324 OF SPIRITUAL MINDEDNESS. ful intimations of his displeasure ! the Lord help us to mind it, lest he in whom we profess to place our only trust, be in our trial found our greatest enemy. Take heed of such sins as Christ himself, our only advocate, hath put a mark upon as those which he will not save us in. Secondly. It is that wherewith above all things the Holy Spirit is grieved. His work it is to give an in crease and progress in our souls. He begins it, and carries it on. And there can be no greater grief to a wise and gracious workman, than to have his work de- cay andgo backward under his hand. This is the oc- casion of those complaints of God which we find in the scripture, of the unprofitableness and backsliding of men, after the use of means and remedies for their fruitfulness and cure. ' What,' saith he, ' could I have done more for my vineyard than I have ,done ? Why then, when I looked for grapes, did it bring forth wild grapes 1' Can any thing be apprehended to be such a just matter of grief and complaint to the Holy Spirit, as to see and find those whom he had once raised up to holy and heavenly affections, so as that their de- lights were in, and their thoughts much upon; the things that are above, to become earthly or sensual, to have no sensible actings of any of his graces in them, which is the state of them who are under the power of spiritual decays 1 And this is the only cause where- in God speaks to men in the way of complaint and ex- postulation; anduseth all sorts of arguments to con- vince them of their folly herein. Wherein a wise, tender, and careful parent, hath been diligent in the use of all means for the education of his child, and he for some time hath given good hopes of himself finds hind to slacken in his diligence,
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