A Body of Practical Divinity

4. If we love a Child more than God, we make a God of it. How many are guilty in this kind! They think more of their Children, and delight more in them, than in God: They grieve more for the loss of their First-born, than for the loss of their first Love. This is to make an Idol of a Child, and to set it in Gods room. Thus God is oft provoked to take away our Children: If we love the Jewel more than him that gave it, God will take away the Jewel, that our love may return to him again.

Use 1. It Reproaches such as have other Gods, and so renounce the true God. 1. Such as set up Idols, Jer. 2.28. According to the number of thy Cities, are thy Gods, O Israel. Hos. 12.11. Their Altars are as heaps in the Furrows of the Field. 2. Such as seek to Familiar Spirits. This is a Sin condemned by the Law of God, Deut. 18.11. There shall not be found among you, any that consult with Familiar Spirits. It is ordinary if People have lost any of their Goods, they send to Wizards and Soothsayers, to know how they may come by their Goods again. What is this but for People to make a God of the Devil, by consulting with him, and putting their Trust in him? What! because you have lost your Goods, will you lose your Souls too? 2 Kings 1.6. So is it not because you think there is not a God in Heaven, that you ask Council of the Devil? If any be guilty, be humbled.

Use 1. It Reproaches such as have other Gods, and so renounce the true God. 1. Such as set up Idols, Ier. 2.28. According to the number of thy Cities, are thy Gods, O Israel. Hos. 12.11. Their Altars are as heaps in the Furrows of the Field. 2. Such as seek to Familiar Spirits. This is a Sin condemned by the Law of God,