[3.] There is the mortification of the hypocrite, which is an outward forbearing evil, though they do not inwardly hate it ; which proceedeth from divers causes :—
(1.) Because they have no inclination to some sins ; or rather, a greater inclination to other sins, which intercept the nouiishment by which these sins should be fed. Though we are all gone astray from God, yet every one hath his way : Isa. liii. 6, * All we like sheep have gone astray ; we have turned every one to his own way.' So Eccles. vii. 29, ' God made man upright, but he hath found out many inven- tions.' As the channel is cut, corrupt nature in us findeth a vent and issue ; some are sensual, but not greedy of worldly gain ; shall we therefore call them mortified ? Some that are greedy of gain, are not proud and aspiring, or given to carnal pleasures ; do you think there- fore sin is dead in them ? No, their corruption breaketh out another way, more suitable to their temper and constitution, or custom and course of life ; in some, nature is more sullen and rigid ; in others, more facile, and obvious to the grosser temptations.
(2.) Sometimes it is because we make one lust give way to another. For certain weeds destroy one another, as wild beasts also prey upon one another. So when men abstain from pomp and pleasure, because of the cost, their covetousness starveth their riot ; so on the contrar}', when men check their sensual inclination by their sparing humour. But mostly it is seen in those that run into extremes, and bend the
58 SERMONS UPON ROMANS VIU. [SeR. X^'^III.
crooked stick too far the otlier way, as the hinatic in tlie Gospel fell sometimes iuto the water, aud sometimes into the fire. Mat. xvii. 15. Or as our ancestors to drive out the Picts or wild Britons, called in the Saxons, a worse enemy; or as if there were no better physic for a dead palsy, than a burning fever. Sins take the tiirone by turns ; as the voluptuous in youth prove the most worldly aud covetous in age; but this is not to quit sin, but to exchange it.
(3.) Sometimes because men have not strength and opportunity to act sin. They may seem weaned and mortified, when they are but spent and tired out with executing their lusts ; and it is not hatred of sin, but indisposition of nature to fulfil it : Job xxxiii. 20, ' His soul abhorreth dainty food.' No thanks to the glutton, but to his disease. Old age is described as ' days that have no pleasure in them,' Eccles. xii. 1. It is not the weakness of sin, but nature in them ; their lusts leave them, rather than they leave their lusts ; sin goeth out rather than is put out, rather dieth to us than we to it.
(4.) It may come to pass through outward respects, of carnal fear and shame. A debauched creature, that walloweth in all filthy lusts, is an abhorring to all that wear the heart of a man ; therefore credit may keep some from running into excess of riot, for lewdness is odious and disgraceful ; their iniquities are found hateful, as the Psalmist saith. Mere shame and men-pleasing may restrain many within the compass of their duty. Joash was gooil all the days of Jehoiada, but afterwards hearkened to the lewd princes, 2 Chron. xxiv. 17. In such cases there is no true hatred of sin, no true gracious principle set up against it ; this abstinence is but for a while ; take away the restraint, and they soon return to their own bent and bias ; and besides, this keepeth them but from a few sins.
(5.) Restraining grace. God may restrain and bridle men by the power of his word on their consciences, when yet their hearts are not renewed ; or by common instincts of natural modesty and ingenuous- ness ; or by the power of his providence, as God withheld Abimelech, Gen. XX. 6. Though the sin be not subdued, yet the act aud exercise may be suspended. Balaam had a mind to curse Israel, but God sufl'ered him not, though he strove by all means to please Balak.
(6.) Terrors of conscience. A man that is under them, no^i proponit peccare ; a renewed man, proponit own peccare ; the one hath for the time no actual will or purpose to sin ; the other a purpose not to sin ; no will to sin, yet have a great deal of sin in the will. Thus negatively I have showed you what is not mortification.
2. Positively, What it is. Here again we must distinguish. Morti- fication is twofold, passive and active ; passive, whereby we are morti- fied ; and active, whereby we mortify ourselves ; the one is God's work, the other our own.
[1.] Mortification passive, whereby God mortifieth sin in us ; which he doth either, — (1.) At conversion, when a principle of grace, con- trary to sin and destructive of it, is planted in our hearts :Ezek. xi. 19, ' I will put a new spirit into them, and I will take away the heart of stone, and I will give them an heart of fiesh, tliat tliey may walk in my statutes.' So Ezek. xxxvi. 2(j, ' I will put a new spirit into them.' In the work of regeneration God doth give a deadly wound to