got in a cleaner way to hell than the rest of his neighbors are.

Might not God now cast off this sinner, and cast him out of his
sight? might he not leave him to his own choice, to be deluded by
and to fall in his own righteousness, because he trusts to it and
commits iniquity?

But grace, preventing grace preserves him. It is true, this turn of
the sinner is a turning short of Christ. But,

4. God in this way of the sinner will mercifully follow him, and
show him the shortness of his performances, the emptiness of his
duties, and the uncleanness of his righteousness. This I speak of
the sinner, the salvation of whose soul is graciously intended and
contrived of God; for he shall by gospel light be wearied out of
all; he shall be made to see the vanity of all, and that the
personal righteousness of Jesus Christ, and that only, is it which
of God is ordained to save the sinner from the due reward of his
sins. But behold, the sinner now, at the sight and sense of his own
nothingness, falleth into a kind of despair; for although he hath it
in him to presume of salvation through the delusiveness of his own
good opinion of himself, yet he hath it not in himself to have a
good opinion of the grace of God in the righteousness of Christ.
Wherefore he concludeth that if salvation be alone of the grace of
God through the righteousness of Christ, and all of a man's own is
utterly rejected as to the justification of his person with God,
then he is cast away.

Now, the reason of this sinking of heart is the sight that God has
given him--a sight of the uncleanness of his best performance. The