2. There are some more tolerable principles, the hope of temporal mercies. When we come and pray, and do not seek the favour of God, but seek temporal mercies : Hosea vii. 14, ' They howled upon their beds for corn and wine.' Or the fear of temporal judgments, Isa. Iviii. 5 ; Jer. ii. 16; when all that they do is to remove some temporal judgment : ' In their afflictions they will seek me right early.' And I think I may add one thing more here, the fear of eternal death, when it is alone (otherwise it is a grace) ; they shall be damned else ; and so it is a slee})y sop to appease an accusing conscience, and so it is but a sin-offering. Though it requireth some faith to fear what is to come, yet fear of punishment alone showeth you are slaves, and only love yourselves : the devils fear and tremble, but do not love. You may fear a thing though you hate it. So far as the heart is affected with the fear of hell, it is good.
3. There are very good and sound principles, yet do not always argue grace, as when duties are done out of the urgings of an en- lightened conscience ; this may be without the bent of a renewed heart, but yet the principle is sound ; for the first thing that inflnenceth a man is to consider himself a creature, and so to look upon himself as bound to obey his creator. I shall illustrate it by the apostle's words in another case : I must preach the gospel, and 'woe unto me if I preach not the gospel,' 1 Cor. ix. IG, 17, ' Whether I do it willingly or unwillingly, yet a dispensation is committed to me.' So saith the soul. Whether I be fitted to do God service or no, God must be obeyed. But because God's precept is invested with a sanction of
VeR. 141.] SERMONS UPON PSALM CXIX. 489^
threaten ings and rewards, here comes in the fear of hell and the hope of heaven. The Lord hath commanded me to fly from hell ; this is a good principle : so the hope of heaven, Heb. xi. 26 ; it is a sound principle: a man may he gracious, or he may not. Many have a liking to heaven and eternal life, as it is a state of happiness, not of likeness to Grod. Where it is not alone, it is a very sound principle, but as it is, it may sometimes be the sign of a renewed man, and some- times not.
4. There are rare and excellent principles, when we act out of thankfulness to God, when we consider the Lord's goodness, that might have required duty out of mere sovereignty ; he hath laid the founda- tion of it in the blood of his own Son, 1 John iv. 29 ; when we love him out of the sense of his love to us in Christ, and when the grace of God that hath appeared teacheth us to deny ungodliness, Titus ii. 11 ; when the mercies of God melt us, Eom. xii. 1 ; when there are no entreaties so powerful as that of love. Again, anotlier principle that is rare and excellent is when the glory of God doth season us in our whole course, that it may be to the praise of his glorious grace, 1 Cor. x. 31. Another is complacency in the work for the work's sake, when we love the law because it is pure, when I see it will ennoble me and make me like God, when I love God and his ways, when nothing but so noble employment doth engage me to his service ; and service to God is the sweetest life in the world.
SERMON CLVIIL
/ am small and despised ; yet do I not forget thy precepts. — Ver. 141.
Here David proveth the truth of his former assertion, that seeing the word of God was so pure, he loved it for its own sake, and that he did not court religion for the portion that he should have with it, but for itself. Some are mere mercenaries ; no longer than they are bribed by some worldly profit, have they any respect for God and his ways. The man of God was of another temper. If God would bestow any- thing on him, well ; if not, he would love his word still ; yea, when it brought him apparent loss, meanness, and contempt, yet this could not make any divorce between his heart and the word : ' I am small and despised,' &c.
In the words we have — (1.) David's condition ; (2.) David's car- riage under that condition. His condition might have been a snare to him, yet still he keepeth up his affection.
1. His condition is set forth by two notions, the one of which im- plieth the other. God's providence, ' I am small.' God had reduced him to straits. The other, man's treatment of him, ' and despised.' The one showcth what he was really in himself, the other what he was in the opinion of others : mean in himself, and contemptible in the eye of others. Tlie Septuagint has, veoiTepo<i ejo) eifxi koI e^ov8€va>/ji,ivo<i — I am the younger, and set at nought ; therefore the Greek interpreters suppose it relateth to the story where God bids Samuel to anoint one