But the same creatures must be admired, studied, loved, honoured, delighted in, and daily used, as they are the excellent work of the Almighty God and reveal to us his Attributes or will, being the Glass in which we must see him while we are in the flesh; and as they lead us to God, and strengthen, furnish or help us in his service. But to Love them for God, and not for themselves, O how hard is it! To keep pure affections towards them and a spiritual delight in in them that shall not degenerate into a carnal delight, is a task for the holiest Saint on Earth, to labour in with all his care and power, as long as he here liveth. Yet this must be done; and the soul that hath obtained true self denial, and is dead to the world, and devoted and alive to God, is able in some good measure to perform it. To love the world for it self, and make the creature our chief delight, and live to it as our End and Idol, this is the common damning course. To cast away ⟨p. 84⟩our possessions, and put our talents into our fellow servants hands, and to withdraw our selves as it were out of the world into solitude as Monks or Herme•s do, this is too like the hiding of our talents, and a dangerous course of unfaithfulness and unprofitableness, unless in some extraordinary case; and is at best the too easy way of weaklings, that will be soldiers only out of the Army, or where there is but little danger of the Enemy; But to keep our Stations, and take Honours, and Riches as our Masters talents, as a burden that we must honour him by bearing, and the instruments by which we must laboriously do him service, and to see and Love him in every creature, and study him in it, and sanctify it to his use; and to see that our lust get no advantage by it, and feed not on it, but that we tame our Bodies, and have all that we have for God, and not for our flesh, this is the hard, but the excellent, most acceptable course of living in this world.
But the same creatures must be admired, studyed, loved, honoured, delighted in, and daily used, as they are the excellent work of the Almighty God and reveal to us his Attributes or will, being the Glass in which we must see him while we are in the flesh; and as they lead us to God, and strengthen, furnish or help us in his service. But to Love them for God, and not for themselves, O how hard is it! To keep pure affections towards them and a spiritual delight in in them that shall not degenerate into a carnal delight, is a task for the holiest Saint on Earth, to labour in with all his care and power, as long as he here liveth. Yet this must be done; and the soul that hath obtained true self denyal, and is dead to the world, and devoted and alive to God, is able in some good measure to perform it. To love the world for it self, and make the creature our chief delight, and live to it as our End and Idol, this is the common damning course. To cast away ⟨p. 84⟩our possessions, and put our talents into our fellow servants hands, and to withdraw our selves as it were out of the world into solitude as Monks or Herme•s do, this is too like the hideing of our talents, and a dangerous course of unfaithfulness and unprofitableness, unless in some extraordinary case; and is at best the too easie way of weaklings, that will be souldiers only out of the Army, or where there is but little danger of the Enemy; But to keep our Stations, and take Honours, and Riches as our Masters talents, as a burden that we must honour him by bearing, and the instruments by which we must laboriously do him service, and to see and Love him in every creature, and study him in it, and sanctifie it to his use; and to see that our lust get no advantage by it, and feed not on it, but that we tame our Bodies, and have all that we have for God, and not for our flesh, this is the hard, but the excellent, most acceptable course of living in this world.
