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

And as you your selves are Gods own as he is your Creator and Redeemer, so all that you have is his own as the bestower, or as your Master that trusteth it in your hands. Exod. 19. 5. [Now therefore if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my Covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure to me above all people: for all the earth is mine.] And saith God to Job, Job 41. 11. [What soever is under the whole heaven is mine.] Psalm 50. 10, 11, 12. [Every beast of the Forrest is mine: the wild beasts of the field are mine: the world is mine, and the fullness thereof.] 1 Cor. 4. 7. What hast thou which thou didst not receive?] Thou hast not a minute of time which thou owest not to God; nor a thought, nor a word, nor a farthing of thy estate. And is it not the basest injustice and dishonesty to give these to thy flesh, and deny them to him, and think his service an unnecessary thing? If thou wilt give the world and thy lusts any thing, let it be that which thou canst truly call thine own. As God saith to the Idolaters, Ezek. 16. 18, 19. [Thou hast set mine oil, and mine incense before them▪ my meat also which I gave thee, &c.] so may he say •o thee: It is his Time which thou hast consumed in idleness and in sinful delights; and his Provision by which thou hast •ed thy lusts. But the sanctified man is devoted to God. His study is to give him his own. All the business of his life which you account his over-much strictness and preciseness, is nothing but his Honesty to God, in giving him his own. You look your horse should travail for you, and your Ox should labour for you, and your servant work for you, because they are your own: And shall not we give up all that we have to God, that are much more his own? Will you hang them that take your Own from you? and count them Honest that deal worse with God? Say not, If Christ were here, we would give it him. For he hath told you how you should use all his talents in his Laws; and if you deny them to the poor, or any holy use that he requireth them, you deny them unto him. Read