_Direct._ XXVII. Abuse not your own knowledge by subjecting it to your carnal interest or sensuality. He that will sin against his conscience, and will not obey the knowledge which he hath, doth deserve to be given over to blindness and deceit, and to lose even that which he hath, and to be forsaken till he believe and defend a lie:[135] "that all they might be damned who obeyed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness," 2 Thess. ii. 10-12. God will not hold him guiltless who debaseth his sacred truth so far, as to make it stoop to his commodity and lust; where he is a teacher he will be a king, and sendeth his truth as the instrument of his government, and not as a slave or pander to the flesh. He that will "do God's will shall know it," John vii. 17; but the carnal mind that cannot be subject to God's law, is unfit to receive it, because it is spiritually discerned, Rom. viii. 7; 1 Cor. ii. 14. [117] Nitebatur Socrates summi ingenii acumine, non tam illos ex sententia refellere, quam ipse quid verum esset invenire. Laert. in Socrat. [118] Heb. xii. 14. 2 Cor. v. 17; Rom. viii. 9, 13. [119] Socrates de ethice, et in officinis, et in publico quotidie philosophans, ea potius inquirenda hortabatur, quæ mores instruerent, et quorum usus nobis domi esset necessarius. Laert. in Socrat. [120] Non tam auctoritatis in disputando, quam rationis momenta quærenda sunt, Cic. Nat. Deo. p. 6. Obest plerumque iis, qui discere volunt, auctoritas eorum, qui se docere profitentur. Desinunt enim suum judicium adhibere: id habent ratum, quod ab eo, quem probant, judicatum vident. Ibid. p. 7. [121] Prov. xxiv. 30; xxi. 25; Matt. xxv. 26. [122] Quæ duæ virtutes in disputatore primæ sunt, eas ambas in Hubero deprehendi, patientiam adversarium prolixe sua explicantem audiendi, et lenitatem etiam aspere dicta perferendi, inq. Scultetus post. disp. Curric. p. 33. [123] 1 Tim. vi. 3; Tit. i. 1; 1 Tim. iv. 7, 8; vi. 5, 6, 11; 2 Pet. i. 3; iii. 11. [124] See chap. ii. direct. 3. [125] Ut Deum noris, etsi ignores et locum et faciem, sic animum tibi tuum notum esse oportet, etiam si ignores et locum et formam. Cicero 1. Tuscul. [126] Nulla erga Deos pietas est, nisi honesta de numine deorum ac mente opinio sit. Cicero pro Planc. [127] Non ii sumus quibus nihil verum esse videatur; sed ii qui omnibus veris falsæ quædam adjuncta esse dicamus, tanta similitudine ut, &c. Cic. de Nat. Deor. p. 7. [128] Job xxxviii-xli. [129] See my preface before the second part of the Saints' Rest, edit. 3, &c. A man of judgment shall hear ignorant men differ, and know that they mean one thing. And yet they themselves will never agree. L. Bacon, Ess. 3. [130] As I have showed in my Dispute of Saving Faith with Dr. Barlow, and of Justification. [131] Non ex verbis res, sed ex rebus verba esse inquirenda, ait Myson. in Laert. p. 70. Bas. 1 Edit.