' Who can with patience see apes in the habit of nobles ? saith Lucian.
' Hypocritis nihil est crudelius, impatientius, et vindictoB cupidius. — LiUJier. There is not a more cruel creature, more impatient and yindictive, than a hypocrite, said he that had the experience of it in his own person.
92 THE NECESSITY, EXCELLENCY, RARITY, [HEB. XII. 14.
carried out in a coffin, whereby she escaped ; at another time, being besieged at Oxford in a cold winter, by wearing white apparel she got away in the snow undiscovered ; but at last vengeance did over- take her. So, though hypocrites may for a time seem to be dead to sin, and dead to the world, though they may clothe themselves with a snow-like purity, and with the white satin of seeming sanctity, yet God at last will unmask and unmuffle them, and vengeance will with a witness overtake them. Job xvii, 8, and xxxvi, 13 ; Isa. xxxiii. 14. Hypocrites are like blazing stars, which, so long as they are fed with vapours, shine as if they were fixed stars ; but let the vapours dry up, and presently they vanish and disappear. As the joy of the hypo- crite, so the goodness of the hypocrite is but for a moment ; it is as a morning cloud, and as the early dew. A hypocrite is a mere comet, a flaunt, a flash. Principles of holiness are lasting, but hypocrisy makes a man only constant in inconstancy, Job xx. 5 ; Hosea vi. 4.
7. Seventhly, If real holiness be the only way to happiness ; if men must be holy on earth, or they shall never come to a fruition of God in heaven ; then this truth, by way of conviction, looks sourly and sadly upon such who please and bless themselves with common gifts and common grace, loith a gift of 'knowledge, a gift of faith, a gift of prayer, a gift of utterance, a gift of memory, dec, lohen they have Tvothing of real holiness in them. Like those in Mat. vii. 22, 23, who had great gifts, but were so far from real sanctity that they were workers of iniquity; they had a flood of gifts, but not a drop of grace ; they had many gifts, but not one saving grace ; they could work miracles, but that miracle of holiness being not wrought in them, Christ takes an everlasting farewell of them, ' Depart from me, ye workers of ini- quity.' So they in Heb. vi. had enlightened heads ; but where was their humbleness and holiness of heart ? They had silver tongues ; but where was their sanctified souls ? They had some smack, some tastes and relishes of heaven's glory ; but where was their inward and outward purity ? Notwithstanding all their extraordinary gifts of speaking with tongues, casting out of devils, and opening of prophe- cies, yet were they not renewed, regenerated, and sanctified by the Holy Ghost. ^ Their gifts might be of singular use to the enlighten- ing, quickening, edifying, comforting, and encouraging of others, and yet never have any influence upon their own hearts, to the changing, renewing, and sanctifying of tbem. Men of greatest gifts are not always men of greatest holiness. The Scribes and Pharisees, Judas, Demas, Tertullus, and Simon Magus, were men of great gifts, and yet they had no real holiness. They had the ninety-nine of gifts which Christ looks not after, but wanted the one, viz., real holiness, which vdth Christ is all in all. The devil hath greater gifts than any man on earth, and yet he is a devil still. Gifts without holiness wiU but make a man twice told the child of hell. Mat. xxiii. 15.^ The more of gifts here, the more, without holiness, of hell hereafter. The greatest scholars have often proved the greatest sinners, the stoutest opposers,
1 As nurses' milk is of use to others, but of none to themselves.
' Augustine trembled when he considered the extraordinary gifts and parts that were in his base child, to think what God meant in infusing so precious a soul, and in giving Buch rare gifts to such an impure creature.
HeB. XII. 14.] AND BEAUTY OF HOLINESS. 93
and the worst of persecutors. There are none so wicked as he that is wittily 1 wicked. The highest gifts many times prove but the fairest paths to the chambers of death. As the richer the ship is laden with bars of silver and gold the deeper it sinks, so the richer the soul is laden with silver parts and golden gifts, and yet not balanced with real holiness, the deeper it sinks under wrath and misery. And no wonder, for, 1. Gifts do but tickle the ear, they do not cleanse the heart. 2. They do but stir the affections, they do not kill corruptions.
3. They are but ornaments to a man's profession, they have no saving influence upon a man's conversation. They tempt a man to take up with the world, but they never help a man to overcome the world.