2. A fool is led uith his humour and his lust, even as the beast. So there * Qu. ' afflicted ' ? — G. t That is, (natural) ' reasoQ.' — G.
WITH A RETURN OF PKAISE.
137
is no wicked man that shakes olF the fear of God, ' Nvhich is true \Yisdom,' Prov. i. 7, but he is led with his humour, and passion, and affection to some earthly thing. Now a man can never be wise and passionate, unless in one case, when the good is so exceeding that no passion can be answer- able ; as in zeal in divine matters. That will excuse all exorbitant car- riage otherwise. When David ' danced before the ark,' a man would think it had been a foolish matter, except it had been a divine business, 2 Sam. vi. 14. When the matter is wondrous great, that it deserves anj' pitch of affection, then a man may be eager and wise ; but for the things of this life, for a man to disquiet himself and others, to hunt after a ' vain shadow,' as the psalmist saith, after riches and honour, and to neglect the main end of a man's life, it is extreme folly. A man that is passionate in this respect cannot be wise. All fools are passionate, and wicked men have their affec- tions set deeply on somewhat else besides God. Because passion presents things in a false glass, as when a man sees the sun through a cloud he seems bigger. When men look on things in* the judgment of the Scripture, and the Spirit of God, and right reason, but through affection, things appear to them otherwise than they are, and themselves afterwards see themselves fools. Take a worldling on his deathbed, or in hell. He sees himself a fool then. When his drunkenness is past ; when he is come to himself and is sober, he sees that he hath catched, all his hfetime, after shadows. Wicked men that are carried with their lusts to earthly things, the}'- cannot be wise. Therefore the ' rich man' in the gospel, is called a * fool,' Lxike xii. 20 ; and in Jer xvii. 11, he speaks of a man that ' labours all his lifetime, and in the end is a fool.' Is not he a fool that will carry a burden, and load himself in his journey more than he needs ? And is not he a spiritual fool that ' loads himself with thick clay,' as the prophet calls it, Hab. ii. 6, and makes his pilgrimage more cumbersome than he needs ? Is not he a ' fool' that lays the heaviest weight on the weakest ? that puts off the heaviest burden of repentance to the time of sickness, and trouble, and death, when all his troubles meet in a centro, as it were, and he hath enough to do to conflict with his sickness ?
3. Again, He is a ' fool' that will play with edge tools, that maJies a sport of sin. He is a ' fool' that provokes his betters ; that shoots up arrows and casts up stones, that shall fall on his own head. He that darts out oaths and blasphemies against God, that shall return back upon his own pate, Ps. vii. IG. Many such fools there are. ' God will not hold them guiltless,' Exod. xx. 7.
4. He is a ' fool' that knows not, or forgets his end. Every wicked man forgets the end wherefore he lives in the world. He comes here into the world, and lives, and is turned out of the world again, and never considers the work that he hath to do here,' but is carried like a ' fool,' with affec- tions and passions to earthly things, as if he had been born only for them. A wise man hath an end prefixed in all that he doth, and he works to that end. Now there is no man but a sound sanctified Christian, that hath a right end, and that works to that end. Other men pretend they have an end, and they would serve God, &c.
They pretend heaven, but they work to the earthward ; like moles, they dig in the earth. They work not to the end they pretend to fix to them- selves. All men, how witty soever they are otherwise, in worldly respects, they are but * fools.' As we say of owls, they can see, but it is by night : so wicked men are witty, but it is in works of darkness. Thsy arc wise ' in * Qu. ' not in ' ?— Ed.
138 A RESCUE FROM DEATH,
their own generation,' among men like themselves. But this is not the life wherein folly and wisdom can be discerned so well. It will appear at the hour of death, and the day of judgment. Then those will be found wise that are wise for eternity ; that have provided how it shall go with them when all earthly things shall fail them ; and those will be ' fools' that have only a particular wit for the particular passages of this life ; to con- trive particular ends and neglect the main. They are penny wise and pound foolish. Ahithophel, a witty wiseman, his ' counsel was an oracle, yet he was not wise to prevent his own destruction, 2 Sam. xvi. 23.