354 OP SPIRITUAL MINDEDNESS. infinite fountain of goodness, so as that our affections may absolutely come to rest and complacency, and find full assured satisfaction in them. It is otherwise as to all temporal things. Men would fain have them to be such as might give absolute rest and satisfaction to all their affections. But they are every one of them so far from it, that all of them together cannot comma pose their minds in rest and peace for one hour. They gain sometimes a transport of affections, and seem for a season to have filled the whole soul, so as it hath no liesure to consider their emptiness and van- ity. But a little composure of men's thoughts, show that they are but a diversion in a journey or labor. they are no rest. Hence are they called broken cis- terns, that will hold no water. Let a man prize them at the highest rate that it is possible for a rational creature to be seduced into the thoughts of, whereof there have been prodigious instances ; let him possess them in abundance, beyond whatever anyman enjoyed in this world, or his own imagination could beforehand reach to; let him be assured of the utmost peaceable continuance in the enjoyment of them that his and their natures are capable of: yet would he not dare to pretend, that all his affections were filled and satisfied with them, that they afforded him perfect rest and peace, Should he do soy: the working of his mind every day, would convince him of his falsehood and folly. But all spiritual things derive from, and lead to, that which is infinite, which is therefore able to fill all our affections, and to give them full satisfaction with rest and peace. They all lead us to the fountain of living waters, the eternal spring of goodness and. blessedness.
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