is a most certain sign of a state of death and misery, where it hath the upper hand. It is the departing of the heart from God to creatures. See the malignity of it before. Good men have been overtaken with heinous sins; but it is hard to find where Scripture calleth any of them covetous. A heart secretly cleaving most to this present world and its prosperity, is the very killing sin of every hypocrite, yea, and of all ungodly men. 2. Worldliness makes the Word unprofitable, and keepeth men from believing and repenting, and coming home to God, and minding seriously the everlasting world. What so much hindereth the conversion of sinners, as the love and cares of earthly things? They cannot serve God and mammon: their treasure and hearts cannot chiefly be both in heaven and earth! They will not yield to the terms that love this world: they will not forsake all for a treasure in heaven. In a word, as you heard, the

When men of a proud and worldly mind have by fraud, and friendship, and simony usurped the pastorship of the churches, according to their minds and ends, they turn it into a malignant domination, and the carnal, worldly part of the church, is the great enemy and persecutor of the spiritual part; and the fleshly hypocrite, as Cain against Abel, is filled with envy against the serious believer, even out of the bitter displeasure of his mind, that his deceitful sacrifice is less respected. What covetousness hath done to the advancement of the pretended holy catholic church of Rome, I will give you now, but in the words of an ábbot and chronicler of their own, Abbas Urspergens. Chron. p. 321. Vix remansit aliquis episcopatus, sive dignitas ecclesiastica, vel etiam parochialis ecclesiæ, quæ non fierit litigiosa, et Romam deduceretur ipsa causa, sed non manu vacua. Gaude mater nostra Roma, quoniam ape. riuntur cataractæ thesaurorum in terra, ut ad te confluant rivi et aggeres nummorum in magna copia. Lætare super iniquitate filiorum hominum; quoniam in recompensationem tantorum malorum, datur tibi pretium. Jocundare super adjutrice tua discordia; quia erupit de puteo infernalis abyssi, ut accumulentur tibi multa pecuniarum præmia. Habes quod semper sitisti; decanta Canticum, quia per malitiam hominum non per tuam religionem, orbem vicisti. Ad te trahit homines, non ipsorum devotio, aut pura conscientia, sed scelerum multiplicium perpetratio, et litium decisio, pretio comparata.

Fortun. Galindas speaking of pope Paul the fifth, his love to the Jesuits for helping him to money, saith, Adeo præstat acquirendarum pecuniarum quam animarum studiosum et peritum esse, apud illos, qui cum animarum Christi sanguine redemptarum, in se curam receperint, vel quid anima sit nesciunt, vel non pluris animam hominis quam piscis faciunt: quod credo suum officium Piscatum quendam esse aliquando per strepitum inaudierint: quibus propterea gratior fuerit, qui animam auri cum Paracelso, quam animam Saxoniæ Electoris invenisse nuntiet. Arcan. Soci. Jesu p. 46. Lege ibid. instruct. secret. de Jesuitarum praxi.

Et Joh. Sarisbur. lib. vii. c. 21. de Monach. Potentiores et ditiores favore vel mercede recepta facilius (absolutione) exonerant, et peccatis alienis humeros supponentes, jubent abire in tunicas et vestes pullas, quicquid illi se commisisse deplorant. -Si eis obloqueris, religionis inimicus, et veritatis diceris impugnator.

love of money is the root of all evil, and the love of the Father is not in the lovers of the world. 3. It destroyeth holy meditation and conference, and turneth the thoughts to worldly things. And it corrupteth prayer, and maketh it but a means to serve the flesh, and therefore maketh it odious to God. 4. It is the great hindrance of men's necessary preparation for death and judgment, and stealeth away their hearts and time till it is too late. 5. It is the great cause of contentions, even among the nearest relations: and the cause of the wars and calamities of nations, and of the woeful divisions and persecutions of the church; when a worldly generation think that their worldly interest doth engage them against self-denying and spiritual principles, practices, and persons. 6. It is the great cause of all the injustice, and oppression, and cruelty, that rageth in the world. They would do as they would be done by, were it not for the love of money. It maketh men perfidious and false to all their friends and engagements: no vows to God, nor obligations to men, will hold a lover of the world. The world is his God, and his worldly interest is his word and law. 7. It is the great destroyer of charity and good works. No more is done for God and the poor, because the love of the world forbids it. 8. It disordereth and profaneth families; and betrayeth the souls of children and servants to the devil. It turneth out prayer, and reading the Scripture, and good books, and all serious speeches of the life to come, because their hearts are taken up with the world, and they have no relish of any thing but the provisions of their flesh. Even the Lord's own day cannot be reserved for holy works, nor a duty performed, but the world is interposing, or diverting the mind. 9. It tempteth men to sin against their knowledge, and to forsake the truth, and fit themselves to the rising side, and save their bodies and estates, whatever become of their souls. It is the very price that the devil gives for souls! With this he bought the soul of Judas, who went to the Pharisees, with a "What will you give me, and I will deliver him to you." With this he attempted Christ himself; "all these will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me." It is the cause of apostacy and unfaithfulness to God. And it is the price that sinners sell

b Matt. iv. 9.

10. It

their God, their conscience and their salvation for. depriveth the soul of holy communion with God, and comfort from him, and of all foretaste of the life to come, and finally of heaven itself. For as the love of the world keepeth out the love of God and heaven, it must needs keep out the hopes and comforts which should arise from holy love. It would do much to cure the love of money, and of the world, if you knew how pernicious a sin it is.

Direct. XIV. Remember how base a sin it is, and how dishonourable and debasing to the mind of man.' If earth be baser than heaven, and money than God, then an earthly mind is baser than a heavenly mind. As the serpent's feeding on the dust is a baser life than that of angels, that are employed in admiring, and obeying, and praising the Most Holy God.

Direct. xv. Call yourselves to a daily reckoning, how you lay out all that God committeth to your trust; and try whether it be so as you would hear of it at judgment.' If you did but use to sit in judgment daily upon yourselves, as those that believe the judgment of God, it would make you more careful to use well what you have, than to get more and it would quench your thirst after plenty and prosperity, when you perceived you must give so strict an account of it. The flesh itself will less desire it, when it finds it may not have the use of it".

Direct. XVI. · When you find your covetousness most eager and dangerous, resolve most to cross it, and give more to pious or charitable uses than at another time.' For a man hath reason to fly furthest from that sin, which he is most in danger of. And the acts tend to the increase of the habit. Obeying your covetousness doth increase it and so the contrary acts, and the disobeying and displeasing it, do destroy it. This course will bring your covetousness into a despair of attaining its desires; and so will make it sit down and give over the pursuit. It is an open protest

c Christ's sheep-mark is plainest on the sheep that are shorn. When the fleece groweth long the mark wears out.

d Pecunia apud eum nunquam mansisse probatur, nisi forte tali hora offeratur, quando sol diei explicans cursum, nocturnis tenebris daret locum. Victor. Ut. de Eugen. Episc. Cath. Plato compareth our life to a game at tables. We may wish for a good throw, but whatever it be, we must play it as well as we can. de Tranquil. Anim.

Plutarch.

ing against every covetous desire; and an effectual kind of repenting and a wise and honest disarming sin, and turning its motions against itself, to its own destruction. Use it thus oft, and covetousness will think it wisdom to be quiet.

Direct. xv11. Above all take heed that you think not of reconciling God and mammon, and mixing heaven and earth to be your felicity, and of dreaming that you may keep heaven for a reserve at last, when the world hath been loved as your best, so long as you could keep it.' Nothing so much defendeth worldliness, as a cheating hope, that you have it but in a subdued, pardoned degree; and that you are not worldlings when you are. And nothing so much supports this hope, as because you confess that heaven only must be your last refuge, and full felicity, and therefore you do something for it on the bye. But is not the world more loved, more sought, more delighted in, and faster held? Hath it not more of your hearts, your delight, desire, and industry? If you cannot let go all for heaven, and forsake all this world for a treasure above, you cannot be Christ's true disciples.

Direct. xvii. If ever you would overcome the love of the world, your great care must be to mortify the flesh; for the world is desired but as its provision.' A mortified man hath no need of that, which is a sensualist's felicity. Quench your hydropical, feverish thirst, and then you will not make such a stir for drink. Cure the disease which enrageth your appetite; and that is the safest and cheapest way of satisfying it. Then you will be thankful to God, when you look on other men's wealth and gallantry, that you need not these things. And you will think what a trouble and burden, and interruption of your better work and comfort it would be to you, to have so much land, and so many servants, and goods, and business, and persons to mind, as rich men have. And how much better you can enjoy God and yourself in a more retired, quiet state of life. But of this more in the next part.

• Socrates, Sæpe cum eorum quæ publice vendebantur multitudinem intueretur, secum ista volvebat, Quam multis ipse non egeo? Diog. Laert. in Socrat. lib. ii. sect. 25. p. 95. Pecuniam perdidisti? Bene, si te illa non perdidit: quod jam multis possessoribus suis fecit. Gaude tibi ablatum unde infici posses, teque illæsum inter pericula transivisse. Petrarch. lib. ii. dial. 13.

Did men but know how much of an ungodly, damnable state doth consist in the love of the world; and how much it is the enemy of souls; and how much of our religion consisteth in the contempt and conquest of it; and what is the meaning of their renouncing the world, in their baptismal covenant; and how many millions the love of the world will damn for ever; they would not make such a stir for nothing, and spend all their days in providing for their perishing flesh; nor think them happiest that are richest; nor "boast themselves of their heart's desire, and bless the covetous whom the Lord abhorreth." They would not think that so small a sin which Christians should not so much as "name" (but in detestation). When God hath resolved that the "covetous shall not inherit the kingdom of God "." And a Christian must not so much as eat with them. Did Christ say in vain, "Take heed and beware of covetousness *." "Woe to him that coveteth an evil covetousness to his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the power of evil'." O what deserving servants hath the world, that will serve it so diligently, so constantly, and at so dear a rate, when they beforehand know, that besides a little transitory, deluding pleasure, it will pay them with nothing but everlasting shame! O wonderful deceiving power, of such an empty shadow, or rather wonderful folly of mankind! That when so many ages have been deceived before us, and almost every one at death confesseth it did but deceive them, so many still should be deceived, and take no warning by such a world of examples! I conclude with Heb. xiii. 5. "Let your conversation be without covetousness, and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee."

1 Cor. vi. 10. Ephes. v. 5.

Psal. x. 3. i 1 Cor. v. 11.

Ephes. v. 3.

k Luke xii. 15.

1 Hab. ii. 9.