romise life to our faith. So that if the Lord had continued that covenant
with us, we ought to have called it grace, and would have been saved by
grace as well as now, though it be true, that there is some more occasion
given to man's nature to boast and glory in that way, yet not at all
"before God," Rom. iv. 2.

But we have scarcely found man in such an estate, till we have found him
sinful and miserable and fallen from his excellency. That son sinned in
the dawning of the creation, but before ye can well know what it is, it is
eclipsed and darkened with sin and misery as if the Lord had only set up
such a creature in the firmament of glory, to let him know how blessed he
could make him, and wherein his blessedness consists, and then presently
to throw him down from his excellency. When you find him mounting up to
the heavens, and spreading himself thus in holiness and happiness, like a
bay-tree, behold again, and you find him not, though you seek him, you
shall not find him, his place doth not know him. He is like one that
comes out with a great majesty upon a stage, and personates some monarch,
or emperor, in the world, and then ere you can well gather your thoughts,
to know what he is, he is turned off the stage, and appears in some base
and despicable appearance. So quickly is man stript of all those glorious
ornaments of holiness, and puts on the vile rags of sin and wretchedness,
and is cast from the throne of eminency above the creatures, and from
fellowship with God, to be a slave and servant to the dust of his feet,
and to have communion with the devil and his angels. And now, ye have man
holden out in Scripture as the only wretched piece of the creation, as the
very plague of the world the whole creation groaning under him, (Rom.
viii.) and in pain to be delivered of such a burden, of such an execration
and curse and astonishment. You find the testimony of the word condemns
him altogether, concludes him under sin, and then under a curse, and makes
all flesh guilty in God's sight. The word speaks otherwise of us than we
think of ourselves! "Their imagination is only evil continually," Gen. vi.
5. O then, what must our affections be, that are certainly more corrupt!
What then must our way be! All flesh hath corrupted their way, and done
abominable works, and "none doeth good," Psal. xiv. 1, 2, 3. But many flee
in unto their good hearts as their last refuge, when they are beaten from
these outworks of their acti