wings of the holy Dove, is not intended to encourage his fires, which burn and smoke, and peep through the cloud already; it tempts him to security; and, if an evil life be a certain in-let to a second death, despair on one side, and security on the other, are the bars and locks to that door, he can never pass forth again while that state remains; whoever slips in his spiritual walking does not presently fall; but if that slip does not awaken his diligence, and his caution, then his ruin begins, "vel pravæ institutionis deceptus exordio, aut per longam mentis incuriam, et virtute animi decidente," as St. Austin observes; "either upon the pursuit of his first error, or by a careless spirit, or a decaying slackened resolution;" all which are the direct effects of lukewarmness. But so have I seen a fair structure begun with art and care, and raised to half its stature, and then it stood still by the misfortune or negligence of the owner, and the rain descended, and dwelt in its joints, and supplanted the contexture of his pillars, and having stood awhile, like the antiquated temple of a deceased oracle, it fell into a hasty age, and sunk upon its own knees, and so descended into ruin: so is the imperfect, unfinished spirit of a man; it lays the foundation of a holy resolution, and strengthens it with vows and arts of prosecution, it raises up the walls, sacraments, and prayers, reading, and holy ordinances; and holy actions begin with a slow motion, and the building stays, and the spirit is weary, and the soul is naked, and exposed to temptation, and in the days of storm take in every thing that can do it mischief; and it is faint and sick, listless and tired, and it stands till its own weight wearies the foundation, and then declines to death. and sad disorder, being so much the worse, because it hath not only returned to its first follies, but hath superadded unthankfulness and carelessness, a positive neglect and a despite of holy things, a setting a low price to the things of God, laziness and wretchlessness: all which are evils superadded to the first state of coldness, whither he is with all these loads and circumstances of death easily revolved. 3. A state of lukewarmness is more incorrigible than a state of coldness; while men flatter themselves, that their state is good, that they are rich and need nothing, that their lamps are dressed, and full of ornament. There are many, that think they are in their country as soon as ever they are weary, and measure not the end of their hopes by the possession of them, but by their precedent labour; which they overvalue, because they have easy and effeminate souls. St. Bernard complains of some that say, "Sufficit nobis, nolumus esse meliores quam patres nostri :" "It is enough for us to be as our forefathers," who were honest and useful in their generations, but be not over-righteous. These men are such as think, they have knowledge enough to need no teacher, devotion enough to need no new fires, perfection enough to need no new progress, justice enough to need no repentance; and then because the spirit of a man and all the things of this world are in perpetual variety and change, these men decline, when they have gone their period; they stand still, and then revert; like a stone returning from the bosom of a cloud, where it rested as long as the thought of a child, and fell to its natural bed of earth, and dwelt below for ever. He that says, he will take care he be no worse, and that he desires to be no better, stops his journey into heaven, but cannot be secure against his descending into hell: and Cassian spake a hard saying: "Frequenter vidimus de frigidis et carnalibus ad spiritualem venisse fervorem, de tepidis et animalibus omnino non vidimus:"Many persons from vicious, and dead, and cold, have passed into life and an excellent grace, and a spiritual warmth, and holy fires; but from lukewarm and indifferent never any body came to an excellent condition, and state of holiness' rarissime,' St. Bernard says, 'very extremely seldom;' and our blessed Saviour said something of this. "The publicans and the harlots go before you into the kingdom of heaven;" they are moved by shame, and punished by disgrace, and remarked by punishments, and frighted by the circumstances and notices of all the world, and separated from sober persons by laws and an intolerable character, and the sense of honour, and the care of their persons, and their love of civil society, and every thing in the world can invite them towards virtues. But the man that is accounted honest, and does justice, and some things of religion, unless he finds himself but upon his way, and feels his wants, and groans under the sense of his infirmities, and sighs under his imperfections, and accounts himself "not to have comprehended," but " still presses towards the mark of his calling," unless (I say) he still in creases in his appetites of religion, as he does in his progression, he will think he needs no counsellor, and the Spirit of God whispers to an ear, that is already filled with noises, and cannot attend to the heavenly calling. The stomach, that is already full, is next to loathing; and that's the prologue to sickness, and a rejecting the first wholesome nutriment, which was entertained to relieve the first natural necessities: "Qui non proficit, vult deficere," said St. Bernard: 'He that goes not forward in the love of God, and of religion, does not stand still, but goes for all that;' but whither such a motion will lead him, himself without a timely care shall feel by an intolerable experiment. In this sense and for these reasons it is, that although a lukewarm Christian hath gone forward some steps towards a state of holiness, and is advanced beyond him that is cold, and dead and unconcerned; and therefore, speaking absolutely and naturally, is nearer the kingdom of God than he that is not yet set out; yet accidentally, and by reason of these ill appendages, he is worse, in greater danger, in a state equally unacceptable, and therefore must either go forward, and still do the work of God carefully, and diligently, with a fervent spirit, and an active hand, with a willing heart, and a cheerful eye, or it had been better he had never begun. 2. It concerns us next to inquire concerning the duty in its proper instances, that we may perceive to what parts and degrees of duty it amounts; we shall find it especially in the duties of faith, of prayer, and of charity. 1. Our faith must be strong, vigorous, active, confident, and patient, reasonable, and unalterable, without doubting, and fear, and partiality. For the faith of very many men seems a duty so weak and indifferent, is so often untwisted by violence, or ravelled and entangled in weak discourses, or so false and fallacious by its mixture of interest, that though men usually put most confidences in the pretences of faith, yet no pretences are more unreasonable. 1. Our faith and persuasions in religion is most commonly imprinted in us by our country, and we are Christians at the same rate as we are English or Spaniards, or of such a family; our reason is first stained and spotted with the die of our kindred, and country, and our education puts it in grain, and whatsoever is against this we are taught to call a temp tation in the meantime, we call these accidental and artificial persuasions by the name of faith, which is only the air of the country, or an heir-loom of the family, or the daughter of a present interest. Whatever it was that brought us in, we are to take care, that when we are in, our faith be noble, and stand upon its most proper and most reasonable foundation; it concerns us better to understand that religion, which we call faith, and that faith whereby we hope to be saved. 2. The faith and the whole religion of many men is the production of fear. Men are threatened into their persuasions, and the iron rod of a tyrant converts whole nations to his principles, when the wise discourses of the religion. seems dull as sleep, and unprevailing as the talk of childhood. That is but a deceitful faith, which our timorousness begot, and our weakness nurses, and brings up. The religion of a Christian is immortal, and certain, and persuasive, and infallible, and unalterable, and therefore, needs not be received by human and weak convoys, like worldly and mortal religions that faith is lukewarm, and easy, and trifling, which is only a belief of that, which a man wants courage to disbelieve. 3. The faith of many men is such, that they dare not trust it: they will talk of it, and serve vanity, or their lust, or their company, or their interest by it, but when the matter comes to a pinch, they dare not trust it; when Antisthenes was initiated into the mysteries of Orpheus, the priest told him, that all that were of that religion, immediately after death should be perfectly happy'; the philosopher asked him, Why he did not die, if he believed what he said? Such a faith as that was fine to talk of at table, or eating the sacrifices of the religion, when the mystic man was voɛoç, full of wine and flesh, of confidence and religion; but to die, is a more material consideration, and to be chosen upon no grounds, but such a faith, which really comes from God, and can secure our reason, and our choice, and perfect our interest and designs. And it hath been long observed concerning those bold people, that use their reason against God that gave it, they have one persuasion in their health, and * His qui sacris visis abeunt ad inferos, Omnium malorum generi incidit. another in their sickness and fears; when they are well, they blaspheme; when they die, they are superstitious. It was Bias's case, when he was poisoned by the atheisms of Theodorus, no man died more like a coward and a fool; "as if the gods were to come and go as Bias pleased to think and talk :" so one said of his folly. If God be to be feared when we die, he is also to be feared in all our life, for he can for ever make us die; he that will do it once, and that when he please, can always. And therefore, all those persuasions against God, and against religion, are only the production of vicious passions, of drink or fancy, of confidence and ignorance, of boldness or vile appetites, of vanity or fierceness, of pride or flatteries; and atheism is a proportion so unnatural and monstrous, that it can never dwell in a man's heart as faith does, in health and sickness, in peace and war, in company and alone, at the beginning and at the end of a design; but comes from weak principles, and leaves shallow and superficial impressions; but when men endeavour to strengthen and confirm it, they only strive to make themselves worse than they can. Naturally a man cannot be an` atheist for he that is so, must have something within him that is worse either than man or devil. 4. Some measure their faith by shows and appearances, by ceremonies and names, by professions and little institutions. Diogenes was angry at the silly priest, that thought he should be immortal because he was a priest, and would not promise so concerning Agesilaus, and Epaminondas, two noble Greeks, that had preserved their country, and lived virtuously. The faith of a Christian hath no signification at all but obedience and charity; if men be just, and charitable, and good, and live according to their faith, then only they are Christians; whatsoever else is pretended is but a shadow, and the image of a grace; for since in all the sects and institutions of the world, the professors did, in some reasonable sort, conform to the rules of the profession (as appears in all the schools of philosophers, and religions of the world, and the practices of the Jews, and the usages and the country-customs of the Turks), it is a strange dishonour to Christianity, that in it alone men should pretend to the faith of it, and do nothing of what it persuades, and commands upon the account of those promises, which it makes us to |