fion of the whole matter, Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. For God hall bring every work into judgement, and every fecret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil. To which I will only add that serious and merciful admonition of a greater than Solomon, I mean the great Judge of the whole world, our bleffed Lord and Saviour, Luke xxi. 34. 35. 36. Take heed to yourselves, left at any time your hearts be overcharged with furfeiting, and drunkenness, and the cares of this life, and fo that day come upon you at unawares. For as a fnare fhall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to efcape all these things. that fhall come to pass, and to ftand before the Son of Man To whom with the Father, and the Holy Ghoft, &c.

SERMON

CXIII

Knowledge and practice neceffary in religion..

JOHN xiii. 17.

If ye know thefe things, happy are ye if ye do them..

WO things make up religion, the knowledge Tand practice of it; and the firft is wholly in op

der to the fecond; and God hath not revealed to us the knowledge of himself and his will, merely for the improvement of our understanding, but for the bettering of our hearts and lives; not to entertain our minds with the fpeculations of religion and virtue, but to form and govern our actions: If ye know thefe things, happy are ye if ye do them.

In which words our bleffed Saviour does, from a particular inftance, take occafion to fettle a general conclufion, namely, That religion doth mainly con

fift in practice, and that the knowledge of his doctrine, without the real effects of it upon our lives, will bring no man to heaven. In the beginning of this chapter, our great Lord and Mafter, to teftify his love to his difciples, and to give them a lively inftance and example of that great virtue of humility, is pleased to condefcend to a very low and mean of fice, fuch as was used to be performed by fervants to their mafters, and not by the mafter to his fervants, namely, to wash their feet; and when he had done this, he asks them if they did understand the meaning of this strange action: Know ye what I have done unto you? Ye call me Mafter, and Lord: and ye fay well, for fo I am. If I iken your Lord and Mafler, have washed your feet, ye ought alfo to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example, that ye fhould do as I have done to you. Verily, verily, I fay unto you, the fervant is not greater than his Lord, neither be that is fent, greater than he that fent him. If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them. As if he had faid, This which I have now done, is eafy to be understood, and fo likewife are all thofe other Chriftian graces and virtues which I have heretofore, by my doctrine and example, recommended to you; but it is not enough to know these things, but ye must likewife do them. The end and the life of all our knowledge in religion, is to put in practice what we know. It is neceflary indeed that we fhould know our duty, but knowledge alone will never bring us to that happinefs which religion defigns to make us partakers of, if our knowledge have not its due and proper influence upon our lives. Nay, fo far will our knowledge be from making us happy, if it be feparas ted from the virtues of a good life, that it will prove one of the heaviest aggravations of our misery; and it is as if he had faid, If ye know these things, wo be unto you, if ye do them not.

From these words then, I fhall obferve these three things, which I shall speak but briefly to.

1. That the knowledge of God's will, and our duty, is neceffary to the practice of it: If ye know

thefe

thefe things; which fuppofeth that we must know our duty before we can do it.

2. That the knowledge of our duty, and the prac tice of it, may be, and too often are, feparated. This likewise the text fuppofeth, that men may know their duty, and yet not do it; and that this is very frequent, which is the reason why our Saviour gives this caution.

3. That the practice of religion, and the doing of what we know to be our duty, is the only way to happiness: If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them. I begin with the

1. First of thefe, namely, That the knowledge of God's will and our duty, is neceffary in order to the practice of it. The truth of this propofition is fo clear and evident at firft view, that nothing can obfcure it, and bring it in queftion, but to endeavour to prove it; and therefore instead of spending time in that, I fhall take occafion from it justly to reprove that prepofterous courfe which is taken, and openly avowed and juftified by fome, as the fafeft and beft way to make men religious, and to bring them to happiness, namely, by taking away from them the means of knowledge, as if the best way to bring men to do the will of God, were to keep them from knowing it. For what elfe can be the meaning of that maxim fo current in the church of Rome, that ignorance is the mother of devotion? or of that ftrange and injurious practice of theirs, of locking up from the people that great ftorehouse and treafury of divine knowledge, the holy fcriptures, in an unknown tongue?

I know very well, that, in juftification of this hard ufage of their people, it is pretended, that knowledge. is apt to puff men up, to make them proud and con. tentious, refractory, and difobedient, and heretical, and what not; and particularly, that the free and familiar ufe of the holy fcriptures permitted to the peo> ple, hath ministered occafion to the people of falling into great and dangerous errors, and of making great difturbance and divifions among Chriftians. For an

fwer

fwer to this pretence, I defire these four or five things may be confidered.

1. That unless this be the natural and neceffary effect of knowledge in religion, and of the free ufe of the holy fcriptures, there is no force in this reafon ; and if this be the proper and natural effect of this knowledge, then this reafon will reach a great way farther than those who make use of it are willing it fhould.

2. That this is not the natural and neceffary effect of knowledge in religion, but only accidental, and proceeding from mens abuse of it; for which the thing itfelf is not to be taken away.

3. That the proper and natural effects and confequences of ignorance are equally pernicious, and much more certain and unavoidable, than those which are accidentally occafioned by knowledge.

4. That if this reafon be good, it is much stronger for with-holding the fcriptures from the priests and the learned, than from the people.

5. That this danger was as great, and as well known in the apoftles times, and yet they took a quite contrary course.

1. I defire it may be confidered, that unless this be the natural and neceffary effect of knowledge in religion, and of the free ufe of the holy fcriptures, there is no force in this reafon; for that which is neceffary, or highly useful, ought not to be taken away, because it is liable to be perverted, and abused to ill purposes. If it ought, then not only knowledge in religion, but all other knowledge, ought to be reftrained and fuppreffed; for all knowledge is apt to puff up, and liable to be abufed to many ill purpofes. At this rate, light, and liberty, and reason, yea, and life itself, ought all to be taken away, because they are all greatly abused by many men, to fome ill purposes or other; fo that unless thefe ill ef fects do naturally and neceffarily fpring from knowledge in religion, the objection from them is of no force; and if they do neceffarily flow from it, then this reafon will reach a great way farther than thofe that make use of it are willing it should; for if this

be

be true, that the knowledge of religion, as it is revealed in the holy fcriptures, is of it own nature so pernicious, as to make men proud, and contentious, and heretical, and difobedient to authority, then the blame of all this would fall upon our bleffed Saviour, for revealing fo pernicious a doctrine, and upon his apostles for publishing this doctrine in a known tongue to all mankind, and thereby laying the foundation of perpetual fchifms and herefies in the church.

2. But this is not the natural and necessary effect of knowledge in religion, but only accidental, and proceeding from mens abufe of it, for which the thing itfelf ought not to be taken away. And thus much certainly they will grant, because it cannot with any face be denied, and if fo, then the means of knowledge are not to be denied, but only men are to be cautioned not to pervert and abuse them. And if any man abufe the holy fcriptures, to the patronizing of error or herefy, or to any other bad purpose, he does it at his peril, and muft give an account to God for it, but ought not to be deprived of the means of knowledge, for fear he fhould make an ill ufe of them. We must not hinder men from being Chriftians, to preferve them from being heretics, and put out mens eyes, for fear they fhould fome time or other take upon them to dispute their way with their guides.

I remember that St Paul, 1 Cor. viii. 1. takes notice of this accidental inconvenience of knowledge, that it puffeth up, and that this pride occafioned great contentions and divifions among them; but the remedy which he prescribes against this mifchief of knowledge, is not to with-hold from men the means of it, and to celebrate the fervice of God, the prayers of the church, and the reading of the fcripture in an unknown tongue, but quite contrary. Chap. xiv. of that epiitle, he ftrictly enjoins, that the fervice of God in the church be fo performed, as may be for the edification of the people; which he fays cannot be, if it be celebrated in an unknown tongue; and the remedy he prefcribes