(6th.) To draw our hearts from all created things, and to lessen our respect to worldly vanities, that so our minds and hearts may more look after those things which are eternal and glorious. He that was before the world was will be when the world shall be no more. Christ as God is ' from everlasting to everlasting/ Ps. xc. 2. To him should we look, after him should we seek : Kev. i. 8, ' I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty ; ' ver. 11, ' Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last ; ' Eev. ii. 8, ' These things saith the first and the last, which was dead, and is alive ; ' Kev. xxii. 13, ' I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.' The first cause and the last end. It is for everlasting blessedness, for the enjoyment of an eternal God, for which our souls were made. He that was from the beginning, and will be when all things end, he should take up our minds and thoughts. How can we have room for so many thoughts on fading things when we have an eternal God and Christ to think of ? What light can we see in a candle when the sun shineth in his full strength ? All things in the world, like flowers, serve only for their season, and then wither ; and that season is a short one. Thou gloriest in thy riches and pre-
404 SERMONS UPON 1 JOHN II. 12-14. [SeR. III.
eminence now ; but how long wilt thou do so ? To-day that house and land is thine, but thou canst not say it will be thine to-morrow. But a believer can say, My God, my Christ, is mine to-day, and will be mine to all eternity. Death taketh all from us, honours and riches, strength and life ; but it cannot take God and Christ from us. They are ours to all eternity.
II. What kind of knowledge it is that is here spoken of. There is a twofold knowledge — (1.) Speculative and historical; (2.) Practical and saving.
1. Speculative and historical, which is but an airy speculation of divine things : with this most content themselves. The Jews had fj,6p(f)co(rcv tt/9 yvcoaeay; iv tu> vo/aw, Horn. ii. 20, ' a form of knowledge ; ' and so hath the formal christian : 2 Tim. iii. 5, ' Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof ; ' a map or model of gospel- truths. There are different degrees of this, — a memorative knowledge, such as children have, when the field of memory is planted with the seeds of knowledge ; as children that are taught to speak of divine mysteries, God, Christ, heaven and hell, sin and righteousness, by rote. As the philosopher observed of young men, that they learned the mathe- matics with all their hearts and minds, but moral things only to talk of them, ra /jbev ov Triarevovaiv ol vkot aXXa Xeyovai, rather to rehearse them, and say after others, than believe them. As some rather hear the sound of music than mind the melody and harmony, so they learn divine things, but they do not mind or believe the certainty of those things of which they are instructed ; this is the lowest form of specu- lative knowledge, such as is in children, and those that are childlike affected. Another degree above this is an opinionative knowledge, when they do not only charge their memories, but have a kind of conscience and judgment about these things, so as to be orthodox and right in opinion, and so bustle and contend about that way of religion in which they have been educated, or suiteth best with their fancies and interests. But yet wisdom entereth not upon the heart, Prov. ii. 10. They make men disputers of this world, but not serious practisers of godliness. They have a religion to talk of, but not to live by. They may know much of religion in the notion, and it may be more accu- rately than a serious christian ; as a vintner's cellar may be better stored with wine than a nobleman's, but they have it for sale, not for use ; so these may dispute for their religion to better effect and pur- pose than a serious godly man, who yet hath a more intimate perceiv- ing of the truth, though he cannot so accurately form his notions. These are useful in the church, as a rotten post may support a living tree, or as negroes and slaves dig in the mines to bring up gold for others. But for an intimate, deep, heart-affecting knowledge, that is proper to the christian that receives the truth, not only in the light of it, but in the love of it : 2 Thes. ii. 10, ' They received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved/ A blunt iron that is red hot will pierce further into an inch board than a sharp tool that is cold. There is yet beyond these a higher degree of speculative and his- torical knowledge, and that is when men have some kind of touch upon their hearts ; but it is too slender and insufficient to stand out against all temptations when they rise up in any considerable