290 THE ABSOLUTE DOMINION love, and in the promised glory, which will easily pay for all your losses. 2. And that upon a deliberate comparing him with the pleasures of this world, you do resolvedly renounce them, and dedicate your- selves to him. 3. And especially that you search carefully lest any reserve should lurk in your hearts, and you should not deliver up your- selves to him absolutely, for life and death, for better and worse, but should still retain some hopes of an earthly felicity, and not take the unseen felicity foryour portion. " It is the lot of the wick- ed to have their portion in this life Psalmxvii. 14. And let . me here warn you of one delusion, by which many thousands have perished, and cheated themselves out of their everlasting hopes. They think that it is only some grosser disgraceful sins, as swear- ing, drunkenness, whoredom, injustice, &c., that will prove men's perdition, and because they are not guilty of these, theyare secure, when, as it is the predominancy of the interest of the flesh against the interest of God in their hearts anda lives, that is the certain evidence of a state of damnation, which way soever it be that this is expressed. Manya civil gentleman bath his heart more addict- ed to his worldly interest, and less to God,than some whoremongers and drunkards. , If you live with, good reputation for civility, yea, for extraordinary ingenuity, yea, for religious zeal, and no disgrace- ful vice is perceived in your ,lives, yet ifyour hearts be on these things which you possess, and you love your present enjoyments better than God, and the glory that he bath promised, your case is as dangerous as the publicans' and harlots. You may spend your days in better reputation, but you will end them in as certain desolation as they. The question is only whether God have your hearts and lives, and not whether you denied them to him with a plausible civility. Nay, it is merely for their carnal selves to pre- serve their reputation, that some men do forbear those grosser crimes, when yet God bath as little of them as of the more visible profane. "'Love not the world, nor the things that are in the world. Ifany man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him ;" 1 John ii. 15. 2. If you are wholly God's, live wholly to him ; at least do not stint him, and grudge him your service. It is grown the com- mon conceit of the world, that a life of absolute dedication to God is more ado than needs. ' What needs all this ado ?' say they. ' Cannot you be saved with less ado than this ?' I will now demand of these men but an answer to these féw sober. questions 1. Do; you fear giving more to God than his due ? Is not all his own? And how can you give him more than all?
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