Three treatises of the vanity of the creature. The sinfulness of sin. The life…Three treatises of the vanity of the creature. The sinfulnesse of sinne. The life…

The last direction which I shall give to remove the vexation of the Creature is out of the text, and that is, To keep it from thy Spirit, not to suffer it to take up thy thoughts and inner man. They are not negotia but viatica only, and a mans heart ought to be upon his business and not upon accessories. If in a tempest men should not address themselves to their offices, to loose the tacklings, to draw the pump, to strike sails, and lighten the vessel, but should make it their sole work to gaze upon their commodities, who could expect that a calm should drop into such mens laps. Beloved when the Creatures have raised a tempest of vexation, think upon your Offices, to the pump, to pour out thy corruptions, to the sails and tackling, abate thy lusts and the provisions of them, to thy faith, to live above hope, to thy patience, It is the Lord, let him do as seemeth good to him, to thy thankfulness, the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, Blessed be the name of the Lord. If Job should have gazed on his children or substance, he might have been swallowed up in the storm; but God was in his heart, and so the vessel was still safe. But what is it to keep the Creature from the spirit? It is¹ in the phrase of Scripture, N•t to set the Heart upon riches. Apponere cor, to carry a mans heart to the creature, the Prophet gives a fit expression of it when he saith, That the heart doth g•t after covetousness; when a man makes all the motions of his soul wait upon his lusts, ⟨p. 99⟩and drudgeth for them, and bringeth his heart to the edge² of the creature: for the world doth not wound the heart, but the heart woundeth it self upon the world. And it is not the rock alone that dasheth the ship, without its own motion being first tossed by the wind and waves upon the rock; so it is a mans own lust which vexeth his spirit, and not the things alone which he possesseth.

The last direction which I shall give to remove the vexation of the Creature is out of the text, and that is, To keepe it from thy Spirit, not to suffer it to take up thy thoughts and inner man. They are not negotia but viatica onely, and a mans heart ought to be upon his businesse and not upon accessories. If in a tempest men should not addresse themselves to their offices, to loose the tacklings, to draw the pumpe, to strike sailes, and lighten the vessell, but should make it their sole worke to gaze upon their commodities, who could expect that a calme should droppe into such mens laps. Beloved when the Creatures have rais'd a tempest of vexation, thinke upon your Offices, to the pumpe, to powre out thy corruptions, to the sailes and tackling, abate thy lusts and the provisions of them, to thy faith, to live above hope, to thy patience, It is the Lord, let him doe as seemeth good to him, to thy thankfulnesse, the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, Blessed be the name of the Lord. If Iob should have gazed on his children or substance, he might have been swallowed up in the storme; but God was in his heart, and so the vessell was still safe. But what is it to keepe the Creature from the spirit? It is