of flesh and blood which maketh you pretend Moderation and Peace and that it is a sign that you are hypocrites that are so lukewarm and carnally comply with error and that the cause of God is to be followed with the greatest zeal and self denyal And all this is true if you be but sure that it is indeed the cause of God and that the greater works of God be not neglected on such pretences and that your Zeal be much greater for Faith and Charity and Unity than for your opinions But upon great experience I must tell you that of the zealous contenders in the world that cry up The Cause of Consuming 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 use at 〈◊〉 â—o 〈◊〉 up the owners of it Whatever tâ—â—y say oâ— do against others in theâ—â— inâ—â—mperaâ—e violâ—nce they teach otherâ— at last to say and do against them when they have opportunity How the Orâ—â—odox taught the Aâ—â—iaâ—s to use severity against them may be sâ—en in Victor utic p. 447 448 449. in the Edict of Hunneâ—yâ—hus â—â—gem quam dudum Christiani Imperatores nostri contra eos alios haereticos pro honorisicentia Ecclesiae Catholiâ—ae dedâ—runâ— adversus nos illi proponere non eâ—ubuerunt v. g. Rex Hun. c. Triumphalis Majestatis Regiae probatur esâ—e virtutis mâ—â—a in autores conâ—lia retorquere Quisquis enim pravitatis aliquid invenerit sibi imputet quod incurrit Nullâ—s 〈◊〉 homâ—usion Saceâ—doâ—es assumanâ— nec aliquid mysteriâ—â—um quae magis polluunt sibi vendicenâ— Nullam habeant oâ—dinandi licentiam Quod ipsaâ—um legum continentia demonstratur quas induxiâ—â—e Imperaâ—oâ—ibuâ— c. viz. Ut nulla exceptâ—s superstiti 〈…〉 s suae â—nâ—stibus Ecclesia pateret nuâ—lâ—s liceret aliis aut convictus agere aut exercere convâ—ntâ—s nec Ecclesias auâ— in uâ—â—iâ—â—â—â— aut in quibuâ—dam 〈◊〉 locis God and Truth there is not one of very many that understandeth what he talks of but some of them cry up the Cause of God when it is a brat of a proud and ignorant brain and such as a judicious person would be ashamed of And some of them are rashly zealous before they have parts or time to come to any judicious tryal and some of them are mis-guided by some person or party that captivateth their minds and some of them are hurried away by passion and discontent and many of the ambitious and worldly are blinded by their carnal interests and many of them in meer pride think highly of an Opinion in which they are somewhat singular and which they can with some glorying call their Own as either invented by them or that in which they think they know more than ordinary men do And abundance after longer experience confess that to have been their own erroneous cause which they before entitled the Cause of God Now when this is the case and one cryeth Here is Christ and another There is Christ one saith This is the cause of God and another saith That is it no man that hath any care of his Conscience or of the honour of God and his profession will leap before he looketh where he shall alight or run after every one that will whistle him with the name or pretence of truth or a good cause It is a sad thing to go on many years together in censuring opposing and abusing thâ—se that are against you and in seducing others and mis-imploying your zeal and parts and time and poysoning all your prayers and discourses and in the end to see what mischief you have done for want of knowledge and with Paul to confess that you were mad in opposing the truth and servants of God though you did it in a zeal of God through ignorance Were it not much better to stay till you have tryed the ground and prevent so many years grievous sin than to scape by a sad repentance and leave behind you stinking and venemous fruits of your mistake And worse if you never repent your selves Your own and your Brethrens souls are not so lightly to be ventured upon dangerous untryed wayes It will not make the Truth and Church amends to say at last I had thought I had done well Let those go to the Wars of disputing and 〈◊〉 and câ—nsuâ—ing and siding with a Sect that are riper and better understand the cause Wars are not for Children Do you suspend your judgement till you can solidly and certainly inform it and serve God in Charity quietness and peace And it s two to one but you will live to see the day that the contenders that would have led you into their Wars will come off with so much loss themselves as will teach them to approve your peaceable course or teach you to bless God that kept you in your place and duty § 3. In all this I deny not but every truth of God is to be valued at a very high rate and that he that shall carry himself in a neutrality when Faith or Godliness is the matter in controversie or shall do it meerly for his worldly ends to save his stake by temporizing is a false-hearted hypocrite and at the heart of no Religion But withal I tell you that all is not matter of Faith or Godliness that the Autonomian-Papist the Antinomian-Libertine or other passionate parties shall call so And that as we must avoid contempt of the smallest Truth so we must much more avoid the most heinous sins which we may commit for the defending of an error And that some Truths must be silenced for a time though not denyed when the contending for them is unseasonable and tendeth to the injury of the Church If you were Masters in the Church you must not teach your Scholars to their hurt though it be truth you teach them And if you were Physicions you must not cramm them or Medicate them to their hurt Your power and duty is not to Destruction but to Edification The good of the Patient is the end of your Physick All Truth is not to be spoken nor all Good to be done by all men nor at all times He that will do contrary and take this for a carnal principle doth but call folly and sin by the name of zeal and duty and set the house on fire to rost his Egg and with the Pharisees prefer the outward rest of their Sabbath before his Brothers life or health Take heed what you do when Gods honour and mens souls and the Churches peace are concerned in it § 4. And let me tell you my own observation As far as my judgement hath been able to reach the men that have stood for Pacification and Moderation have been the most judicious and those that have best understood themselves in most controversies that ever I heard under debate among good Christians And those that suriously censured them as lukewarm or corrupted have been men that had least judgement and most passion pride and foul mistakes in the points in question § 5. Nay I will tell you
seriousness in Religion made odious or banished from the earth and that themselves may be taken for the Center and Pillars and Law-givers of the Church and the Consciences of all men may be taught to cast off all scruples or fears of offending God in comparison of â—â—â—â—â—â—ing them and may absolutely submit to them and never stick at any feared disobedience to 〈…〉 t They are the scorners and persecutors of strict obedience to the Laws of God and take those that â—ear his judgements to be men affrighted out of their wits and that to obey him exactly which alas who can do when he hath done his best is but to be hypocritical or too precise but to question their domination or break their Laws imposed on the world even on Kings and States without any Authority this must be taken for Heresie Schism or a Rebellion like that of Corah and his company This Luciferian Spirit of the proud Autonomians hath filled the Christian world with bloodshed and been the greatest means of the miseries of the earth and especially of hindering and persecuting the Gospel and setting up a Pharisaical Religion in the world It hath fought against the Gospel and filled with blood the Countreys of France Savoy Rhaetia Bohemia Belgia Helvetia Polonia Hungary Germany and many more that it may appear how much of the Satanical nature they have and how punctually they fulfill his will § 3. And natural corruption containeth in it the seeds of all these damnable Heresies nothing more natural to lapsed man than to shake off the Government of God and to become a Law-giver to himself and as many others as he can and to turn the grace of God into wantonness Therefore the prophane that never heard it from any Hereticks but themselves do make themselves such a Creed as this that God is merciful and therefore we need not fear his threatnings for he will be better than his word It belongeth to him to save us and not to us and therefore we may cast our souls upon his care though we care not for them our selves If he hath predestinated us to salvation we shall be saved and if he have not we shall not what ever we do or how well soever we live Christ dyed for sinners and therefore though we are sinners he will save us God is stronger than the Devil and therefore the Devil shall not have the most That which pleaseth the flesh and doth God no harm can never be so great a matter or so much offend him as to procure our damnation What need of so much ado to be saved or so much haste to turn to God when any one that at last doth but repent and cry God mercy and believe that Christ dyed for him shall be saved Christ is the Saviour of the world and his grace is very great and free and therefore God forbid that none should be saved but those few that are of strict and holy lives and make so much ado for Heaven No man can know who shall be saved and who shall not and therefore it is the wisest way to do no body any harm and to live merrily and trust God with our souls and put our salvation upon the venture no body is saved for his own works or deservings and therefore our lives may serve the turn as well as if they were more strict and holy This is the Creed of the ungodly by which you may see how natural it is to them to abuse the Gospel and plead Gods grace to quiet and strengthen them in their sin and to embolden themselves on Christ to disobey him § 4. But this is but to set Christ against himself even his Merits and Mercy against his Government and Spirit and to set his Death against the Ends of his death and to set our Saviour against our salvation and to run from God and rebell against him because Christ dyed to recover us to God and to give us Repentance unto life and to sin because he dyed to save his people from their sins and to purifie a peculiar people to himself zealous of good works Matth. 1. 21. Tit. 2. 14. He that committeth sin is of the Devil for the Devil sinneth from the beginning For this purpose the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the Devil 1 John 3. 8. John 8. 44. Direct 18. WAtch diligently hath against the more discernable decayes of grace and against Direct 18. the degenerating of it into some carnal affections or something counterfeit and of another kind And so also of Religious duties § 1. We are no sooner warmed with the coelestial flames but natural corruption is enclining us to grow cold Like hot water which loseth its heat by degrees unless the fire be continually kept under it Who feeleth not that as soon as in a Sermon or Prayer or holy Meditation his heart hath got a little heat as soon as it is gone it is prone to its former earthly temper and by a little remisness in our duty or thoughts or business about the world we presently grow cold and dull again Be watchful therefore lest it decline too far Be frequent in the means that must preserve you from declining when faintness telleth you that your stomachs are emptied of the former meat supply it with another lest strength abate You are rowing against the stream of fleshly interest and inclinations and therefore intermit not too long lest you go faster down by your ease then you get up by labour § 2. The Degenerating of Grace is a way of backsliding very common and too little observed How Grace may degenerate It is when good affections do not directly cool but turn into some carnal affections somewhat like them but of another kind As if the body of a man instead of dying should receive the life or soul of a Beast instead of the reasonable humane soul. For instance 1. Have you Believed in God and in Iesus Christ and Loved him accordingly You shall seem to do so still as much as formerly when your corrupted minds have received some false representation of him and so it is indeed another thing that you thus corruptly Believe and Love 2. Have you been fervent in Prayer you shall be fervent still iâ— Satan can but corrupt your prayers by corrupting your judgement or affections and get you to think that to be the cause of God which is against him and that to be against him which he commandeth and those to be the troublers of the Church which are its best and faithfullest members Turn but your prayers against the cause and people of God by your mistake and you may pray as fervently against them as you will The same I may say of preaching and conference and zeal Corrupt them once and turn them against God and Satan will joyn with you for zealous and frequent preaching or conference or disputes 3. Have you a confidence in Christ and his promise for
dealing so plainly with you You know that they hazard by it their reputation with such as you and they cannot be ignorant that it is like to expose them to your ill will and indignation § 2. And they are men as well as you and therefore undoubtedly desire the good will and the good word of others and take no pleasure to be scorned or hated Undoubtedly they break through much temptation and reluctancy of the flesh before they can so far deny themselves as to endeavour your salvation on such terms And seeing it is all for you methinks you should be their chief encouragers If others should oppose them you should be for them because they are for you If I go with a Convoy to relieve a besieged Garrison I shall expect opposition from the Enemy that besiegeth them But if the besieged themselves shall shoot at us and use us as enemies for venturing our lives to relieve them it 's time to be gone and let them take what they get by it § 3. Perhaps you think that the Preacher or private admonisher is too plain with you But Seneca Ep. 87. sâ— ibit Tan necessarium fuisle Romano populo â—asci Catoaâ—m quam Scâ—pionem Alter enim cum hostious â—ostâ—â— alter cum moâ—ibus belluâ— gessiâ— you should consider that self-love is like to make you partial in your own cause and therefore a more uncapable Judge than they And you should consider that God hath commanded them to deal plainly and told them that else the peoples blood shall be required at their hands Isa. 58. 1. Ezek. 18. And that God best knoweth what Medicine and Dyet is fittest for your Disease And that the case is of such grand importance whether you shall live in Heaven or Hell for ever that it is scarce possible for a Minister to be too plain and serious with you And that your disease is so obstinate that gentler means have been too long frustrate and therefore sharper must be tryed else why were you not converted by gentler dealing until now If you fall down in a swoon or be ready to be drowned you will give leave to the standers by to handle you a little more roughly than at another time and will not bring your action against them for laying hands on you or ruffling your Silks or Bravery If your house be on fire you will give men leave to speak in another manner than when they modulate their voices into a civill and complementing tone It may be you think that they are censorious in judging you to be unconverted when you are not and to be worse and in more danger than you are and speaking harder of you than you deserve But it 's you that should be most suspicious of your selves and afraid in so great a matter of being deceived A stander by may see more than a player I am sure he that is awake may know more of you than you of your selves when you are asleep § 4. But suppose it were as you imagine it is his Love that mistakingly attempteth your good He intendeth you no harm It is your salvation that he desireth It is your damnation that he would prevent You have cause to love him and be thankful for his good will and not to be angry with him and reproach him for his mistakes He is none of those that brings you into the inquisition and would fine or imprison or banish or burn or hang or torment you in order to convert and save you The worst he doth is but to speak those words which if true you are deeply concerned to regard and if mistaken can do you no hurt unless you are the cause your self If it be in publick preaching he speaketh generally by descriptions and not by nomination no more of you than of others in your case Nor of you at all if you are not in that case If he speak privately to you there is no witness but your self and therefore it is no matter of disgrace Never for shame pretend that thou art willing to be converted and saved when thou hatest those that would promote it and art angry with every one that tells thee of thy case and couldst find in thy heart to stop their mouths or do them a mischief Direction 8. IF thou art willing indeed to be converted do thy best to discover that yet thou art unconverted Direct 8. and in a lost and miserable state § 1. Who will endeavour to cure a Disease which he thinks he hath not Or to Vomit up the poison which he thinks he never took or taketh to be no poison Or to come out of the ditch that thinks he is not in it Or who will turn back again that will not believe but he is in the right way Who will labour to be converted that thinks he is converted already Or who will come to Christ as the Physicion of his soul that thinks he is not sick or is cured already The common cause that men live and die without the grace of Repentance Sanctification and Justification which should save them is because they will not believe but that they have it when they have it not and that they are penitent and justified and sanctified already It is not my desire to make any of you think worse of your condition than it is But if you will not know what it is you will not be fit for recovering grace nor use the means for your own recovery you think it is so sad a conclusion to find your selves in a state of condemnation that you are exceeding unwilling to know it or confess it § 2. But I beseech you consider but these two things First Either it is true that you are in so Bernard de grad humil grad 8. describeth mens excusing their sins thus If it may be they will say I did not do it or else It was no sin but lawful or else I did it not oft or much or else I meant no harm or else I was perswaded by another and drawn to it by temptation miserable a state or it is not true If it be not true the closest tryal will but comfort you by discovering that you are sanctified already But if it be true then do you think it will save you to be ignorant of your danger Will it cure your disease to believe that you have it not Will thinking well of your selves falsly prove that you are well indeed Is it the way to grace to think you have it when you have it not Will it bring you to Heaven to think that you are going thither when you are in the way to Hell Nay do you not know that it is the principal temptation of the Devil to keep men from a state of Repentance and Salvation to deceive them thus and perswade them that they are in such a state already Judge soberly of the case Do you think if all the impenitent unconverted sinners in the world were certain that they are
our faith Help thou our unbelief But he that approveth of his Doubting and would have it so and thinks the revelation is uncertain and such as will warrant no firmer a belief I should scarcely say this man is a Christian. Christianity must be received as of Divine infallible revelation But controversies about less necessary things cannot be determined peremptorily by the ignorant or young beginners without hypocrisie or a humane faith going under the name of a Divine I am far from abating your Divine belief of all that you can understand in Scripture and implicitely of all the rest in general And I am far from diminishing the credit of any truth of God But the Reasons of this Direction are these § 2. 1. When it is certain that you have but a dark uncertain apprehension of any point to think it is clear and certain is but to deceive your selves by pride And to cry out against all uncertainty as sceptiâ—isme which yet you cannot lay aside is but to revile your own infirmity and the common infirmity of mankind and foolishly to suppose that every man can be as wise and certain when he list as he should be Now Reason and experience will tell you that a young unfurnished understanding is not like to see the evidence of difficult points as by nearer approach and better advantage it may do § 3. 2. If your conclusions be peremptory upon meer self-conceitedness you may be in an error for ought you know and so you are but confident in an error And then how far may you go in seducing others and censuring dissenters and come back when you have done and confess that you were all this while mistaken your selves § 4. 3. For a man to be confident that he knoweth what he knoweth not is but the way to keep him ignorant and shut the door against all means of further information When the Opinion is fixt by prejudice and conceit there is no ready entrance for the light § 5. 4 And to be ungroundedly confident so young is not only to take up with your Teachers word instead of a faith and knowledge of your own but also to forestall all diligence to know more and so you may lay by all your studies save only to know what those men hold whose judgements are your Religion Too Popish and easie a way to be safe § 6. 5. If you must never change your first opinions or apprehensions how will you grow in understanding Will you be no wiser at age than you were in childhood and after long study and experience than before Nature and Grace do tend to increase § 7. Indeed if you should be never so peremptory in your opinions you cannot resolve to hold them to the end For Light is powerful and may change you whether you will or no you cannot tell what that Light will do which you never saw But prejudice will make you resist the light and make it harder for you to understand § 8. I speak this upon much experience and observation Our first unripe apprehensions of things will certainly be greatly changed if we are studious and of improved understandings Study the Conâ—roveâ—â—â—â—s about Grace and Free-will or about other such points of difficulty when you are young and â—â—s two to one that ripeness will afterward make them quite another thing to you For my own â—â—â—â—t my judgement is altered from many of my youthful confident apprehensions And where it heldeth the same conclusion it rejecteth abundance of the arguments as vain which once it rested in And where I keep to the same Conclusions and Arguments my apprehension of them is not the saâ—â— â—ut I see more satisfying light in many things which I took but upon trust before And if I had resolved to hold to all my first Opinions I must have forborn most of my studies and lost much truth which I have discovered and not made that my own which I did hold and I must have resolved to live and dye a child § 9. The su 〈…〉 is Hold fast the substance of Religion and every clear and certain Truth which you see in its own evidence and also reverence your Teachers especially the Universal Church or the generality of wise and godly men and be not hasty to take up any private opinion And especially to contradict the Opinion of your Governours and Teachers in small and controverted things But yet in such matters receive their Opinions but with a humane faith till indeed you have more and therefore with a supposition that time and study is very like to alter your apprehensions and with a reserve impartially to study and entertain the truth and not to sit still just where you were bâ—rn Direct 12. IF Controversies â—ccasion any Divisions where you live be sure to look first to the interest of Common Truth and Good and to the exercise of Charity And become not passionate contenders for any party in the division or censurers of the peaceable or of your Teachers that will not â—ver 〈…〉 their own understandings to obtain with you the esteem of being Orthodox or zealous men But suspect your own unripe understandings and silence your Opinions till you are clear and certain and jâ—yn rather with the moderate and the peace-makers than with the Contenders and Dividers § 1. You may easily be sure that Division tendeth to the ruine of the Church and the hinderance of the Gospel and the injury of the common interest of Religion You know it is greatly condemned in the Scriptures You may know that it is usually the exercise and the increase of Pride uncharitableness and passion and that the Devil is best pleased with it as being the greatest gainer by it But on the other side you are not easily certain which party is in the right And if you were you are not sure that the matter will be worth the cost of the contention Or if it be it is to be considered whether the Truth is not like to get more advantage by managing it in a more peaceable way that hath no contention nor stirreth not up other men so much against it as the way of controversie doth And whatever it prove you may and should know that young Christians that want both parts and helps and time and experience to be throughly seen in controversies are very unfit to make themselves parties And that they are yet more unfit to be the hottest leaders of those parties and to spur on their Teachers that know more than they If the work be fit for another to do that knoweth on what ground he goeth and can foresee the end yet certainly it is not fit for you And therefore forbear it till you are more fit § 2. I know those that would draw you into such a contentious zeal will tell you that their cause is the cause of God and that you desert him and betray it if you be not zealous in it and that it is but the counsel
To be as like God in all his communicable excellencies as is agreeable to our created state and capacity 2. And to have as near and full communion with him as we can attain to and enjoy § 7. 7. The Will of God and his Goodness and Holiness is more nearly propounded to us to be the Rule of our Conformity than his Power and his Knowledge Therefore his Law is most immediately the expression of his Will and our Duty and Goodness lyeth in our Conformity to his Law being Holy as he is Holy Because I may not stand on the particulars I shall give you a brief imperfect Scheme of that of God which you must thus know GOD is to be known by us I. As â—â—â—â—â—â—â—â— I. In his BEING Qâ—od â—â—â—â— 1. One and indivisible In Three Persons 2. Immense and incomprehensible 3. Eternal 1. The FATHER 2. The SON 3. The HOLY GHOST 1. Necessary 2. Independent 3. Immutable II. In his NATURE Quod â—â—t A SPIRIT 1. Simple uncompounded 2. Impassionate incoruptible immortal 3. Invisible intactible c. and LIFE it self 1. POWER 2. UNDERSTANDING 3. WILL. III. In his PERFECTIONS Qâ—aliâ—â—â—â—â— 1. OMNIPOTENT 2. OMNISCIENT 3. MOST GOOD 1. MOST GREAT 2. MOST WISE 3. MOST HOLY and HAPPY 1. BEING HIMSELF 2. KNOWING HIMSELF 3. LOVING ENJOYING HIMSELF II. As Râ—laâ—â—d to his Creatures I. The EFFICIENT Cause of all things Rom. 9. 36. OF HIM 1. CREATOR Conserver 1. Our OWNER or LORD most Absolute Free and Irresistible d 1. Our Life and Strength and Safety e 1. Perfecting our Natures in Heavenly Life II. The DIRIGENT Cause THROUGH HIM 2. REDEEMER Saviour 2. Our RULER or KING 1. By Legislation 2. Judgement 3. Execution Absolute Perfect True Holy Just Merciful Patient Terrible 2. Our Light and Wisdom 2. Whom we shall behold in Glorious Light III. The FINAL Cause TO HIM are all things To him be Glory for ever Amen 3. REGENERATOR Sanctifier 3. Our BENEFACTOR or FATHER 1. Most Loving 2. Most Bountiful 3. Most Amiable Patient Merciful Constant. Causally and Objectively d 3. Our Love and Ioy And so our End and Rest and Happiness hereafter e 3. Whom we shall Please and Love and be Pleased in him and Loved by him Rejoyce in him Praise him and so Enjoy him Perfectly and Perpetually See these Practically opened and improved in the First Part of my Divine Life The more full Explication of the Attributes fit for the more capacious is reserved for another Tractate § 8. For the right improvement of the Knowledge of all these Attributes of God I must refer you Do Dâ—s ita uâ— sunt loquere Bias iâ—l â—â—â—â— â—â—g Paâ—â—i Sâ—alâ—gâ—i â—â—â—â—â— sâ—s de 〈◊〉 Mâ—â—do Ep. Cath. l 14. God never wrought Miracâ—e to convince Atheism because his ordinary works convince it â— Baâ—oâ— Essay 16. p. 87. Deus est mens soluta libera legâ—egata ab omni concretione mortall omnia seâ—â—â—â—enâ— movens c. Cicero 1. Tâ—â—cul to the fore-mentioned Treatise The acts which you are to exercise upon God are these 1. The clearest Knowledge you can attain to 2. The firmest Belief 3. The highest Estimation 4. The greatest Admiration 5. The â—eartiest and sweetest Complacency or Love 6. The strongest Desire 7. A filial Awfulness Reverence and Fear 8. The boldest quietting Trust and confidence in him 9. The most fixed Waiting Dependance Hope and Expectation 10. The most absolute self-resignation to him 11. The fullest and quiettest submission to his disposals 12. The humblest and most absolute subjection to his Governing Authority and Will and the exactest obedience to his Laws 13. The boldest courage and fortitude in his cause and owning him before the world in the greatest sufferings 14. The greatest Thank fulness for his Mercies 15. The most faithful improvement of his Talents and use of his Means and performance of our trust 16. A reverent and holy use of his Name and Word with a Reverence of his Secrets forbearing to intrude or meddle with them 17. A wise and cautelous observance of his Providences publick and private neither neglecting them nor mis-interpreting them neither running before them nor striving discontentedly against them 18. A disâ—â—rning loving and honouring his Image in his children notwithstanding their infirmities and faults without any friendship to their faults or over magnifying or imitating them in any evil 19. A reverent serious spiritual adoration and worshipping him in publick and private with soul and body in the use of all his holy Ordinances but especially in the joyful celebration of his Praise for all his Perfections and his Mercies 20. The highest Delight and fullest Content and Comfort in God that we can attain Especially a Delight in Knowing him and Obeying and Pleasing him Worshipping and Praising him Loving him and being beloved of him through Jesus Christ and in the hopes of the Perfecting of all these in our Everlasting fruition of him in Heavenly Glory All these are the Acts of Piety towards God which I lay together for your easier observation and memory But some of them must be more fully opened and insisted on DIRECT V. Remember that God is your Lord or Owner and see that you make an absolute Gr. Dir. 5. Of Self-resignation to God as our Owner Resignation of your selves and all that you have to him as his Own and Use your selves and all accordingly Trust him with his Own and rest in his disposals § 1. OF this I have already spoken in my Sermon of Christs Dominion and in my Directions for a sound Conversion and therefore must but touch it here It is easie notionally to know and say that God is our Owner and we are not our Own But if the Habitual Practical knowledge of it were as easie or as common the happy effects of it would be the sanctification and reformation of the world I shall first tell you what this Duty is and how it is to be performed and then what fruits and benefits it will produce and what should move us to it § 2. I. The duty lyeth in these acts 1. That you consider the Ground of Gods Propriety in you Persuasum hoc sit à principiâ— hominibus dominos esse omnium rerum ac moderatores Deos eaque quae gâ—raâ—â—ur coâ—um geâ—i dâ—â—â—â—one aâ—que numâ—nâ— Et qâ—â—â—â—â— quisque â—â—â—â— quâ—â— agat quâ—d in se admiâ—â—aâ— qua mâ—nte qua pâ—etaâ—e â—olat râ—ligiâ—nem intue â— pâ—orumque impâ—orum habere ratâ—onem 〈◊〉 â— dâ—â—â—â—â— 1. In making you of Nothing and preserving you 2. In Redeeming you by purchase 3. In Regenerating you and renewing you for himself The first is the Ground of his Common Natural Propriety in you and all things The second is the Ground of his Common Gracious Propriety in you and all men as Purchased by Christ Rom. 14. 9 Iohn 13. 3. The third is the Ground of his special Gracious Propriety in you and all his sanctified peculiar people Understand and acknowledge what a Plenary
That if you Tempt 10. are weak he may either discourage you or which is more usual and dangerous make you think better of them than they are and to think you know much when its next to nothing and to make you wise in your own eyes and easily to receive an error and then to be confident in it not to discern between things that differ but to be deceived into false zeal and false wayes by the specious pretences and shews of truth and then to be zealous for the deceiving of others Also that you may be a dishonour to truth and godliness by your weakness and ill management of good causes and may give them away through your unskilfulness to the adversary If you are of stronger wits and parts the Tempter will draw you to despise the weak to take common gifts for special grace or to undervalue holiness and humility and overvalue learning and acuteness He will tempt you dangerously to lothe the simplicity of Christianity and â—f the Scriptures as to style and method and to be offended at the Cross of Christ. So that such persons are usually in greater danger of Infidelity Heresie Pride and insolent domineering over the flock of Christ than vulgar Christians that have lower parts § 20. Direct 10. Labour to be well acquainted with your selves If you are weak know your Direct 10. weakness that you may be humble and fearful and seek for strength and help If you are comparatively strong remember how weak the strongest are and how little it is that the wisest know And study well the Ends and use of knowledge that all that you know may be conâ—â—cted into Love and Holiness and use it as remembring that you have much to give account of § 21. Tempt 11. Moreover the Tempter will fetch advantage against you from your former life Tempt 11. and actions If you have gone out of the way to Heaven he would harden you by custom and make you think it such a disgrace or trouble to return as that it s as good go on and put it to the venture If you have done any work materially good while your heart and course of life is carnal and worldly he would quiet you in your sinful miserable state by applauding the little good that you have done If a good man have erred or done ill he will engage his honour in it and make him study to defend it or excuse it left it prove his shame and tempt men as he did David to hide one sin with another If he gâ—t hâ—ld of one link he will draw on all the chain of sin § 22. Direct 11. Take heed therefore what you do and foresee the end Let not the Devil get Direct 11. in one foot Try your way before you enter it But if you have erred come off and that throughly and betime whatever it cost for be sure it will cost more to go on And if he would make a snare of the good that you have done remember that this is to turn it into the greatest evil And that there must be a concurrence and integrity of good to make you acceptable and to save you Heart and life must be good to the End § 23. Tempt 12. Lastly He fitteth his Temptations to the season He will take the season just Tempt 12. when an evil thought is likest to take with you and when the Winds and Tyde dâ— serve him that will take at one time when a man hath his wits and heart to seek which would be abhorred at another In afflicting Times he will draw you to deny Christ with Peter or shift for your selves by sinful means In prosperous Times he will tempt you to security worldliness and forgetfulness of the night and Winter which approacheth The Timing his Temptations is his great advantage § 24. Direct 12. Dwell as with God and you dwell as in Eternity and will see still that as Time Direct 12. so all the pleasure and advantages and dangers and sufferings of Time are things in themselves of little moment Keep your eye upon Iudgement and Eternity where all the errors of Time will be rectified and all the inequalities of Time will be levelled and the sorrows and joyes that are transitory will be no more And then no reasons from the frowns or flatteries of the Times will seem of any force to you And be still employed for God and still armed and on your watch that Satan may never find you disposed to take the bait The Tempters Method in applying his prepared baits § 25. Tempt 1. The Devils first work is to present the Tempting bait in all its alluring deceiving Tempt 1. properties To make it seem as true as may be to the understanding and as good and amiable as may be to the will To say as much as can be said for an evil cause He maketh his Image of Truth and Goodness as beautiful as he can Sin shall be sugared and its pleasure shall be its strength Heb. 11. 25. Sin shall have its wages paid down in hand 2 Pet. 2. 15. He will set it out with full mouthed praises O what a fine thing it is to be rich and please the flesh continually to have command and honour and lusts and sports and what you desire Who would refuse such a condition that may have it All this will I give thee was the Temptation which he thought fit to assault Christ himself with And he will corrupt the History of Time past and tell you that it went well with those that took his way Jer. 44. 17. And for the future he will promise them that they shall be gainers by it as he did Eve and shall have peace though they please their flesh in sinning See Deut. 29. 19. § 26. Direct 1. In this case first enquire what God saith of that which Satan so commendeth Direct 1. The commendations and motions of an enemy are to be suspected God is most to be believed 2. Then consider not only whether it be good but how long it will be good and what it will prove at the end and how we shall judge of it at the parting And withal consider what it tendeth to whether it tend to good or evil and whether it be the greatest good that we are capable of And then you will see that if there were no good or appearance of good in it it could do a voluntary agent no hurt and were not fit to be the matter of a Temptation And you 'll see that it is temporal good set up to deceive you of the Eternal Good and to entice you into the greatest evil and misery Doth the Devil shâ—w thee the world and say All this will I give thee Look to Christ who sheweth thee the glory of the world to come with all things good for thee in this world and saith more truly All this will I give thee The world and Hell are in one end of the ballance
Unhumbledness Impurity Unreformedness and all sin in general as sin In the ninth you are directed against †Of Presumption and false hope enough is said in the Saints Rest and here about Temptation Hope and other Heads afterward Security Unwatchfulness and yielding to temptations and in general against all danger to the soul. In the tenth you are directed against Barrenness Unprofitableness and Sloth and Uncharitableness and against mistakes in matter of duty or good works In the eleventh you are directed against all Aversness Disaffection or cold Indifferency of heart to God In the twelfth you are directed against Distrust and sinful Cares and Fears and Sorrows In the thirteenth you are directed against an over sad or heartless serving of God as meerly from fear or forcedly without delight In the fourteenth you are directed against Unthankfulness In the fifteenth you are directed against all unholy or dishonourable thoughts of God and against all injurious speeches of him or barrenness of the tongue and against all scandal or barrenness of life In the Books referred to in the sixteenth and seventeenth you are directed against selfishness self-esteem self-love self-conceit self-will self-seeking and against all worldliness and fleshliness of mind or life But yet leâ—t any necessary helps should be wanting against such heinous sins I shall add some more particular Directions against such of them as were not fully spoken to before PART I. Directions against UNBELIEF § 1. I Know that most poor troubled Christians when they complain of the sin of Unbelief do mean by it their not Believing that they are sincere believers and personally justified and shall be saved â— Whether not to believe that my sins are pardoned â—e indeed Unbelieâ— And I know that some Divines have affirmed that the sense of that Article of the Creed I believe the Remission of sins is I believe my sins are actually forgiven But the truth is to believe that I am elect or justified or that my sins are forgiven or that I am a sincere Believer is not to Believe any word of God at all For no word of God doth say any of these nor any thing equivalent nor any thing out of which it can be gathered For it is a Rational Conclusion and one of the premises which do infer it must be found in my self by reflexion or internal sense and self-knowledge The Scripture only saith He that truly believeth is justified and shall be saved But it is Conscience and not Belief of Scripture which must say I do sincerely believe Therefore the Conclusion that I am justified and shall be saved is a Rational Collection from what I find in Scripture and in my self set together and resulting from both can be no firmer or surer than is the weaker of the premises Now Certainty is objective or subjective in the Thing or in my Apprehension As to Objective Certainty in the thing it self all truths are equally true But all Truths are not equally discernable there being much more cause of doubting concerning some which are less evident than concerning others which are more evident And so the Truth of Gods promise of Justification to believers is more certain that is hath fuller surer Evidence to be discerned by than the Truth of my sincere believing And that I sincerely believe is the more Debile of the premises and therefore the conclusion followeth this in its Debility And so can be no article of faith And as to the subjective Certainty that varyeth according to mens various apprehensions The premises as in their evidence or aptitude to ascertain us are the cause of the Conclusion as evident or knowable And the premises as apprehended are the Cause of the Conclusion as known Now it is a great doubt with some Whether a man can possibly be more certain that he believeth Whether a man can be more certain that he believeth than he is that the thing believed is true than he is that the thing believed is true because the act can extend no further than the object and to be sure I believe is but to be sure that I take the thing believed to be true But I shall grant the contrary that a man may possibly be surer that he believeth than he is that the thing believed is true because my believing is not alwayes a full subjective certainty that the thing is true but a believing that its true And though you are fully certain that all Gods word is true yet you may believe that this is his word with some mixture of unbelief or doubting And so the question is but this Whether you may not certainly without doubting know that you Believe the Word of God to be true though with some doubting And it seems you may But then it is a further question Whether you can be surer of the saving sincerity of your faith than you are that this Word of God is true And that ordinarily men doubt of the first as much as they doubt of the later I think is an experimented truth But yet grant that with some it may be otherwise Because he believeth sincerely that so far believeth the Word of God as to trust his life and soul upon it and forsake all in obedience to it And that I do so I may know with less doubting than I yet have about the Truth of the Word so believed All that will follow is but this That of those men that doubt of their Iustification and Salvation some of their doubts are caused more by their doubting of Gods Word than by the doubting whether they sincerely though doubtingly believe it and the doubts of others whether they are justified and shall be saved is caused much more by their doubting of their own sincere belief than by their doubting of the truth of Scriptures And the far greatest number of Christians seem to themselves to be of this later sort For no doubt but though a man of clear understanding can scarcely believe and yet not know that he believeth yet he may believe sincerely and not know that he believeth sincerely But still the knowledge of our own justification is but the effect or progeny of our Belief of the Word of God and of our Knowledge that we do sincerely believe it which conjunctly are the Parents and Causes of it And it can be no stronger than the weaker of the Parents which in esse cognoscibili is our faith but in esse cognito is sometime the one and sometime the other And the effect is not the cause The effect of faith and knowledge conjunct is not faith it self It is not a Believing the Word of God to believe that you believe or that you are Iustified But yet because that faith is one of the Parents of it some call it by the name of faith though they should call it but an effect of faith as one of the causes And well may our doubtings of our own salvation be said to be from Unbelief because
of this but live as quietly and talk as pleasantly as if all were well with them and their souls were safe and their calling and election were made sure Alas if these souls were not hardned in sin we should see it in their tears or hear it in their complaints they would after Sermon sometime come to the Minister as they Acts 2. 37. Acts 16. 30. Sirs what must we do to be saved or we should see it in their lives or hear of it by report of others who would observe the change that grace hath made and Sermons would stick longer by them and not at best be turned off with a fruitless commendation and saying it was a good Sermon and there is an end of it Judge now by this true description which I have given you what a hardned sinner is And then the godly may so see cause to bewail the remnants of this mischief as yet to be daily thankful to God that they are not in the power of it § 10. Direct 7. Live if you can possibly under a lively quickning Ministry and in the company of Direct 7. seriâ—us lively Christianâ— It is true that we should be deeply affected with the truths of God how coldly soever they be delivered But the question is not what is our duty but what is our disease and 〈…〉 and the proper remedy All men should be so holy as not to need any exhortations to 〈◊〉 at all But shall Ministers therefore neglect such exhortations or they that need them â—â—â—â— away their â—ars Hear if possible that Minister that first feels what he speaks and so speaks what â—â— feels as tendeth most to make you feel Isa. 58. 1 2. Cry aloud spare not lift up thy â—â—â—â—â— like a Trumpet and shew my people their transgressions and the house of Israel their sins Though â—â—câ—â—â— seek me daily and delight to know my wayes as a Nation that did righteousness and forsook nâ—t â—â—â—â— Orâ—inanceâ— of their God God is the chief agent but he useth to work according to the â—â—â—â—â—â— of the instrument O woful case to hear a dead Minister speaking to a dead people the living truths of the living God! As Christ said If the blind lead the blind both will fall into the ditch And if the dead must raise the dead and the ungodly enemies of a holy life must bring men to godliness and to a holy life it must be by such a power as once made use of clay and spittle to open the eyes of the blind It seems it was a Proverb in Christs dayes Let the dead bury their dead 2 â—â—â—â— 13 â—1 But not Let the dead raise the dead God may honour the bones of the dead Prophet with the raising a Corps that is cast into its grave and toucheth them A meeting of a dead Minister and a dead people is like a place of graves and though it be a lamentable thing to hear a man speak without any life of life eternal yet God can concurr to the quickning of a soul. But sure we have no great reason to expect that ordinarily he should convert men so miraculously without the moral aptitude of means It is most incongruous for any man in his familiar discourse to speak without great seriousness and reverence of things concerning life eternal But for a Preacher to talk of God of Christ of Heaven and Hell as coldly and sleepily as if he were perswading men not to believe him or regard him that no more regards himself is less tolerable It is a sad thing to hear a man draw out a dreaming dull discourse about such astonishing weighty things and to speak as if it were the business of his art to teach men to sleep while the names of Heaven and Hell are in their ears and not to be moved while they hear the message of the living God about their life or death everlasting If a man tell in the Streets of a fire in the Town or a Souldier bring an Allarm of the enemy at the Gates in a reading or jeasting tone the hearers will neglect him and think that he believeth not himself I know it is not meer noise that will convert a soul A bawling fervency which the hearers may discern to be but histrionical and affected and not to come from a serious heart doth harden the auditors worst of all A rude unreverent noise is unbeseeming an Embassador of Christ But an ignorant saying of a few confused words or a sleepy recital of the most pertinent things do as little beseem them Christ raised not Lazarus by the lowdness of his voice But where the natural ears are the passage to the mind the voice and manner should be suitable to the matter Noise without seriousness and pertinent matter is like Gunpowder without Bullet that causeth sound and no execution And the weightiest matter without clear explication and lively application is like Bullet without Powder If you will throw Canon Bullets at the enemy with your hands they will sooner fall on your feet than on them And it is deadness aggravated by hypocrisie when a lifeless Preacher will pretend moderation as if he were afraid of speaking too lowd and earnestly leâ—t he should awake the dead whom lightning and thunder will not awake and when he will excuse himself by accusing those that are not as drowzie or dead as he and would make men believe that seriousness is intemperate rage or madness If you are cast upon a cold and sleepy Minister consider the matter more than the manner But choose not such a one for the cure of hardness and insensibility of heart § 11. Direct 8. Take notice how sensible tender hearted Christians are of sins far less than those Direct 8. that you make a jeast of And how close those matters come to their hearts that touch not yours And have not you as much cause to be moved as they and as much need to lay such things to heart Did you but know what a trouble it is to them to be haunted with temptations to the unbelief and Atheism which prevaileth with you though they are far from choosing them or delighting in them Did you see how involuntary thoughts and frailâ—ies make some of them aweary of themselves and how they even hate their hearts for believing no more and loving God no more and for being so strange to God and Heaven when yet there is nothing in the world so dear to them nor hath so much of their Estimation or Endeavour You would think sure that if such hearts had your sin and misery to feel they would feel it to their grief indeed unless the sin it self did hinder the feeling as it doth with you Let tender hearted Christians instruct you and not be witnesses against you § 12. Direct 9. Take heed of hardning Company Examples and Discoursâ— To hear men rail and Direct 9. sâ—â—ffe at Holiness and curse and swear and blaspheme the Name and Truth of God
this to encrease and multiply your pleasure Is not health and friends and food and convenient habitation much sweeter as the â—ruit of the Love of God and the fore-tastes of everlasting mercies and as our helps to Heaven and as the means to spiritual comfort than of themselves alone All your mercies are from God He would take nâ—ne from you but sanctifie theâ— and give you more § 26. Direct 5. See that Reason keep up its authority as the Governour of sense and appetite And Direct 5. so take an accounâ— whatâ—ver the Appetite would have of the Ends and Reasons of the thing and to what it doth câ—â—duce Take nothing and do nothing meerly because the sense or appetite would have it but because you have Reason so â—â— do and to gratifie the appetite Else you will deal as Brutes if Reason be laid by in humane acts § 27. Direct 6. Go to the Gâ—ave and see there the end of fleshly pleasure and what is all that it Direct 6. will do for you at the last One would think iâ— should cure the mad desire of plenty and pleasure to see where all our wealth and mirth and sport and pleasure must be buryed at last § 28. Direct 7. Lastly be still sensible that flesh is the grand Enemy of your souls and flesh-pleasing Direct 7. the greatest hinderance of your salvation The Devils enmity and the worlds are both but subordinate to this of the Flesh For its Pleasure is the End and the world and Satans temptations are both but the means to attain it Besides the malignity opened before consider 1. How contrary a voluptuous life is to the blessed example of our Lord and of his servant Paul The enmity of the Flesh. and all the Apostles Paul tamed his body and brought it into subjection left having preached to others himself should be a castaway 1 Cor. 9. 27. And all that are Christs have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts thereof Gal. 5. 24. This was signified in the antient manner of baptizing and so is still by Baptism it self when they went over head in the water and then rose out of it to signifie that they were dead and buried with Christ Rom. 6. 3 4. and rose with him to newness of life This is called our being Baptized into his death And seems the plain sense of 1 Cor. 15. 29. of being Baptized for the dead that is for dead or to shew that we are dead to the world and must dye in the world but shall rise again to the Kingdom of Christ both of Grace and Glory 2. Sensuality sheweth that there is no true belief of the life to come and proveth so far as it prevaileth the absence of all grace 3. It is a home-bred continual traytor to the soul A continual tempter and nurse of all sin The great withdrawer of the heart from God and the common cause of Apostacy it self It still fighteth against the Spirit Gal. 5. 17. And is seeking advantage from all our Liberties Gal. 5. 13. 2 Pet. 2. 10. 4. It turneth all our outward mercies into sin and strengthneth itself against God by his own benefits 5. It is the great cause of our afflictions For God will not spare that Idol which is set up against him Flesh rebelleth and flesh shall suffer 6. And when it hath brought affliction it is most impatient under it and maketh it seem intollerable A flesh-pleaser thinks he is undone when affliction depriveth him of his pleasure 7. Lastly It exceedingly unfitteth men for Death For then Flesh must be cast into the dust and all its pleasure be at an end O doleful day to those that had their good things here and their portion in this life When all is gone that ever they valued and sought and all the true felicity lost which they brutishly contemned If you would joyfully then bear the dissolution and ruine of your flesh O master it and mortifie it now Seek not the ease and pleasure of a little walking breathing clay when you should be seeking and fore-tasting the everlasting pleasure Here lyeth your danger and your work Strive more against your own flesh than against all your Enemies in Earth and Hell If you be saved from this you are saved from them all Christ suffered in the flesh to tell you that it is not pampering but suffering that your flesh must expect if you will reign with him CHAP. V. Further Subordinate Directions for the next great duties of Religion necessary See the Directions how to spend every day Tom. 2. Chap. 17. to the right performance of the former Directions for REDEEMING or well improving TIME § 1. TIME being Mans opportunity for all those works for which he liveth and which his Creator doth expect from him and on which his endless life dependeth the REDEEMING or well improving of it must needs be of most high importance to him And therefore it is well made by holy Paul the great mark to distinguish the Wise from fools Ephes. 5. 15 16. See then that ye walk circumspectly not as fools but as wise Redeeming the time So Col. 4. 5. I shall therefore give you special Directions for it when I have first opened the nature of the duty to you and told you what is meant by Time and what by Redeeming it § 2. Time in its most common acception is taken generally for all that space of this present life What 's meant by Time which is our opportunity for all the works of life and the measure of them Time is often taken more strictly for some special Opportunity which is fitted to a special work which we call the season or the fittest time In both these senses Time must be Redeemed § 3. As every work hath its season which must be taken Eccles. 3. 1. So have the greatest works What are the special seasons of duty assigned us for God and our souls some special seasons besides our common time 1. Some Times God hath fitted by Nature for his service So the Time of Youth and health and strength is specially fit for holy work 2. Some Time is made specially fit by Gods Institution As the Lords Day above all other dayes 3. Some Time is made fit by Governours appointment as the hour of publick Meeting for Gods Worship and Lecture-dayes and the hour for family-worship which every Master of a family may appoint to his own houshold 4. Some Time is made fit by the temper of mens Bodies The Morning hours are best to most and to some rather the Evening and to all the Time when the Body is freest from pain and disabling weaknesses 5. Some Time is made fit by the course of our necessary natural or civil business as the day is fitter than the sleeping time of the night and as that hour is the fittest wherein our other imployments will least disturb us 6. Some Time is made fit by a special showr of Mercy publick
the chief part of this sin is to be cured according to the Directions in the first Chapter as a state of wickedness is and more I shall say anon about the Worship of God and Chap. 3. Direct 11. containeth the cure also Only here I shall add a few Directions to a God-hating Generation § 2. Direct 1. The first thing you have to do is to discover this to be your sin For you are confident Direct 1. that you love God above all while you hate him above all even above the Devil You will confess that this is horrid wickedness where it is found and well deserveth damnation Take heed lest thy own confession judge thee Remember then that it is not the bare Name that we now speak of I know that Gods Name is most honoured and the Devils name is most hated Nor is it every thing in God that is hated None hateth his Mercifulness and Goodness as such Nor is it every thing in the Devil that is loved None love his hatred to man nor his cruelty in tormenting men But the Holiness of God which is it that man must receive the Image of and be conformed to is hated by the unholy And the Devils unholiness and friendship to mens sin and sensuality is loved by the sensual and unholy And this hatred of God and Love of the Devil one would think you might casily perceive § 3. 1. In that you had rather God were not so Iust and Holy you had rather he had never commanded you to be Holy but leâ—t you to live as your flesh would have you you had rather God were indifferent as to your sins and would give you leave to follow your lusts Such a God you would have And a God that will damn you unless you be Holy and hate your sins and forsake them you like not you cannot abide but indeed do hate him § 4. 2. Therefore you will not Believe that God is such a holy sin-hating God Because you would Malunâ— nescire quia jam oderunt Tertul. Apoâ—get c. â— not have him so you will not believe he is so and so hate his nature while you believe that you love him and love but an Idol of your unholy fantasies Psal. 50. 21 22. These things hast thou done and I kept silence thou thoughtst that I was altogether such a one as thy self but I will reprove thee and set them in order before thy eyes Now consider this ye that forget God lest I tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver § 5. 3. You love not the Holiness of the Word of God which beareth his Image You love not these strict and holy passages in it Ioh. 3. 3 5. Luke 14. 26 33. Matth. 18. 3. Rom. 8. 13. Col. 3. 1 2 3 4. 2 Cor. 5. 17. with abundance more You had rather have had a Scripture that would have left your ambition covetousness lust and appetite to their liberties and that had said nothing for the absolute necessity of Holiness nor had condemned the ungodly § 6. 4. You love not the holiest Ministers or servants of Christ that most powerfully preach his holy Word or that most carefully seriously and zealously obey it your hearts rise against them when they bring in the Light which sheweth that your deeds and you are evil Iohn 3. 19 20. They are an eye-sore to you your hearts rise not so much against Whoremongers Swearers Lyars Drunkards Atheists or Infidels as against them What sort of persons on the face of the earth are so hated by the ungodly in all Nations and of all degrees and used by them so cruelly and pursued by them so implacably as the holiest servants of the Lord are § 7. 5 You love not to call upon God in serious fervent spiritual prayer praises and thanksgiving You are quickly weary of it you had rather be at a Play or Gaming or a Feast your hearts rise against holy Worship as a tedious irksome thing § 8. 6. You love not holy edifying discourse of God and of heavenly things Your hearts rise against it and you hate and scorn it as if all serious talk of God were but hypocrisie and God were to be banished out of our discourse § 9. 7. You cannot abide the serious frequent Thoughts of God in secret but had rather stuff your minds with thoughts of your Horses or Hawks or bravery or honour or preferments or sports or entertainments or business and labours in the world So that one hour of a thousand or ten thousand was never spent in serious delightful thoughts of God his holy truths or works or Kingdom § 10. 8. You love not the blessed day of Judgement when Christ will come with his holy Angels to judge the world to justifie his accused and abused servants to be glorified in his Saints and admired in all them that do believe 2 Thess. 1. 8 9 10 11. And can you be so blind after all this as not to see that you are HATERS OF GOD § 11. Direct 2. Know God better and thou canst not hate him especially know the beauty and Direct 2. glorious excellency of that Holiness and Iustice which thou hatest Should the Sun be darkned or disgraced because sore eyes cannot endure its light Must Kings and Judges be all corrupt or change their Laws and turn all men loose to do what they list because Malefactors and licentious men would have it so § 12. Direct 3. Know God and Holiness as they are to thee thy self and then thou wilt know them not only to be Best for thee as the Sun is to the world and as life and health is to thy body but to be thy only good and happiness and then thou canst not choose but love them Thy prejudice and false conceits of God and Holiness cause thy Hatred § 13. Direct 4. Cast away thy cursed unbelief If thou believe not what the Scripture saith of God Direct 4. and man and of the souls immortality and the life to come thou wilt then hate all that is Holy as a deceit and needless troubler of the world But if once thou believe well the Word of God and the life everlasting thou wilt have another heart § 14. Direct 5. Away with thy beastly blinding sensuality While thou art a slave to thy flesh Direct 5. and lusts and appetite and its interest reigneth in thee thou canst not choose but hate that Holiness which is against it and hate that God that forbiddeth it and tells thee that he will judge thee and damn thee for it if thou forsake it not This is the true cause of the Hatred of God and Pene omnis sermâ— Div nus habet aemuloâ— suos Quot genera prâ—â—â—ptorum sunt â—â—t adversa â—oâ—um si larg 〈…〉 esse 〈…〉 buâ— juâ—â—t Dominus avarus irascitur si parsimomam eâ—gâ—â— prodigus execratur Sermones sacros improbi hostes suos dicunt Salvian li. 4 ad Eccles. Cath. Non ego tibi
soon as Isaac had given it to Iacob Answ. When he had sold his birth-right it was too late to recall it for the right was made over to his Brother It seemeth to be Isaac's Repentance which â—â—aw found no place â—â—â—â— But â—â— it be spoken oâ— the unacceptableness of his own Repentance when it was too late it signifieth not that any mans is too late in this life as to 〈…〉 and it was not Repentance and cryes and tears that could recal the right he had sold nor recal the words that Isaac had spoken But this doth not prove that our day of grace doth not continue till death or that any man Repenting before his death shall be rejected as Esau's repentance was The Apostle neither saith nor meaneth any such thing The sense of his words are only this much Take heed lest there be any so prophane among you as to set so light by the blessings of the Gospel even Christ and life eternall as to part with them for a base lust or transitory thing as Esau that set more by a morsel of meat than by his birth-right For let them be sure that the time will come even the time mentioned by Christ Matth. 25. 10 11. when the door is shut and the Lord is come when they will dearly repent it and then as it was with Esau when the blessing was gone so it will be with them when their blessing is gone Repentance and cries and tears will be too late For the Gospel hath its justice and terrors as well as the Law This is all in the Text but there is no intimation that our day of Grace is as short as Esau's hope of the blessing was § 15. Obj. 4. Saul had but his time which when he lost he was forsaken of God Obj. 4. Answ. Saul's sin provoked God to reject him from being King of Israel and to appoint another in Answ. his stead But if Saul had Repented he had been saved after that though not restored to the Crown And its true that as God withdrew from him the spirit of Government so many before death by the greatness of their sins cause God to forsake them so far as to withhold those motions and convictions and fears and disquietments in sin which sometime they had and to give them over to a reprobate mind Rom. 1. 28. to commit all uncleanness with greediness and glory in it as being past feeling Eph. 4. 18 19. If it be thus with you you would be no better you would not be recovered you think sin is best for you and hate all that would reform you § 16. Obj. 5. It is said 2 Cor. 6. 2. Behold now is the accepted time behold now is the day of salvavation Obj. 5. And Heb. 3. 7 12 13. To day if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts lest any of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin Answ. This saith no more than that the present time is the hest yea the only certain time and we Answ. are not sure that the day of salvation will continue any longer because death may cut us off But if it do not yet sin is a hardening thing and the longer we sin the more it hardeneth yea God may withhold the motions of his spirit and leave us to our selves to the hardness of our hearts and thus he doth by thousands of wicked persons who are left in impenitency and hatred of the truth But most certainly if those men Repented they might be saved and the very reason why they have not Christ and life is still because they will not consent § 17. Direct 6. Understand by what help and strength it is that the Obedience to the Gospel must be Direct 6. performed not meerly by your own strength but by the help of grace and strength of Christ If he have but made you willing he will help you to perform the rest You are not by this Covenant to be a Saviour and sanctifier to your selves but to Consent that Christ be your Saviour and the Holy Spirit your Sanctifier You might else despair indeed if you were left to that which you are utterly unable to do Though you must work out your own salvation with fear and trembling it is he that worketh in you to will and to do of his good pleasure Phil. 2. 13. § 18. Direct 7. Understand well the difference between mortal sins and Infirmities that you may not Direct 7. think that every sin is a sign of death or gracelesness but may know the difference between those sins which should make you think your selves unjustified and those sins which only call for particular humiliation being such as the justified themselves commit Though in the Popish sense we take no sin to be venial that is which in it self is properly no sin nor deserveth death according to the Law of works yet the distinction between Mortal and Venial sin is of very great necessity that is between sins which prove a man De quâ vide Tract Râ—b Baâ—oâ—â—â—â— Of Mortal and Venial sin in a state of death or unjustified and sins which consist with a state of Grace and justification between sins which the Gospel pardoneth not and those which it pardoneth that is all that stand with true Repentance There are some sins which every one that Repenteth of them doth so forsake as to cease committing them And there are some lesser sins which they that Repent of them do hate indeed but yet frequently renew as our defective degrees in the exercise of Repentance it self faith love trust fear obedience our vain thoughts and words some sinful passions omissions of many duties of thought affection word or deed towards God or man some minutes of time over-slip us prayer and other duties have a sinful coldness or remissness in them and such like Many such sins are fitly called Infirmities and Venial because they consist with Life and are forgiven It is of great use to the peace of our Consciences to discern the difference between these two for one sort require a Conversion to another state and the other require but a particular repentance and where they are unknown are forgiven without particular repentance because our general repentance is virtually though not actually particular as to them One sort are cause of judging our selves ungodly and the other sort are only cause of filial humiliation Any one may see the great need of discerning the difference but yet it is a matter of very great judgement doctrinally to distinguish them much more actually to discern them in every instance in your selves The way is to know first what is the condition of the New-Covenant and of absolute necessity to salvation or justification and then every sin that is inconsistent with that condition is mortal and the rest that are consistent and do consist with it are venial or but infirmities As Venial signifieth only that sort of sin which is
that hath given us the higher faculty requireth that we use it as well as the lower And remember that they are not meer co-ordinate faculties but the sensitive faculty is subordinate to the Intellectual And accordingly that which the sensible creature objectively revealeth through the sense unto the Intellect is something to which things sensible are subordinate Therefore if you stop in sensible things and see not the Principle which animateth them the Power which ordereth and ruleth them and the End which they are made for and must be used for you play the Beasts you see nothing but a dead carkass without the soul and nothing but a useless senseless thing You know nothing indeed to any purpose no not the creature it self while you know not the use and meaning of the creature but separate it from its Life and Guide and End § 15. Direct 12. First therefore see that you ever look upon all things sensible as the products of the Direct 12. will of the invisible God depending on him more than the Sunshine doth upon the Sun and never see or taâ—â—e a creature separatedly from God Will you know what a plant is and not know that it is the earth that beareth and nourisheth it Will you know what a Fish is and yet be ignorant that he liveth in the water Will you know what a branch or fruit is and yet not know that it groweth on the Tree The nature of things cannot be known without the knowledge of their causes and respective parts It is as no knowledge to know incoherent scraps and parcels To know a hand as no part of the body or an eye or nose without knowing a head or a body without knowing its life or soul is not to know it for you make it another thing It is the difference between a wise man and a fool that Sapiens respicit ad plura insipiâ—ns ad pauciora A wise man looketh comprehensively to things as they are conjunct and takes all together and leaveth out nothing that is useful to his end but a fool seeth one thing and overseeth another which is necessary to the true knowledge or use of that which he seeth see God as the Cause and Life of every thing you see As a carkass is but a ghastly sight without the soul and quickly corrupteth and stinketh when it is separated so the Creature without God is an unlovely sight and quickly corrupteth and becomes a snare or annoyance to you God is the beauty of all that 's beautiful and the strength of all that 's strong and the glory of the Sun and all that is glorious and the wisdom of all that 's wise and the goodness of all that 's good as being the only original total cause of all You play the Brutes when you see the creature and overlook its Maker from whom it is whatsoever it is Will you see the Diall and overlook the Sun Remember it is the use of every Creature to shew you God and therefore it is the use of every sense to promote the knowledge of him § 16. Direct 13. See God as the Conductor orderer and disposer of all the creatures according to their natures as moved necessarily or freely and behold not any of the motions or events of the world without observing the interest and over-ruling hand of God Sense reacheth but to the effects and events but Reason and faith can see the first cause and disposer of all Again I tell you that if you look but on the particles of things by sense and see not God that setteth all together and doth his work by those that never dream of it you see but the several wheels and parcels of a Clock or Watch and know not him that made and keepeth it that setteth on the Poise and winds it up to fit his ends Ioseph could say God sent me hither when his Brethren sold him into Aegypt And David felt his Fathers Rod in Shimei's curse § 17. Direct 14. See God the End of every creature how all things are ordered for his service and Direct 14. be sure you stop not in any creature without referring it to a higher end Else as I have oft told you you will be but like a Child or illiterate person who openeth a Book and admireth the workmanship of the Printer and the order and well forming of the Letters but never mindeth or understandeth the subject sense or end Or like one that looketh on a comely picture and never mindeth either him that made it or him that is represented by it Or like one that gazeth on the Sign at an Inn-door and praiseth the workmanship but knoweth not that it is set there to direct him to entertainment and necessaries within And this folly and sin is the greater because it is the very end of God in all his works of Creation and Providence to reveal himself by them to the intellectual world And must God shew his Power and Wisdom and Goodness so wonderfully in the frame of the creation and in his daily general and particular providence and shall man that daily seeth all this overlook the intended use and end and so make all this glorious work as nothing or as lost to him Sense knoweth no End but its own Delight and the natural felicity of the sensitive creature such as things sensible afford But Reason must take up the work where sense doth end its stage and carry all home to him that is the End of all For OF Him and THROUGH Him and TO Him are all things to whom be Glory for ever Amen Rom. 11. 36. § 18. Direct 15. Besides the General Use and Ultimate End of every creature labour for a clear acquaintance Direct 15. with the particular Use and nearer End of every thing which you have to do with by which it is serviceable to your Ultimate End And suppose still you saw that special use as subserving your highest End as the Title written upon each creature As suppose upon your Bible it were written The Word of the Living God to acquaint me with himself and his will that I may please and glorifie and enjoy him for ever And upon your godly friend suppose you saw this Title written A Servant of God that beareth his Image and appointed to accompany and assist me in his service unto life everlasting Upon your meat suppose you saw this Title written The provisions of my Father sent me as from my Saviours hands not to gratifie my sensuality and serve my inordinate desires but to refresh and strengthen my body for his service in my passage to everlasting life So upon your Clothes your Servants your Goods your Cattel your Houses and every thing you have inscribe thus the proper use and end § 19. Direct 16. Know both the final and the mediate danger of every thing that you have to do Direct 16. with and suppose you still see them written upon every thing you see The final
holy things should be preferred as on the Lords day or at the time of publick worship or when the company occasion or opportunity call for holy speeches Worldlings are talking as Saul of their Asses when they should talk of a Kingdom 1 Sam. 9. 10. To speak about your Callings and common affairs is lawful so it be moderately and in season But when you talk all of the world and vanity and never have done and will scarce have any other talk in your mouths and even on Gods day will speak your own words Isa. 58. 13. this is prophane and sinful speaking § 23. 12. Another common sin of the Tongue is a tempting and perswading others to sin enticing them to gluttony drunkenness wantonness sornication or any other crime as men that not only do the same but have pleasure in them that do them Rom. 1. 32. This is to be the instruments and servants of the Devil and most directly to do his work in the world The same I may say of unjust excusing extenuating or defending the sins of others or commanding alluring affrighting or encouraging them thereto § 24. 13. Another is a carnal manner of handling the sacred things of God as when it is done with lightness or with unsuitable curiosity of words or in a ludicrous toyish manner especially by the Preachers of the Gospel themselves and not with a style that 's grave and serious agreeable to the weight and majesty of the truth § 25. 14. Another is an imprudent rash and slovenly handling of holy things when they are spoken Didy 〈…〉 on 〈◊〉 3. of 〈◊〉 the Toâ—gue saith Non putandum est de peccato prolativi sermonis quae solaecismos barbatismos quidam vocant haec fuisse dicta of so ignorantly unskilfully disorderly or passionately as tendeth to dishonour them and frustrate the desired good success § 26. 15. Another sin of the tongue is the reviling or dishonouring of superiours When Children speak unreverently and dishonourably to or of their Parents or Subjects of their Governours or servants of their Masters either to their faces or behind their backs 2 Pet. 2. 10. They are not afraid to speak evil of dignities Jud. 8. § 27. 16. Another is the imperious contempt of inferiours insulting over them provoking and discouraging them Ephes. 6. 4. Fathers provoke not your Children to wrath § 28. 17. Another sin of the Tongue is Idle talk and multitude of useless words a babling loquacity or unprofitableness of speech when it is speech that tendeth to no edification nor any good use for mind or body or affairs § 29. 18. Another sin is Foolish talk or jeasting in levity and folly which tendeth to possess the minds of the hearers with a disposition of levity and folly like the speakers Ephes. 5. 4. Foolish talking and jeasting are things not convenient Honest mirth is lawful and that is the best which is most sanctified as being from a holy principle and about a holy matter or to a holy end as Rejoycing in the Lord always Phil. 4. 4. If any be merry let him sing Psalms Jam. 5. 13. But such a light and frothy jeasting as is but the vent of habitual levity by idle words is not allowable But especially those persons do most odiously abuse their tongues and Reason who counterfeit ideots or fools and use their wit to cover their jeasts with a seeming folly to make them the more ridiculous and make it their very profession to be the jeasters of great men They make a trade of heynous sin § 30. 19. Another sin is Filthy speaking Ephes. 5. 4. Obscene and ribbald talk which the Apostle calls corrupt or rotten communication Ephes. 4. 29. when wanton filthy minds do make themselves merry with wanton filthy speeches This is the Devils preparative to whoredom and all abominable uncleanness For when the tongue is first taught to make a sport of such filthy sins and the ear to be delighted in it or be indifferent to it there remaineth but a small step to actual filthiness § 31. 20. Another sin of the tongue is cursing when men wish some mischief causlesly or unwarrantably to others If you speak but in passion or jeast and desire not to them in your hearts the hurt which you name it is nevertheless a sin of the tongue as it is to speak blasphemy or treason in a passion or in jeast The tongue must be ruled as well as the heart But if really you desire the hurt which you wish them it is so much the worse But it is worst of all when passionate factious men will turn their very prayers into cursings calling for fire from Heaven and praying for other mens destruction or hurt and pretending Scripture examples for it as if they might do it unwarrantably which others have done in other cases in a warrantable manner § 32. 21. Slandering is another sin of the tongue when out of malice and ill will men speak evil falsly of others to make them odious or do them hurt Or else through uncharitable credulity do easily believe a false report and so report it again to others or through rashness and unruliness of tongue divulge it before they try it or receive either just proof or any warrantable call to mention it 5. 33. 22. Another sin is Backbiting and venting ill reports behind mens backs without any warrant Be the matter true or false as long as you either know it not to be true or if you do yet vent it to make the person less respected or at least without a sufficient cause it is a sin against God and a wrong to men § 34. 23. Another sin is rash censuring when you speak that evil of another which you have but Existimant loquacitatem esse facundiam maledicere omnibus bonae conscientiae signum arbritrantur Hieron Cont. Helâ—id an uncharitable surmise of and take that to be probable which is but possible or that to be certain which is but probable against another § 35. 24. Another sin is Railing reviling or passionate provoking words which tend to the diminution of charity and the breach of peace and the stirring up of discord and of a return of railing words from others contrary to the Love and patience and meekness and gentleness which becometh Saints § 36. 25. Another sin is cheating deceiving over-reaching words when men use their tongues to defraud their Neighbours in bargaining for their own gain § 37. 26. Another sin of the tongue is false witness-bearing and false accusing a sin which crys to God for vengeance who is the justifier of the innocent § 38. 27. Another sin of the tongue is the passing an unrighteous sentence in judgement when Rulers absolve the guilty or condemn the just and call evil good and good evil and say to the Righteous Thou art wicked Prov. 24. 24. § 39. 28. Another sin of the Tongue is Flattery which is the more heynous by how much more hurtful And it
your selves For God can open the eyes of that enemy whom you think to blind by a lie and cause him to know all the truth and so take away that Life which you thought thus to have saved 5. And there are lawful means enough to save your lives when it is best for you to save them That is Obey God and trust him with your lives and he can save them without a lie if it be best And if it be not it should not be desired 6. And if men did not erroniously over-value Life they would not think that a Lie were necessary for it When it is not necessary to Live it is not necessary to Lie for Life But thus one sin brings on another when carnal men over-value Life it self and set more by it than by the fruition of God in the Glory of Heaven they must needs then over-value any means which seemeth necessary to preserve it See Iob 13. 7 8 9. 10. Prov. 13. 17. Rom. 6. 15. 3. 7 8 9. Psal. 5. 7. Hos. 4. 2. Ioh. 8. 44. Rev. 21. 27. 22. 15. Col. 3. 9. 1 Ioh. 2. 21. 7. Yet as to the degree of evil in the sin I easily grant with Augustine Enchirid. that Multum interest quo animo de quibus quisque mentiâ—tur Non enim ita peccat qui consulendi quomodo ille qui nocendi voluntate mentitur nec tantum nocet qui viatorem mentiendo in adversum iter mittit quantum is qui viam vitae mendacio fallente depravat Object Are not the Midwives rewarded by God for saving the Israelitish children by a lie Object Answ. I need not say with Austin The fact was rewarded and the Lie pardoned For there is no such Answ. thing as a lie found in them Who can doubt but that God could strengthen the Israelitish women to be delivered without the Midwives And who can doubt but when the Midwives had made known the Kings murderous command that the women would delay to send for the Midwives till by the help of each other the children were secured Which yet is imputed to the Midwives because they confederated with them and delaid to that end So that here is a dissembling and concealing part of the truth but here is no lie that can be proved Object But Heb. 11. 31. Jam 2. Rahab is said to be justified by faith and works when she saved Object the Spies by a lie Answ. 1. It is uncertain whether it was a lie or only an equivocation and whether her words Answ. were not true of some other men that had been her guests But suppose them a lie as is most like the Scripture no more justifieth her lie than her having been an harlot It is her believing in the God of Israel whose works she mentioned that she is commended for together with the saving of the Spies with the hazard of her own life And it is no wonder if such a woman in Iericho had not yet learned the sinfulness of such a lie as that Object But at least it could be no mortal sin because Heb. 11. 31. Jam. 2. say she was Object justified Answ. It was no mortal sin in her that is a sin which proveth one in a state of death because it Answ. had not those evils that make sin mortal But a lie in one that doth it knowingly for want of such a predominancie of the authority and Love of God in the soul as should prevail against the contrary motives habitually is a mortal sin of an ungodly person It is pernicious falshood and soul delusion in those Teachers that make poor sinners think that it is the smallness of the outward act or hurt of sin alone that will prove it to be as they call it Venial or mortified and not mortal Quest. 3. Is deceit by Action Lawful which seemeth a Practical lie And how shall we interpret Quest. 3. Christs making as if he would have gone farther Luk. 24. 28. and Davids feigning himself mad and common stratagems in war and doing things purposely to deceive another Answ. 1. I have before proved that all Deceiving another is not a sin but some may be a duty As Answ. a Physicion may deceive a Patient to get down a medicine to save his life so he do it not by a lie 2. Christs seeming to go farther was no other than a lawful concealment or dissimulation of his purpose to occasion their importunity For all dissimulation is not evil though lying be And the same may be said of lawful stratagems as such 3. Davids case was not sinful as it was meer dissimulation to deceive others for his escape But whether it was not a sinful distrust of God and a dissimulation by too unmanly a way I am not able to say unless I had known more of the circumstances Quest. 4. Is it lawful to tempt a child or servant to lie meerly to try them Quest. 4. Answ. It is not lawful to do it without sufficient cause nor at any time to do that which inviteth Answ. them to lie or giveth any countenance to the sin as Satan and bad men use to tempt men to sin by commending it or extenuating it But to lay an occasion before them barely to try them as to lay money or wine or other things in their way to know whether they are thieves or addicted to drink that we may the better know how to cure them and so to try their veracity is not unlawful For 1. The sin is virtually committed when there is a Will to commit it though there should be no temptation or opportunity 2. We do nothing which is either a commendation of the sin or a perswading to it nor any true cause either Physical or Moral but only an occasion 3. God himself who is more contrary to sin than any creature doth thus by tryal administer such occasions of sin to men that are vitiously disposed as he knoweth they will take And his common mercys are such occasions 4. God hath no where forbidden this to us We may not do evil that good may come by it but we may do good when we know evil will come of it by mens vice 5. It may be a needful means to the cure of that sin which we cannot know till it be thus detected Quest. 5. Is all equivocation unlawful Quest. 5. Answ. There is an equivocating which is really Lying As when we forsake the usual or just sense of Answ. a word and use it in an alien unusual sense which we know will not be understood and this to deceive such as we are bound not to deceive But there is a use of equivocal words which is lawful and necessary For humane language hath few words which are not of divers significations As 1. When our equivocal sense is well understood by the hearers and is not used to deceive them but because use hath made those words to be fit
for their mortified garb Thus many Sects amongst the Popish Fryars go by Agreement or Vow in Clothes so differing from all other persons in seeming humility and gravity which must be the badge of their Order in the eye of the world that the boast and affectation is visible and professed And thus the Quakers that by the notoriety of their difference from other sober persons and by their impudent bawling in the Streets and Churches and railing against the holiest and humblest Ministers and people that are not of their Sect and this in the face of Markets and Congregations do make a plain profession or detection of their Pride But where it is not openly revealed we cannot judge it § 13. Quest. 3. Is it not lawful for a person that is deformed to hide their deformity by their clothing Quest. 3. And for any person to make themselves by clothing or spots or painting to seem to others as comely and beautiful as they can Answ. The person and the matter and the End and Reasons the May not a â—â— formity be hâ—â— by appareâ— oâ— paâ—â—â—â—ing principle and the probable consequents must all be considered for the right answering of this Question It is lawful to some persons by some means for some good Ends and Reasons when a greater Evil is not like to follow it to hide their deformities and to adorn themselves so as to seem more comely than they are But for others persons by evil means for evil ends and reasons or when it tendeth to evil consequents it is unlawful 1. A person that is naturally very deformed may do more to hide it by their ornaments than one that hath no such deformity may do to seem more comely Because one aspireth no higher than to seem somewhat like other persons but the other aspireth to seem excellent above others And a person that is under Government may do more in obedience to their Governours than another may do that is at their own choice 2. If the matter of their ornament be but modest decent clothing and not immodest insolent luxurious vain or against Nature or the Law of God or man it is in that respect allowable But so is no cover of deformity by unlawful means 3. It may be lawful if also it be to a lawful end as to obey a Governour or only to cover a deformity so as not unnecessarily to reveal it But it is alway sinful when the end is sinful As 1. If it be to seem extraordinary beautiful or comely when you are not so or if it be to be Laertius saith that when Craesus sate in all his ornaments and glory on his Throne he asked Soloâ— An pulchrius unquâ—m specticulum vidâ— it Ilâ—umque ditisse Gallos gallmaceâ—s fasianos pavoâ—â—s Naturali enim eos nitore speciosiâ—ate exâ—mia vestiri observed and admired by beholders 2. If it be to tempt the beholders minds to lustful or undue affections 3. If it be to deceive the mind of some one that you desire in marriage For in that case to seem by such dissembling to be what you are not is the most injurious kind of cheat much worse than to sell a Horse that is blind or lame for a sound one 4. If it be to follow the fashions of proud Gallants that you may not be scorned by them as not neat enough all these are unlawful ends and reasons 4. So also the Principle or Mind that it cometh from may make it sinful As 1. If it come from a lustful wanton mind 2. Or if it come from an overgreat regard of the opinion of spectators which is the proper complexion of Pride A person that doth it not in pride is not very solicitous about it nor makes no great matter of it whether men take him to be comely or uncomely and therefore he is at no great cost or care to seem comely to them If such persons be deformed they know it is Gods work and not their sin and it is sin that is the true cause of shame And all Gods works are good and for our good if we are his children They know that God doth it to keep them humble and prevent that pride and lust and wantonness which is the undoing of many and therefore they will rather be careful to improve it and get the benefit than to hide it and seem comelier than they are 5. Also the consequents concur much to make the action good or bad Though that be not your end yet if you may foresee that greater hurt than good will follow or is like to follow it will be your sin As 1. If it tend to the ensnaring of the minds of the beholders in procacious lustful wanton passions though you say you intend it not it is your sin that you do that which probably will procure it yea that you did not your best to avoid it And though it be their sin and vanity that is the cause it is never the less your sin to be the unnecessary occasion For you must consider that you live among diseased souls And you must not lay a stumbling-block in their way nor blow up the fire of their lust nor make your ornaments their snares but you must walk among sinful persons as you would do with a Candle amongst Straw or Gunpowder or else you may see the flame which you would not foresee when it is too late to quench it But a proud and procacious lustful mind is so very willing to be loved and thought highly of and admired and desired that no fear of God or of the sin and misery of themselves or others will satisfie them or take them off 2. Also it is sinful to adorn your selves in such fashions as probably will encourage pride and vanity in others or seem to approve of it When any fashion is the common badge of the proud and vain sort of persons of that time and place it is sinful unnecessarily to conform your selves to them because you will harden them in their sin and you joyn your selves to them as one of them by a kind of profession As when spotted faces a name that former Ages understood not or naked breasts or such other fashions are used ordinarily by the vain and brain-sick and heart-sick proud and wanton party it is a sin unnecessarily to use them For 1. You will hinder their Repentance 2. And you will hinder the great Benefit which the world may get by their vain attire For though it be no thanks to them that intend it not yet it is a very great commodity that cometh to mankind by these peoples sin that fools should go about in fools-coats and that empty brains and proud and wanton hearts should be so openly detected in the Streets and Churches that sober people may avoid them and that wise and chaste and civil people may not be deceived by such in marriage to their undoing As the different clothing of the different Sexes is necessary to
must either be a very great help or hinderance But yet if there be any persons whose case may be so equally poised with accidents on both sides that to the most judicious man it is not discernible whether a single or married state of life is like to conduce more to their personal Holiness or publick usefulness or the good of others to such persons Marriage in the individual circumstantiated act is a thing indifferent § 4. By these conditions following you may know what persons have a Call from God to marry and Who are called to marry who have not his call or approbation 1. If there be the peremptory will or command of Parents to Children that are under their power and Government and no greater matter on the contrary to hinder it the command of Parents signifieth the command of God But if Parents do but perswade and not command though their desires must not be causlesly refused yet a smaller impediment may preponderate than in case of a peremptory command 2. They are called to marry who have not the gift of Continence and cannot by the use of lawful means attain it and have no impediment which maketh it unlawful to them to marry 1 Cor. 7. 9. But if they cannot contain let them marry for it is better to marry than to burn But here the divers degrees of the urgent and the hindering causes must be compared and the weightiest must prevail For some that have very strong lusts may yet have stronger impediments And though they cannot keep that chastity in their Thoughts as they desire yet in such a case they must abstain And there is no man but may keep his body in chastity if he will do his part Yea and Thoughts themselves may be commonly and for the most part kept pure and wanton imaginations quickly checkt if men be Godly and will do what they can But on the other side there are Unmarried men are the best friends the best masters the best servants but not always the best subjects For they are light to run away and therefore ventrous c. Iâ— â—aâ—oâ— Essay 8. some that have a more tamable measure of Concupiscence and yet have no considerable hinderance whose duty it may be to Marry as the most certain and successful means against that small degree as long as there is nothing to forbid it 3. Another cause that warranteth Marriage is when upon a wise casting up of all accounts it is apparently most probable that in a married state one may be most serviceable to God and the publick good that there will be in it greater helps and fewer hinderances to the great ends of our lives the glorifying of God and the saving of our selves and others And whereas it must be expected that every condition should be more helpful to us in one respect and hinder us more in another respect and that in one we have most helps for a contemplative life and in another we are better furnished for an Active serviceable life the great skill therefore in the discerning of of our duties lyeth in the prudent pondering and comparing of the commodities and discommodities without the seduction of fantasie lust or passion and in a true discerning which side it is that hath the greatest weight § 5. Here it must be carefully observed 1. That the two first Reasons for Marriage Concupiscence Observations and the will of Parents or any such like have their strength but in subordination to the third the final cause or interest of God and our salvation And that this last Reason from the end is of it self sufficient without any of the other but none of the other are sufficient without this If it be clear that in a married state you have better advantages for the service of God and doing good to others and saving your own souls than you can have in a single state of life then it is undoubtedly your duty to marry For our obligation to seek our ultimate end is the most constant indispensable obligation Though Parents command it not though you have no corporal necessity yet it is a duty if it certainly make most for your ultimate end 2. But yet observe also that no pretence of your ultimate end it self will warrant you to marry when any other accident hath first made it a thing unlawful while that accident continueth For we must not do evil that good may come by it Our salvation is not furthered by sin And though we saw a probability that we might do more good to others if we did but commit such a sin to accomplish it yet it is not to be done For our lives and mercies being all in the hand of God and the successes and acceptance of all our endeavours depending wholly upon him it can never be a rational way to attain them by willful offending him by our sin It is a likely means to publick good for able and good men to be Magistrates or Ministers And yet he that would lye or be perjured or commit any known sin that he may be a Magistrate or that he may Preach the Gospel might better expect a curse on himself and his endeavours than Gods acceptance or his blessing and success so he that would sin to change his state for the better would find that he changed it for the worse or if it do good to others he may expect no good but ruine to himself if repentance prevent it not 3. Observe also that if the question be only which state of life it is married or single which best conduceth to this ultimate end than any one of the subordinate Reasons will prove that we have a call if there be not greater Reasons on the contrary side As in case you have no corporal necessity the will of Parents alone may oblige you if there be no greater thing against it or if Parents oblige you not yet corporal necessity alone may do it or if neither of these invite you yet a clear probability of the attaining of such an estate or opportunity as may make you more fit to relieve many others or be serviceable to the Church or the blessing of Children who may be devoted to God may warrant your Marriage if no greater reasons lye against it For when the Scales are equal any one of these may turn them § 6. By this also you may perceive who they be that have no Call to marry and to whom it is a Who may not marry sin As 1. No man hath a Call to marry who laying all the commodities and discommodities together may clearly discern that a married state is like to be a greater hinderance of his salvation or to his serving or honouring God in the world and so to disadvantage him as to his ultimate end Quest. But what if Parents do command it or will set against me if I disobey Quest. Answ. Parents have no authority to command you any thing against God or your salvation
necessitated-slavery by Contract or Consent through poverty are these 1. Such a ones soul must be cared for and preserved though he should consent to the contrary He must have time to learn the word of God and time to pray and he must reâ—t on the Lords day and employ it in Gods service He must be instructed and exhorted and kept from sin 2. He may not be forced to commit any sin against God 3. He may not though he forcedly consent be denyed such comforts of this life as are needful to his cheerful serving of God in Love and Thankfulness according to the peace of the Gospel state and which are called by the name of our Daily bread No man may deny a Slave any of this that is not a criminal punished Slave 2. And the most criminal slave may not be forced to sin nor denyed necessary helps to his salvation But he may penally be beaten and denyed part of his daily bread so it be not done more rigorously than true Justice doth require Quest. But what if men buy Negro's or other slaves of such as we have just cause to believe did steal them by Piracy or buy them of those that have no power to sell them and not hire or buy them by their own consent or by the consent of those that had power to sell them nor take them Captives in a lawful War what must they do with them afterward Answ. 1. It is their heynous sin to buy them unless it be in charity to deliver them 2. Having done it undoubtedly they are presently bound to deliver them Because by right the man is his own and therefore no man else can have just title to him Quest. But may I not sell him again and make my money of him seeing I leave him but as I found him Answ. No because when you have taken possession of him and a pretended propriety then the injury that is done him is by you which before was only by another And though the wrong be no greater than the other did him yet being now done by you it is your sin Quest. But may I not return him to him that I bought him of Answ. No for that is but injuring him by delivering him to another to continue the injury To say as Pilate I am innocent of the blood of this just man will be no proof of your innocency yea Gods Law bindeth you to Love and works of Love and therefore you should do your best to free him He that is bound to help to save a man that is faln into the hand of thieves by the high way it he should buy that man as a slave of the thieves may not after give him up to the thieves again But to proceed in the Directions Direct 3. So serve your own necessities by your slaves as to prefer Gods interest and their spiritual Direct 3. and everlasting happiness Teach them the way to Heaven and do all for their souls which I have before directed you to do for all your other servants Though you may make some difference in their Labâ—ur and dyet and cloathing yet none as to the furthering of their salvation If they be Infidels use them so as tendeth to win them to Christ and the love of Religion by shewing them that Christians are less worldly less cruel and passionate and more wise and charitable and holy and meek than any other persons are Wo to them that by their cruelty and covetousness do scandalize even slaves and hinder their conversion and salvation Direct 4. By how much the hardness of their condition doth make their lives uncomfortable and Direct 4. God hath cast them lower than your selves by so much the more let your charity pity them and labour to abate their burden and sweeten their lives to them as much as your condition will allow And remember that even a slave may be one of those Neighbours that you are bound to love as your selves and to do to as you would be done by if your case were his Which if you do you will need no more direction for his relief Direct 5. Remember that you may require no more of an innocent slave than you would or might Direct 5. do of an ordinary servant if he were at your will and did not by contract except something as to Labour or usage which else you would think just and meet to have required of him Direct 6. If they are Infidels neither be too hasty in baptizing them when they desire it nor too Direct 6. slow Not so hasty as to put them on it before they understand what the Baptismal Covenant is or before you see any likelyhood that they should be serious in making such a Covenant Nor yet so slow as to let them alone to linger out their lives in the state of those without the Church But hasten them to Learn and stir up their desires and look after them as the ancient Churches did after their Catechumens And when you see them fit by knowledge belief desire and resolution to Vow themselves to God on the terms of the holy Covenant then put them on to be baptized But if you should feel an abatement of your desires of their Conversion because you shall lose their service much more if ever you had a wish that they might not be converted which is plain Devilism let it be the matter of your deep humiliation and repentance Direct 7. Make it your chief end in buying and using slaves to win them to Christ and save Direct 7. their souls Do not only endeavour it on the buy when you have first consulted your own commodity but make this more of your end than your commodity it self and let their salvation be far more valued by you than their service And carry your selves to them as those that are sensible that they are Redeemed with them by Christ from the slavery of Satan and may live with them in the liberty of the Saints in Glory CHAP. XV. The Duties of Children and Fellow-servants to one another IT is not easie to resolve whether good Governours or good fellow-servants in a family be the Direct 1. greater help and benefit to each of the inferiours For servants are so much together and so free and familiar with each other that they have the more opportunity to be useful to each other if they have but abilities and hearts It is needful therefore that you know your duty to one another both for doing and getting that good which otherwise will be lost § 1. Direct 1. Love one another unfeignedly as your selves Avoid all contention and falling out Direct 2. with one another or any thing that would weaken your love to one another especially differences about your personal interests in point of profit provision or reputation Take heed of the Spirit of envy which will make your hearts rise against those that are preferred before you or that are used better than you Remember the
is simple or mixt simple when we only intend Gods worship immediately in the action And this is found chiefly in Praises and Thanksgiving which therefore are the most pure and simple sort of expressive worship Mixt worship is that in which we joyn some other intention for our own benefit in the action As in Prayer where we worship God by seeking to him for mercy And in reverent hearing or reading his Word where we worship him by a holy attendance upon his instructions and Commands And in his Sacraments where we worship him by Receiving and acknowledging his benefits to our souls And in Oblations where we have respect also to the use of the thing offered And in holy Vows and Oaths in which we acknowledge him our Lord and Judge All these are acts of Divine Worship though mixt with other uses § 3. It is not only worshipping God when our acknowledgements by word or deed are directed immediately to himself but also when we direct our speech to others if his Praises be the subject of them and they are intended directly to his Honour Such are many of Davids Psalms of Praise But where Gods Honour is not the thing directly intended it is no direct worshipping of God though all the same words be spoken as by others § 4. Direct 2. Understand the true Ends and Reasons of our worshipping God lest you be deceived Direct 1. by the impious who take it to be all in vain When they have imagined some false Reasons to themselves they judge it vain to worship God because those Reasons of it are vain And he that understandeth not the true Reasons why he should worship God will not truly worship him but be prophane in neglecting it or hypocritical in dissembling and heartless in performing it The Reasons then are such as thâ—se § 5. 1. The first ariseth from the Use of all the world and the nature of the Rational Creature in special The whole world is made and upheld to be expressive and participative of the Image and Benefits of God God is most perfect and blessed in himself and needeth not the world to add to his felicity But he made it to please his blessed Will as a communicative Good by communication and appearance that he might have creatures to know him and to be happy in his Light and those creatures might have a fit representation or revelation of him that they might know him And Man is Read Mr. Herberts Poem called Providence specially endowed with Reason and Utterance that he might know his Creator appearing in his works and might communicate this knowledge and express that Glory of his Maker with his Tongue which the inferiour creatures express to him in their being So that if God were not to be worshipped the end of mans faculties and of all the Creation must be much frustrated Mans Reason is given him that he may know his Maker His will and affections and executive powers are given him that he may freely love him and obey him and his tongue is given him principally to acknowledge him and praise him Whom should Gods work be serviceable to but to him that made it § 6. 2. As it is the Natural Use so it is the highest honour of the creature to worship and honour his Creator Is there a nobler or more excellent object for our thoughts affections or expressions And nature which desireth its own perfection forbiddeth us to choose a sordid vile dishonourable work and to neglect the highest and most honourable § 7. 3. The right worshipping of God doth powerfully tend to make us in our measure like him and so to sanctifie and raise the soul and to heal it of its sinful distempers and imperfections What can make us Good so effectually as our Knowledge and Love and Communion with him that is the chiefest Good Nay what is Goodness it self in the creature if this be not As nearness to the Sun giveth Light and Heat so nearness to God is the way to make us Wise and Good For the contemplation of his perfections is the means to make us like him The worshippers of God do not exercise their bare understandings upon him in barren speculations but they exercise all their affections towards him and all the faculties of their souls in the most practical and serious manner and therefore are likest to have the liveliest impressions of God upon their hearts And hence it is that the true worshippers of God are really the wisest and the best of men when many that at a distance are employed in meer speculations about his works and him remain almost as vain and wicked as before and professing themselves wise are practically fools Rom. 1. 21 22. § 8. 4. The right worshipping of God by bringing the Heart into a cleansed holy and obedient frame doth prepare it to command the body and make us upright and regular in all the actions of our lives For the fruit will be like the Tree and as men are so will they do He that honoureth not his God is not like well to honour his Parents or his King He that is not moved to it by his regard to God is never like to be universally and constantly just and faithful unto men Experience telleth us that it is the truest worshippers of God that are truest and most conscionable in their dealings with their neighbours This windeth up the spring and ordereth and strengtheneth all the causes of a good conversation § 9. 5. The right worshipping of God is the the highest and most rational Delight of man Though to a sick corrupted soul it be unpleasant as food to a sick stomach yet to a wise and holy soul there is nothing so solidly and durably contentful As it is Gods damning sentence on the wicked to say Depart from me Matth. 25. 41. 7. 23. so holy souls would lose their joyes and take themselves to be undone if God should bid them Depart from me worship me and love me and praise me no more They would be weary of the world were it not for God in the world and weary of their lives if God were not their Life § 10. 6. The right worshipping of God prepareth us for Heaven where we are to behold him and Love and worship him for ever God bringeth not unprepared souls to Heaven This life is the time that 's purposely given us for our preparation as the Apprenticeship is the time to learn your trades Heaven is a place of action and fruition of perfect Knowledge Love and Praise And the souls that will enjoy and Praise God there must be Disposed to it here and therefore they must be much employed in his Worship § 11. 7. And as it is in all these respects necessary as a means so God hath made it necessary by Psal. 45. 11. Psal. 66. 4. Psal. 80. 9. Psal. 95. 6. Psal. 99. 5 9. his command He hath made it oâ—r duty to worship him constantly and he
of the Church 28. Take heed to your selves and to all the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers to feed the Church of God So 1 Thess. 5. 12 13. Heb. 13. 7 17 24 c. 1 Cor. 7. 23. If the whole Church be come together into one place c. Thus far it is no question but Church-forms and Government is of Divine appointment And man can no more alter this or set up such other without Gods consent than a subject can alter or make Corporations without the Kings consent 2. But besides these two sorts of Divine institution there are other allowable associations which some call Churches God hath required these particular Churches to hold such Communion as they are capable of for promoting the common Ends of Christianity And Prudence is left to determine of the Times and Places and manner of their Pastors Assemblies Councils and Correspondencies according to Gods general Rules If any will call these Councils or the Associations engaged for special correspondencies by the name of Churches I will not trouble any with a strife about the Name In this case so far as men have power to make that Association or Combination which they call a Church so also if they make Officers suited to its ends not encroaching upon the Churches or Officers of Christs own institution I am none of those that will contend against them Nor will this allow us to deny Communion with them 3. And in those Churches which Christ himself hath instituted there are Officers that make but for the Integrity and not for the Political Essence of the Church As Deacons and all Pastors or Presbyters more than One. For it is not essential to it to have any Deacons or many Pastors As to this sort of Officers Christ hath appointed them and it is not in mans power to alter his institution nor to set up any such like in co-ordination with these But yet if they should do so as long as the true Essentials of the Church remain I am not to deny communion with that Church so I own not this corruption 4. But there are also as circumstantial employments about Gods Worship so Officers to do those employments which men may lawfully institute As Clerks Church-wardens Door-keepers Ringers c. It is not the adding of these that is any sin By this time you may see plainly both how far Churches Officers and Church-Government is jure Divino and how far man may or may not add or alter and what I meant in my Proposition viz. That if men introduce a new Universal Head to the Church Catholick or a new Head to particular Churches instead of that of Christs institution this is in sensu Politico to make new species of Churches and destroy those that Christ hath instituted for the pars gubernans and pars gubernata are the essential Constituents of a Church And with such a Church as such in specie I must have no communion which is our case with the Papal Church though with the Material parts of that Church as members of Christ I may hold communion still § 30. 5. If particular members are guilty of obstinate impenitency in true Heresie or ungodliness or any scandalous crime the Church may and must remove such from her communion For it is the Communion of Saints And the offender is the Cause of this separation § 31. 6. If a whole Church be guilty of some notorious scandalous sin and refuse with obstinacy But not denying her to be a Church unless she cast off some essential part But so disowning her as in a Thess. 3. to Repent and Reform when admonished by neighbour Churches or if that Church do thus defend such a sin in any of her members so as openly to own it other Churches may refuse communion with her till she Repent and be Reformed Or if they see cause to hold communion with her in other respects yet in this they must have none § 32. 7. If any Church will admit none to her personal Communion but those that will take some false Oath or subscribe any untruth or tell a lye though that Church do think it to be true as the Trent Oath which their Priests all swear it is not lawful to do any such unlawful thing to obtain Where any Church retaining the purity of doctrine doth require the ownâ—ng of and conforming to any unlawful or suspected practice men may lawfully deny conformity to and communion with that Church in such things without incurring the guilt of Shism Mr. Stilliâ—â—fleet Ireâ—ic p. 11â— communion with that Church And he that refuseth in this case to commit this sin is no way guilty of the separation but is commendable for being true to God And though the case may be sad to be deprived of the liberty of publick Worship and the benefits of publick communion with that Church yet sin is worse and * 1 Sam. 15. 22. Prov. 15. 8. obedience is better than Sacrifice God will not be served with sin nor accept the Sacrifice of a disobedient fool Eccles. 5. 1 2. Nor must we lye to glorifie him nor do evil that good may come by it Just is the damnation of such servers of God Rom. 1. 7 8. All publick Worship is rather to be omitted than any one sin committed to enjoy it Though neither should be done where it is possible to do better It is not so unwise to think to feed a man with Poysons as to think to serve God acceptably by sin § 33. 8. If any one Church would ambitiously Usurp a Governing power over others as Rome doth over the world it is no unwarrantable separation to refuse the Government of that Usurping Church We may hold communion with them as Christians and yet refuse to be their subjects And therefore it is a proud and ignorant complaint of the Church of Rome that the Protestants separate from them as to Communion because they will not take them for their Governours § 34. 9. If any by violence will banish or cast out the true Bishops or Pastors of the Church and set up Usurpers in their stead as in the Arrians persecution it was commonly done it is no culpable separation but laudable and a duty for the people to own their Relation to their true Pastors and deny communion with the Usurpers as the people of the Eastern Churches did commonly refuse communion with the intruding Bishops even to the Death telling the Civil Rulers that they had Bishops of their own to whom they would adhere § 35. 10 If a true Church will obstinately deny her members the use of any one Ordinance of God as Preaching or Reading Scripture or Prayer or Praise or Discipline while it retaineth all the rest though we may not separate from this Church as no Church which yet in the case of total rejection of Prayer or Praise is very questionable at least yet if we have opportunity we must remove our local communion
to a more edifying Church that useth all the publick Ordinances of God unless the publick good forbid or some great impediment or contrary duty be our excuse § 36. 11. If a true Church will not cast out any impenitent notorious scandalous sinner though 2 John 10. 11. 2 Tim. 3. 5. Rom. 16. 17. 1 Cor. 5. 11. I am not to separate from the Church yet I am bound to avoid private familiarity with such a person that he may be ashamed and that I partake not of his sin § 37. 12. As the Church hath diversity of members some more holy and some less and some of whole sincerity we have small hope some that are more honourable and some less some that walk Mat. 13. 41 30. Jer. 15. 19. 1 Cor. 12. 23 24. blamelesly and some that work iniquity So Ministers and private members are bound to difference between them accordingly and to honour and love some far above others whom yet we may not excommunicate And this is no sinful separation § 38. 13. If the Church that I live and communicate with do hold any tolerable error I may differ therein from the Church without a culpable separation Union with the Church may be continued with all the diversities before mentioned D. 3. § 10. § 39. 14. In case of persecution in one Church or City when the servants of Christ do flye to another having no special reason to forbid it this is no sinful separation Matth. 10. 23. § 40. 15. If the publick service of the Church require a Minister or a private Christian to remove to another Church if it be done deliberately and upon good advice it is no sinful separation § 41. 16. If a Lawful Prince or Magistrate command us to remove our habitation or command a Minister from one Church to another when it is not notoriously to the detriment of the common interest of Religion it is no sinful separation to obey the Magistrate § 42. 17. If a poor Christian that hath a due and tender care of his salvation do find that under one Minister his soul declineth and groweth dead and under another that is more sound and clear and lively he is much edified to a holy and heavenly frame and life and if hereupon preferring his salvation before all things he remove to that Church and Minister where he is most edified without unchurching the other by his censures this is no sinful separation but a preferring the One thing needful before all § 43. 18. If one part of the Church have leisure opportunity cause and earnest desires to meet ofter for the edifying of their souls and redeeming their time than the poorer labouring or careless and less zealous part will meet in any fit place under the oversight and conduct of their Pastors and not in opposition to the more publick full assemblies as they did Acts 12. 12. to pray for Peter at the house of Mary where many were gathered together praying and Acts 10. 1 c. this is no sinful separation § 44. 19. If a mans own outward affairs require him to remove his habitation from one City or Countrey to another and there be no greater matter to prohibite it he may lawfully remove his local communion from the Church that he before lived with to that which resideth in the place he goeth to For with distant Churches and Christians I can have none but Mental Communion or by distant means as writing messengers c. It is only with present Christians that I can have local personal communion § 45. 20. It is possible in some cases that a man may live long without local personal communion with any Christians or Church at all and yet not be guilty of sinful separation As the Kings Embassadour or Agent in a Land of Infidels or some Traveller Merchants Factors or such as go to convert the Infidels or those that are banished or imprisoned In all these twenty cases some kind of separation may be lawful § 46. 21. One more I may add which is when the Temples are so small and the Congregations so great that there is no room to hear and joyn in the publick Worship or when the Church is so excessively great as to be uncapable of the proper ends of the society in this case to divide or withdraw is no sinful separation When one Hive will not hold the Bees the swarm must seek themselves another without the injury of the rest By all this you may perceive that sinful separation is first in a censorious uncharitable mind condemning Churches Ministers and Worship causelesly as unfit for them to have communion with And Secondly it is in the personal separation which is made in pursuance of this censure But not in any local removal that is made on other lawful grounds § 47. Direct 4. Understand and consider well the Reasons why Christ so frequently and earnestly Direct 4. presseth Concord on his Church and why he so vehemently forbiddeth Divisions Observe how much the Scripture speaketh to this purpose and upon what weighty Reasons Here are four things distinctly to be represented to your serious consideration 1. How many plain and urgent are the Texts that speak for Unity and condemn Division 2. The great Benefits of Concord 3. And the mischiefs of Discord and Divisions in the Church 4. And the Aggravations of the sin § 48. I. A true Christian that hateth fornication drunkenness lying perjury because they are forbidden in the Word of God will hate Divisions also when he well observeth how frequently and vehemently they are forbidden and Concord highly commended and commanded John 17. 21 22 23. That they all may be One as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also See Rom. 14. throughout Rom. 15. 12. 5 6 7. may be one in us that the world may believe that thou hast sent me And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them that they may be One even as we are One I in them and thou in me that they may be made perfect in One and that the world may know that thou hast sent me and hast loved them as Ephes. 4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7. thou hast loved me Here you see that the Unity of the Saints must be a special means to convince the Infidel world of the truth of Christianity and to prove Gods special Love to his Church and 1 Pet. 3. 6. 1 Cor. 12. throughout Phil. 3. 15 16. Acts 2. 1 46. 4. 32. also to accomplish their own perfection 1 Cor. 1. 10. Now I beseech you brethren by the name of our Lord Iesus Christ that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions or Schisms among you but that ye be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgement For it hath been declared to me of you my brethren that there are contentions among you Rom. 12. 4 5. Psalm 133. 1 Cor. 8. 1
how contrary soever among themselves but they all pretended Gods authority and entitled him to their sin and called it his service and censured others as ungodly or less godly that would not do as bad as they St. Iames is put to confute them that thought this wisdom was from above and so did glory in their sin and lye against the truth when their wisdom was from beneath and no better than earthly sensual and deviliish For the wisdom from above is first pure then peaceable gentle easie to be entreated full of mercy c. James 3. 17. § 78. 12. Church divisions are unlike to our Heavenly state and in some regard worse than the Kingdom of the Devil for he would not destroy it by dividing it against it selâ— Matth. 12. 26. O what a blessed harmony of united holy souls will there be in the Heavenly Ierusalem where we hope to dwell for ever There will be no discords envyings Sideings or contendings one being of this party and another of that but in the Unity of perfect Love that world of Spirits with joyful Eph. 4. 13 14 16. praise will magnifie their Creator And is a snarling envy or jarring discord the likely way to such an end Is the Church of Christ a Babâ—l of confusion Should they be divided party against party here that must be one in perfect Love for ever Shall they here be condemning each other as none of the children of the Most High who there must live in sweetest concord If there be shame in Heaven you will be ashamed to meet those in the delights of Glory and see them entertained by the Lord of Love whom you reviled and cast out of the Church or your communion causelesly on earth § 79. Remember now that Schism and making parties and divisions in the Church is not so small a sin as many take it for It is the accounting it a duty and a part of Holiness which is the greatest cause that it prospereth in the world And it will never be reformed till men have right apprehensions of the evil of it Why is it that sober people are so far and free from the sins of swearing drunkenness fornication and lasciviousness but because these sins are under so odious a character as helpeth them easily to perceive the evil of them And till Church-divisions be rightly apprehended as whoredom and swearing and drunkenness are they will never be well cured Imprint therefore on your minds the true Character of them which I have here laid down and look abroad upon the effects and then you will fear this confounding sin as much as a consuming Plague § 80. The two great causes that keep Divisions from being hated as they ought are 1. A charitable Two Hinderances of our true apprehensions of Schisme respect to the good that is in Church-dividers carrying us to overlook the evil of the sin judging of it by the Persons that commit it and thinking that nothing should seem odious that is theirs because many of them are in other respects of blameless pious conversations And indeed every Christian must so prudently reprehend the mistakes and faults of pious men as not to asperse the piety which is conjunct and therefore not to make their persons odious but to give the person all his just commendations for his piety while we oppose and aggravate his sin Because Christ himself so distinguisheth between the good and the evil and the person and the sin and loveth his own for their good while he hateth their evil and so must we And because it is the grand design of Satan by the faults of the godly to make their Persons hated first and their Piety next and so to banish Religion from the world And every friend of Christ must shew himself an enemy to this design of Satan But yet the sin must be disowned and opposed while the person is Loved according to his worth Christ will give no thanks for such Love to his children as cherisheth their Church-destroying sins There is no greater enemy to sin than Christ though there be no greater friend to souls Godliness was never intended to be a fortress for iniquity or a battery for the Devil to mount his Cannons on against the Church nor for a blind to cover the Powder-mines of Hell Satan never opposeth Truth and Godliness and Unity so dangerously as when he can make Religious men his instruments Remember therefore that all men are vanity and Gods interest and honour must not be sacrificed to theirs nor the most Holy be abused in reverence to the holiest of sinful men § 81. The other great hinderance of our due apprehension of the sinfulness of divisions is our too deep sense of our sufferings by superiours and our looking so much at the evil of persecutions as not to look at the danger of the contrary extream Thus under the Papacy the people of Germany at Luthers Reformation were so deeply sensible of the Papal cruelties that they thought by how many wayes soever men fled from such bloody persecutors they were very excusable And while men were all taken up in decrying the Roman Idolatry corruptions and cruelties they never feared the danger of their own divisions till they smarted by them And this was once the case of many good people here in England who so much hated the wickedness of the Prophane and the Haters of Godliness that they had no apprehensions of the evil of Divisions among themselves And because many prophanâ— ones were wont to call sober godly people Schismaticks and Factious therefore the very names begâ—n with many to grow into credit as if they had been of good signification and there had been really no such sin as schism and factiâ—n to be feared Till God permitted this sin to break in upon us with such fury as had almost turned us into a Babel and a desolation And I am perswaded God did purposely permit it to teach his people more sensibly to know the evil of that sin by the efâ—â—cts which they would not know by other means And to let them see when they had reviled and ruined each other that there is that in themselves which they should be more afraid of than of any enemy without § 82. Direct 5. Own nâ—t any cause which is an enemy to Love And pretend neither Truth nor Holiness Direct 5. nor Unity nor Order nor any thing against it The Spirit of Love is that one Vital Spirit which 〈…〉 9 〈…〉 4. 〈…〉 2. 〈…〉 19. â—â— 1 〈…〉 1 â—â—â—â— 5 〈…〉 2 â—â—â—â— 1. 7. Heb. 10. 24. 〈…〉 5. 6 13. doth animate all the Saints The increase â—f Love is the powerful Balâ—â—me that healeth all the Churches wounds Though loveless lifeless Physicions think that all these wounds must be healed by the Sword And indeed the Weapon-salve is now become the proper cure It is the Sword that must be medicated that the wounds made by it may be healed The decayes of
expectat cuique ad resipiscendum non ista sufficiunt infatuatum se juxta Domini sententiam nullo unquam sale saliri posse demonstrat I will not English it lest those take encouragement by it who are bent to the other extream 7. Yet it will be a great offence if any censorious self-conceited person shall on this pretence set up his judgement of mens parts to the contempt of Authority or to the vilifying of worthy men and especially if he thereby make a stir and Schism in the Church instead of seeking his own edification 8. Yea if a Minister be weaker yea and colder and worse than another yet if his Ministry be competently fitted to edification he that cannot leave him and go to a better without apparent hurt to the Church and the souls of others by division or exasperating Rulers or breaking family ☜ order or violating Relation duties must take himself to be at present denyed the greater helps that others have and may trust God in the use of those weaker means to accept and bless him because he is in the station where he hath set him This case therefore must be Resolved by a prudent comparing of the Good or Hurt which is like to follow and of the accidents or circumstances whence that must be discerned Quest. 10. What if the Magistrate command the people to receive one Pastor and the Bishops or Ordainers another which of them must be obeyed 1. THe Magistrate and not the Bishop or people unless under him hath the power and disposal See more of this after of the Circumstantials or Accidents of the Church I mean of the Temple the Pulpit the Tythes c. And he is to determine what Ministers are fit either for his own Countenance or Toleration and what not In these therefore he is to be obeyed before the Bishops or others 2. If a Pope or Prelate of a foreign Church or any that hath no lawful Jurisdiction or Government over the Church that wanteth a Pastor shall command them to receive one their command is null and to be contemned 3. Neither Magistrate nor Bishop as is said may deny the Church or people any Liberty which God in Nature or Christ in the Gospel hath setled on them as to the Reception of their proper Pastors 4. No Bishop but only the Magistrate can compell by the Sword the obedience of his commands 5. If one of them command the reception of a worthy person and the other of an intolerable one the former must prevail because of obedience to Christ and care of our souls 6. But if the persons be equal or both fit the Magistrate is to be obeyed if he be peremptory in his commands and decide the case in order to the peace or protection of the Church both because it is a lawful thing and because else he will permit no other 7. And the rather because the Magistrates Power is more past controversie than Whether any Bishop Pastor or Synod can any further than by counsel and perswasion oblige the People to receive a Pastor Quest. 11. Whether an uninterrupted Succession either of right Ordination or of Conveyance by Iurisdiction be necessary to the Being of the Ministry or of a true Church THe Papists have hitherto insisted on the necessity of successive right Ordination But Voâ—tius de desperata Causa Papatus hath in this so handled them and confuted Iansenius as hath indeed shewed the desperateness of that Cause And they perceive that the Papacy it self cannot be upheld by that way and therefore Iohnson alias Terret in his Rejoynder against me now concludeth that it is not for want of a successive Consecration that they condemn the Church of England but for want of true Iurisdiction because other Bishops had title to the places whilest they were put in And that successive Consecration which we take to include Ordination is not necessary to the being of Ministry or Church And it is most certain to any man acquainted in Church History that their Popes have had a succession of neither Their way of Election hath been frequently changed sometimes being by the people sometimes by the Clergy sometimes by the Emperours and lastly by the Cardinals alone Ordination they have sometime wanted and a Lay-man been chosen And oft the Ordination hath been by such as had no power according to their own Laws And frequent intercisions have been made sometime by many years vacancy when they had no Church and so there was none on Earth if the Pope be the Constitutive Head for want of a Pope sometime by long Schisms when of two or three Popes no one could be known to have more right than the other nor did they otherwise carry it than by power at last Sometimes by the utter incapacity of the possessors some being Lay-men some Hereticks and Infidels so judged by Councils at Rome Constance Basil and Eugenius the fourth continued after he was so censured and condemned and deposed by the General Council I have proved all this at large elsewhere And he that will not be cheated with a bare sound of words but will ask them whether by a succession of Iurisdiction they mean Efficient Conveying Iurisdiction in the Causers of his Call or Received Iurisdiction in the Office received will find that they do but hide their desperate Cause in Confusion and an insignificant noise For they maintain that none on earth have an Efficient Iurisdiction in making Popes For the former Pope doth not make his successor And both Electors Ordainers and Consecrators yea and the people Receiving they hold to be subjects of the Pope when made and therefore make him not by Jurisdiction giving him the power Therefore Iohnson tells me that Christ only and not man doth give the power and they must needs hold that men have nothing to do but design the person Recipient by Election and Reception and to Invest him ceremonially in the possession So that no Efficient Iurisdiction is here used at all by man And for Received Iurisdiction 1. No one questioneth but when that Office is received which is Essentially Governing he that receiveth it receiveth a Governing power or else he did not receive the Office If the question be only whether the Office of a Bishop be an Office of Iurisdiction or contain essentially a Governing power they make no question of this themselves So that the noise of Successive Jurisdiction is vanished into nothing 2. And with them that deny any Jurisdiction to belong to Presbyters this will be nothing as to their case who have nothing but Orders to receive They have nothing of sense left them to say but this That though the Efficient Iurisdiction which maketh Popes be only in Christ because no men are their Superiours yet Bishops and Presbyters who have Superiours cannot receive their power but by an Efficient Power of man which must come down by uninterrupted succession Answ. 1. And so if ever the Papal Office have an
intercision as I have proved it hath had as to lawful Popes the whole Catholick Church is nullified and it is impossible to give it a new being but by a new Pope But the best is that by their Doctrine indeed they need not to plead for an uninterrupted succession either of Popes Bishops or Presbyters but that they think it a useful cheat to perplex all that are not their subjects For if the Papacy were extinct an hundred years Christ is still alive And seeing it is no matter ad esse who be the Electors or Consecrators so it be but made known conveniently to the people and Men only Elect and Receive the person and Christ only giveth the power by his stated Law what hindereth after the longest extinction or intercision but that some body or some sort of persons may choose a Pope again and so Christ make him Pope And thus the Catholick Church may dye and live again by a new Creation many times over And when the Pope hath a Resurrection after the longest intercision so may all the Bishops and Priests in the world because a new Pope can make new Bishops and new Bishops can make new Priests And where then is there any shew of necessity of an uninterrupted succession of any of them All that will follow is that the particular Churches dye till a Resurrection And so doth the whole Church on earth every time the Pope dyeth till another be made if he be the Constitutive Head 2. But as they say that Christ only Efficiently giveth the Power to the Pope so say we to the Bishops or Pastors of the Church For there is no act of Christs Collation to be proved but the Scripture Law or Grant And if that standing Law give Power to the Pope when men have but designed the Person the same Law will do the same to Bishops or Pastors For it establisheth their Office in the same sort Or rather in truth there is no word that giveth power to any such Officer as an Universal Head or Pope but the Law for the Pastoral Office is uncontrovertible And what the Spanish Bishops at Trent thought of the Divine Right of the Bishops Office I need not mention I shall therefore thus truly resolve the question 1. In all Ordinations and Elections man doth but first choose the Recipient person 2. And Ceremoniously and Ministerially Invest him in the Possession when God hath given him the power But the efficient Collation or Grant of the Power is done only by Christ by the Instrumentality of his Law or Institution As when the King by a Charter saith Whoever the City shall choose shall be their Mayor and have such and such power and be Invested in it by the Recorder or Steward Here the person elected receiveth all his Power from the King by his Charter which is a standing Efficient conveying it to the Capable Chosen person and not from the Choosers or Recorder only the last is as a servant to deliver possession So is it in this case 2. The regular way of entrance appointed by Christ to make a person capable is the said Election and Ordination And for order sake where that may be had the unordained are not to be received as Pastors 3. If any get Possession by false pretended Ordination or Mission and be Received by the Church I have before told you that he is a Pastor as to the Churches use and benefit though not to his own And so the Church is not extinct by every fraudulent usurpation or mistake and so not by want of a true Ordination or Mission 4. If the way of regular Ordination fail God may otherwise by the Churches necessity and the notorious aptitude of the person notifie his will to the Church what person they shall receive As if a Lay-man were cast on the Indian shoar and converted thousands who could have no Ordination And upon the peoples Reception or Consent that man will be a true Pastor And seeing the Papists in the conclusion as Iohnson ubi supra are fain to cast all their cause on the Churches Reception of the Pope they cannot deny reasonably but ad esse the Churches reception may serve also for another Officer And indeed much better than for a Pope For 1. The Universal Church is so great that no man can know when the Greater part Receiveth him and when not except in some notorious declarations 2. And it is now known that the far greater part of the Universal Church the Greeks Armenians Abassines Copties Protestants c. do not receive the Roman Head 3. And when one part of Europe received one Pope and another part another Pope for above fourty years together who could tell which of the parties was to be accounted the Church It was not then known nor it is not known yet to this day And no Papist can prove it who affirmeth it As a Church e. g. Constantinople may be gathered or oriri de novo where there is none before so may it be restored where it is extinct And possibly a Lay-man as Frumentius and Edesiâ—s in the Indies may be the instrument of mens conversion And if so they may by consent become their Pastors when regular Ordination cannot be had I have said more of this in my Disputations of Church-Government Disp. 2. The truth is this pretence of a Necessity of uninterrupted successive Ordination Mission or Jurisdictional Collation ad esse to the being of Ministry or Church is but a cheat of men that have an interest of their own which requireth such a plea when they may easily know that it would overthrow themselves Quest. 12. Whether there be or ever was such a thing in the world as one Catholick Church Constituted by any Head besides or under Christ THe greatest and first controversie between us and the Papists is not What man or Politick person is the Head of the whole Visible Church But Whether there be any such Head at all eiPersonal or Collective Monarchical Aristocratical or Democratical under Christ of his appointment or allowance Or any such thing as a Catholick Church so Headed or Constituted Which they affirm and we deny That neither Pope nor General Council is such a Head I have proved so fully in my Key for Catholicks and other Books that I will not here stay to make repetition of it That the Pope is no such Head we may take for granted 1. Because they bring no proof of it whatever they vainly pretendâ—â— 2. Because our Divines have copiously disproved it to whom I refer you 3. Because the Universal Church never received such a Head as I have proved against Iohnson 4. And whether it be the Pope their Bishop of Calcedon ubi sup Sancta Clara System â—id say is not de fide That a Council is no such Head I have largely proved as aforesaid Part 2. Key for Cath. And 1. The use of it being but for Concord proveth it 2. Most Papists confess it
by decisive Iudicial â—entence Nor any Universal Civil Monarch of the world 2. The publick Governing Decisive judgement obliging others belongeth to publick persons or Officers Eph. 4. 7 13 14 15 16. of God and not to any private man 1 Cor. 12. 28 29. 17. 3. The publick decision of Doubts or Controversies about Faith it self or the true sense of Gods Word and Laws as obliging the whole Church on Earth to believe that decision or not gainsay it Acts 15. See my Key for Catholicks because of the Infallibility or Governing authority of the Deciders belongeth to none but Jesus Christ Because as is said he hath made no Universal Governour nor Infallible Expositor It belongeth to the Law-giver only to make such an Universally obliging Exposition of his own Laws 4. True Bishops or Pastors in their own particular Churches are Authorized Teachers and Guides in Expounding the Laws and Word of Christ And the people are bound as Learners to reverence their Teaching and not contradict it without true cause yea and to believe them fide humanâ in things pertinent to their Office For oportet discentem credere 5. No such Pastors are to be Absolutely believed nor in any case of notorious Error or Heresie where the Word of God is discerned to be against them 6. For all the people as Reasonable creatures have a judgement of private discerning to judge what they must Receive as Truth and to discern their own duty by the help of the Word of God and of their Teachers 7. The same power of Governing-Iudgement Lawful Synods have over their several flocks as a Pastor over his own but with greater advantage 8. The power of Judging in many Consociate Churches who is to be taken into Communion as Orthodox and who to be refused by those Churches as Hereticks in specie that is what Doctrine they will judge sound or unsound as it is Iudicium discernendi belongeth to every one of the Council â—ingly As it is a Iudgement obliging themselves by Contract and not of Governing each other it is in the Contracters and Consenters And for peace and order usually in the Major Vote But with the Limitations before expressed 9. Every true Christian believeth all the Essentials of Christianity with a Divine faith and not by a meer humane belief of his Teachers though by their Help and Teaching his faith is generated and confirmed and preserved Therefore no essential Article of Christianity is left to any obliging decision of any Church but only to a subservient obliging Teaching As whether there be a God a Christ a Heaven a Hell an Immortality of souls whether God be to be believed loved feared obeyed before man Whether the Scripture be Gods Word and true Whether those that contradict it are to be believed therein Whether Pastors Assemblies publick Worship Baptism Sacrament of the Lords Supper be Divine institutions And the same I may say of any known Word of God No mortals may judge in partem utramliâ—et but the Pastors are only Authorized Teachers and helpers of the peoples faith And so they be partly to one another 10. If the Pope or his Council were the Infallible or the Governing Expositors of all Gods Laws and Scriptures 1. God would have enabled them to do it by an Universal Commentary which all men should be obliged to believe or at least not to contradict For there is no Authority and Obligation given to men yea to so many successively to do that for the needful decision of Controversies which they never have Ability given them to do For that were to oblige them to things impossible 2. And the Pope and his Council would be the most treacherous miscreants on earth that in so many hundred years would never write such an Infallible nor Governing Commentary to end the differences of the Christian world Indeed they have judged with others against Arrius that Christ is true God and one with the Father in substance c. But if they had said the contrary must we have taken it for Gods truth or have believed them 11. To judge who for Heresie or Seandal shall be punished by the Sword belongeth to none but the Magistrate in his own dominions As to judge who shall have Communion or be excommunicated from the Church belongeth as aforesaid to the Pastors And the said Magistrate hath first as a man his own Iudgement of discerning what is Heresie and who of his subjects are guilty of it in order to his publick Governing Judgement 12. The Civil Supream Ruler may Antecedently exercise this Judgement of Discerning by the Teaching of their proper Teachers in order to his consequent sentences on offenders And so in his Laws may tell the subjects what Doctrines and practices he will either Tolerate or punish And thus may the Church Pastors do in their Canons to their several flocks in relation to Communion or non-communion 13. He that will condemn particular persons as Hereticks or offenders must allow them to speak for themselves and hear the proofs and give them that which justice requireth c. And if the Pope can do so at the Antipodes and in all the world either per se or per alium without giveing that other his essential claimed power let him prove it by better experience than we have had 14. As the prime and sole-universal Legislation belongeth to Jesus Christ so the final Judgement universal and particular belongeth to him which only will end all Controversies and from which there is no appeal Quest. 29. Whether a Parents power over his Children or a Pastor or many Pastors or Bishops over the same Children as parts of their flock be greater or more obliging in matters of Religion and publick Worship THis being toucht on somewhere else I only now say 1. That if the case were my own I would 1. Labour to know their different Powers as to the matter commanded and obey each in that which is proper to his place 2. If I were young and ignorant Natural necessity and natural obligation together would give my Parents with whom I lived such an advantage above the Minister whom I seldome see or understand as would determine the case de eventu and much de jure 3. If my Parents commanded me to hear a Teacher who is against Ceremonies or certain Forms and to hear none that are for them natural necessity here also ordinarily would make it my duty first to hear and obey my Parents And in many other cases till I came to understand the greater power of the Pastors in their own place and work 4. But when I come to Church or know that the judgement of all Concordant Godly Pastors condemneth such a thing as damnable Heresie or Sin which any Father commandeth me to receive and profess I would more believe and follow the Judgement of the Pastors and Churches Quest. 30. May an Office Teacher or Pastor be at once in a stated Relation of a Pastor and a
own part Which is but what the antients were wont to say of the Baptized Adult But they never meant that the Infidel and Hypocrite and Impenitent person was in a state of life because he was baptized But that all that truly consent to the Covenant and signifie this by being baptized are saved So the Church of England saith that they receive no detriment by delaying Confirmation but it never said that they receive no detriment by their Parents or Sponsors Infidelity and Hypocrisie or by their want of true Right Coram Deo to be baptized 12. But yet before these Questions either of them be taken as resolved by me I must first take in some other questions which are concerned in the same Cause as Quest. 36. What is meant by this speech that Believers and their seed are in the Covenant of God which giveth them right to Baptism Answ. THough this was opened on the by before I add 1. The meaning is not that they are in that Absolute promise of the first and all following grace supposed ordinarily to be made of the Elect as such unknown viz. I will give them Faith Repentance Conversion Iustification and Salvation and all the Conditions of the Conditional promise without any Condition on their part which many take to be the meaning of I will take the hard heart out of them c. For 1. This promise is not now to be first performed to the adult who Repent and believe already And no other are to be baptized at age If that Absolute promise be sealed by baptism either it must be so sealed as a promise before it be performed or after If before either to all because some are elect or only to some that are elect Not to all for it is not common to Infidels Not to some as elect for 1. They are unknown 2. If they were known they are yet supposed to be Infidels Not after performance for then it is too late 2. The meaning is not only that the Conditional Covenant of Grace is made and offered to them For so it may be said of Heathens and Infidels and all the world that hear the Gospel But 1. The Covenant meant is indeed this Conditional Covenant only Mark 16. 16. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved 2. To be in this Covenant is to be a Consenting believer and so to be one that hath by Inward Heart Consent the true Conditions of right to the benefits of the Covenant and is thereby prepared solemnly by baptism to Profess this Consent and to receive an Investiture and seal of Gods part by his Minister given in his name 3. Infants are thus in Covenant with their Parents because Reputatively their Parents Wills are thâ—â—rs to dispose of them for their good And therefore they Consent by their Parents who Consent for them Quest. 37. Are Believers Children certainly in Covenant before their Baptism and thereby in a state of Salvation Or not till they are baptized Answ. DIstinguish between 1. Heart-Covenanting and Mouth-Covenanting 2. Between being in Covenant before God and Visibly before the Church 1. No person is to be baptized at age whose Inward Heart Consent before professed giveth him not Right to baptism Therefore all the adult must be in Covenant that is Consent on their part to the Covenant before they are baptized 2. Therefore it is so with the seed of the faithful who must Consent by their Parents before they have right Otherwise all should have right and their baptism be essentially another baptism as sealing some other Covenant or none 3. If there be no promise made to the seed of the faithful more than to others they have no right more than others to baptism or salvation But if there be a promise made to them as the seed of believers then are they as such within that promise that is performers of its conditions by their Parents and have right to the benefit 4. If the Heart Consent or faith of the Adult do put themselves into a state of salvation before their baptism then it doth so by their children But c. 5. But this Right to salvation in Parents and Children upon Heart Consent before baptism is only before God For the Church taketh no Cognizance of secret heart-transactions But a man then only consenteth in the Judgement of the Church when he openly professeth it and desireth to signifie it by being baptized 6. And even before God there is a necessitas praecepti obliging us to open baptism after heart consent And he that heartily consenteth cannot refuse Gods way of uttering it unless either through ignorance he know it not to be his duty for himself and his child or through want of ability or opportunity cannot have it So that while a man is unbaptized somewhat is wanting to the compleatness of his right to the benefits of the Covenant viz. A reception of Investiture and possession in Gods appointed way though it be not such a want as shall frustrate the salvation of those that did truly consent in heart 7. I take it therefore for certain that the children of true believers Consent to the Covenant by their Parents and are as certainly saved if they dye before baptism as after Though those that despise baptism when they know it to be a duty cannot be thought indeed to believe or consent for their children or themselves Quest. 38. Is Infants title to Baptism and the Covenant-benefits given them by God in his Promise upon any proper Moral Condition or only upon the Condition of their Natural Relation that they be the Seed of the Faithful Answ. THat which is called a meer Natural Condition is properly in Law sense no condition at all nor doth make a Contract or Promise to be called Conditional in a Moral sense But it is matters of Morality and not of Physicks only that we are treating of and therefore we must take the terms in a Moral sense For a Physical Condition is either past or present or future or not-future If it be past or present the proposition may indeed be hypothetical but it is no such conditional promise as we are speaking of For instance if you say If thou wast born in such a City or if thy name be Iohn I will give thee so much These are the words of an uncertain promiser but the Promise is already either equivalent to an Absolute Gift or Null So if the Physical condition be de futuro e. g. If thou be alive to morrow I will give thee this or that or if the Sun shine to morrow c. This indeed suspendeth the gift or event but not upon any Moral being which is in the power of the Receiver but upon a Natural Contingency or uncertainty And God hath no such Conditional Covenants or promises to be sealed by baptism He saith not If thou be the child of such or such a man thou shalt be saved as his natural off-spring only If the Papists that accuse
hold their own mercies upon the condition of their own continued fidelity And let their Apostasie be on other reasons never so impossible or not future yet the promise of continuance and consummation of the personal felicity of the greatest Saint on earth is still conditional upon the condition of â—his persevering sidelity 6. Even before Children are capable of Instruction there are certain duties imposed by God on the Parents for their sanctification viz. 1. That the Parents pray earnestly and believingly for them Second Commandment Prov. 20. 7. 2. That they themselves so live towards God as may invite him still to bless their Children for their sakes as he did Abrahams and usually did to the faithful's seed 7. It is certain that the Church ever required Parents not only to enter their Children into the Covenant and so to leave them but to do their after duty for their good and to pray for them and educate them according to their Covenant 8. It is plain that if there were none to promise so to educate them the Church would not baptize them And God himself who allowed the Israelites and still alloweth us to bring our Children into his Covenant doth it on this supposition that we promise also to go on to do our duty for them and that we actually do it 9. All this set together maketh it plain 1. That God never promiseth the adult in Baptism though true believers that he will work in them all graces further by his sanctifying spirit let them never so much neglect or resist him or that he will absolutely see that they never shall resist him nor that the spirit shall still help them though they neglect all his means or that he will keep them from neglecting the means Election may secure this to the Elect as such but the Baptismal Covenant as such secureth it not to the baptized nor to believers as such 2. And consequently that Infants are in Covenant with the Holy Ghost still conditionally as their Parents are And that the meaning of it The Holy Ghost is promised in Baptism to give the Child grace in his Parents and his own faithful use of the appointed means is that the Holy Ghost as your sanctifier will afford you all necessary help in the use of those means which he hath appointed you to receive his help in Obj. Infants have no means to use Answ. While Infants stand on their Parents account or Wills the Parents have means to use for the continuance of their grace as well as for the beginning of it 10. Therefore I cannot see but that if a believer should apostatize whether any do so is not the question and his Infant not be made anothers Child he forfeiteth the benefits of the Covenant to his Infant But if the propriety in the Infant be transferred to another it may alter the case 11. And how dangerously Parents may make partial forfeitures of the spirits assistance to their Children and operations on them by their own sinful lives and neglect of prayer and of prudent and holy education even in particular acts I fear many believing Parents never well considered 12. Yet is not this forfeiture such as obligeth God to deny his spirit For he may do with his own as a free benefactor as he list And may have mercy freely beyond his promise though not against his word on whom he will have mercy But I say that he that considereth the woful unfaithfulness and neglect of most Parents even the Religious in the Great work of holy educating their Children may take the blame of their ungodliness on themselves and not lay it on Christ or the spirit who was in Covenant with them as their sanctifier seeing he promised but conditionally M. â—â—istoâ— pag. â—3 As Abraham as a single person in Covenant was to accept of and perform the conditions of the Covenant so as a Parent he had something of duty incumbent on him with reference to his immediate seed And as his faithful performance of that duty incumbent on him in his single capacity so his performing that duty incumbent on him as a Parent in reference to his seed was absolutely necessary in order to his enjoying the good promised with reference to himself and his seed Proved Gen. 17 1. 18. 19. He proveth that the promise is conditional and that as to the continuance of the Covenant state the conditions are 1. The Parents upright life 2. His duty to his Children well done 3. The Childrens own duty as they are capable to give them the sanctifying Heavenly influences of his Life Light and Love in their just use of his appointed means according to their abilities 13. Also as soon as Children come to a little use of Reason they stand conjunctly on their Parents Wills and on their own As their Parents are bound to teach and rule them so they are bound to learn of them and be ruled by them for their good And though every sin of a Parent or a Child be not a total forfeiture of grace yet both their notable actual sins may justly be punished with a denyal of some further help of the spirit which they grieve and quench 11. And now I may seasonably answer the former question whether Infants Baptismal saving grace may be lost of which I must for the most that is to be said referr the Reader to Davenant in Mr. Bedfords Book on this subject and to Dr. Sam. Ward joyned with it Though Mr. Gatakers answers are very Learned and considerable And to my small Book called My Iudgement of Perseverance Augustine who first rose up for the doctrine of perseverance against its Adversaries carried it no higher than to all the Elect as such and not at all to all the Sanctified but oft affirmeth that some that were justified sanctified and Love God and are in a state of salvation are not elect and fall away But since the Reformation great reasons have been brought to carry it further to all the truly sanctified of which cause Zanchius was one of the first Learned and zealous Patrons that with great diligence in long disputations maintained it All that I have now to say is that I had rather with Davenant believe that the fore-described Infant state of salvation which came by the Parents may be lost by the Parents and the Children though such a sanctified renewed nature in holy Habits of Love as the adult have be never lost than believe that no Infants are in the Covenant of Grace and to be baptized Obj. But the Child once in possession shall not be punished for the Parents sin Answ. 1. This point is not commonly well understood I have by me a large Disputation proving from the current of Scripture a secondary original sin besides that from Adam and a secondary punishment ordinarily inflicted on Children for their Parents sins besides the common punishment of the World for the first sin 2. But the thing in question is
power derived from the Emperours and partly meer Agreements or Contracts by degrees degenerating into Governments And so the new forms and names are all but accidental of adjuncts of the true Christian Churches And though I cannot prove it unlawful to make such adjunctive or extrinsick constitutions forms and names considering the Matter simply it self yet by accident these accidents have proved such to the true Churches as the accident of sickness is to the body and have been the causes of the Divisions Wars Rebellions Ruines and Confusions of the Christian world 1. As they have served the covetousness and ambition of carnal men 2. And have enabled them to oppress simplicity and sincerity 3. And because Princes have not exercised their own power themselves nor committed it to Lay-Officers but to Church-men 4. Whereby the extrinsick Government hath so degenerated and obscured the Intrinsick and been confounded with it that both going under the equivocal name of Ecclesiastical Government few Churches have had the happiness to see them practically distinct Which tempâ—eth the Erashans to deny and pull down both together because they find one in the Pastors hands which belongeth to the Magistrate and we do not teach them to untwist and separate them Nay few Divines do clearly in their Controversies distinguish them Though Marsilius Patavinus and some few more have formerly given them very fair light yet hath it been but slenderly improved 11. There seemeth to me no readier and directer way to reduce the Churches to holy Concord and true reformation than for the Princes and Magistrates who are the extrinsick Rulers to re-assume their own and to distinguish openly and practically between the properly-Priestly or Pastoral intrinsick Office and their extrinsick part and to strip the Pastors of all that is not Intrinseeally their own It being enough for them and things so heterogeneous not well consisting in one person And then when the people know what is claimed as from the Magistrate only it will take off most of their scruples as to subjection and consent 12. No mortal man may abrogate or take down the Pastoral Office and the Intrinsick real power thereof and the Church-form which is constituted thereby seeing God hath instituted them for perpetuity on earth 13. But whether one Church shall have one Pastor or many is not at all of the Form of a particular Church but it is of the Integrity or gradual perfection of such Churches as need many to have many and to others not so Not that it is left meerly to the will of man but is to be varied as natural necessity and cause requireth 14. The nature of the Intrinsick Office or power anon to be described is most necessary to be understood as distinct from the power of Magistrates by them that would truly understand this The number of Governours in a Civil State make that which is called a variety of Forms of Common-wealths Monarchy Aristocracy or Democracy Because Commanding Power is the thing which is there most notably exercised and primarily magnified And a wiser and better man yea a thousand must stand by as Subjects for want of Authority or true Power which can be but in One Supream either Natural or Political person because it cannot consist in the exercise with self-contradiction If one be for War and another for Peace c. there is no Rule Therefore the Many must be one Collective or Political person and must consent or go by the major Vote or they cannot govern But that which is called Government in Priests or Ministers is of another nature It is but a secondary subservient branch of their Office The first parts are Teaching and Guiding the people as their Priests to God in publick Worship And they Govern them by Teaching and in order to further Teaching and Worshipping God And that not by Might but by Reason and Love Of which more anon Therefore if a Sacred Congregation be Taught and conducted in publick Worship and so Governed as conduceth hereunto whether by one two or many it no more altereth the Form of the Church than it doth the Form of a School when a small one hath one Schoolmaster and a great one four Or of a Hospital when a small one hath one Physicion and a great one many seeing that Teaching in the one and Healing in the other is the main denominating work to which Government is but subservient in the most notable acts of it 15. No mortal man may take on him to make another Church or another Office for the Church as a Divine thing on the same grounds and of the same nature pretendedly as Christ hath made those already made The case of adding new Church Officers or Forms of Churches is the same with that of making new Worship Ordinances for God and accordingly to be determined which I have largely opened in its place Accidents may be added Substantials of like pretended nature may not be added Because it is an usurping of Christs power without derivation by any proved commission and an accusing of him as having done his own work imperfectly 16. Indeed no man can here make a new Church Officer of this Intrinsick sort without making him new work which is to make new Doctrine or new Worship which are forbidden For to do ☞ Gods work already made belongs to the Office already instituted If every King will make his own Officers or authorize the greater to make the less none must presume to make Christ Officers and Churches without his Commission 17. No man must make any Office Church or Ordinance which is corruptive or destructive or contrary or injurious to the Offices Churches and Oâ—dinances which Christ himself hath made This Bellarmine confesseth and therefore I suppose Proâ—estants will not deny it Those humane Offices which usurp the work of Christs own Officers and take it out of their hands do malignantly fight against Christs institutions And while they pretend that it is but Preserving and not Corrupting or Opposing additions which they make and yet with these words in their mouths do either give Christs Officers work to others or hinder and oppress his Officers themselves and by their new Church-forms undermine or openly destroy the old by this expression of their enmity they confute themselves 18. This hath been the unhappy case of the Roman frame of Church innovations as you may observe in the particulars of its degeneracy 1. Councilâ— were called General or Oecumenical in respect to one-Empire only And they thence grew to extend the name to the whole world when they may as well say that Constantine Martiaâ— c. were Emperours of the whole world seeing by their authority they were called 2. These Councils at first were the Emperours Councils called to direct him what to setle in Church orders by his own power But they were turned to claim an imposing authority of their own to command the Churches as by commission from God 3. These Councils at first
any thing and fearless in the greatest perils For what should he fear who hath escaped Hell and Gods displeasure and hath conquered the King of terrours But fear is the duty and most rational temper of a guilty soul and the more fearless such are the more foolish and more miserable § 2. Direct 2. Be sure you have a warrantable Cause and Call In a bad cause it is a dreadful Direct 2. thing to conquer or to be conquered If you conquer you are a murderer of all that you kill If you are conquered and dye in the prosecution of your sin I need not tell you what you may expect I know we are here upon a difficulty which must be tenderly handled If we make the soveraign power to be the absolute and only Iudge whether the Souldiers cause and call be good then it would follow that it is the duty of all the Christian subjects of the Turk to fight against Christianity as such and to destroy all Christians when the Turk commandeth it And that all the subjects of other Lands are bound to invade this or other such Christian Kingdoms and destroy their Kings when ever their Popish or malicious Princes or States shall command them which being intollerable consequences prove the Antecedent to be intollerable And yet on the other side if subjects must be the Judges of their cause and call the Prince shall not be served nor the common good secured till the interest of the Subjects will allow them to discern the goodness of the cause Between these two intollerable consequents it is hard to meet with a just discovery of the mean Most run into one of the extreams which they take to be the less and think that there is no other avoiding of the other The grand errours in this and an hundred like cases come from not distinguishing aright the case de esse from the case de apparere or cognoscere and not first determining the former as it ought before the latter be determined Either the cause which Subjects are commanded to fight in is really lawful to them or it is not Say not here importunely who shall judge For we are now but upon the question de esse If it be not lawful in it self but be meer robbery or murder then come to the case of Evidence Either this evil is to the subject discernable by just means or not If it be I am not able for my part to justifie him from the sin if he do it no more than to have justified the three witnesses Dan. 3. if they had bowed down to the golden Calf or Daniel 6. if he had forborn prayer or the Apostles if they had forborn preaching or the Souldiers for apprehending and crucifying Christ when their Superiours commanded them For God is first to be obeyed and feared But if the evil of the Cause be such as the Subject cannot by just and ordinary means discern then must he come next to examine his Call And a Volunteer unnecessarily he may not be in a doubtful cause It is so heinous a sin to murder men that no man should unnecessarily venture upon that which may prove to be murder for ought he knoweth But if you ask what Call may make such a doubtful action necessary I answer It must be such as warranteth it either from the End of the action or from the Authority of the Commander or both And from the end of the action the case may be made clear that if a King should do wrong to a forreign enemy and should have the worse cause yet if the revenge which that enemy seeketh would be the destruction of the King and Countrey or Religion it is lawful and a duty to fight in the desence of them And if the King should be the assailant or beginner that which is an Offensive War in him for which he himself must answer may be but a Defensive War in the commanded Subjects and they be innocent Even on the High-way if I see a stranger provoke another by giving him the first blow yet I may be bound to save his life from the fury of the avenging party But whether or how farr the bare Command of a soveraigne may warrant the subjects to venture in a doubtfull cause supposing the thing lawful in it self though they are doubtful requireth so much to be said to it which Civil Governours may possibly think me too bold to meddle with that I think it safest to pass it by only saying that there are some cases in which the Ruler is the only Competent Judge and the doubts of the subject are so unreasonable that they will not excuse the sin of his disobedience and also that the degree of the doubt is oft very considerable in the case But suppose the cause of the War be really lawful in it self and yet the subject is in doubt of it yea or thinketh otherwise then is he in the case as other erroneous consciences are that is entangled in a necessity of sinning till he be undeceived in case his Rulers command his service But which would be the greater sin to do it or not the Ends and circumstances may do much to determine But doubtless in true Necessity to save the King and State subjects may be compelled to fight in a just cause notwithstanding that they mistake it for unjust And if the subject have a private discerning judgement so far as he is a voluntary agent yet the Soveraign hath a publick determining judgement when a neglecter is to be forced to his duty Even as a man that thinketh it unlawful to maintain his Wife and Children may be compelled lawfully to do it So that it is apparent that sometime the Soveraigns cause may be good and yet an erroneous conscience may make the Souldiers cause bad if they are Volunteers who run unnecessarily upon that which they take for robbery and murder and yet that the Higher Powers may force even such mistakers to defend their Countrey and their Governours in a case of true necessity And it is manifest that sometimes the Cause of the Ruler may be bad and yet the cause of the Souldier good And that sometimes the cause may be bad and sinful to them both and sometime good and lawful unto both § 3. Direct 3. When you are doubtful whether your Cause and Call be good it is ordinarily Direct 3. safest to sit still and not to venture in so dangerous a case without great deliberation and sufficient evidence to satisfie your consciences Neander might well say of Solons Law which punished them Neander in Chron. p. 104. that took not one part or other in a Civil War or Sedition Admirabilis autem illa atque plane incredibilis quae honoribus abdicat eum qui orta seditione nullam factionem secutus sit No doubt he is a culpable Neuter that will not defend his Governours and his Countrey when he hath a call But it is so dreadful a thing to
do it And so sweet is Revenge to their furious nature as the damning of men is to the Devil that Revenged they will be though they lose their souls by it And the impotency and baseness of their spirits is such that they say Flesh and blood is unable to bear it § 11. 10. Another cause of murder is a wicked impatience with neer relations and a hatred of those that should be most dearly loved Thus many men and women have murdered their Wives and Husbands when either Adulterous Lust hath given up their hearts to another or a cross impatient discontented mind hath made them seem intollerable burdens to each other And then the Devil that destroyed their love and brought them thus far will be their teacher in the rest and shew them how to ease themselves till he hath led them to the Gallows and to Hell How necessary is it to keep in the way of duty and abhor and suppress the beginnings of sin § 12. 11. And sometimes Covetousness hath caused Murder when one man desireth another mans estate Thus Ahab came by Naboth's Vineyards to his cost And many a one desireth the death of another whose estate must fall to him at the others death Thus many a Child in heart is guilty of the murder of his Parents though he actually commit it not Yea a secret gladness when they are dead doth shew the guilt of some such desire◠while they were living And the very abatement of such moderate mourning as natural affection should procure because the estate is thereby come to them as the heirs doth shew that such are far from innocent Many a Iudas for Covetousness hath betrayed another Many a false witness for Covetousness hath sold anothers life Many a Thief for Covetousness hath taken away anothers life to get his money And many a Covetous Landlord hath longed for his Tenants death and been glad to hear of it And many a Covetous Souldier hath made a trade of killing men for Money So true is it that the Love of money is the root of all evil and therefore is one cause of this § 13. 12. And Ambition is too common a Cause of Murder among the great ones of the World How many have dispatched others out of the World because they stood in the way of their advancement For a long time together it was the ordinary way of Rising and dying to the Roman and Greek Emperours for one to procure the murder of the Emperour that he might usurp his Seat and then to be so murdered by another himself And every Souldier that looked for preferment by the change was ready to be an instrument in the fact And thus hath even the Roman seat of his Mock Holiness for a long time and oft received its Successours by the poison or other murdering of the possessours of the desired place And alas how many thousand hath that See devoured to defend its Universal Empire under the name of the spiritual Headship of the Church How many unlawful Wars have they raised or cherished even against Christian Emperours and Kings How many thousands have been Massacred How many Assassinate as Hen. 3. and Hen. 4. of France Besides those that fires and Inquisitions have consumed And all these have been the flames of Pride Yea when their fellow-Sectaries in Munster and in England the Anabaptists and Seekers have catcht some of their proud disease it hath workt in the same way of blood and cruelty § 14. 2. But besides these twelves great sins which are the nearest cause of Murder there are many more which are yet greater and deeper in nature which are the Roots of all especially these 1. The first cause is the want of true Belief of the Word of God and the judgement and punishment to come and the want of the Knowledge of God himself Atheism and Infidelity 2. Hence cometh the want of the true Fear of God and subjection to his holy Laws 3. The predominance of selfishness in all the unsanctified is the radical inclination to murder and all the injustice that is committed 4. And the want of Charity or Loving our Neighbour as our selves doth bring men neer to the execution and leaveth little inward restraint § 15. By all this you may see how this sin must be prevented and let not any man think it a needless work Thousands have been guilty of murder that once thought themselves as far from it as you 1. The soul must be possessed with the Knowledge of God and the true Belief of his Word and judgement 2. Hereby it must be possessed of the Fear of God and subjection to him 3. And the Love of God must mortifie the power of selfishness 4. And also much possess us with a true Love to our neighbours yea and enemies for his sake 5. And the twelve fore-mentioned causes of murder will thus be destroyed at the Root § 16. II. And some further help it will be to understand the Greatness of this sin Consider therefore 1. It is an unlawful destroying not only a Creature of God but one of his noblest Creatures upon earth Even one that beareth at least the natural Image of God Gen. 9. 5 6. And surely your blood of your lives will I require at the hand of every beast will I require it and at the hand of man at the hand of every mans brother will I require the life of man whoso sheddeth mans blood by man shall his blood be shed for in the image of God made he man Yea God will not only have the beast slain that killeth a man but also forbiddeth there the eating of blood v. 4. that man might not be accustomed to cruelty 2. It is the opening a door to confusion and all calamity in the World For if one man may kill another without the sentence of the Magistrate another may kill him and the world will be like Mastiffs or mad Dogs turned all loose on one another kill that kill can 3. If it be a wicked man that is killed it is the sending of a soul to Hell and cutting off his time of Repentance and his hopes If it be a Godly man it is a depriving of the World of the blessing of a profitable member and all that are about him of the benefits of his goodness and God of the service which he was here to have performed These are enough to infer the dreadful consequents to the Murderer which are such as these III. 1. It is a sin which bringeth so great a guilt that if it be repented of and pardoned yet Conscience very hardly doth ever attain to peace and quietness in this World And if it be unpardoned it is enough to make a man his own Executioner and tormenter 2. It is a sin that seldome scapeth vengeance in this life If the Law of the Land take not away their lives as God appointeth Gen. 9. 6. God useth to follow them with his extraordinary Plagues and causeth their sin
Quest. 7. Answ. No not by private assault or violence But if the crime be so great that the Law of the Land doth punish it with death if that Law be just you may in some cases seek to bring the offendor to publick justice But that is rare and otherwise you may not do it For 1. It belongeth only to the Magistrate and not to you to be the avenger 2. And killing a man can be no meet defence against calumny or slander For if you will kill a man for prevention you kill the innocent If you kill him afterward it is no Defence but an unprofitable revenge which vindicateth not your honour but dishonoureth you more Your patience is your honour and your bloody revenge doth shew you to be so like the Devil the destroyer that it is your greatest shame 3. It is odious Pride which maketh men over-value their reputation among men and think that a mans life is a just compensation to them for their dishonour Such bloody Sacrifices are fit to appâ—ase only the blood-thirsty Spirit But what is it that Pride will not do and justifie CHAP. XI Special Directions to escape the guilt of persecuting Determining also the case about Liberty in matters of Religion THough this be a subject which the guilty cannot endure to hear of yet the misery of persecutors the blood and grones and ruines of the Church and the lamentable divisions of profâ—ssed Christians do all command me not to pass it by in silence but to tell them the truth whether they will hear or whether they will forbear though they were such as Ezek. 3. 7 8 9 11. § 1. Direct 1. If you would escape this dreadful guilt Understand well what Persecution is Else Direct 1. you may either run into it ignorantly or oppose a duty as if it were persecution § 2. The Verb Persequor is often taken in a good sence for no more than continuato motu vel ad extremum sequor and sometime for the blameless prosecution of a delinquent But we take it here as the English word Persecute is most commonly taken for inimico affectu insequor for a malicious or injurious hurting or prosecuting another and that for the sake of Religion or Righteousness For it is not common injuries which we here intend to speak of Three things then go to make up Persecution 1. That it be the Hurting of another in his Body liberty relations estate or reputation 2. That it be done injuriously to one who deserveth it not in the particular which is the cause 3. That it be for the cause of Religion or of Righteousness that is for the Truth of God which we hold or utter or for the worship of God which we perform or for obedience to the will of God revealed in his Laws This is the cause on the sufferers part what ever is intended by the Persecuter § 3. There are divers sorts of Persecution As to the Principles of the Persecutors 1. There is a Persecution which is openly professed to be for the cause of Religion As Heathens and Mahometans persecute Christians as Christians And there is an Hypocritical Persecution when the pretended cause is some odious crime but the real cause is mens Religion or obedience to God This is the common Persecution which nominal Christians exercise on serious Christians or on one another They will not say that they Persecute them because they are Godly or serious Christians but that is the true cause For if they will but set them above God and obey them against God they will abate their Persecution Many of the Heathens thus persecuted the Christians too under the name of Ungodly and evil doers But the true cause was because they obeyed not their commands in the Worshipping of their Idol Gods So do the Papists persecute and murder men not as Professours of the truth which is the true cause but under the name of Hereticks and Schâ—smaticks or Rebels against the Pope or what ever their malice pleaseth to accuse them of And prophane nominal Christians seldome persecute the serious and sincere directly by that name but under some Nickname which they set upon them or under the name of Hypocrites or self-conceited or factious persons or such like And if they live in a place and Age where there are many Civil Wars or differences they are sure to fetch some odious name or accusation thence Which side soever it be that they are on or if they meddle not on any side they are sure by every party whom they please not to hear Religion loaded with such reproaches as the times will allow them to vent against it Even the Papists who take this course with Protestants it seems by Acosta are so used themselves not by the Heathens but by one another yea by the multitude yea by their Priests For so saith he speaking of the Parish Priests Priests among the Indians having reproved their Diceing Carding Hunting Idleness Lib. 4 c. 15. pag. 404 405. Itaque is cui Pastoralis Indorum cura committitur non solum contra diaboli machinas naturae incentiva pugnare debet sed jam etiam confirmatae hominum consuetudini tempore turba praepotenti sese objicere ad excipienda invidorum ac malevolorum tela forte pectus opponere qui siquid à profano suo instituto abhorrentem viderint proditorem hypocritam hostem clamaâ—t that is He therefore to whom the Pastoral care of the Indians is committed must not only fight against the Engines of the Devil and the incentives of nature but also now must object or set himself against the confirmed custome of men which is grown very powerful both by time and by the multitude and must valiantly oppose his breast to receive the darts of the envious and malevolent who if they see any thing contrary to their profane fashion or breeding cry out A Traitor An Hypocrite an Enemy It seems then that this is a common course § 4. 2. Persecution is either done in Ignorance or Knowledge The commonest persecution is that which is done in Ignorance and errour when men think a Good cause to be bad or a bad cause to be good and so persecute Truth while they take it to be falshood or good while they take it to be evil or obtrude by violence their Errours for Truths and their evils as good and necessary things Thus Peter testifieth of the Jews who killed the Prince of life Act. 3. 13 14 17. I know that through Ignorance you did it as did also your Rulers And Paul 1 Cor. 2. 8. which none of the Princes of this world knâ—w for had they known it they would not have Crucified the Lord of glory And Christ himself saith Joh. 16. 3. These things will they do unto you because they have not known the Father or me And Paul saith of himself Act. 26. 9. I thought verily with my self that I ought to do many things contrary to the name
think their own understanding and stability is sufficient to preserve them do shew by their pride that they are near a fall 1 Cor. 10. 2. The company of sensual persons at Stage-playes Gaming inordinate playes and wanton dalliance For this is to bring your Tinder and Gunpowder to the fire And the less you fear it the greater is your danger § 24. Direct 7. Look more at the good that is in others than at their faults and falls The Flye Direct 7. that will fall on none but the galled ulcerous place doth feed accordingly Is a professor of Religion Covetous Drunk or other wayes scandalous Remember that it is his Covetousness or drunkenness that is bad Reprove that and fly from it and spare not But Religion is good Let that therefore be commended and imitated Leave the Carrion to Dogs and Crows to feast upon But do you choose out the things that are commendable and mind and mention and imitate those § 25. Direct 8. Lastly Think and speak as much against the sin and danger of taking-scandal as Direct 8. against the sin and danger of giving it When others cry out These are your religious people Do you cry out as much against their malignity and madness who will dislike or reproach Religion for mens sins Which is to blame the the Law-makers or Laws because they are broken or to fall out with Health because many that once were in health fall sick or to find fault with eating because some are lean or with clothing because some are cold Open to your selves and others what a wicked and perillous thing this is to fall out with Godliness because some are ungodly that seemed godly Many cry out against Scandal Scandal that never think what a heinous sin it is to be scandalized or to suffer mens sins to be a scandal to you and to be the worse because that others are so bad No one must differ from them in an opinion or a fashion of apparel or in a mode or form of Worship but some are presently scandalized Not knowing that it is a greater sin in them to be scandalized than in the other by such means supposing them to be faulty to give them the occasion Do you know what it is to be scandalized or offended in the Scripture sense It is not meerly to be displeased or to dislike anothers actions as is before said But it is to be drawn into some sin or hindered from some duty or stopt in the course of Religion or to think the worse of truth or duty or a godly life because of other mens words or actions And do you think him a good Christian and a faithful or constant friend to godliness who is so easily brought to quarrel with it Or is so easily turned from it or hindered in it Some pievish childish persons are like sick stomachs that no meat can please you cannot dress it so curiously but they complain that it is naught or this ayleth it or that ayleth it when the fault is in themselves Or like children or sick persons that can scarce be toucht but they are hurt Do you think that this sickliness or curiosity in Religion is a credit to you This is not the tenderness of Conscience which God requireth to be easily hurt by other mens differences or faults As it is the shame of many Ladies and Gentlewomen to be so curious and troublesomely neat that no servant knoweth how to please them so is it in Religion a sign of your childish folly and worse to be guilty of such proud curiosity that none can please you who are not exactly of your mind and way All men must follow your humours in gestures fashions opinions formalities and modes or else you are troubled and offended and scandalized As if all the world were made to please and humour you Or you were wise enough and great and good enough to be the rule of all about you Desire and spare not that your selves and all men should please God as exactly as is possible But if the want of that exactness in doubtful things or a difference in things disputable and doubtful among true Christians do thereupon abate or hinder your Love or estimation of your brethren or communion with them or any other Christian duty or tempt you into censoriousness or contempt of your brethren or to Schism Persecution or any other sin it is you that are the great offenders and you that are like to be the sufferers and have cause to lament that sinful aptness to be thus scandalized CHAP. XIV Directions against soul-murder and partaking of other mens sins THE special Directions given Part 3. Ch. 22. to Parents and Masters will in this case be of great use to all others But because it is here seasonable to speak of it further under the sixth Commandment and the matter is of greatest consequence I shall 1. Tell you how men are guilty of soul-murder 2. And then give you some General Directions for the furthering of mens salvation 3. And next give you some special Directions for Christian Exhortation and Reproofs § 1. 1. Men are guilty of soul-murder by all these wayes 1. By preaching false soul-murdering doctrine such as denyeth any necessary point of faith or holy living such as is opposite to a holy life or to any particular necessary duty such as maketh sin to be no sin which call good evil and evil good wich putteth darkness for light and light for darkness § 2. 2. By false application of true doctrine indirectly reflecting upon and disgracing that holiness of life which in terms they preach for By prevarication undermining that cause which their office is appointed to promote As they do who purposely so describe any vice that the hearers may be drawn to think that strict and Godly practices are either that sin it self or but a Cloak to hide it § 3. 3. By bringing the persons of the most religious into hatred by such false applications reflections or secret insinuations or open calumnies Making men believe that they are all but Hypocrites or Schismaticks or seditious or fanatical self-conceited persons Which is usually done either by impudent slanders raised against some particular men and so reflected on the rest or by the advantage of factions controversies or Civil Wars or by the falls of any professours or the crimes of Hypocrites whereupon they would make the World believe that they are all alike As if all Christs family were to be judged of by Peters fall or Iudas falshood And the odious representation of Godly men doth greatly prevail to keep others from Godliness and is one of the Devils most successful means for the damnation of multitudes of souls § 4. 4. The disgrace of the persons of the Preachers of the Gospel doth greatly further mens damnation For when the people think their Teachers to be Hypocrites Covetous Proud and secretly as bad as others they are very like to think accordingly of their doctrine
created for § 2. Mot. 2. There is no subject so sublime and honourable for the Tongue of man to be imployed about as the matters of God and life eternal Children will talk of childish toyes and Countreymen talk of their Corn and Cattel and Princes and Statesmen look down on these with contemptuous smiles as much below them But Crowns and Kingdoms are incomparably more below the business of a holy soul The higher subjects Philosophers treat of the more honourable if well done are their discourses But none is so high as God and glory § 3. Mot. 3. It is the most profitable subject to the hearers A discourse of Riches at the most can but direct them how to grow rich A discourse of Honours usually puffeth up the minds of the ambitious And if it could advance the auditors to Honour the fruit would be a vanity little to be desired But a discourse of God and Heaven and Holiness doth tend to change the hearers minds into the nature of the things discourst of It hath been the means of converting and sanctifying many a thousand souls As learned discourses tend to make men learned in the things discourst off so holy discourses tend to make men holy For as natural Generation begetteth not Gold or Kingdoms but a Man so speech is not made to communicate to others directly the wealth or health or honours or any extrinsecal things which the speaker hath but to communicate those Mental Excellencies which he is possest of Prov. 16. 21 22. The sweetness of the lips increaseth learning Understanding is a well-spring of life to him that hath it Prov. 10. 13 21. In the lips of him that hath understanding wisdom is found The lips of the righteous feed many Prov. 15. 7. The lips of the wise disperse knowledge but the heart of the foolish doth not so Prov. 20. 15. There is Gold and a multitude of Rubies but the lips of knowledge are a precious Iewel Prov. 10. 20. The tongue of the just is as choice Silver the heart of the wicked is little worth § 4. Mot. 4. Holy discourse is also most profitable to the speaker himself Grace increaseth by the exercise Even in instructing others and opening truth we are oft times more powerfully led up to further truth our selves than by solitary studies For Speech doth awaken the intellectual faculty and keepeth on the thoughts in order and one truth oft inferreth others to a thus excited and prepared mind And the tongue hath a power of moving own our hearts When we blow the fire to warm another both the exercise and the fire warm our selves It kindleth the flames of holy love in us to declare the praise of God to others It increaseth a hatred of sin in us to open its odiousness to others We starve our selves when we starve the souls which we should cherish § 5. Mot. 5. Holy and Heavenly discourse is the most delectable I mean in its own aptitude and to a mind that is not diseased by corruption That which is most Great and Good and Necessary is most delectable What should best please us but that which is best for us And best for others And best in it self The excellency of the subject maketh it delightful And so doth the exercise of our Graces upon it And serious conference doth help down the truth into our hearts where it is most sweet Besides that Nature and Charity make it pleasant to do good to others It can be nothing better than a subversion of the appetite by carnality and wickedness that maketh any one think idle jeasts or tales or plays to be more pleasant than spiritual Heavenly conference and the talking of Riches or Sports or Lusts to be sweeter than to talk of God and Christ and grace and glory A holy mind hath a continual feast in it self in meditating on these things and the communicating of such thoughts to others is a more Common and so a more pleasant feast § 6. Mot. 6. Our faithfulness to God obligeth us to speak his praise and to promote his truth â—â—d plead his cause against iniquity Hath he given us tongues to magnifie his name and set before us the admirable frame of all the World to declare his Glory in And shall we be backward to so sweet and great a work How precious and useful is all his holy word What light and life and comfort may it cause And shall we bury it in silence What company can we come into almost where either the bare-faced committing of sin or the defending it or the opposition of truth or Godliness or the frigidity of mens hearts towards God and supine neglect of holy things do not call to us if we are the servants of God to take his part and if we are the Children of light to bear our testimony against the darkness of the World and if we love God and truth and the souls of men to shâ—w it by our prudent seasonable speech Is he true to God and to his cause that will not open his mouth to speak for him § 7. Mot. 7. And how precious a thing is an immortal soul and therefore not to be neglected Did Christ think souls to be worth his Mediation by such strange condescension even to a shameful death Did he think them worth his coming into flesh to be their teacher And will you not think them worth the speaking to § 8. Mot. 8. See also the greatness of your sin in the negligence of unfaithful Ministers It is easie to see the odiousness of their sin who preach not the Gospel or do no more than by an hours dry and dead discourse shift off the serious work which they should do and think they may be excused from all personal oversight and helping of the peoples souls all the Week after And why should you not perceive that a dumb private Christian is also to be condemned as well as a dumb Minister Is not profitable conference your duty as well as profitable preaching is his How many persons condemn themselves while they speak against unfaithful Pastors being themselves as unfaithful to Families and Neighbours as the other are to the flock § 9. Mot. 9. And consider how the cheapness of the means doth aggravate the sin of your neglect and shew much unmercifulness to souls Words cost you little Indeed alone without the company of good works they are too cheap for God to accept of But if an Hypocrite may bring so cheap a sacrifice who is rejected what doth he deserve that thinketh it too dear What will that man do for God or for his Neighbours soul who will not open his mouth to speak for them He seemeth to have less love than that man in Hell Luk. 16. who would so fain have had a messenger sent from another World to have warned his brethren and saved them from that place of torment § 10. Mot. 10. Your fruitful conference is a needful help to the ministerial work When
deal with a Tenant as rich or richer than your self or with one that needeth not your mercy or is no fit object of it 2. And if it be Land that no man can by custome claim equitably to hold on lower terms and so it is no injury to another nor just scandal then you may lawfully raise it to the full worth Sometimes a poor man setteth a House or Land to a rich man where the scruple hath no place Quest. 3. May a Landlord raise his Rents though he take not the full worth Quest. 3. Answ. He may do it when there is just reason for it and none against it There is just reason for it when 1. The Land was much underset before 2. Or when the Land is proportionably improved 3. Or when the plenty of money maketh a greater summ to be in effect no more than a lesser heretofore 4. Or when an increase of persons or other accident maketh Land dearer than it was But then it must be supposed 1. That no Contract 2. Nor Custome 3. Nor Service and Merit do give the Tenant any equitable right to his better penny-worth And also that Mercy prohibite not the change Quest. 4. How much must a Landlord set his Land below the full worth that he may be no oppressor Quest. 4. or unmerciful to his Tenants Answ. No one proportion can be determined of because a great alteration may be made in respect to the Tenants ability his merit to the time and place and other accidents Some Tenants are so rich as is said that you are not bound to any abatement Some are so bad that you are bound to no more than strict Justice and common humanity to them Some years like the last when a longer drowth than any man alive had known burnt up the Grass disableth a Tenant to pay his Rent Some Countreys are so scarce of money that a little abatement is more than in another place But ordinarily the common sort of Tenants in England should have so much abated of the fullest worth that they may comfortably live on it and follow their labours with cheerfulness of mind and liberty to serve God in their families and to mind the matters of their salvation and not to be necessitated to such toil and care and pinching want as shall make them liker Slaves than Free-men and make their lives uncomfortable to them and make them unfit to serve God in their families and seasonably mind eternal things Quest. 5. What if the Landlord be in debt or have some present want of money may be not then raise Quest. 5. the Rent of those Lands which were under-let before Answ. If his pride pretend want where there is none as to give extraordinary portions with his daughters to erect sumptuous buildings c. this is no good excuse for oppression But if he really fall into want then all that his Tenants hold as meer gifts from his liberality he may withdraw as being no longer able to give But that which they had by custome an equitable title to or by contract also a legal title to he may not withdraw And yet all this is his sin if he brought that poverty culpably on himself it is his sin in the cause though supposing that cause the raising of his Rent be lawfulâ— But it is not every debt in a rich man who hath other wayes of paying it which is a true necessity in this Case And if a present debt made it necessary only at that time it is better by Fine or otherwise make a present supply than thereupon to lay a perpetual burden on the Tenants when the cause is ceased Quest. 6. What if there be abundance of honest people in for greater want than my Tenants are Quest. 6. yea perhaps Preachers of the Gospel and I have no other way to relieve them unless I raise my Rents Am I not bound rather to give to the best and poorest than to others Answ. Yes if it were a case that concerned meer giving But when you must take away from one to give to another there is more to be considered in it Therefore at least in these two cases you may not raise your Tenants Rents to relieve the best or poorest whosoever 1. In case that he have some equitable title to your Land as upon the easier Rent 2. Or in case that the scandal of seeming injustice or cruelty is like to do more hurt to the interest of Religion and mens souls than your relieving the poor with the addition would do good which a prudent man by collation of probable consequents may satisfactorily discern But if it were not only to preserve the comforts but to save the lives of others in their present famine nature teacheth you to take that which is truly your own both from your Tenants and your Servants and your own mouths to relieve men in such extream distress and Nature will teach all men to judge it your duty and no scandalous oppression But when you cannot relieve the ordinary wants of the poor without such a scandalous raising of your Rents as will do more harm than your alms would do good God doth not than call you to give such Alms but you are to be supposed to be unable Quest. 7. May I raise a Tenants Rent or turn him out of his House because he is a bad man by a Quest. 7. kind of penalty Answ. A bad man hath a title to his Own as well as a good man And therefore if he have either legal or equitable title you may not Nor yet if the scandal of it is like to do more hurt than the good can countervail which you intend Otherwise you may either raise his Rent or turn him out if he be a wicked profligate incorrigible person after due admonition Yea and you ought to do it lest you be a cherisher of wickedness If the Parents under Moses Law were bound to accuse their own Son to the Judges in such a case and say This our Son is stubborn and rebellious he will not obey our voice he is a glutton and a drunkard and all the men of the City must stone him till he dye to put away evil from among them Deut. 21. 18 19 20 21. Then surely a wicked Tenant is not so far to be spared as to be cherished by bounty in his sin It is the Magistrates work to punish him by Governing Justice But it is your work as a prudent Benefactor to withhold your gifts of bounty from him And I think it is one of the great sins of this age that this is not done it being one of the notablest means imaginable to reform the Land and make it happy if Landlords would thus punish or turn out their wicked incorrigible Tenants It would do much more than the Magistrate can do The vulgar are most effectually ruled by their interest as we rule our Dogs and Horses more by the Government of their bellies than
several tempers and strength and appetites 2. And between the restraint of Want and the restraint of Gods Law And so it is thus resolved 1. Such difference in quantity or quality as mens health or strength and real benefit requireth may be made by them that have no want 2. When want depriveth the poor of that which would be really for their health and strength and benefit it is not their duty who have no such want to conform themselves to other mens afflictions Except when other reasons do require it 3. But all men are bound to avoid real excess in matter or manner and curiosity and to lay out nothing needlesly on their bellies yea nothing which they are called to lay out a better way Understand this answer and it will suffice you § 5. Inst. 2. Another way of Prodigality is by needless costly Visits and Entertainments Inst. 2. Quest. 2. What cost upon Visits and Entertainments is unlawful and prodigal Quest. 2. Answ. 1. Not only all that which hath an ill original as Pride or flattery of the rich and all that hath an ill End as being meerly to keep up a carnal unprofitable interest and correspondency but also all that which is excessive in degree I know you will say But that 's the difficulty to know when it is excessive It is not altogether impertinent to say when it is above the proportion of your own estate or the ordinary use of those of your own ranck or when it plainly tendeth to cherish gluttony or excess in others But these answers are no exact solution I add therefore that it is excess when any thing is that way expended which you are called to expend another way Object But this leaveth it still as difficult as before Answ. When in rational probability a greater good may be done by another way of expence consideratis considerandis and a greater good is by this way neglected then you had a call to spend it otherwise and this expence is sinful Object It is a doubt whether of two goods it be a mans duty alwayes to choose the greater Answ. Speaking of that Good which is within his choice it is no more doubt than whether Good be the object of the will If Good be eligible as good then the greatest good is most eligible Object But this is still a difficulty insuperable How can a man in every action and expence discern Whether a man is bound to prefer the greatest good which way it is that the greatest good is like to be attained This putteth a mans conscience upon endless perplexities and we shall never be sure that we do not sin For when I have given to a poor man or done some good for ought I know there was a poorer that should have had it or a greater good that should have been done Answ. 1. The contrary opinion legitimateth almost all villany and destroyeth most good works as to our selves or any others If a man may lawfully prefer a known lesser good before a greater and be justified because that the lesser is a real good than he may be feeding his Horse when he should be saving the life of his child or neighbour or quenching a fire in the City or defending the person of his King He may deny to serve his King and Countrey and say I was ploughing or sowing the while He may prefer sacrifice before mercy He may neglect his soul and serve his body He may plow on the Lords Day and neglect all Gods Worship A lesser duty is no duty but a sin when a greater is to be done Therefore it is certain that when two goods come together to our choice the greater is to be chosen or else we sin 2. As you expect that your Steward should proportion his expences according to the necessity of your business and not give more for a thing than it is worth nor lay out your money upon smaller commodities while he leaveth your greater business unprovided for And as you expect that your Servant who hath many things in the day to do should have so much skill as to know which to prefer and not to leave undone the chiefest whilest he spendeth his time upon the least So doth God require that his servants labour to be so skilful in his service as to be able to compare their businesses together and to know which at every season to prefer If Christianity required no wisdome and skill it were below mens common Trades and Callings 3. And yet when you have done your best here and truly endeavour to serve God faithfully with the best skill and diligence you have you need not make it a matter of scrupulosity perplexity and vexation For God accepteth you and pardoneth your infirmities and rewardeth your fidelity And what if it do follow that you know not but there may be some sinful omission of a better way Is that so strange or intollerable a conclusion As long as it is only a pardoned failing which should not hinder the comfort of your obedience Is it strange to you that we are all imperfect And imperfect in every good we do Even by a culpable sinful imperfection You never Loved God in your lives without a sinful imperfection in your Love And yet nothing in you is more acceptable to him than your love Shall we think a case of Conscience ill resolved unless we may conclude that we are sure we have no sinful imperfection in our duty If your Servant have not perfect skill in knowing what to prefer in buying and selling or in his work I think you will neither allow him therefore to neglect the greater and better knowingly or by careless negligence nor yet would you have him sit down and whine and say I know not which to choose But you would have him learn to be as skilful as he can and then willingly and chearfully do his business with the best skill and care and diligence he can And this you will best accept So that this holdeth as the truest and exactest solution of this and many another such case He that spendeth that upon an entertainment of some great ones which should relieve some poor distressed families that are ready to perish doth spend it sinfully If you cannot see this in Gods cause suppose it were the Kings and you will see it If you have but twenty pound to spend and your Tax or Subsidie cometh to so much If you entertain some Noble friend with that money will the King be satisfied with that as an excuse Or will you not be told that the King should have first been served Remember him then who will one day ask Have you fed or clothed or visited me Mat. 25. You are not absolute Owners of any thing but the stewards of God! and must expend it as he appointeth you And if you let the poor lye languishing in necessities whilest you are at great charges to entertain the rich without necessity or a greater good
worst they can against another as an enemy but as loving friends do use an amicable arbitration resolving contentedly to stand to what the Iudge determineth without any alienation of mind or abatement of brotherly love § 12. Direct 9. Be not too confident of the righteousness of your own cause but ask counsel of some Direct 9. understanding godly and impartial men and hear all that can be said and patiently consider of the case and do as you would have others do by you § 13. Direct 10. Observe what terrors of Conscience use to haunt awakened sinners especially on a Direct 10. death-â—ead for such sins as false witnessing and false judging and oppressing and injuâ—ing the innocent even above most other sins CHAP. XXIII Cases of Conscience and Directions against Backbiting Slandering and Evil Speaking Tit. 1. Cases of Conscience about Backbiting and Evil Speaking Quest. 1. MAy I not speak evil of that which is evil And call every one truly as Quest. 1. he is Answ. You must not speak a known falshood of any man under pretence of Charity or speaking well But you are not to speak all the evil of every man which is true As opening the faults of the King or your Parents though never so truly is a sin against the fifth Commandment Honour thy Father and Mother So if you do it without a call you sin against your neighbours honour and many other wayes offend Quest. 2. Is it not sinful silence and a consenting to or countenancing of the sins of others to say Quest. 2. nothing against them as tender of their honour Answ. It is sinful to be silent when you have a call to speak If you forbear to admonish the offender in love between him and you when you have opportunity and just cause it is sinful to be silent then But to silence backbiting is no sin If you must be guilty of every mans sin that you talk not against behind his back your whole discourse must be nothing but backbiting Quest. 3. May I not speak that which honest religious credible persons do report Quest. 3. Answ. Not without both sufficient evidence and a sufficient call You must not judge of the action by the person but of the person by the action Nor must you imitate any man in evil doing If a good man abuse you are you willing that all men follow him and abuse you more Quest. 4. May I believe the bad report of an honest credible person Quest. 4. Answ. You must first consider Whether you may hear it or meddle with it For if it be a case that you have nothing to do with you may not set your judgement to it either to believe it or disbelieve it And if it be a thing that you are called to judge of yet every honest mans word is not presently to be believed You must first know whether it be a thing that he saw or is certain of himself or a thing which he only taketh upon report And what his evidence or proof is and whether he be not engaged by interest passion or any difference of opinion Or be not engaged in some contrary faction where the interest of a party or cause is his temptation Or whether he be not used to rash reports and uncharitable speeches And what concurrence of testimonies there is and what is said on the other side Especially what the person accused saith in his own defence If it be so heinous a crime in publick Judgement to pass sentence before both parties are heard and to condemn a man before he speak for himself it cannot be justifiable in private judgement Would you be willing your selves that all should be believed of you which is spoken by any honest man And how uncertain are we of other mens honesty that we should on that account think ill of others Quest. 5. May I not speak evil of them that are enemies to God to Religion and godliness and are Quest. 5. open persecutors of it or are enemies to the King or Church Answ. You may on all meet occasions speak evil of the sin and of the persons when you have a just call but not at your own pleasure Quest. 6. What if it be one whose honour and credit countenanceth an ill cause and his dishonour would Quest. 6. disable him to do hurt Answ. You may not belye the Devil nor wrong the worst man that is though under pretence of doing good God needeth not malice nor calumnies nor injustice to his glory It is an ill cause that cannot be maintained without such means as these And when the matter is true you must have a call to speak it and you must speak it justly without unrighteous aggravations or hiding the better part which should make the case and person truly understood There is a time and due manner in which that mans crimes and just dishonour may be published whose false reputation injureth the truth But yet I must say that a great deal of villany and slander is committed upon this plausible pretence and that there is scarce a more common cloak for the most inhumane lyes and calumnies Quest. 7. May I not lawfully make a true Narration of such matters of fact as are criminal and Quest. 7. dishonourable to offenders Else no man may write a true History to posterity of mens crimes Answ. When you have a just cause and call to do it you may But not at your own pleasure Historians may take much more liberty to speak the truth of the dead than you may of the living Though no untruth must be spoken of either yet the honour of Princes and Magistrates while they are alive is needful to their Government and therefore must be maintained oft times by the concealment of their faults And so proportionably the honour of other men is needful to a life of love and peace and just society But when they are dead they are not subjects capable of a right to any such honour as must be maintained by such silencing of the truth to the injury of posterity And posterity hath usually a right to historical truth that good examples may draw them to imitation and bad examples may warn them to take heed of sin God will have the name of the wicked to rot and the faults of a Noah Lot David Solomon Peter c. shall be recorded Yet nothing unprofitable to posterity may be recorded of the dead though it be true nor the faults of men unnecessarily divulged much less may the dead be slandered or abused Quest. 8. What if it be one that hath been oft admonished in vain May not the faults of such a one be Quest. 8. mentioned behind his back Answ. I confess such a one the case being proved and he being notoriously impenitent hath made a much greater forfeiture of his honour than other men And no man can save that mans honour who will cast it away himself But yet it is
a man choose for a matter of trust Quest. 2. Answ. As the matter is One that hath wisdom skill and fidelity through conscience honesty friendship or his own apparent interest Quest. 3. In what cases may I commit a secret to another Quest. 3. Answ. When there is a necessity of his knowing it or a greater probability of good than hurt by it in the evidence which a prudent man may see Quest. 4. What if another commit a thing to me with charge of secresie and I say nothing to him and so Quest. 4. promise it not Am I bound to secresie in that case Answ. If you have cause to believe that he took your silence for consent and would not else have committed it to you you are obliged in point of fidelity as well as friendship except it be with robbers or such as we are not bound to deal openly with and on terms of equality Quest. 5. What if it be a secret but I am under no Command or Promise at all about it Quest. 5. Answ. You must then proceed according to the Laws of Charity and Friendship and not reveal that which is to the injury of another without a greater cause Quest. 6. What if it be against the King or State or common good Quest. 6. Answ. You are bound to reveal it so far as the safety of the King or State or common good requireth it Yea though you swear the contrary Quest. 7. What if it be only against the good of some third ordinary person Quest. 7. Answ. You must endeavour to prevent his wrong either by revealing the thing or disswading from it or by such means as prudence shall tell you is the meetest way by exercising your love to one without doing wrong to the other Quest. 8. What if a man secretly entrust his estate to me for himself or children when he is in debt Quest. 8. to defraud his Creditors Answ. You ought not to take such a trust And if you have done it you ought not to hold it but resign it to him that did entrust you Yea and to disclose the fraud for the righting of the Creditors except it be in such a case as that the Creditor is some such vicious or oppressing person as you are not obliged to exercise that act of charity for or when the consequents of revealing it will be a greater hurt than the righting of him will compensate especially when it is against the publick good Quest. 9. What if a delinquent entrust me with his estate or person to secure it from penalty Quest. 9. Answ. If it be one that is prosecuted by a due course of Justice cujus poena debetur reipublicae whose punishment the common good requireth the case must be decided as the former You must not take nor keep such a trust But if it be one whose Repentance giveth you reason to believe that his impunity will be more to the common good than his punishment and that if the Magistrate knew it he ought to spare or pardon him in this case you may conceal his person or estate so be it you do it not by a lye or any other sinful means or such as will do more hurt than good Quest. 10. What if a friend entrust me with his estate to secure it from some great taxes or tributes to Quest. 10. the King May I keep such a trust or not Answ. No if they be just and legal taxes for the maintenance of the Magistrate or preservation of the Common-wealth But if it were done by a Usurper that had no authority or done without or beyond authority to the oppressing of the subject you may conceal his estate or your own by lawful means Quest. 11. What if a man that suffereth for Religion commit his person or estate to my trust Quest. 11. Answ. You must be faithful to your trust 1. If it be true Religion and a good cause for which he suffereth 2. Or if he be falsly accused of abuses in Religion 3. Or if he be faulty but the penalty intended from which you secure him is incomparably beyond his fault and unjust Supposing still that you save him only by lawful means and that it be not like to tend to do more hurt than good to the cause of Religion or the Common-wealth Quest. 12. What if a Papist or other erroneous person entrust me being of the same mind to educate Quest. 12. his Children in that way when he is dead and afterwards I come to see the errour must I perform that trust or no Answ. No 1. Because no trust can oblige you to do hurt 2. Because it is contrary to the primary intent of your friend which was his Childrens good And you may well suppose that had he seen his errour he would have entrusted you to do accordingly You are bound therefore to answer his primary intention and truly to endeavour his Childrens good Quest. 13. But what if a man to whom another hath entrusted his Children turn Papist or Heretick Quest. 13. and so thinketh errour to be truth what must he do Answ. He is bound to turn back again to the truth and do accordingly Obj. But one saith this is the truth and another that And he thinketh he is right Answ. There is but one of the contraries true Mens thinking themselves to be in the right doth not make it so And God will not change his Laws because they misunderstand or break them Therefore still that which God bindeth them to is to return unto the truth And if they think that to be truth which is not they are bound to think otherwise If you say They cannot It is either not true or it is long of themselves that they cannot And they that cannot immediately yet mediately can do it in the due use of means Quest. 14. What if I foresee that the taking of a trust may hazard my estate or otherwise hurt me and Quest. 14. yet my dying or living friend desireth it Answ. How far the Law of Christianity or friendship oblige you to hurt your self for his good must be discerned by a prudent considering what your obligations â—â—e to the person and whether the good of your granting his desires or the hurt to your self is like to be the greater and of more publick consequence And whether you injure not your own Children or others by gratifying him And upon such comparison prudence must determine the case Quest. 15. But what if afterward the trust prove more to my hurt than I foresaw Quest. 15. Answ. If it was your own fault that you foresaw it not you must suffer proportionably for that fault But otherwise you must compare your own hurt with the Orphanes in case you do not perform the trust And consider whether they may not be relieved another way And whether you have reason to think that if the Parent were alive and knew your danger he would expect
your selves into snares by meer inconsiderateness and prepare not for perplexities and repentance Direct 2. Be very careful what persons you commit either trusts or secrets to And be sure they be trusty Direct 2. by their wisdom ability and fidelity Direct 3. Be not too forward in revealing your own secrets to anothers trust For 1. You cannot be Direct 3. certain of any ones secresie where you are most confident 2. You oblige your self too much to please Quod â—aâ—itum esse velis nemini diâ—eris Si â—bi non imperastâ— quomodo ab alto silentium speras Martiâ— Dumiens de morib that person who by revealing your secrets may do you hurt And are in fear lest carelesness or unfaithfulness or any accident should disclose it 3. You burden your friend with the charge and care of secresie Direct 4. Be faithful to your friend that doth entrust you remembring that perfidiousness or Direct 4. falseness to a friend is a crime against humanity and all society as well as against Christianity and stigmatizeth the guilty in the eyes of all men with the brand of an odious unsociable person Direct 5. Be not intimate with too many nor confident in too many For he that hath too many Direct 5. intimates will be opening the secrets of one to another Direct 6. Abhor Covetousness and ambition Or else a bribe or the promise of preferment will Direct 6. tempt you to perfidiousness There is no trusting a selfish worldly man Direct 7. Remember that God is the avenger of perfidiousness who will do it severely And that even Direct 7. they that are pleased and served by it do yet secretly disdain and detest the person that doth it because they would not be so used themselves Direct 8. Yet take not friendship or fidelity to be an obligation to perfidiousness to God or the King or Direct 8. Common-wealth or to another or to any sin whatsoever CHAP. XXVI Directions against Selfishness as it is contrary to the Love of our Neighbours § 1. THE two Tables of the Law are summed up by our Saviour in two comprehensive precepts Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and soul and might and Thou shalt Love thy neighbour aâ— thy self In the Decalogue the first of these is the true meaning of the first Commandment put first because it is the principle of all obedience And the second is the true meaning of the tenth Commandment which is therefore put last because it is the comprehensive sum of all other duties to our Neighbour or injuries against him which any other particular instances may contain and also the principle of the duty to or sin against our Neighbour The meaning of the tenth Commandment is variously conjectured at by Expositors Some say that it speaketh against inward concupiscence and the sinful thoughts of the heart But so do all the â—est in the true meaning of them and must not be supposed to forbid â—he outward action only nor to be any way defective Some say that it forbiddeth â—oveâ—ing and commandeth contentment with our state so doth the eighth Commandment yet there is some part of the truth in both these And the plain truth is as far as I can understand it that the sin forbidden is SELFISHNESS as opposite to the Love of others and the duty commanded is to LOVE our Neighbours and that it is as is said the sum of the second Table Thou shalt love thy Neighbour as thy self As the Captain leadeth the Van and the Lieutenant bringeth up the rear so Thou shalt Love God above all is the first Commandment and Thou shalt Love thy Neighbour as thy self is the last for the aforesaid reason I shall therefore in these following Directions speak to the two parts of the tenth Commandment Direct 1. The first help against SELFISHNESS is to understand well the nature and malignity Direct 1. of the sin For want of this it commonly prevaileth with little suspicion lamentation and opposition Let me briefly therefore anatomize it § 3. 1. It is the Radical positive sin of the soul comprehending seminally or causally all the rest The corruption of mans nature or his radical sin hath two parts The Positive part and the Privâ—tive part The Positive part is SELFISHNESS or the inordinate Love of Carnal Self The Privative part is UNGODLINESSE or want of the LOVE of GOD. Mans fall was his turning from GOD to HIMSELF And his regeneration consisteth in the turning of him from HIMSELF to GOD or the generating of the LOVE of GOD as comprehending faith and obedience and the mortifying of SELF-LOVE SELFISHNESSE therefore is all positive sin in One as want of the LOVE of GOD is all privative sin in One. And SELFDENYAL and the LOVE of GOD are all duties virtually For the true LOVE of MAN is comprehended in the LOVE of GOD. Understand this and you will understand what original and actual sin is and what Grace and duty is § 3. 2. Therefore SELFISHNESSE is the cause of all sin in the world both Positive and Privative and is virtually the breach of every one of Gods Commandments For even the want of the LOVE of GOD is caused by the inordinate LOVE of SELF As the consuming of other parts is caused by the Dropsie which â—umiâ—ieth the belly It is only selfishness which breaketh the fifth Commandment by causing Rulers to oppress and persâ—â—ute their Subjects and causeth subjects to be seditious and rebellious and causâ—â—â—â— all the bitterness and quarrellings and uncomfortableness which ariseth among all relations It is only selfishness which causeth the cursed Wars of the earth and desolation of Countreys by plundering and burning the murders which cry for revenge to Heaven whether Civil Military or Religious Which causeth all the railings fightings envyings malice the Schisms and proud overvaluings of mens own understandings and opinions and the contending of Pastors who shall be the greatest and who shall have his Will in proud usurpations and tyrannical impositions and domination It is selfishness which hath set up and maintaineth the Papacy and causeth all the divisions between the Western and the Eastern Churches and all the cruelties lyes and treachery exercised upon that account It is selfishness which troubleth families and Corporations Churches and Kingdoms which violateth Vows and bonds of friendship and causeth all the tumults and strises and troubles in the world It is selfishness which causeth all Covetousness all Pride and Ambition all Luxury and Voluptuousness all surfetting and drunkenness chambering and wantonness time-wasting and heart-corrupting sports and all the royots and revellings of the sensual all the contendings for honours and preferments and all the deceit in buying and selling the stealing and robbing the bribery and Simony the Law-suits which are unjust the perjuries false witnessing unrighteous judging the oppressions the revenge and in one word all the uncharitable and unjust actions in the world This is the true
Love is holy and from God whereas the same Love may be of God as to the principle motives and ends in the main and yet may have great mixtures of passionate weakness and sinful excess which may tend to their great affliction in the end Some that have been converted by the writings of a Minister a hundred or a thousand miles off must needs go see the Author some must needs remove from their lawful dwellings and callings to live under the Ministry of such a one yea if it may be in the house with him some have affections so violent as proveth a torment to them when they cannot live with those whom they so affect some by that affection are ready to follow those that they so value into any errour And all this is a sinful Love by this mixture of passionate weakness though pious in the main Quest. 9. Why should we restrain our Love to a bosome friend contrary to Cicero's doctrine and what Quest. 9. sin or danger is in loving him too much Answ. All these following 1. It is an errour of judgement and of will to suppose any one Better than he is yea perhaps than any creature on earth is and so to Love him 2. It is an irrational act and therefore not fit for a Rational creature to Love any one farther than reason will allow us and beyond the true causes of regular Love 3. It is usually a fruit of sinful selfishness For this excess of Love doth come from a selfish cause either some strong conceit that the person greatly Loveth us or for some great kindness which he hath shewed us or for some need we have of him and fitness appearing in him to be useful to us c. Otherwise it would be purely for Amiable worth and then it would be proportioned to the nature and measure of that worth 4. It very often taketh up mens minds so as to hinder their Love to God and their desires and delights in holy things While Satan perhaps upon Religious pretences turneth our affections too violently to some person it diverteth them from higher and better things For the weak mind of man can hardly think earnestly of one thing without being alienated in his thoughts from others nor can hardly love two things or persons fervently at once that stand not in pure subordination one to the other And we seldom Love any fervently in a pure subordination to God For then we should Love God still more fervently 5. It oft maketh men ill members of the Church and Commonwealth For it contracteth that Love to one over-valued person which should be diffused abroad among many and the common good which should be loved above any single person is by this means neglected as God himself which maketh Wives and Children and bosome friends become those gulfs that swallow up the estates of most rich men so that they do little good with them to the publick state which should be preferred 6. Overmuch friendship engageth us in more duty than we are well able to perform without neglecting our duty to God the Commonwealth and our own souls There is some special duty followeth all special acquaintance but a bosome friend will expect a great deal You must allow him much of your Time in conference upon all occasions and he looketh that you should be many wayes friendly and useful to him as he is or would be to you When alas frail man can do but little our Time is short our strength is small our estates and faculties are narrow and low And that Time which you must spend with your bosome friend where friendship is not moderated and wisely managed is perhaps taken from God and the publick good to which you first owed it Especially if you are Magistrates Ministers Physicions Schoolmasters or such other as are of publick usefulness Indeed if you have a sober prudent friend that will look but for your vacant hours and rather help you in your publick service you are happy in such a friend But that is not the excess of Love that I am reprehending 7. This inordinate friendship prepareth for disappointments yea and for excess of sorrows Usually experience will tell you that your best friends are but uncertain and imperfect men and will not answer your expectation And perhaps some of them may so grosly fail you you as to set light by you or prove your Adversaries I have seen the bonds of extraordinary dearness many ways dissolved One hath been overcome by the flesh and turned drunkard and sensual and so proved unfit for intimate friendship who yet sometime seemed of extraordinary uprightness and zeal Another hath taken up some singular conceits in Religion and joyned to some sect where his bosome friend could not follow him And so it hath seemed his duty to look with strangeness contempt or pity on his ancient friend as one that is dark and low if not supposed an adversary to the truth because he espouseth not all his mis-conceits Another is suddenly lifted up with some preferment dignity and success and so is taken with higher things and higher converse and thinks it is very fair to give an embrace to his ancient friend for what he once was to him instead of continuing such endearedness Another hath changed his place and company and so by degrees grown very indifferent to his ancient friend when he is out of sight and converse ceaseth Another hath himself chosen his friend amiss in his unexperienced youth or in a penury of wise and good men supposing him much better than he was and afterward hath had experience of many persons of far greater wisdom piety and fidelity whom therefore reason commanded him to preser All these are ordinary dissolvers of these bonds of intimate and special friendship And if your Love continue as hot as ever its excess is like to be your excessive sorrow For 1. You will be the more grieved at every suffering of your friend as sickness losses crosses c. whereof so many attend mankind as is like to make your burden great 2. Upon every removal his absence will be the more troublesome to you 3. All incongruities and fallings out will be the more painful to you especially his jealousies discontents and passions which you cannot command 4. His death if he die before you will be the more grievous and your own the more unwellcome because you must part with him These and abundance of sore afflictions are the ordinary fruits of too strong affections And it is no rare thing for the best of Gods servants to profess that their sufferings from their friends who have over-loved them have been ten times greater than from all the enemies that ever they had in the world And to those that are wavering about this case Whether only a common friendship with all men according to their various worth or a bosome intimacy with some one man be more desirable I shall premise a free confession of my
that the fleshly mind which is enmity against God should be ready to do good to the spiritual and holy servants of God Gen. 3. 15. Rom. 8. 6 7 8. Or that a selfish man should much care for any body but himself and his own When Love is turned into the hatred of each other upon the account of our partial interests and opinions and when we are like men in war that think he is the bravest most deserving man that hath killed most when men have bitter hateful thoughts of one another and set themselves to make each other odious and to ruine them that they may stand the faster and think that destroying them is good service to God who can look for the fruits of Love from damnable uncharitableness and hatred or that the Devils tree should bring forth holy fruit to God 4. And then when Love is well-spoken of by all even its deadly enemies lest men should see their wickedness and misery and is it not admirable that they see it not the Devil hath taught them to play the Hypocrites and make themselves a Religion which costs them nothing without true Christian Love and Good works that they may have something to quiet and cheat their consciences with One man drops now and then an inconsiderable gift and another oppresseth and hateth and destroyeth and slandereth and censureth that he may not be thought to hate and ruine without cause and when they have done they wipe their mouths with a few Hypocritical prayers or good words and and think they are good Christians and God will not be avenged on them One thinks that God will save him because he is of this Church and another because he is of another Church One thinks to be saved because he is of this opinion and party in Religion and another because he is of that One thinks he is religious because he saith his prayers this way and another because he prayeth another way And thus dead Hypocrites whose hearts were never quickened with the powerful Love of God to love his servants their neighbours and enemies do perswade themselves that God will save them for mocking and flattering him with the service of their deceitful lips while they want the Love of God which is the root of all Good and are possessed with the Love of money which is the root of all evil 1 Tim. 6. 10. and are Lovers of pleasures more than God 2 Tim. 3. 4. They will joyn themselves forwardly to the cheap and outside actions of Religion but when they hear much less than One thing thou yet wantest sell all that thou hast and distribute to the poor and thou shalt have a treasure in Heaven they are very sorrowful because they are very rich Luk. 18. 22 23. Such a fruitless love as they had to others Iam. 2. such a fruitless Religion they have as to themselves For pure Religion and undefiled before God is to visit the fatherless and widows in their adversity and to keep your selves unspotted from the world James 1. 27. See 1 Joh. 2. 15. 3. 17. Whâ—sâ— hath this worlds goods and seeth his brother hath need and shutteth up his bowels of compâ—ssion from him how dwelleth the love of God in him There are specially three Texts that describe the case of sensual uncharitable Gentlemen 1. Luk. 16. A Rich man cloathed in purple and silk for so as Dr. Hammond noteth it should rather be translated and fared sumptuously every day you know the end of him 2. Ezek. 16. 49. Sodoms sin was Pride fulness of bread and abundance of idleness neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy 3. James 5. 1 to 7. Go to now ye rich men weep and howl for the miseries that shall come upon you Ye have lived in pleasure on earth and been wanton ye have nourished your hearts as in or for the day of slaughter Ye have condemned and killed the just and he doth not resist you And remember Prov. 21. 13. Whoso stoppeth his cars at the cry of the poor he also shall cry himself and shall not be heard And Jam. 2. 13. He shall have judgement without mercy that shewed no mercy and mercy rejoyceth against judgement Yea in this life it is oft observable Prov. 11. 24. There is that scattereth and yet increaseth and there is that with-holdeth more than is meet but it tendeth to poverty Tit. 2. Directions for works of Charity Direct 1. LOve God and be renewed to his image and then it will be natural to you to do good Direct 1. and his Love will be in you a fountain of good works Direct 2. Love your Neighbours and it will be easie to you to do them all the good you can As it Direct 2. is to do good to your selves or Children or dearest friends Direct 3. Learn self-denyal that selfishness may not cause you to be all for youâ—â—lelves and be Satans Direct 3. Law of Nature in you forbidding you to do good to others Direct 4. Mortifie the flesh and the vices of sensuality Pride and Curiosity Gluttony and drunkenness Direct 4. are insatiable gulfs and will devour all and leave but little for the poor Though there be never so many poor families which want bread and clothing the Proud person must first have the other silk Gown or the other ornaments which may set them out with the forwardest in the mode and fashion and this house must first be handsomelyer built and these rooms must first be neatlier furnished and these Children must first have finer cloaths Let Lazarus lye never so miserable at the door the sensualist must be cloathed in purple and silk and fare deliciously and sumptuously daily Luke 16. The glutton must have thâ— dish and cup which pleaseth his appetite and must keep a full Table for the entertainment of his companions that have no need These insatiable vices are like Swine and Dogs that devour all the Childrens bread Even vain recreations and gaming shall have more bestowed on them than Church or poor as to any voluntary gift Kill your greedy vices once and then a little will serve your turns and you may have wherewith to relieve the needy and do that which will be better to you at your reckoning day Direct 5. Let not self isâ—ness make your Children the inordinate objects of your charity and provision Direct 5. to take up that which should be otherwise employed Carnal and worldly persons would perpetuate their vice and when they can live no longer themselves they seem to be half alive in their posterity and what they can no longer keep themselves they think is best laid up for their Children to feed them as full and make them as sensual and unhappy as themselves So that just and moderate provisions will not satisfie them but their Childrens Portions must be as much as they can get and almost all their Estates are sibi suis for themselves and theirs And
make any restitution and therefore must desire forgiveness you cannot well do it without confession 2. When you have wronged a man by a lye or by false witness or that he cannot be righted till you confess the truth 3. When you have wronged a man in his honour or frame where the natural remedy is to speak the contrary and confess the wrong 4. When it is necessary to cure the revengeful inclination of him whom you have wronged or to keep up his charity and so to enable him to love you and forgive you 5. Therefore all known wrongs to another must be confessed except when impossibility or some ill effect which is greater than the good be like to follow Because all men are apt to abate their Love to those that injure them and therefore all have need of this remedy And we must do our part to be forgiven by all whom we have wronged Quest. 2. What causes will excuse us from confessing wrongs to others Quest. 2. Answ. 1. When full recompence may be made without it and no forgiveness of the wrong is necessary from the injured nor any of the foresaid causes require it 2. When the wrong is secret and not known to the injured party and the confessing of it would but trouble his mind and do him more harm than good 3. When the injured party is so implacable and inhumane that he would make use of the confession to the ruine of the penitent or to bring upon him greater penalty than he deserveth 4. When it would injure a third person who is interessed in the business or bring them under oppression and undeserved misery 5. When it tendeth to the dishonour of Religion and to make it scorned because of the fault of the penitent confesser 6. When it tendeth to set people together by the ears and breed dissention or otherwise injure the Common-wealth or Government 7. In general it is no duty to confess our sin to him that we have wronged when all things considered it is like in the judgement of the truly wise to do more hurt than good For it is appointed as a means to good and not to do evil Quest. 3. If I have had a secret thought or purpose to wrong another am I bound to confess it Quest. 3. when it was never executed Answ. 1. You are not bound to confess it to the party whom you intended to wrong as any act of Justice to make him reparation nor to procure his forgiveness to your self Because it was no wrong to him indeed nor do thoughts and things secret come under his judgement and therefore need not his pardon 2. But it is a sin against God and to him you must confess it 3. And by accident finis gratia you must confess it to men in case it be necessary to be a warning to others or to the increase of their hatred of sin or their watchfulness or to exercise your own humiliation or prevent a relapse or to quiet your conscience or in a word when it is like to do more good than hurt Quest. 4. To whom and in what cases must I confess to men my sins against God and when not Quest. 4. Answ. The cases about that confession which belongeth to Church-discipline belongeth to the second Tome and therefore shall here be passed by But briefly and in general I may answer the question thus 1. There are conveniences and inconveniences to be compared together and you must make your choice accordingly The reasons which may move you to confess your sins to another are these 1. When another hath sinned with you or perswaded or drawn you to it and must be brought to repentance with you 2. When your conscience hath in vain tryed all other fit means for peace or comfort and cannot obtain it and there is any probability of such advice from others as may procure it 3. When you have need of advice to resolve your conscience whether it be sin or not or of what degree or what you are obliged to in order to forgiveness 4. When you have need of counsel to prevent the sin for the time to come and mortifie the habit of it The inconveniencies which may attend it are such as these 1. You are not certain of anothers secresie His mind may change or his understanding fail or he may fall out with you or some great necessiâ—y may befall him to drive him to open what you told him 2. Then whether your shame or loss will not make you repent it should be foreseen 3. And how far others may suffer in it 4. And how far it will reflect dishonour on Religion All things being considered on both sides the preponderating reasons must prevail Tit. 2. Directions about confessing sin to others Direct 1. DO nothing which you are not willing to confess or which may trouble you much if Direct 1. your confession should be opened Prevention is the easiest way And foresight of the consequents should make a wise man still take heed Direct 2. When you have sinned or wronged any weigh well the consequents on both sides before you Direct 2. make your confession that you may neither do that which you may wish undone again nor causelesly refuse your duty And that inconveniences foreseen may be the better undergone when they cannot be avoided Direct 3. When a well informed conscience telleth you that confession is your duty let not self-respects Direct 3. detain you from it but do it what ever it may cost you Be true to Conscience and do not wilfully put off your duty To live in the neglect of a known duty is to live in a known sin which will give you cause to question your sincerity and cause more terrible effects in your souls than the inconveniences of confession could ever have been Direct 4. Look to your Repentance that it be deep and absolute and free from hypocritical exceptions Direct 4. and reserves For half and hollow Repentance will not carry you through hard and costly duties But that which is sincere will break over all It will make you so angry with your selves and sins that you will be as inclined to take shame to your selves in an honest revenge as an angry man is to bring shame upon his adversary We are seldome over-tender of a mans reputation whom we fall out with And Repentance is a falling out with our selves We can bear sharp remedies when we feel the pain and perceive the mortal danger of the disease And Repentance is such a perception of our pain and danger We will not tenderly hide a mortal enemy but bring him to the most open shame And Repentance causeth us to hate sin as our mortal enemy It is want of Repentance that maketh men so unwilling to make a just confession Direct 5. Take heed of Pride which maketh men so tender of their reputation that they will Direct 5. venture their souls to save their honour Men call
bring an exceeding great dammage upon his Master as by dropping asleep to burn his house or by an hours delay which seemed not very dangerous to frustrate some great business he is obliged to Reparation as well as to Confession but not to make good all that is lost but according to the proportion of his fault But he that by oppression or robbery taketh that which is anothers or bringeth any dammage to him or by slander false witness or any such unrighteous means is bound to make a fuller satisfaction And those that concur in the injury being accessories are bound to satisfie As 1. Those that teach or command another to do it 2. Those who send a Commission or authorize another to do it 3. Those who counsel exhort or perswade another to do it 4. Who by consenting are the causes of it 5. Those who co-operate and assist in the injury knowingly and voluntarily 6. Those who hinder it not when they could and were obliged to do it 7. Those who make the act their own by owning it or consenting afterward 8. Those who will not reveal it afterwards that the injured party may recover his own when they are obliged to reveal it But a secret consent which no way furthered the injury obligeth none to restitution but only to repentance because it did no wrong to another but it was a sin against God Quest. 4. To whom must restitution or satisfaction be made Quest. 4. Answ. 1. To the true Owner if he be living and to be found and it can be done 2. If that cannot Heb. 5. 23. 1 Sam. 12. 3. Neh. 5. 11. Numb 5. 8. Luke 19. 8. be then to his heirs who are the possessors of that which was his 3. If that cannot be then to God himself that is to the poor or unto pious uses For the possessor is no true Owner of it And therefore where no other Owner is found he must discharge himself so of it to the use of the highest and principal Owner as may be most agreeable to his will and interest Quest. 5. What Restitution should he make who hath dishonoured his Governours or Parents Quest. 5. Answ. He is bound to do all that he can to repair their honour by suitable means and to confess his fault and crave their pardon Quest. 6. How must satisfaction be made for slanders lyes and infaming of others Quest. 6. Answ. By confessing the sin and unsaying what was said not only as openly as it was spoken but as far as it is since carryed on by others and as far as the reparation of your neighbours good name requireth if you are able Quest. 7. What reparation must they make who have tempted others to sin and hurt their souls Quest. 7. Answ. 1. They must do all that is in their power to recover them from sin and to do good to their souls They must go to them and confess and lament the sin and tell them the evil and danger of it and incessantly strive to bring them to repentance 2. They must make reparation to the Lord of souls by doing all the good they can to others that they may help more than they have hurt Quest. 8. What reparation can or must be made for Murder or Man-slaughter Quest. 8. Answ. By Murder there is a manifold dammage inferred 1. God is deprived of the life of his servant 2. The person is deprived of his life 3. The King is deprived of a Subject 4. The Common-wealth is deprived of a member 5. The friends and kindred of the dead are deprived of a friend 6. And perhaps also damnified in their estates All these dammages cannot be fully repaired by the offender but all must be done that can be done 1. Of God he can only beg pardon upon the account of the satisfactory sacrifice of Christ expressing true repentance as followeth 2. To the person murdered no reparation can be made 3. To the King and Common-wealth he must patiently yield up his life if they sentence him to death and without repining and think it not too dear to become a warning to others that they sin not as he did 4. To disconsolate friends no reparation can be made but pardon must be asked 5. The dammage of heirs kindred and creditorr must be repaired by the offenders estate as far as he is able Quest. 9. Is a Murderer bound to offer himself to death before he is apprehended Quest. 9. Answ. Yes in some cases As 1. When it is necessary to save another that is falsly accused of the crime 2. Or when the interest of the Common-wealth requireth it But otherwise not Because an offender may lawfully accept of mercy and nature teacheth him to desire his own preservation But if the question be When doth the interest of the Common-wealth require it I think much ofter than it is done As the common-interest requireth that murderers be put to death when apprehended So it requireth that they may not frequently and easily be hid or escape by secresie or flight For then it would embolden others to murder whereas when few escape it will more effectually deter men If therefore any murderers conscience shall constrain him in true repentance voluntarily to come forth and confess his sin and yield up himself to justice and exhort others to take heed of sinning as he did I cannot say that he did any more than his duty in so doing And indeed I think that it is ordinarily a duty and that ordinarily the interest of the Common wealth requireth it though in some cases it may be otherwise The execution of the Laws against Murder is so necessary to preserve mens lives that I do not think that self-preservation alone will allow men to defeat the Common-wealth of so necessary a means of preserving the lives of many to save the life of one who hath no right to his own life as having forfeited it If to shift away other murderers from the hand of Justice be a sin I cannot see but that it is so ordinarily to do it for ones self Only I think that if a true penitent person have just cause to think that he may do the Common-wealth more service by his life than by his death that then he may conceal his crime or fly But otherwise not Quest. 10. Is a Murderer bound to do execution on himself if the Magistrate upon his confession do Quest. 10. not Answ. No because it is the Magistrate who is the appointed Judge of the publick interest and what is necessary to its reparation and hath power in certain cases to pardon And though a murderer may not ordinarily strive to defeat Gods Laws and the Commonwealth yet he may accept of mercy when it is offered him Quest. 11. What satisfaction is to be made by a Fornicator or Adulterer Quest. 11. Answ. Chastity cannot be restored nor corrupted honour repaired But 1. If it was a sin by mutual consent the party