11. Your success in the duty is not to be measured by the multitude and subtlety of the thoughts, but the sincerity of them. Christians puzzle and disquiet themselves because they look too much at gifts ; you should covet the best gifts, but not inordinately : Ps. IL 6, ' Thou desirest truth in the inward parts.' In prayer God looketh more to the impulses of zeal than the flowers of rhetoric ; so in meditation, if we are less subtle, it is no matter, so we be more devout.
12. Tou must begin and end all with prayer. Duties are subser- vient one to another. In the beginning you must pray for a blessing on the duty, and in the end commend your souls and resolutions to God. There is no hope in your own promises, but God's. They were in an high pang of zeal when they offered so freely to the service of the house of God ; but David prays, 2 Chron. xxix. 28, ' 0 Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and of Israel, our fathers, keep this for ever in the imaginations of the thoughts of the heart of thy people, and prepare their hearts to seek thee.' Our motions are fleeting and vanishing ; God must preserve in us these resolutions of consecrating ourselves and all that is ours to him.
SEEMOX IIL
And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at the even-tide. — Gen. xxiv. 63.
My work now is to handle the lets or hindrances of meditation, together with the helps and means that may quicken you to the per- formance of it. The lets may be sooner discovered than remedied, as the nature of many diseases is better known than the cures, an^l therefore they are called opprohria mediconim, the disgrace of thu physician's skill ; so these remain as marks and memorials' of the fall. Entire and uninterrupted visions are the privileges of heaven ;_ we must be contented with our broken and imperfect measures ; it is enough that we have ' doves' eyes,' Cant. iv. 1 ; that we can peck and look up- ward, and enjoy some temperate glances on the glory of our hopes, thou"-h we be not transported with the ravishments of a constant
282 SKRMONS UPON GENESIS XXIV. 63.
and steady vision. We cannot expect to be absolute ; we shall still have cause to be humbled ; it is enough if we can be encouraged against despair ; for many find themselves so unfit that they have not hopes enough to attempt the duty. To these I shall speak chiefly in this discourse. I had thought to have handled the lets severally, and then the helps ; but I think it would be better to suit each discourage- ment with its proper helps.
The lets and hindrances are of several sorts, some common to this with other duties, and others more peculiar to the duty of medita- tion.
First, I begin with the first sort, such hindrances as are common to other duties, and they are four — sloth, love of pleasure, a guilty con- science, and an unwieldy mind.
1. There is a spiritual slothfulness. Men lie upon the bed of ease, and are loath in good earnest to apply themselves to what is painful and difficult. If grace would drop to them out of the clouds, or God would be contented with some faint lazy wishes, or some cold and yawning expressions of a drowsy devotion, they would be religious ; but where duties must cost labour and self-denial, and put them to pains, men withdraw the shoulder, and hang off. Therefore Solomon saith, Prov. xxi. 25, ' The desire of the slothful killeth him, for his hands refuse to labour.' They would fain have grace, and perform what God requires, but are loath to take pains. Now, as this is a prejudice against all other duties, so especially against the duty of meditation ; partly because of all duties it is most difficult and tedious to the flesh ; it is a duty lying within the soul ; we cannot so easily command our own thoughts. Now inward duties are the most difficult, because we cannot always exercise a dominion over our own spirits. Partly because it is a private duty, to which God alone is conscious. In public duties secular interests and ends have a great constraint, and therefore we excite the heart to be more intent and serious. We see byends make men deny themselves, but where there is not this to prompt them, they either omit the work, or turn it into a slight and idle practice.
How shall we do to shake off this spiritual sloth ? I answer —
[1.] You must consider that a lazy spirit is most unfit for Christianity. The whole christian life is carried on with much labour and diligence. You were as good never look after Christ and heaven as refuse labour. There is nothing required in the whole compass of religion but what will cost you a great deal of pains. Faith is a work : John vi. 29, ' That is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.' It is not a barren idle speculation, nor a naked apprehension, but a matter of difficulty and diligence to bring Christ and the soul together, and to lodge the soid in the bosom of Christ. Love is labour : Heb. vi. 10, ' God is not unrighteous, to forget your work and labour of love.' It is not a naked profession, but there is labour in it ; take it either for love to God or men. For love to God, that is not a fellow-like familiarity, but a laying out ourselves in his service ; or for love to men, that doth not consist in a few good words. Debts are not paid with a noise of money ; you do not satisfy the commandment by say- ing, ' Depart in peace, be ye warmed, be ye filled, if you give them not those things which are needful to the body,' James ii. 16. So for