478 OF SPIRITUAL MINDEDNESS. [PART II.
and approve of a goodness and excellency in spiritual things above all others.
(3.) A due consideration is required hereunto, that all spiritual things do proceed from and are resolved into an infinite Fountain of goodness, so as that our affections may absolutely come unto rest and complacency, and find full assured satisfaction in them. It is otherwise as unto all temporal things. Men would very fain have them to be such as might give absolute rest and satisfaction unto all their affections; but they are every one of them so far from it that all of them together cannot compose their minds in rest and peace for one hour. They give sometimes a transport of affections, and seem for a season to have filled the whole soul, so as it hath no leisure to consider their emptiness and vanity: but a little compo- sure of men’s thoughts shows that they are but a diversion in a journey or labour; they are no rest. Hence are they called “broken cisterns, that can hold no water.” Let a man prize them at the highest rate that it is possible for a rational creature to be seduced into the thoughts of, whereof there have been prodigious instances; let him possess them in abundance, beyond what ever any man en- joyed in this world or his own imagination could beforehand reach unto; let him be assured of the utmost peaceable continuance in the enjoyment of them that his and their natures are capable of, —yet would he not dare to pretend that all his affections were filled and satisfied with them, that they afforded him perfect rest and peace. Should he do so, the working of his mind every day would convince him of his falsehood and his folly.
But all spiritual things derive from and lead unto that which is in- finite; which is therefore able to fill all our affections, and to give them full satisfaction with rest and peace. They all lead us to the Foun- tain of living waters, the eternal Spring of goodness and blessedness.
Ido not say that our affections do attain unto this full rest and satisfaction in this life; but what they come short of herein ariseth not from any defect in the things themselves to give this rest and satisfaction, as it is-with the whole world, but from the weakness of our affections themselves, which are in part only renewed, and cannot take in the full measures of divine goodness, which in an- other world they will receive. But whilst we are here, the more we receive them in our minds and souls, the more firmly we adhere unto them, the nearer approaches we make unto our rest and centre.
2. Spiritual things are to be considered as they are filled with divine wisdom. I speak not of God himself, whose essential wisdom is one of the most amiable excellencies of his holy nature, but of all _ the effects of his will and grace by Jesus Christ. All spiritual truths, all spiritual and heavenly things, whereby God reveals and communi-
CHAP, XIX.] THE TRUE NOTION OF SPIRITUAL OBJECTS. 479
cates himself unto the souls of men, and all the ways and means of our approach unto him in faith and obedience through Christ Jesus, I now intend. All these are filled with divine wisdom. See 1 Cor. ii. 7; Eph. iii, 10, i. 8,9. Now, wisdom in itself and in all the effects of it is attractive of rational affections. Most men are brutish in them and their actings, for the most part pouring them out on things fleshly, sensual, and carnal; but where they are at all reduced under the conduct of reason, nothing is so attractive of them, so suited unto them, which they delight in, as that which hath at least an appearance of wisdom. A wise and good man doth command the affections of others; unless it be their interest to hate and oppose him, as commonly it is. And where there is true wisdom in the conduct of civil affairs, sober men cannot but approve of it, like it, delight in it; and men of understanding do bewail the loss of it, since craft, falsehood, treachery, and all sorts of villany, have driven it out of the world. So is divine wisdom attractive of divine, gra- cious affections. The psalmist declares his admiration of and delight in the works of God, because he hath “made them all in wisdom,” Ps. civ. 24. Those characters of divine wisdom which are upon them, which they are filled with, draw the souls of men into a de- lightful contemplation of them. But all the treasures, all the glory of this wisdom are laid up and laid forth in the great spiritual things of the gospel, in the mystery of God in Christ, and the dispensation of his grace and goodness unto us by him. The consideration hereof fills the souls of believers with holy admiration and delight, and thereon they cleave unto them with all their affections. When we see there is light in them, and all other things are in darkness, that wisdom is in them, in them alone, and all other things are filled with vanity and folly, then are our souls truly affected with them, and do rejoice in them with joy unspeakable and full of glory.