A treatise of self-denial. By Richard Baxter, pastor of the church at KidderminsterA treatise of self-denial. By Richard Baxter, pastor of the church at Kederminster

CHAP. LXXII. To be left to self, is the sorest plague.

10. Lastly, remember, that to be given over to our selves is the heaviest plague on this side Hell: And therefore he that delighteth not to be miserable should not desire to be selfish. To be given over to the Love of your selves, is to turn from the Love of the blessed God to the Love of a filthy sinner, and so to forfeit Gods love to you. To be given over to care for your selves, is to forfeit the fatherly care of God, and to be at the care of a silly insufficient improvident sinner. To be given over to your own Conceits or Wisdom, is to be forsaken of the Sun, and left in darkness, and spend the rest of your days in a Dungeon, the beginning of the endless utter darkness. To be given over to your own wills, is to be at the choice and disposal of a fool and of an enemy; and to be in such hands as will certainly undo you, and to be cast out of the hands of God: To be given over to seek your selves, is to lose your selves and God, and your salvation. To be given over to live as your own, is to forfeit the Protection of God, without which you cannot be kept an hour out of hell. To be given over to the defending of your selves, and delivering your selves in danger of soul and body, is even to be exposed to certain and perpetual perdition. To be given over to be ruled by your selves, is to be relinquished as Rebels, and exposed to the tyranny of sin and Satan. So that in all things it is most certain, that you are never well but in the hands of God, and never so ill as when you are most in your own hands. In Paradise innocent man was wholly at the Government of God: and when by casting off his Government ⟨p. 399⟩he had forfeited the benefit of it, the most of the world became even brutish: And when God had owned the Government of Israel above other Nations, and kept the choice of the Sovereign under him in his own hands, at last the foolish people in imitation of the Nations must needs have a King, and extort the Nomination out of the hands of special extraordinary Providence, that they might have more of it in their own; and this was an increase of their misery. Woe to that man that ever he was born, that is finally given over to himself: For this is a sign that God hath forsaken them, and they stand at the brink of eternal death. O think of this you that are self-conceited, and selfwilled, and self-lovers, and self-seekers, and know not how to deny your selves: