The trades-man's calling being a discourse concerning the nature, necessity, choice, &c. of a…

5. The Tradesman's Piety is showed, In spiritualizing his Calling. There is in every Calling a Temporal and a Spiritual respect. The outside of them is the Object of Sense; a brutish Man may comprehend that, and get his Living by it; but there is an inside, which only the gracious Eye can read. There is scarce any thing which you trade in, but a Religious Heart may learn something of God out of it. And this (surely) is one end of Similes and Comparisons, so frequent in the Bible, not only that God may come down by them to us, but that we may by them ascend unto him; he hath translated the World into the Scripture, that we may think of the Scripture in the World. This is the safest and richest Chemistry, ⟨p. 205⟩whereby you may extract the purest Spirits out of the grossest Bodies. As the Bee can gather Honey out of every Flower, yea, out of the very Weeds; so may and should the Religious Tradesman gather some Spiritual Lessons, out of his temporal Wares and Employments. Thus the Merchant may learn something from Mat. 13. 45. And all that buy and sell from Mat. 25. 16. and Luk. 29. 15. The Writer from Psal. 45. 1. They that work in Wool from Isa. 1. 18. and Psal. 147. 16. The Apothecary from Eccles. 10. 1. The Carpenter from Isa. 10. 15. and Zech. 1. 20. The Founder from Jer. 8. 29. The Refiner from Mal. 3. 2, 3. The Baker from Hos. 7. 4, 6. The Fisher from Jer. 16. 16