechiah did Lord I have walked before thee with a perfect heart and thereby doe also stirre and provoke their hearts to the like temper againe So on the contrary doe wicked men use to recall and revive the pleasingest sinfull passages in their lives to suck a new sweetnesse out of them Then which nothing argues more hardnesse and wickednesse of heart or provokes God more For First it argues much wickednesse of heart and such as when it is ordinary with the heart to doe thus is not compatible with grace for in the 6. of the Romans ver 12. the Apostle shewes that a good heart useth to reape no such fruit of sinfull actions past But what fruit had you of those things whereof yee are now ashamed The Saints reap and distill nothing out of all those flowers but shame and sorrow and sad sighs when Ephraim remembred his sinne he was ashamed repented and canst thou in thy thoughts reap a new harvest and crop of pleasure out of them again and againe Secondly it argues much hardnesse of heart nothing being more opposite to the truth and practice of repentance the foundation of which is to call to mind the sinne with shame and sorrow and to recall it with much more griefe than ever there was pleasure in the committing of it and whose property is to hate the appearance of it and to enflame the heart with Zeale and revenge against it And thereby it provoketh God exceedingly our hearts are thereby embrued in a new guilt wee thereby stand to and make good our former act even so by remembring it with pleasure wee provoke God to remember it with a new detestation of it and so to send downe new plagues who if wee recall it with griefe would remember it no more wee shew wee take delight to rake in those wounds wee have given Christ already to view the sinnes of others with pleasure Rom. 1. ult is made more than to commit them But much more to view and revive our owne with a fresh delight and therefore know that how-ever you may take delight here to repeat to your selves your old sins yet that in Hell nothing will gall you more than the remembrance of them every circumstance in every sin will then be as a dagger at thy heart This was the rich mans taske and study in Hell to remember the good things hee had received and his sins committed in the abuse of them And if godly men here be made to possesse the sinnes of their youth with horrour as Iob and to have them ever afore them as David how will wicked men bee continually affrighted with them in hell whose punishment is in a great part set forth to us by this Psalme 50. 20. I will set them in order before thee Fourthly the fourth thing wherein this speculative vanity appeares is in acting sinnes upon meere imaginary suppositions men faigne and contrive to themselves and make a supposition to themselves in their own thoughts first of what they would bee and then what they would doe Men create fooles paradises to themselves and then walke up and downe in them as if they had money enough what pleasures they would have if they were in such places of preferment how they would carry themselves To allude to that Absolom said 2 Sam. 15. 4. Oh if I were a Iudge in the Land I would doe this or that c. doing this with a great deale of pleasure almost as much as those that really enjoy them This may well bee the meaning of that Psalme 50. 18. where of the hypocrite who outwardly abstaines from grosse sins 't is said that hee consenteth with the thiefe and partaketh with the adulterer namely in his heart and fancie supposing himself with them and so desires to bee doing what they doe Thus take one who is naturally ambitious whom both nature parts and education have all made but a Bramble never to rule over the trees and hath fixt in a lower sphere as uncapable of rising higher or being greater as the earth is of becomming a Starre in Heaven yet hee will take upon him in his owne heart faining and supposing himselfe to bee and then act the part of a great man there erect a throne and sit downe in it and thinkes with himselfe what hee would doe if a King or a great Man c. So take a man that is uncleane but now growne old and a dry tree and so cannot act his lust as formerly yet his thoughts shall supply what is wanting in his strength or opportunity And he makes his owne heart both Bawd Brothel house Whore Whoremonger and all so a man that is naturally voluptuous loves pleasures but wants meanes to purchase them yet his inclinations will please themselves with the thoughts of what mixture and composition of delights hee would have hee will set downe with himselfe his Bill of fare how hee would have if he might wish his cup of pleasure mingled what ingredients put into it So a man that is revengefull and yet wants a sting yet he pleaseth himselfe with revengefull thoughts and wishes and will be making invectives and railing dialogues against him hee hates when hee is not by A man in love in his fancy hee will court his Paramour though absent he will by his imagination make her present and so frame solemn set speeches to her In a word let mens inclinations and dispositions bee of what kinde so ever and let the impossibilities and improbabilities be never so great of being what they desire yet in their fancies and thoughts they will discover themselves what they would be Totumque quod esse desiderant sibi apud semetipsos cogitationibus depingunt men will bee drawing Maps of their desires calculate their owne inclinations cut out a condition of life which fills their hearts and they please themselves withall and there is no surer way to know a mans naturall inclination than by this First which yet first is as great a folly as any other imitating children herein for is it not childish to make clay pies and puppets what else are such fancies as these and to bee as children acting the parts of Ladies and Mistresses and yet such childishnesse is in mens hearts 2. And secondly a vanitie also because a man sets his heart on what is not the things themselves are not if a