d God
hath given a man oil for his countenance, as He hath done wine for his
heart, to refresh and cheere it; but this is by reflection and not by
plaister-worke; by comforting, and not by dawbing and covering; by
mending and helping the naturall colour, and not by marring or hiding
it with an artificiall lit. What a miserable vanity is it a man or
woman beholding in a glasse their borrowed face, their bought
complexion, to please themselves with a face that is not their owne?
And what is the cause they paint? Without doubt nothing but pride of
heart, disdaining to bee behind their neighbour, discontentment with
the worke of God, and vaine glory, or a foolish affectation of the
praise of men. This kind of people are very hypocrites, seeming one
thing and being another, desiring to bee that in show which they
cannot be in substance, and coveting to be judged that, they are not:
They are very grosse Deceivers; for they study to delude men with
shewes, seeking hereby to bee counted more lovely creatures than they
are, affecting that men should account that naturall, which is but
artificiall. I may truly say they are deceivers of themselves; for if
they thinke they doe well to paint, they are deceived; if they think
it honest and just to beguile men, and to make them account them more
delicate and amiable, then they are in truth, they are deceived; if
they thinke it meete that that should bee counted God's worke, which
is their owne, they are deceived: If they thinke that shall not one
day give account unto Christ of idle deeds, such as this, as well as
of idle words, they are deceived; if they thinke that God regards not
such trifles, but leaves them to their free election herein; they are
deceived. Now they that deceive themselves, who shall they be trusted
with? A man, that is taken of himselfe, is in a worse taking than he
that is caught of another. This self-deceiver, is a double sinner: he
sinnes in that he is deceived, hee sinnes again in that he doth
deceive himself. To bee murdered of another is not a sin in him that
is murdered; but for a man to be deceived in what he is forbidden, is
a sinne; it were better to bee murdered, than so to be deceived: For
there the body is but killed, but here the soule herself is
endangered. Now, how unhappy is the danger, how grievous is the sin,
when a man is merely of himself indangered? It is a misery of miseries
for a man to bee slaine with his owne sword, with his owne hand, an