Now he calls them carnal, partly because the flesh was strong in them, and partly because they followed and relished the things of the flesh, and partly because they did in their actions resemble carnal men. Do carnal and wicked men cry up one good man, and cry down another ? Do they lift up one, and abase another ? So did they. Are wicked men full of envy, strife, and divisions ? So were they. And these over- flowings of the gall and spleen, come from a fulness of bad humours, from that abundance of carnality that was in them. But now souls strong in grace are higher than carnal men, as Saul was higher than the people by head and shoulders. Souls strong ixx grace have their feet where carnal men's heads are : Prov. xv. 24, ' The way of life is above to the
' Josephus, in the ilth and 12th chapters of his book, tells you of some that imposed the name of Zelote upon themselves, as if they were zealous for the lionour and service of God, and under this pretence committed all riots and imajjjiuable wickedness. It were well if we had no such monsters among us in these days. [Zealots ; Antiq., b.iv. 10, seq, $t alibi.— G.]
' in many things, weak Christians are carnal men's apes.
56 THE UNSEAECHABLE [EPH. III. 8.
wise, that he may depart from hell beneath.' Souls that are strong in grace, do act rather like angels than like carnal men ; they do as much resemble the Father of spirits, as carnal men do the Father of lies.
[8.] Eighthly, Souls weak in grace are easily draivn aside out of the ways of holiness.
You know a man that hath but a little bodily strength, is easily thrust out of the way ; so it is with souls weak in grace : 1 John iii. 7, ' Little children, let no man deceive you ; he that doth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous/ Saith the apostle, 'Little children, let no man deceive you/ Many in these days, under pretences of high and glorious enjoyments of God, neglect and despise righteousness and holiness, crying up visions and manifestations, when their visions are only the visions of their own hearts and their manifestations are plain delusions. Ah ! but says the apostle, * Little children, let none of these deceive you.' I tell you he, and only he, that doth righteousness, is righteous, as God is righteous. Children, you know, may be easily cozened, and made to take counters for gold, because they are broader and brighter. Children in grace are soon deceived, hence is it that they are so cozened. * Little children, keep yourselves from idols,' 1 John V. 21.' So in Heb. xii. 12, 13, 'Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees.' Some think that the apostle alludes to those combats of the heathens, wherein it was a token of yielding, when a man hung down liis hands. You are weak, saith the apostle, and by reason of trials you are apt to hang down your hands, and to give up all as lost; therefore, says he, lift up your hands to fight, and your feet to run, take heart and courage, faint not, give not over, turn not aside because of the sharpness of afflictions. But souls strong in grace will hold on in the ways of grace and holiness, in the face of all dangers and deaths, Ps. xliv.
[9.] Ninthly, ^Yeak Christians are apt to make sense and feeling the judge of their spiritual estates and conditions.
And, therefore, upon every turn they are apt to judge themselves miserable, and to conclude that they have no grace, because they can- not feel it, nor discern it, nor believe it ; and so making sense, feeling, and reason, the judge of their estates, the}' wrong, and perplex, and vex their precious souls, and make their lives a very hell: as if it were not one thing to be the Lord's, and another thing for a man to know that he is the Lord's ; as if it were not one thing for a man to have grace, and another thing to know that he hath grace.
The Canaanite woman had strong faith, but no assurance that we read of. Mat. xv. 22, seq. Gal. iv. 6, ' And because ye are sons, God liath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.' Mark, they are first the sons of God, and then the Spirit cries, Abba, Father. 1 John v. 13, ' Tliese things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that ye may know that ye have eternal life.' Mark, they did believe, and they had eternal life, in respect of Christ their head, who, as a public person, wa« gone to heaven, to represent all his saints. And they had eternal life in respect
' The idols that are here mentioned are surely those that the Gnostics used to wor- ship, viz., the images and pictures of Siiuou Magus and Helena, as might be made evident out of Euacbius.
EpH. III. 8.] BICHES OF CHRIST. 57
of the promises, and they had eternal life in respect of the beginnings of it ; and yet they did not know it, they did not believe it. There- fore * these things write I unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God,' saith- he, ' that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that this life is in his Son.' Ponder on Mieah vii. 7-9. Much of this you may read in my treatise called Heaven on Earth, or a well- grounded Assurance of Men's everlasting Happiness and, Blessedness in this World, and to .that I refer you.^
The word shall judge us at last, John xii. 48 ; and therefore strong saints make only the word of God the judge of their spiritual condition now, as Constantine made it the judge and decider of all opinions.
[10.] Tenthly, Their thoughts and hearts are more taken with the love-tokens, and, the good things they have by Christ, than ivith the person of Christ.