The excellency of holy courage in evil times by Jeremiah Burroughs

First, There may be a difference discerned by that which hath been said; there is something is constant: ⟨p. 117⟩Whether is that which lay at the root of grace in you still there? If you do not find those two things constant (viz. An approving of the life and power and strictness of godliness; and a savour of that which is spiritual, either in Ordinances, or in Gods People) all your good moods in the world, though your hearts be never so up, will not discover the truth of grace.

First, There may be a difference discerned by that which hath been said; there is somthing is constant: ⟨p. 117⟩Whether is that which lay at the root of grace in you still there? If you do not find those two things constant (viz. An approving of the life and power and strictness of godliness; and a savor of that which is spiritual, either in Ordinances, or in Gods People) all your good moods in the world, though your hearts be never so up, wil not discover the truth of grace.

Secondly, Those that have only some good moods at some time, and no bottom of any true grace, they in their good moods are not humbled for that which was failing in them before; their hearts indeed are sometimes up, and they bless themselves in that; but now this doth not make them look back how it was heretofore with them, and to be ashamed and humbled for the wretchedness, and distempers of their hearts formerly: but where the heart is up for God in those that have truth of grace, when their hearts are most up, then they make use of this to be abased, and humbled in their own thoughts for the deadness and distemper that was in their hearts before; the good moods of others rather puff them up, than further any work of humiliation for any evil that was in them before, they think these good moods now, and being in a good temper, shall satisfy God for their evil distempers that were in them before: But it is not so with a gracious heart, a gracious heart when it does get up, it makes use of this work of God upon it, to be ashamed and confounded in its self for those evil distempers that were in it before. The more the heart is up, the more discovery it hath of its own baseness, and vileness, and wretchedness, which others when their hearts are up, have not.