410 The NATURE and -Pow ER [q.] Carry about a conflant humbling fenfe of this clofe averfation unto fpirttualnefs that yet lies in our nature: If men find the efficacy of it what fhould, what confideration can, be more powerful to bring them unto humble walking with God? That after all the difcoveries that God hath madeof himfelf unto them, all the kindnefs they have received from him ; his doing of them good and not evil in all things, there fliould yet be Rich an heart of unkmdnefs and unbelief, ¡fill abiding, as to have an aver- fation lying in it to communionwith him: how ought the thoughts of it to call us into the duff, to fill us with ]name and felf abhorancy all our days? What have we found in God in any of our approaches, or addreffes unto him, that it fhould be thus with us ? What iniquity have we found in him? Hatb he been a wildernefs unto us, or a land of darknefs? Did we ever lofe any thing by drawing nigh unto him ? Nay hath not therein lien all the reft and peace whichwe have obtained ? Is not he the fountain and fpring of all our mercies of all our defirable things? Hath he not bid us welcome at our coining? Have wenot received from himmore than heart can conceive, or tongue exprefs ? What ails then our foolifh and wretched hearts, to harbour fuels .a turfed fecret diflike of him and his ways? Let us be afhamed and alloniíhed at the confideration of it, and walk in an humbling fenfe of it all our days. Let us carry it about with us in the moll ferret of our thoughts. And as this is a duty in its felf acceptable unto God, who delights to dwell with them that are of an humble and contrite fpiritg fo it is of exceeding efficacy to the weakening of the evil we treat of. [s.] Labour to poffefs the mindwith the beauty and excellencyof fpi- ritual things, that fo they may be prefented lovely and defirable to the foul, and this turfed averfation of finwill be weakned thereby. It is an innate acknowlegedprinciple, that the foul ofman will not keepup chearfully unto the worship of God, unlefs it have a difcovery ofa beauty and comelinefs in it. Hence when men had loft all fpiritual fenfe and favour of the things of God, to fupply the want that was in theirown fouls, they invented out- wardly pompous and gorgeous ways of worfhip, in images, paintings, pictures, and I know not what carnal ornaments which they have called the beauties of holinefs. Thus much however was difcovered therein, that the mind of man muff fee a beauty, a defirablenefs in the things of God's worfhip, or it will not delight in it, averfation will prevail. Let then the foul labour to acquaint - itfelf with the fpiritual beauty ofobedience, of communion with God, of all duties of immediate approach to him, that it may be filled with delight in them. It is not my prefent work to dif- cover the heads and fprings ofthat beauty and defirablenefs, which is in fpiritual duties, in their relation to God, the eternal fpring of all beauty, to Chrift, the love, defire, and hope of all nations, to the fpirit the great beautifier of fouls, rendering them by his grace all glorious within, in their fuitablenefs to the fouls of men, as to their alhngs towards their lalt end, in the rectitude and holinefs of the rule in attendance whereunto they are to be performedi but I only fay at prefent in general, that to acquaint the foul throughly with thefe things is an eminent way of ,weakning the averfation fpoken of. %See.g5-tvxx C H A P.
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