worldly tempers, and live wholly unto God, because we are certain that we are to die at the end of five years; surely it must be more reasonable and necessary for us to live in the same spirit, because we have no certainty that we shall live five weeks.

Again, If we were to add twenty years to the five, which is in all probability more than will be added to the lives of many people who are at man's estate; what a poor thing is this! how small a difference is there between five and twenty-five years!

It is said, that a day is with God as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day; because in regard to his eternity, this difference is as nothing.

Now as we are all created to be eternal, to live in an endless succession of ages upon ages, where thousands, and millions of thousands of years will have no proportion to our everlasting life in God; so with regard to this eternal state, which is our real state, twenty-five years is as poor a pittance as twenty-five days..

Now we can never make any true judgment of time as it relates to us, without considering the true state of our duration. If we are temporary beings, then a little time may justly be called a great deal in relation to us; but if we are eternal beings, then the difference of a few years is as nothing.

If we were to suppose three different sorts of rational beings, all of different but fixed duration, one sort that lived certainly only a month, the other a year, and the third a hundred years;

Now if these

were to meet together, and talk about time, they must talk in a very different language; half an hour to those that were to live but a month, must be a very different thing, to what it is to those who are to live a hundred years.

As therefore time is thus a different thing with regard to the state of those who enjoy it, so if we would know what time is with regard to ourselves, we must consider our state.

Now since our eternal state is as certainly ours, as our present state; since we are as certainly to live for ever, as we now live at all; it is plain that we cannot judge of the value of any particular time, as to us, but

by comparing it to that eternal duration for which we are created.

If you would know, what five years signify to a being that was to live a hundred, you must compare five to a hundred, and see what proportion it bears to it, and then you will judge right.

So if you would know what twenty years signify to a son of Adam, you must compare it, not to a million of ages, but an eternal duration to which no number of millions bears any proportion; and then you will judge right. by finding nothing.

Consider therefore this; how would you condemn the folly of a man, who should lose his share of future glory, for the sake of being rich, or great, or praised, or delighted in any enjoyment, only one poor day before he was to die.

But if the time will come, when a number of years will seem less to every one, than a day does now; what a condemnation must it then be, if eternal happiness should appear to be lost, for something less than the enjoyment of a day!

Why does a day seem a trifle to us now? It is because we have years to set against it. It is the duration of years that makes it appear as nothing.

What a trifle, therefore, must the years of a man's age appear, when they are forced to be set against eternity, when there shall be nothing but eternity to compare them with.

Now this will be the case of every man, as soon as he is out of the body; he will bed to forget the distinctions of days and years, and to measure time, not by the course of the sun, but by setting it against. eternity.

As the fixed stars, by reason of our being placed at such distance from them, appear but as so many points; so when we are placed in eternity, shall look back upon all time, it will all appear but as a moment.

Then a luxury, an indulgence, a prosperity, a greatness of fifty years, will seem to every one that looks back upon it, as the same poor short enjoyment, as if he had been snatched away in his first sin.

These few reflections upon time, are only to shew

how poorly they think, how miserably they judge, who are less careful of an eternal state, because they may be at some years distance from it, than they would be, if they knew they were within a few weeks of it.

CHAP. XIV.

Concerning that part of devotion which relates to times and hours of prayer. Of daily early prayer in the morning. How we are to improve our forms of prayer, and how to increase the spirit of devotion.

HAVING in the foregoing chapters shewn the necessity of a devout spirit, or habit of mind in every part of our common life, in the discharge of all our business, in the use of all the gifts of God: I come now to consider that part of devotion, which relates to times and hours of prayer.

I take it for granted, that every Christian, who is in health, is up early in the morning; for it is much more reasonable to suppose a person up early, because he is a Christian, than because he is a labourer, or a tradesman, or a servant, or has business that wants him.

We naturally conceive some abhorrence of a man that is in bed, when he should be at his labour, or in his shop. We cannot tell how to think any thing good of him, who is such a slave to drowsiness, as to neglect his business for it.

Let this therefore teach us to conceive, how odious we must appear in the sight of Heaven, if we are in bed, shut up in sleep and darkness, when we should be praising God; and are such slaves to drowsiness, as to neglect our devotions for it.

For if he is to be blamed as a slothful drone, that rather chooses the lazy indulgence of sleep, than to perform his proper share of worldly business; how much is he to be reproached, who had rather lie folded up in

a bed, than be raising up his heart to God in acts of praise and adoration?

Prayer is the nearest approach to God, and the highest enjoyment of him, that we are capable of in this life.

It is the noblest exercise of the soul, the most exalted use of our best faculties, and the highest estimation of the blessed inhabitants of heaven.

When our hearts are full of God, sending up holy desires to the throne of grace, we are then in our highest state, we are upon the utmost heights of human greatness; we are not before kings and princes, but in the presence and audience of the Lord of all the world, and can be no higher, till death is swallowed up in glory.

On the other hand, sleep is the poorest, dullest refreshment of the body, that is so far from being intended as an enjoyment, that we are forced to receive it either in a state of insensibility, or in the folly of dreams.

Sleep is such a dull, stupid state of existence, that even amongst mere animals, we despise them most, which are most drowsy. He therefore who chooses to enlarge the slothful indulgence of sleep, rather than be early at his devotions to God, chooses the dullest refreshment of the body, before the highest, noblest employment of the soul; he chooses that state, which is a reproach to mere animals, rather than that exercise, which is the glory of angels.

You will perhaps say, though you rise late, yet you are always careful of your devotions when you are ар.

It may be so. But what then? Is it well done of you. to rise late, because you pray when you are up? Is it pardonable to waste a great part of the day in bed because some time after you say your prayers?

It is as much your duty to rise to pray, as to pray when you are risen. And if you are late at your prayers, you offer to God the prayers of an idle, slothful worshipper, that rises to prayers, as idle servants rise to their labour.

Farther, If you fancy that you are careful of your devotions, when you are up, though it be your custom to

rise late, you deceive yourself; for you cannot perform your devotions as you ought. For he that cannot deny himself this drowsy indulgence, but must pass away good part of the morning in it, is no more prepared for prayer when he is up, than he is prepared for fasting, abstinence, or any other self-denial. He may indeed more easily read over a form of prayer, than he can perform these duties; but he is no more disposed to enter into the true spirit of prayer, than he is disposed to fasting. For sleep thus indulged, gives a softness and idleness to all our tempers, and makes us unable to relish any thing, but what suits with an idle state of mind, and gratifies our natural tempers as sleep does. So that a person that is a slave to this idleness, is in the same tem¡ per when he is up; and though he is not asleep, yet he is under the effects of it: and every thing that is idle, indulgent, or sensual, pleases him for the same reason that sleep pleases him; and on the other hand, every thing that requires care, or trouble, or self-denial, is hateful to him, for the same reason that he hates to rise. He that places any happiness in this morning indulgence, would be glad to have all the day made happy in the same manner; though not with sleep, yet with such enjoyments as gratify and indulge the body in the same manner as sleep does; or, at least, with such as come as near to it as they can. The remembrance of a warm bed is in his mind all the day, and he is glad when he is not one of those that sit starving in a church.

Now you do not imagine that such a one can truly mortify that body which he thus indulges; yet you might as well think this, as that he can truly perform his devotions; or live in such a drowsy state of indulgence, and yet relish the joys of a spiritual life.

For surely no one will pretend to say, that he knows and feels the true happiness of prayer, who does not think it worth his while to be early at it.

It is not possible in nature for an epicure to be truly devout; he must renounce this habit of sensuality, before he can relish the happiness of devotion.

Now he that turns sleep into an idle indulgence, does as much to corrupt and disorder his soul, to make it a slave to bodily appetites, and keep it incapable of all