d
extirpate all that bears that image, they would think it sweet as bread,
Psal. xiv. This is a more open and declared enmity against the God of
heaven, and yet I know it lurks under the mask of some other thing. You
pretend to hate hypocrisy only, alas! what a scorn is it for profanity to
hate hypocrisy? Sure it is not because it is a sin but for the very shadow
of piety it carries. You hate the thing itself so perfectly, that you
cannot endure the very picture of it. Do not deceive yourselves, the true
quarrel is because they run not to the same excess of riot with you. If
they will lie, cozen, defraud, swear, and blaspheme as other men, you
could endure to make them companions, as you do others, and the principle
of that is, the enmity that was placed in the beginning, that mortal
irreconcilable feud, betwixt the two families, are two seeds of Christ and
Satan.

But as I told you, this enmity acts in a more subtile and invisible way in
some, and it is painted over with some fair colours to hide the deformity
of it. Not only the grosser corruptions of men carry this stamp, but take
even the most refined piece or part in man, take his mind, take the
excellency of his mind, even the wisdom of it, yet that hath enmity
incorporated into it, and mixed with it throughout all, for the wisdom of
the flesh is enmity with God, as it may be read, {~GREEK SMALL LETTER PHI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMICRON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER MU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}, the very
prudence and reason of a natural man, which carries him to a distance
from, and opposition with, the common defilements in the courses of men,
yet that hath in its bosom a more exquisite and refined enmity against
God, and so the more spiritual and purified it be from grosser
corruptions, it is the more active and powerful against God, because it
is, as it were, the very spirit and quintessence of enmity. You see it, 1
Cor i., how the wisdom of God is foolishness to the wisdom of the world,
and then again, that the wisdom of the world is the greatest folly to the
only wise God. Men, that have many natural advantages beyond others, are
at this great disadvantage, they are more ready to despise godliness, as
too base and simple a thing to adorn their natures, as Christ said of rich
men, it may be said of wise men, of learned men, of civil and blameless
persons who have a smooth carriage bef