not only to keep our hands from picking and stealing, and our tongues from lying and swearing; not only to keep the members of our bodies from the actual commission of any known sin, but to keep our hearts too, and all the faculties of our souls, in the proper frame and disposition which they ought to be always in. II. And that is the second thing to be here considered, the act to be exerted upon this subject; "Keep thy heart." But the heart signifying, as I have shewn, the whole inner man; the keeping of the heart cannot possibly signify any thing else but the preserving the several faculties and inward motions also of the soul in their due order, so as to correspond with the rules laid down for them in the Holy Scripture. In order, therefore, to your right understanding what it is to keep your hearts, I shall shew you, by piece-meal, how you ought to keep every thing that is in them. 1. First, therefore, for your thoughts; the first and most immediate acts of the soul: them you must be sure to keep steady, and fixed upon their right and proper objects, and so pure and clean in themselves. You cannot but be all sensible how nimble, how active, how busy and restless your thoughts are, continually frisking about from one object to another, and from one place to another, how far or distant soever they be asunder; sometimes wandering as far as France, or Spain, or Turkey, anywhere where a man hath ever been, and then presently at home again, in your shops or houses; now soaring aloft in heaven, and in the twinkling of an eye got down to earth again, there roving about from sin to sin, from one vain object to another. So it hath been all along, and so it is still with all men by nature. Their thoughts are not only evil, but they are nothing else but Gen. 6. 5. evil; and that too not only now and then, but continually, at all times, in all places, in all companies, in all employments, even sacred as well as civil: yea, commonly, vain, impertinent, and sinful thoughts, are more apt to crowd themselves into men's minds in the performance of religious duties, than at other times. How many places have your thoughts been in, how many employments have they been busy about, since you came into God's presence! How justly may God complain of us, as He did of His people SERM. Israel. Their hearts, that is, their thoughts, are running Ezek.33.31. upon their trades, their shops, their farms, their merchan CXXXVIII. dise, their estates, and every thing they are covetous and desirous of, even upon any thing rather than the work they are about. Thus it is continually in our very approaches unto God; how much more at other times! But this must not be if you desire to be truly holy; you must bridle your very thoughts, and keep them within their bounds, or else you are never likely either to be or do good. Whatsoever duty you perform, you must keep your hearts and thoughts close unto it, or at least do what you can to do so, otherwise it can never be acceptable unto God. And at all other times, you must watch and guard your fancy and imaginations, that they may not spend themselves upon foolish and impertinent, much less upon vicious and sinful objects: but keep them in that order and discipline, that they may march in rank and file, regularly and directly, towards such things as they were at first made and designed to be fixed upon as the perfections of God, the merits of Jesus Christ, the excellency of holiness, the sinfulness of sin, the vanity of the world, the glory of Heaven, the miseries of hell, and suchlike objects as tend to the deterring you from vice, and the alluring of you to the exercise of grace and virtue. This is the only way to keep your hearts clean and free from worldly, lascivious, uncharitable, malicious, revengeful, proud, and ambitious thoughts, which otherwise will certainly infest and defile you. For do what you can, your agile thoughts will be running upon something or other; and if you do not watch them narrowly and keep them fixed upon proper and good objects, they will fly out, and light upon what is sinful and mischievous. 2. As you must keep your thoughts always pure and clean, so you must be sure to keep your judgments sound and orthodox. Where, by your judgments, I mean your settled thoughts concerning particular truths or falsehood; which is a thing that we must have an especial care of, so as not to think that to be true which is false, nor yet that false which is true; for every such thought is erroneous, and by consequence sinful. I confess an orthodox faith can never bring us to Heaven without a holy life; but so nei orthodox faith; for ther can a holy life do it, without an heresies are damnable, as well as sins. because heresies are as much against the assertions, as sin is against the command, of God, revealed in Scripture. Hence our Saviour speaks of false prophets, which should teach such doctrines, and back them with such "signs and won- Matt.24.24. ders, as, if it were possible, they should deceive the very elect." A place much to be observed: for it plainly shews, that there are such doctrines and opinions held and taught by some, which will certainly ruin and destroy them which believe or espouse them. For, it seems, it is impossible for "the elect" to be deceived with them, because if they were, they could not be saved: and therefore, it is not so indifferent a thing, as some would make it, what opinion a man is of: for it seems a man may be damned for his evil opinions, as well as his evil practices; insomuch, that heresies Gal. 5. 20, are reckoned among the grossest sins; a necessary caution for this age, wherein there have been more errors and heresies broached by some, and swallowed down by others, than in any other age since the world began. But as you tender your eternal Salvation have a care of them: "be not tossed [Eph.4.14.] to and fro with every wind of doctrine:" have a care of new doctrines and opinions, started up in these latter days: but keep close to the articles and principles of religion established in our Church: which are all grounded upon Scripture, consonant to reason, and agreeable to the doctrine of the primitive Christians, as may be easily demonstrated. But whatsoever is new, beware of it upon that very account, because it is new, following the Apostle's advice to Timothy, 66 21. "O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, 1Tim. 6. 20, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of 21. science falsely so called: which some professing have erred concerning the faith." 3. Keep your consciences "void of offence towards God Acts 24. 16, and man." Be sure to avoid whatsoever may defile or offend these, as be sure every sin doth. For which end you must also keep your consciences always awake, that they may duly perform their office, in excusing, or else in accusing of you, according to your merit or demerit. Above all things have a care they be not galled with a heavy sin; SERM. but that their testimony may afford you matter of comfort 2 Cor. 1. 12. and rejoicing, rather than of trouble and remorse. CXXXVIII. 4. You must keep your memories faithful and retentive of the best things, and such as are most necessary and advantageous for you; though no man can remember all things, all men can remember some things: there is no man so forgetful but he can remember his bills, his bonds, and all his concerns in this life. And these are generally the only objects that men exercise their memories about; making their memories the storehouse only of their temporal affairs. But he that would keep his heart aright, must lay up better things in it, than what this world can Deut. 8.18; afford him. Thus you are commanded to remember the Jer. 2. 32. Lord your God; and to remember His Law; your sins; and Mal. 4. 4. Christ, for which the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper is ordained. And he that doth not keep those and suchlike things fresh in his mind and memory, can never be said to keep his heart aright. Eccles.12.1; Ezek.16.61. 63. Luke 22.19. Col. 3. 2. 5. To the keeping of your hearts aright, it is required that you keep a strict watch over your wills, and their several motions or inclinations, which we usually call passions or affections: you must not suffer them to be entangled amongst the briars and thorns, the vexatious trifles and tormenting vanities of this lower world, but you must 1 John 2.15. keep them aloft, soaring amongst the transcendent glories that are above. Your love, your desire, your hope, your joy, must be all fixed only upon God, the chiefest good; your hatred, your abhorrence, your grief, your anger, must be exercised only upon sin, the worst of all evils. These are the proper objects of your several passions: and therefore, as you must not love or desire any thing so much as God, so neither must you hate or abhor any thing in the world but sin. As for the things of this life, you must keep your affections in an equal poise towards them; neither too much overjoyed at the having of them, nor over-grieved at the parting with them: keeping your hearts loose and indifferent as to all things here below, fixed only upon God and the things above. Thus, therefore, it is that you are to keep your hearts, your whole hearts, in a right frame and temper: you must keep your thoughts clean and pure, your judgments sound and orthodox, your consciences clear and void of all offence, your memories stored with the best things, and your affections placed upon their proper objects. III. Thus much may suffice for the art of keeping the heart. The next thing to be considered is the manner of its performance; it is to be kept with all diligence. In the Hebrew it is n bon Above all keeping, keep thy heart:' have a greater care of that than of all things else. There are many things in the world that men are very careful to keep, as their money, their writings, their credit, their friends, their jewels, their liberty, their privileges, their health, their strength, their life, and the like: what care do men take to keep these things! And yet if we will take the wise man's counsel, our heart is to be kept more carefully than any of them all, yea, than all of them for it is "to be kept with all diligence," or above all other keeping, with the best, the safest, the surest way of keeping imaginable; so as not only to look to it now and then, but to have our eye continually upon it, and always to set a strict watch and guard about it. And verily, all things considered, we have all the reason in the world to do so. 1. For, first, the heart of man is certainly the most deceitful thing in nature, for " it is deceitful above all things." Jer. 17. 9. There is no person or thing in the world that puts so many tricks upon men, and cheats them so egregiously as their own hearts do. What lies and falsehoods do they continually tell you! If you be but a little sorry for your sins, your hearts tell you, this is repentance. If you do but believe that Jesus Christ is the Saviour of the world, your hearts tell you, this is faith. And if you have but any thing like to grace or virtue, your hearts presently tell you, they are really so. How many have been thus cheated into everlasting flames by their own fraudulent and deceitful hearts! And therefore the wise man might well say, "He that Prov.28.26. trusteth in his own heart is a fool." For you will all acknowledge him to be a fool, with a witness, that will trust a known cheat; yet such is every man's heart by nature; such a cheat that it cannot but cheat him; it would act contrary to its own nature if it did not. And therefore it |