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THE POWERS
AND
CONTESTS
OP
FLESH
AND
SPIRIT:
334
sometimes seized
into a sudden consent
to the sinful
mo-,
tions
of
the body
before
it
is
aware
;
which
dangers
are
much
more easily
prevented
in
a
calm
and healthful
state
of
life.
But here let
me
insert
a cautionary remark
or
two,
to
guard
against the abuse
of
this
doctrine,
which
is
designed
for
the
relief of
holy,
humble, and dejected
souls
:
Caution
I.
Many
who
return frequently
to the com-
mission
of
the same
sin,
excuse their
own
slothful
and
sottish
negligence
by
throwing the blame
on
their consti-
tution
;
let them
take heed,
lest
it
be found
that it
is
their own
wilful
indulgence
of
sinful
appetite
and
temp-
tation,
and
not constitution, hath made the habit of
sin
so
strong
within.
them,
and bath
formed
their
very
temper
into
such
vice
and iniquity,
which
was
by no
means
born
with them
in
any uncommon degree,
but
is
owing
to
their
own wicked
practice
:
God
sees
through such
vile_
hypo-
crisy
and
disguise
as this,
and
will
punish the sinner with
a double
stroke of
vengeance, one
for
his
guilty
sensu-
ality,
and the other for
his
hateful
dissembling.
If
I
would
give an
instance
of
this
pretence, I think
it
is
found
no
where more
frequently
than among the
drunkards, the
passionate,
and the unclean
;
and
such
persons
also
dis-
cover
the vanity
of
their pretences,
in
that
they always
excuse
their
sins,
and
seldom
or never mourn
under
them.
Caution
2.
If
your iniquity
that
frequently
besets you
arise from any bodily disorder, which you have
brought
on
yourself
by
your
own sins,
dare not
murmur,
and
charge
the
providence
of God
with
this
your
disease
or
impotence,
but
maintain a humbling
sense
of
your
own
guilt,
which,
perhaps,
God hath
thus chastised
in
righ-
teousness
:
And let
younger sinners avoid
all
those guilty
practices
that
may
turn
their
very
nature and better con-
stitution into
vice
and raging appetite,
or
into
such dis-
eases
as
may expose them to
the
violent and unruly
insults
of
flesh
and
blood.
Let
them take heed
of
indulg-
ing
vehement desires
or
aversions, even to common,
indifferent,
or
lawful
objects,
lest
of
ectión get the
ascendant, and
subject the
flesh
;
and,
by
that
means,
the
soul
also, to a slavish
habit of appetite
and passion.
Caution
.
Let
not
those
persons,
whose
happier
con-
stitution, or
uninterrupted
health,
gives
them some ad-
s