^ Spirit, should erect a government in our hearts to captivate and order
V> this licentious faculty.
2. Likewise, it is good to present real things to the soul, as the true riches and true misery of a Christian, the true honour and dishonour, true beauty and deformity, the true nobleness and debasement, of the soul. Whatever is in the world are but shadows of things in comparison of those true realities which religion affords. And why should we vex ourselves about a vain shadow? Ps. xxxix. (5.
* That is, ' apprehended.' — Ed.
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THE soul's conflict. 181
The Holy Ghost, to prevent further mischief hy these outward things, gives a dangerous report of them, cahing them vanity, unrighteous mammon, Luke xvi. 9, uncertain riches, thorns, yea, nothing, Prov. xxiii. 5 ; be- cause, though they be not so in themselves, yet, our imagination over- valuing them, they prove so to us upon trial. Now, knowledge that is bought by trial is often dear bought; and therefore God would have us prevent this by a right conceit of things beforehand, lest trusting to vanity we vanish ourselves, and trusting to nothing we become nothing ourselves, and, which is worse, worse than nothing.
3. Oppose serious consideration against vain imagination ; and because our imagination is prone to raise false objects, and thereby false conceits and discourses in us, our best way herein is to propound true objects of the mind to work upon, as, 1. To consider the greatness and goodness of Almighty God and his love to us in Christ. 2. The joys of heaven and the torments of hell. 3. The last and strict day of account. 4. The vanity of all earthly things. 5. The uncertainty of our lives, &c. From the meditation of these truths the soul will be prepared to have right con- ceits of things, and discourse upon true grounds of them, and think with itself that if these things be so indeed, then I must frame my life suitable to these principles. Hence arise true affections in the soul, true fear of God, true love and desire after the best things, &c. The way to expel wind out of our bodies is to take some wholesome nourishment, and the way to expel windy fancies from the soul is to feed upon serious truths.
4. Moreover, to the weU ordering of this um'uly faculty, it is necessary that our nature itself should he changed ; for as men are, so they imagine ; as the ' treasure of the heart is,' Mat. xii. 35, such is that which comes from it. Mala viem, mains animus, an evil heart cannot think well. Before the heart be changed, our judgment is depraved in regard of our last end ; we seek our happiness where it is not to be foimd. ' Wickedness comes from the wicked,' 1 Sam. xxiv. 13, as the proverb is. If we had as large and as quick apprehensions as Satan himself, yet if the relish of our will and affections be not changed, they will set the imaginations awork, to devise satisfaction to themselves. For there is a mutual working and reflux betwixt the wiU and the imagination ; the imagination stirs up the will, and as the will is affected, so imagination worketh.
-■ When the law of God by the Spirit is so written in our hearts, that the law and our hearts become agreeable one to the other, then the soul is inclined and made pliable to every good thought. When the heart is once taught of God to love, it is the nature of this sweet affection, as the apostle saith, to * think no evil,' 1 Cor. xiii. 5, either of God or man ; and not only so, but it carries the bent of the whole soul with it to good, so that we love God not only ^\ith all our heart, but with all our mind, Mat. xxii. 37, that is, both with our understanding and imagination. Love is an affection full of inventions, and sets the wit awork to devise good things ; therefore our chief care should be, that our hearts may be circumcised and purified, so as they may be filled with the love of God, and then we shall find this duty not only easy, but delightful unto us. The prophet healed the waters by casting salt into the spring, 2 Ivings ii. 20, so the seasoning of the spring of our actions seasons all. And indeed, what can be expected from man, whilst he is vanity, but vain imaginations ? AVhat can we look for from a viper but poison ? A man naturally is either weaving spiders' webs, or hatching cockatrices' eggs, Isa. hx. 5, that is, his heart is exercised either in vanity or mischief ; for not only the frame of the heart, but what
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182 THE soul's conflict.
the heart frameth, is evil continually, Gen. vi. 5. A wicked man that is besotted with false conceits, wiU admit of no good thoughts to enter.
5. Even when we are good, and devise good things, yet there is still some sickness of fancy remaining in the best of us, whereby we work trouble to ourselves ; and therefore it is necessary we should labour to restrain and limit our fancy, and stop these waters at the beginning, Prov. vii. 14, giving no not the least way thereunto. If it begins to grow wanton, tame the wildness of it by fastening it to the cross of Christ (whom we have pierced vsdth our sins, Zech. xii. 10 ; and amongst other, with these sins of our spirits), who hath redeemed us from our vain thoughts and conversations, 1 Peter i. 18 ; set before it the consideration of the wrath of God, of death, and judgment, and the woful estate of the damned, &c., and take it not off tiU thy heart be taken off from straying from God. When it begins once to run out to impertinences, confine it to some certain thing, and then upon examination we shall find it bring home some honey with it ; otherwise it will bring us nothing but a sting from the bitter remem- brance of our former misspent thoughts and time, which we should redeem and fill up with things that most belong to our peace, Luke xix. 47. Idle- ness is the hour of temptation, wherein Satan joins with our imagination, and sets it about his own work, to grind his grease ; * for the soul as a mill, either grinds that which is put into it, or else works upon itself. Imagina- tion is the first wheel of the soul, and if that move amiss, it stirs all the inferior wheels amiss with it. It stirs itself, and other powers of the soul are stirred by its motion ; and therefore the well ordering of this is of the greater consequence. For as the imagination conceiveth, so usually the judgment concludeth, the will chooseth, the affections are carried, and the members execute.