thing for mere age; for Time is his: and continuance of time is so much more excellent, as it comes nearer to the duration of eternity. Old age is a crown of glory. Neither is ought old in relation to God, but to us; neither is age faulty, in respect of nature, but of corruption: for, as that word of Tertullian is true, Primum verum, "The first is true;" so may I as truly say, Primum bonum, "The first is good." Only now, as our nature stands depraved, our old man is the body of corruptions, which we brought with us, and carry about us; and there can be no safety, unless we be transformed by renovation. Behold, God says, I make all things new; a new heaven and a new earth; Isaiah Ixv. 17. The year renews; and to morrow, we say, is a new day: we renew our clothes when they are worn, our leases when they grow towards expiring; only our hearts we care not to renew. If all the rest were old, so that our heart were new, it were nothing. Nothing but the main of all is neglected.

What should I need any other motives to you, than the view of the estate of both these?

Look first at the Old: Put off, concerning the former conversation, the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; Eph. iv. 22. Lo, the old man is corrupt: this is enough to cashier him : what man can abide to carry rotten flesh about him? If but a wound fester and gather dead flesh, we draw it, we corrode it, till it be clear at the bottom. Those, that make much of their old man, do, like that monstrous twin, willingly carry about a dead half of themselves, whose noisomeness doth torment and kill the living.

Look at the New: Being freed from sin, and made servants to God, ye have your fruit in holiness, and the end everlasting life; Rom. vi. 22. Holiness is a lovely thing of itself: there is a Beauty of Holiness; Gloria Sanctitatis, as the Vulgate turns it, Psalm cxlv. 5 and goodness doth amply reward itself: yet this holiness hath besides infinite recompence attending it. Holiness is life begun: eternal life is the consummation of holiness. Holiness is but the way the end, whereto it leads, is everlasting life. As, therefore, we would avoid the annoyance and danger of our sinful corruptions, as we would ever aspire to true and endless blessedness, oh let us be transformed by Renewing.

But how is this renewing wrought; and wherein doth it consist? Surely, as there are three ways, whereby we receive a new being; by Creation, by Generation, by Resuscitation: so, according to all these, is our spiritual renewing: It is by Creation; Whosoever is in Christ is a new creature; 2 Cor. v. 17: it is by Regeneration; Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God; John iii. 3 it is by Resuscitation; Even when we were dead in sins, hath he quickened us together with Christ; Eph. ii. 5. From whence arises this double Corollary :—

1. That we can give, of ourselves, no active power to the first act of our conversion: no more than Adam did to his first crea

tion; no more than the child doth to his own conception; no more than the dead man to his raising from the grave:

2. That there must be a privation of our old corrupt forms; and a reducing us, from our either nothing or worse, to an estate of holiness and new obedience. This is that, which is every where set forth unto us, by the mortification of our earthly members, and putting off the old man, on the one part; and, by the first resurrec tion, and putting on the new, on the other. Nothing is more familiar, than these resemblances. But, of all similes, none doth so fitly, methinks, express the manner of this renewing as that of the snake; which by leaving his old slough in the streights of the rock, glides forth glib and nimble. I remember Holcot (In Librum Sapientia) urges the similitude thus: To turn off the snake's skin, saith he, two things are requisite: the first is, foraminis angustia," the straitness of the passage;" else, he must needs draw the old skin through with him: the latter is, stabilitas sari, the "firmness of the stone;" else, instead of leaving the skin, he shall draw the stone away with him. So must it be in the business of our renovation: first, we must pass through the strait way of due penitence; secondly, we must hold the firm and stable purpose of our perseverance in good. True sorrow and contrition of heart must begin the work, and then, an unmoved constancy of endeavour must finish it. Whosoever thou art therefore, if thy heart have not been touched, yea torn and rent in pieces, with a sound humiliation for thy sins, the old slough is still upon thy back thou art not yet come within the ken of true renovation. Or, if thou be gone so far, as that the skin begins to reave up a little in a serious grief for thy sins; yet, if thy resolutions be not steadily settled and thine endeavours bent to go through with that holy work, thou comest short of thy renewing: thine old loose film of corruption shall so cumber thee, that thou shalt never be able to pass on smoothly in the ways of God.

But, because now we have a conceit, that man, as we say of fish, unless he be new, is naught; every man is ready to challenge this honour of being renewed: and, certainly, there may be much deceit this way. We have seen plate or other vessels, that have looked like new, when they have been but new gilded or burnished: we have seen old faces, that have counterfeited a youthly smoothness and vigorous complexion: we have seen hypocrites act every part of renovation, as if they had fallen from heaven. Let us therefore take a trial, by those proofs of examination, that cannot fail us: and they shall be fetched from those three ways of our renewing, which we have formerly specified.

If we be renewed by CREATION, here must be a Clean Heart. Cor mundum crea, saith the Psalmist; Psalm li. 10. For, as at the first God looked on all his works, and found them very good; so still, no work of his can be other than like himself, holy and perfect. If thy heart therefore be still full of unclean thoughts, wanton desires, covetousness, ambition, profaneness, it is thine old heart of

Satan's marring: it is no new heart of God's making; for nothing but clean can come from under his hands. But if we plead the closeness of the heart, which may therefore seem impervious even to our own eyes, see what the Apostle saith, Eph. ii. 10. We are his workmanship, created unto good works. The cleanness of the heart will shew itself in the goodness of the Hands. But if our hands may deceive us, as nothing is more easily counterfeited than a good action, yet our Feet will not; I mean, the trade of

our ways.

That, therefore, from our Creation we may look to our REGENERATION; if we be the sons of God, we are renewed: and how shall it appear, whether we be the sons of God? It is a golden rule, Whosoever are led by the Spirit of God, they are the Sons of God; Rom. viii. 14. Yet, if, in both of these life could be counterfeited, death cannot.

That, therefore, from our Creation and Regeneration we may look to our RESUSCITATION, and from thence back to our grave; Mortify your members, which are on earth; Col. iii. 5. There is a death of this body of sin; and what manner of death? Those, that are Christ's, have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts; Gal. v. 24. Lo, as impossible as it is for a dead man to come down from his gibbet, or up from his coffin, and to do the works of his former life; so impossible it is, that a renewed man should do the works of his unregeneration.

If, therefore, you find your Hearts unclean, your Hands idle and unprofitable, your Ways crooked and unholy, your Corruptions alive and lively, never pretend any renewing: you are the old men still; and, however ye may go for Christians, yet ye have denied the power of Christianity in your lives: and, if ye so continue, the fire of hell shall have so much more power over you, for that it finds the baptismal water upon your faces.

IV. Our last head is the Subject of this Renewing, THE MIND.

There are, that would have this renovation proper to the inferior (which is the affective) part of the soul; as if the To εμоvínov, as they call it, the supreme powers of that Divine part needed it not. These are met with here by our Apostle, who placeth this renewing upon the Mind.

There are, contrarily, that so appropriate this renewing to the Mind, which is the highest loft of the soul, as that they diffuse it not to the lower rooms, nor to the out-houses of the body; as if only the soul were capable as of sin, so of regeneration.

Both these shoot too short; and must know, that as the mind, so not the mind only, must be renewed. That part is mentioned, not by way of exclusion, but of principality. It is the man, that must be renewed; not one piece of him. Except ye please to say, according to that old philosophical adage, "The Mind is the man;" and the body, as the wisest ethnic had wont to say, nothing but the case of that rich jewel. To say as it is, the most saint-like

philosophy was somewhat injurious in disparaging the outward man. Whatever they thought, this body is not the hang-by, but the partner of the soul; no less interested in the man, than that spirit that animates it; no less open to the inhabitation of God's Spirit; no less free of heaven. Man, therefore, that is made of two parts, must be renewed in both: but, as, in the first birth, whole man is born, only the body is seen; so, in the second, whole man is renewed, only the soul is instanced in. Our Apostle puts both together; 1 Thess. v. 23: The God of peace sanctify you wholly, that your whole spirit and soul and body may be preserved blameless to the coming of our Lord Jesus.

If

Why then is the Mind thus specified? Because it is the best part; because, as it enlivens and moves, so it leads the rest. the Mind therefore be renewed, it boots not to urge the renovation of the body. For, as in nature we are wont to say, that the soul follows the temperature of the body; so, in spiritual things, we say rather more truly, that the body follows the temper and guidance of the soul. These two companions, as they shall be once inseparable in their final condition, so they are now in their present dispositions. Be renewed therefore in your Minds; and, if you can, hold off your earthly parts. No more can the body live without the soul, than the soul can be renewed without the body.

First, then, the Mind; then, the body. All defilement is by an extramission, as our Saviour tells us: That, which goeth into the body, defileth not the man; so as the spring of corruption is within. That must be first cleansed; else, in vain do we scour the channels. Ye shall have some hypocrites, that pretend to begin their renewing from without. On foul hands, they will wear white gloves; on foul hearts, clean hands; and then all is well. Away with these pharisaical dishes; filthy within, clean without; fit only for the service of unclean devils. To what purpose is it, to lick over the skin with precious oil, if the liver be corrupted, the lungs rotten? To what purpose is it, to crop the top of the weeds, when the root, and stalk, remains in the earth? Pretend what you will, all is old, all is naught, till the Mind be renewed.

Neither is the body more renewed without the mind, than the renewing of the mind can keep itself from appearing in the renewing of the Body. The soul lies close; and takes advantage of the secrecy of that cabinet, whereof none but God keeps the key; and therefore may pretend any thing: we see the man, the soul we cannot see; but, by that we see, we can judge of that we

see not.

He is no Christian, that is not renewed: and he is worse than a beast, that is no Christian. Every man, therefore, lays claim to that renovation, whereof he cannot be convinced: yea, there want not those, who, though they have a ribaldish tongue and a bloody hand, yet will challenge as good a soul as the best. Hypocrite, when the conduit-head is walled in, how shall we judge of

the spring, but by the water that comes out of the pipes? Corrupt nature hath taught us so much craft, as to set the best side outward. If, therefore, thou have obscene lips; if bribing and oppressing hands; if a gluttonous tooth, a drunken gullet, a lewd conversation; certainly, the soul can be no other than abominably filthy. It may be worse than it appears; better, it cannot lightly be.

The mind then leads the body, the body descries the mind: both of them, at once, are old; or both, at once, new.

For us, as we bear the face of Christians, and profess to have received both souls and bodies from the same hand, and look that both bodies and souls shall once meet in the same glory, let it be the top of all our care, that we may be transformed in the renewing of our Minds; and let the renewing of our minds bewray itself, in the renewing of our Bodies. Wherefore have we had the powerful Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ so long amongst us, if we be still ourselves? What hath it wrought upon us, if we be not changed?

Never tell me of a Popish Transubstantiation of men of an invisible, insensible, unfeisible change of the person; while the species of his outward life and carriage are still the same. These are but false, hypocritical jugglings, to mock fools withal. If we be transformed and renewed, let it be so done, that not only our own eyes and hands may see and feel it, but others too: that the bystanders may say, "How is this man changed from himself! He was a blasphemous swearer, a profane scoffer at goodness: now, he speaks with an awful reverence of God and holy things. He was a luxurious wanton: now, he possesseth his vessel in holiness and honour. He was an unconscionable briber, and abettor of unjust causes now, the world cannot fee him to speak for wrong. He was a wild roaring swaggerer: now, he is a sober student. He was a devil: now, he is a saint."

Oh, let this day, if we have so long deferred it, be the day of the renovation, of the purification of our souls! And let us begin with a sound humiliation, and true sorrow for our former and present wickednesses.

It hath been an old (I say not how true) note, that hath been wont to be set on this day, that, if it be clear and sun-shiny, it portends a hard weather to come; if cloudy and louring, a mild and gentle season ensuing. Let me apply this to a spiritual use; and assure every hearer, that, if we overcast this day with the clouds of our sorrow and the rain of our penitent tears, we shall find a sweet and hopeful season all our life after.

Oh, let us renew our covenants with God, that we will now be renewed in our Minds. The comfort and gain of this change shall be our own, while the honour of it is God's and the Gospels: for this gracious change shall be followed with a glorious.

Onwards, this only shall give us true peace of conscience: only upon this, shall the Prince of this World find nothing in us: how