_Direct._ II. Know God aright, and behold him by the eye of an effectual faith, and you shall never want matter for holy thoughts. His greatness and continual presence with you may command your thoughts, and awe them, and keep them from masterless vagaries. His wisdom will find them continual employment, upon the various, excellent, and delectable subjects of his natural and supernatural revelation; but no where so much as upon himself. In God thou mayst find matter for thy cogitations and affections, most high and excellent, delighting the mind with a continual suavity, affording still fresh delights, though thou meditate on him a thousand years, or to all eternity. Thou mayst better say, that the ocean hath not water enough for thee to swim in, or that the earth hath not room enough for thee to tread upon, than that there is not matter enough in God, for thy longest meditations, and most delighting, satisfying thoughts. The blessed angels and saints in heaven, will find enough in God alone to employ their minds to all eternity. Oh horrid darkness and atheism that yet remaineth on our hearts! that we should want matter for our thoughts, to keep them from feeding upon air or filth! or want matter for our delight, to keep our minds from begging it at the creature's door, or hungering for the husks that feed the swine! when we have the infinite God, omnipotent, omniscient, most good and bountiful, our life, and hope, and happiness, to think on with delight.
[Sidenote: The world to come.]
_Direct._ III. If you have but an eye of faith, to see the things of the unseen world, as revealed in the sacred word, you cannot want matter to employ your thoughts. Scripture is the glass in which you may see the other world. There you may see the Ancient of Days, the Eternal Majesty shining in his glory, for the felicitating of holy, glorified spirits. There you may see the human nature advanced above angels, and enjoying the highest glory next to the uncreated Majesty; and Christ reigning as the King of all the world, and all the angels of God obeying, honouring, and worshipping him. You may see him sending his angels on his gracious messages, to the lowest members of his body, the little ones of his flock on earth; you may see him interceding for all his saints, and procuring their peace and entertainment with the Father; and preparing for their reception when they pass into those mansions, and welcoming them one by one as they pass hence. There you may see the glorious, celestial society attending, admiring, extolling, worshipping, the Great Creator, the Gracious Redeemer, and the Eternal Spirit, with uncessant, glorious, and harmonious praise; you may see them burning in the delicious flames of holy love, drawn out by the vision of the face of God, and by the streams of love which he continually poureth out upon them; you may see the magnetic attraction of the uncreated love, and the felicitating closure of the attracted love of holy spirits, thus united unto God by Christ, and feasting everlastingly upon him; you may see the ravishments of joy, and the unspeakable pleasures, which all these blessed spirits have in this transporting sight, and love, and praise. You may see the ecstasies of joy which possess the souls of those that are newly passed from the body, and escaped the sins and miseries of this world, and find there such sudden ravishing entertainment, unspeakable beyond their former expectations, conceivings, or belief. You may see there with what wonder, what pity, what loathing and detestation, those holy, glorified souls look down upon earth, on the negligence, contempt, sensuality, and profaneness of the dreaming and distracted world! You may see there what you shall be for ever, if you be the holy ones of Christ, and where you must dwell, and what you must do, and what you shall enjoy. All this you may so know by sound believing, as to be carried to it as sincerely as if your eyes had seen it, Heb. xi. 1; 2 Cor. v. 7. And yet can your thoughts be idle, or carnal, or worldly and sinful, for want of work? Are your meditations dry and barren for want of matter to employ them? Doth the fire of love or other holy affections go out for want of fuel to feed it? Are not heaven and eternity spacious enough for your minds to expatiate in? Is not such a world as that sufficient for you to study, with fresh and delectable variety of discoveries from day to day? or that which is more delightful than variety? Would you have more matter, or higher and more excellent matter, or sweeter and more pleasant matter, or matter which doth nearlier concern yourselves? Get that faith which all that shall be saved live by, which makes things absent as operative (in some measure) as if they were present, and that which will be as if it now were, and that which is unseen as if it were now open to your eyes; and then your thoughts will want neither matter to work upon, nor altogether an actuating excitation.