the Spirit new forming him into the likeness thereof, he can bid adieu to the world, life, and all, for these. As that martyr told him that asked whether he did not love his wife and children, and was not loth to part with them, ' Yes,' saith he, ' I love them so dearly, that I would not part with any of them for all that the Duke of Brunswick is worth,' whose subject he was; 'but for Christ's sake and his truth, farewell to them all.'
Secondly, Labour to get thy heart more and more infired with the love of God, and this will work in thee a dear love to his truth : love observes what is precious and dear to its beloved, and loves it for his sake. David's love to Jonathan made him inqiure for some of his race, that he might shew kindness to, for his sake. Love to God will make the soul inquisitive to find out what is near and dear to God, that by shewing kindness to it he may express his love to him. Now upon a little search, we shall find that the great God sets a very high price upon the head of truth, Psa. cxxxviii. 2 : ' Thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name ;' that is, God's name by which he is known ; evei-y creature hath God's name upon it ; by it God is known, even to the least pile of grass ; but to his word and truth therein written he hath given preeminence above all other things that bear his name. Take a few considerations whereby we may a little conceive of the high value God sets of truth. First, God, when he vouchsafeth his word and truth to a people, he makes account he gives them one of the greatest mercies they can receive or he give ; he calls them ' the great things of his law,' Hos. viii. 12. A people that enjoy his truth, they are by Christ's own judgment ' lifted up to heaven ;' whatever a people have at God's hands, without this, bears no more comparison with it than Hagar's loaf of bread and bottle, which was Ishmael's portion, would with Isaac's inheritance. God, that knows how to prize and rate his own gifts, saith of his word which he ' sheweth to Jacob, and testimonies that he gives to Israel,' that 'he hath not dealt so with any nation,' Psa. cxlvii. 20 ; that is, not so richly and graciously. Secondly, con- sider God's especial care to preserve his truth : whatever is lost, God looks to his truth. In shipwrecks at sea, and scarefires at land, when men can save but little, they use to choose not lumber, and things of no worth, but what they esteem most precious. In ail the great revolutions, changes, and overturning of kingdoms, and churches also, God hath still preserved his truth. Thousands of saints' lives have been taken away, but that wliich the devil spites more than all the saints, yea, which alone he spites them for, that is, the truth, this lives, and shall, to triumph over his malice : and sure if truth were not very dear to God, he would not be at this cost to keep it vv'ith the blood of his saints ; yea, which is more, the blood of his Son, whose errand into the world was by life and death i' to bear witness to the truth,' John xviii. 37. In a word, in that great and dismal conflagration of heaven and earth, when the elements shall melt for heat, and the world come to its fatal period, then truth shall not suffer the least loss, but ' the word of the Lord endureth for ever,' 1 Pet. i. 25. Thirdly, Consider the severity of God to the enemies of truth. A dreadful curse is denovmced against those that shall ' take away from it, or add the least to it,' that embase or clip this heavenly coin, Rev. xxii. 18. All tliese speak at what a high rate Qod values truth ; and no wonder, if we consider what truth is, that truth which shines forth from the written word : it is the extract of God's tlioughts and counsels, which from everlasting he took up, and had in his heart to effect. Nothing comes to pass but as an accomplishment of this his word ; it is the most full and perfect I'epresentation that God himself could give of his own being and nature to the sons of men, that by it we might know him, and love him. Great princes use to send their pictures by their ambassadors to those whom they woo for marriage. God is such an infinite perfection, that no hand can draw him forth to life but his own, and this he hath done exactly in his word, from which all his saints have come to be enamoiu-ed with him. As we deal with truth, so we do with (iod himself; he that despiseth that, despiseth him. He that abandons the truth of (iod, renounceth tlie God of truth. Though men cannot come lo pull God out of iiis tin-one, and deprive him of his Godliead, yet they come as near this as it is ])ossil)le, when they let out their 3vrath against the truth; in this they do, as it were, execute (iod in effigy. There is reason, we see, why God should so higldy prize his truth, and that we that love him should cleave to it.
22i. HAVING YOUR LOINS