Self-feeking is fell-Wing : Pelfdenying oto fafety. 299 but to fin and death ? what work bath it made over all the earth ? Do we not fee a whole world of people, not one-ex- cepted, wounded, and Hain, and brought into fo low and fad a ftate, and all this by then/Oyes I and yet {hall we go on in felflfhnefs Bill ? Of all the enemies you have in theworld, pray God to fiveyou from your felves ? fcape your felves and you fcape all You will never mifcarry by any other hands. The Devil and wicked men will do their worit ; but without you they can do nothing. Never will you come to hell ifyou run not your felves thither : Never will you be Phut out of Hea- ven if you run not from it by your own negleci, and prefer not the profperityof the world before i t. And therefore you fee that we are nowhere moreunfafe then in our own hands. Gods Will is good, and would make a good choice for us : but our wils are bad, and will make a bad choice for them- felves. God is unchangable, and the fame for ever ; but we aregiddy and uncertain, and if we are in a good mind to day, are in danger of being in a bad to morrow. God is able to fecure us againft all the fubtilty, and rage and power of earth or hell : but we are filly impotent worms, and unable to defend our felves, or to accomplifh our own defires. So that our fafely confifteth in forfaking our felves and cleaving to the Lord. The more of your happinefs lieth on your own bands, thegreater is your danger : and the more of it is on the handsof God, the greater isyour fafety. Fly therefore from your felves to God, as you would fly out of a torn or finking veffel into the ftrongeft fhip ; or as you would hafte away from a tottering houfe that is ready to fall upon your heads : fo hafte away from filf to God. Study his Love , and fall in Love with him ; and that will be more gainful to you, then fiudying and carnally Loving your felves. Forget your felves, and remember him ; and he will remember you to your greater advantage then if you had remembred your felves. When any intereft of your Own , rifeth up againft the Interell or will of God, care not then for your felves or for your own; fet as light by it as if it were nothing worth ; and fay as the three witneffes ofGod in Dan. 3.16,17. when they were ready tobe cart into a flaming furnace [We are not careful to an.frer thee in Q24 z this
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