540 HOW TO DO GOOD TO MANY. Yet man doth not good as the sun shineth, by a full bent of nat- ural necessitation, else the world would not be as it is ; but as a free, undetermined agent, which bath need to be commanded by a law, and stirred up bymanifold motives and exhortations ; such as the Holy Ghost here useth in the text. Where, 1. Doing good is the substance of the duty. 2. Men are the objects. 3. To all men is the extent. 4. Especially to them of the household of faith is the direction of precedency. 5. And while we have opportunity is the season, including a mo- tive to make haste. So large and excellent a theme would re- quire more than my allotted time to handle it fully; therefore I shall now confine myself to the duty extended " Do good to all men." Doct. To do good to all men, is all men's duty, to which every Christian especially must apply himself. All men should do it: true Christians can do it, through grace, and must do it, and will do it. A good man is a common good ; Christ's Spirit in them is not a dead or idle principle. It makes them in their several nieasures the salt of the earth, and the lights of the world ; they are fruitful branches of the true vine. Every grace tendeth to well doing, and to the good of the whole body, for which each single member is made. Even hypocrites,' as wooden legs, are serviceable to the body ; but every living member much more, except some diseased ones, who may be more trouble- some and dangerous than the wooden leg. 'It is a sign he is a branch cut off and withered, who careth little for any but himself. The malignant diabolist hateth the true and spiritual good; the ignorant know not good from evil the erroneous take evil for good, and falsehood for truth ; the slothful hypocritewisheth muchgood, but doth but little ; the formal, ceremonious hypocrite extols the name and image of goodness ; the worldly hypocrite will do good if he can do it cheaply, without any loss or suffering to his flesh.; the libertine hypocrite pleadeth Christ's merits against the neces- sity of doing good, and looketh to be saved because Christ is good, though he be barren and ungodly; and some ignorant teachers have taught them to say, when they can fmd no true faith, repent- ance, holiness, or obedience in themselves, that it is enough to be- lieve that Christ believed and repented for them, and washoly and obedient for them. He was, indeed, holy and obedient for peni- tent believers; not to make holiness and obedience unnecessary, to them, but to make then sincerely holy and obedient to himself, and to excuse them from the necessity of that perfect holiness and obedience here, which is necessary to those that will be justified by the law of words, or innocency. Thus all sorts of bad men have their oppositions to doing good ; but to the sincere Christian
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