than before. Thus be still as men for your journey, tending to another place. This is not our home, nor the place of our rest, therefore our loins must be still girt up, our affections kept from training and dragging down upon the earth.

Men that are altogether earthly and profane, are so far from girding up the loins of their mind, that they set them wholly downwards. The very highest part of their soul is glued to the earth, and they are daily partakers of the serpent's curse, they go on their belly and eat the dust, they mind earthly things". Now this disposition is inconsistent with grace; but they that are in some measure truly godly, though they grovel not so, yet may be somewhat guilty of suffering their affections to fall too low, that is, too much conversant with vanity, and further engaged than is meet, to some things that are worldly, and by this means abate of their heavenly hopes, and make them less perfect, less clear and sensible to their souls.

And because they are most subject to take this liberty in the fair and calm weather of prosperity, God doth often, and wisely and mercifully, cause rough blasts of affliction to arise upon them, to make them gather their loose garments nearer to them, and gird them closer.

Let us then remember our way, and where we are, and keep our garments girt up, for we walkamidst thorns and briers, that, if we let them down, will entangle and stop us, and possibly tear our garments. We walk through a world where there is much mire of sinful pollutions, and therefore cannot but defile them; and the crowd we are among will be ready to tread on them, yea our own feet may be intangled in them, and so make us stumble, and possibly fall. Our only safest way is to gird up our affections wholly.

This perfect hope is inforced by the whole strain of it: for well may we fix our hope on that happiness to which we are appointed in the eternal elec

d Phil. iii. 19,

tion of God, v. 2. and born to it by our new birth, v. 3, 4. and preserved to it by his almighty power, v. 5. and cannot be cut short of it by all the afflictions and oppositions in the way, no nor so much as deprived by them of our present joy and comfort in the assurance of it, 67, 8. 9. And then being taught the greatness and excellency of that blessed salvation, by the doctrine of the prophets and Apostles, and the admiration of angels, all these conspire to confirm our hope, to make it perfect and persevering to the end.

And we may also learn by the foregoing doctrine, that this is the place of our trial and conflict, but the place of our rest is above we must here have our loins girt, but when we come there, we may wear our long white robes at their full length with out disturbance, for there is nothing there but peace; and without danger of defilement, for, no unclean thing is there, yea the streets of that mew Jerusalem are paved with pure gold. To him then, that hath prépared that city for us, let us ever give praise.

Ver. 14. As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts, in your ignorance.

15. But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation.

16. Because it is written, Be ye holy, for I am holy.

THY word is a lamp unto my feet, says David, and a light unto my paths, not only comfortable, as light is to the eyes, but withal directive, as a lamp to his feet. Thus here the Apostle doth not only furnish consolation against distress, but exhorts and directs his brethren in the way of holiness, without which, the apprehension and feeling of those comforts cannot subsist.

This is no other but a clearer and fuller expression, and further pressing of that sobriety and spiritualness of mind and life, that he jointly exhorted

e Psal. cxix. 105.

unto, with that of perfect hope, verse 13, as inseparably connected with it. If you would enjoy this hope, be not conformed to the lusts of your former ignorance, but be holy.

There is no doctrine in the world either so pleasant or so pure as that of christianity: it is matchless, both in sweetness and holiness. The faith and hope of a christian have in them an abiding precious balm of comfort; but this is never to be so lavished away, as to be poured into the puddle of an impure conscience: no, that were to lose it unworthily, As many as have this hope purify themselves, even as he is pure'. Here they are commanded to be holy, as he is holys. Faith first purifies the heart, empties it of the love of sin, and then fills it with the consolation of Christ and the hope of glory.

It is a foolish misgrounded fear, and such as argues inexperience of the nature and workings of divine grace, to imagine that the assured hope of salvation will beget unholiness and presumptuous boldness in sin, and therefore that the doctrine of that assurance is a doctrine of licentiousness: our Apostle, we see, is not so sharp-sighted as these men think themselves; he apprehends no such matter, but indeed supposes the contrary as unquestionable: he takes not assured hope and holiness as enemies, but joins them as nearest friends, hope perfectly, and be holy.

They are mutually strengthened and increased each by the other. The more assurance of salvation, the more holiness, the more delight in it, and study of it, as the only way to that end. And as labour is then most pleasant, when we are made surest it shall not be lost, nothing doth make the soul so nimble and active in obedience as this oil of gladness, this assured hope of glory. Again, the more holiness is in the soul, the clearer always is this assurance, as we see the face of the Heavens best, when there are fewest clouds. The greatest affliction doth not f 1 Joh. iii. 3.

s Act. xv. 9.

damp this hope so much as the smallest sin, yea, it may be the more lively and sensible to the soul by affliction; but by sin it always suffers loss, as the experience of all christians does certainly teach them.

The Apostle exhorts to obedience, and enforceth it by a most persuasive reason. His exhortation is, 1. Negative, Not fashioning yourselves. 2. Positive, Be ye holy.

I. For the negative part of the exhortation. That which he would remove and separate them from is lusts this is in scripture the usual name of all the irregular and sinful desires of the heart, both the polluted habits of them, and their corrupt streams, both as they are within, and outwardly vent themselves in the lives of men. The Apostle St. John calls it the Lust of the world, and verse 15, Love of the world; and then verse 16, branches it into those three, that are indeed the base anti-trinity that the world worships, The lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life.

The soul of man unconverted is no other but a den of impure lusts, wherein dwells pride, uncleanness, avarice, malice, &c. just as Babylon is described. Were a man's eyes opened, he would as much abhor to remain with himself in that condition, "as to dwell in a house full of snakes and "serpents," as St. Austin says. And the first part of conversion is once to rid the soul of these noisome inhabitants, for there is none at all found naturally vacant and free from them. Thus the Apostle here expresses of the believers he wrote, that these lusts were theirs before in their igno

rance.

There is a truth in it, that all sin arises from some kind of ignorance, or, at least, from present inadvertence and inconsideration, turning away the mind from the light; which therefore, for the time, is as if it were not, and is all one with ignorance in the effect; and therefore the works of sin are all i Rev. xviii. 2. or as Isa. xiii. 21.

h 1 Joh. ii. 17.

called works of darkness. For were the true visage of sin seen at a full light, undressed and unpainted, it were impossible, while it so appeared, that any one soul could be in love with it, but would rather fly it, as hideous and abominable. But because the soul unrenewed is all darkness, therefore it is all lust, and love of sin; no order in it, because no light. As at the first in the world, confusion and darkness went together, and darkness was upon the face of the deep, it is so in the soul, the more ignorance, the more abundance of lusts.

That light that frees the soul, and rescues it from the very kingdom of darkness, must be somewhat beyond that which nature can attain to. All the light of philosophy natural and moral is not sufficient, yea, the very knowledge of the law, severed from Christ, serves not so to enlighten and renew the soul, as to free it from the darkness or ignorance here spoke of; for our Apostle writes to Jews that knew the law, and were instructed in it before their conversion, yet he calls those times wherein Christ was unknown to them, the times of their ignorance. Though the stars shine never so bright, and the moon with them in its full, yet they do not all together make it day, still it is night till the sun appear. Therefore the Hebrew doctors upon that word of Solomon's, Vanity of vanities, all is vanity, say, Vana etiam lex, donec venerit Messias. Therefore of him Zacharias says, That the dayspring from on high hath visited us, to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace'.

A natural man may attain to very much acquired knowledge of the doctrine of Christ, and may discourse excellently of it, and yet still his soul be in the chains of darkness, fast locked up under the ignorance here mentioned, and so still of a carnal mind, in subjection to these lusts of ignorance.