The life of faith in three parts, the first is a sermon on Heb.…

13. You teach your servants that life which yet you will not ⟨p. 487⟩endure in them: For why should they be more careful and diligent in the work which you command them, than you in the work which God commandeth you? Are you the better Masters? or, will you find them better work? or, will you pay them better wages? I know God needeth not your service, as you do theirs: But he commandeth it, for other ends, though he need it not. And should any be more careful• to please you, that are but worms and dust, than you should be to please your Maker? If an idle life be best, why do you blame it in your servants? If it be not, why do you live such lives your selves?

14. By Idleness you show that when you do labour, it is but for your carnal selves, and that it is not God whom you serve in your daily callings. He that will labour when he is poor, and feeleth the necessity of it, and will give over all, and live idly, and playfully when he is rich, doth show that he laboureth not in obedience to God (or else he would continue it) but merely to supply his bodily wants. You have your reward then from your selves, and you cannot in reason expect any from God. But true Believers have another rule, by which they live, Col. 3.23, 24. Whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not to men; knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance, for ye serve the Lord Christ.

14. By Idleness you shew that when you do labour, it is but for your carnal selves, and that it is not God whom you serve in your daily callings. He that will labour when he is poor, and feeleth the necessity of it, and will give over all, and live idly, and playfully when he is rich, doth shew that he laboureth not in obedience to God (or else he would continue it) but meerly to supply his bodily wants. You have your reward then from your selves, and you cannot in reason expect any from God. But true Believers have another rule, by which they live,