The Grace and Duty of Being Spiritually Minded

This therefore being the original cause of all that disability of mind as unto steadiness in holy Thoughts and Meditations whereof you do complain, when you are affected therewith, turn unto the consideration of that from whence it doth proceed. Labour to be humbled greatly, and to walk humbly under a sense of the Remainders of this Vanity of mind. So some wholesome Fruits may be taken from this bitter Root; and Meat may come out of this Eater. If when you cannot abide in holy Thoughts of God, and your Relation unto him, you reflect on this cause of it to your further Humiliation and self-abasement, your Good designs and purposes are not lost. Let such an one say; I began to think of God, of his Love and Grace in Christ Jesus, of my Duty towards him; and where now in a few minutes do I find my self? I am got into the Ends of the earth, into things useless and earthly; or am at such a loss as that I have no mind to proceed in the work wherein I was engaged. O wretched man that I am, what a cursed Enemy have I within me! I am ashamed of my self, weary of my self, loath my self, who shall deliver me from this Body of Death? Such Thoughts may be as useful unto him as those which he first designed.

This therefore being the original cause of all that disabilty of mind as unto steadiness in holy Thoughts and Meditations whereof you do complain, when you are affected therewith, turn unto the consideration of that from whence it doth proceed. Labour to be humbled greatly, and to walk humbly under a sence of the Remainders of this Vanity of mind. So some wholesom Fruits may be taken from this bitter Root; and Meat may come out of this Eater. If when you cannot abide in holy Thoughts of God, and your Relation unto him, you reflect on this cause of it to your further Humiliation and self-abasement, your Good designs and purposes are not lost. Let such an one say; I began to think of God, of his Love and Grace in Christ Jesus, of my Duty towards him; and where now in a few minutes do I find my self? I am got into the Ends of the earth, into things useless and earthly; or am at such a loss as that I have no mind to proceed in the work wherein I was ingaged. O wretched man that I am, what a cursed Enemy have I within me! I am asham'd of my self, weary of my self, loath my self, who shall deliver me from this Body of Death? Such Thoughts may be as useful unto him as those which he first designed.