USE FIFTH, Again, fifthly, Is it so? Is the soul such an excellent thing, and is the loss thereof so unspeakably great? Then this doctrine commends those for the wise ones, that above all business concern themselves with the salvation of their souls; those that make all other matters but things by the by, and the salvation of their souls the one thing needful. But, few will be concerned with this use; for where is he who does this? Solomon speaks of one man of a thousand (Eccl 7:28). However, some there be, and blessed be God for some; but they are they that are wise, yea, wise in the wisdom of God.
1. Because they reject what God has rejected, and that is sin. 2. Because they esteem but little of that which, by the Word, is counted but of little esteem, and that is the world. 3. Because they choose for a portion that which God commends unto us for that which is the most excellent thing—viz., Himself, His Christ, His heaven, His Word, His grace, and holiness; these are the great and most excellent things, and the things that He has chosen that are truly wise for his soul (and all other wise men are fools in God's account and in the judgment of His Word), and if it is so, glory and bliss must need to be their portion, though others shall miss thereof—'The wise shall inherit glory, but shame shall be the promotion of fools' (Prov 3:35).
Let me, then, encourage those who are of this mind to be strong, and hold on to their way. Soul, thou hast pitched right; I will say of thy choice as David said of Goliath's sword, 'There is none like that; give it to me.' 'Hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown' (Rev 3:11). Oh! I admire this wisdom; this is by the direction of the Lawgiver; this is by the teaching of the blessed Spirit of God: not the wisdom which this world teacheth, nor the wisdom which the world chooses, which comes to naught (1 Cor 2: 6). Surely thou hast seen something of the world to come, and of the glory of it, through faith; surely God has made thee see the emptiness in that wherein others find a fulness, and the vanity in that which by others is counted for a darling. Blessed are your eyes, for they see; and your ears, for they hear.
But who told thee that thy soul was such an excellent thing as by thy practice, thou declared it to be? What! set more by thy soul than by all the world? What! Cast a world behind your back for the welfare of a soul? Is not this to play the fool, in the account of sinners, while angels wonder at and rejoice for your wisdom? What a thing is this, that thy soul and its welfare should be more in thy esteem than all those glories wherewith the eyes of the world are dazzled! Surely thou hast looked upon the sun, and that makes gold look like a clod of clay in thine eyesight.
But who put the thoughts of the excellencies of the things that are eternal—I say, who put the thoughts of the excellency of those things into thy mind in this wanton age?—in an age wherein the thoughts of eternal life, and the salvation of the soul, are with and to many like the Morocco ambassador and his men, men of strange faces, in strange habits, with strange gestures and behavior, monsters to behold. But where hadst thou that heart that gives entertainment to these thoughts, these heavenly thoughts? These thoughts are like the French Protestants, banished thence where they willingly would have harbored them. How came they to thy house, to thy heart, and to find entertainment in thy soul? The Lord keeps them in every imagination of your heart forever and inclines your heart to seek Him more and more.
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