Lord of Heaven and Earth keep the Soul of this Wife this Child this Servant for if it be missing amongst the number of my sheep at the great day through thy neglect in instructing c. thy Soul shall go for it Hence not only should your Children be taught by you but your Wives and Servants The Wife is commanded to learn of her Husband at home and the Husband to walk with her as a man of knowledge and your Servants should be trained by you in Religion Gen. 14.14 as Abrahams Servants were by Abraham thus some of the Hebrew Rabbins think that Abraham's trained Servants are therefore so called Not conversing personally with them abâ—ut their Souls How seldome do you converse personally with every one in your Families concerning the practical part of Religion How seldome do you ask them any questions how it is with their Souls and what they think will become of them to all Eternity Are you not as great strangers to the inwards of their Souls as you are to the Souls of the Indians If their bodies be in danger meat physick attendance are procured but their Souls may perish in formality and carelessness for any help you will afford them Some Professing-Governours never treat with their housholds about their Spiritual Estate from one year to another Hence comes the great Apostasy of our times The Lord humble us and deliver us from bloud-guiltiness Many an Husband may cry out O my Wife's Soul is like to perish through my default many a Parent may shriek O! I am verily guilty of the bloud of my Child and many a Master may impute to his own account all the disorders of his Servants for that they have no personal conference with them about Original Corruption Regeneration Justification Sanctification Glorification c. Perhaps thou prayest in thy Family every day but not knowing the inward lusts and workings of their hearts towards God or Sin thou knowst not how to pray as thou oughtest thou knowst not what to confess and what to pray for nor what to bless God for 4. Not walking with gravity Have you walk'd with that gravity before your Wives Children and Servants as ye ought Have you not made your selves vile by lightness frothiness and unseemly carriages Governours of Families are the Viceroy's of God they are in the place of God and therefore should keep up their Authority and not sinfully run into such vanity and familiarity with their inferiours as to breed in them contempt of the Ordinance of God 5. Not giving them time to serve God in You have given your Children and Servants time to work for your selves but have you afforded them time to serve their God in Too too many use their Inferiours just as they use their Beasts they work and feed their Beasts but never instruct no more do they instruct their Inferiours When do you call your Wives Children Servants into your Closet and not only press them to look after their Souls and in order thereunto to spend some time in Prayer Reading Meditation c. but tell them how God wrought on you how he awakened you what corruptions prevail'd with you and how God help'd you to crucisie them How do you know but the same motives might melt reduce and turn their hearts too 6. Have not you miscarried as to the time Taking undue time for Family-Duties In the Morning too early for the management of your religious work in your houses Some Governours Pray in the Morning too early so early with a small part of their Family whilst others are in Bed or in the service of the World so that they worship not God together as they ought and this is past over with silence but if they miss of their Servant in the Shop or Field O! how doth the fire of Hell break forth at their lips How angry is the Governour he cries out O! I shall be undone by the unfaithfullness of my Wife Children Servants but sees not a greater danger a more probable ruine falling on him for not having his Family to worship God with him Others deferr Morning Prayer till it be almost Noon Too late They will adventure into all worldly imployments as we say without fear or wit they see no need of God to protect them from outward or inward dangers no need of Gods blessing till they are ready to fill their panch and then some Collects must be said some short Prayers it is the Custome of their fore Fathers it is the Religion of their Ancestours or Conscience will trouble at the total neglect of the Morning Sacrifice and therefore the Prayer shall be run over with more hast than the boy that saith his lesson that they may rise up to eat drink and play And as some are unseasonable in their duties in the Morning At Evening too late so at Evening Whilst their strength lasts to serve the world they attend it some 'till even midnight and then come let us go to Prayer when the poor Wife Children and Servants had rather be in bed than on their knees The Governour Prays dully enough 1 Sam. 2.17 Putting off family Prayer with a long grace and that while the poor family sleep or nauseate the duty and so like Elies Sons these Sons of Belial cause their people to abhorre the offering of the Lord. Are there not also some Professing-Governours unworthy of the name of Christian who think to please God and the family with a long grace before meat which shall be in lieu of all the service of the day 7. Not reading Scripture and good books How few are there that read the Scriptures and good books in their houses O! this will take up too much time as if God had given men all their time to neglect him in and to indulge to the services of the Flesh World and Devils CHAP. XXIX The sins of Husbands and Wives HUsband 's and Wives are call'd to reflexion on their miscarriages joyntly Husbands and Wives sins severally Joyntly for their not being so carefull of their choice as they should have been not seeking God enough in a matter of so great consequence which was for tearm of life and wherein the Souls of each other were so highly concerned 1 Cor. 7.39 The Wife is bound by the Law as long as her Husband liveth but if her Husband he dead she is at liberty to be married to whom she will only in the Lord. 2 Cor. 6.14 Be ye not unequally yoaked together with unbelievers for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness and what communion hath light with darkness That they came together upon low earthly and lustfull motives for profit pleasure beauty rather than to further the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ The Sons of God saw the Daughters of Men that they were fair Gen. 6.2 and they took them Wives of all which they chose That they did not by Prayer and Fasting
the Scholar of those Notions which he affects and valueth Haven ot our hearts cryed out many times unto the Bible depart from us for we desire not the knowledge of Gods wayes either as to worship or manners and that because knowledge is an obligation yea a provocation to duty and a sting in case duty be neglected What things we prize we search into Not searching the Scriptures Jo. 5.39 But how little have we searched the Scriptures as diggers in Mines do search for gold and silver in the Earth as the Word signifieth And this leads me to those two main Evidences of our slighting the written Word of God our not reading and not meditating upon it Not reading them Dent. 31.11 Matth. 12.3.5.21.16 Luk. 10.26 Deut. 17.19 as we ought which I shall a little enlarge upon How have we been guilty of not reading the Scriptures as we ought That every one ought to read them is so evident that there is no way for the Papists to keep men from believing this truth but by keeping of them from reading the Scripture No business can discharge any from this duty and yet how is this evident duty neglected Some have not been so farr wrought upon as from sense of their own ignorance and blindness in the things that concern their Everlasting welfare and from conviction that they can know such things only by the help of the written Word of God to take up firm resolutions to undertake the study of the Scripture Others notwithstanding their resolutions never set upon the reading of the Bible over At all They have seen no excellency in this book they have seen more in a piece of Philosophy in a rational discourse of Divinity in an ingenious History in a politick discourse yea in a Romance or in a Play Polititian-like who preferr'd an Ode in Pindar before all Davids Psalms How many read the Bible too seldome Oft enough thinking it too much to read it dayly to spend one hour therein every day Have not some spent several hours in a day in reading some good books of mens inditing but not a quarter of an hour in reading gods-Gods-book I even hate mine own works said Luther and oft times wish they were burnt because I fear lest they should withdraw men from reading the Scriptures How much greater is the Number of those Aright not reverently 2 Sam. 7.18 that have not read the Bible aright Are not all of us in this number When have we prepared for the reading of the Scriptures as becomes those that are going in unto God so going into the Sanctuary where the Word of God was kept is tearmed Have not we read fearlesly Tremblingly When we were going to take the Bible into our hands have we trembled at the Word Isa 66.2 lest we should not sanctifie the Name of God yea lest we should take the Name of God in vain in our reading Have not we read heedlesly Attentively Not diligently marking the Duties commanded the Sins forbidden the Rewards promised and the Punishments threatned therein Have not our thoughts been wandering and gadding and not fixed upon what we read When did we attend to Scripture words as heedfully 1 Kings 20.33 as Benhadad's Messengers did to the words of Ahab Have not we read unbelievingly Believingly Deut. 29.9 Rom. 15.4 Josh 1.5 compar'd with Hebr. 13.5 Conscieneiously For right Ends Not believing that the Scripture is the Word of God that whatever we read therein is true and good that the Spirit of God the Inditer of every word in this Book did particularly intend our good in every Verse that in the Scripture Life and Death is set before us yea that Scripture words are our Life Have not we read out of custome and not conscienciously in obedience to the command of God Have not we read for wrong ends Either to satisfie our curiosity and not to regulate our hearts and lives or to have matter of discourse but not matter of practise to have Scripture at our tongues end not at our hearts or only to know being ashamed to be ignorant of those things which all Christians know and to be able to say nothing of such matters which we cannot but have occasion divers times in company to talk of but not to do When did we read the Scriptures with this particular intention that they might be a Lamp unto our feet Psa 119.105 and a Light unto our paths That we might thereby be help'd to order our conversation aright When did we read the Bible with the same attention reverence Quid est Scriptura Sacra nisi quaedam Epistola Omnipotentis Dei ad Creaturam suam Greg. Hos 8.12 and resolution to follow every rule therein as we think we would if we had lived when Christ was upon Earth received a Letter from him directing us what to believe and do that we might be saved Or as we think we should a Book writ immediately by the singer of God as he wrote the Ten Commandements in two Tables Why the Bible is Gods Letter to every one of us in particular written by himself though mediately I have written to him the great things of my Law To him it is in the singular number because to every man and woman particularly When did we read the Bible as Children read the last Will and Testament of their deceased Parent Have not we read the Scripture With Prayer without begging of God his Spirit to help us to understand what we read and to practise what we understand at least not so importunately as we would if we had been begging for our Lives at the Barr of a Judge Have not we sown this seed among thornes in unplowed hearts Jer. 4.3 and have not so much as prayed to God to take away the heart of stone and to give an heart of flesh a teachable plyable tractable spirit ready to receive every Divine impression O! when shall we make conscience of reading the Scriptures daily as we ought The Emperour of Heaven saith Gregory the great the Lord of Angels and Men hath sent to you that which concerns your life and will you still neglect to read it with a fervent and zealous Spirit How guilty have we been in not meditating in the Word of God as we ought How little Not meditating if at all have we dwelt in our serious thoughts upon the matters contained in the written Word of God to the end we might understand how much they do concern us and that our hearts may thereby be raised to some holy affections and resolutions Though meditation be commanded as a chief means sanctified by God for the keeping of his Word Josh 1.8 Psa 1.2 though we cannot be holy and happy without it altogether though it be one of the Profitablest duties of a Christian the Reader and Studier of Scripture may see the beauty and smell the sweetness of the flowres that grow
to scatter and disperse those fogs and mists which over-cloud their Souls you should be eyes to the blind but you are not you should be of a merciful Spirit to all Souls more especially to the Souls of all Saints most especially to the Souls of those Saints to whom you are peculiarly related but you are not Exod. 23.5 1 Thes 5.14 1 Cor. 12.7 Mal. 3.16 In the old Law God took care of Asses if they lay under a burthen Israel was to help them Doth God take care for beasts and will not ye for men for Saints for the redeemed of the Lord God requires of you that you comfort the feeble minded The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withall Christ expects his own with increase They that feared the Lord spake often one to another to comfort one another with the promises of God made to his people against the flourishing of the wicked and overflowing of ungodliness and the Lord hearkned and heard it and a book of Remembrance was written before him c. the Lord book't that good service Nihil de Scripturis nihil de salute Animarum agitur sed nugae risus verba proferuntur inventum he pur it upon record But though the Lord hearknetâ— and hears yet he seldom finds us so employed our neglects are sealed up in his bag I pray God we may lay it to heart repent and reform Bernards complaint may justly be revived Not a word of the Scriptures nothing of the Salvation of the Soul but trisles and to yes laughter and words as light as the wind eat up the time I know there have been too many Uzza's amongst us who have had an itching desire to be fingring of the Ark thinking of themselves more highly than they ought to think and like the ambitious Sons of Levi taking too much upon them whereby the Ministry hath suffered much contempt The Lord forgive these daring Phaetons who have set the world in a slame hereby But let not us run from one extreme into another Let us give to the Ministry their due Jude v. 20. and yet not neglect to build up our selves in our most holy faith Mutual duties should be exercised between Christian and Christian The Apostle is express for it in the places already quoted I shall adde one more Col. 3.16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another O! if God would be with me so far as to make me an instrument to prevail with you to go and visit one another and stir up one another that knowing the terours of the Lord you may perswade men O! bewail thy unserviceableness thy private spiritedness thy want of love and bowels to others especially now when the Ministerial help fails to such a degree and when there is so great an Apostasie Sure then is no time wherein Christian-fellowship is more called for and wherein it may be more profitable than at this time But alas How are the wise as well as the foolish Virgins asleep generally secure without action no way usefull to each other no more than they are who are fast asleep in their beds of rest O! how few are there like Jonathan and David how few enter into a brotherly promise to exhort one another to call one another to account to tell one another their fears to know of one another their growth in Religion We are proud and loath to have our nakedness appear yea some of us have few stories to tell of Gods goodness and bounty to our Souls and we hate a discovery how low earthly vain backsliding we are Hence reserved to each other But God will bring forth the hidden works of dishonesty 3. Not admonishing or not aright How is Fraternal correption neglected or spoyl'd in the managing Some totally neglect reproving their Brethren Gallio-like they little care for these things they are little concern'd whether God be honoured or dishonoured Others delay admonition Either neglecting it altogether or delaying it The Flesh is backward to this self-denying work and so the many weighty circumstances which should bring the Offendor to Repentance are forgot The Offendor is also hardned in his Sin He thinks by thy silence thou art altogether like unto him so he judgeth of Gods silence these things hast thou done and I kept silence Psa 50.21 thou thoughtest I was altogether such an one as thy self so he judgeth of thy silence It 's much easier to fetch out a spot of inck from a cloth the day it is stained than afterwards Sin like a Mole will quickly bury it self and the longer let alone the harder it is to dig it up The longer a disease is let alone the harder cured Cronical diseases are seldome a credit to the Physitian Besides if you neglect the Reproof this day or hour perhaps by the next he will commit the same Sin again for either he knows it not to be a sin or in case he knows it yet every new act doth strengthen the habit of sin It is the nature of sin to blind the Mind to stupifie the Conscience and to harden the heart Exhort therefore one another dayly Heb. 3.13 while it is called to day lest any of you be hardned through the deceitfulness of sin If the finner add sin to sin put that to your account for neglecting the Ordinance of God for his reducement If he loseth the favour of God and neglects hereupon all private communion with the Lord put that to thy account If at length he becomes impudent in sin so that like a Bedlam he feels not the pricks of sharp admonition put all this to your account because you have delayed to cure to heal to save the Soul of your Brother A timely reproof might have saved a Soul and covered a multitude of sins Besides have you time at your command that you with Faelix will do your duty at a more convenient season May'st not thou dye or the Offendor dye and both in sin thou in the sin of Omission and he in the sin of Commission unrepented of before the day comes wherein thou art resolved to tell him roundly of his fault Why art not thou trembling with fear of blood-guiltiness Is Soul-murther no sin with thee Or have you the Holy-Ghost at command Without the Holy Spirits a sistances and concourse your labour will be in vain you will get a blot by reproving the delinquent will flye in your face hate you for telling the truth he will add sin unto sin and perhaps put you into a flame too and must the Holy-Ghost dance attendance on you If you observe his hour you must go presently whilst the wound is fresh and bleeding but if you neglect his call it is a question whether your hour will be Gods Others miscarry in reproving Some reprove Or miscarrying in it not reproving privately Matth. 18.15 Prov. 10.12 Si solus nosti
our rising up early and sitting up late our spending our strength our lungs our spirits yea and our estates among you you have requited us evil for good even to the spoyling of our Souls Acts 7.51 52. Ye stiffe-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears ye do alwayes resist the Holy-Ghost as your Fathers did so do ye Which of the Prophets have not your Fathers persecuted c. Have not you in your hypocrisie made outcries against others for silencing your Ministers for taking away the bread out of yours and your Childrens mouths and for removing them from their stations and dwellings But may not I profess in the name of all my Fellow-Sufferers that your misimprovements your inconstancies your pride and earthliness have been and are our chiefest burdens a greater pressure to us than any burdens that lye upon our names bodies or estates I cannot but think of a passage of holy Mr. Shepheard The Jews saith he did long for Christ and when he came they Crucified him and you would have Ministers and you had them and though you did not immediately cast them out of their places yet you so wearied their Spirits and grieved the Spirit in them that you made them glad to bury themselves and leave their places you had Prophets and their teâ—â—s and their sorrows too yea and their blâ—â—d too and O! what a light matter was it teâ—â—s you to break their very hearts How little did you obey them that ruled over you Hebr. 13.17 and submitted your selves that they might give their account with joy and not with grief How little did you believe that that is unprofitable for you Have not you made nothing of it for your Ministers to lose their labour to put them upon crying out I have laboured in vain Isa 49.45 Yea how have you grieved their very Souls with reproaches Some who have pretended affection to them yet have had their reproachfull Names of Priest Parson Vicar c. Though God hath put a Crown of honour upon them by making them his Ambassadours yet how have some impudent Professours blasted them with their stinking breath and prosane scoffs Ambassadours are inviolable by the Laws of Nations The Lord saith one hath set a better mark on them than Cain had and given them a better pasport touch not mine anointed and do my Prophets no harm yet you have made a light matter of vexing their very Souls When you could have nothing else against your Minister have not you been censuring him for his manner of speaking 2 Cor. 10.10 His Letters say they are weighty and powerfull but his bodily presence is weak and his speech contemptible Lastly And being weary of them Have not your Ministers been so troublesome to you in your sins in your formality worldliness lukewarmness c. that you were even weary of them Have not you been as weary of them as the Children of Israel of Angels food as weary as weak somachs are of feeding on one dish Your Ministers urged flesh-displeasing and self-denying duties they would not suffer you to sin quietly and were not you therefore burthened with them they would not stand and comply with your carnal ends and sinfull interests and did not your hearts therefore cry out away with them Have not you been like the Gadarenes more willing to part with your Ministers than with your swinish lusts Rom. 1.28 Because you did not like to retain God in your knowledge 't is no wonder if God give up many of you to a reprobate mind Hath not the Gospel been too costly too chargeable to some of you and too irksome requiring too much pains taking to others of you O! when you Remember your crying iniquities for which God is chiefly contending with you forget not this dreadfull sinne of being weary of Gods Ambassadours of being weary of speaking with God and of hearing God speak unto your Souls CHAP. XXXIII Their misearriages with reference to the Ministers of Christ Professours miscarriages toward their Ministers since their removal Not finding the want of them Not esteeming the loss great enough since their removal 1. H How many of you do not find them wanting This will be evident by the following Queries Have you indeed accounted that none in the world want help like your selves upon this very account Do you look upon your selves as litting in darkness yea in the region and shadow of death under a worse Plague than the Egyptian-darkness that was a darkness wherein men lived but do you look on this as a darkness of death Do you account a Throne without the Gospel but the Devils Dungeon Wealth without the Gospel fuell for Hell Advancement without the Gospel but a going high to have the greater fall Do you look upon your selves as under a worse famine than that of bread Cannot you your selves make up this great loss cannot you set other things in the breach Do not some of you set good books in the room of your Ministers Going about to make it up by good books I confess saith a Reverend Man Reading hath its use but the voice hath a secret force upon the Soul it hath a Ministerial efficacy by which the Authority and Soveraign efficacy of the Spirit is conveyed I pray God the fruitfullness of the Press may not beget a dis-esteem and contempt of the great Ordinance of the Minister already you have been told already that Luther had rather his books should be burnt than the Scriptures suffer a dishonour and neglect by perusing his papers Do not some of you set your own parts and gifts in their room Their own parts and gifts Do not some of you think that you have so profited by their Ministry that you have no further need to attend upon any Ministers of Christ May not such doubt whether their experience of the power and efficacy of the Ministry hath been true seeing true experience thereof sweetneth the Ministry unto Souls raiseth up their esteems of it and engageth them to a further and more chearfull attendance upon it A true tast will sharpen the Souls appetite the true Christian gets a Stomach by eating as the new born babe by sucking 1 Pet. 2.2 3. As new born babes desire the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby if so be that ye have found that the Lord is gracious Do not some of you go about to make up your selves by attending on Christ's companions in the sense of Solomon And Christ's companions Cant. 1.7 by going to Wells without water by sucking empty breasts whence you can draw nothing but wind or blood what is this but seeking the living among the dead expecting gracious showers from Clouds without rain making up the want of bread with stones if not poyson O! why do not you say Tell me O thou whom my Soul loveth where thou feedest where thou makest thy Flocks to rest at Noon for why should I be as