rthly, sunk into the flesh, and transformed into a brutish
quality or nature. Now the great purpose of the gospel is, to bring along
a deliverer unto your spirits, for the releasing and unfettering of them
from the chains of fleshly lusts. This is the very work of Christianity,
to give liberty to the captive souls of men "and the opening of the prison
to them that are bound," Isa. lxi. 1. The souls of men are chained with
their own fleshly lusts, and if at any time they can break these grosser
chains, as some finer spirits have escaped out of the vilest dungeon of
the flesh, and cast off these heavier chains that bind the most part of
men, yet wholly escape they cannot. There be higher and lower rooms of
this prison, there are some more gross, some more subtile cords and bands
of the flesh, and whatsoever it be that holds a man bound or in whatsoever
house he be imprisoned, it is not much matter, since really he is bound,
and his liberty restrained. If a chain of gold bind as fast as a chain of
iron, there is no real difference, except that mockery is added unto it,
when a man is detained in a golden prison with golden chains. Though some
men, I say, escape the grosser pollutions of the flesh, yet they are
fettered within some narrow, scant, and but imaginary good things, they
cannot go without the compass of those. Every man is confined by nature
within the circle of his own narrow bosom or if he expatiate into the
field of the world, yet how narrow, how limited are all created objects,
for the infinite desires of the soul, whether it tend to the enjoyment of
other creatures, or to the possession of some imaginary excellency in a
man's self. How straitened are they! How imprisoned in all that compass!
There is no true liberty can be found there. Though some may be disengaged
from baser lusts and the common vain employments of men, yet far they
cannot go, they do but engage more with themselves the love and estimation
of themselves. Without that compass they cannot possibly go, whether from
another principle, or to another end. And, O how little bounds is within
any created breast for the immortal spirit, that is so vast and
expatiating in its desires to dwell in!

But here is the perfect redemption that is in Jesus Christ. When he comes
into the soul, he unfetters and releases it, not only of the grosser lusts
of the flesh, but even of those subtile invisible bands of self love, self
seeking, of all scant, narrow, and pa