A plain discourse upon uprightness showing the properties and privileges of an upright man…A plain discourse upon uprightness shewing the properties and priviledges of an upright man…

But there is a culpable Temporizing when a man hath so mastered his Conscience, and reduced it to that ready ¹flexibleness, that for worldly ends he can think, and speak, and act, one way, this day, this month, this year, and next day, next month, next year another way; can set his sails to every wind, please every body, to profit or preserve himself: Can turn, return, overturn, any turn to serve his own turn. And this temper is directly opposite to that uprightness we are describing. The upright man is deliberate in choosing and settling his principles, but a thousand worlds shall not alter him without clear evidence in his Conscience. He is not a twining Willow, but a sturdy Oak; and whether the point he differ in, be small or great, if a matter of Conscience, though he will not be factious, troublesome, or uncharitable; yet all the Rhetoric or Rigour on Earth, will not remove an upright man from his course, till God do make the business clear upon his Conscience.

But there is a culpable Temporizing when a man hath so master'd his Conscience, and reduced it to that ready ¹flexibleness, that for worldly ends he can think, and speak, and act, one way, this day, this month, this year, and next day, next month, next year another way; can set his sails to every wind, please every body, to profit or preserve himself: Can turn, return, overturn, any turn to serve his own turn. And this temper is directly opposite to that uprightness we are describing. The upright man is deliberate in chusing and setling his principles, but a thousand worlds shall not alter him without clear evidence in his Conscience. He is not a twining Willow, but a sturdy Oak; and whether the point he differ in, be small or great, if a matter of Conscience, though he will not be factious, troublesome, or uncharitable; yet all the Rhetorick or Rigour on Earth, will not remove an upright man from his course, till God do make the business clear upon his Conscience.

1. 1Like Theophilus Bishop of Alexandria, who was nam'd Euripus for his ebbing and flowing in matters of Religion: for a Bishopric he would swear to the Nicene Council, and then to keep it, he would for swear it again.Like Theophilus Bishop of Alexandria, who was nam'd Euripus for his ebbing and flowing in matters of Relgion: for a Bishoprick he would swear to the Nicene Council, and then to keep it, he would for swear it again.