* What is more innocent than rest and retirement? And yet what more dangerous than sloth and idleness? How lawful is the care of a family? And yet how are many people rendered incapable of all virtue, by a [♦]worldly, sollicitous temper? How lawful is it for us, to eat and drink in such quantity and quality, as may render the body healthful, and useful to the soul? And yet what danger is there in eating and drinking if we are not under this strict law of religion, to seek only health; and not the pleasure of various tastes in our food? What sensuality of discourse shall we not every day fall into, unless it be a fixed law to us, to speak of no other joy in our food, but that which is expressed by our grace before, and after our meals?
[♦] “wordly” replaced with “worldly”
How indifferent a thing, and innocent in itself, is dress? And yet what more hurtful and abounding with sin? It reaches and affects the heart and soul both of the wearer and beholder. Its evils are innumerable; it has destroyed, and does destroy like a pestilence.
Now how can all these evils, which arise from the use of these things indifferent and lawful in themselves be avoided, but by making every thing in our common and ordinary life to be matter of conscience, which is to have its rule and measure and end from the spirit of religion? And indeed what other end is there in religion, but to govern every motion, and desire of our hearts? To make all the actions of our common life pure and holy, by being done in strict conformity to the will of God, and under the light and guidance of his Holy Spirit? So that the very outward form of our lives, and the whole manner of our living in the world, whether in estate, shops, or farms, whether in eating, drinking, or dressing, may make it known to all the world, that we do every thing in the name of Jesus Christ, suitably to that high vocation wherewith we are called.
20. No folly of life whatever can be rightly removed but by being thus wholly cut up by the roots, by making every thing subject to the spirit of religion.
That which is to direct our prayers, and govern us at church, must with the same strictness direct our conversation, and govern our dealings in common life. We must dress with the same spirit that we give alms, or go to prayers; that is, we must no more dress to be seen and admired by others, than we must give alms, or make prayers for the same reasons.
And when religion has its seat in our hearts, and is the work of God’s spirit in us, this acting according to its direction in all things, will be so far from seeming to be a hard lesson, that it would be a pain to act otherwise. It is no hardship to a miser to do every thing suitably to the greedy desires of his heart. The ambitious man is not troubled with acting always agreeable to his ambition. If these persons are in trouble or distress, or under any dejection, you can only comfort the one with honour and power, and the other with filthy lucre and gain.
21. Yet the Doctor complains of the Treatise upon Christian Perfection, because Christians in sickness, distress, and dejection of spirit, are there directed to seek for comfort and refreshment in God alone! Our blessed Lord is very short and yet very full upon this article. He only says, Be of good comfort, I have overcome the world. And the Doctor might as well be angry at the gospel for having made no mention of worldly amusements proper for sick and distressed Christians, as at the treatise of Christian Perfection, for not having done the same.
If I should see a sick man smelling a rose, I should not reprove him. But if he wanted comfort in his state, I would no more direct him to any thing, but the great and solid comforts that are to be found in the love, and goodness of God, than I would direct him to another Saviour, than Jesus Christ.
* For to tell Christians that in some kinds of trouble, they might justly seek for relief in reading a play, or wanton Bucolic, instead of the gospel; would be the same absurdity, as to have told people in our Saviour’s time, that in some sorts of distress, they might justly have recourse to Simon Magus, instead of Jesus Christ.