The superstitious hath too many gods; the profane man hath none at all,
unless perhaps himself be his own deity, and the world his heaven. To
matter of religion his heart is a piece of dead flesh, without feeling
of love, of fear, of care, or of pain from the deaf strokes of a
revenging conscience. Custom of sin hath wrought this senselessness,
which now hath so long entertained that it pleads prescription and knows
not to be altered. This is no sudden evil; we are born sinful, but have
made ourselves profane; through many degrees we climb to this height of
impiety. At first he sinned and cared not, now he sinneth and knoweth
not. Appetite is his lord, and reason his servant, and religion his
drudge. Sense is the rule of his belief; and if piety may be an
advantage, he can at once counterfeit and deride it. When aught
succeedeth to him he sacrifices to his net, and thanks either his
fortune or his wit; and will rather make a false God than acknowledge
the truth; if contrary, he cried out of destiny, and blames him to whom
he will not be beholden. His conscience would fain speak with him, but
he will not hear it; sets the day, but he disappoints it; and when it
cries loud for audience, he drowns the noise with good fellowship. He
never names God but in his oaths; never thinks of Him but in extremity;
and then he knows not how to think of Him, because he begins but then.
He quarrels for the hard conditions of his pleasure for his future
damnation, and from himself lays all the fault upon his Maker; and from
His decree fetcheth excuses of his wickedness. The inevitable necessity
of God's counsel makes him desperately careless; so with good food he
poisons himself. Goodness is his minstrel; neither is any mirth so
cordial to him, as his sport with God's fools. Every virtue hath his
slander, and his jest to laugh it out of fashion; every vice his colour.
His usualest theme is the boast of his young sins, which he can still
joy in, though he cannot commit; and (if it may be) his speech makes him
worse than he is. He cannot think of death with patience, without
terror, which he therefore fears worse than hell, because this he is
sure of, the other he but doubts of. He comes to church as to the
theatre, saving that not so willingly, for company, for custom, for
recreation, perhaps for sleep, or to feed his eyes or his ears; as for
his soul, he cares no more than if he had none. He loves none but
himself, and that not enough to seek his true good; neither cares he on
whom he treads that he may rise. His life is full of license, and his
practice of outrage. He is hated of God as much as he hateth goodness;
and differs little from a devil, but that he hath a body.