Caryl - Houston-Packer Collection BS1415 .C37 v2

Chap. 5 he,by all thofe confiderations ofmynatural conftitution, I cannot bring my heart tobe fo fenfible of my frailty, as I ought to be ; therefore he turnes himfelf to God, Lord make no to know this thing.Here is our wifdom,when we leek to God to fpiritualize,na- total confiderations, andmake them etfe&ual for the attaining of this wifdom,the knowing of our end,and the meafure ofour days. But is it not force ignorance of our duty to petition for the knowledge_of our end ? May we delire to know what God hath no where promiled to reveal ? To petition for the literal know- `ledge of our end, that is, what year or day, our lives (hall end, is a linful curiolty, and a prefumptuous intrution into the fecret will of God: But to petition fora ípiritual knowledge ofour end, that is, how we may end well, any day in the year, or any hour of the day, is a holy duty, and an humble fubmiflion of our felves to the revealed will of God. Thus to know our end, how foon feafing (as one Tran latcs) ¡hurt lived and brittle ware we be ; Thus to know, how defedive we are (as the Greek renders it) or what we lack, namely to the end of our dayes, is above the inflruecionof any creature. We may preach,and you hear of death as long as you and we live, and yet not know the frailty of our lives, till God makes us know it ; therefore (faith he)Lord make me toknowhowfrail I ant : none could teach him this leffon but God himfelf The fame holy delires are breathed out, Pfal. 9o. 12. So teach us tonumber our dayes, that we may apply our hearts unto wifdem ; as if Mores had laid ; Lord I have been numbring my dayes my Pelf, and telling over my life, I can tell no further cannot three or four fcore, and heart unto wildome ; though e need but littlerArithI tló ápply my metick, to number our dayes, but weneed a great deal of grace to number them. A child may be wile enough to number the dayes of anold man, and yet that old man a child, ín numbring his own dayes, that is, not able to number his own dayes fo, as to applyhis heart to wildome. To number them fo, is a very fpe.. cial point of wildome ; the true Chriifian PlóilJóphy : perfeï;tly to Metat:omor meditate on death is the perfebtion of lift. And it is therefore tHVitae l or- our wildome to die well, becaufe we can die but once ; A man fefai GCg,, had need do that wifely which he can do no more. An errour ita tktoral, r3, death, is like anerrour in Warr,you 'cannot commit it twice.We S hraa Philo. have mole realon to look to it, not to erreat all, where it is nb,ttfP , Bcra.,. An Expofition upon the beekpf J O B. Vere 2i. 165.

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