CHAPTER IV.
Other evidences of thoughts about spiritual things arising from an internal prin- ciple of grace, whereby they are an evidence of our being spiritually minded —The abounding of these thoughts, how far, and wherein, such an evidence.
The SECOND evidence that our thoughts of spiritual things do pro- ceed from an internal fountain of sanctified light and affections, or that they are acts or fruits of our being spiritually minded, is, that they abound in us, that owr minds are filled with them. We may say of them as the apostle doth of other graces, “ If these things be in you, and abound, ye shall not be barren.” It is well, indeed, when our minds are like the land of Egypt in the years of plenty, when it “brought forth by handfuls,’—when they flow from the well of living water in us with a full stream and current; but there is a measure of abounding which is necessary to evidence our being spi- ritually minded in them.
There is a double effect ascribed here unto this frame of spirit,— first “life,” and then “peace.” The nature and being of this grace de- pend on the former consideration of it,—namely, its procedure from an internal principle of grace, the effect and consequence whereof is “life:” but that it is “peace” also depends on this degree and measure of the actings of this part of it in our spiritual thoughts; and this we must consider.
It is the character of all men in the state of depraved nature and apostasy from God, that “ every imagination of the thoughts of their hearts is only evil continually,” Gen. vi. 5. All persons in that con- dition are not swearers, blasphemers, drunkards, adulterers, idolaters, or the like; these are the vices of particular persons, the effects of particular constitutions and temptations, But thus it is with them, all and every one of them:—all the imaginations of the thoughts of
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their hearts are evil, and that continually, some as unto the matter - of them, some as unto their end, all as unto their principle; for out of the evil treasure of the heart can proceed nothing but what is evil. That infinite multitude of open sins which is in the world doth give a clear prospect or representation of the nature and effects of our apostasy from God; but he that can consider the numberless number of thoughts which pass through the minds of every indivi- dual person every day, all evil, and that continually, he will have a farther comprehension of it. :
We can therefore have no greater evidence of a change in us from this state and condition, than a change wrought in the course of our thoughts. A relinquishment of this or that particular sin is not an evidence of a translation from this state; for, as was said, such particular sins proceed from particular lusts and temptations, and are not the immediate universal consequence of that deprava- tion of nature which is equal in all. Such alone are the vanity and wickedness of the thoughts and imaginations of the heart. A change herein is a blessed evidence of a change of state. He who is cured of a dropsy is not immediately healthy, because he may have the prevailing seeds and matter of other diseases in him, and the next day die of a lethargy; but he who, from a state of sickness, is re- stored, in the temperature of the mass of blood and the animal spirits, and all the principles of life and health, unto a good crisis and tem- perature, his state of body is changed. The cure of a particular sin may leave behind it the seeds of eternal death, which they may quickly effect; but he who hath obtained a change in this character, which belongs essentially unto the state of depraved nature, is spi- ritually recovered. And the more the stream of our thoughts is turned, the more our minds are filled by those of a contrary nature, the greater and more firm is our evidence of a translation out of that depraved state and condition.
There is nothing so unaccountable as the multiplicity of thoughts of the minds of men. They fall from them like the leaves of trees when they are shaken with the wind in autumn. To have all these thoughts, all the several figments of the heart, all the conceptions that are framed and agitated in the mind, to be evil, and that con- tinually, what a hell of horror and confusion must it needs be! A deliverance from this loathsome, hateful state is more to be valued than the whole world. Without it neither life, nor peace, nor immor- tality, nor glory, can ever be attained.
The design of conviction is to put a stop unto these thoughts, to take off from their number, and thereby to lessen their guilt. It deserves not the name of conviction of sin which respects only out- ward actions, and regards not the inward actings of the mind; and
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this alone will for a season make a great change in the thoughts, especially it will do so when assisted by superstition, directing them unto other objects. These two in conjunction are the rise of all that devotional religion which is in the Papacy. Conviction labours to put some stop and bounds unto thoughts absolutely evil and corrupt, and superstition suggests other objects for them, which they readily embrace; but it is a vain attempt. The minds and hearts of men are continually minting and coining new thoughts and imaginations; the cogitative faculty is always at work. As the streams of a mighty river running into the ocean, so are the thoughts of a natural man, and through self they run into hell. It is a fond thing to set a dam before such a river, to curb its streams. Fora little space there may be a stop made, but it will quickly break down all obstacles or over- flow all its bounds. There is no way to divert its course but only by providing other channels for its waters, and turning them there- into. The mighty stream of the evil thoughts of men will admit of no bounds or dams to put a stop unto them. There are but two ways of relief from them, the one respecting their moral evil, the other their natwral abundance. The first [is,] by throwing salt into the spring, as Elisha cured the waters of Jericho,—that is, to get the heart and mind seasoned with grace; for the tree must be made good before the fruit will be so. The other is, to turn their streams into new channels, putting new aims and ends upon them, fixing them on new objects: so shall we abound in spiritual thoughts; for abound in thoughts we shall, whether we will or no.