Four useful discourses viz. ... /Four usefull discourses viz. ... /

Now though the very naming of these things may show he difficulty of it, yet we shall come in the Second place, to show that there's a great deal of difficulty in Mens and Women's knowing how to be full: And I name this the rather, because I would put your hearts upon exercise, that you may not lightly pass over what is said, when we speak of knowing how to be full; for it is ordinary for Men that have estates and outward comforts, to slight the Word. Well, Let me have what will satisfy me, and for this lesson, to know how to be full, I hope we shall do well enough for that. Now for this, that you may not slight the lesson; I shall show you something about the difficulty of it.

Now though the very naming of these things may shew he difficulty of it, yet we shall come in the Second place, to shew that there's a great deale of difficulty in Mens and Womens knowing how to be full: And I name this the rather, because I would put your hearts upon exercise, that you may not lightly pass over what is said, when we speak of knowing how to be full; for it is ordinary for Men that have estates and outward comforts, to slight the Word. Well, Let me have what will satisfie me, and for this lesson, to know how to be full, I hope we shall do well enough for that. Now for this, that you may not slight the lesson; I shall shew you something about the difficulty of it.

You that are Mariners, If you may have Sea-room enough, you care not; you think then you can do well enough, but though you can do well enough in your Art, ⟨p. 21⟩when you have Sea-room; yet the truth is, you do the worst for your selves, when you have the greatest Sea of prosperity, there you do worst of all; and it is your Sea-room that doth undo you: I mean the abundance of outward prosperity, it is that ordinarily which doth undo men. So it is easier a great deal, you know, for one to manage a little Boat in the Thames, then for one to be able to manage an East-Indian Ship. The truth is, less skill will serve for the ordering of a mans estate when it is low and mean in the world, than when he comes to be full. It were a mad thing for a man that can but only row in the Thames, to undertake the command of one of your greatest Ships: And so it is for those that are mean, if God doth not teach them how to be full, they are like to undo themselves by their fullness as well as any way. It is easier for a man to manage a little estate that he hath, then for him to manage great merchandizing. There is more difficulty and skill required in fullness, than in other ways; as extremity of heat is harder to bear than cold: though it be very cold, yet by exercise we may get our selves a heat: but when it is extreme hot weather, that's very tedious, and it breeds diseases. And so it is easier to carry a Cup that is but half full steadily, than to carry a Cup that is brim-full. And a Traveller (you know the expression) the storm and the tempest makes him to get his Cloak closer together, and to hold it faster: but when the warm beams of the Sun comes and shines upon him, that makes him cast off his Cloak. You know the Fable of the Sun and the Wind to get the Travellers Cloak, which should do it; when the Wind came blustering, that could not do it; but the warm Sun beams, that made him throw it off. So many times those that can hold fastest in the time of adversity, yet in the time of prosperity they