III. 1, 2. cxii. 1. SERM. fore his complete fruition of it. The want of all other petty things no more can maim the integrity of his felicity, than cutting the hair, or paring the nails, do mutilate a man: all other things are but fuperfluities or excrescences in regard to the conftitution of happiness. Whatever happeneth, that will affuredly be true, which Pf. cxxviii. is so much inculcated in holy Scripture, Bleffed is every one that feareth the Lord, that walketh in his ways; happy Shall he be, and it shall be well with him. Piety is indeed fraught with beatitudes, every part thereof yieldeth peculiar blessedness. To the love of God, to charity toward our neighbour, to purity of heart, to meeknefs, to humility, to patience, to mercifulness, to peaceableness, beatitude is afcribed by our Lord, the great Judge and Difpenfer of it. Each religious performance hath happy fruits growing from it, and blissful rewards affigned thereto. All pious difpofitions are fountains of pleasant ftreams, which by their confluence do make up a full fea of felicity. Matt. v. IV. It is a peculiar advantage of piety, that it furnifheth employment fit for us, worthy of us, hugely grateful, and highly beneficial to us. Man is a very busy and active creature, which cannot live and do nothing, whofe thoughts are in restless motion, whofe defires are ever stretching at fomewhat, who perpetually will be working either good or evil to himself: wherefore greatly profitable must that thing be, which determineth him to act well, to spend his care and pain on that which is truly advantageous to him; and that is religion only. It alone fasteneth our thoughts, affections, and endeavours, upon occupations worthy the dignity of our nature, fuiting the excellency of our natural capacities and endowments,, tending to the perfection and advancement of our reason, to the enriching and ennobling of our fouls. Secluding that, we have nothing in the world to ftudy, to affect, to pursue, not very mean and below us, not very bafe and misbecoming us, as men of reafon and judgment. What have we to do but to eat and drink, like horses or like swine; but to sport and play, like children or apes; but III. to bicker and scuffle about trifles and impertinences, like SERM. ideots? what, but to scrape or scramble for useless pelf; to hunt after empty fhows and fhadows of honour, or the vain fancies and dreams of men? what, but to wallow or bask in fordid pleasures, the which foon degenerate into remorfe and bitterness? To which fort of employments were a man confined, what a pitiful thing would he be, and how inconfiderable were his life! Were a man defigned only, like a fly, to buz about here for a time, fucking in the air, and licking the dew, then foon to vanifh back into nothing, or to be transformed into worms; how forry and defpicable a thing were he? And fuch without religion we should be. But it fupplieth us with business of a moft worthy nature and lofty importance; it fetteth us upon doing things great and noble as can be; it engageth us to free our minds from all fond conceits, and cleanse our hearts from all corrupt affections; to curb our brutish appetites, to tame our wild paffions, to correct our perverse inclinations, to conform the difpofitions of our foul and the actions of our life to the eternal laws of righteousness and goodness: it putteth us upon the imitation of God, and aiming at the resemblance of his perfections; upon obtaining a friendship and maintaining a correspondence with the High and Holy One; upon fitting our minds for converfation and fociety with the wifeft and pureft fpirits above; upon providing for an immortal ftate, upon the acquist of joy and glory everlafting. It employeth us in the divineft actions, of promoting virtue, of performing beneficence, of ferving the public, and doing good to all: the being exercised in which things doth indeed render a man highly confiderable, and his life excellently valuable. men. It is an employment most proper to us as reasonable For what more proper entertainments can our mind have, than to be purifying and beautifying itself, to be keeping itself and its fubordinate faculties in order, to be attending upon the management of thoughts, of paffions, of words, of actions depending upon its governance? SERM. It is an employment most beneficial to us: in pursuing which we greatly better ourselves, and improve our condition; we benefit and oblige others; we procure found reputation and steady friendships; we decline many irkIfa. Iv. 2. some mischiefs and annoyances; we do not, like those in the Prophet, spend our labour for that which fatisfieth not, nor Spend our money for that which is not bread: for both temporal prosperity and eternal felicity are the wages of the labour which we take herein. It is an employment most constant, never allowing sloth or liftleffness to creep in, inceffantly bufying all our faculties with earnest contention; according to that profefActs xxiv. fion of St. Paul, declaring the nature thereof, Herein always do I exercife myself, to have a confcience void of offence toward God and toward man. Whence it is called a fight, and a race, implying the continual earneftness of attention and activity, which is to be spent thereon. 16. 2 It is withal a fweet and grateful business: for it is a Pfal. cxii. 1. pious man's character, that he delighteth greatly in God's 1 John v. 3. commandments; that the commandments are not grievous John iv. 34. to him; that it is his meat and drink to do God's will; that Pfal. cxix. God's words (or precepts) are sweeter than honey to his Prov. iii. 17. tafte; that the ways of religious wifdom are ways of plea} 103. fantnefs, and all her paths are peace. Whereas all other employments are wearifome, and foon become loathfome: this, the farther we proceed in it, the more pleafant and fatisfactory it groweth 8. There is perpetual matter of victory over bad inclinations peftering us with in, and ftrong temptations affailing us without: which to combat hath much delight; to mafter, breedeth unexpreffible content. The fenfe alfo of God's love, the influences of his grace and comfort communicated in the performances of devotion and all duty, the fatisfaction of good conscience, the affured hope of reward, the foretastes of future blifs, do feafon and fweeten all the labours taken, and all the difficulties undergone therein. Non poteft cuiquam femper idem placere, nifi rectum. Sen. 20. III. In fine, the bare light of nature hath difcerned, that SERM. were it not for fuch matters as these to spend a man's care and pains upon, this would be a lamentable world to live in. There was, for inftance, an emperor great and mighty as ever did wield fceptre upon earth, whofe excellent virtue, coupled with wifdom, (inferior, perhaps, to none that any man ever without special inspiration hath been endowed with,) did qualify him with most advantage to examine and rightly to judge of things here; who, notwithstanding all the conveniences which his royal eftate and well settled profperity might afford, (the which furely he had fully tasted and tried,) did yet thus exprefs his thoughts: Τί μοι ζῆν ἐν κόσμῳ κενῷ θεῶν, ἢ προνοίας κενῷ ; M. Ant. ii. What doth it concern me to live in a world void of God, or void of Providence? To govern the greatest empire that ever was, in the deepest calm; to enjoy the largest affluences of wealth, of splendour, of respect, of pleasure; to be loved, to be dreaded, to be ferved, to be adored by fo many nations; to have the whole civil world obfequious to his will and nod; all these things feemed vain and idle, not worthy of a man's regard, affection, or choice, in cafe there were no God to worship, no providence to observe, no piety to be exercised. So little worth the while common fenfe hath adjudged it to live without religion. 11. vi. 10. jucunda V. It is a confiderable benefit of piety, that it affordeth the best friendships and fweeteft fociety. Man is framed Nullius bofor fociety, and cannot live well without it: many of his ni fine focio faculties would be ufelefs, many of his appetites would poffeffio eft. reft unfatisfied in folitude. To have a friend wife and Sen. Ep. 6. able, honeft and good, unto whom upon all occafions we ut aliarum may have recourfe for advice, for affiftance, for confola- rerum notion, is a great convenience of life: and this benefit we dulcedo eft, owe to religion, which supplieth us with various friend- Sen. Ep. 9. ships of the best kind, most beneficial and most sweet unto us. It maketh God our friend, a friend infinitely better than all friends, moft affectionate and kind, moft faithful and fure, most able, moft willing, and ever moft ready to per bis innata fic amicitiæ. 15. xxxiii. 19. xxxvii. 28. SERM. form all friendly offices, to yield advice in all our doubts, III. fuccour in all our needs, comfort in all our troubles, faProv. xii. 2. tisfaction to all our defires. Unto him it miniftereth a Pfal. xxxiv. free addrefs upon all occafions; with him it alloweth us 18. cxlv. continually a moft fweet and pleasant intercourfe. The pious man hath always the all-wife God to counsel him, Job xxxvi. to guide his actions and order his steps; he hath the Almighty to protect, fupport, and relieve him; he hath the immenfe Goodness to commiferate and comfort him; unto him he is not only encouraged, but obliged to refort in need: upon him he may, he ought to discharge all his cares and burdens. 7. It confequently doth engage all creatures in the world to be our friends, or inftruments of good to us, according to their several capacities, by the direction and disposal of God. All the fervants of our great Friend will, in comJob v. 23. pliance to him, be ferviceable to us, Thou shalt be in league with the ftones of the field, and the beasts of the field shall be at peace with thee: fo Job's friend promiseth him upon condition of piety. And God himself confirmeth that proHof. ii. 18. mife; In that day, faith he in the Prophet, will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground. Ifa. xliii. 2. And again, When thou paffeft through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkeft through the fire, thou shalt not be Pf. cxxi. 6. burnt ; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee. And, The fun fhall not fmite thee by day, nor the moon by night. Pf. xci. 13. Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder, the young lion Mark xvi. and the dragon fhalt thou trample under foot. They shall take up fcorpions; and if they drink any deadly thing, it xxviii. 12. Shall not hurt them: (so our Lord promised to his Difciples.) Not only the heavens fhall difpenfe their kindly influences, and the earth yield her plentiful stores, and all the elements discharge their natural and ordinary good offices; nor only the tame and fociable creatures shall upon this condition faithfully serve us; but even the most wild, most fierce, moft ravenous, most venomous creatures fhall, if there be need, prove friendly and helpful, or at 18. Deut. |