A Treatise of the Affections

Set your affections on things that are above, and not on things which are on the earth.

THe subject of the Text and this Treatise is the affections, shewing the right use and ordering of them, which is a thing of continual and great concernment: for they will never be idle, but still running out and bringing into the soul, either healing or hurtful objects, and so authours either of our woe or welfare: and certain signs either of our happinesse, that we are risen with Christ: or misery, that we are still dead. —And concerning these the Apostle

p. 2First, Implies a disease and distemper: that they are disjoyned from God, and that desperately.

Secondly, Applies a medicine, a way to cure them, to bring them back, and place them upon their first and right object, God, and things above.

The first he intimates to us in three things.

First, By calling them inordinate affections, and such as can never be set right without they be mortifyed. Mortifie your earthly members, Fornication, Vncleannesse, Inordinate affection, &c. ver. 5. He terms them inordinate and masterlesse affections, and he commands us to mortifie them.

Secondly, By shewing they are buried in the things of the world, and never can be raised up again, but only by the power of the resurrection of Christ, If ye be risen with Christ, seek those things that are above, ver. 1. Ye can never be able to make your affections seek upwards, unlesse ye be risen with Christ.

Thirdly, By supposing they are naturally (as Solomon saies of a fools wrath) as heavy as a stone; the affections are so naturally, as heavy as a stone, which fals down to the earth, and cannot ascend, except it be heaved up: Set your affections on things above, and not on things on the earth. They naturally sagge downwards on things that are earthly, but let them not doe so: no, heave them up, and set them upon things that are heavenly, If you be risen with Christ.

These words are to be construed with all the exhortations Saint Paul doth here give, If ye be risen with Christ, seek those things that are above, If ye be risen with Christ, set your affections on things that are above, If ye be risen with Christ, mortifie your earthly members, and your inordinate affections, &c. If ye be not risen with Christ, it is but a folly for me to bid you do this, ye cannot mortifie your affections, nor raise up your affections to God, ye cannot possibly do this, except ye be risen with Christ. The point then is this, which I will handle by way of coherence, p. 3A natural man cannot set his affections upon God, [Doctr.] or upon things above: For our more intelligible proceeding in this Doctrine, as likewise in the whole treatise of the affections, which I desire to goe through: let me tell you,

First, [What the • ffections • re.] What the affections be. The affections are the forcible and sensible motions of the heart or the will, to a thing or from a thing, according as it is apprehended to be good or to be evill. There be four things to be considered herein.

First, [1. The affe •• ions are • otions. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 .] The affections are motions. They are the motions of the heart. The motions of sinne, saies Saint Paul, Rom. 7. 5. that is, the affections of sin, for so it is in the original: so that then are a mans affections set upon God, when the heart hath its out-goings to God, and therefore the Scriptures call the affections the feet of the soul: for as the body goes with its feet to that which it loves, so the soul goes out with its affections to that which it loves. I thought upon my waies, and turned my feet unto thy testimonies, Psal. 119. 59. that is, I turned mine affections to thy Testimonies: Look to thy feet when thou comest into the house of the Lord. I have refrained my foot from every evil way, Psal. 119. 101. Their feet are swift to shed bloud, Rom. 3. 15. The Soul hath no other way to come at that which it loves, but only by its affections: can the muck-worm bring his bags and his coffers to his Soul? can the voluptuous man bring his dogges, and his hounds, and his bowls to his Soul? No, though his Soul loves such vanities as these, it cannot move to them but only by its affections, [L. 6 de vero cultu cap. 17. By faith Noah warned of God moved with fear, &c. H • b. 11. 7.] Currui similes sunt & equis pernicibus affectus, saies Lactantius. The affections are the Souls horses, that draw her as it were in a Coach to the thing that she affects: a man is moved by his affections. By Anger he moves out to revenge: by Desire he moves out to obtain: by Love he moves out to enjoy: by Pity he moves out to relieve: the affections are the motions of the Soul. When the unbeleeving Jews had an affection of envy at Saint p. 4Paul, the Text saies, They were moved with Envy, Act. 17. 5. so the Soul of the godly is moved with affection to God. This is the first thing, the affections are motions.

p. 4Secondly, [2. The affections are motions of the Will. Stoici vocant 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Simolicius in Epictetum] As the affections are motions, so they are the motions of the will. I know Aristotle and most of our Divines too, doe place the affections in the sensitive part of the Soul, and not in the will, because they are to be seen in the beasts. …