be for Earth or Heaven 〈◊〉 this and you may resolve the case A worldling may speak contemptuously of the world and speak most honourably of God and the Life to come But speculative knowledge and practical are frequently contradictory in the same man Still it is this world that hath his chief Intentions and is the End of his designs and life and the world to come is regarded but as a reserve because of their unavoidable separation from this world The main End of every upright Christian is to please and enjoy God and the main End of all the rest of the world is how to Please their carnal minds in the enjoyment of some earthly things If you could but discern which of these is your chiefest End you might discern whether it be Christ or the world that Liveth in you For Christ liveth in you when he is your End and the world Liveth in you when it is your End But because some are such strangers to themselves that they do not know their own Ends the rest of the signs shall be for the discovery of the former that you may discern whether the world or God be your ultimate End 1. That which is your Principal End is highlyest esteemed by your Practicall judgement Not only by the speculative but by that which moveth and disposeth of the man Is God or the world Heaven or earth thus highlyest esteemed by you Let your Practise shew it 2. It is your Principal End that hath the Principal Interest in you That can do most with you and prevail most in a contest Can God or the world do more with you Which of them doth prevail when an opposition doth arise I speak not of God in his efficiency for so I know he can do what his list and will do it whether you will or no and will not ask your consent to do it But its God as your End that I now speak of as he worketh Morally by your own consent and upon your wills Honours and Profits and Pleasures are before you and these would draw you to something that he forbids And God and Glory are propounded to you to take you off turn your hearts another way which of these can do more with you which is it that can nullifie the perswasions of the other 3. It is your Principal End that hath the principal ruling and disposal of your whole life â—…do purposely conâ—rive the maâ—… part of your life in order to it If you are indeed Christians and God be your End the main drift of your Life is a contrived Means for the obtaining of that End that is to Please God and to enjoy him in everlasting glory If you were such as you should be you should have no other End at all nor should you ever do one work or receive or use one creature or speak one word or behold one object but as a means to God intendâ—ng the pleasing and enjoying him in all As a traveller should not go one step of his journey but in order to his End But while we are Imperfect in our Love and other graces this will not be But yet the main bent and drift of our Lives must needs be for God and the Life to come and thus it is with every true Believer and you are none if it be not thus with you I say it again left you should slightly pass it over though you may through infirmity sometimes step out of the way yet if God be your End and Happiness that is if he be your God and you be Christians the main scope and bent and drift of your lives is for to please God and enjoy him in glory But if the main scope and drift of your life be for the flesh and the world and God and Religion comes in but upon the by you are then no better then unsanctified worldlings Though you may do much in Religion and be zealous about it and seem the devoutest and most resolved professors in all the Countrey where you live yet if all this be but in subordination to the flesh and the world or if co-ordinate it have the smaller Interest in your hearts and when you have done or suffered most for Christ you will do and suffer more for the flesh and world you are carnal wretches and no true Christians O that you would let conscience do its office and Judge you as we go along according to Evidence It is not by one or two Actions that you can judge of your estate but by the main scope and bent and drift of your life What is your very heart set upon What is your care and your chief contrivances Are they for Heaven or Earth Speak out and take the comfort of your sincerity if you are Christians and if you are not know it while there is remedy and do not wilfully deceive your selves Have you been so far illuminated by the Word and Spirit as to see the Amiableness of the Lord by faith and have you so firm a Belief of the Everlasting Glory where we shall see his face immediately or more nearly and praise him among his Angels for ever I say have you so firm a 〈◊〉 of this that you are unfeignedly resolved upon it as your Happiness that you take it for your Portion and there have laid up your Hopes Can you truly say that God hath more of your Heart then all the world and Heaven is dearer to your thoughts then earth Can you say that whatever you are tempted to on the by that the main care design and bent of your life is for God and the Glory to come and that this is your daily Work and Business If so you are Christians indeed you have Crucified the world by the Cross of Christ The world is dead and down where God raigneth and is exalted and no where else But if all this be clean contrary with you and if the flesh and the world have the prevalent Interest and these cut out your work and form your thoughts and choose your imployments if these choose the calling that you live upon and the manner of managing it and your very Religion or set limits to it if it be these that rule your tongue and hands and they can make a cause seem good or bad to youâ— and that seemeth best which most conduceth to your fleshly worldly interests and that seemeth worst which destroyeth it or is against it if God be loved and worshipped but as a Necessary Mâ—ans to your carnal Happiness or if he have but the second place in your hearts and the leavings of the flesh and world be they never so much and if your Religion and Endeavours for salvation for pleasing God and for the invisible Glory be but on the by and the flesh and the world hath the main scope and bent and drift of your life flatter not your selves then most certainly you are but carnal wretches and drudges of the world and slaves to him that
and their living without God in the world But when faith hath opened a mans eyes and shewed him God in every creature who was hid from him before then is the creature who was before his All annihilated to him in that separated sense and God becomes his All again and this annihilation of the creature is indeed its restauration objectively to its primitive nature and use and it was not indeed known or respected as a creature till now So that sensual men by making the creature an imaginary God or chiefest Good or All do make it indeed objectively to become Nothing and so their All their God their felicity is Nothing and so all their life is a Nothing When as the faithfull by Crucifying or Annihilating the creature as it would appear a felicity to us or any Good as separated from God do restore it to its true objective being and use by returning to God who is truly All and in whom the creature is a Derived Imperfect something and out of whom it is indeed a Nothing I will further illustrate it by one other similitude God gave the Ceremonial Law by Moses to the Israelites to be an obscure Gospell and to lead them unto Christ. The sacrifices and other typicall Ceremonies were the Letters of the Law and Christ was the sense The true Believers thus understood and used them but the Carnal Jews lookt only on the letter and lost the sense and thus separating the bare Letter from the sense that is the Legall works from Christ they thought to be justified by those works and by the Law in that separated sense But the Apostle Paul doth plead against thiâ— errour and tells them that Christ is the end of the Law to all Believers and that he is the fulfilling of it and that through him it is fulfilled in those that walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit and that by the deeâ—s of the Law in this separated sense no flesh can be justified and that the Letter separated from the sense of it killeth but Christ by his Spirit who is the sense of it giveth life If these Jews had taken and used the Law as God intended it and had taken the sense and spirit with the letter and had understood that Christ was the very life and end and all of the Law Paul would never have cryed down the Law nor Justification by it in this sense for that had been to cry down Justification by Christ. But it was Justification by the Letter or the Law as separated from Christ who was the meaning of it So is it in our present case The creature is the letter and God the sense and Carnal men do understand only the Letter of the creature and fall in love with it and thus God cryeth down the world and vilifieth and speaketh contemptuously of the world When as if it had not been for the separation he would never have cryed it down nor spoken an hard word of it As the Law had never been so hardly spoken of if the mis-understanding Jew had not separated it from Christ. So the world had never been so often called Vanity and a Lie and Nothing and a Dream and that which is not bread and that which profiteth not a Shadow a Deceiver with abundance of the like contemptuous terms if carnal sinners had not in their minds and affections separated it from God And thus I have shewed you in what Respects the World must be Crucified AND let me add in the Conclusion as most necessary for your observation that there is in the world an inseparable aptitude to tempt us dangerously to the foresaid abuse and therefore when we have done all that we can in Crucifying and sublimating it we must never imagine that we can make it so wholsom or harmless a thing as that we may feed upon it without great caution and suspition or ever return to friendship with it again till fire have refined it and grace hath perfectly refined us And yet this is not long of the creature without us but of us and the tempter The world is in it self Good as being the work of God and it cannot be the proper efficient culpable cause of our sin For it hath no sin in it self I mean the world as distinct from the men of the world and therefore cannot be the direct cause of sin But yet there is that in it which is apt to be the Matter of our temptation and so apt as that all that perish do perish by the world As there is no salvation but by the whole Trinity Conjunct who have each person his several office for our recovery so there is no damnation but by the whole Infernal Trinity the flesh the world and the Devil Even to Innocent Adam the world must be the bait and Satan found somewhat in it that made it apt for such an office though nothing but what was very good But now that the flesh is become the Predominant part and power in us as it is in all till the Spirit overcome it the case is much worse and the world is incomparably a more dangerous enemy then to Adam it could be For though still the creature is good in it self yet we are so bad that the better the creature is the worse it becomes to us For we are naturally propense to it in its separated capacity and all men till regeneration are fond of it as their felicity and hug it as their dearest good and Sacrifice to it as their Idol So that an enemy it is and an enemy it will be when we have done our best as long as we are on earth For while we have a flesh that would fain be pleased by that which God forbiddeth and there is a Devil to offer us the bait and tempt us to this flesh-pleasing the world which is the bait will still be the matter and occasion of our danger The consideration of this may cut the throat of licentious principles and hence we may answer the most of their vain pretended reasons who under the Cloak of Christian liberty would again indulge the flesh and be reconciled to the world But certainly it will never lay by its enmity till we lay by our flesh and therefore there is no thoughts to be entertained of closing with it any more but we must be killing it and dying to it to the last SECT IV. HAving thus shewed you in what Respect the world must be Crucified and so resolved the question as to the Object I am next to resolve it as to the Act and shew you wherein the Crucifying it doth consist The Apostle followeth on the Allegory which he took occasion of from the mention of the Cross of Christ. From thence therefore we must also fetch the proper sense As the world did use Christ or would have used him so we must use the world Not actually murder the sons of death as they did murder the Lord of Life but what Christ
fitted to the poor and give six pence or twelve pence to a certain Number of poor that hear it 2. As far as Law will enable you bind all your Tenants in their Leases to learn a Catechism and read the Scripture and be once a year at least accountable to the Minister of their Profiting If you cannot do this at least use your Interest in every Tenant you have to do it and to seek God and worship him in their families in which let your own families be eminently exemplary It is very much that Landlords might do for God if they had hearts Discountenance the ungodly Encourage the good Give them back some little when they pay their Rent to hire them to some duty And think not too much to go to their houses for such ends 3. Buy some plain and rowzing Books that tend to Conversion and are fittest for their Condition and give them to the families that most need them getting them to promise you to read them twice over at least and then to give their Teachers an account of the effect and receive Instructions from them for their further profit Many have this way received much good Or you may buy the Books and trust the Ministers to distribute them and engage the receivers to read them or to hear them read 4. Take the children of the poor and set them Apprentices to some honest trade and be sure you choose them Godly Masters that may take care of their souls as well as of their bodies Or if you are able settle a perpetual allowance for this use entrusting the Minister with the choice of a Godly Master for them and whom you see meet with the choice of the boies 5. In very great Congregations that have but one Minister nor are able and willing to maintain another it is a very good work to settle some maintenance for an Assistant without whom the flock must needs be much neglected Impropriations may be bought in to that use 6. To settle Schools in the more rude parts of the Countrey where they use not to teach their children to read or in Market Towns where people are numerous is a very good work 7. It is one of the best works I know within the reach of a mean mans purse to maintain Scholars in Sizers places at about 10. l. per annum charge till they are capable either of the Ministry or of some other station in order to it where they can maintain themselves As also to maintain some of the choiceest parts for some special studies There is an Intent of some to propound this work in a method fit for the whole Nation to concur in Tâ—ll that be done any Rich man that is willing to do Good may entrust some able Godly Ministers with the choice of the fittest youths which is the greatest matter and may allow them necessary maintenance How many souls may be saved by the Ministry of one of these And how can money be better husbanded 8. It will be a very Good work also conjunctly to encourage Manufactures or other trades and Piety too if in Cities and Corporations some yearly rents be given on these terms That several of the honestest tradesmen may have 5. l. or 10. l. a piece yearly of this Rent lent them freely for four or five years to trade with putting in security to repay it And so the stock will encrease and more Land may be bought by it after certain years to go on to the same use only let the Trustees have power to remit all or part where there is an extraordinary unexpected failing And that the fittest men may still receive it some godly Trustees may be chosen who may choose their successors the Minister being one as likest to choose the fittest subjects of this beneficence If Honest men be kept up they will better relieve the poor then if it were left to their own hands 9. It would be a blessed Work for our Rulers and some Rich men to erect a Colledge at Salop I think the only fit place for many Reasons for the education of Scholars for the use of Wales a Countrey whose present misery and antient honour and readiness to receive the Gospel and zealous profession of what they know should encourage all good men to help them Too few will send their sons to our present Universities and too few of those that come thither are willing to return But if this may not be done the next way will be to add some Charitable help for them in Oxford obliging them to return to the service of their Countrey 10. Were I to speak to Princes or men so Rich and Potent as to be able to do so good a Work I would provoke them to do as much as the Jesuites have done in seeking the Conversion of some of the vast Nations of Infidels that are possest of so great a part of the world viz. To erect a Colledge for those whom the Spirit of God shall animate for so great a Work and to procure one or two of the Natives out of the Countries whose Conversion you design to Teach the Students in this Colledge their language which its like might be effected And when they have learned the Tongues to Devote themselves to the Work where by the Countenance of Embassadors Merchants Plantations or any other means they may procure access and liberty of speech Doubtless God would stir up some among us to venture on the labour and apparent danger for so great a work If we be not better principled disposed and resolved to do or suffer in so good a cause then the Jesuites are we are much to blame And where we can but have opportunity we are like to do muâ—â— more good then they 1. Because they are so importunate every where for the Interest of the Pope that the People presently smell it to be but a selfish secular design 2. Because when they have taken them from their Heathenish Idolatry and taken down their Images they set up the Divine Worship of the Host and the Cross and the Religious worship of the Virgin Mary and the Saints with prayers to them in the stead with such abundance of Ceremonious additions that the people think it is as good be where they are as if it were but the taking down one Daimon or Divus to set up another in a kind of emulation and they think that every Countrey should continue the worship of their antient Patrons or Daimons Whereas if we went among them with the plain pure Gospel not sophisticated by these superstitions with a simple intention of their spiritual good without any designs of advantage to our selves its like we might do much more and might expect a greater blessing from God as Mr. Eliot and his helpers find of their Blessed labours in New England where if the languages and remote habitations or rather no habitations but dispersions of the inhabitants did not deny them opportunity of speech much more
God the things that are his own It is not a proper Donation that we call you to You cannot give him a propriety who hath it already nor alienate it from your selve who never had it in respect to God But yet you may Give it to him by tradition You may deliver him his own in the way that he requires it and lay out your Masters stock for his service And if he will so far honour your fidelity as to call this a giving or a lending to him me thinks this should encourage you to liberality but I see not how it can excuse your denying him his own Obj. But it is but to satisfie the covetousness of the Priests that we are called on to Give to God as if they were God or God had that which they have Answ. Adding reproach to covetousness will prove one day but a sad excuse for sin If this age understood the fift Commandment and the hainousness of ingratitude to God and man for the greatest mercies and how it is that Christ Teacheth and Ruleth and how he is Obeyed or Despised in the world they would tremble to think of the scorn and contempt of a faithful Ministry The eye that mocketh at his Father and despiseth to obey a Mother the Ravens of the valley shall pick it out and the young Eagles shall eat it Prov. 30. 17. Who so curseth his Father or Mother his Lamp shall be put out in obscure darkness Prov. 2â— 20. And he shall die the death Exod. 21. 17. And for your Objection The Priests of the Lord under the Law were not God the Apostles and Gospel Ministers were not God nor any that serve at the Altar who yet must live upon the Altar The poor themselves be not God and yet you shall understand one day that in as much as you did it not to one of these you did it not to Christ and in despising them you despised him Mat. 25. Luke 10. 16. The vanity of your fond pretence was sufficiently told you by Christ himself Mat. 25. 45. where he tells you how he will answer your companions that shall use it In as much as you did it not to one of these you did it not to me And yet will you say Lord when did we see thee hungry naked c. when you have your answer before hand Worldly wretches you would not part with your wealth if you could help it to Christ himself if he should come and ask it of you For you read in his word that it is he that asketh it and commandeth it from you now But if you will not believe that it is Christ that requireth it till he come himself in person to demand it and if you are such faithfull Stwards that you will part with none of your Masters stock till he ask you for it face to face for fear of mis-imploying it be patient awhile and he will come and seek his own with advantage but to the eternal woe of unprofitable servants You can spare God the tithe of your words in formal duties when the devil and the world have had the rest but not so much as the old legal proportion of your estates much less the Evangelical All. What makes you drop prayers so much thicker then Alms or Distributions Do you think that God doth not as strictly require the one as the other If speaking were not cheaper to you then giving your prayers and religious talk would be so seldom and so short as that it would be as your distributions are next to none If words cost money your tongues would be as strait as your purses are and the world should scarce hear whether you were of any Religion or none Do these men glory only in the Cross of Christ and is the world by it crucified to them and they to the world We have their answer in their actions what need we any more They are dead in and by the world but not to the world They are its slaves though they are called the servants of Christ. SECT XVII HOnourable Worshipfull and all well beloved it is a weighty imployment that occasioneth your meeting here to day The estates and lives of men are in your hands But it is another kind of Judgement which you are all hasting towards when Judges and Justices the Accusers and Accused must all appear upon equal terms for the final decision of a far greater Cause The case that is then there to be determined is not whether you shall have Lands or no Lands Life or no Life in our natural sense but whether you shall have Heaven or Hell Salvation or Damnation an endless life of Glory with God and the Redeemer and the Angles of Heaven or an endless life of Torment with devils and ungodly men As sure as you now sâ—t on those seats you shall shortly all appear before the Judge of all the world and there receive an irreversible sentence to an unchangeable state of Happiness or Misery This is the great business that should presently call up your most serious thoughts and set all the powers of your souls on work for the most effectuall preparation that if you are men you may quit your selves like men for the preventing of that dreadful doom which unprepared souls must there expect The greatest of your secular affairs are but dreams and toyes to this Were you at every Assize to determine causes of no lower value then the Crowns and Kingdoms of the Monarchs of the earth it were but as childrens games to this If any man of you believe not this he is worse then the Devil that tempteth him to unbelief and let him know that unbelief is no prevention nor will put off the day or hinder his appearance but ascertain his condemnation at that appearance And if you all do believe this you will sure be content that I speak to you of it as one that also do believe it Faith is the evidence of things not seen by it we may fore see the Judgement set the world appearing and your selves there waiting for your final doom And because we clearly find before-hand who then shall die and who shall live I shall desire of you that you would presently improve the discovery Some think we cannot know in this life what will become of us in the next But God hath not bid us try in vain nor in vain delivered us so many signs by which it may be known nor is the difference between the saved and the damned so small as to be undiscernable Our own reason may tell us that the righteous God would not send some to Glory with Angels and others to endless misery with Devils and make such a difference between men hereafter if there were not a considerable difference here He that knows the Law and the fact may know before your Assizes what will become of every prisoner if the proceedings be all just as in our case they will certainly be Christ will Judge