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A SERIOUS CALL TO A DEVOUT AND HOLY LIFE by William Law CHAPTER I. Concerning the nature and extent of Christian devotion.
DEVOTION is neither private nor public prayer; but prayers, whether private or
public, are particular parts or instances of devotion. Devotion signifies a
life given, or devoted, to God.
He, therefore, is the devout man, who lives no longer to his own will, or the
way and spirit of the world, but to the sole will of God, who considers God in
everything, who serves God in everything, who makes all the parts of his common
life parts of piety, by doing everything in the Name of God, and under such
rules as are conformable to His glory.
We readily acknowledge, that God alone is to be the rule and measure of our
prayers; that in them we are to look wholly unto Him, and act wholly for Him;
that we are only to pray in such a manner, for such things, and such ends, as
are suitable to His glory.
Now let any one but find out the reason why he is to be thus strictly pious in
his prayers, and he will find the same as strong a reason to be as strictly
pious in all the other parts of his life. For there is not the least shadow of
a reason why we should make God the rule and measure of our prayers; why we
should then look wholly unto Him, and pray according to His will; but what
equally proves it necessary for us to look wholly unto God, and make Him the
rule and measure of all the other actions of our life. For any ways of life,
any employment of our talents, whether of our parts, our time, or money, that
is not strictly according to the will of God, that is not for such ends as are
suitable to His glory, are as great absurdities and failings, as prayers that
are not according to the will of God. For there is no other reason why our
prayers should be according to the will of God, why they should have nothing in
them but what is wise, and holy, and heavenly; there is no other reason for
this, but that our lives may be of the same nature, full of the same wisdom,
holiness, and heavenly tempers, that we may live unto God in the same spirit
that we pray unto Him. Were it not our strict duty to live by reason, to devote
all the actions of our lives to God, were it not absolutely necessary to walk
before Him in wisdom and holiness and all heavenly conversation, doing
everything in His Name, and for His glory, there would be no excellency or
wisdom in the most heavenly prayers. Nay, such prayers would be absurdities;
they would be like prayers for wings, when it was no part of our duty to fly.
As sure, therefore, as there is any wisdom in praying for the Spirit of God, so
sure is it, that we are to make that Spirit the rule of all our actions; as
sure as it is our duty to look wholly unto God in our prayers, so sure is it
that it is our duty to live wholly unto God in our lives. But we can no more be
said to live unto God, unless we live unto Him in all the ordinary actions of
our life, unless He be the rule and measure of all our ways, than we can be
said to pray unto God, unless our prayers look wholly unto Him. So that
unreasonable and absurd ways of life, whether in labour or diversion, whether
they consume our time, or our money, are like unreasonable and absurd prayers,
and are as truly an offence unto God.
It is for want of knowing, or at least considering this, that we see such a
mixture of ridicule in the lives of many people. You see them strict as to some
times and places of devotion, but when the service of the Church is over, they
are but like those that seldom or never come there. In their way of life, their
manner of spending their time and money, in their cares and fears, in their
pleasures and indulgences, in their labour and diversions, they are like the
rest of the world. This makes the loose part of the world generally make a jest
of those that are devout, because they see their devotion goes no farther than
their prayers, and that when they are over, they live no more unto God, till
the time of prayer returns again; but live by the same humour and fancy, and in
as full an enjoyment of all the follies of life as other people. This is the
reason why they are the jest and scorn of careless and worldly people; not
because they are really devoted to God, but because they appear to have no
other devotion but that of occasional prayers.
Julius1 is very fearful of missing
prayers; all the parish supposes Julius to be sick, if he is not at Church. But
if you were to ask him why he spends the rest of his time by humour or chance?
why he is a companion of the silliest people in their most silly pleasures? why
he is ready for every impertinent2
entertainment and diversion? If you were to ask him why there is no amusement
too trifling to please him? why he is busy at all balls and assemblies? why he
gives himself up to an idle, gossiping conversation? why he lives in foolish
friendships and fondness for particular persons, that neither want nor deserve
any particular kindness? why he allows himself in foolish hatreds and
resentments against particular persons without considering that he is to love
everybody as himself? If you ask him why he never puts his conversation, his
time, and fortune, under the rules of religion? Julius has no more to say for
himself than the most disorderly person. For the whole tenor of Scripture lies
as directly against such a life, as against debauchery and intemperance: he
that lives such a course of idleness and folly, lives no more according to the
religion of Jesus Christ, than he that lives in gluttony and intemperance.
If a man was to tell Julius that there was no occasion for so much constancy at
prayers, and that he might, without any harm to himself, neglect the service of
the Church, as the generality of people do, Julius would think such a one to be
no Christian, and that he ought to avoid his company. But if a person only
tells him, that he may live as the generality of the world does, that he may
enjoy himself as others do, that he may spend his time and money as people of
fashion do, that he may conform to the follies and frailties of the generality,
and gratify his tempers and passions as most people do, Julius never suspects
that man to want a Christian spirit, or that he is doing the devil's work. And
if Julius was to read all the New Testament from the beginning to the end, he
would find his course of life condemned in every page of it.
And indeed there cannot anything be imagined more absurd in itself, than wise,
and sublime, and heavenly prayers, added to a life of vanity and folly, where
neither labour nor diversions, neither time nor money, are under the direction
of the wisdom and heavenly tempers of our prayers. If we were to see a man
pretending to act wholly with regard to God in everything that he did, that
would neither spend time nor money, nor take any labour or diversion, but so
far as he could act according to strict principles of reason and piety, and yet
at the same time neglect all prayer, whether public or private, should we not
be amazed at such a man, and wonder how he could have so much folly along with
so much religion?
Yet this is as reasonable as for any person to pretend to strictness in
devotion, to be careful of observing times and places of prayer, and yet
letting the rest of his life, his time and labour, his talents and money, be
disposed of without any regard to strict rules of piety and devotion. For it is
as great an absurdity to suppose holy prayers, and Divine petitions, without a
holiness of life suitable to them, as to suppose a holy and Divine life without
prayers.
Let any one therefore think how easily he could confute a man that pretended to
great strictness of life without prayer, and the same arguments will as plainly
confute another, that pretends to strictness of prayer, without carrying the
same strictness into every other part of life. For to be weak and foolish in
spending our time and fortune, is no greater a mistake, than to be weak and
foolish in relation to our prayers. And to allow ourselves in any ways of life
that neither are, nor can be offered to God, is the same irreligion, as to
neglect our prayers, or use them in such a manner as make them an offering
unworthy of God.
The short of the matter is this; either reason and religion prescribe rules and
ends to all the ordinary actions of our life, or they do not: if they do, then
it is as necessary to govern all our actions by those rules, as it is necessary
to worship God. For if religion teaches us anything concerning eating and
drinking, or spending our time and money; if it teaches us how we are to use
and contemn the world; if it tells us what tempers we are to have in common
life, how we are to be disposed towards all people; how we are to behave
towards the sick, the poor, the old, the destitute; if it tells us whom we are
to treat with a particular love, whom we are to regard with a particular
esteem; if it tells us how we are to treat our enemies, and how we are to
mortify and deny ourselves; he must be very weak that can think these parts of
religion are not to be observed with as much exactness, as any doctrines that
relate to prayers.
It is very observable, that there is not one command in all the Gospel for
public worship; and perhaps it is a duty that is least insisted upon in
Scripture of any other. The frequent attendance at it is never so much as
mentioned in all the New Testament. Whereas that religion or devotion which is
to govern the ordinary actions of our life is to be found in almost every verse
of Scripture. Our blessed Saviour and His Apostles are wholly taken up in
doctrines that relate to common life. They call us to renounce the world, and
differ in every temper and way of life, from the spirit and the way of the
world: to renounce all its goods, to fear none of its evils, to reject its
joys, and have no value for its happiness: to be as new-born babes, that are
born into a new state of things: to live as pilgrims in spiritual watching, in
holy fear, and heavenly aspiring after another life: to take up our daily
cross, to deny ourselves, to profess the blessedness of mourning, to seek the
blessedness of poverty of spirit: to forsake the pride and vanity of riches, to
take no thought for the morrow, to live in the profoundest state of humility,
to rejoice in worldly sufferings: to reject the lust of the flesh, the lust of
the eyes, and the pride of life: to bear injuries, to forgive and bless our
enemies, and to love mankind as God loveth them: to give up our whole hearts
and affections to God, and strive to enter through the strait gate into a life
of eternal glory.
This is the common devotion which our blessed Saviour taught, in order to make
it the common life of all Christians. Is it not therefore exceeding strange
that people should place so much piety in the attendance upon public worship,
concerning which there is not one precept of our Lord's to be found, and yet
neglect these common duties of our ordinary life, which are commanded in every
page of the Gospel? I call these duties the devotion of our common life,
because if they are to be practised, they must be made parts of our common
life; they can have no place anywhere else.
If contempt of the world and heavenly affection is a necessary temper of
Christians, it is necessary that this temper appear in the whole course of
their lives, in their manner of using the world, because it can have no place
anywhere else. If self-denial be a condition of salvation, all that would be
saved must make it a part of their ordinary life. If humility be a Christian
duty, then the common life of a Christian is to be a constant course of
humility in all its kinds. If poverty of spirit be necessary, it must be the
spirit and temper of every day of our lives. If we are to relieve the naked,
the sick, and the prisoner, it must be the common charity of our lives, as far
as we can render ourselves able to perform it. If we are to love our enemies,
we must make our common life a visible exercise and demonstration of that love.
If content and thankfulness, if the patient bearing of evil be duties to God,
they are the duties of every day, and in every circumstance of our life. If we
are to be wise and holy as the new-born sons of God, we can no otherwise be so,
but by renouncing everything that is foolish and vain in every part of our
common life. If we are to be in Christ new creatures, we must show that we are
so, by having new ways of living in the world. If we are to follow Christ, it
must be in our common way of spending every day.
Thus it is in all the virtues and holy tempers of Christianity; they are not
ours unless they be the virtues and tempers of our ordinary life. So that
Christianity is so far from leaving us to live in the common ways of life,
conforming to the folly of customs, and gratifying the passions and tempers
which the spirit of the world delights in, it is so far from indulging us in
any of these things, that all its virtues which it makes necessary to salvation
are only so many ways of living above and contrary to the world, in all the
common actions of our life. If our common life is not a common course of
humility, self-denial, renunciation of the world, poverty of spirit, and
heavenly affection, we do not live the lives of Christians.
But yet though it is thus plain that this, and this alone, is Christianity, a
uniform, open, and visible practice of all these virtues, yet it is as plain,
that there is little or nothing of this to be found, even amongst the better
sort of people. You see them often at Church, and pleased with fine preachers:
but look into their lives, and you see them just the same sort of people as
others are, that make no pretences to devotion. The difference that you find
betwixt them, is only the difference of their natural tempers. They have the
same taste of the world, the same worldly cares, and fears, and joys; they have
the same turn of mind, equally vain in their desires. You see the same fondness
for state and equipage, the same pride and vanity of dress, the same self-love
and indulgence, the same foolish friendships, and groundless hatreds, the same
levity of mind, and trifling spirit, the same fondness for diversions, the same
idle dispositions, and vain ways of spending their time in visiting and
conversation, as the rest of the world, that make no pretences to devotion.
I do not mean this comparison, betwixt people seemingly good and professed
rakes, but betwixt people of sober lives. Let us take an instance in two modest
women: let it be supposed that one of them is careful of times of devotion, and
observes them through a sense of duty, and that the other has no hearty concern
about it, but is at Church seldom or often, just as it happens. Now it is a
very easy thing to see this difference betwixt these persons. But when you have
seen this, can you find any farther difference betwixt them? Can you find that
their common life is of a different kind? Are not the tempers, and customs, and
manners of the one, of the same kind as of the other? Do they live as if they
belonged to different worlds, had different views in their heads, and different
rules and measures of all their actions? Have they not the same goods and
evils? Are they not pleased and displeased in the same manner, and for the same
things? Do they not live in the same course of life? does one seem to be of
this world, looking at the things that are temporal, and the other to be of
another world, looking wholly at the things that are eternal? Does the one live
in pleasure, delighting herself in show or dress, and the other live in
self-denial and mortification, renouncing everything that looks like vanity,
either of person, dress, or carriage? Does the one follow public diversions,
and trifle away her time in idle visits, and corrupt conversation, and does the
other study all the arts of improving her time, living in prayer and watching,
and such good works as may make all her time turn to her advantage, and be
placed to her account at the last day? Is the one careless of expense, and glad
to be able to adorn herself with every costly ornament of dress, and does the
other consider her fortune as a talent given her by God, which is to be
improved religiously, and no more to be spent on vain and needless ornaments
than it is to be buried in the earth? Where must you look, to find one person
of religion differing in this manner, from another that has none? And yet if
they do not differ in these things which are here related, can it with any
sense be said, the one is a good Christian, and the other not?
Take another instance amongst the men? Leo3 has a great deal of good nature, has
kept what they call good company, hates everything that is false and base, is
very generous and brave to his friends; but has concerned himself so little
with religion that he hardly knows the difference betwixt a Jew and a
Christian.
Eusebius,4 on the other hand, has
had early impressions of religion, and buys books of devotion. He can talk of
all the feasts and fasts of the Church, and knows the names of most men that
have been eminent for piety. You never hear him swear, or make a loose jest;
and when he talks of religion, he talks of it as of a matter of the last
concern.
Here you see, that one person has religion enough, according to the way of the
world, to be reckoned a pious Christian, and the other is so far from all
appearance of religion, that he may fairly be reckoned a Heathen; and yet if
you look into their common life; if you examine their chief and ruling tempers
in the greatest articles of life, or the greatest doctrines of Christianity,
you will not find the least difference imaginable.
Consider them with regard to the use of the world, because that is what
everybody can see.
Now to have right notions and tempers with relation to this world, is as
essential to religion as it have right notions of God. And it is as possible
for a man to worship a crocodile, and yet be a pious man, as to have his
affections set upon this world, and yet be a good Christian.
But now if you consider Leo and Eusebius in this respect, you will find them
exactly alike, seeking, using, and enjoying, all that can be got in this world
in the same manner, and for the same ends. You will find that riches,
prosperity, pleasures, indulgences, state equipages, and honour, are just as
much the happiness of Eusebius as they are of Leo. And yet if Christianity has
not changed a man's mind and temper with relation to these things, what can we
say that it has done for him? For if the doctrines of Christianity were
practised, they would make a man as different from other people, as to all
worldly tempers, sensual pleasures, and the pride of life, as a wise man is
different from a natural5; it would
be as easy a thing to know a Christian by his outward course of life, as it is
now difficult to find anybody that lives it. For it is notorious that
Christians are now not only like other men in their frailties and infirmities,
this might be in some degree excusable, but the complaint is, they are like
Heathens in all the main and chief articles of their lives. They enjoy the
world, and live every day in the same tempers, and the same designs, and the
same indulgences, as they did who knew not God, nor of any happiness in another
life. Everybody that is capable of any reflection, must have observed, that
this is generally the state even of devout people, whether men or women. You
may see them different from other people, so far as to times and places of
prayer, but generally like the rest of the world in all the other parts of
their lives: that is, adding Christian devotion to a Heathen life. I have the
authority of our blessed Saviour for this remark, where He says, "Take no
thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal
shall we be clothed? For after all these things do the Gentiles seek." [Matt.
vi. 31, 32] But if to be thus affected even with the necessary things of this
life, shows that we are not yet of a Christian spirit, but are like the
Heathens, surely to enjoy the vanity and folly of the world as they did, to be
like them in the main chief tempers of our lives, in self-love and indulgence,
in sensual pleasures and diversions, in the vanity of dress, the love of show
and greatness, or any other gaudy distinctions of fortune, is a much greater
sign of an Heathen temper. And, consequently, they who add devotion to such a
life, must be said to pray as Christians, but live as Heathens.
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