proper work of a servant is to wait. Stay thy Master's pleasure for any comfort. All his servants will have what they want, and therefore should be content with what they have. The standing wages are set, the vails are uncertain. [3.] Submissive in not doing what we please, not going beyond our rule, our order. Ministers are his servants, and therefore must not make laws in his house, either for themselves or others, but keep laws; not of themselves lay down what they publish, but publish what he has laid down. Ministers are not owners of the house, but stewards in the house. Laws are committed to us, and must not be framed by us. No servant must do what is right in his own eyes. [4.] Submissive in doing whatever the Master please. Not picking out this work, or rejecting that: nothing must come amiss to a servant. We must not examine what the service is which is commanded, but who the Master is that commands. We must not prefer one thing before another; or refuse a service that most crosses our inclinations, or opposes our ease and interest. A servant must come at every call, and say, Lord, I hear every command, Acts x. 33. [5.] We must serve Christ obediently in doing what is commanded, because it is commanded: this is to serve for conscience' sake. If the eye be not to the command, the servant acts not with obedience, though the thing be done which is commanded; nay, it is possible a work, for the matter, agreeable to the command, may yet be an act of disobedience, in respect of the intention of the performer. Oh how sweet is it to eye a precept in every performance! to pray, hear, preach, give, because Christ bids me! Many do these works for the wages; this is not to be obedient: they sell their services, not submit in service.

(3.) Christ must be served heartily. We must not be opaλuódsλot, eye-servants, we must "do the will of God from the heart," Eph. vi. 6; Col. iii. 23. Paul speaks of serving God in the spirit, Rom. i. 9. There are many complimental servants of Christ in the world, who place their service in saying, Thy servant, thy servant, Lord; lip servants, but not life, heart servants; such as the apostle speaks of, Gal. vi. 12, that mρоσwлñσαι, make a show only, but the heart of a service is wanting. The heart makes the service sacrificium medullatum, the marrow of a performance. Bodily service is but like the fire in the bush, that appeared to burn, but did not; or like the glow-worm in the night, that shines, but heats not these only act service, but are no servants; servants only in profession. To those who would not profess Christ seriously, Christ will hereafter profess seriously, "I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity," Matt. vii. 23.

(4.) Christ must be served cheerfully, Psal. xl. 8. He, as he was his Father's servant, delighted to do his will; it was his meat and his drink, John iv. 34. God loveth a cheerful servant in every piece of service, 2 Cor. ix. 7. This makes the service pleasing to Master and servant too; acceptable to the former, easy to the latter. Nothing is hard to a willing mind; willingness is the oil to the wheel. A servant cheerful at his work is as free as his Dominis liberi master: if his master make him not fieri, suam servi- free, he makes himself free. The dammodo libe- preaching of the gospel must be perAug. de C. D. 1. formed willingly, I Cor. ix. 17. Love to souls should make us cheerful in that service; not mourning at our own pains, but at people's unprofitableness; not that we do so much, but that they get no more.

Si non possint a

tutem ipsi quo

ram faciunt.

19. c. 15.

(5.) Christ must be served diligently. These two, "fervent in spirit," and "serving the Lord," are most

properly joined together, Rom. xii. 11. Hence it is most necessary, that whatever we do, should be done with all the might, Eccl. ix. 10. Abraham's servant was diligent when he went to procure a wife for Isaac: he would not eat bread till he had done his errand; when it was done, he staid not upon compliments, Gen. xxiv. 33. They whose service is in soul marriage, should spend no time needlessly. It is a pity that Satan's emissaries should be more diligent than Christ's servants; impostors, than pastors. How diligent a servant was Paul, that passed over so many countries with so much speed! "I laboured more than they all," was spoken as commendably as truly; not plus profui, I was more successful, but plus laboravi, I took more pains: diligence may be a companion and comfort, where success is a stranger.

(6.) Christ must be served perpetually. There must be no end of working, till of living. The dead are they who rest from their labours. Life and labour are of equal continuance. We can never begin too soon, nor continue too long, in the service of Christ: none ever repented of either, many of the contrary to both. Faithfulness to the death hath the only promise of the crown of life. Better never to have begun, than to apostatize. It is an unanswerable dilemma, If the service of Christ were bad, why did you enter into it? if good, why did you depart from it?

Obs. 5. That they who expect to persuade others to serve Christ, must be servants themselves. Jude, a servant of Christ, hopefully exhorts others to continue in his service, and to contend for his faith. The best way to move others, is to be moved ourselves words that come from the heart, are most likely to reach to the heart. It is not sufficient for ministers to discourse of his service, but to embrace it. A blurred finger is unfit to wipe away a blot. It is woeful when the function and the conversation oppose each other. If the service of Christ be bad, why exhort we others to submit to it? if good, why accept we not of it ourselves? A titular service shall never receive a real reward. "Depart from me, ye that work iniquity," shall be the doom of some that cast out devils, and prophesy in the name of Christ.

Thus much for the second particular in the description of the author of this Epistle, viz. his office, "A servant of Jesus Christ." Now follows the last particular considerable in his description, 3. His kindred and alliance, "The brother of James."

Of which, by way of explication and observation. For explication, two things are to be opened: Who this James was; and, Why this apostle here calls himself his brother.

(1.) Who this James was.

The Scripture speaks of two of that name: the one, James the son of Zebedee, the brother of John the evangelist, mentioned under these relations, Matt. x. 3; iv. 21; called by Christ; leaving father and ship; slain by Herod, Acts xii. 2; named by Christ, with his brother, Boanerges, Mark iii. 17, the sons of thunder. The other, this James here mentioned; concerning whom much is said in Scripture, and in ecclesiastical history; but in both he is spoken of very honourably.

His

[1.] In Scripture. First, His kindred and alliance are often mentioned. His father is said to be Alphæus, Matt. x. 3; Mark iii. 18; Luke vi. 15; Acts i. 13. His mother was Mary, spoken of Matt. xxvii. 56; Mark xvi. 1; Luke xxiv. 10; Mark xv. 40. brethren are said to be Simon, Joses, and Judas, Matt. xiii. 55; Mark vi. 3; two whereof were apostles, viz. Simon and Judas, Matt. x. 3, 4; Luke vi. 15, 16; Acts i. 13; and the other, viz. Joses, or Jo

Hierom cont.

mansit cum Maria

floridi pudoris integritatem, ut non modo de virgineo utero nasce

retur, sed etiam nutritio virgineo tractaretur. Pet. Dam. Ep. 11. Aug. Tr. 10. in

a

seph, was competitor with Matthias (as is generally supposed) for the apostleship, in the room of Judas Iscariot, Acts i. 23. Particularly, this James is said to be the brother of the Lord, Gal. i. 19, though, together with him, his brethren, Joses, Judas, and Simon, are also called Christ's brethren, Matt. xiii. 55; Mark vi. 3. Not as if Mary, the mother of Christ, had afterward borne children unto Joseph, as the erroneous Helvidius (whom Helv. Virgo ille Hierom confutes at large) laboured to qui pater Domini maintain. Nor as if James and the rest meruit appellari. Tantopere were called the brethren of Christ as Christus dilexit being the sons of Joseph, Christ's reputed father, by another wife; for the Scripture tells us frequently they were the sons of Alphæus; and it is the received opinion, that Joseph was never the husband of any but the blessed Joh. Bed. Aqu. Virgin, though haply some have the more earnestly asserted it from their high esteem of virginity. But some suppose this James and his brethren are called the brother and brethren of Christ, because they were the cousins-german of Christ by the mother's side, or Christ's mother's sister's children: and Hierom thinks their mother is that Mary, called the sister to the Virgin, and the wife of Cleophas, John xix. 25; her first husband Alphæus either being dead, or else one and the same husband being adorned with two names, Alphæus and Cleophas; which might well be, because, among the Hebrews, those names that agree Apud Hebræos nomina quæ con in the same radical letters, lose not their calibus, per addi. notion and signification by the addition tionem literarum of other letters to them, a rule applicable to these two names, Alphæus and Cleophas. And Gerhard also thinks, that this Mary, the sister of the Virgin, and the wife of Cleophas, was Harm. Hist. Pas. the mother of James, &c.; because, as Ch. 16. p. 186. in John xix. 25, Mary the wife of Cleophas and sister of the Virgin, is joined with Mary Magdalene standing by the cross; so, in the other evangelists, Mary the mother of James, upon the very same occasion, is joined with Mary Magdalene, Matt. xxvii. 56; Mark xv. 40. Some conceive this Mary the wife of Cleophas was mother of James, but was not own sister to the Virgin Mary, because, say they, it is not the custom for the same parents to put the same names on several children; but that she is called sister to the Virgin Mary because her husband Cleophas, or Alphæus, was the brother of Joseph, the husband of the Virgin Mary, brothers' wives being frequently called sisters. The most probable opinion is, that Joseph and Alphæus were of near relation, perhaps natural brethren, and therefore Joseph, being the reputed father of Christ, the children of his brother Alphæus, among whom this James was one, are called the brethren of Christ; it being usual in Scripture to call those persons brethren who are near of kin. As we see Abraham and Lot are called brethren, Gen. xiii. 8, although Lot was his nephew, Gen. xiv. 12. So Jacob calls his uncle Laban brother, Gen. xxix. 12, 15. See Gen. xxxi. 36, 37, 46.

veniunt in radi

servilium, notionem non mutant; ut Judas et Thodas idem significant, &c. Boulduc. in Jud. ver. 1.

Thus the Scripture speaks of James in respect of his kindred or alliance.

Secondly, The Scripture speaks worthily of him on account of his office; not only because he was an Perkins in Gal. ii. apostle, but also of great honour and 9, with others. respect among the apostles, and in the church, he being, Acts xv., a principal member, some say president, in the council of Jerusalem, where he gave his advice in a great controversy, which was highly esteemed and followed: and on account of his

high esteem in the church, and usefulness, he, Cephas, and John, are called pillars, Gal. ii. 9; for although all the apostles were equal in degree of office, yet there were some of them endowed with more eminent gifts, and had greater esteem than the rest; and therefore we read of Paul's comparing himself with the chiefest of the apostles, 2 Cor. xi. 5; xii. 11, of which James was one. And whereas he is called "James the less," Mark xv. 40, it is conceived it was not to distinguish him from the other James the son of Zebedee, as if the Scripture hereby would denote our James less in respect Ista majoritas of age, calling to apostleship, or of et minoritas est stature, much less of esteem: but he inter patrem et may be called "the less" in comparison cobum Alphæum, of his father, who, as a learned man phai filium, Vid. thinks, was called James also, as well Boulduc. in ver. as Alphæus; which opinion of his he tur Epiphan. probably confirms in his Exposition pus, &c. upon this place.

filium; inter Ja

et Jacobum Al

1. Jud. VideanHieron. Egesip

[2] Ecclesiastical history speaks of him also as a most worthy person, both for the admirable and rare holiness of his life, and his constancy in professing Christ at his death.

TO UEL κάμπτειν

Kat αἰτεῖσθαι

apa raw. υπερβολήν της axeito dikaios,

Διὰ γέτοι την δικαιοσύνης αὐτή,

1. For his life: Hierom, in allusion to his name, James, or Jacob, calls him the supplanter of sin and vice of those times wherein he lived, Απεσκληκέναι preached, and wrote. And as many a ovata aŬTOU write most highly in commendation of dia, dia him, so particularly Eusebius, in his you νοῦντα τῷ θεω second book, chap. i. and xxii. For his holiness he was called the Just, one that was much in fasting and prayer for the pardon of that sinful people the Jews: with his frequent and long praying his knees were hard. The Jews were generally much convinced of his holiness; insomuch, as the enemies of Christ hoped, if they could procure him to deny Christ, that most of those who professed, would abandon the faith of 22. Christ.

aver a spaφείς ἔθηκε τὰ τόσ κατα, λέγων, Πα pakalé Kupie Θεέ Πατερ, ἀφές αὐτοῖς, οὐ γὰρ τι voi, &c.

&c. 'Enei kata

Euseb. lib. iì. c.

2. For his death: The scribes and Pharisees earnestly besought him to disclaim Christ openly; and to that end they set him upon the temple, that in the sight and audience of the people he might declare that Jesus was not Christ. But to admiration he professed his own faith in Christ, telling the multitudes that Christ was in heaven "at the right hand of God," and that in the clouds he should come again to judge the world; with which profession his enemies, being enraged, cast him down from the temple, and afterwards murdered him, he before his death praying that God would pardon their sin unto them. The same author, and also Josephus, lib. xx. Antiq. cap. 8, testifies that those who were of the wiser sort thought that this detestable fact was that which shortly after drew down the judgment of God, to the utter destruction of that bloody city Jerusalem, that had, among others, butchered so holy a man. Thus far Eusebius.

Though I do not relate this as canonical, yet neither do I look upon it as fabulous, it being by many famous and godly writers testified. And this for the first particular to be explained, Who this James was. (2.) Why Jude styles himself the brother of this James.

Of which I find two reasons given, both probable. 1. That he might difference himself from others of that name, especially Judas Iscariot; of which also the Scripture seems to take especial care. Hence he is spoken of with the addition of "not Iscariot," John xiv. 22, this traitor's name having grown detestable; on account of which it is generally con

of the child is an ornament to the father, that of the father to the child, the grace of the husband to the wife; the holiness of one brother beautifies another. It is true, every one must live by his own faith: it is a folly to boast of the holiness of our parents, and neglect it ourselves: if thy father be holy for himself and thee too, he shall go to heaven for himself and thee too. The grace of thy friends doth not beget grace in thee, but beautify it. The saints have oil of grace little enough for their own lamps; and where holiness is abhorred by the child, that of the parent is but an addition to the child's shame and punishment, in being so unlike him spiritually, whom he resembles naturally. It was but a poor privilege for the Jews to have Abraham for their natural, and the devil for their spiritual father: but when a child, a brother, a wife, love and labour for that grace which those of near relation have attained, it is their honour and ornament, that they who are near them are nearer to God. Indeed, it is often seen that they who have most spiritual loveliness have least love from us. The godly want not beauty, but carnal friends want eyes. A blind man is unmeet to judge | of colours: how possible is it to entertain angels, and not to know it! The love of grace in another requires more than nature in oneself. Blood is thicker (we say) than water; and truly the blood of Christ beautifying any of our friends and children, should make us prefer them before those, between whom and us there is only a watery relation of nature. But how great a blemish often doth the gracelessness, the unholiness of a parent, a husband, a brother, bring upon those who are nearly related to them! It is a frequent question that was propounded by Saul to Abner, Whose son is this stripling? 1 Sam. xvii. 56. How disgraceful is such an answer as this; The son of drunkard, a murderer, an oppressor, a traitor, a whoremaster! Love to our friends, our posterity, &c., as well as to ourselves, should make us love grace.

Thus much for the third and last particular in the description of the author of this Epistle, "The brother of James;" and so for the first part of the title of the Epistle, the description of the penman of it. Hence follows,

II. A description of those persons to whom he wrote; which persons are described from a threefold privilege :

They are sanctified by God the Father, preserved in Jesus Christ, and called.

1. The first branch of this description is, They are sanctified by God the Father; wherein I consider two particulars: The sort or kind of the privilege bestowed upon them, viz. sanctification, "To them that are sanctified." The author thereof, or by whom it was bestowed, "By God the Father.""

(1.) Of the kind of privilege, sanctification. Of which I shall speak by way of explication, and ob

servation.

[1] Of the privilege, sanctification, by way of exposition. youèvoic, " To them that are sanctified." Beza speaks of two copies that read it yarnuevo and from thence the Vulgate renders it Dilectis, To them that are beloved of God the Father; which manner of speech, as Beza well remarks, is unusual in Scripture, which speaks of us being for and in Christ beloved of the Father. And Estius, though a papist, acknowledges that the former reading, sanctified, is not only more pure, but more suitable to the scope and drift of the apostle, who by calling them sanctified, would deter them from, and make them take heed of, those unholy and impure seducers against whom he was now about to write.

The word here used by the apostle admits of and

signifies in Scripture several kinds of sanctification: as,

1. Sanctification by way of destination or separation. To this purpose the Greeks use the word apopi¿w, i. e. when things are separated to a holy use: so the Lord sanctified the sabbath day, by separating it from other days, and appointing it for the duties of his own service. Thus also the tabernacle, Exod. xxix. 44, the temple, I Kings ix. 3; 2 Chron. vii. 16; the first-born, were sanctified. God commands Moses to sanctify all the first-born, Exod. xiii. 2; which he explains, ver. 12, "Thou shalt set apart unto the Lord all that openeth the matrix."

2. There is a sanctification by way of celebration, acknowledging, manifestation, declaration of the goodness of a thing: thus the creature sanctifies the name of the Creator, "They shall sanctify my name, and sanctify the Holy One of Jacob," Isa. xxix. 23. 3. Sanctification by way of fruition, comfortable use, and blessed enjoyment of the gifts of God: so, "The unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife," 1 Cor. vii. 14; and, Every creature of God is sanctified, 1 Tim. iv. 5.

4. Sanctification by way of application; to apply a thing to such a holy use as God appointed: so we sanctify the sabbath, Exod. xx. 8, i. e. employ it to the holy use for which God ordained it.

5. By exhibition, introduction, or bestowing actual holiness; by putting holiness really and properly into one. This the Creator only can do to his creature: this God doth by his Spirit, which is called the Holy Ghost, and the Spirit of sanctification, 2 Thess. ii. 13. And thus man particularly is sanctified or made holy three ways:

(1.) Of not holy negatively: and so Christ as he was man was sanctified; for there was a time whenas Christ had not this holiness in his human nature, when his human nature was not.

(2.) Of not holy privately: and so man that had lost totally his holiness, is made holy by regeneration or effectual vocation.

:

(3.) Of less holy and so God's children are sanctified, by being enabled to the exercise of an actual mortifying of sin, and living in holiness, with proceeding in both.

The sanctification here spoken of presupposes the second, afterward in the word "called" more particularly to be handled; and intends the third, namely, the actual exercise of the abolition of our natural corruption, and the renovation of God's image in us, begun in grace here, and perfected in glory hereafter.

One

So that this sanctification stands in an actual putting off of corrupt qualities; a putting on the new and sanctified. A burial; a resurrection. A mortification of the old; a vivification of the new man. thing is destroyed and pulled down; another set up. A taking away of what is redundant; an addition of what is wanting. The killing power of the cross; the quickening power of the resurrection of Christ, Eph. iv. 22-24; Col. iii. 9, 10; Gal. ii. 20; v. 24; Rom. vi. 5, 8; Gal. vi. 14; Col. iii. 5; Eph. ii. 1.

1. Mortification of the old man is the first part of sanctification, whereby the strength, power, and tyranny of sin is weakened, and more and more abolished: like John Baptist, it decreases; like old folks in a house, who are going out of the world, and crowded out, as it were, by the younger, the heirs. The living of the old man is only as a clog and eye

sore to the new.

This work of mortification stands principally in these three acts, or degrees of acting: An act of discerning; detesting; destroying sin, the soul's enemy. Knowing causeth hatred; and hatred puts us upon seeking the destruction of an enemy.

(1.) An act of discerning. Sin may hurt us when we know it not; but we do not hate it unless we know it. Sin always had deformity, but we had not always eyes to see it. It was Leah that lay by Jacob all night, but he discerned her not till the morning. Sin is now discovered as it is, not as it is coloured over by Satan. Sin is uncomely only to a renewed understanding. Nature never sets up a light to discover its own deformities. Of others it is often said, They know not what they do: in understanding they are children, nay, brutes; they see with Satan's spectacles. But a renewed mind discerns between things that differ, looks upon the old bosom favourite as a traitor: there are new apprehensions of the old man. The apostle not without an emphasis speaks of those things whereof we are now ashamed; now, not formerly: nay, heretofore sin was gloried in; but now the soul sees it is not only unsafe, and its own death, but unsuitable, and was the death of Christ. It was striking at me, saith a gracious heart, but Christ stepped between me and the blow. Herein stands sin's great deformity, as that of drunkenness in a man's wounds. (2.) Detestation. The eye increases loathing. It cannot meet this ugly guest in any corner of the house, but the heart rises against it: this hatred of evil, Psal. xcvii. 10, is more than of hell; it is a killing look that the soul casts upon every corruption. He that hateth his brother is a man-slayer; he that hateth his lust is a sin-slayer: not he that hateth the sins or practices of his brother, but the person of his brother; so, not he that hateth the effects and fruits of sin, but the nature of sin; not he that hateth sin for hell, but as hell. Every evil, by how much the nearer it is, by so much the more it is hated. An evil, as it is so to our estate, names, children, wife, life, soul, as impendent, adjacent, incumbent, inherent, admits of several degrees of hatred: sin is an inward, a soul foe. Love turned into hatred becomes most bitter: brethren's divisions are hardest to reconcile : the soul's old love is turned into new hatred; the very ground sin treads upon is hated. There is a kind of hatred of oneself for sin; every act that sin hath a hand in is hated, our very duties for sin's intermixing with them; and we are angry with ourselves that we can hate it no more.

(3.) This hatred puts forth itself in labouring the destruction of sin. Love cannot be hid, neither can this hatred. The soul seeks the death of sin by these ways and helps.

[1.] By lamentation to the Lord, when we feel its strength with the apostle, "O wretched man that I am!" was there ever a soul so sin-pestered! Ah, woe is me, Lord, that I am compelled to be chained to this block! Never did a slave in Egypt or Turkey so sigh under bondage, as a mortifying soul does under corruption. The sorrows of others are outward, shallow, in the eye, the look; but these are in the bottom of the soul, deep sorrows. It is true, a man may give a louder cry at the drawing of a tooth, than ever he did pining under the deepest consumption; but yet the consumption, which is the harbinger of death, afflicts him much more; and though outward worldly grief, as for the death of a child, &c., may be more intense and expressive, yet grief for sin is more deep, close, sticking, oppressive to the soul, than all other sorrows: the soul of a saint, like a sword, may be melted, when the outward man, the scabbard, is whole.

[2] The soul of a sin-subduer fights against sin with the cross of Christ, and makes the death of Christ the death of sin; (1.) By depending on his death as the meritorious cause of sin's subduing, of sanctification and cleansing, Eph. v. 25, 26. Christ's purifying us being upon the condition of his suffering, and so it urges God thus, Lord, hath not Christ

laid down the price of the purchase? 1 Cor. vi. 20; why then is Satan in possession? Is Satan bought out? Lord, let him be cast out. (2.) By taking a pattern from the death of Christ for the killing of sin, we being planted into the similitude of his death, Rom. vi. 5, sin itself hanging upon the cross, as it were, when Christ died. Oh (saith a gracious heart) that my corruptions may drink vinegar, that they may be pierced, and nailed, and never come down alive, but though they die lingeringly, yet certainly! Oh that I might see their hands, feet, side, and every limb of the body of death bored, the head bowing, and the whole laid in the grave; the darkness, error, and vanity of the understanding, the sinful quietness and unquietness of my conscience, the rebellion of my will, the disorder of my affections! (3.) And especially the soul makes use of the death of Christ as a motive or inducement to put it upon sin-killing. Ah, my sin is the knife (saith the soul) that is coloured with my Redeemer's blood. Ah, it pointed every thorn on his head, and nail in his hands and feet. Lord, art thou a friend to Christ, and shall sin that killed him live? Thus a sin-mortifying heart brings sin near to a dead Christ, whom faith beholds bleeding afresh upon the approach of sin; and therefore it lays the death of Christ to the charge of sin. The cross of Christ is sin's terror, the soul's armour. The blood of Christ is old sures-be (as holy Bradford was wont to say) to kill sin. As he died for sin, so must we to it; as his flesh was dead, so must ours be. "Our old man is crucified with him," Rom. vi. 6. It is not a pope's hallowing a cross that can do Mr. D. Rogers it, but the power of Christ by a pro- Pr. Cat. mise, which blesses this cross to mortification.

[3.] The soul labours to kill sin by fruitful enjoyment of ordinances. It never goes to pray, but it desires sin may have some wound, and points by prayer (like the sick child) to the place where it is most pained. How doth it bemoan itself with Ephraim, and pour forth the blood of sin at the eyes! It thus also improves baptism; it looks upon it as a seal to God's promise, that sin shall die; we being buried with Christ in baptism, that the Egyptians shall be drowned in the sea. It never hears a sermon, but (as Joab dealt with Uriah) it labours to set its strongest corruption in the forefront of the battle, that when Christ shoots his arrows, and draws his sword in the preaching of the word, sin may be hit. An unsanctified person is angry with such preaching, and cannot endure that the wind of a sermon should blow upon a lust.

[4.] By a right improving all administrations of providence. If God send any affliction, the sanctified soul concludes that some corruption must go to the lions. If there arise any storms, presently it inquires for Jonah, and labours to cast him overboard. If God snatches away comforts, (as Joseph fled from his mistress,) presently a sin-mortifying heart saith, Lord, thou art righteous, my unclean heart was prone to be in love with them more than with Christ, my true Husband. If God at any time hedge up her way with thorns, she reflects upon her own gadding after her impure lovers. If her two eyes, profits, pleasures, be put out and removed, a sin-mortifier will desire to pull down the house upon the Philistines, and to bear every chastisement cheerfully, even death itself, that sin may but die too.

[5.] By consideration of the sweetness of spiritual life. Life is sweet; and therefore what cost are men at to be rid of diseases, to drive an enemy out of the country! The soul thinks how happy it should be, could it walk with God, and be upright, and enjoy Christ, be rid of a tyrant, and be governed by the laws of a Liege, the Lord Jesus. How heavy is Sa