3. There are yet less degrees of this disregard of God and forgetfulness of him. Some are so filled with thoughts of the world, and the occasions of life, that it is impossible they should think of God as they ought. For as the love of God, and the love of the world, in prevalent degrees, are in- consistent, (* for if a man loveth this world, how dwelleth the love of God in him ?') so thoughts of God and of the world, in the like degree, are inconsistent. This is the state of many who yet would be esteemed spiritually minded. They are continually conversant in their minds about earthly things.
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324 ■ THE GRACE AXD DUTY OF
Some things impose themselves on them under the notion of duty : they belong unto their callings, they must be attended unto. Some are suggested unto their minds from daily occa- sions and occurrences. Common converse in the world engag- eth men into no other but vt^orldly thoughts : love and desire of earthly things, their enjoyment and increase, exhaust the vigour of their spirits all the day long. In the midst of a multitude of thoughts arising from these and the like occa- sions, whilst their hearts and heads are reeking with the steam of them, many fall immediately in their seasons unto the performance of holy duties. Those times must suffice for thouofhts of God. But notwithstandino- such duties, what through the want of a due preparation for them, what through the fulness of their minds and affections with other things, and what through a neglect of exercising grace in them, it may be said comparatively, that ' God is not in all their thoughts.'
I pray God, that this, at least, as unto some degrees of it, be not the condition of many among us. I speak not now of men who visibly and openly live in sin, profane in their principles, and profligate in their lives. The prayers of such persons are an abomination unto the Lord ; neither have they ever any thoughts of him, which he doth accept: but I speak of them who are sober in their lives, industrious in their callings, and not openly negligent about the outward duties of religion. Such men are apt to approve of them- selves, and others also to speak well of them ; for these things are in themselves commendable and praiseworthy. But if they are traced home, it will be found as to many of them, that ' God is not in all their thoughts' as he ought to be. Their earthly conversation, their vain communication, with their foolish designs, do all manifest that the vigour of their spirits, and most intense contrivances of their minds, are en- gaged into things below : some refuse, transient, unmanaged thoughts are sometimes cast away on God, which he despiseth .
4. Where persons do cherish secret predominant lusts in their hearts and lives, God is not in their thoughts as he ought to be. He may be, he often is, much in the words of such persons, but in their thoughts he is not, he cannot be in a due manner. And such persons no doubt there are.
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Ever and anon, we hear of one and another whose secret lusts break forth into a discovery. They flatter themselves for a season, but God ofttimes so orders things in his holy providence, that their iniquity shall be found out to be hate- ful. Some hateful lust discovers itself to be predominant in them : one is drunken, another unclean, a third an oppres- sor. Such there were ever found among professors of the gospel, and that in the best of times: among the apostles one was a traitor, a devil. Of the first professors of Chris- tianity, there were those ' whose God was their belly, whose end was destruction, who minded earthly things ;' Phil. iii. 18, 19. Some may take advantage at this acknowledgment, that there are such evils among such as are called professors. And it must be confessed that great scandal is given hereby unto the world, casting both them that give it, and them to whom it is given, under a most dreadful woe. But we must bear the reproach of it, as they did of old, and commit the issue of all things unto the watchful care of God, However, it is good in such a season to be 'jealous over ourselves and others, to exhort one another daily whilst it is called to-day, lest any be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin,' See Heb. xii. 13 — 17. And because those with whom it is thus, cannot be spiritually minded, yet are there some difficulties in the case, as unto the predominancy of a secret lust or sin, I shall consider it somewhat more distinctly.
1. We must distinguish between a time of temptation in some, and the ordinary state of mind and affections in others. There may be a season wherein God in his holy wise order- ings of all things towards us, and for his own glory, in his holy blessed ends, may suffer a lust or corruption to break loose in the heart, to strive, tempt, suggest, and tumultuate unto the great trouble and disquietude of the mind and con- science. Neither can it be denied, but that falling in con- junction with some vigorous temptation, it may proceed so far as to surprise the person in whom it is into actual sin, unto his defilement and amazement. In this case no man can say, he is tempted of God, for God tempteth no man, but every man is tempted of his own lust and enticed. But yet temptations of what sort soever they be, so far as they are afflictive, corrective, or penal, are ordered and disposed by God himself. For there is no evil of that nature, and he