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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A57573	A discourse concerning trouble of mind and the disease of melancholly in three parts : written for the use of such as are, or have been exercised by the same / by Timothy Rogers ... ; to which are annexed, some letters from several divines, relating to the same subject.	Rogers, Timothy, 1658-1728.	1691 (1691)	Wing R1848; ESTC R21503	284,310	522

Friends in mind of the Sovereign Grace of God in Jesus Christ often put them in mind that he is merciful and gracious that as far as the Heavens are above the Earth so far are his thoughts above their thoughts his thoughts of mercy and love above their self-condemning guilty thoughts Teach them as much as you can to look up to God by the Great Mediator for Grace and strength and not too much to pore on their own souls where there is so much darkness and unbelief And seek to divert them from puzling themselves too much with God's secret and unknown Decrees and strive to help them to believe in Christ which is their certain duty shew them what great sinners God has pardoned and how he is merciful because he will be merciful finding motives to help them from their very miseries and from his own gracious nature Thus I find they dealt with Mrs. Drake she would send to several Ministers to know concealing her name Whether such and such a Creature without Faith Hope Love to God or Man hard-hearted without natural affection who had rejected all means nor could submit to the same yet might have any hope to go to Heaven And they returned for Answer That such like and much worse though as bad as Manasseh might by the mercy of God be received into favour converted and saved which did much allay her trouble For said she the Fountain of all my misery hath been See her Life pag. 1●7 that I sought for that in the Law which I should have found in the Gospel and for that in my self which was only to be found in Christ This is what I thought necessary to say to you and you will find the course I have mentioned being taken with your Friends will do them no prejudice I do not speak only with borrowed expressions in this matter nor without some experience The mild and the gentle way of dealing I know very well you 'l find to be the best and the way of roughness and severity will but aggravate and increase their miseries And I desire you that are yet healthful and chearful to improve your health for if ever this distemper seize you you will be able to do nothing for your Souls or Bodies You may have time but such will be your anguish that you will not be able to do any thing to purpose in that time This Book has a peculiar Relation to the distresses of the mind for as to what concerns that bodily pain that I had with my inward trouble I have largely shewed what it was in my Practical Discourses on Sickness and Recovery that were published about a year ago And what a mercy it is to have our afflictions sanctified and to bear the yoak in our Youth I have explained in my Treatise of Early Religion lately published which is peculiarly designed for young people and if God bless it to their good it may help them to avoid those woful Terrors which many others have groaned under I think I could in the composing of the following Book have used a little more exactness had I set my self studiously to do so and by that means it might have been more pleasant to the Reader but not so well have served my design for according to that old saying Aeger non quaerit medicum Eloquentem sed sanantem A Physitian that can remove the disease is more welcome to the sick than one that can talk finely about it but do him no good and if the Cure be performed 't is no matter tho the potion was not extreamly sweetned I purposely avoided all pretence to a regular smoothness of stile because that the Ears of people in great affliction are not so tender and so delicate as theirs are who are in heaith I know that the Age in which we live is very curious and critical and that the English Language has been within a few years greatly polished and improved and Religion deserves the best words we can find wherewith to express our thoughts And in Eccles 12.10 't is said The Preacher sought out acceptable words by which I suppose he means words that were grateful as well as profitable I hope the Reader will mt find either Bombast or slovenliness in my expressions and if in them there is not as I do not pretend there is an accomplished beauty yet that at least they are not all deformity Whatever some persons may say I think it my duty to express my thoughts not altogether in a neglected and a careless manner so it be with plainness and clearness and such as may tend to edification Tho I have not in the following Book given such a particular relation of my Troubles as perhaps the Readers may expect yet I desire them to take notice that where ever I speak of inward distress as by a third person I there speak what I my self have felt It is an observation of the Readers of St. Cyprian that through all his Writings almost every word doth breathe Martyrdom his Expressions are full of spirit and passion as if he had writ them with his blood and conveyed the anguish of his sufferings into his Writings If I had had the judgment and the Pen of so Eloquent a person I might have much better described the sadness of my case but I am sure nothing in the world could fully express it it was so very terrible and the greatness of the danger does heighten the mercy of God my deliverer to whose Grace and wonderful Salvation I owe my present peace and hope to whom I will devote all my poor endeavours That those which I have used in the following Treatise may be serviceable to his Glory your advantage and the relief of your Melancholly Friends and many others as also to my own good is the prayer of Your Hearty Adviser TIMOTHY ROGERS London Sept. 10. 1691. The LETTERS that were sent from several Divines to the Author are these following LETTER I. From Matching-Hall in Essex Nov. 21. 1690. .................................... Sir I took the first opportunity to read your good Book and besides the many useful things which are there to be learned in detail the general scope and occasion of it did much affect me partly with gratitude partly with an awful fear with the former to consider how it might have been with me with the latter considering how it may be with me I see in what others suffer what I might have suffered and what am I that God should exempt me from the lot of others better than my self It is likely now it is over you may have cause to say That all the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth and the comforts that you have in the return of the morning after a night like theirs that live under the Poles may more than recompence all your sorrows and pains And God hath thereby fitted you to support and comfort others from your own experience yet it is a favour to

and down in a thick and foggy night and which lead the deceived Traveller into some Pit or Gulf but the Joys of God are like the brightness of a Summers day their clearness their comfortableness and their continuance render them worthy of our highest admiration The smiles of the World many times cover a designed mischief but the smiles of God are to make us happy Whether then shall we most prize the Fountain or the polluted Streams the rich Ocean or the smaller Brooks Why should we love the Creatures when we have a God to love Why should we doat upon a Bubble that every little Storm blows away and not embrace that Salvation that is offered and that is both suitable to our faculties and not liable to perish With Angels and with glorified Saints let us make God our all our portion and our hearts-desire for our great Creator is much more amiable than his own handy-work Let us leave the Men that know not God to fall down before their Idols of Clay and Dirt but let us with the highest reverence with the most cordial submission adore him from whose Favour we have life Let us leave them to dig in the Bowels of this Earth for a sordid happiness but let us arise and go hence Let us go and seek after God Let us go and seek till we find him and when we have found him let nothing in this World no pleasure no pain no promises no threats nor life nor death make us part with our dear God again Let us never cease to sigh and to long for him Let us never be weary of his work nor ever think that we call do too much for so good a Master Let us feast our selves with the chearful expectation of his Eternal Love and so take up the good resolution of the Church Cant. 4.6 Vntil the day breaks and the shadows flee away I will get me to the mountain of Myrrh and to the hill of Frankincense 6. That you may with more care seek and endeavour to obtain the Favour of God improve your experiences to this purpose Have you not found what a pleasant thing it is to be near to him to have access to his Throne and to see his Face And on the contrary Have you not known what a dismal and uncomfortable state it is to be without him And there are two sorts of Experiences that may be very seviceable to you in this great affair 1. Those Experiences that you have of all other things in common with the rest of Men Have you not found that the Promises and Friendships of this World have been very changeable Have you not embraced many a time a Cloud when you have promised your selves a real and a solid happiness Has the World given you that pleasant entertainment that cordial satisfaction that you proposed to your selves when you first let your minds run upon it Have you not a Thousand times called it a very vain World Have you not a Thousand times found it to be so Have you not prick'd your hands and vex'd your souls when you thought to have gathered the pleasant flower that you doated on Have you not seen that the most beautiful Rose is attended with a neighbouring Thorn Has it smelt so sweet and lasted so long as you once thought it would Has not all your Wine had some Wormwood and Gall mingled with it Has not every Comfort had a mixture of a Cross and where you hoped for the greatest pleasures have you not met with a sad allay of grief Have you not been eager and importunate and restless for this or that creature-good and when you have obtained it has it been so suitable so delightful so every way amiable as at a distance it did seem to be He must be a young Man indeed that hath not found this World to be a cheat and he must be a Fool that when he has been once cheated will suffer himself to be again impos'd upon A few years experience will make us all to say with the Wise Man That all is vanity and vexation of spirit and if we hope to extract more from it than so great an Observer of Nature as he did we shall be miserably deceived In our first and rash desires we flatter our selves with something here on Earth that is great and plausible and charming but in our more sedate and second thoughts we find that all that is under the Sun is but a shew and a meer appearance And when we find it to be so as a great many have already and all shall in a little time it becomes us to apply our selves to something that is more durable and satisfying and that is only the Favour and the Love of God 2. Improve not only your common but your Spiritual Experiences to this end and purpose I suppose there are a great many people here that have been under distress of soul and that in such distress have been brought very low Now What was it I pray you that gave you relief in so sad a Case Was it that you had many Friends and great Estates and a flourishing Trade and abundance of outward Accommodations I am sure you will answer No no none of these things gave us the least help Methinks I hear you saying We tried several methods for a Cure we tried several diversions and pleasures the Conversations of our Friends and whatever innocent Recreation it was that we thought might give us ease we heard Sermons we read good Books we enquired of our Ministers but we found them all to be Physicians of no value they did not open our Eyes nor heal our Wounds nor answer our Doubts nor refresh our tired and weary Souls till God himself was pleased to do it Nothing in all the World did avail us nor could all the means we used pull out the Sting that the sense of our guilt and condemnation pierced us with Abanah and Pharphar all the Rivers of Damascus and all the streams of sensual delights were not able to mitigate or quench our thirst All was desolation and terror and amazement till his Face was pleased to shine through the threatning cloud We lived in darkness and in the deepest sorrows till he became our light and joy we were sinking till he held us up and dying till he was pleased to revive us All the delight and mirth that ever the World gave us was but as a flash of Lightning to that clear and serene day that his Grace created in our hearts his Love did indeed mitigate our pains and remove our sores and one beam from him was as the dawn of Heaven He has fed us like John the Baptist with Honey in the Desert his Loving-kindness did indeed quench our thirst This I know is the sense of your Souls that have tasted how good the Lord is and having had so pleasant a relish of his Mercy I beseech you let not the remembrance of it wear away Oh! remember with delight