A supplement to The Morning-exercise at Cripple-Gate, or, Several more cases of conscience practically…

(8). Love to the world is the root of all sin; and therefore what more inconsistent with the love of God? To love God is to hate evil, Psal. 97.10. therefore to love evil, either in the cause or effect, is to hate God. Now love to the world has not only a love for, but also a causal influence on all sin. And that, (1) As it exposeth men to the violent incursion and assaults of every tentation, so 1 Tim. 6.9. But they that will be rich. [Greek or Hebrew], they that have their wills biassed with a violent bent, or vehement weight of carnal love towards riches. This Solomon expresseth, Prov. 28.22. By hasting to be rich. What befalls such? why, saith Paul, such fall into tentation, and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in perdition and destruction: and then he gives the reason and cause of it, v. 10. For the love of money is the root of all evil, &c. i. e. There is no sin, but may call the love of money Father: whence Philo calls it [Greek or Hebrew], the Metropolis of evil. (2). Love to the world is the cause of all sin, in that it blinds and darkens the mind, which opens the door to all sin. It is an observation of the prudent moralist^(t), that every lover is blind about that he loves, which he himself interprets, of love to lower goods. And oh! how true is this of those that love the world? what a black veil of darkness is there on their minds, as to what they love? hence Paul calls such mens love, 1 Tim. 6.9. foolish lusts. They are indeed foolish, not only eventually, but causally, as they make men fools and sots. (3). Love to the world stifles all convictions, breaks all chains and bars of restraining grace, and so opens a more effectual door to all sin. We find a prodigious example hereof in Balaam, Numb. 22.22, 40. where you see at large, how his predominant love to the wages of unrighteousness, 2 Pet. 2.15. stifled all those powerful convictions of, and resolutions against sin he lay under. (4). Love to the world is the disease and death of the soul, and therefore the life of sin,