After Moses had enjoyed forty days' private communion with God in the mount, how did his heart rise, and his anger wax hot against the molten calf that his people had made ! Exod. xxxii. 1&, 20, 'And it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh unto the camp, that he saw the calf and the dancing ; and Moses' anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount : and he took the calf which they had made, and burnt it in the fire, and ground it to powder, and strawed it upon the water, and made the children of Israel drink of it.' Moses had never more intimate fellowship with God than now, and he never discovered so much holy zeal, anger, and indignation against sin as now. When a man comes off from the mount of closet-duties with a greater hatred, anger, wrath, and indig- nation against bosom-sins, darling- sins, complexion-sins, that were once as dear to him as right hands or right eyes, or as Delilah was to Samson, or Herodias to Herod, or Isaac to Abraham, or Joseph to Jacob, then certainly he hath had communion with God in those duties. When a man finds his beloved sins, his Delilahs, which, like the prince of devils, command all other sins, to fall before his closet-duties, as Dagon fell before the ark, or as Goliath fell before David, then assuredly he hath had fellowship with God in them. Pliny writes of some families that had privy marks on their bodies, peculiar to those of that line.' Cer- tainly, there are no families, no persons, but have some sin or sins, some privy marks on their souls, that may in a peculiar way be called theirs. Now when in private duties they find the bent of their hearts, and the purposes, resolutions, and inclinations of their souls more raised, in- flamed, and set against these, they may safely and comfortably conclude, that they have had communion with God in them. O sirs ! there is no * Viz., The Tibareni and Mossyni, Nat. Hist. lib. vi. c 4.— G.
Mat. VI. 6.] the privy key of heaven. 273
no bosom-sin so sweet or profitable, that is worth burning in hell for, or worth shutting out of heaven for ; and therefore, in all your private duties and services, labour after that communion with God in them, that may break the neck and heart of your most bosom-sins. When Darius fled before Alexander, that he might run the faster out of danger, he threw away his massy crown from his head. As ever you would be safe from eternal danger, throw away your golden and your silver idols, throw away your bosom-sins, your darling lusts.
And thus I have done with the answers to that noble and necessary question, that was last proposed.
(9.) My ninth advice and counsel is this. In all your closet-duties look that your ends be right, look that the gloi^ of God he your ultimate end, the mark, the white, that you have in your eye. There is a great truth in that old saying. Quod non axitibus, sed finihus pensantur ojfficia, that duties are esteemed, not by their acts, but by their ends.* Look, as the shining sun puts out the light of the fire, so the glory of God must consume all other ends. There may be malum ojms in bona materia, as in Jehu's zeal. Two things make a good Christian, good actions and good aims. And though a good aim doth not make a bad action good, as in Uzzah, yet a bad aim makes a good action bad, as in Jehu, whose justice was approved, but his policy punished. God writes a nothing upon all those services, wherein men's ends are not right : Jer. xxxii. 23, ' They obeyed not thy voice, neither walked in thy law, they have done nothing of all that thou hast commanded them to do.' So Dan. ix. 13, 'AH this evil is come upon us, yet made we not our prayer before the Lord our God.' The Jews were very much in religious duties and services; witness Isa. i. 11-15; Isa Iviii. 1-3; Zech. viL 5, 6. I might produce a hundred more witnesses to confirm it, were it necessary ; but because they did not aim at the glory of God in what they did, therefore the Lord writes a nothing upon all their duties and services. It was Ephraim's folly, that he brought forth fruit unto himself, Hos. x. 1. And it was the Pharisees' hypocrisy, that in all their duties and services they looked at the praise of men. Mat. vi. 1 -5, ' Verily,' saith Christ, ' you have your reward.' A poor, a pitiful reward indeed ! Such men shall be sure to fall short of divine accept- ance, and of a glorious recompence, that are not able to look above the praises of men. Woe to that man that, with Augustus, is ambitious to go off the stage of duty with a plaudit} Peter was not himself when he denied his Lord, and cursed himself to get credit amongst a cureed crew. As ever you would ask and have, speak and speed, seek and find, look that the glory of the Lord be engraven upon all your closet-duties. He shall be sure to speed best, whose heart is set most upon glorifying of God in all his secret retirements. When God crowns us, he doth but crown his own gifts in us ; and when we give God the glory of all we do, we do but give him the glory that is due unto his name ; for it is he, and he alone, that works all our works in us and for us. All closet-duties are good or bad, as the mark is at which the soul aims. He that makes
OhrutuB opera nostra, non tarn aetibua quam finibus penaat. — Zanchius. ' See more of this in my Treatise on Holiness, p. 157 to p. 168. [That is, his ' Crowa and Gloi^y of Christianity.' See it in Vol. IV.— G.]
274 THE PRIVY KEY OF HEAVEN. [MaT. VI. 6.
God the object of closet-prayer, but not the end of closet-prayer, doth but lose his prayer, and take pains to undo himself. God will be Alexander or Nemo ; he will be all in all, or he will be nothing at all. Such prayers never reach the ear of God, nor delight the heart of God, nor shall ever be lodged in the bosom of God, that are not directed to the glory of God. The end must be as noble as the means, or else a man may be undone after all his doings. A man's most glorious actions will at last be found to be but glorious sins, if he hath made himself, and not the glory of God, the end of those actions.