come like them, and take their quality; will make them gross and earthly, and unable to mount up; will clog the wings of prayer, and you will find the loss, when your soul is heavy and drowsy, and falls off from delighting in God and your communion with him. Will such things as those you follow, be able to countervail your damage? Can they speak you peace, and uphold you in a day of darkness and distress? Or may it not be such now, as will make them all a burden and vexation to you? But, on the other hand, the more you abate and let go of these, and come empty and hungry to God in prayer, the more room shall you have for his consolations; and therefore the more plentifully will he pour in of them, and enrich your soul with them the more, the less you take in of the other.

Again; would you have yourselves raised to and continued and advanced in a spiritual heavenly temper, free from the surfeits of earth, and awake and active for heaven? Be incessant in prayer.

But thou wilt say, I find nothing but heavy indisposedness in it, nothing but roving and vanity of heart, and so, though I have used it some time, it is still unprofitable and uncomfortable to me. Although it be so, yet, hold on, give it not over. Or need I say this to thee? Though it were referred to thyself, wouldst thou forsake it and leave off? Then what wouldst thou do next? For if there be no comfort in it, far less is there any for thee in any other way. If temptation should so far prevail with thee as to lead thee to try intermission, either thou wouldst be forced to return to it presently, or certainly wouldst fall into a more grievous condition, and, after horrors and lashings, must at length come back to it again, or perish for ever. Therefore, however it go, continue praying. Strive to believe that love thou canst not see; for where sight is abridged, there it is proper for faith to work. If thou canst do no more, lie before thy Lord, and look to him, and say, Lord, here I am. Thou may

est quicken and revive me if thou wilt, and I trust thou wilt; but if I must do it, I will die at thy feet. My life is in thy hand, and thou art goodness and mercy.

While I have breath I will cry, or, if I cannot cry, yet I will wait on and look to thee.

One thing forget not, that the ready way to rise out of this sad yet safe state, is, to be much in viewing the Mediator, and interposing him betwixt the Father's view and thy soul. Some who do orthodoxly believe this to be right, yet do not so consider and use it in their necessity, as becomes them, and therefore fall short of comfort. He hath declared it, No man cometh to the Father but by me. How vile soever thou art, put thyself under his robe and into his hand, and he will lead thee unto the Father, and present thee acceptable and blameless; and the Father shall receive thee, and declare himself well pleased with thee in his well-beloved Son, who hath covered thee with his righteousness, and brought thee so clothed, and set thee before him.

III. The third thing we have to consider is, the rea son which binds on us these duties; The end of all things is at hand.

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We need often to be reminded of this, for even believers too readily forget it; and it is very suitable to the apostle's foregoing discourse of judgment, and to his sent exhortation to sobriety and watchfulness unto prayer, Even the general end of all is at hand; though, since the apostle wrote this, many ages are past. The apostles usually speak of the whole time after the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh, as the last time; and they seem, by divers expressions, to have apprehended it in their days to be not far off. So St. Paul, 1 Thes. iv, 17, We which are alive and remain, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, speaking as if it were not impossible that it might come in their time; which put him upon some explication of that correction of their mistake in his next epistle to them, wherein notwithstanding he seems not to assert any great tract of time to intervene, but only that in that time great things were first to come. This however might always have been said. In respect of suc. ceeding eternity, the whole duration of the world is not considerable; and to the eternal Lord who made it and hath appointed its period, a thousand years are but as one day. We think a thousand years a great matter, in re

spect of our short life, and more so through our shortsightedness, who look not through this to eternal life; but what is the utmost length of time, were it millions of years, to a thought of eternity? We find much room in this earth, but to the vast heavens, it is but as a point. Thus that which is but small to us, a field or little enclosure, a fly, had it skill, would divide into provinces in proportion to itself.-To each man, the end of all things is, even after our measure, at hand; for when he dies, the world ends for him. Now this consideration fits the subject, and presses it strongly. Seeing all things shall be quickly at an end, even the frame of heaven and earth, why should we, knowing this and having higher hopes, lay out so much of our desires and endeavours upon those things that are posting to ruin? It is no hard notion, to be sober and watchful to prayer, to be trading that way, and seeking higher things, and to be very moderate in these, which are of so short a date. As in themselves and their utmost term, they are of short duration, so more evidently to each of us in particular, who are so soon cut off and flee away. Why should our hearts cleave to those things from which we shall so quickly part, and from which, if we will not freely part, and let them go, we shall be pulled away, and pulled with the more pain, the closer we cleave, and the faster we are glued to them?

O foolish man, that hunteth such poor things and will not be called off till death benight him, and he finds his great work not done, yea, not begun, nor even seriously thought of. Your buildings, your trading, your lands, your matches, and friendships, and projects, when they take with you and your hearts are after them, say, But for how long are all these? Their end is at hand; therefore be sober and watch unto prayer. Learn to divide better; more hours for prayer, and fewer for them; your whole heart for it, and none of it for them. Seeing they will fail you so quickly, prevent them; become free lean not on them till they break, : and you fall into

the pit.

It is reported of one, that, hearing the fifth chapter of Genesis read, so long lives, and yet the burden still, they

died-Seth lived nine hundred and twelve years, and he died; Enos lived nine hundred and five years, and he died; Methuselah, nine hundred and sixty-nine years, and he died-be took so deeply the thought of death and eternity, that it changed his whole frame, and turned him from a voluptuous, to a most strict and pious course of life. How small a word will do much, when God sets it into the heart! But surely this one thing would make the soul more calm and sober in the pursuit of present things. if their term were truly computed and considered. How soon shall youth, and health, and carnal delights, be at an end! This casts a damp upon all those fine things, But to a soul acquainted with God, and in affection removed hence already, no thought so sweet as this. It helps much to carry it cheerfully through wrestlings and difficulties, through better and worse; they see land near, and shall quickly be at home: that is the way. The end of all things is at hand; an end of a few poor delights and the many vexations of this wretched life; an end of temptations and sins, the worst of all evils; yea, an end of the imperfect fashion of our best things here, an end of prayer itself, to which succeeds that new song of endless praises.

Ver. 8. And, above all things, have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins.

THE graces of the Spirit are an entire frame, making up the new creature, and none of them can be wanting; therefore the doctrine and exhortation of the apostles, speak of them usually, not only as inseparable, but as one. But there is amongst them all, none more comprehensive than this of love, insomuch that St. Paul calls it the fulfilling of the law. Love to God is the sum of all relative to him, and so likewise is it towards our brethren. Love to God is that which makes us live to him, and be wholly his; that which most powerfully weans us from this world, and causeth us delight in communion with him in holy meditation and prayer. Now the apostle adding here the duty of Christians to one another, gives this as

the prime, yea, the sum of all; Above all, have fervent love.

Concerning this, consider, I. the nature of it; II. the eminent degree of it; and, III. the excellent fruit of it.

I. The nature of this love. It is a union, therefore called a bond or chain, that links things together. It is not a mere external union, that holds in customs, or words, or outward carriage, but a union of hearts. It is here not a natural, but a spiritual, supernatural union; it is the mutual love of Christians as brethren: There is a common benevolence and good will due to all; but a more particular uniting affection amongst Christians, which makes them interchangeably one.

The Devil being an apostate spirit, revolted and separated from God, doth naturally project and work division. This was his first exploit, and it is still his grand design and business in the world. He first divided man from God; put them at an enmity by the first sin of our first parents; and the next we read of in their first child, was enmity against his brother. So Satan is called by our Saviour justly a liar and a murderer from the beginning: he murdered man by lying, and made him a murderer.

And as the Devil's work is division, Christ's work is union. He came to dissolve the works of the devil, by a contrary work. He came to make all friends; to re-collect and re-unite all men to God, and man to man. This was his great project in all; this he died and suffered for, and this he prayed for; and this is strong above all ties, natural or civil-union in Christ. This they have who are indeed Christians; this they would pretend to have, if they understood it, who profess themselves Christians. If natural friendship be capable of that expression, "one spirit in two bodies," Christian union hath it much more really and properly; for there is indeed one spirit more extensive in all the faithful, yea, so one spirit, that it makes them up into one body more extensive. They are not so much as divers bodies, only divers members of one body.

Now this love of our brethren is not another from the love of God; it is but the streaming forth of it, or the reflection of it. Jesus Christ sending his Spirit into the