Section 6
Rule 6. The last Rule is, Let meditation be reduced to practice; live over your Meditation, Joshua 1:8. You shall Meditate in this book, that you may observe to do according to all that is written therein. Meditation and practice like two sisters must go hand in hand. Cassian says that the contemplative life cannot be perfected without the practical. We read that the angels had wings, and hands under their wings, Ezekiel 1:8. It may be a Hieroglyphical Emblem of this truth; Christians must not only fly upon the wing of Meditation, but they must be active in obedience, they must have hands under their wings. The end of Meditation is action. We must not only Meditate in God's law but walk in his law. Deuteronomy 28:9. Without this we are like those Gnostics of whom Epiphanius complains, they had much knowledge, but were in their lives licentious. Christians must be like the Sun, which does not only send forth heat, but goes its circuit round the world; it is not enough that the affections be heated by meditation, but we must go our circuit too, that is, move regularly in the sphere of obedience. After warming at the fire of Meditation, we must be fitter for work. Meditation is the life of Religion, and practice is the life of meditation. It is said in the Honor of Nazianzen, fecit quae docuit, he lived over his own Sermons. So a good Christian must live over his own meditations.
For instance; First, When you have been meditating of Sin, which for its bitterness is compared to Grapes of Gall, for its damnableness to poison of asps; and you begin to burn in a holy indignation against sin, now put your meditations in practice, Give sin a Bill of Divorce, Job 11:14. If iniquity be in your hand put it far away, and let not wickedness dwell in your Tabernacles.
2. When you have been meditating of the Graces of the spirit, let the verdure and luster of these graces be seen in you: live these graces; meditate, that you may observe and do; It was Saint Paul's counsel to Timothy; 1 Timothy 4:7. Exercise yourself to Godliness. Meditation and practice are like a pair of Compasses, the one part of the compass fixes upon the center, and the other part goes round the circumference; a Christian by meditation fixes upon God as the Center, and by practice goes round the circumference of the Commandments; A man who has let his thoughts run out upon riches, will not only have them in the notion, but will endeavor to get riches; Let your meditations be practical; when you have been meditating upon a promise, live upon a promise; when you have been meditating of a good conscience, never leave till you can say as Paul, Herein I exercise myself to have a good conscience, Acts 24:16. Beloved, here lies the very essence of Religion.
That this rule may be well observed, Consider,
1. It is only the practical part of Religion will make a man blessed. Meditation is a beautiful flower, but as Rachel said to her husband, Give me children or I die, Genesis 30:1. So if Meditation be barren, and does not bring forth the child of obedience, it will die and come to nothing.
2. If when you have meditated in God's law, you do not obey his Law, you will come short of them who have come short of heaven. It is said of Herod, Mark 6:20. He did many things; he was in many things a practicer of John's Ministry: They who meditate in God's Law, and observe not to do, are not so good as Herod, nay, they are no better than the Devil, he knows much, but still he is a Devil.
3. Meditation without practice, will increase a man's condemnation. If a Father writes a Letter to his son, and the son shall read over this Letter, and study on it, yet not observe to do as his Father writes, this would be an aggravation of his fault, and would but provoke his father so much the more against him. Thus when we have meditated upon the Evil of sin, and the beauty of holiness, yet we do not eschew the one, nor espouse the other, it will but incense the divine Majesty so much the more against us, and we shall be beaten with many stripes.
FINIS.
