WE MUST KNOW WHAT THINGS ARE SINFUL

WE MUST KNOW WHAT THINGS ARE SINFUL.  And, first, let us inform ourselves well what those sins are from which we ought to abstain. And here we must not take our measures from the maxims of the world, or the practices of those whom in charity we account good men. Most people have very light apprehensions of these things, and are not sensible of any fault, unless it be gross and flagitious, and scarce reckon any so great as that which they call preciseness: and those who are more serious, do many times allow themselves too great latitude and freedom. Alas! how much pride and vanity, and passion and honour; how much weakness, and folly, and sin, doth every day show itself in their converse and behaviour? It may be they are humbled for it, and striving against it, and are daily gaining some ground: but then the progress is so small, and their failings so many, that we have need to choose a more exact pattern. Every one of us must answer for himself, and the practices of others will never warrant and secure us. It is the highest folly to regulate our actions by any other standard than that by which we must be judged. If ever we would cleanse our way, it must be “by taking heed thereto according to the word of God;” and that “word which is quick and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart,” will certainly discover many things to be sinful and hideous, which pass for very innocent in the eyes of the world. Let us therefore imitate the Psalmist, who saith, “Concerning the works of men, by the words of thy lips I have kept myself from the paths of the destroyer.” Let us acquaint ourselves with the strict and holy laws of our religion. Let us consider the discourses of our blessed Saviour, (especially that divine sermon on the mount,) and the writings of his holy apostles, where an ingenuous and unbiased mind may clearly discern those limits and bounds by which our actions ought to be confined. And then let us never look upon any sin as light and inconsiderable; but be fully persuaded, that the smallest is infinitely heinous in the sight of God, and prejudicial to the souls of men; and that, if we had the right sense of things, we should be as deeply affected with the least irregularities, as now we are with the highest crimes.