Psalms 37:8

10. “For my soul is filled with illusions, and there is no soundness in my flesh” ( ver. 7 ). Where there is the whole man, there there is soul and flesh both. The “soul is filled with illusions;” the flesh hath “no soundness.” What does there remain that can give joy? Is it not meet that one should “go mourning”? “All the day long have I gone mourning.” Let mourning be our portion, until our soul be divested of its illusions; and our body be clothed with soundness. For true soundness is no other than immortality. How great however are the soul’s illusions, were I even to attempt to express, when would the time suffice me? For whose soul is not subject to them? There is a brief particular that I will remind you of, to show how our soul is filled with illusions. The presence of those illusions sometimes scarcely permits us to pray. …

More then than all other things together, let us attend seriously to this. “I have loved,” saith he,“ those that love thy law.” ( Ps. cxix. 165 , not exact.) This man then let us too emulate, and such let us love. And that the young may further be taught chastity, let them hear the Prophet, saying, “My loins are filled with illusions” ( Ps. xxxviii. 7 , Sept.); and again let them hear him saying, “Thou wilt utterly destroy every one that goeth a whoring from Thee.” ( Ps. lxxiii. 27 , Sept.) And, that one ought to restrain the belly, let them hear again, “And slew,” he saith, “the more part of them while the meat was yet in their mouths.” ( Ps. lxxviii. 30 , Sept.) And that they ought to be above bribes, “If riches become abundant, set [not] your heart upon them” ( Ps. lxii. 10 .); and that they ought to keep glory in subjection, “Nor shall his glory descend together after him.” ( Ps. …

Therefore he begins at that point to arm the soldier of Christ: for “stand,” saith he, “having your loins girt about,” and he added “with truth.” ( Eph. vi. 14 .) Why “with truth”? Because lust is a mockery and a lie: wherefore the prophet says, “My loins are filled with mockings.” ( Ps. xxxviii. 7 .) The thing is not pleasure, but a shadow of pleasure. “Having your loins,” he says, “girt about with truth”; that is, with true pleasure, with temperance, with orderly behavior. For this cause he gives this advice, knowing the unreasonableness of sin, and wishing that all our members should be hedged round; for “unjust anger” it is said, “shall not be guiltless.” ( Ecclus. i. 22 .)

xxxviii. 7 . There is no soundness in my flesh.

14. From this swelling pride springs the audacity in prayer which marks the directions in your letter to acertain widow as to how the saints ought to pray. “He,” you say,“rightly lifts up his hands to God; he pours out supplications with a good conscience who can say, ‘Thou knowest, Lord, how holy, how innocent, how pure from all deceit, wrong, and robbery are the hands which I spread out unto Thee; how righteous, how spotless, and free from all falsehood are the lips with which I pour forth my prayers unto Thee, that Thou mayest pity me.’” Is this the prayer of a Christian, or of a proud Pharisee like him who says in the Gospel, “God, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are, robbers, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican: I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.” Yet he merely thanks God because, by His mercy, he is not as other men: he execrates sin, an …