are abomination. There is nothing
makes your worship of God so hateful as this, ye think so much of it, and
justify yourself by it, and then God knows what it is that ye so magnify,
and make the ground of your claim to salvation. It is even an empty
ceremony, a shadow without substance, a body without a soul. You speak
and look and hear, you exercise some outward senses but no inward
affection, and what should that be to him, who is a Spirit?

They did not observe the iniquity of their holy things, and therefore are
they marked by him--they are in his sight. They did not see so many faults
in their prayers and services, they wondered why God did chide them so
much, but God marks what we miss, he remembers when we forget. We cover
ourselves with a wall of external duties, and think to hide all the
rottenness of our hearts, but it will not be hid from him, before whom
hell hath no covering. All hearts are open and naked before him. Your
secret sins are in the light of his countenance. Men hear you pray, see
you present at worship, they know no more, at least they see no more, nay,
but the formality of thy worship, the wanderings of thy mind are in his
sight. And, O how excellent a rule of walking were this, to do all in his
sight and presence! O that ye were persuaded in your hearts of his all
seeing, all searching eye, and all knowing mind! Would ye not be more
solicitous and anxious anent the frame of your hearts, than the liberty of
your speech or external gesture? O how would men retire within themselves,
to fashion their spirits before this all searching and all knowing Spirit!
If ye do not observe the evils of your hearts and ways, they are in his
sight, and this will spoil all acceptance of the good of them. If ye
observe the evils of your well doing, and bring these also to the fountain
to wash them, and be about this earnest endeavour of perfecting holiness,
of perfecting well doings in the power and fear of God, then certainly he
will not set your sins in the light of his countenance, the good of your
way shall come before him, and the evil of it Christ shall take away.

"Cease to do evil," &c. These are the two legs a Christian walks on, if
he want any of them, he is lame and cannot go equally,--ceasing from evil,
and doing good, nay, they are so united, that the one cannot subsist
without the other. If a man do not cease from evil and his former lusts,
he cannot do well, or perfect holiness. There a