A saint or a brute the certain necessity and excellency of holiness, &c. ...…

Dir. 2. Come near and search into the inwards of a holy life, and try it a little while your selves, if you would taste the pleasure of it: and do not stand looking on it at a distance, where you see nothing but the out side: nor judge by bare hearsay, which giveth you no taste or relish of it. The sweetness of honey, or wine, o• meat is not known by looking on it, but by tasting it. Come near and try what it is to live in the Love of God, and in the belief and hope of life eternal, and in universal obedience to the laws of Christ; and then tell us how these things do relish with you. You will never know the sweetness of them effectually, as long as you are but lookers on. It was the similitude which Peter Martyr used in a Sermon, which converted the Noble Neapolitan Marquess of Uicum, Galeacius Caracciolus, (who forsook wife, and children, and honours, and lands, and country, and all for the liberty of the Reformed Religion at Geneva:) saith he, [If you see the motion of dancers a far off, and hear not the Music, you will think they are frantic: but when you come near and hear the music, and observe their harmonical orderly motion, you will take delight in it, and desire to join with them.] So men that judge at a distance of the truth and holy ways of God, by the slanderous reports of malignant men, will think of the godly as Festus of Paul that they are beside themselves. But if they come among them, and search more impartially into the reasons of their course, and specially ⟨p. 350⟩if they join with them in the inwards and vital actions of religion, they will then be quickly of another mind, and not go back for all the pleasures or profits of the world. In the works of Nature, (and sometimes of Art) the outside is so far from showing you the excellencies, that it is but a comely veil to hide them. Though you would have a handsome cover for your watch, yet doth it but hide the well ordered frame, and useful motions that are within: You must open it, and there observe the parts and motions, if you would pass a right judgement of the work. You would have a comely cover for your Books: but it is but to hide the well composed letters from your sight, in which the sense and use and excellency doth consist. You must open it, if you will read it and know the worth of it.

Dir. 2. Come neer and search into the inwards of a holy life, and try it a little while your selves, if you would taste the pleasure of it: and do not stand looking on it at a distance, where you see nothing but the out side: nor judge by bare hearsay, which giveth you no taste or relish of it. The sweetness of honey, or wine, o meat is not known by looking on it, but by tasting it. Come neer and try what it is to live in the Love of God, and in the belief and hope of life eternal, and in universal obedience to the laws of Christ; and then tell us how these things do relish with you. You will never know the sweetness of them effectually, as long as you are but lookers on. It was the similitude which Peter Martyr used in a Sermon, which converted the Noble Neopolitane Marquess of Uicum, Galeacius Caracciolus, (who forsook wife, and children, and honours, and lands, and countrey, and all for the liberty of the Reformed Religion at Geneva:) saith he, [If you see the motion of dancers a far off, and hear not the Musick, you will think they are frantick: but when you come near and hear the musick, and observe their harmonical orderly motion, you will take delight in it, and desire to joyn with them.] So men that judge at a distance of the truth and holy ways of God, by the slanderous reports of malignant men, will think of the godly as Festus of Paul that they are beside themselves. But if they come among them, and search more impartially into the reasons of their course, and specially