State II. the Lord, before angels, devils, and one another; in effect giving out that they were hardly dealt by, and that heaven grudged their happinefs. (10.) They were difcontt with their lot, and coveted an evil covetoufnefs to their houfe; which ruined both them and theirs. Thus was the image of God on man defaced all at once.

The Doctrine of the Corruption of Nature applied.

USE I. For Information. Is man's nature wholly corrupted? Then,

1. No wonder the grave open it's devouring mouth for us, as foon as the womb hath caft us forth; and that the cradle be turned into a coffin, to receive the corrupt lump: for we are all, in a fpiritual sense, dead born; yea, and filthy, (Pfal. xiv. 3.) noifome, rank, and stinking as a corrupt thing, as the word imports. Let as not complain of the miferies we are expofed to, at our entrance, nor of the continuance of them, while we are in the world. Here is the venom that has poisoned all the fprings of earthly enjoyments we have to drink of. It is the corruption of man's nature, that brings forth all the miferies of human life in churches, ftates, families: in men's fouls and bodies.

2. Behold here, as in a glafs, the fpring of all the wickednefs, profanity, and formality in the world; the fource of all the diforders in thy own heart and life. Every thing acts like itself, agreeable to its own nature; and fo corrupt man acts corruptly. You need not wonder at the finfulness of your own heart and life, nor at the finfutnefs and perverfenefs of others: if a man be crooked, he cannot but halt; and if the clock be fet wrong, how can it point the hour right.

3. See here, why fin is fo pleasant, and religion fuch a burden to carnal fpirits: fin is natural, holiness not fo. Oxen cannot feed in the fea, nor fishes in the fruitful fields. A fwine brought into a palace, would get away again, to wallow in the mire. A corrupt nature tends ever to impurity."

4. Learn from this, the nature and neceffity of regeneration. First, This difcovers the nature of regeneration in these two things, (1.) It is not a partial, but a total change, tho' imperfect in this life. Thy whole nature is corrupted, and therefore the cure muft go thro' every part. Regeneration makes not only a new head for knowledge, but a new heart, and new affections for holiness. All things become new, 2 Cor. v. 17. If one who has received many wounds, thould be cured of them all, fave one only, he might bleed to death, by that one, as well as a thoufand. So if the change go not through the whole man, it is naught. (2.) It is not a change made by human industry, but by the mighty power of the Spirit of God. A man muft be born of the Spirit, John iii. 5 Accidental diseases may be cured by men, but thefe which are natural, not without a miracle, John ix. 22. The change wrought upon men, by good education, or forced upon them, by a natural confcience, tho' it may pafs among men for a fav

ing change, it is not fo; for our nature is corrupt, and none but the God of nature can change it. Tho' a gardiner, ingrafting a pear branch into an apple-tree, may make the apple-tree bear pears; yet the art of man cannot change the nature of the apple-tree: fo one may pin a new life to his old heart, but he can never change the heart. Secondly, This alfo fhews the neceffity of regeneration. It is abfolutely neceffary in order to falvation, John iii. 3. Except a man be born again, he cannot fee the kingdom of God. No unclean thing can enter the new Jerufalem: but thou art wholly unclean, while in thy natural ftate. If every member of thy body were disjointed, each joint behoved to be loofed, ere the members could be fet aright again. This is the cafe of thy foul, as thou haft heard: and therefore thou must be born again; elfe thou shalt never fee heaven, unless it be far off, as the rich man in hell did. Deceive not thyself; no Mercy of GOD, no Blood of CHRIST will bring thee to heaven, in thy unregenerate state: for God will never open a fountain of mercy, to wash away his own holiness and truth: nor did Chrift thed his precious blood, to blot out the truths of God, or to overturn God's measures about the falvation of finners. Heaven! What would you do there, that are not born again? Ye that are no ways fitting for Chrift the head. That would be a ftrange fight, a holy head, and members wholly corrupt! a head full of treafures of grace, members wherein are nothing but treasures of wickednefs! a head obedient to death, and heels kicking against heaven! Ye are no ways adapted to the fociety above, more than beafts for converfe with men. Thou art a

:

hater of true holiness and at the first fight of a faint there, would cry out, Haft thou found me, O mine enemy! Nay, the unrenewed man, if it were poffible he could go to heaven, in that ftate, he would no otherwife go to it, than now he comes to the duties of holiness, that is, leaving his heart behind him.

USE II. For Lamentation. Well may we lament thy cafe, Q natural man, for it is the faddeft cafe one can be in, out of hell. It is time to lament for thee; for thou art dead already, dead whilft thou livest; thou carrieft about with thee a dead foul in a living body:. and because thou art dead, thou canst not lament thy own cafe. Thou art loathfome in the fight of God; for thou art altogether corrupt. Thou haft no good in thee; thy foul is a mafs of darkness, rebellion, and vileness before the Lord. Thou thinkest, perhaps, that thou haft a good heart to God, good inclinations, and good defires: but God knows there is nothing good in thee, but every imagination of thine. heart is only evil. Thou canst do so good; thou cart do nothing but fin. For,

Firft, Thou art the fervant of fin, Rom. vi. 17. and therefore free from righteoufnefs, ver. 20. Whatever righteousness be, (poor foul) thou art free of it; thou dost not, thou canst not meddle with it. Thou art under the dominion of fin, a dominion where righteoufnels can have no place. Thou art child and fervant of the devil, tho'

thou

thou be neither wizzard nor witch.: seeing thou art yet in the state of nature, John viii. 44. Te are of your father the devil. And to prevent any mistake, confider, that fin and Satan have two forts of fervants, (1.) There are fome employed, as it were, in coarfer work: those bear the devil's mark in their fore-heads, having no form of godlinefs; but are profane, grofly ignorant, mene moralifts, not fo much as performing the external duties of religion, but living to the view of the world; as fons of earth, only minding earthly things, Philip. iii. 19. (2.) There are fome employed in a more refined fort of fervice to fin, who carry the devil's mark in their right hand; which they can, and do hide from the view of the world. Thefe are clofs hypocrites, who facrifice as much to the corrupt mind, as the other to the flesh, Eph. ii. 3. These are ruined by a more undifcernable trade of fin: pride, unbelief, self-seeking, and the like, fwarm in, and prey upon their corrupted, wholly corrupted fouls. Both are fervants of the fame houfe; the latter as far as the former from righteousness.

Secondly, How is it poffible thou fhouldst be able to do any good, thou whose nature is wholly corrupt? Can fruit grow where there is no root? Or, can there be an effect without a caufe? Can the fig-tree bear olive berries? Either a vine figs? If thy nature be wholly corrupt, as indeed it is, all thou doft is certainly fo too; for no effect can exceed the virtue of its caufe. Can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit? Matth. vii. 18.

Ah! What a miferable spectacle is he that can do nothing but fin? Thou art the man, whofoever thou art, that art yet in thy natural ftate. Hear, O finner, what is thy cafe.

Firft, Innumerable fins compafs thee about. Mountains of guilt are lying upon thee. Floods of impurities overwhelm thee. Living lufts of all forts roll up and down in the dead fea of thy foul; where no good can breathe, because of the corruption there. Thy lips are unclean: the opening of thy mouth is as the opening of an unripe grave, full of ftench and rottennefs, Rom. iii. 13. Their throat is an open fepulchre. Thy natural actions are fin, for when ye did eat, and when ye did drink, did not ye eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves? Zech. vii 6. Thy civil actions are fin, Prov. xxi. 4. The plowing of the wicked is fin. Thy religious actions are fin, Prov. xv. 8. The facrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord. The thoughts and imaginations of thy heart, are only evil. A deed may be foon done, a word foon fpoken, a thought swiftly palleth through the heart: but each of thefe is an Item in thy accounts. O fad reckoning! as many thoughts, words, actions; as many fins. The longer thou livest, thy accounts fwell the more. Should a tear be dropt for every fin, thine head behoved to be waters, and thine eyes a fountain of tears; for nothing but fin comes from thee. Thy heart frames nothing but evil imaginations; there is nothing in thy life, but what is framed by thine heart; and therefore there is nothing in thy heart or life but evil.

Seconilly,

"

Secondly, All thy religion, if thou haft any, is loft labour; as to acceptance with God, or any faving effect to thyfelf. Art thou yet in thy natural ftate? Truly then thy duties are fins, as was just now hinted. Would not the beft wine be lothfome in a vessel wherein there is no pleafure? So is the religion of an unregenerate man. Under the law; the garment which the flesh of the facrifice was carried in, tho' it touched other things, did not make them holy but he that was unclean touching any thing, whether cominon or facred, made it unclean. Even fo thy duties cannot make thy corrupt foul holy, tho' they in themselves be good; but thy corrupt heart defiles them, and makes them unclean, Hag. ii. 12, 13, 14. Thou wast wont to divide thy works into two forts; fome good, fome evil; but thou must count again and put them all under one head; for God writes on them all, only evil. This is lamentable: It will be no wonder to fee those beg in harvest, who fold their hands to sleep in feed-time: but to be labouring with others in the fpring, and yet have nothing to reap when the harvest comes, is a very fad cafe; and will be the cafe of all profeffors living and dying in their natural state.

Laftly, Thou canst not help thyfelf. What canft thou do to take away thy fin, who art wholly corrupt? Nothing truly but fin. If a natural man begin to relent, drop a tear for his fin and reform, prefently the corrupt heart apprehends, at least, a merit of congruity: he has done much himself, (he thinks) and God cannot but do more for him on that account. In the mean time he does nothing but fin: fo that the congruous merit is the leper that must be put out of the camp; the dead foul buried out of fight: and the corrupt lump caft into the pit. How canft thou think to recover thy felf by any thing thou canst do? Will mud and filth wash out filthinefs? and wilt thou purge out fin by finning? Fob took a potfherd to fcrape himself, becaufe his hands were as full of boils as his body. This is the cafe of thy corrupt foul: not to be recovered but by Jefus Chrift, whofe ftrength was dried up like a potfherd, Pfal. xxii. 15. Thou art poor indeed, extremely miferable and poor, Rev. iii. 17. Thou haft no fhelter but a refuge of hes; no garment for thy foul, but filthy rags; nothing to nourish it but hufks that cannot fatisfy. More than that, thou haft got fuch a bruife in the loins of Adam, which is not yet cured, that thou art without strength, Rom. v. 6. unable to do or work for thyself; nay, more than all this, thou canst not fo much as feek aright, but lieft helpless, as an infant expofed in the open field, Ezek. xvi. 5.

USE III. I exhort you to believe this fad truth. Alas! it is evident, it is very little believed in the world. Few are concerned to get their corrupt converfation changed; but fewer, by far, to get their nature changed: Most men know not what they are, nor what spirits they are of: they are as the eye, which feeing many things, never fees itself. But until ye know, every one the plague of his own heart, there is no hope of your recovery. Why will you not believe it? Ye have plain fcripture-teftimony for it; but you are loth to entertain

fuch

fuch an ill opinion of yourselves. Alas! that is the nature of your difeafe, Rev. ii. 17. Thou knoweft not that thou art wretched, and miferable, and poor, and blind, and naked. Lord open their eyes to fee it, before they die of it; and in hell lift up their eyes, and fee what they will not fee now.

I fhall fhut up this weighty point of the corruption of man's nature, with a few words to another doctrine from the text.

DOCTRINE. God takes fpecial notice of our natural corruption, or the fin of our nature. This he teftifies two ways, 1. By his word, as in the text, God faw-that every imagination of the thoughts of man's heart was enly evil continually. See Pfal. xiv. 2, 3. 2. By his works. God writes his particular notice of it, and displeasure with it, as in many of his works, fo especially in these two:

(1.) In the death of the infant children of men. Many miferies they have been expofed to: they were drowned in the deluge, confumed in Sodom by fire and brimftone; they have been flain with the fword, dashed against the stones, and are still dying ordinary deaths. What is the true caufe of this? On what ground doth a holy God thus purfue them? Is it the fin of their parents? That may be the occafion of the Lord's raifing the process against them: but it must be their own fin that is the ground of the fentence paffing on them: for the foul that finneth, it shall die, faith God, Ezek. xviii. 4. Is it their own actual fin? They have none. But as men do with toads and ferpents, which they kill at first fight, before they have done any hurt, because of their venomous nature, fo is it in this cafe.

(2) In the birth of the elect children of God. When the Lord is about to change their nature, he makes the fin of their nature ly heavy on their spirits. When he minds to let out the corruption, the lance gets full depth in their fouls, reaching to the root of fin, Rom. vii. 7,8,9. The flesh, or corruption of nature is pierced, being crucified, as well as the affections and lufts, Gal. v. 24.

USE. Let us then have a fpecial eye upon the corruption and fin of our nature. God fees it: O that we faw it too, and that fin were ever before us! What avails it to notice other fins, while this motherfin is not noticed? Turn your eyes inward to the fin of your nature. It is to be feared, many have this work to begin yet; that they have fhut the door, while the grand thief is yet in the house undiscovered. This is a weighty point; and in the handling of it,

I. I fhall, for conviction, point at fome evidences of men's overlooking the fin of their nature, which yet the Lord takes particular notice of, (1.) Men's looking on themfelves with fuch confidence, as if they were in no hazard of grofs fins. Many would take it very hainoufly to get fuch a caution, asChrift gave his Apostles, Luke xxi. 3 Take heed of furfeiting and drunkenness. If any fhould fuppofe thei to break out in grofs abominations, they would be ready to say, Am I a dog? It would raife the pride of their hearts, but not their fear and trembling; because they know not the corruption of their nature.

-34.

(2.) Un