their sincere desire, aim, and endeavour to do their duty in every respect. But it is generally far otherwise with hypocrites; in some things they are like Christians, in others like heathens. Sometimes they appear earnestly religious in duties that immediately respect God, as in attending ordinances, and in appearing devout in external duties of the first table; but in duties that respect their neighbour, there is but little appearance of Christianity. Some behave themselves like saints in God's house, and like devils at home. Some seem to be very religious abroad, in the house of God, and also at the houses of their neighbours, at private meetings, and in religious conferences; but if you follow them into their own families, and observe their carriage there towards those who dwell under the same roof, towards their wives, or husbands, or children, or servants, their behaviour there does not at all consist with the other. So some may carry themselves well in their families, and yet are wretchedly negligent of the religion of the closet. Some seem to be religious men, who are not honest men; some are honest men, and are not religious. They are willing to pay their debts, to speak the truth, and to avoid all knavish actions, all low and underground management; but as to religion, or to seeking God in the religious use of his ordinances, and in reading his holy word, in meditation and prayer, there is but little of this to be seen in them.

Some are honest men with respect to strict commutative justice, but they are not charitable men; they are selfish, covetous, close, and unmerciful. Some seem to be generous and liberal, and yet are very proud and haughty; their honour is their God. Some are very strict and exemplary as to all that can be seen of men, but secretly they live in some abominable practice. So their practice does not consist with itself; it is not of a piece. God complains of this self-inconsistence in Israel of old. Hosea vii. 8. "Ephraim hath mixed himself among the people; Ephraim is a cake not turned." "He hath mixed himself among the people;" that is, he was conversant with the heathen nations, and mingled the religion and customs of an Israelite with those of the heathen; so that he was inconsistent with himself, he was partly an Israelite and partly a heathen. "He is a cake not turned," alluding to their custom of baking cakes on the hearth, or in the sun; where, if they were not turned, one side would be baked, and the other raw. So they on one side seemed to appear religious, and like saints, but on the other, wicked and impure. So it was with the Pharisees; in some things they appeared eminently religious, but in others they behaved themselves as some of the vilest of men. Matth. xxiii. 14. 23. "Wo unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!

for ye devour widows' houses, and for a pretence, make long prayers; therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation. Wo unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint, and anise, and cumin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone." A true saint is sanctified throughout, in soul, body, and spirit; he has put off the old man with his deeds, and has He has put on the new man; he is all over a new creature. not only a new hand and head, but he is a new man, all the members are new. But hypocrites are monsters; they have a saint's tongue, and a devil's heart. The members do not well consist together. They are inconsistent with themselves as they go about to serve two masters, God and Mammon, which Christ has taught us to be a great inconsistence. They are alike inconsistent as the Samaritans were, who would serve the God of Israel, and their own god too. 2 Kings xvii. 28, &c. "Then one of the priests, whom they had carried away from Samaria, came and dwelt in Bethel, and taught them how they should fear the Lord. Howbeit every nation made gods of their own, and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt."

There is the like inconsistence in them as was in Judas, who betrayed Christ with a kiss. How ill did those two things in Judas consist together, his coming to him, and kissing him; his seeming to show himself his friend, and at the same time betraying him to death! But it was no greater inconsistency than is commonly found with hypocritical professors, who carry themselves as Christ's friends, and as though he were very dear to them in some things, and yet act the part of mortal enemies in others, and by their wicked behaviour do indeed betray his cause and interest.

Secondly. Their wicked practice in one thing is inconsistent with their wicked practice in others. It is a common thing for wicked men to quarrel with God for permitting those things which they allow themselves, and practice with delight. It is common for wicked men to ascribe the blame of their wickedness to God, therein following their first father, Adam. So men will often lay the blame of their being unconverted, and having lived so wicked a life, so carnal, careless, and evil a life, to God, and especially under conviction, to quarrel with God for it; and yet they approved of those things which they did themselves, with full consent and approbation.

And, again. It is common for wicked men to contend with men, and hate their neighbour for doing the same

thing that

So an unjust

they do themselves, and allow in themselves. man, a backbiter and reviler, a revengeful man, will condemn in others the sin which he allows in himself. And so, many other instances might be mentioned. And thus I have showed through all the instances proposed, how wicked men are inconsistent with themselves.

APPLICATION.

1. Hence we may see the woful ruin which sin has brought on the nature of man. Man was not thus in his first estate. If we had nothing but the light of nature, or the light of our own reason to guide us, that would be sufficient to lead us to conclude that man in his first estate was not made thus by his Creator, who has made other things in such excellent order and harmony. We see that God hath so made the world, that one thing sweetly harmonizes with another, all things are adapted to each other, the nature of one thing to the nature of another; one thing to be subservient to another; and all things subject to the laws that the Creator has fixed.

We therefore, without the scripture, should have all reason to conclude that man, the most noble of all the creatures in the visible world, was not made in this state of woful inconsistency with himself; so that all the faculties of his nature are at war with each other, and at war with themselves; so that now there is nothing but the most dreadful confusion to be seen.

But the scripture teaches us plainly that God saw all things that he had created and made, and behold, they were very good; and particularly that God made man upright, and that it is himself that has brought ruin on his own nature. In man's first estate all things were in perfect order in his nature. There shone such a light in his understanding as led him to right judgments of things, all the dictates of his understanding were consistent one with another. And then his reason, the superior faculty, kept its place, and bare rule in him over the other faculties, and there was no principle or faculty of his nature but what was subject to its dictates, nothing rose up in rebellion against it. His will then was agreeable to his reason, and agreeable with itself; there was a perfect harmony between his outward appearance and his inward character; his mouth and his heart, and his mouth and practice then agreed together, and his practice then was of a piece; until he ate of the forbidden fruit, all was in perfect order, and peace, and decorum, both within and without.

But what was the consequence when man hearkened to the devil, and rebelled against his Maker? We learn, by what has been said under this doctrine, that then the Spirit of God de

parted from him, and with his influence, God's holy image also, the life, the crown, and glory of his nature left him, and all light, and regularity, and order were gone, and a worse darkness and confusion succeeded than was in the primitive chaos when it was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And such is the woful confusion of the nature of all men now in their fallen state. Now their reason determines one thing, and their governing practical judgment the reverse of it; and their judgment in some things is utterly inconsistent with their judgment in others. Now the will is in no consistency with the reason, but commonly determines directly contrary to its dictates. Men's wills are in such bondage and slavery to their lusts, that they are not only determined contrary to their own consciences to choose those things which their reason tells them are unjust, and vile, and unbecoming their nature, but also those things which their reason at the same time declares to be exceedingly against their own highest interest, even so as to tend to their everlasting perdition. Yea, their dispositions are not only contrary to their own reason and consciences, but contrary to themselves; there is not only war between faculty and faculty, but the very same faculty is at war with itself, so that they do in some respects choose and refuse the same things at the same time. There are some things that they seem earnestly to wish for, and yet indeed are at the same time utterly averse to, and refuse, and will by no means accept of when offered; yea, they will not have them though they are urged and entreated, and pleaded with for years together to accept of them. So inconsistent are their dispositions with themselves, that they will not have spiritual and divine things as they are, nor yet will they have them otherwise. They do not like God as he is, they find abundance of fault with him, they are urged to accept of him as their God, but they will by no means comply with it. They reject him, and have an enmity against him; they love to keep at a distance from him, and to have as little as possible to do with him, and will not hearken to him, or submit to him, but are ever maintaining a kind of warfare against him, because they do not like him as he is. And yet they would not like him if he were any otherwise. If it were possible that he could be altered from what he is in any respect whatsoever, they would refuse to accept him as their God then. They are enemies to him because he is so holy and just a God, and yet they would not like him if he were unholy and unjust; they do not like his Almighty power, and yet they would not like him if he were weak. They also dislike his knowing all things, and yet they would dislike him if he were ignorant. They quarrel with God for the exercise

of

of his infinite mercy and grace to others, and the more for its being so great in some instances, in being exercised towards those who are so unworthy; and yet they would not like him if he were not infinitely merciful; they would wish him to be merciful enough to pardon the most unworthy, and yet sometimes quarrel with him because he is no more merciful.

Now there is a similar inconsistency in them with themselves in that they do not like men for being godly; they have an enmity against such sort of men: and at the same time, they do not like those who are godly, they hate men for being wicked, and will have a bitter spirit against them for it. The world in its fallen state cannot agree with the church of God; it has always had a spite against it, and has almost always from the beginning of the world hitherto been persecuting it; and yet neither can they agree among themselves, but are at the same time contending and quarrelling with one another. And as there is no suiting them in this world, so neither is there any suiting them in another; they would neither go to heaven, nor to hell. They do not like heaven because it is holy; and yet they would not like it, if it were a world of wickedness. And such is the jarring and confusion that is in their disposition, that those things that they do choose are impossibilities, and self-contradictions, and self-inconsistences. They would have a sufficient Saviour and not a holy one; they would have one good, and excellent, and holy enough to save them, and yet would not have one with any holiness at all. They have a mind to have salvation from misery, without salvation from sin; when sin is their misery. They have a mind to have light, and yet to keep darkness without light; they would have a light, consisting in darkness; and sweet, consisting in bitterness; and good, consisting in evil. They would have such a sort of happiness as is impossible in its own nature; for they would have happiness with unholiness, which is as much as to say they would be happy men, and yet remain destroyed and ruined. And when life and death are set before them to choose, and they are urged to make their choice, and told that they must certainly have one or the other, that there is no possibility of avoiding it; yet they will come to a deliberate determinate choice to have neither one nor the other. They are always halting between two opinions, they are always choosing and yet never come to a choice. Instead of those holy principles that man had in his heart at first, that sweetly consented one with another, he has now introduced into his soul a number of vile and hateful lusts, that clash one with another : pride clashing with covetousness, and covetousness thwarting sensuality, and sloth crushing all these; and instead of the purity in body and mind, which man had at first, he is now, if he has