on Heb. x;. /8. 299 rive honefly ; We may, and do fail and come Mort, as to the length we íhould be at, but it is befide our pur- pore ; our defire, defign and endeavour is faithfully to approve ourfelves to God in all things. Obferve, I. here, Tuat an honeft and good life or walk, and an honeft and good Confcience go together : There is always a fuitablenefs betwixt the teftimony of a perfon's Confcience within, and the ordering of his walk and con - verfation without ; or,thus, As a man's life is, ío is his Confcience : If the life and converfation be honeft, then ä man may have, and hath, an honeft and good Confci- ence; but if his life and converfátion be untender, difho- nett, profane and loofe, he cannot poffibly have a good Confcience, as the apoftle plainly affirms, Tit. I. 15. And the reafon of it is clear, becaufe Confcience's well -roun- ded reftimony muff be according to truth, and (peak out the thing as indeed it is : And, as, when the the thing is ill and wrong, it cannot leek peace and good ; fo, when the thing is right, it will not fpeak ill. For ufe of it, do not feparate there things which God hath conjoined ; think never to have a good Confcience, when ye have not an honeft converfation : It may be found, without the accomplifhment of a very diligent fearch, that many do prefumptuoufly and groundlefly (peak and boaft of a good Confcience, when there is no- thing in their converfation that looks like it, let be war- rants it : But, if ye would certainly know the companion of a good Confcience, take it from Paul, it is even a living honefily. I would only here have you to take this caveat in the by : When we fay, That a good Confcience and an bonefl life or walk go together, we would not have you to look to the connexion of there two, fo feverely and ri- gidly, as if there could not be a good Confcience, but where there is an honeft walk in its perfe ±ion, without all flips or failings ; for we are now fpeakng of a deli- berate, fixed and fettled purpofe, and fincere endeavour to live and walk honeffly; which may confift with flips and failings of infirmity : This Willingnefs to live boneft- ly cm never be feparate from a good Confcience. Neither would we have you thinking, when a Chriftian mifcar -- lies in his converfatio; that be c never recover a good.
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