blessed us with in opposition to a pinching and penurious way of living This I say seems to be the notion of Rejoycing that the Text speaks of as appears by the following verse Solomon having told us in the Text that there is nothing better for a man than to rejoyce and do Good he adds by way of explication of what he meant by rejoycing these words that every Man should eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his labours for it is the gift of God And frequently in this Book of Ecclesiastes doth he persuade to this kind of rejoycing Thus in Chap. 2. ver 24. there is nothing better for a man than that he should eat and drink and that he should make his soul enjoy Good in his labour this also I saw it was from the hand of God And in Chap. 5. ver 18. Behold that which I have seen it is good and comely for one to eat and drink and to enjoy the good of all his labours that he taketh under the sun all the days of his life which God giveth him for it is his portion And in Chap. 6. ver 1 2. he represents it as a great evil that he hath seen under the sun and yet such an evil as is common among men that a man to whom God hath given riches and wealth and honour so that he wanteth nothing for his soul of all that he desireth yet God giveth him not power to eat thereof but a stranger eateth it this saith he is vanity and an evil disease And there is certainly great reason in what he saith For to have a plentiful portion of the good things of this life and not to have the heart to make use of them for the enjoyment of our selves and friends for the refreshing us under the toil that this life doth expose us to for the promoting Acquaintance and Society and the rendering our condition as easie as may be is as unaccountable a folly as we can be guilty of and makes us really as poor and necessitous as those that want bread but only not so pityable Taking now this to be the sense of rejoycing in the Text as I believe it is we have from hence a good warrant for this day's Meeting for we come together to rejoyce in Solomon's sense that is to eat and drink and to enjoy the good of our labours it being the gift of God so to do And this practice of ours is not only reasonable in it self but is commended to us by the example of God's people both under the Law and the Gospel The Jews by the appointment of God himself were to meet every year three times at Jerusalem the Capital City of the Nation See Deut. 16. to feast and to rejoyce before the Lord as we have it in the express words of Moses And the Christians for near 200 years after our Saviours had their Agapae their Feasts of charity wherein they met together both poor and rich to enjoy and make merry one with another It is true these Feasts were at length left off by common consent because there grew abuses in them they became occasions of Luxury and excess and so matters of scandal to our Religion But this was not an ill reflexion upon the thing it self which was innocent and commendable but upon the abuse of the thing A good and laudable institution was perverted to evil purposes However this very consideration ought to make us very careful of our carriage and behaviour in these our Meetings lest we fall under the same inconveniencies which that we may prevent Two things are especially needful to be taken care of by us First That we do not exceed the bounds of rejoycing prescribed to Christians that is that we avoid all excess and use the Creatures of God soberly and temperately so as to give offence to none nor to make provision for the flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof And Secondly That we take care to perform and make good the ends and designs of these Feasts of rejoycing which ends if we will take our measures from those Laws that God gave to his own People in the Old Testament and which the modern Jews themselves in their Commentaries take notice of and which are so reasonable in themselves that without any Authority they do recommend themselves to us are these four following First That we Rejoyce before the Lord that is that we make our humble acknowledgments and return our due praises and thanks to him for all the good things he hath blessed us with in our lives confessing that all we have is from his free bounty and goodness and that our Meeting together is to praise his name upon that account And this was the thing that was meant by those solemn Sacrifices that the Jews were bound to offer at Jerusalem at their Annual Feasts The second end of these Feasts is to take occasion from hence to learn our duty to be instructed in all the branches of that obedience we owe unto God For as Maimonides observes that was one of the principal reasons of God's calling together all the people of the Jews to appear at the Feast of Tabernacles to wit that they might hear the Law read unto them and this design is I suppose pursued by us in our chusing this Place to Assemble in A third end of these Feasts as the same Maimonides tells us and is manifest from Scripture is to promote acquaintance and Friendship and brotherly love one with another And this is a very noble end and serves many excellent purposes and nothing can be beyond it except The fourth and last end of these Meetings which is to do Good to exercise our Charity towards our poor indigent Brethren No man at the Solemn Feasts of the Jews was to appear before the Lord empty Exod. 23.15 He was to bring his offering not only to God by way of recognition and acknowledgement to him but for the poor also that they might rejoyce as well as he This is well observed by Maimonides from Deut. 16.14 where it is thus said Thou shalt rejoyce in thy feast thou and thy son and thy daughter thy man-servant and thy maid-servant the Levite and the stranger the fatherless and the widow that are within thy gates This then is the great end of our Assembly that not only we but the Fatherless and the widow all of our Country that need our Charity may rejoyce with us and for us And this is that which Solomon joyns with rejoycing in the Text There is no good in them but for a man to rejoyce and do Good and what that Man who by the sentence of God was declared the wisest of all men hath thus joyned together let none of us presume to put asunder These are the Rules and these are the ends that we are to observe in this our Feast and let us all for the Honour of Christ's Religion and for the credit of our particular Country Charge
III. PREACHED AT BOW-CHURCH On the 17th of February 1680. Eccles iij. 10. I know that there is no good in them but for a man to rejoice and to do good in his Life THIS Book of Ecclesiastes gives us an Account of the several Experiments that Solomon had made in order to the finding out wherein the Happiness of Man in this World doth consist And these Words are one of the Conclusions he drew from those Experiments No Man had ever greater Opportunities of Trying all the Ways wherein Men generally seek for Contentment than he had and no Man did ever more industriously apply himself to or took a greater Liberty in enjoying those Good Things that are commonly most admired than he did And yet after all his Labour and all his Enjoyments he found nothing but Emptiness and Dissatisfaction He thought to become Happy by Philosophy giving his Heart as he tells us Eccl. 1.13 to seek and search out all the things that come to pass under the Sun Yet upon Trial he found all this to be Vanity and Vexation of Spirit He apply'd his Mind to Political Wisdom and other sorts of Knowledge and his Attainments in that kind were greater than of any that were before him Yet he experienced at last Ver. 18. that in Wisdom was much Grief and he that increaseth Knowledge increaseth Sorrow He proved his Heart as he tells us with Mirth and Wine Chap. 2. Ver. 1 3. and all sorts of Sensual Pleasures to find if these were good for the Sons of Men And yet so far was he from his desir'd Satisfaction in these things that he was forced to say of Laughter Ver. 2. that it was mad and of Mirth What Good doth it He turned himself to Works of Pomp and Magnificence He built him stately Houses and made him Gardens and Vineyards Ver. 4. and Orchards and Fountains He increased his Possessions Ver. 8. and gathered Silver and Gold and the precious Treasures of Kings and of the Provinces He got him a vast Retinue and kept the most splendid Court that ever any Prince of that Country did Yet as he tells us when he came to look upon all the Works that his hands had wrought Ver. 11. and on the Labour that he had laboured to do behold all was Vanity and Vexation of Spirit and there was no Profit under the Sun But wherein then is there any Profit if not in these things What is that Good that the Sons of Men are to apply themselves to in order to their living as comfortably as the state of things here will allow This Question after an Intimation of the Uncertainty and Perplexedness of all Humane Events but withall of the Exactness of the Providence of God who hath made every thing beautiful in its Season he thus resolves in the Words of the Text I know saith he that there is no good in them but for a Man to rejoice and do good in his Life That is to say I have found by long Experience that all the Happiness that is to be had in the Good Things of this Life doth arise from these two Things Rejoicing in the Enjoyment of them and Doing Good to others with them while we live Take away these two Uses and there is no good in them Or if you please we may interpret the first part of his Proposition not of Things but of Men thus I know there is no good in them i. e. I am convinced that there is nothing so good for the Sons of Men or nothing that more contributes to their Happiness in this World than that every Man should rejoice and do good in his Life And to this purpose the Words are render'd by several Interpreters But it is no matter which of the Senses we pitch upon since in effect they come both to one thing Two Things then Solomon here recommends to every one that would live comfortably in this World Rejoicing and Doing Good And I do not know what can be more proper and seasonable to be recommended and insisted on to you at this time and on this occasion than these two things for the putting them in practice makes up the whole Design of this Meeting We are here so many Brethren met together to Rejoice and to do Good To Rejoice together in the Sense and Acknowledgment of God's Mercies and Blessings to us and in the Enjoyment of Society one with another And to do Good not only by increasing our Friendship and mutual Correspondence but by joining together in a chearful Contribution to those our Country-men that need our Charity To entertain you therefore upon these two Points seems to be my proper Business But in treating of them I shall make bold to invert the Order in which they are put in the Text and shall first speak of doing Good though it be last named and shall afterwards treat of Rejoicing The truth is Doing Good in the Order of Nature goes before Rejoicing for it is the Foundation of it There can be no true Joy in the Possession or Use of any Worldly Blessings unless we can satisfie our selves we have done some Good with them It is the doing Good that sanctifies our other Enjoyments and makes them Matter of Rejoicing Now in treating of this Argument I shall briefly endeavour these Three Things First I shall earnestly recommend to you the Practice of doing Good upon several Considerations Secondly I shall represent the Practicableness of it by shewing the several Ways which every Person though in the meanest Circumstances is capable of doing Good Thirdly I shall make two or three Inferences by way of Application I begin with the First Thing Seriously to recommend the Practice of doing Good But where shall I begin to speak either of the Obligations that lie upon us or of the Benefits and Advantages that do accrue to us by doing Good in our Lives Or having begun where shall I make an end The Subject is so copious that the Study of a whole Life cannot exhaust it The more we consider it still the more and the weightier Arguments will present themselves to us to engage us in the practice of it and the more we practise it still the more shall we desire so to do and the more happy and blessed shall we find our selves to be For to do Good is nothing else but to act according to the Frame and Make of our Beings It is to gratifie those Inclinations and Appetites that are most strongly rooted in our Natures such as Love and Natural Affection Pity and Compassion a Desire of Friends and a Propensity to knot our selves into Companies and Societies What are all these but so many Stimuli so many powerful Incitements of Nature to put us upon doing good Offices one to another To do Good is the End of all those Acquisitions of all those Talents of all those Favours and Advantages that God has bless'd us with it is the proper Use we
yet even in this case still there will To the Vpright arise Light in the Darkness that is Light in the third sense we have given of the word viz. taking Light for Peace and Joy and Comfort And this is that which the Psalmist tells us in another place Light is sown for the Righteous and Gladness for the Vpright in heart Psal 97.11 Whatever Afflictions come upon the Upright Man yet he hath this advantage of other Men that he bears them infinitely more lightly than they do They are really no great disturbance to him for he enjoys the same calmness and serenity of Mind the same peace and quiet and contentment that ever he did His present sufferings are rather matter of rejoycing and triumph to him than of discontent and repining for he knows that they come upon him by the Counsel and Disposal of the great Governour of the World And he knows that he hath so sincerely approved himself to God and is so well beloved by him that he should not have been ordered into these Circumstances had it not been really for his good And this Consideration doth so effectually support him under all the Difficulties that he hath to conflict with that he not only sits down casily and quietly but is very well pleased with the dispensations of the Divine Providence towards him how ingrateful soever they may be to Flesh and Blood Let what will happen to him he is full of Peace and Joy For he hath met with no disappointment of his designs His great aim was to please God and his Conscience from God's word assures him that he has done it and he hath nothing to do farther but to wait for the happy time when the secrets of all Hearts shall be revealed and every Man's Counsels and Actions shall be made manifest and then he doubts not to receive approbation and praise and a great Reward in that Day of the Lord Jesus And so much the rather 2 Cor. 4.17 because this light affliction wherewith he is now exercised he is assured will work for him a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory To conclude Whatever his sufferings be he will live and die in a profound Peace perfectly satisfied with all God's dealings towards him And his Life and Death will verify to all that know him that advice and observation of the Psalmist Psal 37.37 Mark the Perfect Man and behold the Vpright for the end of that Man is Peace SERMON VI. PREACHED AT WHITE-HALL On the 20th of March 1684 5. Luke xvi 31. If they hear not Moses and the Prophets neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead THE Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus in the Gospel is so well known that it is needless to relate the Particulars of it These Words are the Conclusion of that Parable and they are made the Words of Abraham who being in Paradise is brought in as speaking them to the Rich Man in Hell The Occasion was this This now Poor Man not being able to obtain the least Comfort or Refreshment for himself under that unsupportable anguish he endured bethinks himself of his Friends and Relations in the World and casts about how to prevent their coming to that sad condition And for this purpose he begs of Abraham that he would be pleased to send the happy Lazarus into the World again to testifie to his Brethren what he knew and had seen concerning the State of the other Life and to exhort them to a timely Repentance lest they should come into that place of Torment in which he was To this Request Abraham thus answers They had Moses and the Prophets which did plainly enough testifie against their Sins and offered sufficient Motives to them to repent and therefore there was no need of such extraordinary Means as he desired But this Answer did not satisfie the miserable Man Still he pursues his former Request Nay Father Abraham saith he but if one went unto them from the dead they will repent There was no resisting such an Argument as that If Lazarus whom they all had known living and now knew to be dead should rise again and personally come to them and tell them in what a sad condition he had seen their Friend and that they must all expect to run the same Fortune if they did not change their Course of Living This would come close to them and be more convincing than a hundred Arguments drawn from the Books of Moses and the Prophets which were written many Ages before their time and so consequently could not be presumed to have so great a force as an Argument drawn from their own Sense and Experience To this Reply of the Rich Man Abraham peremptorily rejoyns in the Words of the Text. If they hear not Moses and the Prophets neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead To omit lesser Matters that may be observed from these Words the Point which primarily and most naturally seems to be offered to our Consideration from them is this That those who give no credit to a setted standing Revelation of God once well attested or are not thereby prevailed upon to reform their Evil manners neither in all probability would they be prevailed upon though a particular Miracle was wrought by God in order to their Conversion as for instance though one should rise from the dead and appear to them Now to satisfie every one of the Truth of this Proposition it will be abundantly sufficient to make out these two things First That there is really more force and weight in a Publick standing Revelation of God such as that was by Moses and the Prophets here mentioned to convince Men or to reclaim them than there can be in a Private Miracle though I see it with my Eyes And Secondly Though God should be pleased to work a Miracle or to send an Apparition for the Conviction of an obstinate Unbeliever or vicious Person yet such a one would as easily find out shifts and ways to evade the force of such an Argument and to hinder the Effect it ought have upon him as he formerly did to put off the ordinary standing Motives and Arguments of Religion And consequently there is little probability that he who is not gained by the former will be wrought upon by the latter I begin with the first of these things That there is really more force and weight in a Publick standing Revelation of God to convince Men or to reclaim them than there can be supposed to be in a Private single Miracle though a Man sees it with his Eyes Or than there can be in an Apparition from the dead if God should think fit to vouchsafe such a thing In speaking to this I mean not to concern my self or you with the Revelation of Moses and the Prophets though that be the Revelation which the Text here speaks of I think it will be more suitable and useful to us to consider