I have made this little appeal to antiquity, and quoted these few passages of Scripture, to support some uncommon practices in the life of Miranda; and to shew, that her highest rules of holy living, her devotion, self-denial, renunciation of the world, her charity, virginity, and voluntary poverty, are founded in the sublimest counsels of Christ and his apostles, suitable to the high expectations of another life, proper instances of a heavenly love, and all followed by the greatest saints of the best and purest ages of the church.

He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

CHAP. X.

Shewing how all orders and ranks of men and women of all ages, are obliged to devote themselves unto God.

I HAVE in the foregoing chapters gone through the several great instances of Christian devotion, and shewn that all the parts of our common life, our employments, our talents and gifts of fortune, are all to be made holy and acceptable unto God, by a wise and religious use of every thing, and by directing our actions and designs to such ends as are suitable to the honour and glory of God.

I shall now shew, that this regularity of devotion, this holiness of common life, this rei gious use of every thing that we have, is a devotion that is the duty of ail orders of Christian people.

Fulvius has had a learned education, and taken his degrees in the university; he came from thence, that he might be free from any rules of life. He takes no em

ployment upon him, nor enters into any business, because he thinks that every employment or business, calls people to the careful performance and discharge of its several duties. When he is grave, he will tell you that he did not enter into holy orders, because he looks upon it to be a state that requires great holiness of life, and that it does not suit his temper to be so good. He will tell you that he never intends to marry, because he cannot oblige himself to that regularity of life, and

good behaviour, which he takes to be the duty of those that are at the head of a family. He refused to be godfather to his nephew, because he will have no trust of any kind to answer for.

Fulvius thinks that he is conscientious in this conduct, and is therefore content with the most idle, impertinent and careless life.

He has no religion, no devotion, no pretences tu piety. He lives by no rules, and thinks all is very well, because he is neither a priest nor a father, nor a guardian, nor has any employment or family to look after.

But Fulvius, you are a rational creature, and as such, are as much obliged to live according to reason and order, as a priest is obliged to attend at the altar, or a guardian to be faithful to his trust; if you live contrary to reason, you don't commit a small crime, you don't break a small trust; but you break the law of your nature, you rebel against God who gave you that nature, and put yourself amongst those whom the God of reason and order will punish as apostates and deserters.

Though you have no employment, yet as you are baptized into the profession of Christ's religion, you are as much obliged to live according to the holiness of the Christian spirit, and perform all the promises made at your baptism, as any man is obliged to be honest and faithful in his calling. If you abuse this great calling, you are not false in a small matter, but you abuse the precious blood of Christ; you crucify the Son of God afresh; 'you neglect the highest instances of divine goodness; you disgrace the church of God; you blemish the body of Christ; you abuse the means of grace, and the promises of glory; and it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you.

It is therefore great folly, for any one to think himself at liberty to live as he pleases, because he is not in such a state of life as some others are; for if there is any thing dreadful in the abuse of any trust; if there is any thing to be feared for the neglect of any calling, there is nothing more to be feared than the wrong use of our reason, nor any thing more to be dreaded, than the neglect of our Christian calling, which is not to serve the little uses of a short hfe, but to redeem souls unto

God, to fill heaven with saints, and finish a kingdom of eternal glory unto God.

No man therefore must think himself excused from the exactness of piety and morality, because he has chosen to be idle and independent in the world; for the necessities of a reasonable and holy life, are not founded in the several conditions and employments of this life, but in the immutable nature of God, and the nature of man. A man is not to be reasonable and holy, because he is a priest, or a father of a family; but he is to be a pious priest, and a good father, because piety and goodness are the laws of human nature. Could any man please God, without living according to reason and order, there would be nothing displeasing to God in an idle priest, or a reprobate father. He therefore that abuses his reason, is like him that abuses the priesthood; and he that neglects the holiness of the Christian life, is as the man that disregards the most important trust.

If a man was to choose to put out his eyes, rather than enjoy the light, and see the works of God; if he should voluntarily kill himself, by refusing to eat and drink, every one would own, that such a one was a rebel against God, that justly deserved his highest indignation. You would not say, that this was only sinful in a priest, or a master of a family, but in every man as such.

Now wherein does the sinfulness of this behaviour consist? Does it not consist in this, that he abuses his nature, and refuses to act that part for which God had created him? But if this be true, then all persons that abuse their reason, that act a different part from that for which God created them, are like this man, rebels against God, and on the same account subject to his wrath.

Let us suppose, that this man, instead of putting out his eyes, had only employed them in looking at ridiculous things, or shut them up in a sleep; that instead of starving himself to death, by not eating at all, he should turn every meal into a feast, and eat and drink like an epicure; could not he be said to have lived more to the glory of God? could he any more be said to act the part for which God had created him, than if he had put out his eyes, and starved himself to death?

Now do but suppose a man acting unreasonably; do but suppose him extinguishing his reason, instead of putting out his eyes; and living in a course of folly and impertinence, instead of starving himself to death; and then you have found out as great a rebel against God.

For he that puts out his eyes, or murders himself, has only this guilt, that he abuses the powers that God has given him; that he refuses to act that part for which he was created, and puts himself into a state that is contrary to the divine will. And surely this is the guilt of every one that lives an unreasonable, unholy, and foolish life.

As therefore, no particular state, or private life, is an excuse for the abuse of our bodies, or self-murder; so no particular state, or private life, is an excuse for the abuse of our reason, or the neglect of the holiness of the Christian religion. For surely it is as much the will of God, that we should make the best use of our rational faculties, that we should conform to the purity and holiness of Christianity, as it is the will of God, that we should use our eyes, and eat and drink for the preservation of our lives.

Till, therefore, a man can shew, that he sincerely endeavours to live according to the will of God, to be that which God requires him to be; till he can shew that he is striving to live according to the holiness of the Christian religion; whosoever he be, or wheresoever he be, he has all that to answer for, that they have, who refuse to live, who abuse the greatest trusts, and neglect the highest calling in the world.

Every body acknowledges, that all orders of men are to be equally and exactly honest and faithful; there is no exception to be made in these duties, for any private or particular state of life. Now if we would but attend to the reason and nature of things; if we would but consider the nature of God, and the nature of man, we should find the same necessity for every other right use of our reason, for every grace, or religious temper of the Christian life: we should find it as absurd to suppose, that one man must be exact in piety, and another need not, as to suppose that one man must be exact in honesty, but another need not. For Christian humility,

sobriety, devotion, and piety, are as great and necessary parts of a reasonable life, as justice and honesty.

And on the other hand, pride, sensuality, and covetousness, are as great disorders of the soul, are as high an abuse of our reason, and as contrary to God, as cheating and dishonesty.

Theft and dishonesty seem indeed, to vulgar eyes, to be greater sins, because they are so hurtful to civil society, and are so severely punished by human laws.

But if we consider mankind in a higher view, as God's order or society of rational beings, that are to glorify him by the right use of their reason, and by acting conformably to the order of their nature, we shall find, that every temper that is equally contrary to reason and order, that opposes God's ends and designs, and disorders the beauty and glory of the rational world, is equatly sinful in man, and equally odious to God. This would shew us, that the sin of sensuality is like the sin of dishonesty, and renders us as great objects of the divine displeasure.

Again, if we consider mankind in a farther view, as a redeemed order of fallen spirits, that are baptized into a fellowship with the Son of God; to be temples of the Holy Ghost; to live according to his holy inspirations; to offer to God the reasonable sacrifice of an humble, pious, and thankful life; to purify themselves from the disorders of their fall; to make a right use of the means of grace, in order to be sons of eternal glory; if we look at mankind in this true light, then we shall find that all tempers that are contrary to this holy society, that are abusers of this infinite mercy; all actions that make us unlike to Christ, that disgrace his body, that abuse the means of grace, and oppose our hopes of glory, have every thing in them, that can make us forever odious unto God. So that though pride and sensuality, and other vices of the like kind, do not hurt civil society, as cheating and dishonesty do, yet they hurt that society, and oppose those ends, which are greater and more glorious in the eyes of God, than all the societies that relate to this world.

Nothing therefore can be more false, than to imagine, that, because we are private persons, that have taken upon us no charge or employment of life, that therefore we