A Christian Directory Volume I Part 49

_Direct._ II. Observe the motions and discoveries of pride, towards G.o.d and man, that it may not, like the devil, prevail by keeping out of sight. Because this is the chief part of my work, I shall here distinctly show you the signs and motions of it, in its several ways against G.o.d and man.

_Signs of the worst part of Pride against G.o.d._

_Sign_ I. Self-idolizing pride doth cause men to glory in their supposed greatness, when the greatness of G.o.d should show them their contemptible vileness; and to magnify themselves, when they should magnify their Maker. It makes the strong man glory in his strength, and the rich man in his wealth, and the conqueror in his victories;[206] and princes, and rulers, and lords of the earth, in their dominions, and dignities, and power to do hurt or good to others; and say as Nebuchadnezzar, Dan. iv. 30, "Is not this great Babylon that I have built, for the house of the kingdom, by the might of my power, for the honour of my majesty?" How hard is it to be great and truly humble, and not to swell, and be lifted up in heart, as they rise in power! This G.o.d abhorreth as unsuitable to worms, and dust, and injurious to his honour, and will make them know that "power, and riches, and strength are his, and that the Most High doth rule in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whom he will," Dan. iv. 32.

_Sign_ II. Pride causeth men to set up their supposed worth and goodness above or against the Lord: so that they make themselves their princ.i.p.al end, and practise that which some of late presume to teach, that it is not G.o.d that can or ought to be man's end, but himself alone: as if we were made only for ourselves, and not for our Creator. Pride makes men so considerable in their own esteem, that they live wholly to themselves, as if the world were to stand or fall with them: if they be well, all is well with them; if they are to die, they take it as if the world were at an end. They value G.o.d, but as they do their food, or health, or pleasure, even as a means to their own felicity; not as preferring him before themselves, nor making him the chiefest in their end.[207] They love themselves much better than G.o.d: and so far is man fallen from G.o.d to himself, that he feeleth himself disposed to this as strongly, as that he taketh it to be his primitive nature, and therefore warrantable, and that it is impossible to go higher.

[Sidenote: How G.o.d is man's end.]

G.o.d is to be man's end, though we can add nothing to him. The highest love supposeth no want in him that we love, but an excellency of glory, wisdom, and goodness, to which all our faculties offer up themselves in admiration, love, and praise: not only for the delights of these, nor only that our persons may herein be happy; but chiefly that G.o.d may have his due, and his will may be pleased and fulfilled; and because his excellencies deserve all this from men and angels.

When we love a man of wonderful learning, and wisdom, and meekness, and charity, and holiness, and other goodness, it is not chiefly for ourselves that we love him, that we may receive something from him; for we feel his excellency command our love, though we were sure that we should never receive any thing from him: nor is the delight of loving him our chief end, but a consequent, or the lesser part of our end; for we feel that we love him before we think of the delight.[208]

The admiration, love, and praise of G.o.d our ultimate end, hath no end beside their proper object; for it is itself the final act, even man's perfection. Amiableness magnetically attracteth love: if you ask an angel why he loveth G.o.d, he will say, because he is infinitely amiable: and though in such motions nature secretly aimeth at its own perfection and felicity, and lawfully interesteth itself in this final motion, yet the union being of such as are infinitely unequal, oh how little do the glorified spirits respect themselves in comparison of the blessed, glorious G.o.d! See what I said of this before, chap. iii.

direct. xi. and xv.

_Sign_ III. Pride maketh men more desirous to be over-loved themselves, than that G.o.d be loved by themselves or others. They would fain have the eyes and hearts of all men turned upon them, as if they were as the sun, to be admired and loved by all that see them.

_Sign_ IV. Pride causeth men to depend upon themselves, and contrive inordinately for themselves, and trust in themselves; as if they lived by their own wit, and power, and industry, more than by the favour and providence of G.o.d. Isa. ix. 9; Obad. 3.

_Sign_ V. Pride makes men return the thanks to themselves which is due to G.o.d for the mercies which they have received. G.o.d is thanked by them but in compliment; but they seriously ascribe it to their care, or skill, or industry, or power, Dan. iv. 30; they sacrifice to their net, Hab. i. 16, and say, Our hand, our contrivance, our power, our good husbandry hath done all this.[209]

_Sign_ VI. Pride setteth up the wisdom of a foolish man against the infinite wisdom of G.o.d; it makes men presume to judge their Judge, and judge his laws, before they understand them; and to quarrel with all that they find unsuitable to their own conceits; and say, How improbable is this or that! and how can these things be? He that cannot undo a pair of tarrying irons, or unriddle a riddle till it be taught him, which afterwards appeareth plain, will question the truth of the word of G.o.d about the most high, unsearchable mysteries. Proud men think they could mend G.o.d's word, and they could better have ordered matters in the world, and for the church, and for themselves, and for their friends, than the providence of G.o.d hath done.[210]

_Sign_ VII. Pride maketh men set up their own love and mercy above the love and mercy of G.o.d. Augustine mentioneth a sort of heretics called Misericordes, merciful men; and Origen was led hereby into his errors.

When they think of h.e.l.l fire, and the number of the miserable, and the fewness of the saved, they consult with their ignorant compa.s.sion, and think that this is below the love and mercy which is in themselves, and that they would not thus use an enemy of their own; and therefore they censure the holy Scriptures, and pride inclineth them strongly to unbelief; while they forget the narrowness and darkness of their souls, and how unfit they are to censure G.o.d, and how many truths may be unseen of them, which would fully satisfy them if they knew them; and how quickly G.o.d will show them that which shall justify his word and all his works, and convince them of the folly and arrogancy of their unbelief and censures.

_Sign_ VIII. Pride makes men pretend to be more just than G.o.d; and to think that they could more justly govern the world; and to censure G.o.d's threatenings, and the sufferings of the good, and the prosperity of the wicked, as things so unjust, as that they thereby incline to atheism. So James and John would be more just than Christ, and call down fire on the rejecters of the gospel; and the prodigal's brother, Luke xv. repined at his father's lenity.

_Sign_ IX. Pride maketh men slight the authority and commands of G.o.d, and despise his messengers, and choose to be ruled by their own conceits, and l.u.s.ts, and interest, Jer. xiii. 15, 17; xliii. 2, 3; when the humble tremble at his word, and readily obey it, Isa. lvii.

15; Neh. ix. 16, 29; Isa. ix. 9.

_Sign_ X. A proud man in power will expect that his will be obeyed before the will of G.o.d; and that the subjects of G.o.d displease their Master rather than him: he will think it a crime for a man to inquire first what G.o.d would have him do; or to plead conscience and the commands of the G.o.d of heaven, against the obeying of his unjust commands. If he offer you preferment, as Balak did Balaam, he looketh you should be more taken with it, than with G.o.d's offer of eternal life: if he threaten you, as Nebuchadnezzar did the three witnesses, he looks that you should be more afraid of him than of G.o.d, who threateneth your d.a.m.nation; and is angry if you be not.

_Sign_ XI. A proud man is more offended with one that would question his authority, or speak diminutively of his power, or displease his will, or cross his interest, than with one that sinneth against the authority, and will, and interest of G.o.d. He is much more zealous for himself and his own honour, than for G.o.d's; and grieved more for his own dishonour, and hateth his own enemies more than G.o.d's; and can tread down the interest of G.o.d and souls, if it seem but necessary to his honour or revenge: he is much more pleased and delighted with his own applause, and honour, and greatness, than with the glory of G.o.d, or the fulfilling of his will.

_Sign_ XII. Proud men would fain steal from G.o.d himself the honour of many of his most excellent works.[211] If they are rulers, they are more desirous that the thanks for the order and peace of societies, be given by the people to them, than unto G.o.d. If they are preachers, they would fain have more than their due, of the honour of men's conversion and edification: if they are pastors, they would encroach upon Christ's part of the government of his church. If they be bountiful to the poor, and do any good works, they would have more of the praise than belongeth to a steward, or messenger that delivereth the gifts of G.o.d. If they be physicians, they would have the real honour of the cure, and have G.o.d to be but a barren compliment: like the atheistical physician, that reviled and beat his patient for thanking G.o.d that he was well, When, saith he, it was I that cured you, and do you thank G.o.d for it?

_Sign_ XIII. A proud man will give more to his honour than to G.o.d: his estate is more at the command of his pride, than of G.o.d. He giveth more in the view or knowledge of others, than he could persuade himself to do in secret. He is more bountiful in gifts that tend to keep up the credit of his liberality, than he is to truly indigent persons: it is not the good that is done, but the honour which he expecteth by it, which is his princ.i.p.al motive. He had rather be scant in works of greatest secret charity, than in apparel, and a comely port, and the entertaining of friends, or any thing that is for ostentation, and for himself.

_Sign_ XIV. A proud man would have as great a dependence of others upon him as he can. He would have the estates, and lives, and welfare of all others at his will and power; that he might be much feared, and loved, and thanked, and that many may be beholden to him as the G.o.d or great benefactor of the world. He is not contented that good is done, and men's wants supplied, unless he have the doing of it, that so he may have the praise. If he save his enemy, it is but to make him beholden to him, and be said to have given him his life. Fain he would be taken to be as the sun to the world, which mankind cannot be without.

_Sign_ XV. A proud man is very patient when men ascribe to him that which he knoweth to be above his due, though it be to the injury of G.o.d.

He can easily forgive those that value and love him more than he deserveth, though they sin in doing it. He is seldom offended with any for over-praising him; nor for reverencing or honouring him too much; nor for setting him too high, or for giving or ascribing too much power to him; nor for obeying him before G.o.d himself. He careth not how much love, and honour, and praises, and thanks he hath; when an humble soul saith, as Psal. cxv. 1, "Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name give the glory:" and as the angel to John, that would have wors.h.i.+pped him, "See thou do it not, for I am thy fellow-servant." They know G.o.d will not give "his glory to another," Isa. xlii. 8. "In his temple every one speaketh of his glory," Psal. xxix. 9. But of themselves they say, "I am a worm and no man," Psal. xxii. 6. I am less "than the least of all thy mercies," Gen. x.x.xii. 10; "less than the least of all saints," Eph. iii. 8; the chiefest of sinners, 1 Tim. i.

15: how unfit am I for so much love, and praise, and honour!

_Sign_ XVI. A proud man would have his reason to be the rule of all the world, or at least, of all that he hath to do with. If there were laws or canons to be made, he would have the making of them: he would have all men take his counsel, as an oracle: he would have all the world of his opinion; and sets more by those that thus esteem him and are of his opinion, and yield to all that he saith and doth, than by those that most earnestly desire to conform their minds to the word of G.o.d, and differ from him in the understanding of any part of it. He loveth them better that inquire of him and take his word, than them that inquire of the word of G.o.d. Though he cannot deny but it is G.o.d's prerogative to be infallible, and the rule of the world.

_Sign_ XVII. A proud man affecteth the reputation of G.o.d's immutability as well as his infallibility. He will stand to an error when once he hath vented it, and resist the truth when once he hath appeared against it, to avoid the dishonour of being accounted mutable, or one that formerly was deceived. His pride keepeth him from repenting of any fault or error that he can but find a cloak for. If he have done wrong to G.o.d and mischief to the church, he will do as much more to make it good, and justify it by any cruelty or violence. If he have once done you wrong, he will do more for fear of seeming to have wronged you. If he have slandered you, he will stab or hang you if he can, to justify his slander, rather than seem so mutable as to retract it.

_Sign_ XVIII. A proud man affecteth a partic.i.p.ation of G.o.d's omniscience, and is eager to know more than G.o.d revealeth (if he be an inquiring man whose pride runneth this way). Thus our first parents sinned, by desiring to be as G.o.d in knowledge. This hath filled the world with proud contentions, and the church with divisions; while proud wits heretically make things unrevealed the matter of their ostentation, imposition, censures, or furious disputes; while humble souls are taken up in studying and practising things revealed, and keep themselves within G.o.d's bounds, as knowing that G.o.d best knoweth the measure fittest for them, and that knowledge is to be desired and sought, but so far as it is useful to our serving or enjoying G.o.d, and the good which truth revealeth to us; and that knowledge may else become our sorrow, Eccl. i. 1, 8, and truth the instrument to torment us, as it doth the miserable souls in h.e.l.l.

_Sign_ XIX. A proud man is discontented with his degree, especially if it be low. He would be higher in power, and honour, and wealth; yea, he is never so high but he would fain be one step higher. If he had a kingdom, he would have another: and if he had the dominions of the Turkish or Tartarian emperor, he would desire to enlarge them, and to have more; and would not be satisfied till he had all the world. Men feel not this in their low condition; they think, If I had but so much or so much, I would be content: but this is their ignorance of the insatiable pride that dwelleth in them. Do you not see the greatest emperors on earth still seeking to be greater. Every man naturally would be a pope, the universal monarch of the world. And every such pope would have both swords, and have princes and people wholly at their will: and when they have no mind to hurt, they would have power to hurt; that all the world might hold their estates, and liberties, and lives, as by their clemency and gift, and they might be as G.o.d to other men. And if they had attained this, pride would not stop, till it had caused them to aspire to all the prerogatives of G.o.d, and to depose him, and dethrone him of his G.o.dhead and majesty, that they might have his place.

_Sign_ XX. A proud man would fain have G.o.d's independency. Though need make him stoop, yet he would willingly be beholden to none. Not only because in prudence he would keep his liberty, and not be unnecessarily the servant of men, nor under obligations to serve them in any evil way (for so the humblest would fain be independent); but because he would be so great, and high, as to scorn to lean on any other. Thus you see how pride is that great idolatry that sets up man as in the place of G.o.d.

_Signs of the next Degrees of Pride as against G.o.d._

_Sign_ I. A proud heart is very hardly brought to see the greatness of its sins, or to know its emptiness of grace, or to be convinced of its unpardoned, miserable state, or of the justice of G.o.d if he should d.a.m.n it to everlasting torments.[212] Concerning others it may confess all this; but hardly of itself. Its own unbelief and averseness from G.o.d and holiness, seemeth to it a small and tolerable fault; its own pride, and l.u.s.t, and worldliness, and sensuality, seem not to be so bad as to deserve d.a.m.nation; much less the smallest sin which it committeth.

Though customarily they may say that G.o.d were just, if he did condemn them, yet they believe it not at the heart. The most convincing preacher shall have much ado to bring a proud man heartily to confess that he is an enemy to G.o.d, a child of wrath, and under the guilt of all his sins, and sure to be condemned unless he be converted. He will confess that he is a sinner, or any thing else which the most G.o.dly must confess, or which doth not conclude him to be in a d.a.m.nable, unrenewed state. But to make an unG.o.dly man know that he is unG.o.dly, and an impenitent person know that he is impenitent, and an unsanctified person know that he is unsanctified, is wonderful hard, because that pride hath dominion in them. "Are we blind also?" say the proud, incorrigible Pharisees to Christ, John ix. 40.

_Sign_ II. A proud heart doth so much overvalue all that is in itself, that every common grace or duty doth seem to it to be a state of G.o.dliness. Their common knowledge seemeth to them to be saving illumination: every little sorrow for their sin, or wish that they had done better, when they have had all the sweetness of it, doth go with them for true repentance; their heartless lip-labour goes for acceptable prayer; their image of religion seemeth to them to be the life of G.o.dliness; they take their own presumption for true faith, and their false expectation for christian hope, and their carnal security and blockish stupidity for spiritual peace of conscience, and their desperate venturing their souls upon deceit they take for a trusting them with G.o.d. If they forbear but such sins as their flesh can spare, as unnecessary to its ease, provision, or content, yea, or such sins as the flesh commandeth them to forbear, as tending to their dishonour in the world, they take this for true obedience to G.o.d.

Because they had rather have heaven than h.e.l.l, when they must leave the earth, whether they will or no, they think that they are heavenly-minded, and lay up their treasure there, and take it for their portion: because conscience sometimes troubleth them for their sin, they think they renew a sincere repentance, and think all is pardoned, because they daily ask for pardon. Their forced submission to the hand of G.o.d they take for patience; and a "Lord, have mercy on us, and forgive us, and save us," they take for a true preparation for death. Thus pride deceiveth sinners, by making them believe that they have what they have not, and do what they do not, and are something when they are nothing, Gal. vi. 3, and by multiplying and magnifying the little common good that is in them.

_Sign_ III. A proud heart hath very little sense of the necessity of a Saviour, to die for his sins, and satisfy G.o.d's justice, and reconcile him to G.o.d: notionally he is sick of sin; and notionally he thinks he needeth a physician; but practically, at the heart he feeleth little of his disease, and therefore little sets by Christ. He feeleth not that which should thoroughly acquaint him with the reasons of this blessed work of our redemption; and therefore indeed is a stranger to the mystery, and an unbeliever at the heart, and would turn apostate if the trial were strong enough. He never felt himself a condemned man, under the curse and wrath of G.o.d, and liable to h.e.l.l; and therefore never lay in tears with Mary at his Saviour's feet, nor melted over his bleeding Lord; nor feelingly said with Paul, "He came to save sinners, of whom I am chief;" nor "esteemed all things as loss and dung for the knowledge of Christ, that he might be found in him," Phil. iii. 7, 8. He is a christian but as a Turk is a Mahometan, because it is the religion of the king, and the country in which he was bred.

_Sign_ IV. A proud heart perceiveth not his own necessity of so great a change as a new birth, and of the Holy Ghost to give him a new nature, and plant the image of G.o.d upon him. He findeth perhaps some breaches in his soul; but he thinks there needs no breaking of the heart for them, nor pulling all down and building up his hopes anew.

Amending his heart, he thinks may serve the turn, without making it and all things new, 2 Cor. v. 17. The new creature he taketh to be but baptism, or some patching up of the former state, and amending some grosser things that were amiss. He will confess that without Christ and grace we can do nothing, but he thinketh this grace is an ordinary help. Whereas an humble soul is so emptied of itself, and perceiveth its deadness and insufficiency to good, that it magnifieth grace, and is wondrous thankful for it, as for a new and spiritual life.

_Sign_ V. A proud heart hath so little experimental sense of the great accusations which Scripture bringeth against the corrupted heart of man, that it is easily drawn into any heresy which denieth them: as about our original sin, and misery, and need of a Saviour; about the desperate wickedness of the heart, and man's insufficiency and impotency to good, yea, averseness from it: whereas humble men are better acquainted with the sin within them, that beareth witness to all these truths.[213]

_Sign_ VI. The proud are insensible of the need and reason of all that diligence to mortify the flesh, and subdue corruptions, and watch the heart, and walk with G.o.d in holiness of life, which G.o.d requireth. He saith, what need all this ado? he feeleth not the need of it, and therefore thinks it is more ado than needs. But the humble soul is sensible of that within him that requireth it, and justifieth the strictest ways of G.o.d. The rich think they have no need to labour, but labour is a poor man's life and maintenance; if he miss it a day, he feeleth the want of it the next.

_Sign_ VII. Proud men are much insensible of the want of frequent and fervent prayer unto G.o.d. Begging is the poor man's trade: the humble soul perceives the need of it: he finds as constant need of G.o.d, as of air, or bread, or life itself. And he knoweth that the exercise of our desires and faith, and the expression by prayer of our dependence upon G.o.d, is the way appointed for our supply. But the proud are full-stomached, and think this earnest, frequent praying is but hypocritical, needless work, and they cannot make a trade of begging, and therefore they are sent empty away.

_Sign_ VIII. A proud man is a great undervaluer of all mercies, and unthankful for them; but especially for spiritual mercy. He receiveth it customarily, as if it were his due; and customarily gives G.o.d thanks.

But though he may rejoice in the prosperity of his flesh, yet he is a stranger to holy thankfulness to G.o.d; and thinks diminutively of mercy; yea, he is discontent, and murmureth if G.o.d give him not as much as he desireth. Whereas the humble confess themselves unworthy of the least, Gen. x.x.x. 10; 2 Chron. x.x.xii. 24-26. Hezekiah's lifting up and unthankfulness go together. A poor man will be very thankful for a penny or a piece of bread, which the rich would reject as a great indignity.

_Sign_ IX. Proud men are always impatient in their afflictions. If they have a stoutness or stupidity, yet they have not christian patience: they take it as if G.o.d used them hardly, or did them wrong.

But the humble know that they deserve much worse, and that the mercy that is left them is contrary to their desert; and therefore say with the humbled church, Micah vii. 9, "I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against him." Lam. iii. 22, "It is because his compa.s.sions fail not, that we are not consumed."

_Sign_ X. Proud men are fearless of temptations, and confident of their strength and the goodness of their hearts. They dare live among snares, in pomp and pleasure, faring deliciously every day; among plays, and gaming, and lascivious company and discourse, and fear no hurt; their pride making them insensible of their danger, and what tinder and gunpowder is in their natures, for every spark of temptations to catch fire in. But the humble are always suspicious of themselves, and know their danger, and avoid the snare. Prov. xiv. 16, "A wise man feareth and departeth from evil; but the fool rageth and is confident." Prov. xxii. 3, "A prudent man foreseeth the evil and hideth himself: but the simple pa.s.s on and are punished."

_Sign_ XI. Pride maketh men murmur if the work of G.o.d be never so well done, if they had not the doing of it; and sometimes by contending to have the honour of doing it, they destroy the work. If they are officers of Christ, they look more at the power than their obligation; at the dignity than at the duty; and at what the people owe to them, than what they owe to G.o.d and to the people. They are like dogs that snarl at any other that would partake with them, or come into the house. They say not as Moses, "Would all the Lord's people were prophets." Yea, the peace and unity of church and state is often sacrificed to this cursed pride.

_Sign_ XII. Pride makes men ashamed of the service of G.o.d, in a time and place where it is disgraced by the world; and if it have dominion, Christ and holiness shall be denied or forsaken by them, rather than their honour with men shall be forsaken. If they come to Jesus, it is as Nicodemus did, by night: they are ashamed to own a reproached truth, or scorned cause, or servant of Christ. If men will but mock them with the nick-names or calumnies hatched in h.e.l.l, they will do as others, or forbear their duty: a scorn will do more to make them forbear praying in their families to G.o.d, than the lion's den would do with Daniel, or the fiery furnace with the three confessors, Dan. iii. and vi. Especially if they be persons of honour and greatness in the world, then G.o.d must be merciful to them while they bow down in the house of Rimmon. As the rich man, Luke xviii. 23, when he heard Christ's terms, "was very sorrowful, for he was very rich;" so these, because their honours and dignities are so great, do think them too good to let go for the sake of Christ. Had they but the proportion of the obscure vulgar to lay down, they could forsake it; but they cannot forsake so fair a portion, nor endure the reproach of so honourable a name. But oh what contemptible things are these to a humble soul! He marvelleth what dreaming worldlings find, in the doting thoughts and breath of fools, which men call honour, that they should prefer it before the honour of G.o.d, and their real honour; when Christ hath told them, Mark viii. 31, that "whosoever shall be ashamed of him and his words, in an adulterous and sinful generation, of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with his holy angels." I now proceed to the signs of pride in particular duties.

_The Signs of Pride in and about Religious Duties._

_Sign_ I. A proud person is most solicitous in and about that part of duty which is visible to man, and tendeth to advance him in men's esteem: and therefore he is more regardful of the outside, than of the inside; of the words, than of the heart.[214] He taketh much pains, if he be a preacher, to cast his sermon into such a form as tendeth to set forth his parts, according to the quality of them that he would please. If he live where wit is valued above grace, or pedantic gingling above a solid, clear, judicious, masculine discourse, he bends himself to the humour of his auditors, and acts his part as a stage-player for applause. If he live where serious, earnest exhortations are in more request, he studieth to put an affected fervency into his style, which may make the hearers believe that he believes himself, and to seem to be what indeed he is not, and to feel what he feeleth not: but all this while about his heart he is little solicitous; and takes small pains to affect it with the reverence of G.o.d, and with a due estimation of his truth, and a due compa.s.sion of men's souls, and indeed to believe and feel what he would seem to believe and feel. So also in prayer and discourse, his chief study is to speak so as may best procure applause; and it is seldom that he is so cunning as to hide this his design from the observation of judicious men that know him: they may usually perceive that he is the image of a preacher or christian, by affectation forcing himself to that which he is not truly serious in. He is sounding bra.s.s, a tinkling cymbal, a bladder full of wind, a skin full of words; wise and devout in public on the stage, but at home and with his companions in his ordinary converse, he is but common, if not unclean. He is the admiration of fools, and the compa.s.sion of the wise; an oracle at the first congress to those that know him not, and the pity of those that have seen him at home, and without his mask: he is like proud gentlewomen that bestow a great part of the morning in mundifying and adorning themselves when they are to be seen, and go abroad, but at home are very homely. And usually the proud, being hypocrites, are secret haters of the most serious, and judicious christians; because these are more quick-sighted than others, to see through the cloak of their hypocrisy; unless as their charity, constraining them to conceal their fears and jealousies, may reconcile the hypocrite to them.

_Sign_ II. Proud men are apt to put on themselves to any public duty which may tend to magnify them or set out their parts, and think themselves fitter to be preferred before others, and employed, than indeed they are.[215] They are forward to speak in preaching or praying among others, or in ordinary talk; a little knowledge maketh them think that they are fit to be preachers: whereas the humble say with Moses, "Who am I that I should go unto Pharaoh?" &c. Exod. iii.

11. "I am not eloquent, but slow of speech.--O my Lord, send I pray thee by the hand of him whom thou wilt send," Exod. iv. 13. Or, as Isaiah, chap. xvi. 5, "Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips!" &c.; or as Paul, 2 Cor. ii. 16, "Who is sufficient for these things?" How many a sermon hath pride both studied and preached! And how many a prayer hath it formed! And how well are they like to be heard of G.o.d!

_Sign_ III. The proud are loth to be clouded by the greater abilities of others: they are content that weaker men pray or preach with them, that will not obscure but put off their parts, that they may have the pre-eminence; as a dwarf, that makes another seem a proper man. They are less troubled that G.o.d and the gospel is dishonoured by the infirmities, insufficiency, and faults of others, than that their glory is obscured by worthier men, though G.o.d be honoured and his work promoted.[216] Whereas the humbled person wisheth from the bottom of his heart, that all the Lord's people were prophets, that all men could preach, and pray, and discourse, and live much better than he doth himself, though he would also be as good as they. He is glad when he heareth any speak more judiciously, powerfully, and convincingly than he, rejoicing that G.o.d's work is done, whoever do it; for he loveth wisdom and holiness, truth and duty, not only because it is his own, but for itself, and for G.o.d, and for the souls of others. A proud man envieth both the parts, and work, and honour of others; and is like the devil, repining at the gifts of G.o.d; and the better and wiser any one is the more he envieth him: he is an enemy to the fruits of G.o.d's beneficence; as if he would have G.o.d less good and bountiful to the world, or to any but himself, and such as will serve his party, and interest, and honour with their gifts: his eye is evil because G.o.d is good. If others be better spoken of than himself, as more learned, able, wise, or holy, it kindleth in his breast a secret hatred of them, unless they are such whose honour is his honour, or contributeth thereto; whereas the holy, humble soul, is sorry that he wants what others have, but glad that others have what he wants. He loveth G.o.d's gifts wherever he seeth them; yea, though it were in one that hateth him. He would not have the world to be shut up in a perpetual night, because he may not be the sun; but would have them receive that by another which he cannot give them, and is glad that they have a sun though it be not he. Though some preached Christ of envy and strife, of contention, and not sincerely, to add afflictions to his bonds, yet Paul rejoiced, and would rejoice, that Christ was preached, Phil. i. 15-18.

_Sign_ IV. When the proud man is praying or preaching, his eye is princ.i.p.ally upon the hearers, and from them it is that his work is animated, and from them that he fetcheth princ.i.p.ally the fire or motives for his zeal. He is thinking princ.i.p.ally of their case, and all the while fis.h.i.+ng for their love, and approbation, and applause; and where he cannot have it, the fire of his zeal goeth out. Whereas, though the humble subordinately look at men, and would do all to edification, yet it is not to be loved by them, so much as to exercise love upon them; nor to seek for honour and esteem from them, so much as to convert and save them: and it is G.o.d that he chiefly eyeth and regardeth; and from him that he fetches his most powerful motives; and it is his approbation that he expecteth: his eye and heart is so upon the auditors as to be more upon G.o.d; he would feed the sheep, but would please the Lord and Owner of them.