Accordingly the gospel lays its foundation, in utterly renouncing those false goods and enjoyments, which feed the vanity and corruption of our nature, fill our hearts with foolish and wicked passions, and keep us separate from God, the only happiness of all spirits.
II. For not only the vices, the wickedness, and vanity of this world, but even its most lawful concerns, if unduly pursued, make men unable to enter into the true state of Christianity.
He who is busied in an honest calling, may, on that account, be finally rejected of God.
*For it is no more pardonable to be less affected to the things of God, for the sake of any worldly business, than for the indulgence of our pride, or any other sinful passion: every business of life being equally trifling, when compared with the one thing needful.
III. Men of serious business indeed generally censure those, who trifle away their time in vain and impertinent pleasures.
But they don’t consider that their own employments also are as vain as vanity itself: they don’t consider that any business or employment, if it has got hold of the heart, renders men as vain and odious in the sight of God, as any sensual gratification.
They may call it an honest care, a wise industry, or by any other plausible name. But it is a wisdom which can no more recommend itself to the eyes of God than the wisdom of an epicure.
*For it shews as wrong a turn of mind, and as great a contempt of the true good, to neglect any degrees of piety for the sake of business, as for any the most trifling pleasures of life.
IV. *The wisdom of this world indeed gives an importance and air of greatness to several ways of life, and ridicules others as vain and contemptible, which differ only in their kind of vanity. But the wisdom from above condemns all labour as equally fruitless, which hinders our labouring after everlasting life. For what can it signify whether a man forgets God in his farm, or in a shop, or at a gaming table? The world is full as important in its pleasures as in its cares; there is no more wisdom in the one than in the other. And the man who, by the cares and business of the world is made less affected to the things of God, is no wiser than he who takes his delight in running foxes and hares out of breath.
For there is no wisdom in any thing but religion. Nor is any way of life less vain than another, but as it is made serviceable to piety, and conspires with the designs of religion, to raise mankind to a participation and enjoyment of the divine nature.