FIFE OF FAITH. 429 licity. The sensual part, with the sensual inclination communi- cated to the corruptedmind and will, doth by carnal reasonings, and by carnal means, pursue and embrace a present, fading, car- nal interest ; and therefore it findeth and attaineth no more. " The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh ; and these are contrary the one to the other;" Oal. v. 17: " They that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that areafter the. Spirit, the things of the Spirit. To be carnally minded is death ; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace; because the carnal mind is enmity against God ; for it is not sub- ject to the law of God, neither indeed eau be. So, then, they that are in the flesh cannot please God. If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, the same is none of his. If we live after the flesh, we shall die ; but if by the Spirit we mortify the deeds of the body, we shall live;" Rom. viii. 5-14. "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. He that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption ; but he that soweth to the Spir- it shall of the Spirit reap everlasting life." As a man is, so he loveth and desireth; as he desireth, he seeketh, and as he seek- eth, he findeth and possesseth. If you know which world, what riches a man prefers, intends, and liveth for, you may know which world is his inheritance, and whither he is going as to his perpet- ual abode. Reason enableth a man to know and seek more than he seeth; and faith informeth and adtranceth reason to know that by the means of supernatural revelation, that by no other means is fully known. To seek and hope for no better than we know, and. to know no more than is objectively revealed, (while we hinder not the revelation,) is the blameless imperfection of a creature that bath limited faculties and capacities: To know what is best, and yet to chooseand seek an inferior, inconsistent good, and to refuse and neglect the best, when it is discerned, is the course of such as have but a superficial opinion ofthe good refused, or a knowledge not awakened to speak so loudly as may be effectual for choice : and whose sensuality mastereth their wills and ,reason, and leads them backward : and those that know not because they would not know, or hear not because they would not hear, are under that same dominion of the flesh, which it an enemy to all knowledge, that is, an enemy tóits delights and interest. To profess to know good, and yet refuse it, and to profess to know evil, and yet to choose it, and this predominantly and in the main, is the descrip- tion of a self-condemningñypocrite, And if malignity and oppo- sition of the truth professed be added to the hypocrisy, it comes up to that pharisaical blindness and obdurateness which prepareth men for the remediless sin.
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