The crucifying of the world

SECT. XIII.

1. AND as you see that the Christian Doctrine teacheth this: So 2. It is thence clear without any more ado, that wherever the Cross and Doctrine of Christ are effectual, the world is Crucified to that man, and he to the world. There are some great Duties which a man may possibly be saved, though he omit them, in some cases: but this is none such. It is a wonder to see the security of worldlings, how easily they bear up a confidence of their sincerity, under this sin which is as inconsistent with sincerity as Infidelity it self is • If they see a man live in common Drunkenness, or Adultery, or Swearing, they take him for a profane and miserable wretch; and good reason for it: When in the mean time they pass no such sentence on themselves, who may deserve it as much as the worst of these. It is one notable cheat among the Papists, that occasions the ruin of many a soul, that they make a Religious mortified life, to be a work of supererogation, and those that profess it, (and some of their own inventions with it, which turn it into sin) they Cloister up from the rest of the world, and these they call Religious people, and some few even of these that are either more devout or superstitious then the rest, they call Saints. So rare a thing is the appearance of Religiousness and Sanctity among them, that it must be enclosed in Societies, not only separated from the world, as the Church is, but separated as it were out of the Church it self. And yet the common people are kept in hope ⟨p. 75⟩of salvation in their way. By which means they are commonly brought to imagine that it is not absolutely necessary to salvation to be a Religious man, or a Saint, or one that doth really renounce and crucify the world; but that these things belong to certain Orders of Monks and Fryers, and that it is enough for other men to honour these devout and mortified Saints, and to crave their Prayers, and do some lower and easier things. And indeed their vows of Chastity, and separation, and unprofitableness, and other Inventions of their own, they may well conceive unnecessary to others, being noxious to themselves. But they will one day find that none but Religious men and Saints shall be saved, and that every true Member of Christ is dead to the world, and not only Monks, or Votaries, or such like. And a Conceit too like to this of the Papists, is in the minds of many of our Auditors.