be busie too If we had only an Idol to serve the body were enough but God is a spirit and cannot be conversed with without the spirit yea and the whole spirit also Fond man that thinks with his narrow soul to deal with God and somewhat else who alone is immense and beyond our greatest capacity He must be taken up and goe out of the world in a sense that will get into Heaven The soul on the lip and the soul in the ear do rid work in the service of God 3. It is sweet work Psal. 138.5 Yea they shall sing in the wayes of the Lord for great is the glory of the Lord mark shall sing their spirits shall neither droop nor step aside He that attends on the Lord hath a most sweet imployment now the mind useth not to straggle at most rare musick or under an enchanting song Alexanders great soul yet is said exilire è convivio under the charms of Musick O the gracious presence of God! his sweet smiles and blessed love-tokens that can transport Angels sure they may ingage the heart of man and sufficiently fill it Read the Canticles and say then Is not converse with God an Heaven upon Earth and how far is Heaven from distracted thoughts sad and severe things afflict the mind It would flit from such subjects but sweet imployment ingages all the heart next dwelling in Heaven is the soul flying to Heaven in an Ordinance Our dryest Duties yield us least comfort The nearer the Sun the warmer More close to God more sweet you 'l find him and never more joyfull than in the House of Prayer SECT III. THe third reason is taken from the Nature of our Condition and that is this 1. We cannot live without God In him we live as to our natural life every 〈◊〉 is fetcht from Him so in our spiritual life the life of the soul is He that made it A world without a Sun is dark a body without a soul is dead but a soul withont God is dark is dead is damned It s true men feed and sing and make a shift without God in the World but he that lives truly lives by faith the other life Beasts live they eat and drink and work but know not God but if you will define the life of a soul God must be in the beginning in the midst and in the end of it 2. Our only way of communion with God is in an Ordinance This is the River the streams whereof make glad the heart Were a City besieged by mortal enemies round about and no relief to be conveyed but by the River that waters it how fatal to the City would the stopping of that River be that City must starve or yield The ordinary supplies that a Christian cannot be without come swimming down from Heaven through the Ordinances of God Distractions stop the River hinder Prayer from ascending to God hinder instruction from descending into the heart intercept commerce and starve the soul. The zeal of the Iews was eminent this way of whom Iosephus relates that when Pompeys Souldiers shot at the thickest of them in the siege of Ierusalem yet amidst those arrows did they go and perform their rites as though there had been peace why thy Prayer is the Embassador Distractions cut off the feet and Prov. 26.6 He that sendeth a message by the hand of a fool cutteth off the feet and drinketh damage A wandring Prayer is a message by the hand of a fool and that man is like to drink damage that useth it A man is a poor thing without God and God is not ordinarily met with but in an Ordinance 3. All our strength and Heart is too little for this business All our understanding too little to apprehend his rare perfections All our affections too weak and shallow to love imbrace and delight in him hence Mark 12.33 we are obliged to love and so to serve the Lord our God with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our strength that is with every faculty of the soul and with the utmost strength of every faculty Now if it be hard enough to climb the hill unto God with wings how shall we ascend with these weights about us or think to please with half an heart when the whole is too little for he is a great King and his name is dreadfull among the Heathen when all the water in the pool will but turn the Mill that Miller is a fool that by twenty Channels lets out the Water other wayes The intense and earnest heart is little enough to converse with God all the water in our Pool will but turn the Mill. What then can the remiss heart bring to pass and how unlikely are we to obtain with the great God with the negligent approaches of a trivial spirit with a little part of a little heart SECT IV. THe fourth Reason is taken from the Nature of Distractions 1. They divide the Heart and disable it wholly now a divided heart can do nothing at all Hos. 10.2 Their heart is divided now shall they be found faulty If one heart divided from another make a fault much more faulty is one heart divided within it self Hence it comes to pass that Satan offers as the false Mother did about the living Child 1 King 3.26 Let it be neither mine nor thine but divide it If he cannot block your way to the presence of God and make good his claim to the living Child as She would have done then with might and main he furthers all imaginable diversions to part the Soul and cryes Lord let it be neither thine nor mine but divide it well knowing that as the Child so the heart while intire is a living and lively heart but divide it and destroy it As he that runs at once after two Hares catches neither so two businesses at once spoils both He that thinks to treat the Creator and the creature at the same time enjoyes neither of them And thus the vain heart of man by over-doing undoes it self and reaching at two matters spoils them both 2. These Distractions frustrate the Ordinance and cause the great name of God to be taken in vain Instead of forcing the Hearers these do but beat the air and cannot reach the Heart of God because they never reach your own And this is one of the follies of a roving heart that it consumes as much time in a sensless as in a serious Duty and yet doth nothing in it brings nothing to pass And so the Holy God stands over the heedless sinner with Iobs words Job 16.3 When shall Vain words have an End I am weary with this tinkling Cymbal either pray in earnest or pray not at all hear in earnest or hear not at all As good not at all as never the better The service of God requires a man not a shadow yea all a man and more than a man our
any other Reasons recommend me to Moses above Plato for the demonstrating a Deity All that Reason can suggest might be written by an Infidel and more Infidels I trow have been convinced by reading and hearing the Book of the Christians than have Christians been settled by reading the Books of Infidels And therefore although holy David Psal. 19.1 appeals to the Heavens and the Host of them as a most strong Argument to declare God and so it is for what reason but the hand of a God can be rendred that the Planets being all of one matter should have contrary motions seeing things of the like matter have by nature like motion yet laying that Topick aside he pitches upon the Law of God vers 7. as the most perfect and sure way to demonstrate a God and convert and enwise a Soul Then go to God in prayer and beg him to touch thy Heart and open thine Eyes and thou shalt quickly see him that is not far from every one of us SECT II. THE second Cause of Distractions in the service of God is The corruption of our Nature that is of Soul and Body so that our inward faculties do act our outward senses and they infect our inward faculties in this business Mat. 15.19 Out of the Heart proceed vain and evil thoughts are not forced out as sparks out of a Flint but come out thence of themselves as sparks out of a Furnace View the mind and its accident is Vanity and how can a vain Mind be serious with God without a great deal of grace The Heart its name is Deceitful and makes a trade of jugling and purloining in the solemnest Duties and when the ear receives the word as a lovely song she runs after covetousness the while Now is she without now in the streets and lâ—eth in wait at every corner like the lewd woman Prov. 7.11 The eye that should be fix'd on Heaven is in the ends of the earth and gathering a stragling notion from every object The ear by every noise calls off the soul from its great business thus wofully the old man is bent against the new man Rom. 7.23 The law of the members war against the law of the mind and leads us into captivity to the law of sin that is in the members When the mind it self is set in its most hearty purposes to wait on God and offer him a faithful sacrifice then comes in the law of the members and either suggests within or admits from without some roving notions and these lead the poor soul like that young man Prov. 7.21 22. forc'd with flatteries like the ox to the slaughter or the fool to the correction of the stocks And he that began in Heaven ends on earth if not in hell Thus the good he would do he cannot O wretched man that must lead his life with such an heart As if a man were tied still to shoot in a warping bow he settles himself in his right postures aims directly at the White but his warping bow still carries the arrow quite besides the Butt and his skill is rendred ineflectual so the poor upright Christian in a duty orders his business and his heart as well as ever he can and aims at the glorifying of God and getting good to his soul but the corruption of his nature diverts him and perverts him from his purpose This hinders the elevation of the soul which would fix it in God's service like one that hath a light heart and an heavy body the light heart would flie the heavy body clips her wings and will hardly creep O saith the soul now will I arise and soar into heaven I must I will speak with my God my wants are pressing my sins increase Eternity approaches who will give me the wings of an Eagle I 'le never live so far from God I will away Thus this Bird of Paradise takes wing when behold the stone of her corrupt nature hangs at her leg and weighs her down she flutters a little but cannot flie for her heart she cannot flie indeed because of the heart she cannot flie And not only the dulness but the deceitfulness of our corrupt nature furthers our distractions For though the heart be deceitful from the beginning to the end of the year yet her prime and subtled sleights are shewed in the service of God where she is put hard to it to shift hard for her self and therefore useth her finest notions and sliest fetches to evade the presence of God and powerful influences of the holy Ghost Like some subtil Thief that joyns himself to the unwary Traveller and gives him pleasant company a while till when he watches his time he draws him with him out of the way and takes his purse before he is aware he is in a wood and his purse is gone Even so the heart of man takes on to be very willing to prayer or other good duties and goes with us a while but ere we have stept twenty sentences into our work this deceitful heart turns us aside brings us to feed upon ashes and binds up the faculties that we cannot deliver our souls nor say Is there not a lie in my right hand Isa. 44.20 Now is it not an hell upon earth to live with such a heart to cross a man in the midst of his greatest business disappoint him in his highest expectations and make him lose his labour if not his soul The Remedy against this corruption of our Nature is hard To divert a stream is easie but to dry up a spring is hard stop it here and it breaks out there So to divert and discharge a wandring thought is easie in comparison but the womb of the heart is pregnant kill one Viper and there 's an hundred more ready for the birth We think our worldly business is the only cause of them but the most retired Hermites tell us that an unsanctified or half-sanctified heart can find matter enough of diversion in a naked Cell And that the corruption of the subject as well as the bewitching of the object makes us trifle in Gods worship As Hierom tells of Hilarion whose heart roving from God was soundly scourged for his labour by an Angel And therefore the only cure of this is to get a true and greater degree of sanctifying grace You that have no grace can never pray well till your hearts be changed a new heart can only sing this new song well You complain that you want expressions ah it is impressions you want and nothing else if you had that sense of sin that makes the soul to ake and mourn you would find words sufficient to express it and you would not be playing with your fingers when you are in danger of falling into hell fire nor smilâ—ng at one another when God is frowning and thundring against you He that feels the Stone to torment hath few wandring thoughts while he is telling his grief
If thou wouldst believe that every word spoken by thee or to thee is written with what care and conscience wouldst thou pray and hear And be sure there is one among you that takes notes of all who will give to every man according to his works whom to see and feel in an Ordinance will quit you from Distractions SECT V. V. LAY a Law upon your senses Beg of God to sanctifie them as they are all Pensioners to Satan by nature and comploâ—ment so bring them all into Covenant with God that ye may be sanctified in soul and body and spirit Give them to him use them for him Is is said Prov. 17.24 The fools eyes are in the ends of the Earth Any new face that comes in any antick garb any noise about every head that moves every leaf that stirs commands the eyes and heart of a fool but that while Prov. 4.25 Let thy eyes look straight on and let thine eye-lids look straight before thee Compose thy eyes in that devout and heavenly posture that whatever falls out thou mayest hoc agere keep to thy business without wavering For the heart is used to walk after the eye Job 31.7 To the undoing of the soul. It is a precept among the Rabbins that if a Jew be at prayer though a Serpent come and bite him yet he must not stir till he hath done his duty Satan that old Serpent will be nibling at thy heel with one vain suggestion or other but go thou through with thy business and let God alone with him In Prayer then fix thy eyes Heaven-ward and let nothing divert them till the prayer be done This will shew that thou wouldst lift thy heart thither if thou couldst and will prevent many an impertinent distraction that comes in by the eye If any deride thee for this doubt thou not of good company Psal. 123.1 Unto thee do I lift up my eyes O thou that dwellest in the Heavens Let your ears be as good as stopt to every thing besides your work And the lifting up your craving hands will not be unprofitable to this end for you will find them to flagg when the heart knocks off from its business whereby you may be advertised to come in again Lam. 3.41 Let us lift up our hearts WITH OUR HANDS unto God in the Heavens And let your prayers be vocal if it may be for the voice both helps to fix the thoughts and raise the affections the want whereof we discern in meditation In hearing of God's Word let the eye be chained to the Preacher with the greatest attention and reverence as if you saw an Angel in the Pulpit or Christ himself And beware lest your needless complements to men be interpreted a neglect to God 'T is small manners to be complementing the Kings Servants in his Presence chamber till you have done your homage to the King Do your work with God 't is time enough to perform your civilities to men when that is done Look then to God from him is thy expectation with him is thy business Luk. 4.20 The eyes of all them that were in the Synagogueâ— were FASTENED on him And therein also let your ears be only open Heaven-ward Lord to deal with thee I am come and thou shalt have all my soul and body and all And here I cannot but digress a little but it is to cure a more criminal digression which is that frequent Abuse of Whispering and talking to one another in the service of God which except it be upon such instant indispensable business as cannot be ordered before or after the Ordinance is a sin in an high degree and that 1. Because it brings a guilt and distraction upon two at once If a vain thought there be so evil as you have heard how criminal then is this that involves you both yea perhaps occasions a distraction to twenty more that observe you And the guilt of all their vain thoughts on that occasion will be charged on your account according to the equity of that Law Exod. 21.23 2. Because this hath more of Affront in it Thy heart testifies to God's face that thou dost despise his presence Who but an impudent Renegade would while the King is laying down terms of mercy and honour to him be talking and laughing with his companions at some uncouth Courtier that comes in and who but an implicit Atheist shall be whispering with his neighbour about any thing while the King of Heaven and Earth is treating with him about Eternity You hold it no piece of good manners while any man is speaking to you especially if he be your superiour to neglect him so far as to turn from him to discourse another nay if the most necessary business call you away you apologize for your diversion and crave pardon And shall you dare while your Maker is in conference with you to confront him with an open parle with others This is an high affront if you consider it well 3. This hath more offence in it An offence to the Preacher that hath taken much pains to prepare that which you will not take pains to hear or else imply it is not worth the hearing An offence to the Congregation that sees it who must needs if they fear Godâ— be troubled at so publick a fault An offence to the Angels that while they stoop down to look into the mysteries opened in the Church see you sleight them so notoriously An offence to your own souls that perhaps in that moment miss of what would most have done them good O therefore Christian Reader mourn for thy misbehaviour this way and amend it for time to come lest God refuse to treat with thee that triflest thus in thy treating with him Remember it 's work enough for a poor man to converse with a great God He needs no other business to fill his hands And then in Meditation you must also compose your senses There shut your eye and ear and sequester your self wholly to the contemplation of things invisible The least sight or sound will here distract Any thing yea nothing will throw us off the hinges in this duty indeed it is said of Isaac Gen. 24.63 That he went forth in the field in the evening-â—ide to meditate And in that kind of meditation where the rise and subject matter is sensible there the senses must be active and busie but I think in other cases the outward senses may stand aside and let the soul alone without them we are never more sensible than when we use no outward sense at all And lastly in communicating at the Lord's-table there fix both your eyes on the sacred elements until the eye have affected the heart to feel what Christ felt to die in his death and looking on him whom you have pierced you mourn for him with a superlative sorrow And then look at those sacred signs with an eye of Faith till virtue come from that brazen Serpent to cure your sin-stung
find that in it which none ever found will it do more for thee than ever it did for any Believe its vanity upon God's Word ere thou try it by thy sad experience Get faith to suck vertue out of Christ's death to vanquish it For this is our victory 1 Ioh. 5.4 that overcometh the world even our faith Lay thee down with Christ in the grave by faith and say then What is the world Get faith to believe that eternal happiness which being once seen by that piercing eye would so disgrace the world that all the comforts of it would not weigh a straw in comparison of it If a man lived in the Sun what a poor mote would the whole earth look He that lives in Christ in Heaven by faith sees all the glories of the earth with a disdainful eye and cries Vanity of vanities all is vanity 2. You shall be helped against this disease by deep consideration of the folly and misery of such a frame of heart It 's folly for all that is gotten of the world with the neglect of the soul invasion of holy duties or by a carking worldly heart comes to thee in wrath will sink thee deeper in hell or if thou repent is most commonly some way consumed vix gaudet tertius haeres thy grand-child will rue it If we could penetrate the method of God's providence usually those losses you have in this beast or the other house or the like are the just value of what you have gotten by immoderate care hard dealing with others or unseasonable contrivance when your heart should have been better employed And then the misery of worldly-mindedness that it pierceth the heart through with many sorrows Sorrow and pain in getting sorrow and care in keeping sorrow and grief in losing The heart is never at perfect rest A man would not use his horse as a worldling doth his heart gives it no quiet or ease and all this to no purpose at all Hab. 2.13 The people labour in the very fire and weary themselves for very vanity and may not the consideration hereof be an effectual means to hate this humour and when it is once hated it is more than half discharged 3. Have recourse to God by prayer and therein see and bewail thy former madness solemnly vow to restore their right to every man thou hast wronged rather part like Zacheus with half thine estate than with thy whole soul and body and earnestly cry to the Lord to encline thy heart to his testimonies and not unto covetousness Psal. 119.36 Intreat your heavenly Father to give you an heavenly heart and if it come not at first asking it 's a gift worth going for again humbly tell him by vertue of that Covenant wherein you promised to forsake the world which you are now resolved to stick to his Majesty is bound to give you a mortifi'd and heavenly heart and you will never leave him till you have obtained it 4. Charm your hearts from worldly thoughts when you go to the worship of God Prov. 16.1 3. The preparation of the heart is from the Lord Commit thy ways to him and thy thoughts shall be established The Heathen left their shooes at the Temple doors to intimate that all earthly affections must be left behind you when you go to speak with God Do as that great States-man used who would lay off his Gown wherein he administred his Office when he went to worship God and say Lie there Lord Cecil implying he would take none of the cares of his Office into the presence of God So when you go to prayer reading or hearing lay aside the world and say Lie there house ye fields lie there lie there my cares till I have done with God So Abraham left his servants and asses Gen. 22.5 below the hill and took up nothing but an holy heart and the materials of his Sacrifice with him thither Keep still an eye upon your hearts and both watch and pray lest ye enter into temptation SECT VI. THe sixth cause of Distractions in the Worship of God is Weakness of love to Iesus Christ and consequently to his Ordinances Love unites the soul to its object as Faith is the bond of our mystical so Love is the bond of our moral union with Christ. The more love to Christ the more life in his service Cant. 8.6 Set me as a seal upon thy heart as a seal upon thy arm for love is strong as death Were your love more strong it would seal up both soul and body and unite them firmly unto Jesus Christ. Love marries the heart and eye to the object hence 't is there is not a distracting thought in heaven for there love is perfect they see and love and sing and praise and see enjoy and love for ever and ever The three Disciples Matth. 17.4 had but an half-quarter glimpse of that state but their love to their dearest Lord and his presence was so heightned that the world was forgotten Ierusalem below and all their friends and fellow-Disciples forgotten and they undone to abide there And if we could by the eye of faith see him that is invisible and perfectly love him O how hardly could we spare a by-thought in his presence and service no all the world would be forgotten comforts and crosses all sleep together while God and our soul were conversing in an Ordinance Whence is it that most men can work and care perpetually and no distractions divert them discourse their business most orderly without one alien thought drive on a bargain an hour together and think on nothing but what 's pertinent to their present business Why they love what they are about they like it well and so tongue and heart go together are wholely taken up therewith The jovial knot like their company and nothing shall distract them the servant comes about necessary business the master fumes that they will not let him alone the child comes and then the wife but he frets he rages And why all this why he loves his company 't is his delight his heaven Even so the Soul that hath a strong love to a precious Christ and his Ordinance-presence doth most heavily bear a distracting thought The devil cannot pluck him from Christ but the soul smarts and when there is this smart at parting that soul will part but seldom You have sometimes seen a sucking child that loves the mother and the breast most dearly how loth is it to leave it while it is hungry how eagerly and angrily it seeks and cries and catches hold again Here 's love Christ Iesus is the spring of all happiness and his Ordinances are his breasts and he that loves the Lord Jesus with all his soul and all his strength there he lies and sucks at the breasts of consolation This business knocks at door that trifle tempts him yet there he sticks and frowns away all his temptations His love is ardent Psal.