gligence in all spiritual duties, "None stirreth up himself to take hold
on thee." Here is the want of the exercise of faith: faith is the soul's
hand and grip, John i. 12; Heb. vi. 18; 1 Tim. vi. 12; Isa. xxvii. 5.
Nobody awaketh themselves out of their deadness and security, to lay hold
on thee. Lord, thou art going away, and taking good-night of the land, and
nobody is like to hold thee by the garment; no Jacobs here, who will not
let thee go, till thou bless them; none to prevail with thy Majesty,--every
one is like to give Christ a free passport and testimonial to go abroad,
and are almost Gadarenes, to pray him to depart out of their coasts. There
is a strange looseness and indifferency in men's spirits concerning the
one thing necessary. Men lie by and dream over their days, and never put
the soul's estate out of question; none will give so much pains, as to
clear their interest in thee, to lay hold on thee, so as they may make
peace with thee. Now, can there be a more ample and lively description of
our estate, both of the land and of particular persons of it? Since this
must not be limited to the nation of the Jews, though the prophet spake of
the generality of them, yet, no doubt, all mankind is included in the
first six verses; and any secure people may be included in the seventh
verse, for Paul applieth even such like speeches (Rom. xi. 13.) that were
spoken, as you would think, of David's enemies only. Yet the Spirit of God
knowing the mind of the Spirit, maketh a more general use of their
condition, to hold out the natural estate of all men out of Christ Jesus.

But there are in these two verses other two things beside the
acknowledgment of sin:

I. The acknowledgment of God's righteousness in punishing them, for now
they need not quarrel God, they find the cause of their fading in their
own bosom. They now join sin and punishment together, whereas in the time
of their prosperity they separated punishment from sin; and in the time of
their security in adversity they separated sin from punishment: at one
time making bare confession of sin, without fear of God's justice, at
another time fretting and murmuring at his judgments, without the sense of
their sin. But now they join both these, and the sight and sense of God's
displeasure maketh sin more bitter, and to abound more, and to appear in
the loathsome and provoking nature of it, so that their acknowledgment
hath an edge upon it. And again, the sight and s