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  WRITINGS OF EDWARD MANNING
  by Edward Manning
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A collection of theological writings, sermons, and essays by Edward Manning,
compiled for study and devotional reading.

  Chapters: 3

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS
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    1. 00.00. Manning, Edward - Library
    2. S.     Christ, Our Only Rest
    3. S.     Worldly Affections Destructive of Love to God

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  CHAPTER 1: 00.00. MANNING, EDWARD - LIBRARY
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Manning, Edward - Library S. Christ Our Only Rest S. Worldly Affections
Destructive of Love to God


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  CHAPTER 2: S.     CHRIST, OUR ONLY REST
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Christ, Our Only Rest by Edward Manning

“Come unto me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me: for I am meek and lowly in heart: and
you shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is
light.” Matthew 11:28-30.

With these gracious promises our blessed Lord drew to Him the people who were
toiling and struggling with the burdens of this saddened and sinful world. He
beheld not only sinners, but many a good man wearying himself in vain. Among
those to whom He spoke, He saw, besides those that were heavy laden with their
own sins, many who were burdened with evil traditions and unmeaning customs, who
were fainting under the yoke which had been laid upon them as a schoolmaster to
bring them unto Christ. He promised them rest, if they would come, and learn,
and take on them His yoke– that is, if they would obey and follow Him, if they
would believe and be like Him. Many there were, as Andrew and Levi, who gave up
their former ways, and all that they had, and made the trial, and found the
promise true. They found rest in forgiveness and a quiet mind, in a heart
chastened to a holy calm, and in the hope of their Master’s kingdom. Now what He
promised them when He was seen by men on earth, He has both promised and
fulfilled, ever since from heaven. By His unseen Spirit He has ever been in the
world—pleading, drawing, persuading men to take His easy yoke. This He has done
by His Church in all the earth. Among all nations He has gone, offering rest to
every weary soul. Who can tell what has ever been the ineffable yearning of the
heathen world; what tumultuous cries of spiritual sorrow have been heard in the
ears of God? There has ever been among them the voice of conscience, and the
sting of guilt, and the fears of defenseless purity, and the remorse of
conscious sin. Without a doubt, among the myriads of eternal beings who thronged
the face of the earth at Christ’s coming, there were tens of thousands who felt
higher and purer aspirations, who sighed and strove for light and truth in the
dark and stifling bondage of heathenism. And to these, in due season, Christ in
His Church went preaching, as “to spirits in prison,” bringing the balm of
meekness, and the peace of a lowly heart. When they heard Him, they were drawn
to Him by an irresistible persuasion. They had found what in darkness they
longed for—and all the needs and miseries of their being clung to His healing
touch. They were “refreshed with the multitude of peace.” And not only so, but
within the Church itself, and to this day, Christ ever calls, in these soft,
persuasive words, “Come unto me, all you that are weary and heavy laden.” It is
not only among the unregenerate spirits of men, but among those also who have
been born again by His gracious working, that He finds toiling and burdened
hearts. As He stands in the midst of His Church, and beholds our daily life, and
all the hurrying to and fro of weary and restless spirits, He sees and pities
our blind infirmities: for many are His by baptism, who have never deeply
learned of Him; many know him in word, who have never borne His yoke; many have
seemed to draw near, who have found no rest unto their souls. For instance, He
sees among us the very same kinds of men as among the Jews—sinners “laden with
sins”—men conscious of guilt, hating the sin for its after-agonies, but yielding
to its momentary bait. The throes and torments of Christian men are worse even
than the terrors of the heathen or the Jew. For Christians know of life and
immortality: to them Tophet and Gehenna are no parables, but well-known and
horrible realities. No tongue of man can tell the scourge, and fear, and
suffocating burden of guilt seen in the light of an illuminated conscience. And
this is all around us, among baptized men. It is the cause of their stubbornness
in sin, because it is the root of their despair.

But, besides these, there are men of a worldly heart, who weary themselves day
and night in the round of gain or selfishness, “lading themselves with thick
clay;” early and late full of care—with furrowed brows and withered hearts;
wearing a false cheerfulness, being sick in their inmost soul. This world fairly
frets such a man’s heart through and through; to him the world is overgrown, and
all its cares are swollen to an unnatural greatness. He has no sight of the
unseen world, to check and balance the visible world; and therefore to him this
world is all things. Hence come foolish choices, and inordinate cravings, and
bitter disappointments. I am not speaking of men who are so greedy of gold as to
pass into a proverb; but of a common sample of men, whose aim in life is to gain
no more than an ordinary measure of wealth, or to rise, as they say, to fitting
places of dignity and power. If you could read the inner life of such men, you
would, find their minds wound up to an incessant and unrelieved stretch, which
is ever at the highest pitch. At last it makes them weary of themselves, and
they break down in bitterness or imbecility.

There is also all the aching of disappointment, and the irritation of rivalry,
and the fear of discontentment, and the foresight of unpitied falls; and well is
it if there is not also the hidden smouldering of an angry jealousy, and the
wincing soreness, which ambitious and envious minds feel at the very name of a
successful neighbor. What burden heavier than this dead world bound about the
heart of man? what yoke more galling than a restless, craving spirit?

And, once more; there are others who are not less truly laboring in vain, though
they know it not: I mean, those that are making personal happiness their aim in
life. There are many who ply this unprofitable, disappointing trade. I am not
speaking of sensualists, or empty-hearted followers of this vain-glorious world;
but of grave and thoughtful people, whose theory of life is the pursuit of
individual happiness. They look forward, as a matter of course, to certain great
acts and stages of life, as to things predetermined by a customary law.

Oftentimes, indeed, their aims and desires are very reasonable; sometimes sadly
commonplace. They choose out, for instance, some of life’s purer fountains,
running through a broken cistern, at which to slake their thirst to be happy.
There is something lacking—something without which their being is not full. They
take, it may be, many ways of meeting this craving of their hearts; but diverse
as are their schemes, their aim is all one—they have a predominant desire to be
happy, and to choose their own happiness; and therefore they are full of
disappointments, perpetually wounded on some side, which they have laid bare to
the arrows of life. The treacherous reed is ever running up into the hand that
leans on it. They are ever giving hostages, as it were, to this changeful world,
and ever losing their dearest pledges; and so they toil on, trying to rear up a
happiness around them, which is ever dropping piecemeal, and, at last, is swept
away by some chastening stroke; and then, no wiser than before, they set
themselves, with a bruised and chafing heart, to weave the same entanglements
again. From what has been said, it follows plainly: First, that all our unrest
and weariness is in and of ourselves. It is either the slavery of some tyrannous
sin, or the scourge of an impenitent memory, or the indulgence of some fretful,
implacable temper, or some self-flattering and sensitive vanity, some repining
discontent at what we are, or some impotent straining after what God has not
willed us to be, or some hungering for an earthly happiness, with all the chill
and faintness of heart which arises from the ever-present consciousness that
what we crave for, even though we had it, would fail to satisfy.

Besides all these, the weary recurrence of night and day, laboriously spent in
toiling on towards an end they never reach—these, I say, and only these, or such
like, make men weary and desolate. If they would only burst through this
thraldom of indulged faults, or break the spell of this cheating, benumbing
world, they would soon find rest to their souls. But so long as they run on in
the ring of evil or vain desires, God will not give them rest; no, if He would
give it, they would soon barter it away for some exciting pleasure.

Once more; we may learn that it is only in Jesus that we can find rest; that is,
it is only by learning of Him, yielding ourselves up to Him, and living for Him,
that we can find release from the causes of our disquiet, or rest for the deep
cravings of an immortal being. The main and original fault in all our toiling
after rest is this: we forget that peace with God, and the purification of our
own nature, is the absolute condition to our ever reaching it. Here men stumble
on the very threshold; and, here it is that Christ will have us make the first
step. “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in
heart.” The first step to rest is, to have forgiveness in the blood-shedding of
Christ, and to have His mind renewed in us. It is thus that we are delivered
from ourselves. Even though men should gain all they labor after, yet without
this, happiness would be as far off as ever; it would fly before them as the
horizon, which they are ever following after, but never reach. In the very midst
of success, the bitterness of the fallen nature would rise to the surface, and
taint all the joy. How uneasily does a cheerful look sit upon the face of the
happiest worldly man! how soon it fades, and the settled aspect of uncertainty
return and overcast his brow! There is a worm that dies not, at the root of
all—a “sorrow of the world,” which “works death.” It is only the virtue that
goes out from Christ that can disinfect us of our natural sadness. Nothing but a
devout life of repentance and self-discipline at the foot of His cross can avail
to free us from ourselves.

Seek, then, forgiveness, and the gift of a broken heart. Ask of Him the words of
peace—“Your sins be forgiven you;” and the words of purity—“I will; be clean.”
He will lay on you that sweet yoke, of which He spoke in the mountain: Blessed
are the poor in spirit, the mourners, the meek, the hungry and thirsty for
righteousness, the merciful, the poor, the peacemakers, the persecuted. He will
change your inward soul by His purifying breath. As you fall down before Him, He
will lift upon you the light of His countenance, which transfigures all on whom
it falls into the likeness of Himself. Be sure that in Him only can the deep
cravings of our immortal being find enough to really satisfy them. He has so
made man’s heart for Himself, that it is ever restless until it finds rest in
Him. This is the master-key to all earthly disappointments. Men choose a false,
cheating happiness, instead of a true one. They choose things which have nothing
akin to their immortal nature. All earthly things are too lifeless and dull for
the heart of spiritual beings. Something higher and purer, more intimate and
searching, is needed for a regenerate man: for only a part, and that the lower,
of his reasonable being is affected by the fullest earthly happiness; and when
men have chosen even the best of earthly things, the purest and highest—such as
intellectual employments, or domestic happiness—they find it variable and
fleeting. It wears dull, or soon changes to a cloyed satiety. There is an
ever-springing care, and a chilling anxiety, which pierces through all such
happiness at its best. Even when God is not forgotten, it is not enough; and
without Him it is all an exciting and empty dream.

Oh that men would learn of the Psalmist! “Delight yourself in the Lord; and He
shall give you the desires of your heart.” It is not for man to choose happiness
as the end of life—but God: to delight in God, and then none of his desires
shall fail. As they are all laid up in God, so he has them all fulfilled. If it
be good for him to be happy, he shall have happiness; if not, it is happiness to
him to lack what God in love withholds. But God would have all men happy. As He
has no pleasure in the death of a sinner, so He has none in people’s sadness. He
would have you to be happy, but not in your way. The time and the manner He
reserves in His own power. Happiness is not a thing inherited by the rich
alone—the poorest may have it better; nor is it only for those who have many and
dear friends about them—the loneliest may have it in a deeper, though a severer
measure; for happiness is an inward boon; it is shed abroad secretly in the
heart by the love of Christ. Those who have chosen Him, above all others have
chosen well. He is enough, though they hardly feel it: though their affections
crave about, like a flickering flame, for nearer and palpable things.

Therefore let us choose boldly. Some choice you must have. Even the most
wavering have a preference, which to them is equal to a choice. A thousand other
forms beckon to us with promises of rest; but only He can give it. Choose rather
to sit at His feet than to be at ease, or rich, or high, or prosperous, or full
of bright earthly hopes. Yes, choose rather to sit in loneliness before Him,
than to dwell in the happiest throng where He holds the second place.

Life is very short; and the world to come already dawns upon us. Brethren,
choose boldly a life devoted to Christ. Be His above all; be His only. Hear the
Church saying, “My Beloved is mine, and I am His.” The world holds you but by a
thread; you may snap it in twain, and in the settled though hidden purpose of
your soul take on you His yoke forever. And having chosen boldly, make good your
choice with perseverance. Many a time your heart will hanker for what it once
promised itself to possess. Many a time you will almost fear to walk alone in
the way “which is desert.” It will seem strange, singular, and solitary. It may
be, you will have seasons of a faint will—at times all but consent to revoke
your choice, and unbind your resolution. But this is not your trial only. It is
common to all who devote themselves greatly. Only be steadfast, and you shall
breathe more freely, and poise yourselves more steadily on the heaving flood of
this unstable world. The more devoted you are to Him, the more absolutely free
shall you be from all agitations and irritations—the safer, the stronger, the
happier.

True, a devoted life is a demanding one. But there is a severity in the
perfection of bliss. It is severe because perfect, as God is awesome in His
perfection. Fear not to give up what the world counts dearest, that you may wear
His yoke in secret. Live in lowly well-doing; in works of alms and prayer, of
charity and spiritual mercy. Better to be so under a vow to Him, than to be free
to choose this world’s alluring hopes.

Brethren, are you happy now? If not, why not? Why, but because you are hankering
after something on a lower level of devotion. Something below Christ is your aim
in life. You are restless because you have not reached it; or now that you have
it in your hands, you find it cannot satisfy your heart.

"Martha, Martha, you are careful and cumbered about many things. But one thing
is needful; and Mary has chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away
from her."


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  CHAPTER 3: S.     WORLDLY AFFECTIONS DESTRUCTIVE OF LOVE TO GOD
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Worldly Affections Destructive of Love to God By Edward Manning

"Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love,
the world, the love of the Father is not in him." 1 John 2:15.

John here tells us that the love of the world thrusts the love of God out of our
hearts. Now this love of the world means a love either of things which are
actually sinful, or of things not sinful in themselves, but hurtful and a
hindrance to the love of God. The first is too plain to need a word. A love of
sin must set a man at war with God; his whole inner being ranges itself in array
against the Spirit of holiness. The second form of this truth is somewhat less
clear, and far less thought of; and we will therefore consider it.

There are things, then, in the world, which, although not actually sinful in
themselves, do nevertheless so check the love of God in us as to stifle and
destroy it. For instance, it is lawful for us to possess wealth and worldly
substance; we may serve God with it, and consecrate it at His altar; but we
cannot love wealth without growing ostentatious, or soft, or careful, or
narrow-hearted; “for the love of money is the root of all evil; which while some
coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through
with many sorrows.”

So, again, with friends and what is called society. It is lawful for us both to
have and to love friends, both to enter into and to enjoy the pure happiness of
living among them; but when we begin to find loneliness irksome, when we grow
fond of being much in society, we are really trying to forget ourselves, and to
get rid of sadder and better thoughts. The habit of mind which is formed in us
by society is so unlike that in which we speak with God in solitude, that it
seems to wear out of us the susceptibility of deeper and higher energies.

Much more true is this when to the love of society is added a fondness for light
pleasures, or a love of power, or a craving after rank and dignities. And so,
once more, lawful as it is to be thoughtful and circumspect in the ordering of
our life, and in thankfully enjoying the ease and happiness which God gives us,
we cannot long have our thoughts on these things without becoming biassed with a
sort of proneness to spare and to indulge ourselves.

Now it is against such dangers as these that John warns us. They will, by a most
subtle but inevitable effect, stifle the pure and single love of our hearts
towards God; and that in many ways. For, in the first place, they actually turn
away the affections of the heart from God. He so made our nature for Himself,
that He alone is the lawful and true object of our supreme and governing love.
Other lawful affections are not contrariant to this, but contained in it. The
love to God presides over them all; orders, and harmonizes, and preserves them
in purity and health. But when they are loved immoderately, or chiefly, or
before God, He is defrauded of so much of His own inalienable homage. They
become to us as other gods, each one diverting our heart from its straight and
single direction towards Him alone. It is of our affection that He speaks when
He calls Himself “a jealous God.” Love of worldly things, then, plainly defrauds
Him of our loyalty, and checks, if it does not absolutely thrust our love to Him
altogether out of our hearts.

And, in the next place, it impoverishes, so to speak, the whole character of the
mind. Even the religious affections which remain undiverted are weakened and
lowered in their quality. They are like the thin fruits of an exhausted soil.
The virtue and the fatness of the land have been drawn off and distributed into
so many channels, that what remains is cold and poor. It is wonderful how
characters of great original earnestness lose their intensity by entanglement in
the lower affections of the world. They spend their energy on objects both so
many in number, and so beneath the care of a regenerate spirit, that they lose
all unity of heart and intention. They are even conscious to themselves that
this is going on, sapping the foundations of their moral strength. Surely it is
a sign of a poor mind to be greatly moved by little things; to have much
fondness for the most harmless of this world’s littlenesses to love them and
God, as it were, in one affection. There is an evident shallowness about such
minds, a lack of power to perceive the measures, and relations, and magnitude of
things. Even their highest energies are slack and feeble.

Thus much, then, may be said generally. We will now consider somewhat more
closely the particular CONSEQUENCES OF THIS LOVE OF THE WORLD.

1. It brings a dullness over the whole of a man’s soul. To stand apart from the
throng of earthly things, and to let them hurry by as they will and wither as
they will, is the only sure way to calmness and clearness in the spiritual life.
It is by living much alone with God, by casting off the burden of things not
needful to our inner life, by narrowing our toils and our wishes to the
necessities of our actual lot, that we become familiar with the world unseen.
Fasting, and prayer, and a simple life, and plainness, and freedom from the
cumbering offices and possessions of the world, give to the eye and ear of the
soul a keen and piercing sense. And what is this but to say, that by such a
discipline the powers of our regenerate life are unfolded and enlarged? But this
discipline is almost impossible to the man that moves with the stream of the
world: it carries him away against his will. The oppressive nearness of the
things which throng upon him from without defrauds him of solitude with God.
They come and thrust themselves between his soul and the realities unseen; they
drop like a veil over the faint outlines of the invisible world, and hide it
from his eyes. They ring too loudly in his ear, and throw too strong an
attraction over his heart, to allow him to hear and understand. And the
spiritual powers that are in him grow inert and lose their virtue by the
dullness of inaction. This is most clearly perceptible, not only in persons of a
predominately worldly tone of mind, but in those who have been, and still are in
some measure, religious; and none know it better than they. Perhaps the only
feeling which long retains its keenness after the religious affections are
deadened, is the fearful consciousness that they can no longer love God as they
loved Him once. They are painfully alive to a sense of the eager and importunate
sympathy, the warm and clinging fondness which they still have for the goings on
of their worldly life, and the stunned and senseless heart with which they turn
to the heart of God. When they are on their knees before Him, even at the foot
of the altar, and in the very act of prayer, they feel in a strange unnatural
posture; and are half in doubt whether it were not better to make no approach to
Him at all, than to draw near with a heart so deaf and dull. Now to this, and,
alas, often far beyond this, many blameless and good-hearted people are brought
at last. Much trading, or much toiling for advancement, or much popularity, or
much communion in the usages and engagements of society, or the giving up of
much time to the refinements of a soft life,— these, and many like snares, steal
away the quick powers of the heart, and leave us estranged from God. And this is
the secret of the oppressive weariness which people who live in the world feel
in all holy duties. The acts of religion, such as reading, thought,
contemplation of the unseen, prayer, self-examination, the fasts, feasts, and
offices of the Church, first seem to lose their savor, and are less delighted
in; then they grow irksome; and are consciously avoided. So it must be. When
religion ceases to be a delight, it becomes a yoke. Serve God we must, either in
freedom or in bondage: if not for love, then for fear. If we love the world, we
shall only fear God. We shall turn to our profession or our calling, or to
society, or to our pleasures in life, with speed and gladness, but to God with
constrained prayers and reluctant confessions. We shall go to Him with distant
and equivocating hearts, and turn from Him with a secret readiness which makes
us tremble. How awfully do people deceive themselves in this matter! We hear
them saying, “It does me no harm to go into the world: I come away, and can go
into my room and pray as usual.” Oh, surest sign of a heart half laid asleep!
You are not aware of the change, because it has passed upon you. Once, in days
of livelier faith, you would have wept over the indevoutness of your present
prayers, and joined them to the confession of your other backslidings; but now
your heart is not more earnest than your prayers, and there is no index to mark
the decline.

Even they that lament the loss of their former earnestness do not half know the
real measure of their loss. The growth of a duller feeling has the power of
masking itself. Little by little it creeps on, marked by no great changes, much
as the dimness of the natural sight, which must reach to an advanced point
before it is detected to be more than a passing film. And so the inward
affections lose all their freshness, and the pure light of the heart is
over-cast, and its love towards God grows cold. The mind is excited, and its
feelings and powers drawn into life and play on every other side; but in the
region which lies towards God it is bleak and lonely; and the faint gleams of
heavenly love, which must be fed by insights of the world unseen, flicker and
decay in the unwholesome neighborhood of worldly affections.

2. I will notice one more consequence. As we grow to be attached to the things
that are in the world, there comes over us what I may call a vulnerableness of
mind. We lay ourselves open on just so many sides as we have objects of desire.
We give hostages to this changeful world, and we are ever either losing them, or
trembling lest they be wrested from us. What a life of disappointment, and
bitterness, and aching fear, and restless uncertainty, is the life of the
ambitious, or covetous, or self-indulgent! Merchants, trading at a thousand
hazards; statesmen, climbing up to slippery places; men of letters, catching at
every breath of fame; men of the world, toiling to sustain a great
appearance—how anxious, and craving, how sensitive, and impatient of an equal do
they become! How saddened, how ill at ease, how preyed upon by the inward
shining of the love of God! Where this is, there is contentment and a submissive
will, and a glad consent in our present lot, and a simplicity which shields
itself from the throng of manifold perturbations. But all these hallowed and
happy tempers are frightened away by the writhing and the moaning of a worldly
spirit, chafing against the visitations which invade or sever its earthly
attachments. But it is not only in this form that the mind is made vulnerable by
a love of the world. It lays itself open not more to chastisements than to
temptations; it gives so many inlets to the suggestions of evil. Every earthly
fondness is an ambush for a thousand solicitations of the wicked one. Through
these he fills men with pride, vanity, vain-glory, with ambition and jealous
rivalry, with a greedy mind, with murmuring and discontent, with unthankfulness
and mistrust of God. Any affection, either ill-directed or inordinate, passes
into a temptation. It is a lure to the tempter—a signal which betrays our weaker
side; and as the subtle infection of evil tempers winds itself into the mind,
the Spirit of the Dove is grieved by an irritable and unloving spirit. The very
affections of the heart recoil sullenly into themselves, and sometimes even turn
against the objects of their immoderate fondness. In this way the love of the
world becomes a cause of very serious deterioration of character. It soon
stifles the love of God; and when that is gone, and the character has lost its
unity, particular features unfold themselves into a fearful prominence. The
chief among its earthly affections becomes thenceforth its ruling passion; and
so predominates over all the rest, and draws the whole mind to itself, as to
stamp the man with the character of a besetting sin. And this is what we mean
when we call one man purse-proud, and another ostentatious, or wordly-minded, or
selfish, and the like. The world has eaten its way into his soul, and “the love
of the Father is not in him”

Now, if this be so, what shall we do? If it were possible for us to begin life
over again, and to lay it out upon some definite and carefully adjusted plan, we
might avoid the entanglements of the world. But almost every one of us already
finds himself fully implicated in the embarrassments of life, and involved in a
multitude of inferior attachments, before he is well aware. What, then, is to be
done? We cannot withdraw ourselves. One has wealth, another a family, a third
rank and influence, another a large business; and all these bring with them an
endless variety of duties and responsibilities, and usages of custom and
courtesy. If a man is to break through all these, he must needs go out of this
world. All this is very true: but, at the same time, it is certain that every
one of us might reduce his life to a greater simplicity. In every position in
life there is a great multitude of unnecessary things which we may readily
abandon: if we were to examine carefully the objects on which we bestow time and
money, thought and earnestness, we should find many that are purely artificial.
Many things we do only because others have done them before us; many by mere
passive imitation. We are all over-ready to combine many characters, or
pursuits, or offices together; to make heavier our own burdens; we learn to form
exaggerated judgments of the worth and importance of things from other men; and
all this gathers into a worldliness of character, and overspreads our mind,
fearfully oppressing the religious life within us. Now, they are happiest who
are most discharged from contact with the world; who can sit, like Mary, at the
Lord’s feet without distraction. Most peaceful life, to have nothing to do with
the conflicts, or changes, or possessions of this world: to have enough, and
somewhat for them, that lack; and friends, so as not to be desolate, and yet
without excess carefulness! What is there for them to do, but to wait on God,
and to look out for the resurrection? But they are very few to whom this scarce
and solitary lot is given. The great multitude of men are so interwoven in the
tangled maze of relations and duties, that they must take the burden with the
blessing; and yet even they would find that they are allowing their heart to be
diverted and impoverished, and their affections to be dulled and deteriorated,
by entanglement with many things from which a little boldness and a little
decision would set them free. All that is not necessary may be cast off. Our
unwariness, or our own free choice, has encumbered us with it; and it is in our
own hands to undo it again. And as for all the necessary cares of life, they
need involve us in no dangers. In them, if we be true-hearted, we are safe. The
inevitable relations of our earthly lot are the appointments and declaration of
God’s will to us. It is He that has surrounded us with them, and there is no
danger in His dispensations. “God cannot be tempted with evil, neither does He
tempt any man.” Besides, even though a man were never so deeply implicated with
the relations of life, there is no need that he should allow them to usurp upon
him. He may live in the midst of them with an unsubdued and single heart; he may
meet them cheerfully, fulfill what they exact of him, but do them no homage;
yield to them no mastery over his inward purpose. He submits to them as to a
rule of God’s ordaining; accomplishing day by day his toil, or study, or
professional offices; mixing, too, in life, taking pleasure in its pure
happiness and fond affections, without fear or doubting, knowing that he is
where God has willed his probation. But the deep movements of his heart are
reserved for God alone. All other emotions are partial, affecting only a portion
of his spiritual life; but this extends over all, and concentrates all upon
itself. It is only towards God that he turns with a perfect unity of will. And,
besides that the necessary entanglements of our lot are thus in themselves safe
and lawful, God in His mercy shields an obedient mind from the deteriorating
effects of inevitable contact with the world. When He leads men into positions
of great trial, whether by wealth, or rank, or business, He compensates by
larger gifts of grace. The spiritual life is perpetually replenished by the
“powers of the world to come;” and we find men who are the most burdened, and
even overborne, by the thronging toils of daily life, or lured and solicited by
the splendors of the world, not only holding out against the secularizing action
of worldly things, but even confirmed and elevated to a higher pitch of
devotion. The world not only has no power to conform them to itself, but it
becomes a sort of counter-pressure, which forces them, to take shelter in a
secret life of self-renouncement. It keeps them ever on the watch, by a
consciousness that to relax is to be in peril; and therefore it often happens
that none are more dead to the world than they that have it around them in the
largest measure. They have learned its emptiness and its bitterness, and recoil
into themselves, as into a silence where the presence of God is heard: they have
had many struggles with it, and gained many masteries, and suffered many wounds,
and they have become estranged from it, and suspicious of all its advances and
allurements; and have learned that, whensoever they have leaned upon it, an edge
has pierced them, and that there is no safety but in God. From all this, then,
it is plain that we can never charge the worldliness of our hearts upon our lot
in life; for our hindrances are either made by entanglement in things which are
unnecessary, or, if in necessary things, are made through some inward fault of
our own. Let us therefore no more pretend to excuse the withholding of our
hearts from God, or the poverty and dullness of our affections, on the plea that
the cares and duties of the world keep us back from a devoted life. Still less
let us persuade ourselves, that the temptations to which we needlessly expose
ourselves are inevitable and appointed of God, or that we can resist their
action. They have already overcome us, as soon as we allow them to pass within
the precinct of our daily life. We can still, however, with great ease, in due
season, disentangle ourselves from all needless hindrances. The rest will be no
hindrance to the love of God. All pure loves may dwell under its shadow. Only we
must not allow them to shoot above, and to overcast it; for the love of God will
not grow in the shade of any worldly affection.

Above all, let us pray of Him to shed abroad in our hearts more and more of His
love; that is, a fuller and deeper sense of His exceeding love towards us. It is
thus He draws our love upward to Himself. “We love Him because He first loved
us.” The consciousness of this divine love comes down like a flood of light upon
our darkened hearts, transfiguring all pure love of God’s creatures with
exceeding brightness, making all the affections of our spiritual life harmonious
and eternal.


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Source: https://sermonindex.net/books/writings-of-edward-manning/
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