Religion & morality > Human nature in its four-fold state ... in several practical discourses

f Head I. fpedally noticed. 14.1
a Straw; you’ll fee what a Swarm is there, and
jj how lively they be. Juft fuch a Sight would thy
f: Heart afford thee; did the Lord but withdraw the
iReftraint he has upon it, and fufler Satan to ftir it
up by ^temptation.
4. The Sin of our Nature is, of all Sins, themoft
fixed and abiding. Sinful Actions, tho’ the Guilt
and Stain of them may remain, yet in thcmfelves
they arc paffing. The Drunkard is not always at
sjhis Cups, nor the unclean Perfon always ading
^ Lewdnefs. But the Corruption of Nature is an a-
•xbiding Sin: It remains with Men in its full Power,
I [(by Night and by Day, at all Times, fixed as with
f Bands of Iron and Erafs; till their Nature be chang¬
ed by converting Grace: And the Remains of it
continue with the godly, until the Death of the Bo¬
dy. Pride, Envy, Covetoufnefs,vand the like are
51 not always Jiirring in thee. But "the proud, envi-
Bous, carnal Nature isftill with thee: Even as the
Clock that is wrong, is not always Jtriking wrong;
but the wrong Set continues with it, without In-
) termiffion.
5. It is the great reigning Sin, Rom. vi. 12. Let
not Sin therefore reign in your mortal Body, that ye
Jhould obey it in the Lufts thereof. There are three
Things you may obferve in the corrupt Heart, (x.)
There’s the corrupt Nature ; the corrupt Set of the
[ Heart, whereby Men are unapt for ail Good, and
li fitted for all Evil. This the Apoftle, here, calls Sin
I which reigns. (2.) There are particular Lufts, or
C Difpofitions of that corrupt Nature, which the A-
<poftle calls the Lufts thereof; fuch as Pride, Cove-
xtoufnefs, &c. (3.) There’s one among thefe, which
sis (like Saul among the People) higher by far than
Lthe reft, namely the Sin, which doth fo eaftly befet
us.