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greet with flattering titles; and do their fellow-creatures homage to scorn that language to themselves that they give to God, and to spend their time and estate to gratify their wanton minds; the customs of the Gentiles, that knew not God, pass with them for civility, good breeding, decency, recreation, accomplishments, &c. O that man would consider, since there are but two spirits, one good, the other evil, which of them it is that inclines the world to these things! and whether it be Nicodemus or Mordecai in thee, that doth befriend these despised Christians, which makes thee ashamed to disown that openly in conversation with the world, which the true light hath made vanity and sin to thee in secret? Or, if thou art a despiser, tell me, I pray thee, which dost thou think thy mockery, anger, or contempt do most resemble, proud Haman, or good Mordecai? My friend, know, that no man hath more delighted in, or been prodigal of those vanities called civilities, than myself; and could I have covered my conscience under the fashions of the world, truly I had found a shelter from showers of reproach that have fallen very often and thick upon me; but had I, with Joseph, conformed to Egypt's customs, I had sinned against my God, and lost my peace. But I would not have thee think it is a mere Thou or Title, simply or nakedly in themselves, we boggle at, or that we would beget or set up any form inconsistent with sincerity or true civility: there is but too much of that but the esteem and value the vain minds of men do put upon them, that ought to be crossed and stripped of their delights, constrains us to testify so steadily against them. And this know, from the sense God's Holy Spirit hath begotten in us, that that which requires these customs, and begets fear to leave them, and pleads for them, and is displeased if not used and paid, is the spirit of pride and flattery in the ground, though frequency, use, or generosity, may have abated its strength in some: and this being discovered by the light that now shines from heaven, in the hearts of the despised Christians I have communion with, necessitates them to this testimony, and myself, as one of them, and

for them, in a reproof of the unfaithful, who would walk undiscerned, though convinced to the contrary; and for an allay to the proud despisers, who scorn us as a people guilty of affectation and singularity. For the eternal God, who is great amongst us, and on his way in the earth to make his power known, "will root up every plant that his right hand hath not planted." Wherefore let me beseech thee, reader, to consider the foregoing reasons, which were mostly given me from the Lord, in that time, when my condescension to these fashions would have been purchased at almost any rate; but the certain sense I had of their contrariety to the meek and self-denying life of holy Jesus, required of me my disuse of them, and faithful testimony against them. I speak the truth in Christ; I lie not; I would not have brought myself under censure and disdain for them, could I, with peace of conscience, have kept my belief under a worldly behaviour. It was extreme irksome to me, to decline and expose myself; but having an assured and repeated sense of the original of these vain customs, that they rise from pride, self-love, and flattery, I dared not gratify that mind in myself or others. And for this reason it is, that I am earnest with my readers to be cautious how they reprove us on this occsaion; and do once more entreat them, that they would seriously weigh in themselves, whether it be the spirit of the world, or of the Father, that is so angry with our honest, plain, and harmless Thou and Thee: that so every plant that God, our heavenly Father, hath not planted in the sons and daughters of men, may be rooted up.

CHAP. XI.

sons.

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SECT. 1. Pride leads people to an excessive value of their per2. It is plain from the racket that is made about blood and families also in the case of shape and beauty. 3. Blood no nobility, but virtue. 4. Virtue no upstart: antiquity, nobility without it, else age and blood would bar virtue in the present age. 5. God teaches the true sense of nobility, who made of one blood all nations: there is the original of all blood. 6. These men of blood, out of their feathers, look like other men. 7. This is not said to reject, but humble the gentleman: the advantages of that condition above others. An exhortation to recover their lost economy in families, out of interest and credit. 8. But the author has a higher motive; the gospel, and the excellencies of it, which they profess. 9. The pride of persons respecting shape and beauty: the washes, patches, paintings, dressings, &c. This excess would keep the poor: the mischiefs that attend it. 10. But pride in the old, and homely, yet more hateful: that it is usual. The madness of it. Counsel to the beautiful to get their souls like their bodies; and to the homely, to supply want of that, in the adornment of their lasting part, their souls, with holiness, Nothing homely with God, but sin. The blessedness of those that wear Christ's yoke and cross, and are crucified to the world.

SECT. 1. BUT pride stops not here; she excites people to an excessive value and care of their persons : they must have great and punctual attendance, stately furniture, rich and exact apparel: all which help to make up that pride of life, that John tells us, "is not of the Father, but of the world."a A sin God charged upon

a 1 John ii. 16, 17.

the haughty daughters of Zion, Isa. iii. and on the proud prince and people of Tyrus, Ezek. xxvii. 28. Read these chapters, and measure this age by their sins, and what is coming on these nations by their judgments. But at the present I shall only touch upon the first, viz. the excessive value people have of their persons; leaving the rest to be considered under the last head of this discourse, which is luxury, where they may be not improperly placed.

Sect. 2. That people are generally proud of their persons, is too visible and troublesome; especially if they have any pretence either to blood or beauty; the one has raised many quarrels among men; and the other among women, and men too often, for their sakes, and at their excitements. But to the first: what a pother has this noble blood made in the world, antiquity of name or family? whose father or mother, great grandfather, or great grand-mother, was best descended or allied? what stock, or what clan, they came of? what coat of arms they gave? which had, of right, the precedence? But, methinks, nothing of man's folly has less shew of reason to palliate it.

Sect. 3. For first, What matter is it of whom any one is descended, that is not of ill-fame; since it is his own virtue that must raise, or vice depress him? An ancestor's character is no excuse to a man's ill actions, but an aggravation of his degeneracy and since virtue comes not by generation, I am neither the better nor the worse for my fore-father; to be sure, not in God's account, nor should it be in man's. Nobody would endure injuries the easier, or reject favours the more, for coming by the hand of a man well or ill descended. I confess it were greater honour to have had no blots, and with an hereditary estate to have had a lineal descent or worth but that was never found, no, not in the most blessed of families upon earth, I mean Abraham's. To be descended of wealth and titles, fills no man's head with brains, or heart with truth: those qualities come

from an higher cause. It is vanity then, and most condemnable pride, for a man of bulk and character to despise another of less size in the world, and of meaner alliance, for want of them; because the latter may have the merit, where the former has only the effects of it in an ancestor and though the one be great, by means of a fore-father; the other is so too, but it is by his own: then, pray, which is the bravest man of the two?

Sect. 4. O, says the person proud of blood, it was never a good world, since we have had so many upstart gentlemen! But what should others have said of that man's ancestor, when he started first up into the knowledge of the world? for he, and all men and families, ay, and all states and kingdoms too, have had their upstarts, that is their beginnings. This is like being the true church because old, not because good; for families to be noble by being old, and not by being virtuous. No such matter: it must be age in virtue, or else virtue before age; for otherwise a man should be noble by means of his predecessor, and yet the predecessor less noble than he, because he was the acquirer: which is a paradox that will puzzle all their heraldry to explain! Strange that they should be more noble than their ancestor, that got their nobility for them! But if this be absurd, as it is, then the upstart is the noble man ; the man that got it by his virtue and those are only entitled to his honour, that are imitators of his virtue; the rest may bear his name from his blood, but that is all. If virtue then give nobility, which Heathens themselves agree, then families are no longer truly noble, than they are virtuous. And if virtue go not by blood, but by the qualifications of the descendants, it follows, blood is excluded: else blood would bar virtue; and no man that wanted the one, should be allowed the benefit of the other : which were to stint and bound nobility for want of antiquity, and make virtue useless.

No, let blood and name go together; but pray let nobility and virtue keep company, for they are nearest

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