DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.3689#0048
46
*A Serious Call to
are to use anything as the gift of God, we are to use everything
as his gift. If we are to do anything by strict rules of reason
and piety, we are to do everything in the same manner. Because
reason, and wisdom, and piety, are as much the best things at all
times, and in all places, as they are the best things, at any time,
or in any place.
If it is our glory and happiness to have a rational nature, that
is endued with wisdom and reason, that is capable of imitating
the Divine nature, then it must be our glory and happiness, to
improve our reason and wisdom, to act up to ,the excellency of
our rational nature, and to imitate God in all our actions, to
the utmost of our power. They therefore who confine Religion
to times and places, and some little rules of retirement, who think
that it is being too strict and rigid to introduce religion into
common life, and make it give laws to all their actions and ways
of living, they who think thus, not only mistake, but they
mistake the whole nature of Religion. For surely they mistake
the whole nature of Religion, who can think any part of their
life is made more easy, for being free from it. They may well
be said to mistake the whole nature of wisdom, who do not think
it desirable, to be always wise. He has not learnt the nature of
piety, who thinks it too much to be pious in all his actions. He
does not sufficiently understand what reason is, who does not
earnestly desire to live in everything according to it.
If we had a Religion that consisted in absurd superstitions,
that had no regard to the perfection of our nature, People might
well be glad to have some part of their life excused from it.
But as the Religion of the Gospel is only the refinement, and
exaltation of our best faculties, as it only requires a life of the
highest Reason, as it only requires us to use this world, as in
reason it ought to be used, to live in such tempers as are the
glory of intelligent beings, to walk in such wisdom as exalts our
nature, and to practise such piety, as will raise us to God ; who
•can think it grievous, to live always in the spirit of such a
Religion, to have every part of his life full of it, but he that
would think it much more grievous, to be as the Angels of God
in heaven ?
Further, as God is one and the same being, always acting like
himself, and suitably to his own nature, so it is the duty of every
being that he has created, to live according to the nature that he
has given it, and always to act like itself.
It is therefore an immutable law of God, that all rational
beings should act reasonably in all their actions ; not at this
time, or in that place, or upon this occasion, or in the use of some
particular thing, but at all times, in all places, at all occasions,
*A Serious Call to
are to use anything as the gift of God, we are to use everything
as his gift. If we are to do anything by strict rules of reason
and piety, we are to do everything in the same manner. Because
reason, and wisdom, and piety, are as much the best things at all
times, and in all places, as they are the best things, at any time,
or in any place.
If it is our glory and happiness to have a rational nature, that
is endued with wisdom and reason, that is capable of imitating
the Divine nature, then it must be our glory and happiness, to
improve our reason and wisdom, to act up to ,the excellency of
our rational nature, and to imitate God in all our actions, to
the utmost of our power. They therefore who confine Religion
to times and places, and some little rules of retirement, who think
that it is being too strict and rigid to introduce religion into
common life, and make it give laws to all their actions and ways
of living, they who think thus, not only mistake, but they
mistake the whole nature of Religion. For surely they mistake
the whole nature of Religion, who can think any part of their
life is made more easy, for being free from it. They may well
be said to mistake the whole nature of wisdom, who do not think
it desirable, to be always wise. He has not learnt the nature of
piety, who thinks it too much to be pious in all his actions. He
does not sufficiently understand what reason is, who does not
earnestly desire to live in everything according to it.
If we had a Religion that consisted in absurd superstitions,
that had no regard to the perfection of our nature, People might
well be glad to have some part of their life excused from it.
But as the Religion of the Gospel is only the refinement, and
exaltation of our best faculties, as it only requires a life of the
highest Reason, as it only requires us to use this world, as in
reason it ought to be used, to live in such tempers as are the
glory of intelligent beings, to walk in such wisdom as exalts our
nature, and to practise such piety, as will raise us to God ; who
•can think it grievous, to live always in the spirit of such a
Religion, to have every part of his life full of it, but he that
would think it much more grievous, to be as the Angels of God
in heaven ?
Further, as God is one and the same being, always acting like
himself, and suitably to his own nature, so it is the duty of every
being that he has created, to live according to the nature that he
has given it, and always to act like itself.
It is therefore an immutable law of God, that all rational
beings should act reasonably in all their actions ; not at this
time, or in that place, or upon this occasion, or in the use of some
particular thing, but at all times, in all places, at all occasions,