the party is right or wrong in the Discovery of these Wants I now meddle not Whether they Judge rightly or wrongly the Directions may be Usefull to them And though I purposely meddle not with the unhumbled that feel not the want of Christ and Mercy yet most that falls may be usefull to all that profess the Christian faith For I shall study so to avoid the extreames in my doctrinall Directions as may conduce to your escaping the desperate extremes of Vngrounded Comforts and Causless Terrours in your own spirit Of my Directions the first shall be only Generall and the rest more particular And in all of them I must intreat you 1. To observe the Order and Method as well as the Matter and that you would practise them in the same order as I place them 2. And to remember that it is not only Comfortable words but it is Directions for your own practice which here I prescribe you And therefore that it is not the bare Reading of them that will Cure you but if you mean to have the benefit of them you must bestow more time in Practising them then I have done in Penning them yea you must make it the work of your life And let not that startle you or seem tedious to you for it will be no more grievous a work to a well tempered soul then eating or drinking or sleep or recreation is to a healthfull Body and then it is to an honest woman to Love and Delight in her Husband and her Children which is no grievous task DIRECTION I. 1. Get as clear a discovery as you can of the true Cause of your Doubts and Troubles for if you should mistake in the Cause it would much frustrate the most excellent means for the Cure THe very same Doubts and Complaints may come from severall Causes in severall Persons and therefore admit not of the same way of Cure sometime the Cause begins in the body and thence proceedeth to the minde sometime it begins in the minde and thence distempereth the body sometime in the minde it is most or first from worldly crosses and thence proceedeth to spirituall things And of spirituall matters sometimes it begins upon scruples or differences in Religion or points of Doctrine sometimes and most commonly from the â—ense of our own Infirmities sometimes it is only from ordinary Infirmities sometimes from some extraordinary decayes of inward Grace sometime from the neglects of some weighty duty and sometimes from the deep wounds of some heynous secret or scandalous sin And sometimes it is meerly from the fresh discovery of that which before we never did discern And sometimes from the violent assault of extraordinary Temptations which of these is your own Case you must be carefull to finde out and to apply the means for Cure accordingly Even of true Christians the same means will not fit all The difference of Natures as well as of actuall Cases must be considered One hath need of that tender handling which would undo another and he again hath need of that rowsing which another cannot bear And therefore understand that when I have given you all the Directions that I can I must in the end hereof advise you to take the Counsel of a skilfull Minister in applying and making use of them For it is in this as in the Case of Physick When we have written the best Books of Receipts or for Methodicall Cures yet we must advise people to take heed how they use them without the advice of a learned and faithfull Physitian For Medicines must not be only fitted to Diseases but to Bodies That Medicine will kill one man which will cure another of the same distemper such difference there may be in their age strength complexion and other things So is it much in our present Case And therefore as when all the Physick Books in the world are written and all Receipts known yet will there be still a Necessity of Physitians so when all Discoveries and Directions are made in Divinity there will still be a Necessity of a constant standing Ministry And as ignorant Women and Emprikes do kill oft times more then they Cure though they have the best Receipts for want of Judgment and experience to use them aright so do ignorant Teachers and Guides by mens souls though they can say the same words as a Judicious Pastor and repeat the same Texts of Scripture Not that I mean that such can do no good Yes much no doubt if they will humbly compassionately and faithfully improve their Talents within the verge of their own Calling which if they go beyond ordinarily a remarkable Judgment followeth their best labours both to the Churches and particular souls that make use of them And therefore because if my conjectural prognisticks fail not as I daily pray they may we are like to be more tried and plagued this way then ever were any of our fore-fathers since Adams dayes till now and seeing this is the hour of our Temptation wherein God is purposely separating the chaff and discovering to the world the dangers of injudicious misguided Zeal I shall therefore both first and last advise you as ever you would have a setled Peace of Conscience keep out of the hand of vagrant and seducing Mountebanks under what Names or Titles or pretences soever they may assault you Especially suspect all that bestow as much pains to win you to their party as to win you to Christ DIRECTION II. 2. Make as full a Discovery as you can how much of the trouble of your minde doth arise from your Melancholy and bodily distempers and how much from discontenting afflictions in your worldly Estate or Friends or Name And according to your Discovery make use of the Remedy I Put these two Causes of trouble here together in the beginning because I will presently dismiss them and apply the rest of these Directions only to those Troubles that are raised from sins and wants in Grace 1. For Melancholy I have by long experience found it to have so great and common a hand in the fears and troubles of minde that I meet not with one of many that live in great Troubles and fears for any long time together but Melancholy is the main seat of them Though they feel nothing in their body but all in their Minde I would have such persons make use of some able godly Phisitian and he will help them to discern how much of their Trouble comes from Melancholy Where this is the Cause usually the party is Fearfull of almost every thing a word or a sudden thought will disquiet them Sometime they are sad and scarce know why all Comforts are of no continuance with them but as soon as you have done comforting them they be never so well satisfied yet the trouble returns in a few dayes or hours as soon as the dark and troubled spirits return to their former force They are still addicted to musing and solitariness and thoughts will
run in their mindes that they cannot lay them by If it go any thing farre they are almost alwayes assaulted with Temptations to Blasphemy to doubt whether there be a God or a Christ or the Scriptures be true or whether there be a Heaven or a Hell and oft tempted to speak some blasphemous words against God and this with such importunity that they can hardly forbear and oft times they are tempted to make away themselves When it goes so farre they are next to the loss of the use of reason if it be not prevented Now to those that finde that Melancholy is the Cause of their Troubles I would give this advice 1. Expect not that Rational Spiritual Remedies should suffice for this Cure For you may as well expect that a good Sermon or comfortable words should cure the falling Sickness or Palsie or a broken head as to be a sufficient Cure to your Melancholy fears For this is as reall a bodily disease as the other Only because it works on the spirits and phantasie on which words of advice do also work therefore such words and Scripture and Reason may somewhat resist it and may palliate or allay some of the effects at the present but as soon as time hath worn off the force and effects of these Reasons the distemper presently returns For the Humour hath the advantage 1. Of continuall presence 2. Of a more necessary naturall and sensible way of working As if a man be in an easie Lethargy you may awake him so long as you are calling on him aloud but as soon as you cease he is asleep again Such is the case of the Melancholy in their sorrows For it is as natural for Melancholy to cause fears and disquietness of minde as for Phlegme in a Lethargy to cause sleep Do not therefore lay the blame on your Books Friends Counsels Instructions no nor all on your Soul if these Troubles be not cured by words But labour to discern truly how much of your Trouble comes this way and then fix it in your minde in all your Enquiries Reading and Hearing that it is the other part of your Trouble which is truly Rational and not this part of it which is from Melancholy that these means were ordained to remove though God may also bless them extraordinarily to do both Only constant importunate Prayer is a fit and special means for the Curing of all 2. When you have truly found out how much of your Disquietness proceeds from Melancholy acquit your soul from that part of it Still remember in all your self-examinations self-judgings and reflections on your heart that it is not directly to be charged with those sorrowes that come from your Spleen save only remotely as all other Diseases are the fruits of sin as a Lethargick dullness is the deserved fruit of sin but he that should charge it immediatly on his soul should wrong himself and he that would attempt the Cure must do it on the Body 3. If you would have these fears and troubles removed apply your self to the proper Cure of Melancholy 1. Avoid all passions of sorrow fear and anger as much as you can and all occasions of discontent and grief 2. Avoid much solitariness and be most commonly in some cheerfull company Not that I would have you do as the foolish sinners of the world do to drink away Melancholy and keep company with sensual vain and unprofitable persons that will draw you deeper into sin and so make your wound greater instead of healing it and multiply your Troubles when you are forced to look back on your sinfull loss of time But keep company with the more cheerfull sort of the Godly There 's no mirth like the mirth of Believers which faith doth fetch from the bloud of Christ and from the Promises of the Word and from experiences of Mercy and from the serious fore-apprehensions of our everlasting Blessedness Converse with men of strongest faith that have this heavenly mirth and can speak experimentally of the Joy of the holy Ghost and these will be a great help to the reviving of your spirit and changing your Melancholy habit so far as without out a Physitian it may be expected Yet sometimes it may not be amiss to confer with some that are in your own Case that you may see that your Condition is not singular For Melancholy people in such distresses are ready to think that never any was in the Case as they are in or at least never any that were truly godly when you hear people of the most upright lives and that truly fear God to have the very same complaints as you have your self it may give you some hopes that it is not so bad as you before did imagin However be sure that you avoid solitariness as much as you well can 3. Also take heed of too deep fixed musing thoughts studying and serious meditating be not duties for the deeply-Melancholy as I shall shew more in the following Directions You must let those alone till you are better able to perform them lest by attempting those duties which you cannot perform you shall utterly disable your self from all Therefore I would advise you by all means to shake and rowse your self out of such musings and suddenly to turn your thoughts away to something else 4. To this end be sure that you avoid Idleness and want of imployment which as it is a life not pleasing to God so is it the opportunity for Melancholy thoughts to be working and the chiefest season for Satan to tempt you Never let the Devil finde you unimployed but see that you go cheerfully about the works of your Calling and follow it with diligence and that time which you redeem for spiritual exercises let it be most spent in Thanksgiving and Prayses and heavenly Conference These things may do much for prevention and abating your disease if it be not gone too far but if it be you were best have recourse to the Physitian and expect Gods blessing in the use of means and you will finde when your Body is once cured the disquietness of your Minde will vanish of it self 2. The second part of this Direction was That you take notice how much of your disquietness may proceed from outward Crosses for it is ordinary for these to lye at the root and bring the heart into a disquiet and discontent and then trouble for sin doth follow after Alas how oft have I seen that verified of the Apostle 2 Cor. 7.10 The sorrow of the world worketh death How many even godly people have I known that through crosses in children or friends or losses in their estates or wrongs from men or perplexities that through some unadvisedness they were cast into or the like have fallen into mortall Diseases or into such a fixed Melancholy that some of them have gone besides themselves and others have lived in fears and doubting ever after by the removall of the disquietness to their consciences How
sad a thing is it that we should thus add to our own Afflictions and the heavier we judge the burden the more we lay on As if God had not done enough or would not sufficiently afflict us We may more comfortably bear that which God layeth on us then that which we immediately lay upon our selves Crosses are not great or small according to the bulk of the matter but according chiefly to the minde of the sufferer Or else how could holy men rejoyce in Tribulation and be exceeding glad that they are accounted worthy to suffer for Christ Reproaches wrongs losses are all without you unless you open them the door wilfully your self they cannot come in to the heart God hath not put the Joy or Grief of your Heart in any other mans power but in your own It is you therefore that do your selves the greatest mischief God afflicts your body or men wrong you in your state of name a small hurt if it go on further and therefore you will afflict your soul But a sadder thing yet is it to consider of that men fearing God should so highly value the things of the world They who in their Convenants with Christ are engaged to renounce the world the flesh and the devil They that have taken God in Christ for their Portion for their All and have resigned themselves and all that they have to Christs dispose whose very business in this world and their Christian life consisteth so much in resisting the devil mortifying the flesh and overcoming the world and it is Gods business in his inward works of Grace and his outward teachings and sharp afflictions and examples of others to convince them of the vanity and vexation of the world and throughly to wean them from it And yet that it should be so high in their estimation and sit so close to their hearts that they cannot bear the loss of it without such discontent disquiet and distraction of minde Yea though when all is gone they have their God left them they have their Christ still whom they took for their Treasure they have opportunities for their souls they have the sure promise of Glory yea and a promise that all things shall work together for their good yea and for that one thing that is taken from them they have yet a hundred outward Mercies remaining that yet even Believers should have so much unbelief and have their Faith to seek when they should use it and live by it and that God should seem so small in their eyes as not to satisfie or quit them unless they have the world with him and that the world should still seem so Amiable when God hath done so much to bring it into contempt Truly this and more shews that the work of Mortification is very imperfect in professors and that we bend not the force of our daily strivings and endeavours that way If Christians did bestow but as much time and pains in Mortifying the flesh and getting down the Interest of it in the soul that Christs Interest may be advanced as they do about Controversies external duties formalities tasks of devotion and self tormenting fears O what excellent Christians should we then be and how happily would most of our disquiet be removed Alas if we are so unfit to part with one outward comfort now upon the disposal of our fathers providence how should we forsake all for Christ or what shall we do at death when all must be parted with As ever therefore you would live in true Christian Peace set more by Christ and less by the world and all things in it and hold all that you possess so loosely that it may not be grievous to you when you must leave them So much for the Troubles that arise from your Body and outward state All the rest shall be directed for the Curing of those Troubles that arise immediatly from more Spiritual Causes DIRECTION III. 3. Be sure that you first lay sound apprehensions of Gods nature in your understanding and lay them deeply THis is the first Article of your Creed and the first part of Life Eternal to know God! His substance is quite past humane understanding therefore never make any attempt to reach the knowledge of it or to have any positive conceivings of it for they will be all but Idols or false conceptions but his Attributes are manifested to our understandings Well consider that even under the terrible Law when God proclaims to Moses his own Name and therein his Nature Exod. 34.6 7. the first and greatest part is The Lord God Mercifull and Gracious long suffering and abundant in Goodness and Truth keeping mercy for thousands forgiving iniquity transgression and sin And he hath sworn that he hath no pleasure in the death of a sinner but rather that he return and live Think not therefore of Gods Mercifulness with diminishing extenuating thoughts nor limit it by the bounds of our frail understandings for the heavens are not so far above the earth as his thoughts and wayes are above ours Still remember that you must have no low thoughts of Gods Goodness but apprehend it as bearing proportion with his Power As it is blasphemy to limit his Power so it is to limit his Goodness The advantages that your soul will get by this right knowledge and estimation of Gods Goodness will be these 1. This will make God appear more Amiable in your eyes and then you will Love him more readily and abundantly And Love 1. Is effectually consolatory in the very working so much Love usually so much Comfort I mean this Love of Complacency for a Love of Desire there may be without comfort 2. It will breed perswasions of Gods Love to you again and so Comfort 3. It will be an unquestionable evidence of true Grace and so Comfort The Affections follow the Understandings conceptions If you think of God as one that is glad of all advantages against you and delighteth in his Creatures misery it is impossible you should Love him The Love of our selves is so deeply rooted in nature that we cannot lay it by nor Love any thing that is Absolutely and directly against us We conceive of the devil as an Absolute Enemy to God and man and one that seeks our destruction and therefore we cannot Love him And the great Cause why troubled souls do Love God no more is because they represent him to themselves in an ugly odious shape To think of God as one that seeks and delighteth in mans ruine is to make him as the devil and then what wonder if in stead of Loving him and Delighting in him you tremble at the thoughts of him and fly from him As I have observed Children when they have seen the devil painted on a wall in an ugly shape they have partly feared and partly hated it If you do so by God in your fancy it is not putting the Name of God on him when you have done that will reconcile your Affections
harden their hearts or stiffen their necks and you will finde that the most usual meaning of the Holy Ghost is this They were an intractable disobedient obstinate people or as the Greek word in the New Testament signifieth which we often translate Vnbelieving they were an Vnperswadable people no saying would serve them They set light by Gods Commands Promises and severest Threatnings and Judgements themselves nothing would move them to forsake their sins and obey the voyce of God You shall finde that hardness of heart is seldom put for want of tears or a melting weeping disposition and never at all for the want of such tears where the will is tractable and obedient I pray you examine your self then according to this Rule God offereth his Love in Christ and Christ with all his benefits to you Are you willing to Accept them He commandeth you to worship him and use his ordinances and Love his people and others and to forsake your known Iniquities so far that they may not have dominion over you Are you Willing to this He commandeth you to take him for your God and Christ for your Redeemer and stick to him for better and worse and never forsake him Are you willing to do this If you have a stiff Rebellious heart and will not Accept of Christ and Grace and will rather let go Christ then the world and will not be perswaded from your known iniquities but are loth to leave them and love not to be reformed and will not set upon those duties as you are able which God requireth and you are fully convinced of then are you Hard-hearted in the Scripture sense But if you are glad to have Christ with all your heart upon the terms that he is offered to you in the Gospel and you do walk-daily in the way of duty as you can and are willing to Pray and willing to hear and wait on God in his Ordinances and willing to have all Gods Graces formed within you and willing to let go your profitablest and sweetest sins and it is your daily desires O that I could seek God and do his will more faithfully zealously and pleasingly then I do O that I were rid of this body of sin these carnal corrupt and worldly inclinations and that I were as holy as the best of Gods Saints on earth And if when it comes to practise whether you should obey or no though some unwillingness to duty and willingness to sin be in you you are offended at it and the greater bent of your Will is for God and it is but the lesser which is towards sin and therefore the world and flesh do not lead you captive and you live not wilfully in avoidable sins nor at all in gross sin I say if it be thus with you then you have the Blessing of a soft heart a heart of flesh a new heart for it is a Willing obedient tractable heart opposed to obstinacy in sin which Scripture calleth a soft heart And then for the Passionate part which consisteth in lively feelings of sin misery mercy c. and in weeping for sin I shall say but this 1. Many an unsanctified person hath very much of it which yet are desperately Hard-hearted sinners It dependeth far more on the temper of the body then of the Grace in the soul Women usually can weep easily and yet not all and children and old men Some complexions encline to it and others not Many can weep at a Passion-Sermon or any moving duty and yet will not be perswaded to obedience these are hard-hearted sinners for all their tears 2. Many a tender godly person cannot weep for sin partly through the temper of their minds which are more judicious and solid and less passionate but mostly from the temper of their bodies which dispose them not that way 3. Deepest sorrows seldom cause tears but deep thoughts of heart as greatest joys seldom cause laughter but inward pleasure I 'le tell you how you shall know whose heart is truly sorrowful for sin and tender He that would be at the greatest cost or pains to be rid of sin or that he had not sinned You cannot weep for sin but you would give all that you have to be rid of sin you could wish when you dishonoured God by sin that you had spent that time in suffering rather and if it were to do again on the same terms and inducements you would not do it Nay you would live a beggar condtendedly so you might fully please God and never sin against him and are content to pinch your flesh and deny your worldly interest for the time to come rather then wilfully disobey This is a truly tender heart On the other side another can weep to think of his sin and yet if you should ask him what wouldst thou give or what wouldst thou suffer so thou hadst not sinned or that thou mightest sin no more Alas very little For the next time that he is put to it he will rather venture on the sin then venture on a little loss or danger or disgrace in the world or deny his craving flesh its pleasures This is a hard-hearted sinner The more you would part with to be rid of sin or the greater cost you would be at for that end the more Repentance have you and true tenderness of heart Alas if men should go to Heaven according to their weeping what abundance of children and women would be there for one man I 'le speak truly my own Case This doubt lay heavy many a year on my own soul when yet I would have given all that I had to be rid of sin but I could not weep a tear for it Nor could I weep for the death of my dearest friends when yet I would have bought their lives had it been Gods will at a dearer rate then many that could weep for them ten times as much And now since my nature is decayed and my body languisheth in consuming weakness and my head more moistned and my veins filled with flegmatick watry blood now I can weep and yet I find never the more tender-heartedness in my self then before And yet to this day so much remains of my old disposition that I could wring all the money out of my purse easier then one tear out of my eyes to save a friend or rescue them from evil when I see divers that can weep for a dead friend that would have been at no great cost to save their lives 5. Besides as Dr. Sibs saith There is oft sorrow for sin in us when it doth not appear It wanteth but some quickening word to set it afoot It is the nature of Grief to break out into tears most when sorrow hath some vent either when we use some expostulating aggravating terms with our selves or when we are opening our hearts and case to a friend then sorrow will often shew it self that did not before 6. Yet do I not deny but that our want of Tears and
you would you stand asking first How shall I know that it is mine or rather Take and Eat it when you are sure it may be yours if you will Let me intreat you therefore when the devil clamours in your ears Christ and Salvation is none of thine suppose that this voice of God in the Gospel were still in your ears yea let it be still in your memory O Take Christ and Life in him that thou maist be saved still think that you hear Paul following you with these words We are Embassadors for Christ as though God did beseech you by us we pray you in Christs stead be Reconciled to God Will you but remember this when you are on your knees in sorrow and when you would fain have Christ and Life and you are afraid that God will not give them to you I say Remember then God stands by Beseeching you to Accept the same thing which you are Beseeching him to give God is the first suitor and solicitor God Prayes you to Take Christ and you Pray him to give you Christ what have you now to do but to Take him And here understand that this Taking is no Impossible business it is no more but your hearty Consenting as I shall tell you more anon If you did but well understand and consider that Beleeving is the great Duty that God calls you to perform and promiseth to save you if you do truly perform it and that this Beleeving is to Take or Consent to have the same Mercy which you pray for and are troubled for fear least you shall misse of it even Christ and life in him this would presently draw forth your Consent and that in so open and express a way as you could not but discover it and have the comfort of it Remember this then That your first work is to Beleeve or Accept an offered Saviour 2. You must learn as I told you to Receive the Comforts of Universal or General Grace before you search after the Comforts of Special Grace I here suppose you so far sound in the doctrine of the Gospel as neither with some on one hand to look so much at Special Grace as to deny that General Grace which is the Ground of it or presupposed to it nor with others so far to look at universal Mercy as to deny Special Satan will tell you that all your Duties have been done in hypocrisie and you are unsound at the heart and have not a drop of saving Grace You are apt to entertain this and conclude that all this is true If I had any Grace I should have more Life and Love and Delight in God more tenderness of heart more growth in Grace I should not carry about such a Rock in my breast such a stupid dull insensible soul c. At the present let us suppose that all this be true yet see what a world of Comfort you may gather from Universal or General Mercy I have before opened to you four parts of it in the Cause of your Happiness and three in the Effect which may each of them afford much relief to your troubled soul 1. Suppose you are yet Graceless is it nothing to you that it is a God of Infinite Mercy that you have to do with whose Compassions are ten thousand times greater then your dearest friends or your own husbands Object O but yet he will not save the Graceless Answ True but he is the more ready to give Grace that you may be saved If any of you mark any of you do lack wisdome let him ask it of God who giveth to all men liberally without desert and upbraideth not with our unworthiness or former faults and it shall be given him Jam. 1.4 If you that are evil can give good gifts to your children how much more shall your heavenly Father give his holy Spirit to them that ask it Luk. 11.13 Suppose your life were in the hands of your own husband or your childrens life in your hands would it not exceedingly comfort you or them to consider whose hands they are in though yet you had no further Assurance how you should be used It may be you will say But God is no Father to the Graceless I answer He is not their Father in so neer and strict a sense as he is the Father of Beleevers but yet a Father he is even to the wicked and to convince men of his Fatherly Mercy to them he often so stileth himself He saith by Moses Deut. 32.6 to a wicked generation whose spot was not the spot of his children Do ye thus requite the Lord O foolish people and unwise Is not he thy Father that bought thee hath he not made thee and established thee And the Prodigall could call him Father for his encouragement before he returned to him Luk. 15.16 17 18. For my own part I must needs profess that my soul hath more frequent support from the consideration of Gods Gracious and Merciful nature then from the Promise it self 2. Furthermore Suppose you were Graceless at the present yet is it not an exceeding Comfort that there is one of such Infinite Compassions as the Lord Christ who hath assumed our Nature and is come down to seek and save that which was lost and is more tender hearted to poor sinners then we can possibly conceive yea who hath made it his Office to Heal and Relieve and Restore and Reconcile Yea that hath himself endured such temptations as many of ours For we have not an high-Priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities but was in all points tempted like as we are without sin Let us therefore saith the holy Ghost come boldly unto the throne of Grace that we may obtain Mercy and finde Grace to help in time of need Heb. 4.15 16. Forasmuch as the children were partakers of flesh and bloud he also himself likewise took part with them that he might destroy through death him that had the power of death that is the devil and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage For verily he took not on him the nature of Angels but he took on him the seed of Abraham Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his Brethren that he might be a Merciful and faithful high-Priest in things pertaining to God to make Reconciliation for the sins of the people For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted he is able to succour them that are tempted Heb. 2.14 15 16 17 18. Have you discountenance from men Christ had much more Doth God seem to forsake you so he did by Christ Are you fain to lye on your knees crying for Mercy why Christ in the days of his flesh was fain to offer up strong cryes and tears to him that was able to save him and was heard in that he feared It seems that Christ had distressing fears as well as you though not sinful fears Have you horrid
disposeth helps or hinders the minde Let us hear one man reason the Case and we think he makes all as clear as the Light Let us hear another solve all his Arguments and dispute for the contrary and then we see that our Apprehensions were abused Let us hear him Reply and confute all again and confirm his Cause and then we think him in the right again Nothing more changeable then the conceivings and minde of man till he be throughly Resolved and Habituated Now in this Case how shall those that have but little Grace be able to discern it It will not keep the minde from fluctuating If they seem Resolved for obedience to Christ to day to morrow they are so shaken by some enticing object and force of the same temptation that their Resolution is undiscernable nay actually they prefer sin at that time before obedience It is impossible then but the soul should stagger and be at a loss for it will judge of it self as it findes it self and it cannot discern the Habitual Prevalency of Christs Interest when they feel the Actual Prevalency of the fleshes Interest For the Act is the only discoverer of the Habit And if Peter himself should then have fallen to the examination of his heart Whether he Preferred Christ before his Life at the same time when he was denying and forswearing Christ to save his Life do you think he could have discerned it and yet even then Christs Interest was greatest in him Habitually If David should have gone to search whether he preferred obedience to God before his fleshly pleasure when he was committing Adultery or before his credit when he was plotting the death of Vriah what discovery do you think he would have made 7. Add to all these that as these severall distempers were they but in the same measure in a weak Christian as they are in the best or in most would yet make the smallest measure of Grace undiscernable if we might suppose the smallest Grace to be consistent with such a frame so it is certain that whoever he be that hath the least measure of Grace to discover in himself he hath proportionably the least measure of abilities and helps to discover it and the greatest measure of all the forementioned hinderances He that hath but a very little Repentance Faith Love and Obedience sincere when he goeth to finde it out he hath in the same measure a Darker Understanding to discern it then others have and a greater strangeness and disacquaintance with himself and more deceitfulness in his heart and a greater confusion and hurlyburly in his thoughts and Affections and all more out of order and to seek Also he hath a greater backwardness to the work of self-examination and can hardly get his heart to it and more hardly to do it throughly and search to the quick and most hardly to hold on against all withdrawing temptations till he have made a clearer discovery And lastly his soul is more mutable then stronger Christians are and therefore when cross Actings are so frequent he cannot discern the smallest prevailing Habit. If when you are weighing Gold the scales be turned but with one grain every little jogge or winde or unsteadfast holding will actually lift up the heavier end and its preponderation is with great wavering and mobility 8. Yet further Consider those that have least Grace have most sin habitual and actual and they are so frequent in transgressing that their failings are still in their eye and thereby the prevalency of Christs interest is made more doubtfull and obscure For when he asketh his own conscience Do I will or love most the world and my fleshly delights or Christ and his wayes presently conscience remembreth him at such a time and such a time thou didst choose thy fleshly pleasures profits or credit and refuse obedience and it is so oft and so foully that the soul is utterly at a loss and cannot discern the Habitual prevalent bent and Resolution of the Will 9. Besides Conscience is a Judge in mans soul and will be Accusing and condemning men so far as they are guilty now they that make work for the most frequent and terrible Accusations of Conscience that will stand with true Grace are unlikely to have Assurance For Assurance quiets the soul and easeth it and a galled Conscience works the contrary way They that keep open the wound and daily fret off the skin more and are still grating on the galled part are unlikely to have Assurance 10. Again These weakest Christians being least in Duty and most in sinning of any in whom sin reigneth not they are consequently most in provoking and displeasing God And they that do so shall finde that God will shew them his displeasure and will displease them again They must not look to enjoy Assurance or see the Pleased face of God till they are more carefull to please him and are more sparing and seldom in offending him As Gods universal Justice in Governing the world will make as great a difference between the sincerely Obedient and Disobedient as there is between Heaven and Hell so Godâ— Paternal Justice in Governing his family will make as wide a difference between the more Obedient children and the less Obedient as is between his dreadfull frowns and his joyous reviving smiles or between his smarting Rod or his encouraging Rewards 11. If God should give Assurance and Peace to the sinning and least obedient believers he should not fit his providential disposals to their good It is not that which their state requires nor would it tend to their Cure any more then a healing Plaister to a sore that is rotten in the bottom or a Cordial to the removall of a cacochymy or the purging out of corrupt redundant humours They are so inclined to the Lethargy of security that they have need of continual pinching striking or loud calling-on to keep them waking still remember that by this weak Christian I mean not every doubting distressed soul that is weak in their own apprehension and little in their own eyes and poor in spirit but I mean those that have the least measure of sincere Love to Christ and desire after him and tenderness of conscience and care to please God and the greatest measure of security worldliness pride flesh-pleasing and boldness in sinning which is consistent with sincerity in the faith I believe there is no father or mother that hath children to govern but they know by experience that â—here is a necessity of frowns and rods for the more disobedient and that rewards and smiles are no cure for stubbornness or contempt 12. Lastly Do but well consider what a solaâ—cisme in Government it would be and what desperate inconveniences it would have brought into the world if God should but have set such a punctual land-mark between his Kingdom and the Kingdom of Satan as we are ready to dream of If God should have said in his Word just so oft a man may
be drunk or may murder or commit adultery or steal or forswear himself and yet be a true Christian and be saved Or just so far a man may go in neglecting duty to God and man and in cherishing his flesh hiding his sin c. and yet be a true Believer and be saved This would 1. Embolden men in sinning and make them think I may yet venture for I stand on safe ground 2. And it would hinder Repentance Indeed it would be the way to rob God of his honour and multiply provocations against him and keep his children in disobedience and hinder their growth in holiness and cause a deformity in Christs body and a shame to his Religion and sacred name As for those that say Assurance never encourageth men in sin but tends to destroy it I answer It is true of Gods Assurance seasonably given to those that are fit for it and used by them accordingly But if God should have told all the world just how far they may sin and yet be certain of salvation this would have bred Assurance in those that were unfit for it and it would have been but the putting of new wine into old crackt bottles or a new piece into an old garment that would break them or make worse the rent I must therefore freely tell these objectors I am sorry that so many of my old acquaintance now harp so much on this Antinomian string that ignorance or error hath so blinded them that they have forgotten or know not 1. What an imperfect piece the best is in this life much more the worst true Christian 2. Nor what a subtil Devil we have to tempt us 3. Nor what an active thing corruption is and what advantage it will take on unseasonable Assurance 4. Nor what the nature of Grace and Sanctification is and how much of it lies in a godly jealousie of our selves and apprehension of our danger and that the fear of God is the beginning of wisedom See Heb. 4.1 Nay 5. They have forgotten what a man is and how inseparable from his nature is the Principle of self-preservation and how necessary the apprehension of danger and the fear of evil to himself is to the avoiding of that evil and so to his preservation 8. Yea if they knew but what a Commonwealth or a family is they would know that fear of evil and desire of self-preservation is the very motive to Associations and the groundwork of all Laws and Government and a great part of the life of all Obedience And thus I have fully proved to you That the smallest measure of Grace cannot help men to Assurance in Gods ordinary way Perhaps you will say What comfort is there in this to a poor weak Christian This is rather the way to put him quite out of heart and hope I answer No such matter I shall shew you the uses of this observation in the following Directions In the mean time I will say but this The expectations of unseasonable Assurance and out of Gods way is a very great cause of keeping many in languishing and distress and of causing others to turn Antinomians and snatch at comforts which God never gave them and to feign and frame an Assurance of their own making or build upon the delusions of the great Deceiver transforming himself into an Angel of Light DIRECTION XIII 13. From the last mentioned Observation there is one plain Consectary arising which I think you may do well to note by the way viz. That According to Gods ordinary way of giving Grace it cannot be expected that Christians should be able to know the very time of their first receiving or acting true saving Grace or just when they were Pardoned Justified Adopted and put into a state of Salvation THis must needs be undeniable if you grant the former Point That the least measure of Grace yieldeth not Assurance of its sincerity which is proved and withall if you grant this plain truth That it is Gods ordinary way to give a small measure of Grace at the first This I prove thus 1. Christ likeneth Gods Kingdom of Grace to a grain of mustard seed which is at first the least of all seeds but after cometh to a tree And to a little leaven which leaveneth the whole lump I will not deny but this may be applied to the visible progress of the Gospel and increase of the Church but it is plainly appliable also to the Kingdom of Christ within us 2. The Scripture oft calleth such young beginners Babes Children Novices c. 3. We are all commanded still to grow in Grace which implieth that we have our smallest measure at the first 4. Heb. 5.12 sheweth that strength of Grace should be according to time and means 5. Common experience is an invincible argument for this Men are at a distance from Christ when he first calleth them to come to him and many steps they have Toward him before they reach To him We are first so far enlightned as to see our sin and misery and the meaning and truth of the Gospel and so rowsed out of our security and made to look about us and see that we have souls to save or lose and that it is no jesting matter to be a Christian and so we come to understand the tenour of the Covenant and Christs termes of saving men But alas how long is it usually after this before we come sincerely to yield to his termes and take him as he is offered and Renounce the World Flesh and the Devil and Give up our selves to him in a faithfull Covenant We are long deliberating before we can get our backward hearts to Resolve How then should a man know just when he was past the highest step of common or preparative Grace and arived at the first step of special Grace Yet mark that I here speak only of Gods ordinary way of giving Grace For I doubt not but in some God may give a higher Degree of Grace at the first day of their conversion then some others do attain in many years And those may know the time of their true Conversion both because the effect was so discernable and because the suddenness makes the change more sensible and observable But this is not the ordinary course Ordinarily Convictions lye long on the soul before they come to a true Conversion Conscience is wounded and smarting long and long grudging against our sinfull and negligent courses and telling us of the Necessity of Christ and a holy life before we sincerely obey Conscience and give up our selves to Christ We seldom yield to the first conviction or perswasion The Flesh hath usually too long time given it to plead its own Cause and to say to the Soul Wilt thou forsake all thy pleasure and merry company and courses Wilt thou beggar thy self or make thy self a scorn and mocking stock to the world Art thou ever able to hold out in so strict a course and to be undone and to
you would draw a block through the water but as men that must hold fast and be commanded and threatned to that end and therefore when they lose their hold it is the fear of drowning which they felt themselves near which shall cause them to hold faster the next time and this must needs be the fear of a possible danger And for those that perish they have none to blame but themselves They perish not for want of a Saviour but because they would not lay hold on him and follow him through the tempests and waves of trial Nor can they quarrel with him because he did more for others and did not as much for them as long as he offered them so sufficient help that only their own wilfull refusal was their ruine and their perdition was of themselves I conclude therefore That seeing our Salvation is laid by God upon our faithfull obedient holding fast to Christ through all trials and difficulties and our holy fear is the means of that holding fast Christ being still the principal cause of our safety therefore never look for such a Certainty of Salvation as shall put you above such fears and moderated apprehensions of danger For then it s ten to one you will lose your hold You read in Scripture very many warnings to take heed least we fall and threatnings to those that do fall away and draw back What are all these for but to excite in us those moderate fears and cares and holy diligence which may prevent our falling away And remember this that there can be no such holy fears and cares and diligence where there is no danger or possibility of falling away for there can be no Act without its proper Object And the Object of fear is A possible hurt at least in the apprehension of him that feareth it No man can fear that evil which he knoweth to be Impossible DIRECTION XXI 21. The next advice which I must give you is this Be thankfull if you can but reach to a setled Peace and composure of your minde and lay not too much on the high raptures and feelings of comfort which some do possess And if ever you enjoy such feeling Joyes expect not that they should be either long or often IT is the cause of miserable languishing to many a poor soul to have such importunate expectations of such passionate Joyes that they think without these they have no true comfort at all no witness of the Spirit no Spirit of Adoption no joy in the holy Ghost Some think that others have much of this though they have not and therefore 〈…〉 themselves because it is no◠〈…〉 as with others when alas they little 〈◊〉 how it goes with others Some 〈…〉 raptures sometimes themselves and therefore when they are gone they think they are forsaken and that all grace or peace at least is gone with them Take heed of these expectations And to satisfie you let me tell you these two or three things 1. A setled calm and peace of soul is a great Mercy and not to be undervalued and looked at as Nothing 2. The highest raptures and passionate feeling joyes are usually of most doubtfull sincerity Not that I would have any suspect the sincerity of them without cause but such passions are not so certain signes of Grace as the setled frame of the understanding and will nor can we so easily know that they are of the Spirit and they are liable to more questioning and have in them a greater Possibility of deceit Doubtless it is very much that Phantasie and Melancholy and specially a natural weakness and moveable temper will do in such cases Mark whether it be not mostly these three sorts of people that have or pretend to have such extraordinary raptures and feelings of joy 1. Women and others that are most passionate 2. Melancholy People 3. Men that by erroneous opinions have lost almost all their understandings in their phantasies and live like men in a continual dream Yet I doubt not but solid men have oft high joyes and more we might all have if we did our duty And I would have no Christian content himself with a dull quietness of spirit but by all means possible to be much in labouring to rejoyce in God and raising their souls to heavenly delights O what lives do we lose which we might enjoy But my meaning is this Look at these joyes and delights as Duties and as Mercies but look not at them as Marks of trial so as to place more necessity in them then God hath done or to think them to be ordinary things If you do but feel such an high estimation of Christ and Heaven that you would not leave him for all the world take this for your surest Signe And if you have but so much Probability or Hope of your interest in him that you can think of God as one that loveth you and can be thankfull to Christ for Redeeming you and are gladder in these hopes of your interest in Christ and Glory then if you were owner of all the world take this for a happy Mercy and a high Consolation Yet I mean not that your joy in Christ will be alwaies so sensible as for worldly things but it will be more rational solid and deeper at the Heart And that you may know by this You would not for all the Pleasures Honours or Profits in the world be in the same case as once you were supposing that you were converted since you had the use of Reason and Memory or at least as you see the ungodly world still lye in 3. And let me adde this Commonly those that have the highest passionate joyes have the saddest lives for they have with all the most passionate fears and sorrows Mark it whether you finde not this prove true And it is partly from Gods will in his dispensations partly from their own necessities who after their exaltations do usually need a prick in the flesh and a messenger of Satan to buffet them lest they be exalted above measure and partly and most commonly it is from the temperature of their bodies Weak pastionate women of moveable spirits and strong affections when they Love they Love violently and when they Rejoyce especially in such cases they have most sensible joyes and when any fears arise they have most terrible sorrows I know it is not so with all of that sex but mark the same people usually that have the highest Joyes and see whether at other times they have not the greatest troubles This week they are as at the gates of Heaven and the next as at the doors of hell I am sure with many it is so Yet it need not be so if Christians would but look at these high joyes as Duties to be endeavoured and Mercies to be valued But when they will needs Judge of their state by them and think that God is gone from them or forsaken them when they have not such joyes then it leaves
willing of them and there is no more sin then there is will in it I answer 1. We were in Adam willing of that sin which caused them 2. We are in some degree inclining in our Wils to sin though God have that prevalent part and determination which in comparative cases doth denominate them 3. The Understanding and Will may be most hainously guilty where they do not consent in that they do not more strongly dissent and more potently and rulingly command all the subject Faculties And so a Negation of the Wils act or of such a Degree of it as is necessary to the Regiment of the sensual part is a deep guilt and great offence and it may be said that there is Will in this sin It is morally or reputatively voluntary though not naturally because the Will doth not its office when it should As a man is guilty of voluntary murder of his own childe that stands by and seeth his servant kill him and doth not do his best to hinder him I would this were better understood by some Divines For I think that the commonest guilt of the Reason and Will in our actual sinnes is by Omission of the exercise of their Authority to hinder it And that most sinnes are more bruitish as to the true efficient cause then many imagine and yet they are humane or moral Acts too and the soul nevertheless guilty because the commanded Faculties performed not their office and so are the Moral or Imputative causes and so the great culpable causes of the fact But I am drawn nearer to Philosophy and points beyond your reach then I intended a fault that I must be still resisting in all my Writings being upon every occurring difficulty carried to forget my subject and the capacity of the meanest to whom I write But what you understand not pass over and go to the next The second kinde of sinnes of Infirmity are The smaller sort of sinnes which we may forbear if we will that is If we be actually though not perfectly yet prevalently Willing or if our Wils be determined to forbear them or if the chief part of the Will actually be for such forbearance The first sort are called sinnes of Infirmity in an Absolute sense These last I call sinnes of Infirmity in both an Absolute and Comparative sense that is both as they proceed from our inward corruption which through the weakness of the soul having but little grace is not fully restrained and also as it is compared with gross sinnes And so we may call idle words and rash expressions in our hast and such like Sins of Infirmity in comparison of Murder Perjury or the like gross sinnes which we commonly call Crimes or Wickedness when the former we use to call but Faults These Infirmities are they which the Papists and some Learned Divines of our own as Rob. Baronius in his excellent Tractate de Peccat Mortali Veniali do call Venial sinnes Some of them in a fair and honest sense viz. Because they are such sinnes as a true Christian may live and die in though not unrepented or unresisted yet not subdued so farre as to forsake or cease from the practice of them and yet they are pardoned But other Papists call them Venial sinnes in a wicked sense as if they needed no pardon or deserved not eternal punishment And why should they call them Venial if they need not pardon A justified man liveth in the daily practice of some vain thoughts or the frequent commission of some other sinnes which by his utmost diligence he might restrain But he liveth not in the frequent practice of Adultery Drunkenness False-witnessing Slandering Hating his Brother c. Yet observe that though the forementioned lesser sinnes are called Infirmities in regard of the matter of them yet they may be so committed in regard of the end and manner of them as may make them crimes or gross sinnes As for example If one should use idle words wilfully resolvedly without restraint reluctancy or tenderness of conscience this were gross sinning or the neerer it comes to this and the more wilfulness or neglect or evil ends there is in the smallest forbidden action the worse it is and the grosser And observe of which more anon that the true bounds or difference between gross sinnes and those lesser faults which we call Infirmities cannot be given I think by any man I am sure not by me either as to the Act it self to say just what Acts are gross sins and what not or else as to the manner of committing them as to say Just how much of the Will must go to make a gross sinne or Just how farre a man may proceed in the degree of evil intents or how farre in the frequency of sinning before it must be called a gross sinne 3. The third sort of sinnes which may be called Sins of Infirmity are these last mentioned gross sinnes themselves so far as they are found in the Regenerate These are gross sinnes put in opposition to the former sort of Infirmities but our Divines use to call them all Sins of Infirmity in opposition to the sinnes of Unbelievers who are utterly unholy And they call them Sins of Infirmity 1. Because the person that committeth them is not dead in sinnes as the Unregenerate are but only diseased wounded and infirm 2. Because that they are not committed with so full consent of Will as those of the Unregenerate are but only after much striving or at least contrary to Habitual Resolutions though not against Actual Here we are in very great Difficulties and full of Controversies Some say that these gross sinnes do extinguish true Grace and are inconsistent with it and that David and Peter were out of the 〈◊〉 of Grace till they did again Repent Others say that they were in the state of Grace and not at al so liable to condemnation but that if they had died in the Act they had been saved because There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus and that therefore all the sins of Believers are alike sins of Infirmity pardoned on the same terms and therefore as a rash word may be pardoned without a particular repentance so possibly may these gross sins To others this seems dangerous and contrary to Scripture and therefore they would fain finde out a way between both But how to do it clearly and satisfactorily is not easie at least to me who have been long upon it but am yet much in the dark in it I think it is plain that such persons are not totally unsanctified by their sin I believe that Christs interest is Habitually more in their Wils then is the interest of the flesh or world at that very time when they are sinning and so Christs interest is least as to their Actual Willing And so sinne prevaileth for that time against the Act of their Faith and Love but not wholly against the prevalent part of the Habit. And therefore
tender Affections and heart-meltings are our sins For my part I see exceeding Cause to bewail it greatly in my self that my soul is not raised to a higher pitch of tender sensibility of all spiritual things then it is and I doubt not but it should be the matter of our daily confession and complaint to God that our hearts are so dull and little affected with his sacred Truths and our own sins But this is the scope of all my Speech Why do not you distinguish between Matter of Sorrow and Matter of Doubting No question but you should lament your dulness and stupidity and use all Gods means for the quickening of your Affections and to get the most lively frame of soul but must it cause you to doubt of your sincerity when you cannot obtain this Then will you never have a setled Peace or Assurance for many days together for ought I know I would ask you but this Whether you are willing or unwilling of all that hardness insensibleness and dulness which you complain of If you are willing of it what makes you complain of it If you are unwilling it seems your will is so far sound and it is the Will that is the seat of the Life of Grace which we must try by And was not Pauls Case the same with yours Rom. 7.19 when he saith The Good which I Would do I do not and When I Would do Good Evil is present with me I know Paul speaks not of gross sins but ordinary Infirmities and I have told you before that the Liveliness and Sensibility of the Passions or Affections is a thing that the Will though sanctified cannot fully command or excite at its pleasure A sanctified man cannot Grieve or Weep for sin when he will or so much as he will he cannot Love Joy be Zealous c. when he will He may be truly Willing and not Able And is not this your Case And doth not Paul make it the Case of all Christians Gal. 5.17 The flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh and these are contrary one to the other so that we cannot do the things that we would Take my Counsel therefore in this if you love not self-deceiving and disquietness Search whether you can say unfeignedly I would with all my heart have Christ and his quickening and santifying Spirit and his softning Grace to bring my hard heart to Tenderness and my dull and blockish soul to a lively frame O that I could attain it And if you can truly say thus Bless God that hath given you saving sincerity And then let all the rest of your Dulness and Deadness and Hard-heartedness be matter of daily sorrow to you and spare not so it be in Moderation but let it be no matter of Doubting Confess it complain of it pray against it and strive against it but do not deny Gods Graces in you for it And here let me mind you of one thing That it is a very ill distemper of spirit when a man can mourn for nothing but what Causeth him to Doubt of his salvation It is a great Corruption if when your Doubts are Resolved and you are perswaded of your salvation if then you cease all your humiliation and sorrow for your sin For you must sorrow that you have in you such a body of Death and that which is so displeasing to God and are able to please and enjoy him no more though you were never so Certain of the pardon of sin and of salvation 7. Lastly let me ask you one Question more What is the reason that you are so troubled for want of Tears for your sin Take heed lest there lie some Corruption in this trouble that you do not discern If it be onely because your deadness and dulness is your sin and you would fain have your soul in that frame in which it may be fittest to please God and enjoy him then I commend and encourage you in your trouble But take heed lest you should have any conceit of a Meritoriousness in your Tears for that would be a more dangerous sin then your want of Tears And if it be for want of a sign of Grace and because a dry eye is a sign of an unregenerate soul I have told you It is not so except where it onely seconds an impenitent heart and comes from or accompanieth and unrenewed Will and a prevailing unwillingness to turn to God by Christ Shew me if you can where the Scripture saith He that cannot Weep for sin shall not be Saved or hath no true Grace Is not your complaint in this the very same that the eminentest Christians have used in all times That most Blessed holy man Mr. Bradford who sacrificed his life in the flames against Romish abominations was wont to subscribe his Spiritual Letters endited by the breath of the Spirit of God thus The most miserable Hard-hearted sinner John Bradford DOUBT V. O But I am not willing to Good and therefore I fear that even my will it self is yet unchanged I have such a backwardness and undisposedness to Duty especially secret Prayer Meditation and self-examination and reproving and exhorting sinners that I am fain to force my self to it against my will It is no Delight the find in these Duties that brings me to them but onely I use violence with my self and am fain to pull my self down on my knees because I know it is a Duty and I cannot be saved without it but I am no sooner on my knees but I have a motion to rise or be short and am weary of it and find no great miss of duty when I do omit it ANSWER 1. THis shews that your soul is sick when your meat goes so much against your stomack that you are fain to force it down And sickness may well cause you to complain to God and man But what 's this to Deadness The Dead cannot force down their meat nor digest it at all It seems by this that you are sanctified but in a low Degree and your Corruption remains in some strength and let that be your sorrow and the overcoming of it be your greatest care and business But should you therefore say that you are unsanctified It seems that you have still the flesh lusting against the spirit that you cannot do the Good you would when you would pray with Delight and unweariedness the flesh draws back and the Devil is hindering you And is it not so in too great a measure with the best on earth Remember what Christ said to his own Apostles when they should have done him one of their last Services as to the attendance of his body on earth and should have comforted him in his Agony they are all asleep Again and again he comes to them and findeth them asleep Christ is Praying and sweating blood and they are still sleeping though he warned them to watch and Pray that they enter not into Temptation But what doth God say to
no great Likelyhood or hopes yet that they are sincere If you do as I think many Christians easily may that yet receive not a proportionable comfort remember that this is no small Mercy but matter of great consolation But suppose the worst that you see no Grace in your self yet you cannot be sure you have none For it may be there and you not see it Yea suppose the worst that you were sure that you had no true Grace at all yet remember that you have still abundant cause of Comfort in Gods General Grace Do you think you must needs Despair or give up all Hope and Comfort or conclude your self irrecoverably lost because you are Graceless why be it known to you there is that ground of Consolation in general Grace that may make the hearts of the very wicked to leap for joy Do I need to prove that to you You know that the Gospel is called Glad tidings of salvation and the Preachers of it are to tell those to whom they preach it Behold we bring you tidings of great Joy and glad tidings to all People And you know before the Gospel comes to men they are miserable If then it be glad tidings and tidings of great joy to all the unconverted where it comes why should it not be so to you and where is your great joy If you be Graceless is it nothing to know that God is exceeding merciful slow to anger ready to forgive pardoning iniquity transgression and sin loving mankinde Is it nothing to know that the Lord hath brought Infinite Mercy and Goodness down into humane flesh and hath taken on him the most blessed office of Reconciling and is become the Lamb of God Is it nothing to you that all your sins have a sufficient Sacrifice paid for them so that you are certain not to perish for want of a Ransom Is it nothing to you that God hath made such an universal Grant of Pardon and Salvation to all that will Believe and that you are not on the terms of the meer Law of Works to be judged for not obeying in perfection Suppose you are never so certainly Graceless is it not a Ground of unspeakable Comfort that you may be certain that nothing can condemn you but a flat refusal or unwillingness to have Christ and his Salvation This is a certain truth which may comfort a man as yet unsanctified that sin meerly as sin shall not Condemn him nor any thing in the World but the final obstinate Refusal of the Remedy which thereby leaveth all other sin unpardoned Now I would ask you this Question in your greatest fears that you are out of Christ Are you Willing to have Christ to pardon sanctifie guide and save you or not If you are then you are a true Believer and did not know it If you are not if you will but wait on Gods Word in Hearing and Reading and Consider frequently and seriously of the necessity and excellency of Christ and Glory and the evil of sin the vanity of the world and wil but beg earnestly of God to make you Willing you shall finde that God hath not appointed you this means in vain that this way will be more profitable then all your complainings See therefore when you are at the very lowest that you forsake not the Comforts of General Grace And indeed those that deny any General Grace or Redemption Do leave poor Christians in a very lamentable Condition For alas Assurance of Special Grace yea or a high probability is not so common a thing as meer Disputers against Doubting have imagined And when a poor Christian is beaten from his Assurance which few have he hath nothing but Probabilities and when he hath no confident probable perswasion of special Grace where is he then and what hath he left to support his soul I will not so far now meddle with that Controversie as to open further how this opinion tends to leave most Christians in desperation for all the pretences it hath found and I had done more but that General Redemption or Satisfaction is commonly taught in the maintaining of the General Sufficiency of it though men understand not how they contradict themselves But perhaps you will say This is cold comfort for I may as well argue thus Christ will damn sinners I am a sinner therefore he will damn me as to argue thus Christ will save sinners I am a Sinner therefore he will save me I answer There is no shew of soundness in either of these Arguments It is not a certainty that Christ will save you that can be gathered from General Grace alone that must be had from assurance of of special Grace superadded to the General But a conditional certainty you may have from General Grace onely and thus you may soundly and infallibly argue God hath made a Grant to every sinful man of Pardon and salvation through Christs Sacrifice if they will but Repent and Believe in Christ but I am a sinful man therefore God hath made this Grant of Pardon and Salvation to me DIRECTION XXXI If God do bless you with an able faithful prudent judicious Pastor take him for your Guide under Christ in the way to Salvation and open to him your Case and desire his advice in all your extraordinary pressing necessities where you have found the advice of other godly friends to be insufficient And this not once or twice only but as often as such pressing necessities shall return Or if your own Pastor be more defective for such a work make use of some other Minister of Christ who is more meet HEre I have these several things to open to you 1. That it is your Duty to seek this Direction from the Guides of the Church 2. When and in what cases you should do this 3. To what end and how far 4. What Ministers they be that you should choose thereto 5. In what manner you must open your Case that you may receive satisfaction 1. The first hath two parts 1. That you must open your Case 2. And that to your Pastor 1. The Devil hath great advantage while you keep his Counsel Two are better then one for if one of them fall he hath another to help him It is dangerous Resisting such an enemy alone An uniting of forces oft procureth victory God giveth others knowledge prudence and other gifts for our good that so every member of the body may have need of another and each be useful to the other An Independency of Christian upon Christian is most unchristian much more of people on their Guides It ceaseth to be a Member which is separated from the body and to make no use of the body or fellow members is next to separation from them Sometime bashfulness is the cause sometimes self-confidence a far worse cause but whatever is the cause of Christians smothering their Doubts the effects are oft sad The disease is oft gone so far that the Cure is very difficult
Pray more oft and earnestly then we do and instruct our Families more diligently and speak against sin more boldly and admonish our neighbours more faithfully with many the like The good that we would do we do not Rom. 7.19 Nay the flesh so striveth against the Spirit that we cannot do the good we would Gal. 5.17 Nay many a true Christian in time of temptation hath been drawn to omit secret prayer or family duties almost wholly for a certain space of time yea and perhaps to be so corrupted in his judgement for a time as to think he doth well in it as also in forbearing praising God by Psalmes Receiving the Sacraments and Communicating with the Church hearing the Word publikely c. for what duty almost is not denied of late and perhaps may not only omit Relieving the poor for a time but excuse it Now what man can punctually determine just how often a true Christian may be guilty of any such omission and just how long he may continue it and what the duties be which he may possibly so omit and what not So also in sins of Commission Alas what sins did Noah Lot David Solomon Asa Peter c. commit If we should say as the Papists and Arminians that these being mortal sins do for the time till Repentance restore him cast a true Christian out of Gods favour into a state of Damnation then what man breathing is able to enumerate those Mortal sins and tell us which be so Damning and which not Nay if he could say Drunkenness is one and Gluttony another Who can set the punctual stint and say Just so many bits a man must eat before he be a Glutton or Just so much he must drink before he be a Drunkard or by such a signe the turning point may be certainly known We may have signes by which he may be tried at the Barre of Man but these are none of them taken from that smallest degree which specifieth and denominates the sinne before God If we avoid the foresaid opinion that one such sin doth bring us into the state of Damnation yet is the difficulty never the less For it is certain that he that commits sin is of the Devil 1 Joh. 3.8 and there are spots which are not the spots of Gods children and all true faith will mortifie the world to us and us to it Gal. 6.14 and he that is in Christ hath crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts thereof Gal. 5.24 and that if we live after the flesh we shall die Rom. 8.13 and his servants we are to whom we obey whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto Righteousness Rom. 6.16 and if we delight in iniquity or regard it God will not hear our prayers Psal 66.18 and that he that nameth the name of Christ must depart from iniquity 1 Tim. 2.19 and that God will judge all men according to their works and bid the workers of iniquity depart from him Mat. â— 23 Now can any man on earth tell us just how great or how often sinning will stand with true Grace and how much will not who can finde those punctual bounds in the Word of God I conclude therefore that no Minister or at least none who is no wiser then I am can give a true discernable difference between the worst of Saints and the best of the unsanctified or the weakest degree of true Grace and the highest of common Grace and so to help such weak Christians to true Assurance of their salvation 2. But as this is impossible to be declared by the Teachers so much more is it impossible to be discerned by the persons themselves yea though it could possibly be declared to him and that for these Reasons 1. From the nature of the thing Small things are hardly discerned A little is next to none 2. From the great darkness of mans understanding and his unacquaintedness with himself both the nature faculties and motions of his soul naturally considered and the moral state dispositions and motions of it and is it likely that so blinde an eye can discern the smallest thing and that in so strange and dark a place every purblind man cannot see an atome or a pin especially in the dark 3. The heart is deceitfull above all things as well as dark full of seemings counterfeits and false pretences And a childe in Grace is not able to discover its juglings and understand a book where almost every word is aequivocall or mysterious 4. The heart is most confused as well as dark and deceitfull It is like a house or shop of tools where all things are thrown together on a heap and nothing keeps its own place There are such multiplicity of cogitations phantasies and passions and such irregular thronging in of them and such a confused reception and operation of objects and conceptions that it is a wonderfull difficult thing for the best Christian to discern clearly the bent and actions and so the state of his own soâ—â— For in such a crowd of cogitations and passions we are like men in a Fair or crowd of people where a confused noise may be heard but you cannot well perceive what any of them say except either some one neer you that speaks much lowder then all the rest or else except you single out some one from the rest and go close to him to confer with him of purpose Our Intellect and Passions are like the lakes of water in the common roades where the frequent passage of Horses doth so muddy it that you can see nothing in it especially that is neer the bottom when in pure untroubled waters you may see a small thing In such a confusion and tumult as is usually in mens souls for a poor weak Christian to seek for the discovery of his sincerity is according to the proverb to seek for a needle in a bottle of hay 5. Besides all this the corrupt heart of man is so exceeding backward to the work of self-examination and the use of other means by which the soul should be familiarly acquainted with it self that in a case of such difficulty it will hardly ever overcome them if it were a thing that might be done In the best a great deal of resolvedness diligence and unwearied constancy in searching into the state of the soul is necessary to the attainment of a setled Assurance and Peace How much more in them that have so small and almost undiscernable a measure of Grace to discover 6. Yet further The Conceptions Apprehensions and consequently the sensible motions of the Will and especially the Passions are all naturally exceeding mutable And while the mobile agile spirits are any way the Instruments it will be so especially where the Impression which is made in the understanding is so small and weak Naturally mans minde and will is exceeding mutable turned into an hundred shapes in a few daies according as objects are presented to us and the temperature of the body
that God is Reconciled to you and hath forgiven you for you are Justified before you were born if you are one of the Elect and can but Believe it 't is not any thing of your own by which you can be Justified Nor is it any sin of yours that can unjustifie It is the witness of the Spirit onely perswading you of your Justification and Adoption that can give you Assurance and fetching it from any thing in your self is but a resting on your own Righteousness and forsaking Christ When the Antinomian hath but sung this Ignorant Charm to a poor Soul as Ignorant as himself and prepared by terrours to entertain the Impression presently it oft takes and the sinner without a wonder of Mercy is undone This Doctrine which subverteth the very scope of the Gospel being entertained subverteth his Faith and Obedience and usually the Libertinism of his opinion is seen in his Liberty of Conscience and Licentious practises and his trouble of mind is cured as a burning feaver by opium which gives him such a sleep that he never awaketh till he be in another world Yet these errours are so gross and so fully against the express Texts of Scripture that if Ministers would condescendingly lovingly and familiarly deal with them and do their duty I should hope many well-meaning Souls might be recovered Thus you see the danger of rash interpreting and so misinterpreting Providences As such interpretations of prosperity and success deludeth not onely the Mahometan world and the Prophane world but many that seemed Godly so many such Interpretations of Adversity and Crosses do especially if the Seducer be but kind and liberal to relieve them in their Adversity he may do with many poor Souls almost what he please 3. The third Enemy to your peace here mentioned is Misinterpreting or misapplying the Passages of Preachers in their Sermons Writings or private Speeches A Minister cannot deal throughly or seriously with any sort of sinners but some fearful troubled souls apply all to themselves I must intreat you to avoid this fault or else you will turn Gods Ordinances and the daily food of your souls into bitterness and wormwood and all through your mistakes I think there is few Ministers so preach but you might perceive whom they mean and they so difference as to tell you who they speak to I confess it is a better sign of an honest heart and self-judging conscience to say He speaks now to me this is my case then to say He speaks now to such or such a one this is their case For it is the property of Hypocrites to have their eye most abroad and in every duty to be minding most the faults of others and you may much discern such in their prayers in that they will fill their confessions most with other mens sins and you may feel them all the while in the bosom of their neighbours when you may even feel a sincere man speaking his own heart and most opening his own bosom to God But though self-applying and self-searching be far the better sign yet must not any wise Christian do it mistakingly for that may breed abundance of very sad effects For besides the aforesaid embittering of Gods Ordinances to you and so discouraging you from them do but consider what a grief and a snare you may prove to your Minister A grief it must needs be to him who knows he should not make sad the soul of the innocent to think that he cannot avoid it without avoiding his duty When God hath put two several Messages in our mouthes Isa. 3.10 11. Say to the Râ—ghteous it shall be well with him and Say to the wicked it shall be ill with him He that believeth shall be saved He that believeth not shall be damned and we speak both will you take that as spoken to you which is spoken to the unbeliever and the wicked Alas how is it possible then for us to forbear troubling you If you will put your head under every stroke that we give against sin and sinners how can we help it if you smart what a sad case are we in by such misapplications We have but two Messages to deliver and both are usually lost by misapplication The wicked saith I am the Righteous and therefore it shâ—ll go well with me the Righteous saith I am the wicked and therefore it shall go ill with me The Unbeliever saith I am a Believer and therefore am justifâ—â—d The Believer saith I am 〈◊〉 Vnbeliever â—nd therefore am condemned nay it is not onely the loss of our preaching but we oft do them much harm for they are hardened that should be humbled and they are wounded more that should be healed A Minister now must needs tell them who he means by the Believer and who by the Unbeliever who by the Righteous and who by the wicked and yet when he hath done it as accurately and as cautelously as he can misapplying souls will wrong themselves by it so that because people cannot see the distinguishing line it therefore comes to pass that few are comforted but when Ministers preach nothing else but comfort and few humbled but where Ministers bend almost all their endeavors that way that people can feel almost nothing else from him But for him that equally would divide to each their portion each one snatcheth up the part of another and he oft misseth of profiting either And yet this is the course that we must take And what a snare is this to us as well as a grief what if we should he so moved with compassion of your troubles as to fit almost all our Doctrine and Application to you what a fearful guilt should we draw upon our own souls Nay what a snare may you thus prove to the greater part of the Congregation Alas we have seldom past one or two or three troubled Consciences in an Auditory and perhaps some of their troubles be the fruit of such wilful sinning that they have more need of greater humbling yet should we now neglect all the rest of these poor souls to preach only to you O how many an ignorant hard-hearted sinner comes before God every day Shall we let such go away as they came without ever a blow to awaken them and stir their hearts when alas all that ever we can do is too little when we preach you into tears and trembling we preach them asleep Could we speak swords it would scarce make them feel when you through misapplication have gone home with anguish and fears how few of all these have been pricked at the heart and said What shall we do to be saved Have you no Pity now on such stupid souls as these I fear this one distemper of yours that you cannot bear this rousing preaching doth bewray another and greater sin look to it I beseech you for I think I have spy'd out the cause of your trouble Are you not your self too great a stranger to poor stupid sinners and
come not among them or pitty them not as you should and do not your duty for the saving of their souls but think it belongs not to you but to others Do you use to deal with servants and neighbors about you and tell them of sin and misery and the remedy and seek to draw their hearts to Christ and bring them to duty I doubt you do little in this and that is sad unmercifulness for if you did truly you could not choose but finde such miserable ignorance such senselesness and blockishness such hating reproof and unwillingness to be reformed such love of this world and slavery to the flesh and so little savour of Christ Grace Heaven and the things of the Spirit and especially such an unteachableness intractableness as thorns and bryars and so great a difficulty of moving them an inch from what they are that you would have been willing ever after to have Ministers preach more rousingly then they do and you would be glad for their sakes when you heard that which might awake them and prick them to the heart Yea if you had tried how hard a work it is to bring worldly formal Hypocrites to see their Hypocrisie or to come over to Christ from the creature and to be in good earnest in the business of their salvation you would be glad to have Preachers search them to the quick and ransack their hearts and help them against their affected and obstinate self-delusions Besides you should consider that theâ— Case is far different from yours Your disease is pain and trouble they are stark dead You have Gods favour and doubt of it they are his enemies and never suspect it You want comfort and they want pardon and life if your disease should never here be cured it is but going more sadly to heaven But if they be not recovered by Regeneration they must lie for ever in Hell And should we not then pitty them more then you and study more for them and preach more for them and rather forget you in a Sermon then them should you not wish us so to do should we more regard the comforting of one then the saving of an hundred Nay more we should not onely neglect them but dangerously hurt them if we should preach too much to the case of troubled souls For you are not so apt to misapply passages of terror and to take their portion as they are apt to apply to themselves such passages for comfort and take your portion to themselves I know some will say that it is preaching Christ and setting forth Gods Love that will win them best and terrors do but make unwilling Hypocrital Professors This makes me remember how I have heard some Preachers of the times blame their Brethren for not preaching Christ to their People when they Preached the danger of rejecting Christ disobeying him and resisting his Spirit Do these men think that it is no preaching Christ when we have first many years told men the fulness of his satisfaction the freeness and general extent of his Covenant or Promise and the riches of his Grace and the incomprehensibleness of his Glory and the Truth of all to tell them afterwards the danger of refusing neglecting and disobeying him and of living after the flesh and preferring the world before him and serving Mammon and falling off in persecution and avoiding the cross and yielding in Temptation and quenching the Spirit and declining from their first Love and not improving their Talents and not forgiving and loving their brethren yea and enemies c. Is none of this Gospel nor preaching Christ yea is not Repentance it self except despairing Repentance proper to the Gospel seeing the Law excludeth it and all manner of hope Blame me not Reader if I be zealous against these men that not only know no better what preaching Christ is but in their ignorance reproach their Brethren for not preaching Christ and withal condemn Christ himself and all his Apostles Do they think that Christ himself knew not what it was to preach Christ or that he set us a patern too low for our imitation I desire them soberly to read Mat. 5.6 7 10 25. Rom. 8. from the first verse to the 14. Rom. 2. Heb. 2. 4. 5. 10 and then tell me whether we preach as Christ and his Apostles did But to the Objection I Answer first we do set forth Gods love and the fulness of Christ and the sufficiency of his death and satisfaction for all and the freeness and extent of his offer and promise of mercy and his readiness to welcome returning sinners this we do first mixing with this the discovery of their natural misery by sin which must be first known and next we shew them the danger of Rejecting Christ and his offer 2. When we finde men settled under the preaching of free Grace in a base contempt or sleepy neglect of it preferring the world and their carnal pleasures and ease before all the Glory of heaven and Riches of Christ and Grace is it not time for us to say How shall ye escape if ye neglect so great salvation Heb. 2.3 and of how much soarer punishment shall he be thought worthy that treads under foot the blood of the Covenant Heb. 10.26 when men grow careless and unbelieving must we not say Take heed lest a promise being lest of entring into his Rest any of you should seem to come short of it Heb. 4.1 3. Hath not Christ led us commanded us and taught us this way Except ye Repent ye shall all perish was his Doctrine Luke 13.3 5. Go into the world and preach the Gospel to every creature what 's that Gospel He that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be damned Mark 16.16 Those mine Enemies that would not I should raign over them bring hither and stay them before me Luke 19.27 Doth any of the Apostles speak more of hell-fire and the worm that never dyeth and the fire that never is quenched their Christ himself doth And do not his Apostles go the same way even Paul the greatest preacher of faith 2 Thess 1 7 8 9. and 2.12 c. What more common Alas what work should we make if we should stroak and smooth all men with Antinomian language It were the way to please all the sensual prophane multitude but it is none of Christs way to save their souls I am ready to think that these men would have Christ preached as the Papists would have him pray'd to to say Jesu Jesu Jesu nine times together and this oft over is their praying to him and to have Christs name oft in the Preachers mouth some men think is the right preaching Christ Let me now desire you hereafter to be glad to hear Ministers awaken the prophane and dead-hearted hearers and search all to the quick and misapply nothing to your self but if you think any passage doth neerly concern you open your mind to the Minister privately