On Idleness

“Our thoughts are so active and restless that they will be doing something or other, and like unruly soldiers, if others do not employ them well, they will employ themselves ill. God has therefore in mercy appointed us callings to take up our thoughts, that they may be not only innocent but profitable to ourselves and others. Paradise had employment, and Heaven also will not be without it. Idleness is an hour of temptation; and we can have no excuse to stand idle in the market place when God himself offers to employ us… the best way to free our hearts from evil thoughts is by good employment.”

Ralph Venning, The Plague of Plagues (1669; repr., London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1965), 234-235.

Hat tip: Kairos Journal (http://www.kairosjournal.org.uk/about/)