92 SERMONS UPON TITUS ir. 11-14. [SeR. Y.
know, but because "we desire ; as the eye doth not carry the body to a far country, but the feet. All affections have their rise from some inclination and tendency of the desire towards the object. Amor meus pondus meum — It is love or desire that poiseth and inclineth the heart. We are directed by the judgment, but pressed and carried to a thing by the heart. So Austin, Non faciunt honos vel malos mores, nisi honivel maliamores — A man is not good or evil by his thoughts, but by his de- sires. It is true, before man sinned his desires and appetites were under rule, and did not stir but at the command of reason ; but now since the fall desire doth all in the soul, and man consulteth with his desires rather than anything else, and there all action and pursuit beginneth. Thus you see the reasons why the word lusts is used in this case.
2. The next term is, ' Worldly lusts.' Sometimes they are called fleshly lusts, and sometimes worldly lusts. Fleshly lusts : 1 Peter ii. 11, 'Abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul.' They are so called because they are most of all manifested in those things that belong to the body or the flesh. But here they are called ' worldly lusts,' and that for three reasons. Partly because they are cherished by the greater sort of men, which greater sort of men is counted by the name of the world : 1 John v. 19, ' The whole world lies in wicked- ness ; ' that is, the opposite malignant world. In this sense these lusts are called worldly, because they are most rife in the multitude, or greater part of the world, who only regard the present life. Partly because they are stirred up by worldly objects, by pleasures, honours, and profits : ' Having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust,' 2 Peter i. 14. He doth not name the objects, but the lusts, because the world becometh hurtful only by our own lusts. The world affordeth the object, and we find the sin ; as the garden yieldeth the flower, and the spider sucketh the poison out of it. Partly because they serve only for a worldly use and purpose, to detain us in the employments of the present life ; so that we have no heart, no desire, no leisure to think of any other, or to apply ourselves to better things. Lusts depress the heart, and sink it down to the present world, and the contentments thereof, and therefore called ' worldly lusts.'
You see now what is meant by the terms here used. But that you may conceive a little better of the thing itself, let me give you a dis- tinction or two.
First, These worldly lusts are sometimes carried out, either to things simply unlawful, or else to lawful things in an unlcnown' manner.
1. There are some desires altogether evil, in what sense soever you take them ; as a desire of murder, theft, adultery, revenge : ' The works of the flesh are manifest, which are these, adultery, fornication, uncleanness/ &c., Gal. v. 19; that is, these gross and brutish lusts are easily discerned, not only by grace, but by the light of nature ; therefore they must not be regulated, but extinguished, as a venomous plant must be plucked up by the roots. You cannot qualify them ; it is a sin to be moderate herein, to be a moderate adulterer, a moderate drunkard ; here the least is too much, these lusts must be wholly destroyed.
2. There are other desires, that are natural and necessary for the preservation of mankind, as to eat and drink, lawfully to provide for our families and posterity. Here men do ordinarily sin by excess, by
1 Qu. 'unkAvful' ?— Ed.
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desiring these things otherwise than they should and more than they should, and not for the causes that they should. Now these natural and necessary desires are not to be extinguished, but governed, and to be kept under the coercion of prudence and honesty. Honesty must restrain them, that they may not exceed their bounds, and so degenerate, lest a desire be turned into a lust, and its vehemency withdraw the heart from God. As we know natural heat from unnatural ; it is so temperately dispersed that the constitution of nature is not disturbed or oppressed by it, but unnatural heats oppress nature ; so desires, as long as they do not disturb the soul, they are not hurtful ; but when they exceed their bounds, they are to be under the coercion of reason : 1 Cor. vi. 12, ' All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.' He that will do all that he may will do more than he should. It is good to keep at a distance from the power of sin, not always to walk on the brink, lest we become slaves to lust.
Secondly, Take one distinction more of these lusts. It is intimated by the apostle, 1 John ii. 16, ' All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life ; ' this is the sum and contents of the corrupt world. Let us see the meaning, and then make some observations on the place, ' All that is in the world.'