Holiness

I see many after their baptism living more carelessly than the uninitiated, and having nothing peculiar to distinguish them in their way of life. It is, you see, for this cause that neither in the market nor in the Church is it possible to know quickly who is a believer and who an unbeliever, unless one be present at the time of the mysteries and see the one sort put out, the others remaining within. On the contrary they ought to be distinguished not by their place, but by their way of life. For as men’s outward dignities are naturally to be discovered by the outward signs with which they are invested, so ours ought to be discernible by the soul. That is, the believer ought to be manifest not by the gift only, but also by the new life.

Certainly that Christian will never be eminent in holiness that has many eyes to behold a little holiness, and never an eye to see his further want of holiness. He that is more affected with that holiness he has than he is afflicted about those great measures of holiness that he needs will never be but … a dwarf in holiness. The more sensible we are of our own weakness and emptiness, the more pleasure God will take to fill us with his own fullness, and to perfect in us the work of holiness.

Exercising yourself to godliness in solitude will be a probable evidence of your uprightness. Men are withheld in company from doing evil by the iron curb of fear or shame, and provoked to do good by the golden spurs of praise or profit; but in solitariness there are not such rubs in the way of lust to hinder our passage, nor such baits in the way of holiness to encourage our progress. The naked lineaments and natural thoughts of the soul are best discerned in secret.