will nothing in their existence, but that they should live and work, and manifest that same spirit of love and goodness which brought them into being. Every thing therefore, but the _will_ to goodness, is some degree of _apostasy_, yea, rebellion against the _whole nature_ of God. There is no peace, nor ever can be, for the soul of man, but in the purity and perfection of its first-created nature; nor can it have its purity and perfection in any other way, than in and by the _spirit of love_. For love is the purity, the perfection of all created things; and nothing can live in God but as it lives in love. Look at every vice, pain, and disorder, in human nature, it is in itself nothing but the spirit of the creature turned from the _universality_ of love to some _self-seeking_ in created things. So that love alone is the cure of every evil; and he that lives in the purity of love, is risen out of the power of evil, into the freedom of the one spirit of heaven. The _schools_ have given us very accurate definitions of every vice, whether it be covetousness, pride, wrath, or envy, and shewn us how to conceive them as notionally distinguished from one another. But the Christian has a much shorter way of knowing them, and what they all are, and do, in himself. For, call them by what names you will, they are all, that _same one_ thing, and all do that _same one work_, as the Scribes, the Pharisees, and rabble of the _Jews_, who crucified Christ, were all but _one and the same thing_, and all did _one and the same work_, however different they were in outward names. If you would therefore have a true sense of the nature and power of pride, wrath, covetousness, envy, they are in their whole nature nothing else but the _murderers_ and _crucifiers_ of the true Christ of God; not as the high-priests did many hundred years ago, nailing his outward humanity to an outward cross, but crucifying afresh the Son of God, who is the Christ that every man crucifies as often as he gives way to wrath, pride, envy, or covetousness. For where pride, and envy, and hatred, are wilfully indulged, there the same thing is done, as when Christ was killed, and _Barabbas_ was saved alive. In all the universe, nothing but heaven and heavenly creatures could have been known, had every creature continued in that state in which it came forth from God. For God can will nothing in the life of the creature but a manifestation of his own goodness, happiness, and perfection. And therefore when this is wanted, it is certain, the creature hath lost its first state that it had from God. Every thing therefore, which is the _vanity_, the _torment_, and evil, of man, or any intelligent creature, is solely the effect of his will turned from God. Misery and wickedness can have no other root; for whatever wills and works with God, must partake of the happiness and perfection of God.