BoOli I.] A TREATISE OF SELF-DENIAL. 201
you go out of the world you will fiud they will come fast enonglh. Many cases will happen when duty is without encouragement, and all self-respects fail ; nay, when for conscience' sake you are put upon visible- disadvantage, Rev. xii. 11. It is said of the children of God, that ' they loved not their lives to the death.' When it came to this pinch, that either they must deny lite or deny Christ, then they loved not their lives. Many may in a prodigality of resolution, seem to lay all at Christ's feet, as Peter in his confidence talked high — * I will not deny thee,' but yet afterward they may fail, when they come to resist nnto> blood : Heb. xii. 4, ' Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.' When you must make choice of the world or Christ, then arfr the best discoveries made.
[3.] They are nothing in religion that cannot deny pleasure and the- delicacy of life. For this is the constant and private self-denial of a< christian, which is always necessary. All sin is rooted in a love of pleasure more than of God ; for therefore do we sin, because of the contentment we do imagine to be in sin, that draws on the heart to the practice of it. Now he that cannot abjure his contentment is nothing : Prov. XXV. 28, ' He that hath no rule over his own spirit is like a city that is broken down, and without walls.' The meaning is, he that cannot subdue his inclination to pleasure, doth lie open to every temptation. As an unwalled town in time of war receives every army that comes ; so is his soul, it lies obvious to temptation. And besides, pleasures will necessarily bring a brawn upon the heart, they are so contrary to the severity of religion. Seneca said. Certainly, it is necessaiy that he should have low thoughts of duty that hath high thoughts of pleasure, and to gratify his senses. If God had required nothing of us but the perfection of reason, if we were only to show our- selves men, there must be a bridle upon appetite and sensual desires- There is an old quarrel between appetite and reason. Nature itselt" would suggest such arguments to us as would put us upon the n^ortifi- cation of the senses.
[4.] We must deny ourselves in point of desire as well as in point of enjoyment: Titus ii. 12, 'Denying ungodliness and worldly lusts.* The great part of this duty consists in mortifying and subduing worldly lusts, that we may be content with our portion, though but a little of the world, if God seeth us fit for no more. It is a high point of self- denial, not only to part with what we liave, but to be content with what we have ; when the soul comes to this, to say, I have enough^ because I have as much as God allotteth me, and because God seeth it fit I should have no more. To be content with a little of the Avorld^ and not to desire more, it is the poor man's duty as well as the rich. As a rich man is to quit his possessions when God calls him, so a poor man is to quit, mortify, and subdue his desires. Covetousness, when once it prevails upon the heart, it desires, it grasps, it aims at the whole world ; therefore Christ saith, Mat. xvi. 2G, ' If a man should gain the wdiole world,' implying, that is in the aims of men. When a man's corruptions break out that way, he will never be satisfied. Solomon saith, Eccles. v, 10, ' He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver.' The heart of man is largely drawn out, so that like the grave, we shall never be able to say. It is enough. To enjoy complacency in
202 A TIIKATISK OF SELF-DENIAL. [BoOK I.
our portion, it is a g,rcat part of self-denial. To desire more, it is but to desire more snares. If I had more, I should have more trouble, more snares, more duty ; greater gates do but open to more care ; I should have more to account for, more time, and more opportunity ; and alas ! I cannot answer for what I have already. If a plant be staived in the valleys, it will never tVirive on the mountains ; so if in a low condition we are not able to conquer the temptation of it, what shall we do if we had more, if we cannot be responsible to God for what ■we have ?
[5.] Vainglory is as sordid a piece of self, and as much to be denied, as aft'ectation of riches and worldly greatness. Covetousuess, that carries a man to another object, but vainglory to another end -, the one makes us idolaters, and the other hypocrites ; an idolater sets up another God, and a hypocrite denies the true God. For mark, God, by reason of the excellency of his being, is to be the higliest object of our respect; and because he is the supreme cause, he is to be the ultimate end of all our actions ; and when we set up another end, we deny God his prerogative.