man humble and watchful, and the other to see an old man contented and cheerful.

Bernard saith, that pride is the rich man's cousin, and experience every day speaks out pride to be the young man's cousin. God (said one) had three sons, Lucifer, Adam, and Christ; the first aspired to be like God in power, and was therefore thrown down from heaven; the second to be like him in knowledge, and therefore deservedly driven out of Eden, when young; the third did altogether imitate and follow him in his goodness, mercy, and humility, and by so doing obtained an everlasting inheritance.

Remember this, young men, and as you would get a paradise, and keep a paradise, get humble, and keep humble. Pride is an evil that puts men upon all manner of evil. Accius the poet, though he were a dwarf, yet would be pictured tall of sta ture. Psaphon a proud Libyan would needs be a god; and having caught some birds, he taught them to speak and prattle, The great god Psaphon. Menecrates a proud physician wrote thus to king Philip, Menecrates, a god, to Philip a king. Proud Simon in Lucian, having got a little wealth, changed his name from Simon to Simonides, for that there were so many beggars of his kin, and set the house on fire wherein he was born, because nobody should point at it. What sad "evils Pharaoh's pride, and Haman's pride, and Herod's pride, and Belshazzar's pride, put them upon, I shall not now mention.

Ah, young men! had others a window to look into your breasts, or did your hearts stand where your faces do, you would even be afraid of yourselves, you would lothe and abhor yourselves. Ah!

young men, as you would have God to keep house with you, as you would have his mind and secrets made known to you, as you would have Christ to delight in you, and the-Spirit to dwell in you, as you would be honoured among saints, attended and guarded by angels, get humble, and keep humble.

Tertullian's counsel to the young gallants of those times was excellent. Clothe yourselves, said he, with the silk of piety, and with the satin of sanctity, and with the purple of modesty; so shall you have God himself be your suitor.

II. The second evil that youth is subject to, is sensual pleasures and delights. Rejoice, O young man in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thy heart, and in the sight of thine eyes. The wise man by an ironical concession bids him rejoice, &c. sin, &c. Thou art wilful, and resolved upon taking thy pleasure, go on, take thy course: this he speaks by way of mockage and bitter scoff, but know thou, that for all these things, God shall bring thee into judgment. So Sampson made a feast, for so used the young men to do; the hearts of young men usually are much given up to pleasure. I have read of a young man, who was very much given up to pleasures, he, standing by St. Ambrose, and seeing his excellent death, turned to other young men by him, and said, Oh! that I might live with you, and die with him. Sensual pleasures are like to those locusts, Rev. ix. 7. the crowns upon whose heads are said to be only as it were such, or such in appearance, and like gold, but ver. 10. it is said, there were (not as it were, but) stings in their tails. Sensual pleasures are

but seeming and appearing pleasures, but the pains that attend them are true and real; he that delights in sensual pleasures, shall find his greatest pleasures become his bitterest pains. The Heathens looked upon the back parts of pleasure, and saw it going away from them, and leaving a sting behind.

Pleasures pass away as soon as they have wearied out the body, and leave it as a bunch of grapes" whose juice hath been pressed out; which made one to say, Nulla major voluptas quam voluptatis fastidium, I see no greater pleasure in this world, than the contempt of pleasure. Julian, though an apostate, yet professed, That the pleasures of the body were far below a great spirit. And Tully saith, He is not worthy of the name of a man (qui unum diem vellit esse in voluptatem) that would entirely spend one whole day in pleasures: it is better not to desire pleasures than to enjoy them. "I said of laughter, It is mad, and of mirth, What dost thou?" Eccl. ii. 2. The interrogation bids a challenge to all the masters of mirth, to produce any satisfactory fruit, which it affordeth, if they could.

Xerxes being weary of all pleasures, promised rewards to the inventors of new pleasures, which being invented, he nevertheless remained unsatisfied. As a bee flieth from flower to flower, and is not satisfied, and as a sick man removes from one bed to another, from one seat to another, from one chamber to another for ease, and finds none: so men given up to sensual pleasure, go from one pleasure to another, but can find no content, no satisfaction in their pleasures, Eccl. i. 8. The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with

hearing. There is a curse of unsatisfiableness lies upon the creature, honours cannot satisfy the ambitious man, nor riches the covetous man, nor pleasures the voluptuous man; man cannot take off the weariness of one pleasure by another, for after a few evaporated minutes are spent in pleasures, the body presently fails the mind, and the mind the desire, and the desire the satisfaction, and all the man. Pleasures are Juno's in the pursuit, and but clouds in the enjoyment; pleasure is a beautiful harlot, sitting in her chariot, whose four wheels are pride, gluttony, lust, and idleness; the two horses are prosperity and abundance; the two drivers are idleness and security; her attendants and followers are guilt, grief, late repentance (if any) and oft death and ruin; many great men, and many strong men, and many rich men, and many hopeful men, and many young men, have come to their ends by her, but never any enjoyed full satisfaction and content in her. Ah! Young men, avoid this harlot, and come not near the door of her house. And for lawful pleasures, let me only say this, it is your wisdom only to touch them, to taste them, and to use them, as Mithridates used poison, to fortify yourselves against casual extremities and maladies. When Mr. Roger Ascham asked the lady Jane Gray, how she could lose such pastime, her father, with the duchess being a-hunting in the park; smilingly answered, All sport in the park is but a shadow of that pleasure I find in this book, having a good book in her hand.

Augustine before his conversion, could not tell how to live without those pleasures which he delighted much in, but when his nature was changed,

and his heart graciously turned to the Lord, O how sweet, saith he, is it to be without those former sweet delights. Ah, young men, when once you come to experience the goodness and sweetness that is in the Lord, and in his word and ways, you will then sit down and grieve, that you have spent more wine in the cup, than oil in the lamp. There are no pleasures so delighting, so satisfying, so ravishing, so engaging, and so abiding, as those that spring from union and communion with God, as those that flow from a sense of interest in God, and from an humble, and a holy walking with God.

III. The third sin of youth is rashness. They many times know little, and fear less, and so are apt rashly to run on and run out often to their hazard. "Exhort young men to be sober minded, and discreet." Tit. ii. 6. They are apt to be rash, to be hotspurs, as you may see in Rehoboam's young counsellors, who counselled him to tell the people, that groaned under their burden, that his little finger should be thicker than his father's loins, and that he would add to their yoke, and that whereas his father had chastised them with whips, he would chastise them with scorpions; this rash counsel proved Rehoboam's ruin. Yea, David himself though a good man, yet being in his warm blood and young, how sadly was he overtaken with rashness?" As the Lord God of Israel liveth," saith he, except thou hadst hastened, and come to meet me, surely there had not been left unto Nabal, by the morning light, any that pisseth against the wall," 1 Sam. xxv. 34, 35. And this he binds with an oath; because the master was foolishly wilful, the innocent servants must all be

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