What Selfiihnejs andSelf-denyal are at the Root. quainted with the particular way by which he mull be delivered he is not fatisfied : for he cannot truft God, fo well as himfelf, Js not this the cafe ofall you that are carnal ? Would you not think your cafe much fafer and better if it were in your own hands, then you do now it is in Gods .1 What would you not give , that you were but as able to give cafe, and health and wealth, and honour, and life to your (elves, as God is ! Hence it is that you fo anxioufly contrive for your felves, and trouble your felves with neeedlefs cares , becaufe you dare not truft God, but think youare fain to your own care and finding. You think your felves quite undone when you have nothing left you but God and his Promife to truft upon and when you lee nothing in your felves and the creature to fupport you. And thus are all men: ain from God to themfilvet. But Sanftification teacheth men that fe/f-detipil which ac- cording to its meafure,doth heal them of this difeafe. Though tome aetual knowledgeof good and evil , and fome care of our natural felves be now become a necefrary duty, as 'lifted to our lapfed flate, which yet had never been but through fin : Yet that which is finfpd, felf.denyal doth defiroy. It theweth man that he is every way infufEcient for himfelf, and that he is not the fountain of his own felicity : nor Both it be- long to him , but to God, to preferve him and fecure his welfare. He feeth what.a folly it is to depart from the tuition ofhis Heavenly Father, and as the Prodigal Son to defire to havehis portion in his own hands. Experience tell him with fmart and forrow that he bath not been fo good a preferver of himfelf, nor ufed himfelf fo well as to defire to be in the fame hands any longer that have fo abufed him : Yea heknoweth that it was God that indeed preferved him, while he was over Soli. thous about it himfelf, and would needs have the managing of his own affairs. He nowbelieves that he can be nowhere fafe but in the hands of God : and no way fufficiently provided for bit by his wifdom, love and power : Nor dare he truft hirofelf hereafter with himfelfor any creature He finds that he bath turmoiled and difIratied his mind by undertaking the ma. nagement of his own prefervation : and that hey bath brought fell. into a wildernefs , and loft himfalf and ravelled his own affairs
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