2. Experience shows it. Take mere nature itself, and, like plants neglected, it soon runneth wild ; as the nations that are barbarous, and not polished with arts and civility, have more of the beast than of the man in them : Jude 10, ' What they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves.' Suppose they use the spectacles of art to help the native light of reason with industry, yet their eyes are blind. How erroneous in religion were the civil nations ! Rom. i. 22, ' Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools ;' very foolish in matters of worship. The Romans placed fear, human passions, and every paltry thing among their gods. The ruder and more brutish nations worshipped only the sun and thunder, things great and wonderful. And still now we see great scholars given over to fond superstitions. Nay, go higher; suppose, besides the spectacles of art, nature be furnished with the glass of the Word, yet we see great scholars very defective in the most useful and practical points. Nicodemus, a teacher in Israel, knew not regeneration, John iii. 10. Usually they delight rather in moral strains than mysteries of faith, and err in one point or another ; usually in the controversies of their age, they are blinded by pride or interest, are loath to stooj) to truth revealed, and so are outstarted by the vulgar. Siirgunt indocti et rapiunt coelum, &c. — they dispute away heaven while others surprise it. Nay, suppose they had an exact model and proportion of faith, and do pry into all the secrets of religion, as it is possible to do with the common light and help of the Spirit, which is as far as a reprobato
126 SERMONS UPON JOHN XVII. [Ser. XLIIL
can go ; yet all this is without any change of affection, without any favour or relish of truth. This speculative and artificial knowledge doth not change the heart.
But here is an objection ; many carnal men have great parts, and profess the knowledge of the true God. I answer —
[1.] The greatest part of the world lieth in ignorance ; they are born in darkness, live in darkness, love darkness more than light, and are under the powers of darkness: Eph. vi. 12, ' The rulers of the darkness of this world.' The devil hath a large territory over all the blind nations.
[2.] Carnal men, that own the true God, and profess him, yet in a scripture sense they do not know him. For knowledge not being affective, it is reputed ignorance : John viii. 54, 55, ' Of whom ye say, that he is your God. Yet ye have not known him, but I know him : and if I should say, I know him not, I shall be a liar like unto you ; but I know him, and keep his saying.' It is a lie to pretend to know- ledge without obedience : 1 John ii. 4, 5, ' And hereby we know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.' For all their great parts, they are but spiritual fools ; they have no true wisdom, dvoijrol. So are all carnal men : Titus iii. 3, ' We ourselves also were sometimes foolish,' out of our wits. They do not understand things spiritual, and such as tend to maintain communion with God ; they love and do those things with delight that are against all reason, hurtful to body and soul. Natural men are sometimes represented as fools that judge amiss, sometimes as infants that know nothing : Isa. xxviii. 9, ' Whom shall he teach knowledge ? and whom shall he make to understand doctrine ? they that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breast.' Some- times as beasts, that are incapable of understanding : Ps. xxxii. 9, ' Be ye not as the horse, or as the mule, that hath no understanding.' Fools they are in their choice that prefer a nut or an apple before a jewel ; they spend all their time in looking after riches, and honours, and such kind of things as do not conduce to eternity ; for carnal pleasures forfeit their souls, and yet think themselves very wise. In their course they make war with heaven, and enter into the lists with God, as if they were stronger than he. In their presumption, they give out themselves for the sons of God, when they are the devil's children ; as if a man, born of a beggar, should pretend to be the son of a king. Fools and madmen challenge all lands as theirs, so do they all promises and comforts. Within xi little while experience will show them to be fools ; their eyes are never opened to see their folly till it be too late : Luke xii. 20, ' Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee ;' Jer. xvii. 11, ' As a partridge sitteth on eggs, and hatcheth them not, so he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool.' There is no fool to the carnal fool; godly men are only wise, that are wise to save their souls.