thankful for But as they are abstracted from God and inordinately loved sought and trusted in so they have this five-fold vanity which is but too easily discovered in them namely their unsatisfactoriness their commoness their deceitfulness their unsuitableness and unprofitableness 1. That which speaks the little worth but great vanity of worldly things is their unsatisfactoriness Ahab had the possession of a wealthy Kingdome and yet for want of Naboths vineyard only how was he heart-sick so as to take no content in all his other enjoyments 1 Kings 21. 4. In like manner to what a wonderful height of dignity and earthly happiness was Human advanced and yet how did so inconsiderable a thing as the want of poor Mordecaie's knee damp all the delights of his proud heart Esther 5. 11 12 13. Knock at the door of the Choicest earthly possessions and they will tell you one by one sufficiency is not in me The creature if parted from God is empty and the Soul too and what fulness can be had by adding one emptiness to another Many a poor man hath thought if I had but enough to supply such necessaries and discharge such debts how chearfully would I serve the Lord without distraction and not care so much for the world any more But when these desires have been granted they have found themselvs still unsatisfied being ready now to thirst as much after fulness as before after necessaries It is God only who is All-sufficient both as to his own happiness and our satisfaction Gen. 17. 1. It is Christ the uncreated Wisdome Prov. 8. 21. Who fills the treasures of those that love him and causeth them to inherit substance And if he do not make God ours as well as the creature our condition will be but like theirs mentioned Haggai 1. 6. Ye have sown much and bring in little Ye eat but ye have not enough Ye drink but ye are not filled with drink ye clothe you but there is none warm and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes Solomon that was so rich to compass all worldly accommodations and so wise to find out what was best in them to be enjoyed after a full experience tells us that if they lead not to God they will be but vanity and vexation of Spirit 2. How doth the Commonness of these worldly things abate the value of them Eccl. 9. 1 2. They come alike to all and none can certainly know by them either love or hatred whether they be the friends or enemies of God You cannot say God gives me poverty therefore he hates me or he gives me riches therefore he loves me such conclusions are weak and deceitful For the good may be afflicted as well as the bad and sometimes undergoe the heaviest burden of earthly trouble Luke 16. 15. And on the other hand the wicked may flourish for a while as well as the righteous and sometimes enjoy the greatest measure of worldly prosperity Psal 17. 13 14. Renewing grace is a certain sign of Gods favour and a special distinguishing mercy and therefore highly to be esteemed and earnestly sought after but outward comforts common natural gifts and acquired abilities as a fair estate an healthful body a faithful memory a quick understanding a ready utterance or the like these though blessings in themselves yet are but blessings of the left hand such as are given to the heathen Idolater as well as to the Christian Worshipper to the clean and unclean to him that sacrificeth and him that sacrificeth not And therefore this their commonness shews much of their vanity and worthlesness 3. How is there in worldly things a vanity of deceitfulness which also speaks them less valuable How many people come to the world as to a lottery looking for a prize but go away cheated with a blank How often doth the world by promising much and performing little first abuse our Judgements and then frustrate our hopes and expectations Have you not sometimes found creature-confidences like the trusting in the Staff of a brokenreed whereon if a man lean it will go into his hand and pierce it Isa 36. 6. Have you not sometimes enjoyed the pleasures of sin for a season and flattered your self with the long continuance of them Whereas that season is gone and never returns again Can you not remember what happiness you may have promised your self in such a friend such a purchase such a preferment but some unexpected disappointment or other some Crosse or other hath much imbittered them unto you and lessened your comfort in their enjoyment The mutability of the world is the great deceit of it which that we may avoid let us duly consider what the Apostle hath written 1 Tim. 6. 6 7 8 9 10 17 18 19. And again 1 Cor. 7. 29 30 31. Oh let us not suffer our selves to be imposed upon counting that to continue long which he according to the experience of all tells us shall abide but a short while and then passe away Oh let us not think with them Isa 56. 12. what carnal delights we will have this day and to morrow much more abundant Oh let us not say with him S t Luke 12. 19 20. Soul take thine ease eat drink be merry thou hast much goods layd up for many years Least we be awakened with that terrible voice of God saying as unto him Thou fool this night thy Soul shall be required of thee then whose shall those things be which thou hast provided Why should we inordinately set our hearts and affections on that which is not for as Prov. 23. 5. Riches honours pleasures make themselves wings and fly away When we think our selves most sure of them when we trust most in them when by the abuse of them we are become most proud stomackful secure and negligent of Gods service then are we most sadly deceived then the wing of prodigality of oppression of casualty sweeps them from us or else the wing of death carries us away from them in a moment But suppose the world to perform more then it promiseth and that we could be sure of it for a very considerable while yet have we not immortal Souls to provide for Have we not matters of life or death to look after And what can all the world be to this Oh therefore how nearly doth it concern us to lay up in store for our selves a sure foundation for the time to come to anchor our Souls upon Christ the rock of ages who will never deceive us and not to hazard them for any thing in this worthless because deceitful and changeable world 4. That which further shews the worthlesness of the things of the world is their vanity of unsutableness in respect of the precious Soul Those are corporeal and fading this is spiritual and immortal Those are limited and finite beings this a substance of unbounded desires and can be fully satisfied with nothing but communion with the Father and the
Son through the Spirit with nothing but a state of grace and salvation and the fruition of God All that worth which silver and gold and such worldly things have is not so much in their own nature as from our esteem or from some outward humane appointment but we can never thus make them equally excellent with our selves 'T is true by a wilful slavery to sin we may as the Prophet speaks Jerem. 6. 30. turn our selves into brasse and iron and reprobate silver we may unman and unchristian our selves we may undervalue and debase our Souls blotting out the image of God and writing upon them the superscription of earth and the world Thus indeed the Epicure may greatly delight in sensual pleasures and the ambitious mind in flattering titles and the frothy wit in abusive lightness Thus 't is true carnal and worldly things to carnal and worldly hearts may become but too sutable dear and precious But the desires of a gracious heart are after higher and better things For every faithful Christian considers that God hath made even our bodies upright and our faces lifted from the earth that we might conceive how far from it our heaven-born Spirits should be elevated towards himself and Christ and heavenly Glory which are therefore most excellent because most proportionable and sutable to our Souls in their utmost capacities 5. And lastly the worthlesness of the world appears by its unprofitableness As Samuel said to the people 1 Sam. 12. 20 21. Turn ye not aside from serving and following the Lord for then should ye go after vain things which cannot profit because they are vain Too many indeed are ready to think the profits of the world worth their gaining even by the loss of their consciences of heaven and God himself And as for those who make conscience of their waies and endevour to walk circumspectly closely and humbly with God who scrupulously forbear prophane rash oaths and idle discourse who are sensible of the least secret sin who avoid what they can all occasions and appearances of evil who withstand the corruptions of the times and places they live in though they gain less in the world these are often accounted such as know not what is best for themselves But S t Paul assures us that such Godliness with contentment is the truest gain whereas the world when you have spent all your thoughts and the labour of your lives upon it though it may further you in some lesser respects yet it cannot profit you in the main thing necessary It cannot procure us the favour of God who regardeth not the rich man more then the poor for they are all alike the work of his hands He accounts of all not according to their meanness or greatness but according to their real piety and goodness Prov. 19. 1. Better is the poor that walketh in his integrity then he that is perverse in his lips and is a fool Prov. 28. 6. Better is the poor that walketh in his uprightness then he that is perverse in his ways though he be rich Observe They are the poor that walk in their integrity that know love and serve God not that kind of poor who are grossely ignorant and neglectful of God and who lead sensual sloathful and heathenish lives though they above others might be most easily convinced of the emptiness and unprofitableness of the world and so have greater care of their Souls salvation seeking out after God in Christ to supply their Spiritual necessities that it may be better with them in the life to come Again the world cannot ease the pain of an afflicted conscience nor can it give us the grace we want Ordinarily 't is so abused that it makes people not more thankful but more forgetful of God nor doth it as it ought draw their hearts nearer to God but sets them at a further distance from him nor doth it make them more humble but more haughty nor more constant and sincere in duties but more unfit for any good word or work Nor can the world profit us in the day of wrath When the sinful pleasures of youth are ended by sickness age or death what can be left but the worm of conscience bred out of them to torment the Soul for ever Have you not sometimes considered with your self how soon the world and its pleasures will turn you off How can you but now and then take notice of your own frailties which tell you how certainly and shortly you must lie down in the dust Do you not sometimes go to the house of mourning or stand by dying people confessing the world to be nothing worth and complaining of the losse of their time and strength spent upon it And do you not see how little it doth for them in their greatest need Oh therefore let this prevail with us to prize our Souls above the world let this with what hath been considered in the foregoing particulars make us set as light by it as it doth or will do by us Let us henceforth make Christ our treasure and count it our happiness to honour and worship him as we ought to do Let us make God our portion and sit down content with him alone and let them who can get no better take the world and the pleasures of it Having now seen what it is to gain the world and the worthlesness thereof though gained we are in the next place to consider what it is to lose the Soul and the preciousness of that if lost As to the losing of the Soul the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here rendred to lose signifies to have a mulct or punishment inflicted and so may import not only the fatal final losse or damnation of the Soul but also any losse or damage that belongs to it here or hereafter 1. Therefore to lose the Soul is to lose ones self A mans Soul is the principal part of himself and so it is in S t Luke ch 9. 25. What is a man advantaged if he gain the whole world and lose himself Soul and body too and be cast away 2. To lose the Soul implies a being deprived of all further opportunities and seasons of grace of all virtuous and gracious endowments which are as the life of the Soul When Christ calls by death or Judgement they that like the foolish virgins have not oyl in their lamps and their lamps trimmed that have not their Souls adorned with the saving graces of his Spirit they shall not enter with him Having waited so long already and all in vain he will now stay no longer till they go and buy for themselves but will shut the door of mercy against them for ever 3. The losing of the Soul implyes the losse of all such earthly enjoyments as sensual hearts love and prize above their Souls and for which they undoe themselves for ever Oh who can express the wretchedness of such people when they shall stand before the Judgment seat of God to
receive their just doom in the most forlorn and desolate condition stript and forsaken of all carnal comforts friends possessions and outward accommodations whatsoever which to the hazard of their Souls they have grasped at and used in a sinful way and therefore must now lose both the Soul and them too eternally 4. The losing of the Soul implyes the losing of Christ and Heaven and the blessed Vision of God for ever And this indeed is the loss of losses such as there was never the like before nor ever can be again after it The fore-mentioned might be born but hardly but this is intollerable This worst effect of sin Depart from me or go away from me is as terrible a word as everlasting fire For alass Whither shall they go that go from God when he alone hath the power of eternal life Ten thousand words cannot speak a Soul more unhappy then those two words without God Eph. 2. 12. Thou mayst be without riches without friends without health without liberty nay without all outward blessings and yet be blessed but if without God thou art cursed with a curse The hypocrites hell which is the hottest of all other is set out by this Job 13. 16. The hypocrite shall not come before God When God would most powerfully perswade to dutie this is his motive Jerem. 7. 27. Obey my voice and I will be your God When he would most effectually disswade from sin this is his argument Jerem. 6. 8. Be instructed O Jerusalem least my Soul depart from you And again Hos 9. 12. Wo unto them when I depart from them How sad a saying is that of Sauls 1 Sam. 18. 15. I am sore distressed for the Philistins are upon me and God is departed from me How mournfully doth Micah bemoan the loss even of his helpless idols Judges 18. 24. Ye have taken away my Gods and what have I more and what is this ye say unto me what aileth thee How sadly is holy David and our Blessed Saviour afflicted at Gods absence in part and for a while My God my God why hast thou forsaken me says the one Lord says the other Psal 88. 14 15. why castest thou off my Soul Why hidest thou thy face from me I am afflicted and ready to dye while I suffer thy terrours I am distracted Do these so complain of Gods absence in part and for a while how bitterly then will the lost Soul complain when forsaken of God utterly and eternally Some are ready to say to God as Job 21. 24. Depart from us for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways They think him sometimes too near them in a Sermon in a private instruction in a motion of his Spirit or in a conviction of conscience and could wish him with his holy Laws farther off that they might sin more securely but let such beware least he take them at their word and give them their wish to their woe in banishing them everlastingly from his comfortable presence Oh with what tormenting grief will they then behold those Soul-ravishing delights which the righteous have in the presence of God the fountain of all good whilst they are sentenced to an eternal separation from him How sad and deformed a spectacle is the body from which the Soul is parted oh how sad then shall the condition of that Soul be from which God is parted for ever This though very grievous yet is not all for 5. and lastly the losing of the Soul implies further it s being brought to the highest degree of sin and consequently to such a fulness of sorrow and such a weight of Gods burning eternal wrath as no heart can conceive or tongue express They that would choose sin to save themselves from a little trouble or affliction will find that now what they feared and ten thousand times more is come upon them The wicked could now wish their Souls were so lost as to cease to be that they might cease to be tormented but God by his infinite power will both uphold them in their being and make them more sensible of pain then ever that they may be the subjects of greater punishment And now the Conscience of a lost Soul gnaws to think so many nights I went to bed prayerless so many times I swallowed down unlawful gain so many hours I spent in revelling foolish sporting or idle unprofitable talking so many opportunities of receiving good at the Lords-supper and other ordinances I have lost because I would not prepare for them nor so much as defile my foot or endure a little cold or trouble to be present at them Oh that I had been more diligent in the practice of religion and holiness oh that I had kept the Lords-day better and been more innocent in my walking all the week after though a less gainer in the world Oh that I had never known such or such a sin which I loved lived in plotted and contrived and by which I have now wrought my own eternal ruine Oh that I had spent but half my mis-spent time in praying and studying Gods Word in doing good and watching over my ways then had I been yonder in Heaven but now I must be for ever tormented in these flames Thou mayst now so under value thy Soul as to spend much more time upon thy beasts then upon it though Truth it self tells us in the Text that it is more worth then a world But that which is now despised in hell will be esteemed and the damned shall fully know the price of this Pearl whether they will or no. But it is far better to know and believe it now that we may be more careful of its preservation Consider therefore I beseech you in the next place the preciousness of the Soul in these several respects 1. As to God our maker for did not he at first make it in innocency after his own glorious image in knowledge righteousness and holiness Gen. 1. 26. Eph. 4. 14. Col. 3. 10. And ever since how is it the body of the Child only the frailer and viler part which is from the substance of the Parents as it was at first formed of the dust of the ground Gen. 2. 7. whereas the precious Soul which is of a Spiritual nature and shall never die hath its immediate being and original from God the Father of Spirits Heb. 12. 9. Infundendo creatur creando infunditur How is it God only from whom it is who can effectually command the Soul to subjection while the Magistrate can but force the outward man And God only who can punish it while man can but kill the body S t Mat. 10. 28. Still even under the state of corruption how is it the Candle of the Lord and the master-piece of his creation shewing the dignity of its nature by its various and noble operations He that by these knows not what the Soul is knows not what a man is For what is it but the Soul which thus distinguisheth us
which are abstracted from bodily substances In adversity there may be solid joys in the mind as there may be real torments upon a mans spirit which the Primitive Christians and Martyrs being freed from made little reckoning of their outward sufferings but endured them as Sozomen says as if their bodies had been other folks and not their own In prosperity too there may be a power in mans Soul to curb the body in that which is most sutable and pleasing which a beast cannot do 1 Cor. 9. 27. I keep under my body and bring it into subjection St Mat. 18. 8 9. Prov. 23. 1 2. When thou sittest to eat with a ruler consider diligently what is before thee And put a knife to thy throat if thou be a man given to appetite Again when the body faints with age or sickness the Soul may have strong desires after God and eternity And when the body returns to the dust the immortal spirit goes to him that gave it to be judged to weal or woe I desire says the Apostle to be dissolved and be with Christ Father says our Saviour into thy hands I commend my spirit S t Luke 23. 43. and 46. to the penitent thief This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise The body you see then though curiously wrought or imbroydered is but the cabinet of a more precious Soul which as was said is chiefly the man Oh therefore let us not live as if we were all of a piece and the body was the man as if that only was to be adorned pampered and provided for God having given us Souls capable of all those excellencies which he is pleased to impart to the best of his Creatures let us count them richly worth the care and labour of an holy Christian life Far be it from us to be willing of so much pains for the world and to call farless for the Soul too much ado Far be it from us to think our precious Souls no more worth then honour wealth or foolish mirth Oh far be it from us to count them so worthless as to be abused to the basest drudgery to be poysoned with sin and sensuality or to be ventured for a thing of nought But thus you have seen both what it is to gain the world and what to lose the Soul as also the worthlesness of the one though gained and the preciousness of the other if lost which if you compare and duely consider you will acknowledge as our Saviour here hath taught us That each ones Soul is of such worth and excellency that they must needs be exceeding great losers who lose their Souls though it could be by the gaining of the whole world As for the more full and particular improvement of this weighty truth which so nearly concerns every one of us you may take it in the following inferences Use 1. Is the Soul of any man or woman whatsoever more worth then a world Hence then O Christian learn to entertain right thoughts concerning the dignity of thy nature and let this 1. make thee hate to dishonour thy self by thinking speaking or doing any thing unworthy of a rational Soul much more of a Christian Let this make thee afraid to live and dye so vilely as at last with the wicked to wish thou hadst been made a toad or serpent or that thou hadst never been born 2. Rather let this consideration make thee careful to live holily to Gods glory and so to praise him for thy Soul made capable of so excellent a work as to love serve and honour him here and of so glorious a reward as to enjoy him hereafter 3. Let the same consideration move thee to praise God also for Christ the Lover of Souls who hath done and suffered so much for their eternal welfare and in him to praise the Lord especially for all other Soul mercies and advantages Though he should be pleased to keep thee short of other things say with a thankful heart as Eph. 1. 3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Gaius had a Sickly body but was happy in the prosperous state of his Soul Beloved says S t John Epistle 3. v. 2. I wish that thou mayst prosper and be in health even as thy Soul prospereth 4. Let this dignity of thy humane nature help thee to see the dignity of thy holy religion And remember though every thing else be mean about thee yet thy sincere religiousness relating to the precious Soul is no mean but an excellent thing which as Solomon says makes the righteous more excellent then his neighbour 5. Let this further make thee to carry they self alwaies humbly and courteously towards the meanest people thou canst meet with considering that though thou mayst differ from them in some outward respects yet they have Souls which in their own nature are as precious as thine own Use 2. Is the Soul more worth then a world and shall they be such exceeding great losers that lose their Souls though by the gaining of the whole world See then a great help Christians have to beat back Satans temptations when tempted to evil as Eve and our Saviour by any thing in the world Should a Chapman bid thee for any part of thy goods not so many pence as they are worth pounds wouldst thou not turn away with scorn from one that offered thee so much to thy loss Or if but for thy life thou couldst have an earthly crown or the whole world layd in thy hand wouldst thou not utterly refuse it knowing it could do thee no good at all when thy life was gone Wilt thou then exchange thy so precious Soul to its eternal undoing when offered for it but a morsel of base gain or a cup of stoln pleasure which will vanish in a moment Therefore 1. When about to lye dissemble curse or swear blasphemously if the next abuse of thy tongue would cost thee the certain loss of that unruly member would not self-love make thee refrain from such evil and wilt thou not do so much more for the love of God and to prevent the loss of thy precious Soul Take not his name who made thy mouth in vain It gets thee nothing and hath no excuse Lust and wine plead a pleasure avarice gain But the Cheap swearer through his open sluce Le ts his Soul runne for nought as little fearing Were I an Epicure I could bate swearing Again 2. when tempted to drink more then will do thee good if one should assure thee that the next needless cup was mixed with deadly poyson thou wouldest certainly refuse it counting thy life more precious then to be so vilely cast away shouldst thou not then much rather resolutely and constantly avoid such beastly drunkenness as manifestly endangers the life and happiness of thy far more precious Soul 3. So when tempted next to Ale-house gaming and stage-plays in