484 The, Lo» of Faith. k God of Nature ; yea and agztntt for Lord your Redeemer; to think that the wife Almighty God, did make fo noble a thing as a foul, and place it in fo curious an engine as the body, where fpirits, and blood, andheart, and lungs, arc never idle, but in confiant motion; and that he hath appointed us fo glo- rious a retinueas aforefaid, and all this to donothing with, or worfc than nothing? To f cep, and rife, and drefs your Cclves, and talk, and eat, and drink ; to tell men only that you are not dead, left they fhould miflake, and bury you alive ? what is it but topet a (corn on your Creator and Rcdeemer,to live as if he had created and redeemed you for no better and 'nobler ends than theft ? 4. You do as it were prayfor death, cr provoke God to take awayyour lives. For if they be good for nothing clfc but idle- nefs, and beaftly pleafures,why fhould you expel tohave them continued ? or at leafl, why fhould he not tile you as N, bucbad- nezzar, and take away your realen, and turnyou into beafis, if the life and pieafure of a beat} be all that you Mire ? Could not you cat, and drink, and f cep, and play, without an intel- lcQual foul ? Cannot the birds make their nets, and breed, and feed their young, and fit and fing, without an intcllec;}ual nature ? Cannot a twine have his cafe, and meat, and tuft, without rcafon ? what fbould you do with reafon for fuch cafes? 5. Touflier afiupidferflfr heart, that can live idly, and have fo much to do; and have fomany fpurrs to rouleyou up : To live continually in the fight of God, tohave a foul fo ignorant, fo unbelieving, founholy, fo unfurnifhed of faith and love, fo unready for death, fo uncertain of falvasion : nay in fuch ap- parent danger ofdamnation, and tobe (till uncertain ofliving one day or hour longer ; and yet to live idly in fuch a cafe, as if all were wcll,and your work were donc,and you had no more to fear or care for : Owhat a mad, what adcad,what a fottith kind offoul is this ! to fee the graves before your eyes; to fee your neighbours carryed thither ; to feel the tokens of morta- lity daily in yourCalves ; tobe called cn and warned to pre- pare; and yet under this to live as ifyou had nothing to do, but to (hew your film in theneatcft drefs, and as a Peacock, to fprcad your plutncafor your fclvcs and others to lookupon,or to
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