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
upon Justification c. which I have seen de nomine and neither of them seemed to take notice of it Be sure as soon as you peruse the terms of your question to sift this throughly and dispute verbal controversies but as verbal and not as real and material We have real differences enow we need not make them seem more by such a blind or heedless manner of Disputing § 22. Direct 11. Suffer not a rambling mind in study nor a rambling talker in Disputes to interrupt Direct 11. your orderly procedure and divert you from your argument before you bring it to the natural issue Both deceiving Sophisters and giddy headed praters will be violent to start another game and spoil the chase of the point before you But hold them to it or take them to be unworthy to be disputed with and let them go except it be where the weakness of the Auditors requireth you to follow them in their Wild-goose Chase. You do but lose time in such rambling studies or disputes § 23. Direct 12. Be caâ—telous of admitting false suppositions or at least of admitting any inference Direct 12. that dependeth upon them In some cases a supposition of that which is false may be made while it no way tends to infer the truth of it But nothing must be built upon that falshood as intimating it to be a truth False suppositions cunningly and secretly workt into arguments are very ordinary instruments of deceit § 24. Direct 13. Plead not uncertainties against certainties But make certain points the measure Direct 13. to try the uncertain by Reduce not things proved and sure to those that are doubtful and justly controverted But reduce points disputable to those that are past doubt § 25. Direct 14. Plead not the darker Texts of Scripture against those that are more plain Direct 14. and clear nor a few texts against many that are as plain For that which is interpreted against the most plain and frequent expressions of the same Scripture is certainly mis-interpreted § 26. Direct 15. Take not obscure Prophecies for Precepts The obscurity is enough to make Direct 15. you cautelous how you venture your self in the Practice of that which you understand not But if there were no obscurity yet Prophecies are no warrant to you to fulfill them no though they be for the Churches good Predictions tell you but de eventu what will come to pass but warrant not you to bring it to pass Gods Prophesies are oft-times fulfilled by the wickedest men and the wickedest means As by the Jews in killing Christ and Pharaoh in refusing to let Israel go and Iehu in punishing the house of Ahab Yet many self-conceited persons think that they can fetch that out of the Revelations or the Prophecies of Daniel that will justifie very horrid crimes while they use wicked means to fulfil Gods Prophecies § 27. Direct 16. Be very cautelous in what cases you take mens practice or example to be instead of Direct 16. precept in the sacred Scriptures In one case a Practice or example is obligatory to us as a Precept and that is when God doth give men a commission to establish the form or orders of his Church and Worship as he did to Moses and to the Apostles and promiseth them his Spirit to lead them into all truth in the matters which he employeth them in here God is engaged to keep them from miscarrying for if they should his work would be ill done his Church would be ill constituted and framed and his servants unavoidably deceived The Apostles were authorized to constitute Church officers and orders for continuance and the Scripture which is written for a great part historically acquaints us what they did as well as what they said and wrote in the building of the Church in obedience to their commission at least in declaring to the World what Christ had first appointed And thus if their practice were not obligatory to us their words also might be avoided by the same pretenses And on this ground at least the Lords day is easily proved to be of Divine appointment and obligation Only we must see that we carefully distinguish between both the Words and Practices of the Apostles which were upon a particular and temporary occasion and obligation from those that were upon an universal or permanent ground § 28. Direct 17. Be very cautelous what Conclusions you raise from any meer works of Providence Direct 17. For the bold and blind exposition of these hath lead abundance into most heynous sins No providence is instead of a Law to us But sometimes and oft-times providence changeth the Matter of our duty and so occasioneth the change of our obligations As when the husband dyeth the Wise is disobliged c. But men of worldly dispositions do so over-value worldly things that from them they venture to take the measure of Gods Love and hatred and of the causes which he approveth or disapproveth in the World And the wisdom of God doth seem on purpose to cause such wonderful unexpected mutations in the affairs of men as shall shame the principles or spirits of these men and manifest their giddiness and mutability to their confusion One year they say This is sure the cause of God or else be would never own as he doth Another year they say If this had been Gods cause he would never have so disowned it Just as the Barbarians judged of Paul when the Viper seized on his hand And thus God is judged by them to own or disown by his prospering or afflicting more than by his Word § 29. Direct 18. In controversies which much depend on the sincerity or experience of Godly men take Direct 18. heed that you affect not singularity and depart not from the common sense of the Godly For the workings of Gods spirit are better judged of by the ordinary tenour of them than by some real or supposed case that is extraordinary § 30. Direct 19. In Controversies which most depend on the testimony of Antiquity depart not from Direct 19. the judgement of the ancients They that stood within View of the dayes of the Apostles could better tell what they did and what a condition they left the Churches in than we can do To appeal to the Ancients in every cause even in those where the later Christians do excell them is but to be fools in reverence of our fore-fathers wisdom But in points of History or any thing in which they had the advantage of their posterity their testimony is to be preferred § 31. Direct 20. In Controversies which depend on the Experience of particular Christians or of the Direct 20. Church regard most the judgement of the most experienced and prefer the judgement of the later ages of the Church before the judgement of less experienced ages except the Apostolical age that had the greater help of the spirit An ancient experienced Christian or Divine is
idly or to lie will find at first some difficulty to overcome their customs and live a mortified holy life yet grace will do it and prevail Especially in point of knowledge and ability of expression be not too hasty in your expectation but wait with patience in a faithful diligent use of means and that will be easie and delightful to you afterwards which before discouraged you with its difficulties § 3. 2. And God himself will have his servants and his graces tryed and exercised by difficulties He never intended us the Reward for sitting still nor the Crown of Victory without a fight nor a â—ight without an enemy and opposition Innocent Adam was unfit for his state of Confirmation and reward till he had been tryed by temptation Therefore the Martyrs have the most glorious Crown as having undergone the greatest tryal And shall we presume to murmur at the Method of God § 4. 3. And Satan having liberty to tempt and try us will quickly raise up Storms and Waves before us as soon as we are set to Sea which make young beginners often fear that they shall never live to reach the Haven He will shew thee the greatness of thy former sins to perswade thee that they shall not be pardoned He will shew thee the strength of thy passions and corruptions to make thee think they will never be overcome He will shew thee the greatness of the opposition and suffering which thou art like to undergo to make thee think thou shalt never persevere He will do his worst to meet thee with poverty losses crosses injuries vexations persecutions and cruelties yea and unkindness from thy dearest friends as he did by Iob to make thee think ill of God or of his service If he can he will make them thy enemies that are of thine own houshold He will stir up thy own Father or Mother or Husband or Wife or Brother or Sister or Children against thee to perswade or persecute thee from Christ Therefore Christ tells us that if we hate not all these that is cannot forsake them and use them as men do hated things when they would turn us from him we cannot be his Disciples Luke 14. 26. Matth. 10. Look for the worst that the Devil can do against thee if thou hast once lifted thy self against him in the Army of Christ and resolvest what ever it coâ—â— thee to be saved Read Heb. 11. But how little cause you have to be discouraged though Earth and Hell should do their worst you may perceive by these few Considerations 1. God is on your side who hath all your enemies in his hand and can rebuke them or destroy them in a moment O what is the breath or fury of dust or Devils against the Lord Almighty If God be for us who shall be against us Rom. 8. 32 33. Read often that Chapter Rom. 8. In the day when thou didst enter into Covenant with God and he with thee thou didst enter into the most impregnable Rock and Fortress and house thy self in that Castle of defence where thou maist modestly defie all adverse powers of Earth or Hell If God cannot save thee he is not God And if he will not save thee he must break his Covenant Indeed he may resolve to save thee not from affliction and persecution but in it and by it But in all these sufferings you will be more than Conquerors through Christ that loveth you that is It is far more desirable and excellent to conquer by patience in suffering for Christ than to conquer our Persecutors in the field by force of arms O think on the Saints triumphant boastings in their God Psal. 46. 1 2 3. God is our refuge and strength a very present help in trouble therefore will we not fear though the earth be removed and though the Mountains be carryed into the midst of the Sea Psal. 56. 1 2 3 4 5. When his enemies were many and wrested his words daily and fought against him and all their thoughts were against him yet he saith What time I am afraid I will trust in thee In God will I praise his word In God have I put my trust I will not fear what flesh can do unto me Remember Christs charge Luke 12. 4. Fear not them that can kill the body and after that have no more that they can do But I will fore-warn you whom you shall fear Fear him which after he hath killed hath power to cast into Hell yea I say unto you fear him If all the world were on thy side thou might yet have cause to fear but to have God on thy side is infinitely more § 6. 2. Jesus Christ is the Captain of thy salvation Heb. 2. 10. and hath gone before thee this Securus ego â—um de Christo Deâ— domino meo Haec Regi dicatis Subigat ignibus adigat bestiis excrucieâ— omnium tormentoâ—um generibus si cessero fâ—ustra sum in Ecclesiâ— Catholica baptizatus Nam si haec praesens vita sola esset aliam quae vera est non speraremus aeternam nec ita facerem ut modicum temporaliâ—er gloriarer ingratus existerâ—m qui suam fidem mihi contulâ—t Creatori Victorianus ad Hunnerychum in Vict. Utic p. 461. Victor Uti eusis saith that before the persecution of Hunnerychus these Visions were seen 1. All the Lights put out in the Church and a darkness and stink succeeded 2. The Church filled with abundance of Swine and Goats 3. Another saw a great heap of Corn unwinnowed and a sudden Whirlwind bâ—ew away all the Chaff and after that one came and cast out all the stricken dead and useless Corn till a very little heap was left 4. Another heard one cry on the top of a Mount Migrate Migrate 5. Another saw great Stones cast from Heaven on the Earth which â—lamed and destroyed But he hâ—d himself in a Chamber and none of them could touch him Pag. 405. Sed hoc aedificium ubi construâ—r visus est diabolus statim illud destruere digâ—atus est Christus Id. ib. way himself and hath conquered for thee and now is engaged to make thee Conquerour And darest thou not go on where Christ doth lead the way He was perfected through suffering himself and will see that thou be not destroyed by it Canst thou draw back when thou seest his steps and his blood § 7. 3. Thou art not to conquer in thy own strength but by the Spirit of God and the power of that grace which is sufficient for thee and his strength which appeareth most in our weakness 2 Cor. 12. 9. And you can do all things through Christ that strengtheneth you Phil. 4. 13. Be of good cheer he hath overcome the world John 16. 33. § 8. 4. All that are in Heaven have gone this way and overcome such oppositions and difficulties Iâ— ib saith that an Aâ—â—â—â—an Bishop being put over a City all that could take Ship fled
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
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
destroying the Kingdom of the Devil and next the purifying his peculiar people and calling home all that are ordained to eternal life § 60. But more particularly he looketh principally at the heart to plant there 1. Holy Knowledge 2. Faith 3. Godlyness or holy devotedness to God and Love to him above all 4. Thankfulness 5. Obedience 6. Humility 7. Heavenly-mindedness 8. Love to others 9. Self-denial and Mortification and contentment 10. Patience And in all these 1. sincerity 2. tenderness of heart 3. â—eal and holy strength and resolution And withal to make us actually serviceable and diligent in our masters work for our own and others salvation § 61. II. Christs order in working is direct and not backward as the Devils is He first revealeth saving truth to the understanding and affecteth the will â—â— shewing the Goodness of the things revealed And these employ the Thoughts and Passions and Senses and the whole body reducing the inferiour faculties to obedience and casting out by degrees those images which had deceived and prepossessed them § 62. The matter which Christ presenteth to the Soul is 1. Certain Truth from the Father of Lights set up against the Prince and Kingdom of darkness ignorance error and deceit 2. Spiritual and everlasting Good even God himself to be seen and Loved and Enjoyed for ever against the Tempters temporal corporal and seeming good Christs Kingdom and work are advanced by Light He is for the promoting of all useful knowledge and therefore for clear and convincing Preaching for reading the Scriptures in a known tongue and meditating in them day and night and for exhorting one another daily which Satan is against § 63. III. The Means by which he worketh against Satan are such as these 1. Sometime he maketh use of the very temper of the body as a preparative and being Lord of all he giveth such a temperature as will be most serviceable to the soul As a sober deliberate meek quiet and patient disposition But sometime he honoureth his Grace by the conquest of such sins as even bodily disposition doth entertain and cherish § 64. 2. Sometimes by his providence he withdraweth the matter of temptations that they shall not be too strong for feeble souls But sometimes his Grace doth make advantage of them all and leave them for the magnifying of its frequent victories § 65. 3. Sometimes he giveth his cause the major vote among the people so that it shall be a matter of dishonourable singularity not to be a professed Christian and somtime but exceeding rarely it is so with the life of Godliness and practice of Christianity also But ordinarily in the most places of the world Custom and the Multitude are against him and his grace is honoured by prevailing against these bands of Satan § 66. 4. He maketh his Ministers his principal Instruments qualifying disposing and calling them to his work and helping them in it and prospering it in their hands § 67. 5. He maketh it the duty of every Christian to do his part to carry on the work and furnisheth them with Love and Compassion and Knowledge and Zeal in their several measures § 68. 6. He giveth a very strict charge to Parents to devote their Children with themselves to God encouraging them with the promise of his accepting and blessing them and commandeth them to teach them the word of God with greatest diligence and to bring them up in the nurture and fear of God § 69. 7. He giveth Princes and Magistrates their power to promote his Kingdom and protect his servants and encourage the good and suppress iniquity and further the obedience of his Laws Though in most of the world they turn his enemies and he carrieth on his work without them and against their cruel persecuting opposition § 70. 8. His Light detecteth the nakedness of the Devils cause and among the Sons of Light it is odious and a common shame And as wisdom is justified of her children so the judgement of holy men condemning sin doth much to keep it under in the world § 71. 9. His providence usually casteth the sinner that he will do good to into the bosome and communion of his holy Church and the familiar company and acquaintance of the Godly who may help him by instruction affection and example § 72. 10. His providence fitteth all conditions to their good but especially helpeth them by seasonable quickning afflictions These are the means which ordinarily he useth But the powerful inward operations of his Spirit give efficacy to them all Tit. 2. Temptations to particular sins with Directions for preservation and Remedy IN Chapter 1. Part 2. I have opened the Temptations which hinder sinners from Conversion to God I shall now proceed to those which draw men to particular sins Here Satans Art is exercised 1. In fitting his baits to his particular use 2. In applying them thereto § 1. Tempt 1. The Devil fitteth his Temptations to the sinners age The same bait is not suitable Tempt 1. to all Children he tempteth to excess of playfullness lying disobedience unwillingness to learn the things that belong to their salvation and a senselesness of the great concernments of their souls He tempteth youth to wantonness rudeness gulosity unruliness and foolish inconsiderateness In the beginning of manhood he tempteth to lust voluptuousness and luxury or if these take not to designs of worldliness and ambition The aged he tempteth to covetousness and unmoveableness in their error and unteachableness and obstinacy in their ignorance and sin Thus every age hath its peculiar snare § 2. Direct 1. The Remedy against this is 1. To be distinctly acquainted with the Temptations of Direct 1. your own age and watch against them with a special heedfullness and fear 2. To know the special duties and advantages of your own age and turn your thoughts wholly unto those Scripture hath various precepts for the various ages study your own part The young have more time to learn their duty and less care and business to divert them Let them therefore be taken up in obedient learning The middle age hath most vigor of body and mind and therefore should do their masters work with the greatest vigor activity and zeal The Aged should have most judgement and experience and acquaintedness with Death and Heaven and therefore should teach the younger both by word and holy life § 3. Tempt 2. The Tempter also fitteth his Temptations to mens several bodily tempers as I Tempt â— shewed § 22. The hot and strong he tempteth to lust The sad and fearful to discouragement and continual self-vexations and to the Fear of Men and Devils Those that have strong appetites to Gluttony and Drunkenness Children and Women and weak-headed people to Pride of Apparel and trifling Complement And masculine wicked-unbelievers to Pride of Honour Parts and Grandeur and to an ambitious seeking of Rule and Greatness The meek and gentle he tempteth to a yieldingness unto the perswasions
Answ. tween the Being of a duty and the Knowledge of a duty and remember that the first Question is whether this be my duty and the next How I may discern it to be my duty And that God giveth it the Being by his Law and Conscience is but to know and use it And that God changeth not his Law and our duty as oft as our opinions change about it The obligation of the Law is still the same though our Consciences err in apprehending it otherwise Therefore if God command you a duty and your opinion be that he doth not command it or that he forbids it and so that it is no duty or that it is a sin it doth not follow that indeed God commands it not because you think so Else it were no error in you nor could it be possible to err if the thing become true because you think it to be true God commandeth you to Love him and to worship him and to nourish your children and to obey the higher powers c. And do you think you shall be discharged from all these duties and allowed to be prophane or sensual or to resist authority or to famish your children if you can but be blind enough to think that God would have it so 2. Your error is a sin it self And do you think that one sin must warrant another or that sin can discharge you from your duty and disannull the Law 3. You are a subject to God and not a King to your self and therefore you must obey his Laws and not make new ones § 33. Quest. 2. But is it not every mans duty to obey his Conscience Quest. Answ. Answ. No It is no mans duty to obey his Conscience in an error when it contradicteth the command of God Conscience is but a Discerner of Gods command and not at all to be obeyed strictly as a Commander but it is to be obeyed in a larger sense that is to be followed where ever it truly discerneth the command of God It is our duty to lay by our error and seek the cure of it till we attain it and not to obey it § 34. Quest. 3. But is it not a sin for a man to go against his Conscience Quest. Answ. Answ. Yes Not because Conscience hath any authority to make Laws for you but because interpretatively you go against God For you are bound to obey God in all things and when you think that God commandeth you a thing and yet you will not do it you disobey formally though not materially The Matter of Obedience is the thing commanded The form of obedience is our doing the thing because it is commanded when the Authority of the Commander causeth us to do it Now you reject the Authority of God when you reject that which you think he commandeth though he did not Quest. § 35. Quest. 4. Seeing the form of obedience is the being of it and denominateth which the Matter doth not without the form and there can be no sin which is not against the authority of God which is the formal cause of obedience is it not then my duty to follow my Conscience Answ. Answ. 1. There must be an integrity of causes or concurrence of all necessaries to make up Obedience though the want of any one will make a sin If you will be called Obedient you must have the matter and form because the true form is found in no other matter You must do the thing commanded because of his Authority that commandeth it If it may be called really and formally Obedience when you err yet it is not that obedience which is acceptable For it is not any kind of obedience but obedience in the thing commanded that God requireth 2. But indeed as long as you err sinfully you are also wanting in the form as well as the matter of your obedience though you intend Obedience in the particular act It is not only a willful opposing and positive rejecting the Authority of the Commander which is formal disobedience but it is any Privation of due subjection to it when his Authority is not so regarded as it ought to be and doth not so powerfully and effectually move us to our duty as it ought Now this formal disobedience is found in your erroneous Conscience For if Gods Authority had moved you as it should have done to diligent enquiry and use of all appointed means and to the avoiding of all the causes of error you had never erred about your duty For if the error had been perfectly involuntary and blameless the thing could not have been your particular duty which you could not possibly come to know Quest. § 36. Quest. 5. But if it be a sin to go against my Conscience must I not avoid that sin by obeying it Would you have me sin Answ. Answ. You must avoid the sin by changing your judgement and not by obeying it For that is but to avoid one sin by committing another An erring judgement is neither obeyed nor disobeyed without sin It can make you sin though it cannot make you duty It doth ensnare though not oblige If you follow it you break the Law of God in doing that which he forbids you If you forsake it and go against it you reject the authority of God in doing that which you think he forbids you So that there is no attaining to innocence any other way but by coming first to Know your duty and then to do it If you command your servant to weed your corn and he mistake you and verily think that you bid him pull up the corn and not the weeds what now should he do Shall he follow his judgement or go against it Neither but change it and then follow it and to that end enquire further of your mind till he be better informed and no way else will serve the turn § 37. Quest. 6. Seeing no man that erreth doth know or think that he erreth for that 's a contradiction Quest. how can I lay by that opinion or strive against it which I take to be the truth Answ. It is your sin that you take a falshood to be a truth God hath appointed means for the Answ. cure of blindness and error as well as other sins or else the world were in a miserable case Come into the light with due self-suspicion and impartiallity and diligently use all Gods means and avoid the causes of deceit and error and the Light of Truth will at once shew you the Truth and shew you that before you erred In the mean time sin will be sin though you take it to be duty or no sin § 38. Quest. 7. But seeing he that knoweth his Masters will and doth it not shall be beaten with Quest. 〈…〉 â—e that knoweth it not with few is it not my duty chiefly to avoid the many 〈…〉 against my Conscience or Knâ—wledge Answ. 1. Your duty is to avoid both and if
feed the poor and give thy body to be burnt and have not Love it will profit thee nothing If thou speak with the tongue of Men and Angels and hast not Love thou art but as sounding brass or a tinkling Cymbal If thou canst prophecie and preach to admiration and understand all mysteries and knowledge and hadst faith to do miracles and have not Love thou art Nothing 1 Cor. 13. 1 2 3. Thou hast but a shadow and wantest that which is the substance and life of all Come then and make an agreement with God and resolve now to Offer him thy Heart He asketh thee for nothing which thou hast not It is not for riches and lands that he seeketh to thee for then the poor might say as Peter silver and gold have I none Give him but such as thou hast and it sufficeth He knoweth that it is a polluted sinful heart but give it him and he will make it clean He knoweth that it is an unkind heart that hath stood out too long but give it him yet and he will pardon and accept it He knoweth that it is an unworthy heart but give it him and he will be its worth Only see that you give it him entirely and unreservedly for he will not bargain with the Devil or the world for the dividing of thy heart between them A half heart and a hollow heart that is but lent him till fleshly interest or necessity shall call for it again he will not accept Only resign it to him and do but Consent that thy Heart be his and entirely and absolutely his and he will take it and use it as his own It is his own by title Let it be also so by thy Consent If God have it not who shall have it Shall the world or pride or fleshly lust Did they make it or did they purchase it Will they be better to thee in the time of thy extremity Do they bid more for thy heart than God will give thee He will give thee his Son and his Spirit and Image and the forgiveness of all thy sins If the greatest gain or honour or pleasure will win it and purchase it he will have it If Heaven will buy it he will not break with thee for the price Hath the world and sin a greater price than this to give thee And what dost thou think that he will do with thy Heart and how will he use it that thou art loth to give it him Will he blind it and deceive it and corrupt it and abuse it and at last torment it as Satan will do No he will more illuminate it and cleanse it and quicken it Psalm 51. 10. Ephes. 2. 1. Ier. 24. 7. He will make it new and heal and save it Ezek. 36. 26. 2 Cor. 5. 17. Tit. 3. 3. 5. and 2. 14. He will advance and honour it with the highest relations imployments and delights For Christ hath said John 12. 26. If any man serve me let him follow me and where I am there shall also my servant be If any man serve me him will my Father honour He will Love it and govern it and comfort it and the Heart that is delivered to him shall be kept â—ear unto his own John 26. 27. For the Father himself loveth you saith Christ because you have loved me Whereas if thou deliver not thy heart to him it will feed on the poyson of Iuscious vanity which will gripe and tear it when it is down it will be like a house that nothing dwelleth in but Dogs and Flies and Worms and Snakes it will be like one that is lost in the Wilderness or in the night that tireth himself in seeking the way home and the longer the worse Despair and Restlesness will be its companions for ever Let me now once more in the name of God bespeak thy Heart I will not use his commands or threatnings to thee now though these as seconds must be used because that Love must have attractive arguments and is not raised by meer authority or fear If there be not Love and Goodness enough in God to deserve the highest affections of every reasonable creature then let him go and give thy Heart to one that 's better Hear how God pleadeth his own cause with an unkind unthankful people Mic. 6. 2 3. Hear O ye mountains the Lords controversie O my people what have I done unto thee and wherein have I wearied thee testifie against me What is there in him to turn away thy heart Let malice it self say the worst without notorious impudence against him What hath he ever done that deserveth thy disaffection and neglect What wouldst thou have to win a heart that is not in him For which of his mercies or excellencies is it that thou thus contemnest and abusest him What dost thou want that he cannot yea or will not give thee Doth not thy tongue speak honourably of his Goodness while thy heart contradicteth it and denieth all What hast thou found that will prove better to thee Is it sin or God that must be thy glory rest and joy if thou wilt not be a firebrand of restlesness and misery for ever What saist thou yet sinner Shall God or the world and fleshly pleasures have thy Heart Art thou not yet convinced which best deserveth it and which will be best to it Canst thou be a loser by him Will he make it worse and sin make it better Or wilt thou ever have cause to repent of giving it up to God as thou hast of giving it to the world and sin I tell thee if God have not thy Heart it were well for thee if thou hadst no Heart I had a thousand times rather have the Heart of a dog or the basest creature than that mans heart that followeth his fleshly lusts and is not unfeignedly delivered up to God through Christ. If I have not prevailed with your hearts for God by all that I have said your Consciences shall yet bear me witness that I shewed you Gods title and love and goodness and said that which ought to have prevailed and you shall find ere long who it is that will have the worst of it But if you resolve and Give them presently to God he will entertain them and sanctifie and save them And this happy day and work will be the Angels joy Luke 15. 7 10. and it will be my joy and especially your own everlasting joy DIRECT XII Trust God with that soul and body which thou hast delivered up and dedicated to Gr. Dir. 12. him and quiet thy mind in his Love and faithfulness whatever shall appear to To Trust in God thee or befall thee in the world § 1. I Shall here briefly shew you 1. What is the Nature of this Trust in God 2. What are the Of the nature of Affiance and faith I have written moâ—e â—ulâ—y in my Dispuration with Dr. Baâ—low of Sâ—viâ—g Faith contraries to it 3. What are the
But the misery is that few of the ignorant and weak have knowledge and humility enough â—o pâ—rceive their ignorance and weakness but they think they speak as wisely as the best and are offended if their words be not reverenced accordingly As a Minister should study and labour for a skill and ability to preach because it is his work so every Christian should study for skill to discourse with wisdom and meet expressions about holy things because this is his work And as unfit expressions and behaviour in a Minister do cause contempt instead of edifying so do they in discourse § 31. Direct 10. When ever Gods holy Name or Word is blasphemed or used in levity or jeast Direct 10. or a holy life is made a scorn or God is notoriously abused or dishonoured be ready to reprove it with gravity where you can and where you cannot at least let your detestation of it be conveniently manifested Of Prayer I have spoken aâ—terwaâ—d Among those to whom you may freely speak lay open the greatness of their sin Or if you are unable for long or accurate discourse at least tell them who hath said Thou shalt Tom. 2. c. not take the Name of the Lord thy God in vain for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his Name in vain And where your speech is unmeet as to some Superiours or is like to do more harm than good let your departing the room or your looks or rather your tears shew your dislike Directions for the glorifying God in our Lives § 32. Direct 1. Our Lives then glorifie God when they are such as his Excellencies most appear in Direct 1. And that is when they are most Divine or Holy when they are so managed that the world may see that Turâ—issimum est Philosopho secus docere quam viviâ— Paul Scaligâ—r p. 728. it is God that we have chiefly respect unto and that HOLINESS TO THE LORD is written upon all our faculties and affairs So much of GOD as appeareth in our lives so much they are truly venerable and advanced above the rank of fleshly worldly lives God only is the real glory of every person and every thing and every word or action of our lives And the natural conscience of the world which in despight of their Atheism is forced to confess and reverence a Deity will be forced even when they are hated and persecuted to reverence the appearance of God in his holy ones Let it appear therefore 1. That Gods Authority commandeth you above all the powers of the earth and against all the power of fleshly lusts 2. That it is the Glory and Nam illa quae de regno calorum commâ—mâ—rantur à nâ—bâ—â— dâ—que praesentâ—um reâ—um contâ—mpâ—u vel non caâ—â—unt vel non â—aâ—â—le sibi peâ—suadeâ—t cum sâ—rmo factis evertitur Interest of God that you live for and look after principally in the world and not your own carnal interest and glory And that it is his work that you are doing and not your own and his cause and not your own that you are engaged in 3. That it is his Word and Law that is your Rule 4. And the example of his Son that is your pattern 5. And that your hearts and lives are moved and acted in the world by motives fetcht from the Rewards which he hath promised and the punishments which he hath threatned in the world to come 6. And that it is a supernatural powerful principle sent from God into your hearts even the Holy Ghost by which you are inclined and actuated in the tenor of your lives 7. And that your daily converse is with God and that men and other creatures are comparatively nothing to you but are made to stand by while God is preferred and honoured and served by you and that all your business is with him or for him in the world Acâ—staâ—l 4. c. 18. p. 418. § 33. Direct 2. The more of Heaven appeareth in your Lives the more your Lives do glorifie God Worldly and carnal men are conscious that their glory is a vanishing glory and their pleasure but a transitory dream and that all their honour and wealth will shortly leave them in the dust And Direct 2. therefore they are forced in despight of their sensuality to bear some reverence to the life to come And though they have not hearts themselves to deny the pleasures and profits of the world and to spend their dayes in preparing for eternity and in laying up a treasure in Heaven yet they are convinced that those that do so are the best and wisest men and they could wish that they might dye the death of the righteous and that their last end might be like his As Heaven exceedeth Earth even in the reverent acknowledgement of the World though not in their practical esteem and choice so Heavenly Christians have a reverent acknowledgement from them when malice doth not hide their Heavenliness by slanders though they will not be such themselves Let it appear in your lives that really you seek a higher happiness than this world affordeth and that you verily look to live with Christ and that as Honour and Wealth and Pleasure command the lives of the ungodly so the hope of Heaven commandeth yours Let it appear that this is your design and business in the world and that your Hearts and conversation are above and that whatever you do or suffer is for this and not for any lower end and this is a life that God is glorified by § 34. Direct 3. It glorifieth God by shewing the excellency of faith when we contemn the riches Direct 3. and honours of the world and live above the worldlings life accounting that a despicable thing which he accounts his happiness and loseth his soul for As men despise the toyes of children so a believer must take the transitory vanities of this world for matters so inconsiderable as not to be worthy his regard save only as they are the matter of his duty to God or as they relate to him or the life to come Saith Paul 2 Cor. 4. 18. We look not at the things which are seen they are not worth our observing or looking at but at the things which are not seen For the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal The world is under a believers feet while his eye is fixed on the coelestial world He travelleth through it to his home and he will be thankful if his way be fair and if he have his daily bread but it is not his home nor doth he make any great matter whether his usage in it be kind or unkind or whether his Inn be well adorned or not He is almost indifferent whether for so short a time he be rich or poor in a high or in a low condition further than as it tendeth to his Masters service Let men see that you
20. Insomuch as it sâ—â—mâ—th one of the greatest impediments to the Conversion of the Heathen and Mahomâ—tan world and the chiefest means of confirming them in their Iâ—â—â—â—delity and making them hate and scorn Christianity that the Romish and the Eastern and Southern Churches within their view do worship God so dishonourably as they do as if our God were like a little Child that must have pretty toyes bought him in the Fair and brought home to please him Whereas it the unreformed Churches in the East West and South were Reformed and had a Learned Pious Able Ministry and clearly preached and seriously applyed the Word of God and worshipped God with understanding gravity reverence and serious spirituality and lived a holy heavenly mortified self-denying conversation this would be the way to propagate Christianity and win the Infidel world to Christ. § 43. Direct 12. If you will glorifie God in your lives you must be above a selfish private narrow Direct 12. mind and must be chiefly intent upon the publick good and the spreading of the Gospel through the world A selfish private narrow soul brings little honour to the cause of God It s alwayes taken up about it self or imprisoned in a corner in the dark to the interest of some Sect or Party and seeth not how things go in the world Its desires and prayers and endeavours go no further than they can see or travel But a larger soul beholdeth all the earth and is desirous to know how it goeth with the Cause and Servants of the Lord and how the Gospel gets ground upon the unbelieving Nations and such are affected with the state of the Church a thousand miles off almost as if it were at hand as being members of the whole body of Christ and not only of a Sect. They pray for the Hallowing of Gods Name and the coming of his Kingdom and the doing of his will throughout the Earth as it is in Heaven before they come to their own necessities at least in order of esteem and desire The prosperity of themselves or their Party or Countrey satisfieth them not while the Church abroad is in distress They live as those that know the Honour of God is more concerned in the welfare of the whole than in the success of any party against the rest They pray that the Gospel may have free course and be glorified abroad as it is with them and the Preachers of it be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men 2 Thess. 3. 1 2. The silencing the Ministers and suppressing the interest of Christ and souls is the most grievous tydings to them Therefore they pray for Kings and all in authority not for any carnal ends but that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty 1 Tim. 2. 1 2 3. Thus God must be glorified by our Lives DIRECT XVI Let your life on Earth be a conversation in Heaven by the constant work of Gr. Dir. 16. Faith and Love even such a faith as maketh things future as now present and the unseen world as if it were continually open to your sight and such a Love as makes you long to see the glorious face of God and the glory of your dear Redeemer and to be taken up with blessed Spirits in his perfect endless Love and Praise MY Treatise of The Life of Faith and the fourth Part of The Saints Rest being written wholly or mostly to this use I must refer the Reader to them and say no more of it in this Direction DIRECT XVII As the soul must be carried up to God and devoted to him according to all the Gr. Dir. 17. foregoing Directions so must it be delivered from carnal selfishness or flesh-pleasing I pass not this by as a small matter to be passed by also by the Reader For I take the Love of God kindled by Faith in Christ with the full Denyal of our carnal selves to be the sum of all Religion But because I would not injure so great a duty by saying but a little of it And therefore desire the Reader who studieth for Practice and needeth such helps to peruse the mentioned Books of Self-denyal and Crucifying the World which is the grand enemy to God and Godliness in the world and from the three great branches of this Idolatry viz. the Love of sensual pleasures the Love of worldly wealth and the proud desire and Love of worldly honour and esteem And the mortifying of these must be much of the labour of your lives OF this also I have written so much in a Treatise of Self-denyal and in another called The Crucifying of the World by the Cross of Christ that I shall now pass by all save what will be more seasonable anon under the more Particular Directions in the fourth Tome when I come to speak of Selfishness as opposed to the Love of others I Have now given you the General Grand Directions containing the very Being and Life of Godliness and Christianity with those particular sub-directions which are needful to the performance of them And I must tell you that as your life and strength and comfort principally depend on these so doth your success in resisting all your particular sins And therefore if you first obey not these General Directions the more particular ones that follow will be almost useless to you even as branches cut off from the Stock of the Tree which are deprived thereby of their support and life But upon supposition that first you will maintain these Vital parts of your Religion I shall proceed to Direct you first in some particulars most nearly subordinate to the forementioned duties and then to the remoter branches APPENDIX The true Doctrine of LOVE to GOD to HOLINESS to OUR SELVES and to OTHERS opened in certain Propositions Especially for resolving the Questions what self-love is lawful What sinful Whether God must be loved above our own felicity And how Whether to Love our felicity more than God may stand with a state of saving grace Whether it be a middle state between sensuality and the Divine nature to Love God more for our selves than for Himself Whether to Love God for our selves be the state of a Believer as he is under the promise of the New Covenant And whether the spirit and sanctification promised to Believers be the Love of God for himself and so the Divine nature promised to him that chooseth Christ and God by him out of self-love for his own felicity How God supposeth and worketh on the principle of self-love in mans Conversion With many such like To avoid the tediousness of a distinct debating each Question THough these things principally belong to the Theorie and so to another Treatise in hand called Methodus Theologiae yet because they are also Practical and have a great influence upon the more Practical Directions and the right understanding of them may help the Reader himself to determine a multitude of Cases of Conscience the
corruption Direct 3. and that the natural tendency of Reason is to those high and excellent things which corruption and bruitishness do almost extinguish or cast out with the most and that the prevalency of the lower-faculties against right Reason is so lamentable and universal to the confusion of the world that it is enough to tell us that this is not the state that God first made us in and that certainly sin hath sullied and disordered his work The wickedness of the world is a great confirmation of the Scripture § 7. Direct 4. Consider how exactly the Doctrine of the Gospel and Covenant of Grace is suited to Direct 4. the lapsed state of man even as the Law of Works was suited to his state of innocency so that the Gospel may be called the Law of Lapsed Nature as suited to it though not as revealed by it as the other was the Law of Entire Nature § 8. Direct 5. Compare the many Prophecies of Christ with the fulfilling of them in his person As Direct 5. that of Moses recited by Stephen Acts 7. 37. Isa. 53. Dan. 9. 24 25 26 c. And consider that those Jews which are the Christians bitterest enemies acknowledge and preserve those Prophecies and all the Old Testament which giveth so full a testimony to the New § 9. Direct 6. Consider what an admirable suitableness there is in the Doctrine of Christ to the relish Direct 6. of a serious heavenly mind and how all that is spiritual and truly good in us doth close with it and embrace it from a certain congruity of Natures as the eye doth with the light and the stomach with its proper food Every good man in reading the Holy Scripture feeleth something even all that 's good within him bear witness to it And only our worser part is quarrelling with it and rebells against it § 10. Direct 7. Consider how all the first Churches were planted by the success of all those Miracles Direct 7. mentioned in the Scripture And that the Apostles and thousands of others saw the Miracles of Christ and the Churches saw the Miracles of the Apostles and heard them speak in Languages unlearnt and had the same extraordinary gifts communicated to themselves And these being openly and frequently manifested convinced unbelievers and were openly urged by the Apostles to stop the mouths Gal 3. 1 2 3. of opposers and confirm believers who would all have scorned his arguments and the faith which they supported if all these had been fictions of which they themselves were said to be eye-witnesses and agents So that the very existence of the Churches was a testimony to the matter of fact And what testimony can be greater of Gods interest and approbation than Christs Resurrection and all these miracles § 11. Direct 8. Consider how no one of all the Hereticks or Apostates did ever contradict the matters Direct ◠of fact or hath left the world any kind of confutation of them which they wanted not malice or encouragement or opportunity to have done § 12. Direct 9. Consider how that no one of all those thousands that asserted these miracles are Direct 9. ever mentioned in any history as repenting of it either in their health or at the hour of death whereas it had been so heinous a villany to have cheated the world in so great a cause that some consciences of dying men especially of men that placed all their hopes in the life to come must needs have repented of § 13. Direct 10. Consider that the witnesses of all these Miracles and all the Churches that believed Direct 10. them were taught by their own doctrine and experience t◠forsake all that they had in the world and to be reproached hated and persecuted of all men and to be as lambs among wolves in expectation of death and all this for the hope of that blessedness promised them by a Crucified Risen Christ. So that no worldly end could move them to deceive or willingly to be deceived § 14. Direct 11. Consider how impossible it is in it self that so many men should agree together to deceive Direct 11. the world and that for nothing and at the rate of their own undoing and death and that they should all agree in the same narratives and doctrines so unanimously And that none of these should ever confess the deceit and disgrace the rest All things well considered this will appear not only a Moral but a Natural impossibility Especially considering their quality and distance there being thousands in several countries that never saw the faces of the rest much less could enter a confederacie with them to deceive the world § 15. Direct 12. Consider the certain way by which the Doctrine and Writings of the Apostles and Direct 12. other Evangelical messengers hath been delivered down to us without any possibility of material alteration Because the Holy Scriptures were not left only to the care of private men or of the Christians of one country who might have agreed upon corruptions and alterations But it was made the office of the ordinary Ministers to read and expound and apply them And every Congregation had one or more of these Ministers And the people received the Scriptures as the Law of God and that by which they must live and be judged and as their charter for Heaven So that it was not possible for one Minister to corrupt the Scripture Text but the rest with the people would have quickly reproved him Nor for those of one Kingdom to bring all other Christians to it throughout the world without a great deal of consultation and opposition if at all which never was recorded to us § 16. Direct 13. Be acquainted as fully as you can with the History of the Church that you may Direct 13. know how the Gospel hath been planted and propagated and assaulted and preserved until now which will much better satisfie you than general uncertain talk of others § 17. Direct 14. Iudge whether God being the Wise and Merciful Governor of the world would Direct 14. Neq enim potest Deus qui summa Veritas Bonitas est hu manum genus prolem suam decipere suffer the honestest and obedientest subjects that he hath upon earth to be deceived in a matter of such importance by pretence of Doctrines and Miracles proceeding from himself and which none but God or by his special grant is able to do without disowning them or giving any sufficient means to the world to discover the deceit For certainly he needeth not deceit to govern us If you say that he permits Mahometanism I answer 1. The main positive doctrine of the Mahometanes for the worshiping of one only God against Idolatry is true And the by-fancies of their pretended Prophet are not commended to the world upon the pretense of attesting Miracles at all but upon the affirmation of Ma sil 〈◊〉 de
say you are hypocrites and do it for applause If you do it secretly that no one know of it they will say you are covetous and have no good works and though you make a greater profession of Religion you do no good and others shall be censured so also for your sakes If you be pleasant and merry they will censure you as light and vain If you be more grave and sad they will say you are melancholly or discontent In a word whatever you do be sure by some it will be condemned and do or not do speak or be silent you shall certainly displease and never escape the censures of the world § 50. 15. There is among men so great a contâ—ariety of judgements and dispositions and interests that they will never agree among themselves and if you please one the rest will be thereby displeased When the Diviâ—eâ— of Hieldesoâ—â—ge appointed Pâ—tisâ—us to wâ—ite his Irâ—â—icoâ— his very writing for Peace and to perswade the Reformed from Apologies and Disâ—utes did give occasion of renewed â—â—â—â—s to the Saâ—ons and Swedish Divines to tell men that they could have no peace with uâ— Scâ—lâ—et â—â—â—â—iâ— p. 46. He that you please is an enemy to another and therefore you displease his enemy by pleasing him Sometime State-differences divide Kingdoms into parties and one party will be displeased with you if you be of the other and both if you are neuters or dislike them both and each party think their cause will justifie any accusations they can charge you with or odious titles they can give you if not any sufferings they can bring upon you Church-differences and Sects have been found in all ages And you cannot be of the opinion of every party When the world aboundeth with such variety of conceits you cannot be of all at once And if you be of one party you must displease the rest If you are of one side in controverted opinions the other side accounteth you erroneous And how far will the supposed interest of their cause and party carry them One half of the Christian world at this day condemneth the other half as Schismatical at least the other half doing the like for them And can you be Papisâ—s and Protestants and Greeks and every thing If not you must displease as many as you please Yea more if mutable men shall change never so oft they will expect that you change as fast as they and whatever their contrary interests require you must follow them in One year you must swear and another you must unswear all again whatever cause or action they engage in be it never so devillish you must approve of it and countenance it and all that they do you must say is well done In a word you must teach your tongue to say or swear any thing and you must sâ—ll your innocency and hire out your consciences wholly to their service or you cannot please them Michaiah must say with the rest of the Prophets Go and prosper or else he will be hated as not prophesying good of Ahab but evil 1 Kings 22. 8. And how can you serve all interests at once It seems the providence of God hath as of purpose wheeled about the affairs of the world to try and shame man-pleasers and temporizers in the sight of the Sun It is evident then that if you will please all you must at once both speak and be silent and verifie contradictions and be in many places at once and be of all mens minds and for all mens wayes For my part I mean to see the world a little better agreed among themselves before I will make it my ambition to please them If you can reconcile all their opinions and interests and complexions and dispositions and make them all of One Mind and Will then hope to please them § 51. 16. If you excell in any one Virtue or Duty even that shall not excuse you from the contrary defamation so unreasonable are malicious men Nothing in the world can secure you from censorious slanderous tongues The perfect holiness of Jesus Christ could not secure him from being called Theâ— that saw Stâ—â—â—â—â—s face as it had been the face of an Angel and heard him tell them that he saw Heaven opâ—ned yet stored him â—o death as a Blaâ—pheamer Acts 6. 15. 7. 55 56 57 58 59 60. a gluttonous person and a wine-bibber and a friend of publicans and sinners His wonderful contempt of worldly dignities and honours and his subjection to Caesar could not secure him from being slandered and crucified as Caesars enemy The great piety of the antient Christians excused them not from the vulgar calumny that they met together for filthiness in the dark nor from the cry of the rabble Tolâ—ite impios away with the ungodly because they were against the worshipping of Idols I have known those that have given all that ever they had to the poor except their food and necessaries and yet though it was to a considerable value have been reproached as unmerciful by those that had not what they expected Many a one hath been defamed with scandalous rumours of uncleanness that have lived in untainted chastity all their lives The most â—minent Saints have been defamed as guilty of the most horrid crimes which never entered into their thoughts The principal thing that ever I bent my Studies and care about hath been the reconciling Unity and peace of Christians and against unpeaceableness uncharitableness turbulency and division And yet some have been found whose interest and malice hath commanded them to charge me with that very sin which I have spent my dayes my zeal and study against How oft have contrary factions charged me with perfectly contrary accusations I can scarce remember the thing that I can do in all the world that some will not be offended at Nor the duty so great and Sâ—crateâ— primus de vite raâ—â—â—â—ne diâ—seâ—uit ac primus Phâ—â—osophorum damnatus moritur â—â—â—â—râ—ius iâ— Socâ—at p. 9â— Mulâ—a priuâ— de immortalitate animarum ac prâ—râ—â—ara dâ—â—â—â—eâ—tus Ibid. clear that some will not call my sin Nor the self-denyal so great to the hazard of my life which hath not been called self-seeking or something clean contrary to what it was indeed Instead therefore of serving and pleasing this malicious unrighteous world I contemn their blind and unjust censurès and appeal to the most righteous God § 52. 17. If you have a design for a name of honour when you are dead consider what power a prevailing faction may have to corrupt the History of your life and represent you to posterity perfectly contrary to what you are and how impossible it is for posterity to know whose History is the product of malicious sâ—â—meless lies and whose is the narrative of impartial truth What contrary Histories are there of particular persons and actions written by men of the â—ame Religion as of Pope Gregory the seventh and the Emperours that contended
22. 3. A prudent man foreseeth the evil and hideth himself but the simple pass on and are punished § 41. Sign 11. Pride maketh men murmure if the work of God be never so well done if they Sign 11. had not the doing of it and sometimes by contending to have the honour of doing it they destroy the work If they are officers of Christ they look more at the Power than their obligation at the Dignity than at the Duty and at what the people owe to them than what they owe to God and to the people They are like dogs that snarl at any other that would partake with them or come into the house They say not as Moses would all the Lords people were prophets Yea the peace and unity of Church and state is often sacrificed to this cursed pride § 42. Sign 12. Pride makes men ashamed of the service of God in a time and place where it is Sign 12. disgraced by the world and if it have dominion Christ and holiness shall be denyed or forsaken by them rather than their honour with men shall be forsaken If they come to Jesus it is as Nicodemus did by night They are ashamed to own a reproached truth or scorned cause or servant of Christ If men will but mock them with the nick-names or calumnies hatcht in Hell they will do as others or forbear their duty A scorn will do more to make them forbear praying in their families to God than the Lyons den would do with Daniel or the fiery-furnace with the three Confessors Dan. 3. 6. Especially if they be persons of honour and greatness in the world then God must be merciful to them while they bow down in the house of Rimmon As the Rich man Luke 18. 23. when he heard Christs terms was very sorrowful for he was very rich so these because their honours and dignities are so great do think them too good to let go for the sake of Christ Had they but the proportion of the obscure vulgar to lay down they could forsake it but they cannot forsake so fair a portion nor endure the reproach of so honourable a name But O what contemptible things are these to a humble soul He marvelleth what dreaming worldlings find in the doting thoughts and breath of fools which men call Honour that they should prefer it before the honour of God and their real honour When Christ hath told them Mark 8. 38. That whosoever shall be ashamed of him and his words in an adulterous and sinful generation of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed when he cometh in the glory of his Father with his holy Angels I now proceed to the signs of Pride in particular duties The Signs of Pride in and about Religious duties § 43. Sign 1. A Proud person is most sollicitous in and about that part of duty which is visible to Sign 1. man and tendeth to advance him in mens esteem And therefore he is more regardful of the outside His ergo qui loquendi arte caeteris hominibus excellere videntur sedulo monendi sunt ut humilitate induti Christianâ discant non contemnere quos cognoverint morum vitia quam verbâ—rum amplius devitare Aug. de Cat. â—udib c. 9. than of the inside of the words than of the heart He taketh much pains if he be a preacher to cast his sermon into such a form as tendeth to set forth his parts according to the quality of them that he would please If he live where wit is valued above grace or pedantick gingling above a solid clear judicious masculine discourse he bends himself to the humour of his auditors and acts his part as a stage-player for applause If he live where serious earnest exhortations are in more request he studieth to put an affected fervency into his stile which may make the hearers believe that he believes himself and to seem to be what indeed he is not and to feel what he feeleth not But all this while about his Heart he is little sollicitous and takes small pains to affect it with the reverence of God and with a due estimation of his truth and a due compassion of mens souls and indeed to believe and feel what he would seem to believe and feel So also in prayer and discourse his chief study is to speak so as may best procure applause And it is seldom that he is so cunning as to hide this his design from the observation of judicious men that know him They may usually perceive that he is the Image of a Preacher or Christian by affectation forcing himself to that which he is not truly serious in He is sounding brass a tinkling Cymbal a bladder full of wind a skin full of words wise and devout in publick on the stage but at home and with his companions in his ordinary converse he is but common if not unclean He is the admiration of fools and the compassion of the wise An Oracle at the first congress to those that know him not and the pity of those that have seen him at home and without his mask He is like proud Gentlewomen that bestow a great part of the morning in mundifying and adorning themselves when they are to be seen and go abroad but at home are very homely And usually the Proud being Hypocrites are secret haters of the most serious and judicious Christians because these are more quick-sighted than others to see through the cloak of their Hypocrisie Unless as their Charity constraining them to conceal their fears and jealousies may reconcile the Hypocrite to them § 44. Sign 2. Proud men art apt to put on themseves to any publick duty which may tend to magnifie Sign 2. them or set out their parts and think themselves fitter to be preferred before others and imployed than indeed they are They are forward to speak in preaching or praying among others or Non potest non indoctus esse qui se doctum credit Hermar Barbarus in ordinary talk A little knowledge maketh them think that they are fit to be preachers Whereas the humble say with Moses who am I that I should go unto Pharaoh c. Exod. 3. 11. I am not eloquent but slow of speech O my Lord send I pray thee by the hand of him whom thou wilt send Exod. 4. 10 13. Or as Isaiah 16. 5. Wâ— is me for I am undone because I am a man of unclean lips c. or as Paul 2 Cor. 2. 16. Who is sufficient for these things How many a Sermon hath Pride both studied and preached And how many a prayer hath it formed And how well are they like to be heard of God § 45. Sign 3. The Proud are loath to be clouded by the greater abilities of others They are content Sign 3. that weaker men pray or preach with them that will not obscure but put off their parts that they Pliny saith In commending another you
senâ—lis Quid â—nâ—m absurdâ—us quam quo mi 〈…〉 viae 〈…〉 stat eo plus vâ—atici 〈…〉 ere â—i 〈…〉 â—at Maâ— thou hast provided So is every one that layeth up Riches for himself and is not Rich towards God If If thou be rich to day and be in another world tomorrow had not poverty been as good Distracted soul Dost thou make so great a matter of it whether thou have much or little for so short a time and takest no more care either where thou shalt be or what thou shalt have to all eternity Dost thou say thou wilt cast this care on God I tell thee he will make thee care thy self and care again before he will save thee And why canst thou not cast the care of smaller matters on him when he commandeth thee Is it any great matter whether thou be Rich or poor that art going so fast unto another world where these are things of no signification Tell me if thou were sure that thou must die tomorrow yea or the next month or year wouldst thou not be more indifferent whether thou be Rich or Poor And look more after greater things Then thou wouldst be of the Apostles mind 2 Cor. 4. 18. We look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen for the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal Our eye of faith should be so fixed on invisible eternal things that we should scarce have leisure or mind to look at or once regard the things that are visible and temporal A man that is going to execution scarce looks at all the bussle or business that is done in Streets and Shops as he passeth by because these little concern him in his departing case And how little do the wealth and honours of the world concern a soul that is going into another world and knows not but it may be this night Then keep thy wealth or take it with thee if thou canst § 25. Direct 4. Labour to feel thy greatest wants which worldly wealth will not supply Thou Direct 4. hast sinned against God and money will not buy thy pardon Thou hast incurred his displeasure and money will not reconcile him to thee Thou art condemned to everlasting misery by the Law Prov. 11. 4. Riches 〈…〉 fiâ— not in the â—ay of wâ—ath and money will not pay thy ransom Thou art dead in sin and polluted and captivated by the flesh and money will sooner encrease thy bondage than deliver thee Thy Conscience is ready to tear thy heart for thy willful folly and contempt of grace and money will not bribe it to be quiet Iudas brought back his money and hanged himself when Conscience was but once awaked Money will not enlighten a blinded mind nor soften a hard heart nor humble a proud heart nor justifie a guilty soul. It will not keep off a Feavor or Consumption nor ease the Gowt or Stone or Tooth-ache It will not keep off ghastly death but dye thou must if thou have all the world Look up to God and remember that thou art wholly in his hands and think whether he will love or favour thee for thy wealth Look unto the day of Judgement and think whether money will there bring thee off or the Rich speed better than the poor § 26. Direct 5. Be often with those that are sick and dying and mark what all their Riches will Direct 5. do for them and what esteem they have then of the world and mark how it useth all at last Then you shall see that it forsaketh all men in the hour of their greatest necessity and distress when they Jer. 17. 11. would cry to friends and wealth and honour if they had any hopes If ever you will help me let it be now If ever you will do any thing for me O save me from death and the wrath of God Jam. 5. 1 2 3. But alas such cryes would be all in vain Then O then one drop of mercy one spark of grace the smallest well gâ—ounded hope of Heaven would be worth more than the Empire of Caesar or Alexander Is not this true sinner Dost thou not know it to be true And yet wilt thou cheat and betray thy soul Is not that best now which will be best then And is not that of little value now which will be then so little set by Dost thou not think that men are wiser then than now Wilt thou do so much and pay so dear for that which will do thee no more good and which thou wilt set no more by when thou hast it Doth not all the world cry out at last of the deceitfulness of riches and the vanity of pleasure and prosperity on Earth and the perniciousness of all worldly cares And doth not thy conscience tell thee that when thou comest to dye thou art like to have the same thoughts Chilon in Laâ—rt p. 43. Damnum potius quam â—uâ—pe lucrum eligendum nam id semel tantum dolori esse hâ—c semper thy self And yet wilt thou not be warned in time Then all the content and pleasure of thy plenty and prosperity will be past And when its past it s nothing And wilt thou venture on everlasting wo and cast away everlasting joy for that which is to day a dream and shadow and to morrow or very shortly will be nothing The poorest then will be equal with thee And will honest poverty or over-loved wealth be sweeter at the last How glad then wouldst thou be to have been without thy wealth so thou mightst have been without the sin and guilt How glad then wouldst thou be to dye the death of the poorest Saint Do you think that Poverty or Riches are liker to make a man loth to dye or are usually more troublesome to the Conscience of a dying man O look to the end and live as you dye and set most by that and seek that now which you know you shall set most by at last when full experience hath made you wiser § 27. Direct 6. Remember that Riches do make it much harder for a man to be saved and the love Direct 6. of this world is the commonest cause of mens damnation This is certainly true for all that Poverty also hath its temptations and for all that the poor are far more â—umerous than the rich For even Socrates dixit Opes nobiâ—itates non solum nihil in se habere honestatis verum omne malum ex eis oboâ—iâ—i Laâ—rt in Socrat the poor may be undone by the love of that wealth and plenty which they never get and those may perish for over-loving the world that yet never prospered in the world And if thou believe Christ the point is out of Controversie For he saith Luke 18. 24 25 26 27. How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the Kingdom of God For it is easier for a Camel to go
against or perswading you to mortifie § 17. Direct 5. Look on the worst of the creature with the best and foresee what it will be when it Direct 5. withereth and what it will appear to you at the last I have applyed this against worldliness before Chap. 4. Part 6. and I shall afterwards apply it to the lustful love Bring your beloved creature to the grave and see it as it will appear at last and much of the folly of your Love will vanish § 18. Direct 6. Understand well the most that it will do for you and how short a time you must Direct 6. enjoy it and flatter not your selves with the hopes of a longer possession than you have reason to expect If men considered for how short a time they must possess what they dote upon it would somewhat cool their fond affections § 19. Direct 7. Remember that too much Love hath the present trouble of too much care and the future trouble of too much grief when you come to part with what you love Nothing more createth Direct 7. care and grief to us than inordinate Love You foreknow that you must part with it and will you now be so glued to it that then it may tear your flesh and heart Remember you caused all that your selves § 20. Direct 8. Remember that you provoke God to deprive you of what you overlove or to suffer it Direct 8. to grow unlovely to you Many a mans horse that he over-loved hath broke his neck And many a mans child that he over-loved hath dyed quickly or lived to be his scourge and sorrow And many a Husband or Wife that was over-loved hath been quickly snatcht away or proved a thorn or a continual grief and misery § 21. Direct 9. If there be no other means left prudently and moderately embitter to thy self the creature which thou art fond on which may be done many ways according to the nature of it By Direct 9. the seldomer or more abstemious use of it or by using it more to benefit than delight or by mixing some mortifying humbling exercises or mixing some self-denying acts and minding more the good of others c. § 22. Direct 10. In the practice of all Directions of this nature there must abundance of difference be made between a carnal voluptuous heart that is hardly taken off from sensual Love and a mortified Direct 10. melancholy or over-scrupulous person who is running into the contrary extream and is afraid of every bit they eat or of all they possess or wear or use and sometime of their very children and relations and ready to over-run their mercies or neglect their duties suspecting that all is too much loved And it is a very hard thing for us so to Write or Preach to one party but the other will mis-apply it to themselves and make an ill use of it All that we can write or say is too little to mortifie the fleshly mans affections And yet speak as cautelously as we can the troubled soul will turn it into gall to the increase of his trouble And what we speak to his peace and settlement though it prove too little and uneffectual yet will be effectual to harden the misapplying sensualist in the sinful affections and liberty which he useth Therefore it is best in such cases to have still a wise experienced faithful guide to help you in the application in cases of difficulty and weight Tit. 3. Directions against sinful Desires and Discontent § 1. I Shall say but little here of this subject because I have already treated so largely of it in my Read Mâ— â—â—â—â—roughs excellent â—reat called Tâ—â—â—â—â—â— of Coâ—tâ—ntâ—â—â—â—t And that excellent Tract of a Heathen Plutarch de tranquillitate animi Book of self-denyal and in that of Crucifying the World and here before in Chap. 4. Part 6. 7. against worldliness and Flesh-pleasing and here against sinful Love which is the cause § 2. How sinful Desires may be known you may gather from the discoveries of sinful Love As 1. When you Desire that which is forbidden you 2. Or that which will do you no good upon a misconceit that it is better or more needful than it is 3. Or when you desire it too eagerly and must needs have it or else you will be impatient and discontented and cannot quietly be ruled and disposed of by God but are murmuring at his providence and your lot 4. Or when you desire it too hastily and cannot stay Gods time 5. Or else too greedily as to the measure being not content with Gods allowance but must needs have more than he thinks fit for you 6. Or speciall when your desires are perverse preferring lesser things before greater desiring bodily and transitory things more than the mercies for your souls which will be everlasting 7. When you desire any thing ultimately and meerly for the flesh without referring it to God it is a sin Even your daily bread and all your comforts must be desired but as Provender for your Horse that he may the better go his journey even as Provision for your bodies to fit them to the better and more cheerful service of your souls and God 8. Much more when your desires are for wicked ends as to serve your lust or pride or covetousness or revenge they are wicked desires 9. And when they are injurious to others § 3. Direct 1. Be well acquainted with your own Condition and consider what it is that you have Direct 1. most need of and then you will find that you have so much grace and mercy to desire for your souls Meâ—â—em nullis imaginibus depâ—ctam habeat Nam si corde mundus ab universis imaginibus liber esse cupit nil penitus cum amore possidere nulli hommi per voâ—â—ntarium affectum singulaâ—â— familiaritatâ— nulluâ— ipsi adhaerâ—re debet Omnis namque familiaritas aut conversatio pure propter Dei amorem non inita variis imaginibus inficit perturbat hominum mentes cum non ex Deo sed ex carne originâ—m ducat Quisquis in virum spiritualem divinum proficere cupit is carnali vitâ penitus renunciata Deo â—oli amore adhaereat eundemque interiori homine suo peculiariter possideat quo habito mox omnis multiplicitas omnes imagines omnis inordinaâ—us erga creaturas amor fortâ—ter ab eo prostigabuntur Deus quippe per amorem intus possesso protinus ab universis homo imaginibus liberatur Deus spiritus est cujus imaginem nemo proprie exprimere aut â—ffigiare potest Thaulerus flor pag. 79 80. without which you are lost for ever and that you have a Christ to desire and an endless life with God to desire that it will quench all your thirst after the things below This if any thing will make you wiser when you see you have greater things to mind A man that is in present danger of his life will
men though never so sound and rational be certainly deceived in this we know not when they are not deceived and there can be no certainty of faith or knowledge For if you say that the Church telleth us that sense is deceived in this and only in this Deny not sense with the Papists I answer If it be not first granted that sense as so stated is certain in its apprehension there is no certainty then that there is a Church or a man or a world or what the Church ever said or any member of it And if sense be so fallible the Church may be deceived who by the means of sense doth come to all her knowledge To deny faith is the property of an Infidel To deny Reason is to deny Humanity and is fittest for a mad man or a Beast if without reason reason could be denyed But to deny the certainty of sense it self and of all the senses of all sound men and that about the proper objects of sense this sheweth that ambition can make a Religion which shall bring man quite below the Beasts and make him a Mushrome that Rome may have subjects capable of her Government and all this under pretence of honouring faith and saving souls Making God the destroyer of nature in order to its perfection and the deceiver of nature in order to its ☜ edification § 12. Direct 10. Sense must not be made the Iudge of matters that are above it as the proper objects Direct 10. of faith and reason nor must we argue negatively from our senses in such cases which God in nature never brought into their Court. We cannot say that there is no God no Heaven no Hell no Angels no souls of men because we see them not We cannot say I see not the Antipodes nor other Kingdoms of the world and therefore there is no such place so we say as well as the Papists that sense is no Judge whether the spiritual body of Christ be present in the Sacrament no more than whether an Angel be here present But sense with reason is the Judge whether bread and Wine be there present or else humane understanding can judge of nothing Christ would have had Thomas to have believed without seeing and feeling and blesseth those that neither see him nor feel and yet believe but he never blesseth men for believing contrary to the sight and feeling and taste of all that have sound senses and understandings in the world Their instance of the Virgins conception of Christ is nothing contrary to this For it belongeth not to sense to judge whether a Virgin may conceive Nor will any wise mans Reason judge that the Creator who in making the world of nothing was the only cause cannot supply the place of a partial second cause in Generation They might more plausibly argue with Aristotle against the Creation it self that ex nihilo nihil fit but as it is past doubt that the infallibility of sense is nothing at all concerned in this so it is sufficiently proved by Christians that God can create without any pre-existent matter Reason can see much further than sense by the help of sense and yet much further by the help of Divine Revelation by faith To argue Negatively against the conclusions of Reason or Divine Revelation from the meer negation of sensitive apprehension is to make a Beast of man We must not be so irrational or impious as to say that there is nothing but what we have seen or felt or tasted c. If we will believe others who have seen them that there are other parts of the world we have full Reason to believe the sealed testimony of God himself that there are such superiour worlds and powers as he hath told us We have the use of sense in hearing or seeing Gods revelation and we have no more in receiving mans report of those Countreys which we never saw § 13. If they will make it the Question whether the sense may not be deceived I answer we doubt not by distance of the objects or distempers or disproportions of it self or the Media it may But if the sense it self and all the means and objects have their natural soundness aptitude and disposition it is a contradiction so say it is deceived for that is to say it is not the sense which we suppose it is If God deceive it thus he maketh it another thing It is no more the same nor will admit the same definition But however it is most evident that the senses being the first entrance or inlet of knowledge the first certainty must be there which is presupposed to the certain judgement of the intellect But if these err all following certainty which supposeth the certainty of the senses is destroyed And this error in the first reception like an error in the first concoction is not rectified by the second And if God should thus leave all men under a fallibility of sense he should leave no certainty in the world and I desire those that know the definition of a lye to consider whether this ☞ be not to feign God to lye in the very frame of nature and by constant lyes to rule the world when yet it is impossible for God to lye And if this Blasphemy were granted them yet it would be mans duty still to judge by such senses as he hath about the objects of sense For if God have made them fallible we cannot make them better Nor can we create a Reason in our selves which shall not presuppose the judgement of sense or which shall-supply its ordinary natural defects So that the Roman faith of Transubstantiation denying the reality of Bread and Wine doth not only unman the world but bring man lower than a Beast and make sense to be no sense and the world to be governed by natural deceit or lyes and banish all certainty of faith and reason from the Earth and after all ☞ with such wonderful enmity to charity as maketh man liker the Devil than else could easily be believed they sentence all to Hell that believe not this and decree to burn them first on earth and to depose Temporal Lords from their dominions that favour them or that will not exterminate them from their Lands and so absolve their Subjects from their Allegiance and give their Dominions to others All this you may read in the third Canon of the Laterane General Council under Innocent 3. § 14. Direct 11. Look not upon any object of sense with sense alone nor stop not in it but let reason Direct 11. begin where sense doth end and alwayes see by faith or reason the part which is invisible as well as the sensible part by sense By that which is seen collect and rise up to that which is unseen It God had given us an eye or ear or taste or feeling and not a mind then we should have exercised no other faculty but what we had But sure he
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
Laws for the preservation of so excellent a thing as Truth he should not secure the happiness of the world As to the securing of mens lives it is not enough to make a Law that you shall not kill men without just cause though that be all that the Law intendeth to attain for then every man being left to judge would think there were just cause whenever his passion or interest told him so But the Law is You shall not kill at all without the judgement of the Magistrate So if the Law against Lying did intend no more than the securing men from the injuries of errour and deceit yet would it not have been a sufficient means to have said only You shall not injure men by Lying for then men would have judged of the injury by their own interests and passions But much more is it needful to have a stricter Law when Truth it self is the thing that God intendeth to secure as well as the interest of men In the eyes of Christians and Heathens and all mankind that have not unmand themselves there appeareth a singular beauty and excellency in Truth Aristotle could say that the Nature of man is made for Truth Cicero could say that Qâ—â—d verum simplex sincerumque est id naturae bominis accommodatissimum est Verity and Virtue were ever taken as the inseparable perfections of man Pythagoras could say that to Love Truth and do Good were the two things that made man likest to God and therefore were his two most excellent gifts Plato could say that Truth was the best rhetorick and the sweetest oration Epictetus could say that Truth is a thing immortal eternal of all things most precious better than friendship as being less obnoxious to blind affections Iamblichus could say that as Light naturally and constantly accompanyeth the Sun so Truth accompanyeth God and all that follow him Epaminondas is praised for that he would not Lye no not in jeast Pomponius Atâ—icus was so great a hater of a lye that all his friends were desirous to Trust him with their â—â—â—â—y lye iâ— evil and to be avoided saâ—â—h Aristot. Eâ—hâ—c l 4 See Psal. 5. â— Prov. 6 17 19. 12. 22. 19. 5 9. 21 18 Rev. 21. 27. 22 15. Joh. 8. 44. Col. 3. 9. business and use him as their Counsellor He knoweth not what use mans understanding or his tongue were made for that knoweth not the excellency of Truth Let a Pilate only ask as a stranger what is Truth Joh. 18. 38. as Pharaoh asked who is the Lord For this end Christ himself came into the world to bear witness to the Truth and every one that is of the Truth will hear him Joh. 18. 37. He is the Truth Joh. 14. 6. and full of Grace and Truth Joh. 1. 14. Grace and Truth came by him Joh. 1. 17. His spirit is given to guide his servants into the Truth Joh. 16. 13. and to sanctifie them by the truth Joh. 17. 19. that knowing the truth it might make them free Joh. 8. 32. The fruit of the spirit is in all truth Ephes. 5. 9. His Ministers can do nothing against the truth but for the truth 2 Cor. 13. 8. Truth is the girdle that must gird our loins Ephes 6. 14. The Church is the pillar and ground of Truth 1 Tim. 3. 15. The faithful are they that believe and know the Truth 1 Tim. 4. 3. Speaking the truth in Love is the way of the Churches growth and edification Ephes. 4. 15. Repentance is given men to the acknowledging of the Truth that they may escape out of the power of the Devil 2 Tim. 2. 25 26. The dullards are they that are never able to come to the knowledge of the truth 2 Tim. 3. 7. They are men of perverse minds that resist the Truth 2 Tim. 3. 8. They that receive not the Truth in the Love of it cannot be saved 2 Thes. 2. 10. All they are damned that believe not the Truth 2 Thes. 2. 12 13. You see what Truth is in the judgement of God and all the sober world Therefore a Lye that is contrary to Truth as darkness to Light must be equally odious as truth is amiable No wonder therefore if it be absolutely forbidden of God § 21. 3. You may the easilyer perceive this by considering that other faults of the tongue as idle talk swâ—aring and such like are forbidden not only because they are a hurt to others but for the intrinsical evil in the thing it self Great reason therefore that it should be so in this § 22. 4. Lying is a vice which maketh us most unlike to God For he is called the God of truth Psal. 31. 5. Deut. 32. 4. All his ways are mercy and truth Psal. 25. 10. His judgement is according to truth Rom. 2. 2. It is impossible for God to lye Heb. 6. 18. Tit. 1. 2. His word is the word Numb 23. 19. 1 Sam. 15. 29. 1 Joh. 5. 10. of truth Psal. 119. 43. Col. 1. 5. 2 Tim. 2. 15. Jam. 1. 15. 2 Cor. 6. 7. And who shall dwell in his Tabernacle but thâ—se that speak the truth in their hearts Psal. 15. 2. The disconformity of the soul to God then being its greatest dâ—formity in things wherein it is made to be conform to him it may hence appear that Lying is an odious sin And this may the easilyer appear if you consider what a case the world were in if God could lye and were not of undoubted truth we should then be sure of nothing and therefore could have no sure information by his word no sure direction and guidance by his precepts and no sure consâ—lation in any of his promises Therefore that which maketh us so unlike to the true and holy God must needs be odious § 23. 5. Lying is the Image or work of the Devil and Lyars are his Children in a special sort For Christ telleth us that he abode not in the truth for there is no truth in him when he speaketh a lye he speaketh of his own for he is a lyar and the father of it Joh. 8. 44. The Proud the Malicious and 1 King 22. 22 23. I will be a lying spirit in the moâ—â—hâ— of all his Prophets 2 Chron 18. 21 22. the Lyars are in a special sort the Children of the Devil for these three are in Scripture in a special manner made the Devils sins Therefore sure there is an intrinsical evil and odiousness in a lye It was Satan that filled the hearts of Ananias and Saphira to Lye to the Holy Ghost Act. 5. 3. To change the Truth of God into a lye and to make God a lyar are therefore the most odious sins Rom. 1. 25. 1 Joh. 5. 10. because it is a feigning him to be like the Devil And should we make our selves like him then by the same vice If you love not the Devils sin and image love not a lye § 24. 6. Lying destroyeth humane converse and bringeth
genuine 1. There is a zeal and activity meerly Natural which is the effect of an active temperature of body 2. There is an affected zeal which is hypocritical about things that are good when men speak and make an outward stir as if they were truly zealous when it is not so 3. There is a selfish zeal when a proud and selfish person is fervent in any matter that concerneth himself for his own opinions his own honour his own estate or friends or interest or any thing that is his own 4. There is a partial factioâ—s zeal when errour or pride or worldliness hath engaged men in a party and they think it is their duty or interest at least to side with the Sect or Faction which they have chosen they will be zealous for all the Mat. 23. 15. Opinions and wayes of their espoused Party 5. There is a superstitious Childish carnal zeal for small indifferent inconsiderable things Like that of the Pharisees and all such hypocrites for their Washings and Fastings and other ceremonious Observances 6. There is an envious malicious zeal against those that have the precedency and cross your desires or cloud your honour in the World or that contradict you in your conceits and ways such is that at large described Iam. 3. 7. There is a pievish contentious wrangling zeal that is assaulting every man who is not squared just to your conceits 8. There is a malignant zeal against the Cause and Servants of the Lord which carryeth men to persecute them See that you take not any of these or any such like for holy zeal § 3. If you should so mistake these mischiefs would ensue 1. Sinful zeal doth make men The mischiefs of false zeal doubly sinful As holy zeal is the fervency of our grace so sinful zeal is the intention and fervency of sin 2. It is an honouring of sin and Satan as if sin were a work and Satan a Master worthy to be fervently and diligently followed 3. It is the most effectual violent way of sinning making men do much evil in a little time and making them more mischievous and hurtful to others than other sinners are 4. It blindeth the judgement and maketh men take truth for falshood and good for evil and disableth Reason to do its office 5. It is the violent resister of all Gods means and teacheth men to rage against the truth that should convince them It stops mens ears and turns away their hearts from the Counsel which would do them good 6. It is the most furious and bloody persecutor of the Saints and Church of Jesus Christ It made Paul once exceeding mad against them Act. 26. 10 11. and shut them up in Prison and punish them in the Synagogues See Jam. 3. and câ—mpel them to blaspheam and persecute them even unto strange Cities and vote for their death Thus concerning zeal he persecuted the Church Phil. 4. 6. 7. It is the turbulent disquieter of all Societies A destroyer of Love a breeder and fomenter of contention and an enemy to order peace and quietness 8. It highly dishonoureth God by presuming to put his name to sin and errour and Rom. 10. 2. Act. 21. 20 22. to entitle him to all the wickedness it doth Such zealous sinners commit their sin as in the Name of God and fight against him ignorantly by his own pretended or abused authority 9. It is an impenitent way of sinning The zealous sinner justifieth his sin and pleadeth reason or Scripture for it and thinketh that he doth well yea that he is serving God when he is murdering his Servants Ioh. 16. 2. 10. It is a multiplying sin and maketh men exceeding desirous to have all others of the sinners mind The zealous sinner doth make as many sin with him as he can Yea if it be but a zeal for small and useless things or about small Controversies or Opinions in Religion 1. It sheweth a mind that 's lâ—mentably strange to the tenour of the Gospel and the mind of Christ and the practice of the great substantial things 2. It destroyeth Charity and peace and breedeth censuring and abusing others 3. It dishonoureth holy zeal by accident making the prophane think that all zeal is no better than the foolish passion of deceived men 4. And it disableth the persons that have it to do good even when they are zealous for holy truth and duty the people will think it is but of the same nature with their erroneous zeal and so will disregard them § 4. The signs of holy zeal are these 1. It is guided by a right Judgement It is a zeal for The signs of holy zeal Truth and Good and not for falshood and Evil Rom. 10. 2. 2. It is for God and his Church or cause and not only for our selves It consisteth with meekness and self-denyal and patience as to our own concernments and causeth us to prefer the interest of God before our own Numb 12. 3. Exod. 32. 19. Gal. 4. 12. Act. 13. 9 12. 3. It is always more careful of the substance than the circumstances It preferreth great things before small It contendeth not for small Controversies to Mat. 23. 22 23. Tit. 2. 14. the loss or wrong of greater truths It extendeth to every known truth and duty but in due proportion being hottest in the greatest things and coolest in the least It maketh men rather zealous of good works than of their controverted Opinions 4. Holy Zeal is alway charitable It is not cruel 2 Pet. 2. 7 8. â—â—â—â—k 9. 4. 1 Cor. 5. and bloody nor of a hurting disposition Luk. 9. 55. but is tender and merciful and maketh men burn with a desire to win and save mens souls rather than to hurt their bodies 1 Cor. 13. Zeal against the sin is conjunct with Love and pity to the sinner 2 Cor. 12. 21. 5. Yet it excludeth that foolish pity which cherisheth the sin Rev. 2. 2. 1 King 15. 13. 6. True zeal is tender of the Churches Unity and Peace It is not a dividing tearing zeal It is first pure and then peaceable gentle and easie to be intreated full of mercy and good fruits Jam. 3. 17. 7. True zeal is impartial and is Gâ—n 38. 24. 2 Sam. 12. 5. as hot against our own sins and our Childrens and other relations sins as against anothers Mat. 7. 4. 8. True zeal respecteth all Gods Commandments and is not hot for one and contemptuous of another It aimeth at perfection and stinteth not our desires to any lower degree It maketh a man desirous to be like to God even Holy as he is Holy It consisteth principally in the fervour of our Love to God when false Zeal consisteth principally in censorious wranglings against other mens actions or opinions It first worketh towards good and then riseth up against the hindering-evil 9. It maketh 2 Cor. 8. 3. Act 18. 25. Exod. 36. 6. a man laborious in holy duty to God and diligent in
he shall serve me He that worketh Deceit shall not dwell within my House He that telleth lyes shall not tarry in my sight Prov. 3. 33. The Curse of the Lord is in the House of the wicked but he blesseth the Habitation of the Iust. LONDON Printed by Robert White for Nevill Simmons at the Sign of the Princes-Arms in St. Pauls Church-yard 1673. To all that fear God in the Burrough and Parish of Kederminster in Worcestershire Dear Friends YOU are the Only People that ever I took a special Pastoral Charge of And Gods blessing and your Obedience to his Word do make the remembrance of my Labours and Converse with you to be sweet It was neither by Your Will or Mine that we have been this twelve years separated nor that we yet continue so I thank our most Gracious God who maugre all the Serpents Malice hath Inwardly and Outwardly so well provided for you above most others as that I hope you will be no losers by any thing which hath yet befallen you That I have hitherto survived so many of my departed Friends both with you and elsewhere after all that you have known is my own wonder as well as yours And what I have been doing in this time of our separation I have formerly told you in part by some other Writings and now tell you more by this which was written about five or six years ago though it found not passage into the world till now I live not yet Idle But whether this be the way of my chiefest service to the Church of God in my present case some distant Censurers have questioned If it be not my Ignorance of my duty and of what will be most useful to others is the cause and not my Love of Ease or my obeying Man rather than God I judge that my chief duty which I think is likest to do most good I am glad that once more before I dye I have opportunity to speak to you at this distance and to perswade you to and Direct you in that Family Holiness and Righteousness which hath been so much of your Comfort and Honour and will be so while you faithfully continue it O how happy a state is it to have God dwell in your Families by his Love and Blessing and Rule them by his Word and Spirit and Protect them by his Power and Delight in them and they in Him as his Churches preparing for the Coelestial Delights O how much of the Interest of true Religion must be kept up in the world by the Holiness and Diligence of Christian Families How happy a supply doth it afford where there are sad defects in the Teaching Holiness and Discipline of the Churches O that the Rulers of Families who are silenced by no others did not silence themselves from that Instructing and Prayer which is their work I should be sorry that this Directory is so Voluminous that few of you can buy it but that more Ends than One in such works must be intended If any of you which God forbid shall shew by an ungodly life that you have forgotten the Doctrine which was taught you or if more yet shall traduce the Doctrine of your once unworthy Teacher Posterity shall here see what it was in this Record which may remain and preach when I am yet more silenced in the dust The Lord whom we have served though with lamentable defects and in whom though alas too weakly we have trusted preserve us in the Life of Faith Hope and Love in Sincerity Zeal and patient Constancy to the Glorious Life where we hope to behold in Perfect Love without the fear of death or separation our most Blessed Head and God for ever Amen Totteridge near Barnet Feb. 10. 1671 2. Your Servant in Willingness Richard Baxter A Christian Directory TOM II. Christian Oeconomicks CHAP. I. Directions about Marriage for Choice and Contract AS the Persons of Christians in their privatest capacities are Holy as being Dedicated and separated unto God so also must their Families be HOLINESS TO THE LORD must be as it were written on their Doors and on their Relations their Possessions and Affairs To which it is requisite 1. That there be a Holy Constitution of their Families 2. And a holy Government of them and discharge of the several duties of the Members of the Family To the right constituting of a Family belongeth 1. The right contracting of Marriage and 2. The right choice and contract betwixt Masters and their Servants For the first § 2. Direct 1. Take heed that neither lust nor rashness do thrust you into a marryed condition before Direct 1. you see such Reasons to invite you to it as may assure you of the Call and approbation of God For 1. It is God that you must serve in your Marryed state and therefore it is meet that you take his counsel before you rush upon it For he knoweth best himself what belongeth to his service 2. And it is God that you must still depend upon for the blessing and comforts of your relation And therefore there is very great reason that you take his advice and consent as the chief things requisite to the match If the Consent of Parents be necessary much more is the Consent of God § 3. Quest. But how shall a man know whether God call him to Marriage or consent unto it Hath Quest. he not here left all men to their liberties as in a thing indifferent Answ. God hath not made any Universal Law commanding or forbidding Marriage but in this Answ. Whether Marriage be indifferent regard hath left it indifferent to mankind yet not allowing all to marry for undoubtedly to some it is unlawful But he hath by other General Laws or Rules directed men to know in what cases it is lawful and in what cases it is a sin As every man is bound to choose that condition in which he may serve God with the best advantages and which tendeth most to his spiritual welfare and increase in Holiness Now there is nothing in Marriage it self which maketh it commonly inconsistent with these benefits and the fulfilling of these Laws And therefore it is said that He that Marrieth doth well that is he doth that which of it self is not unlawful and which to some is the 1 Cor 7. 7 3◠most eligible state of life But there is something in a single life which maketh it especially to Preachers and persecuted Christians to be more usually the most advantagious state of life to these Ends of Christianity And therefore it is said that He that marrieth not doth better And yet to individual persons it is hard to imagine how it can choose but be either a duty or a sin at least except in some unusual cases For it is a thing of so great moment as to the ordering of our hearts and lives that it is hard to imagine that it should ever be indifferent as a means to our main end but
souls to do their undertaken work § 1. Motive 1. Consider that the Holy Government of Families is a considerable part of Gods own Government Motive 1. of the world and the contrary is a great part of the Devils Government It hath pleased God to settle as a natural so a Political order in the world and to honour his creatures to be the instruments of his own operations And though he could have produced all effects without any interior causes and could have Governed the world by himself alone without any instruments he being not as Kings constrained to make use of Deputies and Officers because of their own natural confinement and insufficiency yet is he pleased to make inferiour causes partakers in such excellent effects and taketh delight in the frame and order of causes by which his will among his creatures is accomplished So that as the several Justices in the Countries do govern as Officers of the King so every Magistrate and Master of a family doth govern as an Officer of God And if his government by his Officers be put down or neglected it is a contempt of God himself or a rebellion against him What is all the practical Atheism and Rebellion and ungodliness of the world but a rejecting of the Government of God It is not against the Being of God in it self considered that his enemies rise up with malignant rebellious opposition But it is against God as the Holy and Righteous Governour of the world and especially of themselves And as in an Army if the Corporals Sergeants and Lieutenants do all neglect their offices the Government of the General or Colonels is defeated and of little force so if the Rulers of Families and other Officers of God will corrupt or neglect their part of Government they do their worst to corrupt or cast out Gods Government from the earth And if God shall not Govern in your families who shall The Devil is always the Governour where Gods Government is refused The world and the flesh are the instruments of his Government Worldliness and Fleshly living are his service Undoubtedly he is the Ruler of the family where these prevail and where Faith and Godliness do not take place And what can you expect from such a Master § 2. Motive 2. Consider also that an ungoverned ungodly family is a powerful means to the damnation Motive 2. of all the members of it It is the common Boat or Ship that hurrieth souls to Hell that is bound for the devouring gulf He that is in the Devils Coach or Boat is like to go with the rest as the Driver or the Boatman pleaseth But a well-governed family is an excellent help to the saving of all the souls that are in it As in an ungodly family there are continual temptations to ungodliness to swearing and lying and railing and wantonness and contempt of God so in a Godly family there are continual provocations to a holy life to faith and love and obedience and heavenly mindedness Temptations to sin are fewer there than in the Devils Shops and Workhouses of sin The Authority of the Governours the conversation of the rest the examples of all are great inducements to a holy life As in a well ordered Army of valiant men every coward is so linked in by order that he cannot choose but fight and stand to it with the rest and in a confused rowt the valiantest man is born down by the disorder and must perish with the rest even so in a well ordered holy family a wicked man can scarce tell how to live wickedly but seemeth to be almost a Saint while he is continually among Saints and heareth no words that are profane or filthy and is kept in to the constant exercises of Religion by the authority and company of those he liveth with O how easie and clean is the way to Heaven in such a gratious well ordered family in comparison of what it is to them that dwell in the distracted families of prophane and sensual worldlings As there is greater probability of the salvation of souls in England where the Gospel is preached and professed than in Heathen or Mahometane countrys so is there a greater probability of their salvation that live in the houses and company of the Godly than of the Ungodly In one the advantages of instruction command example and credit are all on Gods side and in the other they are on the Devils side § 3. Motive 3. A holy well-governed Family tendeth not only to the safety of the members but also Motive 3. to the ease and pleasure of their lives To live where Gods Law is the principal Rule and where you may be daily taught the mysteries of his Kingdom and have the Scriptures opened to you and be led as by the hand in the paths of life where the praises of God are daily celebrated and his name is called upon and where all do speak the heavenly language and where God and Christ and Heaven are both their daily work and recreation where it is the greatest honour to be most holy and heavenly and the greatest contention is who shall be most humble and godly and obedient to God and their superiors and where there is no reviling scornes at Godliness nor no prophane and scurrilous talk what a sweet and happy life is this Is it not likest to Heaven of any thing upon earth But to live where worldliness and prophaneness and wantonness and sensuality bear all the sway and where God is unknown and holiness and all religious exercises are matter of contempt and scorn and where he that will not swear and live prophanely doth make himself the hatred and derision of the rest and where men are known but by their shape and speaking-faculty to be men nay where men take not themselves for men but for bruits and live as if they had no rational souls nor any expectations of another life nor any higher employments or delights than the transitory concernments of the flesh what a sordid lothsom filthy miserable life is this made up by a mixture of BEASTLY and DEVILISH To live where there is no communion with God where the marks of Death and Damnation are written as it were upon the doors in the face of their impious worldly lives and where no man understandeth the holy language and where there is not the least foretast of the Heavenly everlasting joys what 's this but to live as the Serpents seed to feed on dust and to be excommunicated from the face and favour of God and to be chained up in the prison of concupiscence and malignity among his enemies till the judgement come that is making haste and will render to all men according to their works § 4. Motive 4. A holy and well-governed family doth tend to make a Holy Posterity and so to propagate Motive 4. the fear of God from Generation to Generation It is more comfortable to have no children than to beget
the Enemies of Religion that forbad Christs Ministers to preach his Gospel and forbad Gods servants to meet in Church-assemblies for his Worship the support of Religion and the comfort and edification of believers would then lye almost all upon the right performance of family-duties There Masters might teach the same truth to their housholds which Ministers are forbid to preach in the Assemblies There you might pray together as fervently and spiritually as you can There you may keep up as holy converse and communion and as strict a discipline as you please There you may celebrate the praises of your blessed Creator Redeemer and Sanctifier and observe the Lords Day in as exact and spiritual a manner as you are able You may there provoke one another to Love and to good works and rebuke every sin and mind each other to prepare for death and live together as passengers to eternal life Thus holy families may keep up Religion and keep up the life and comfort of believers and supply the want of publick preaching in those Countreys where persecutors prohibit and restrain it or where unable or unfaithful Pastors do neglect it § 8. Motive 8. The duties of your families are such as you may perform with greatest peace and least exception Motive 8. or opposition from others When you go further and would be instructing others they will think you go beyond your Call and many will be suspicious that you take too much upon you And if you do but gently admonish a rowt of such as the Sodomites perhaps they will say This one fellow came in to sojourn and he will needs be a Iudge Gen. 19. 9. But your own house is your Castle Your family is your charge You may teach them as oft and as diligently as you will If the ungodly rabble scorn you for it yet no sober person will condemn you nor trouble you for it if you teach them no evil All men must confess that Nature and Scripture oblige you â—o it as your unquestionable work And therefore you may do it among sober people with approbation and quietness § 9. Motive 9. Well governed Families are honourable and exemplary unto others Even the worldly and Motive 9. ungodly use to bear a certain reverence to them For Holiness and Order have some witness that commendeth them in the consciences of many that never practised them A worldly ungodly disordered family is a Den of Snakes a place of hissing railing folly and confusion It is like a Wilderness overgrown with Bryars and Weeds But a holy family is a Garden of God It is beautified with his Graces and ordered by his Government and fruitful by the showres of his heavenly blessing And as the very sluggard that will not be at the cost and pains to make a Garden of his thorny Wilderness may yet confess that a Garden is more beautiful and fruitful and delightful and if wishing would do it his Wilderness should be such Even so the ungodly that will not be at the cost and pains to order their souls and families in holiness may yet see a beauty in those that are so ordered and wish for the happiness of such if they could have it without the labour and cost of self-denyal And no doubt the beauty of such holy and well governed families hath convinced many and drawn them to a great approbation of Religion and occasioned them at last to imitate them § 10. Motive 10. Lastly Consider That holy well governed families are blest with the special presence Motive 10. and favour of God They are his Churches where he is worshipped His houses where he dwelleth He is engaged both by Love and Promise to bless protect and prosper them Psal. 1. 3. 128. It is safe to sail in that Ship which is bound for Heaven and where Christ is the Pilot. But when you reject his Government you refuse his company and contemn his favour and forfeit his blessing by despising his presence his interest and his commands § 11. So that it is an evident truth that most of the mischiefs that now infest or seize upon mankind throughout the earth consist in or are caused by the disorders and ill-governedness of families These are the Schools and Shops of Satan from whence proceed the beastly ignorance lust and sensuality the devilish pride malignity and cruelty against the holy wayes of God which have so unman'd the progeny of Adam These are the Nests in which the Serpent doth hatch the Eggs of Covetousness Envy Strife Revenge of Tyranny Disobedience Wars and Bloodshed and all the Leprosie of sin that hath so odiously contaminated humane nature and all the miseries by which they make the world calamitous Do you wonder that there can be persons and Nations so blind and barbarous as we read of the Turks Tartarians Indians and most of the inhabitants of the earth A wicked education is the cause of all which finding nature depraved doth sublimate and increase the venome which should by education have been cured And from the wickedness of families doth National wickedness arise Do you wonder that so much ignorance and voluntary deceit and obstinacy in errors contrary to all mens common senses can be found among professed Christians as Great and small High and low through all the Papal Kingdom do discover Though the Pride and Covetousness and Wickedness of a worldly carnal Clergie is a very great cause yet the sinful negligence of Parents and Masters in their families is as great if not much greater than that Do you wonder that even in the Reformed Churches there can be so many unreformed sinners of beastly lives that hate the serious practice of the Religion which themselves profess It is ill education in ungodly families that is the cause of all this O therefore how great and necessary a work is it to cast Salt into these corrupted fountains Cleanse and cure these vitiated Families and you may cure almost all the calamities of the earth To tell what the Emperours and Princes of the earth might do if they were wise and good to the remedy of this common misery is the idle talk of those negligent persons who condemn themselves in condemning others Even those Rulers and Princes that are the Pillars and Patrons of Heathenisme Mahometanisme Popery and Ungodliness in the world did themselves receive that venome from their Parents in their birth and education which inclineth them to all this mischief Family-reformation is the easiest and the most likely way to a common Reformation At least to send many souls to Heaven and train up multitudes for God if it reach not to National reformation CHAP. VI. More special Motives for a holy and careful Education of Children BEcause the chief part of Family-Care and Government consisteth in the right Education of Children I shall adjoyn here some more special Motives to quicken considerate Parents to this duty And though most that I have to say for it be already said
14. between light and darkness a believer and an Infidel Answ. It maketh it unlawful for a Believer to marry an Infidel except in case of true necessity Because they can have no Communion in Religion But it nullifieth not a marriage already made nor maketh it lawful to depart or divorce Because they may have meer conjugal Communion still As the Apostle purposely determineth the case in 1 Cor. 7. Quest. 15. Doth not the Desertion of one party disoblige the other Quest. 15. Answ. 1. It must be considered what is true Desertion 2. Whether it be a Desertion of thâ— Relation it self for continuance or only a temporary desertion of co-habitation or congress 3. What the temper and state of the deserted party is 1. It is sometimes easie and sometimes hard to discern which is the deserting party If the Wife go away from the Husband unwarrantably though she require him to follow her and say that she doth not desert him yet it may be taken for a desertion because it is the man who is to rule and choose the habitation But if the man go away and the woman refuse to follow him it is not he that is therefore the deserter Quest. But what if the man have not sufficient cause to go away and the woman hath great and urgent reasons not to go As suppose that the man will go away in hatred of an able Preacher and good company and the woman if she follow him must leave all those helps and go among ignorant prophane heretical persons or Infidels which is the deserter then Answ. If she be one that is either like to do good to the Infidels Hereticks or bad persons whom they must converse with she may suppose that God calleth her to receive good by doing good or if she be a confirmed well-setled Christian and not very like either by infection or by want of helps to be unsetled and miscarry it seemeth to me the safest way to follow her Husband She must lose indeed Gods publick Ordinances by following him But it is not imputable to her as being out of her choice and she must lose the benefits and neglect the duties of the Conjugal Ordinance if she do not follow him But if she be a person under such weaknesses as make her remove apparently dangerous as to her perseverance and salvation and her Husband will by no means be prevailed with to change his mind the case then is very difficult what is her duty and who is the deserter Nay if he did but lead her into a Countrey where her life were like to be taken away as under the Spanish Inquisition unless her suffering were like to be as serviceable to Christ as her life Indeed these cases are so difficult that I will not decide them The inconveniencies or mischiefs rather are great which way soever she take But I most incline to judge as followeth viz. It is considerable first what Marriage obligeth her to simply of its own nature and what it may do next by any superadded Contract or by the Law or Custome of the Land or any other accident As to the first it seemeth to me that every ones obligation is so much first to God and then to their own souls and lives that marriage as such which is for Mutual help as a Means to higher Ends doth not oblige her to forsake all the Communion of Saints and the place or Countrey where God is lawfully worshipped and to lose all the helps of publick Worship and to expose her soul both to spiritual famine and infection to the apparent hazard of her salvation and perhaps bring her children into the same misery nor hath God given her Husband any power to do her so much wrong nor is the Marriage-Covenant to be interpreted to intend it But what any humane Law or Contract or other accident which is of greater publick consequence may do more than Marriage of it self is a distinct Case which must have a particular discussion Quest. But what if the Husband would only have her follow him to the forsaking of her estate and undoing her self and children in the world as in the case of Galeacius Caracciolus Marquess of Vicum yea and if it were without just cause Answ. If it be for greater spiritual gain as in his case she is bound to follow him But if it be apparently foolish to the undoing of her and her children without any cause I see not that Marriage simply obligeth a Woman so to follow a fool in beggary or out of a Calling or to her ruine But if it be at all a controvertible Case whether the Cause be just or not then the Husband being Governour must be Judge The Laws of the Land are supposed to be just which allow a Woman by Trustees to secure some part of her former Estate from her Husbands disposal Much more may she before hand secure her self and children from being ruined by his wilful folly But she can by no Contract except her self from his true Government Yet still she must consider whether she can live continently in his absence otherwise the greatest sufferings must be endured to avoid incontinency 2. Moreover in all these cases a temporary removal may be further followed than a perpetual transmigration because it hath fewer evil consequents And if either party renounce the Relation it self it is a fuller desertion and clearer discharge of the other party than a meer removal is Quest. 16. What if a Man or Wife know that the other in hatred doth really intend by poyson or Quest. 16. other murder to take away their life May they not depart Answ. They may not do it upon a groundless or rash surmise nor upon a danger which by other lawful means may be avoided As by Vigilancy or the Magistrate or especially by love and duty But in plain danger which is not otherwise like to be avoided I doubt not but it may be done and ought For it is a duty to preserve our own lives as well as our neighbours And when Marriage is contracted for mutual help it is naturally implyed that they shall have no power to deprive one another of life However some barbarous Nations have given men power of the lives of their Wives And killing is the grossest kind of Desertion and a greater injury and violation of the Marriage-Covenant than Adultery and may be prevented by avoiding the murderers presence if that way be necessary None of the Ends of Marriage can be attained where the hatred is so great Quest. 17. If there be but a fixed hatred of each other is it inconsistent with the Ends of Marriage Quest. 17. And is parting lawful in such a case Answ. The injuring party is bound to Love and not to separate and can have no liberty by his or her sin And to say I cannot love or my Wife or Husband is not amiable is no sufficient excuse Because every person hath somewhat that is amiable if it
be used but as means and not all at once but sometimes one and sometimes another when the End is still the same and paâ—t Deliberation or choice so all those Graces which are but means must be used thus variously and with deliberation and choice when the Love of God and of eternal life must be the constant tenour and constitution of the mind as being the final grace which consisteth with the exercise of every other mediate grace Never take â—o with lip-labour or bodily exercise alone nor bâ—rren thoughts unless your Hearâ—â— be also employed in a course of duty and holy breathings after God or motion towards him or in the sincere internal part of the duty which you perform to men JUSTICE and LOVE are Graces which you must still exercise towards all that you have to deal with in the world LOVE is called the fulfilling of the Law Rom. 13. 10. because the LOVE of God and man is the soul of every outward duty and a cause that will bring forth these as its effects § 13. Direct 13. Keep up a high esteem of Time and be every day more careful that you lose Direct 13. none of your Time than you are that you lose none of your Gold or Silver And if vain recreations dressings feastings idle talk unprefâ—iable company or sleep be any of them Temptations to râ—â— yoâ— of any of your Time accordingly heighten your watchfulness and for in resolutions against them Be not more careful to escape Thieves and Robbers than to escape â—hat person or action or course of life that would rob you of any of your Time And for the Redeeming of Time especially see not only that you be never idle but also that you be doing the Greatest Good that you can do and prefer not a lâ—ss before a Greater § 14. Direct 14. Eat and drink with temperance and thankfulness for health and not for unprofitable Direct 14. pleasure For quantity most carefully avoid excess For many exâ—eed for one that taketh too little Never please your appetite in meat or drink when it tendeth to the detriment of your health Prov. 31. 4 6. It is not for Kings to drink Wine nor for Princes strong drink Give strong drink to him that is ready to perish and wine to those that be of heavy hearts Eccles. 10. 16. 17. Woe to thee O Land when thy King is a Child and thy Princes eat in the worning Blessed aâ—t thou O Land when thy King is the Son of Nobleâ— and thy Princes eat in due season for strength and not for drunkenness Then must poorer men also take heed of in temperance and excess Let your dyet incline rather to the courser than the finer sort and to the cheaper than the costly sort and to sparing abstinence than to fulness I would advise Rich men especially to write in great letters on the walls of their Dining rooms or Parlours these two sentences Ezek. 16. 49. BEHOLD THIS WAS THE INIQUITY OF SODOM PRIDE FULNESS OF BREAD and ABUNDANCE OF IDLENESS WAS IN HER neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy Luk. 16. 19 25. There was a certain Rich man which was CLOATHED IN PURPLE and SILK and FARED SUMPTUOUSLY every day Son remember that thou in thy life time * receivedst thy good things Paul wept when See Dr. Hammaâ—d's Annotat he mentioned them whose end is destruction whose God is their belly and whose glory is in their shame who mind earthly things being enemies to the Cross Phil. 3. 18 19. O live not after the flesh lest ye die Rom. 8. 13. Gal. 6. 8. and 5. 21 23 24. § 15. Direct 15. If any temptation prevail against you and you fall into any sins besides common infirmities Direct 15. presently lament it and confess not only to God but to men when confession conduceth more to good than harm and rise by a true and through repentance immediatly without delay Spare not the flesh and dawb not over the breach and do not by excuses palliate the sore but speedily rise whatever it cost For it will certainly cost you more to go on or to remain impenitent And for your ordinary infirmities make not too light of them but confess them and daily strive against them and examine what strength you get against them and do not aggravate them by impenitence and contempt § 16. Direct 16. Every day look to the special duties of your several Relations whether you are Direct 16. Husbands Wives Parents Children Masters Servants Pastors People Magistrates Subjects remember that every Relation hath its special duty and its advantage for the doing of some good And that God requireth your faithfulness in these as well as in any other duty And that in these a mans sincerity or hypocrisie is usually more tryed than in any other parts of our lives § 17. Direct 17. In the evening return to the worshipping of God in the family and in secret as was Direct 17. directed for the morning And do all with seriousness as in the sight of God and in the sense of your necessities and make it your delight to receive instructions from the holy Scripture and praise God and call upon his name through Christ. § 18. Direct 18. If you have any extraordinary impediments one day to hinder you in your duty Direct 18. to God and man make it up by diligence the next And if you have any extraordinary helps make use of them and let them not overslip you As if it be a Lecture-day or a Funeral Sermon or you have opportunity of converse with men of extraordinary worth or if it be a day of humiliation or thanksgiving it may be expected that you gather a double measure of strength by such extraordinary helps § 19. Direct 19. Before you betake your selves to sleep it is ordinarily a safe and needful course Direct 19. to take a review of the Actions and Mercies of the past day that you may be specially thankful for all special mercies and humbled for your sins and may renew your repentance and resolutions for obedience and may examine your selves whether your souls grow better or worse and whether sin go down and grace increase and whether you are any better prepared for sufferings and death But yet waste not too much time in the ordinary accounts of your life as those that neglect their duty while they are examining themselves how they perform it and perplexing themselves with the long perusal of their ordinary infirmities But by a general yet sincere repentance bewail your unavoidable daily failings and have recourse to Christ for a daily pardon and renewed grace And in case of extraordinary sins or mercies be sure to be extraordinarily humbled or thankful Some think it best to keep a daily Catalogue or Diurnal of their sins and mercies If you do so be not too particular in the enumeration of those that are the matter of every dayes return For it
experiences thou wilt be very hardly kept from desperation Thou wilt read such passages as Heb. 6 4 5 6. and Heb. 10. 26 27 28 29. with so much horrour that thou wilt hardly be perswaded that there is any hope Thou wilt be ready to think that thou hast sinned against the Holy Ghost and that thou hast trampled underfoot the blood of the Covenant and done despite to the spirit of grace And thou wilt think that there is no being twice born again Or if thou be restored to Life thou wilt hardly ever be restored to thy comforts here if thy backsliding should be very great But indeed the danger is exceeding great lest thou never be recovered at all if once thou be twice dead and pluckt up by the roots Jud. 6. and lest God do finally forsake thee And then how desperate will be thy case § 35. 16. Is it not the example of Backsliders very terrible which God hath set up for the warning of his servants as monuments of his wrath Luk. 17. 32. Remember Lot's Wife saith Christ to them that are about to lose their estates or goods or lives by saving them How frightful is the remembrance of a Cain a Iudas a Saul a Ioas 2 Chron. 24. 2. a Iulian How sad is it to hear but such a one as Spira especially at his death crying out of his backsliding in the horrour of his soul and to see such ready to make away themselves § 36. 17. Consider that there is none that so much dishonoureth God as a Backslider Others are supposed to sin in ignorance But you do by your lives as bad as speak such blaspheamy as this against the Lord As if you should say I thought once that God had been the best Master and his servants the wisest and happiest men and Godliness the best and safest life but now I have tryed both and I find by experience that the Devil is a better master and his servants are the happiest men and the world and the flesh do give the truest contentment to the mind This is the plain blaspheamy of your lives And bethink thee how God should bear with this § 37. 18. There is none that so much hardeneth the wicked in his sin and furthereth the damnation of souls as the Backslider If you would but drive your Sheep or Cattle into a house those that go in first do draw the rest after them but those that run out again make all the rest afraid and run away One apostate that hath been noted for Religion and afterwards turneth off again doth discourage many that would come in For he doth as it were say to them by his practice Keep off and meddle not with a Religious life for I have tryed it and found that a life of worldliness and fleshliness is better And people will think with themselves Such a man hath tryed a Religious life and he hath forsaken it again and therefore he had some reason for it and knew what he did Woe to the world because of offences and woe to him by whom the offence shall come â—â—k 17. 1. Mat. 18. 7. How dreadful a thing is it think that mens souls should lie in Hell and you be the cause of it It were good for that man that a milstone were hanged about his neck and be were drowned in the depth of the Sea Matth. 18. 6 7. Luk. 17. 2. § 38. 19. There is none that are so great a terrour to weak Christians as these Backsliders For they are thinking how far such went before they fell away And those that think that true grace may be lâ—st are saying Alas how shall I stand when such that were better and stronger than I have faln away And those that think true grace cannot be lost are as much perplexed and say How far may an Hypocrite go that after falleth away How piously did this man live how sorrowfully did he repâ—nt how blamelesly did he walk how fervently and constantly did he pray how savourily did he speak how charitably and usefully did he live And I that come far short of him as far as I can discern can have no assurance that I am sincere till I am sure that I go further than ever he did Woe to thee that thus perplexest the consciences of the weak and hinderest the comforts of believers § 39. 20. Thou art the greatest grief to the faithful Ministers of Christ Thou canst not conceive what a wound it giveth to the heart and comforts of a Minister when he hath taken a great deal of pains for thy Conversion and after that rejoyced when he saw thee come to the flock of Christ and after that laboured many a year to build thee up and suffered many a frown from the ungodly for thy sake to see all his labour at last come to nought and all his glorying of thee turned to his shame and all his hopes of thee disappointed I tell thee this is more doleful to his heart than any outward loss or cross that could have befaln him It is not persecution that is his greatest grief as long as it hindereth not the good of souls It is such as thou that are his â—orest persecutors that frustrate his labours and rob him of his joyes And his sorrows shall one day cost thee dear The life and comforts of your faithful Pastors is much in your hands 2 Cor. 7. 3. 1 Thes. 3. 8. Now we Live if ye stand fast in the Lord. § 40. 21. Thou art more treacherous to Christ than thou wouldst be to a common friend Wouldst thou forsake thy friend without a cause especially an old and tryed friend And especially when in forsaking him thou dost forsake thy self Prov. 27. 10. Thy own friend and thy fathers friend forsake not Prâ—v 17. 17. A friend loveth at all times and a brother is born for adversity If thy friend were in distress wouldst thou forsake him And wilt thou forsake thy God that needs thee not but supplyeth thy needs Ruth was more faithful to Naomi Ruth 1. 16 17. that resolved Whither thou goest I will go and where thou lodgest I will lodge where thou dyest I will dye And hath God deserved worse of thee § 41. 22. Nay thou dealest worse with God than the Devils servants do with him Alas they are too constant to him Reason will not change them nor the Commands of God nor the offers of everlasting life nor the fears of Hell nothing will change them till the spirit of God do it And wilt thou be less constant to thy God § 42. 23. Consider also that thy end is so near that thou hadst but a little while longer to have held out And thou mightest have known that thou couldst keep thy worldly pleasures but a little while And it is a pitiful thing to see a man that hath born the forest brunt of the battle and run till he is almost at the end of the race to lose all for want of a
the poorest people and their children They never teach them to read nor teach them any thing for the saving of their souls and they think that their poverty will be an excuse for all When reason telleth them that none should be more careful to help their children to Heaven than they that can give them nothing upon earth § 21. Direct 9. Be acquainted with the special Duties of the poor and carefully perform them Direct 9. They are these 1. Let your sufferings teach you to contemn the world It will be a happy poverty if it do but help Duty 1. to wean your affections from all things below that you set as little by the world as it deserveth 2. Be eminently Heavenly-minded The less you have or hope for in this life the more fervently Duty 2. seek a better You are at least as capable of the heavenly treasures as the greatest Princes God purposely Phil. 3. 18 20 21. 2 Cor. 5. 7 8. straitneth your condition in the world that he may force up your hearts unto himself and teach you to seek first for that which indeed is worth your seeking Matth. 6. 33 19 20 21. 3. Learn to live upon God alone Study his Goodness and faithfulness and all-sufficiency When Duty 3. you have not a place nor a friend in the world that you can comfortably betake your selves to for relief Gal. 2. 20. Psal. 73. 25. 26 27 28. 2 Cor. 1. 10. retire unto God and trust him and dwell the more with him If your poverty have but this effect it will be better to you than all the Riches in the world 4. Be laborious and diligent in your Callings Both precept and necessity call you unto this And Duty 4. if you cheerfully serve him in the labour of your hands with a heavenly and obedient mind it will Ephes 4. 28. Prov. 21. 25. 1 Sam. 15. 22. 2 Thes. 3. 8 10 be as acceptable to him as if you had spent all that time in more spiritual exercises For he had rather have Obedience than Sacrifice and all things are pure and sanctified to the pure If you cheerfully serve God in the meanest work it is the more acceptable to him by how much the more subjection and submission there is in your obedience 5. Be humble and submissive unto all A poor man proud is doubly hateful And if Poverty Duty 5. cure your Pride and help you to be truly humble it will be no small mercy to you 〈…〉 1â— 23. 〈…〉 uty 6 6. You are specially obliged to mortifie the flesh and keep your senses and appetites in subjection because you have greater helps for it than the Rich You have not so many baits of lust and wantonness and gluttony and voluptuousness as they 7. Your corporal wants must make you more sensibly remember your spiritual wants and teach Duty 7. you to value spiritual blessings Think with your selves If a hungry cold and naked body be so great a calamity how much greater is a guilty graceless soul a dead or a diseased heart If bodily food and necessaries are so desirable O how desirable is Christ and his Spirit and the Love of God and life eternal 8. You must above all men be careful Redeemers of your Time Especially of the Lords Day Duty 8. Your labours take up so much of your time that you must be the more careful to catch every opportunity for your souls Rise earlier to get half an hour for holy duty and meditate on holy things in your labours and spend the Lords Day in special diligence and be glad of such seasons and let scarcity preserve your appetites 9. Be willing to dye Seeing the world giveth you so cold entertainment be the more content to Duty 9. let it go when God shall call you For what is here to detain your hearts 10. Above all men you should be most fearless of sufferings from men and therefore true to God Duty 10. and Conscience For you have no great matter of honour or riches or pleasure to lose As you fear not a Thief when you have nothing for him to rob you of 11. Be specially careful to fit your children also for Heaven Provide them a portion which is better Duty 11. than a Kingdom For you can provide but little for them in the world 12. Be exemplary in Patience and Contentedness with your state For that grace should be the Duty 12. strongest in us which is most exercised And Poverty calleth you to the frequent exercise of this § 22. Direct 10. Be specially furnished with those Reasons which should keep you in a chearful contentedness Direct 10. with your state and may suppress every thought of anxiety and discontent As 1. Consider as aforesaid that that is the best condition for you which helpeth you best to Heaven Phil. 4. 11 12 13. Maâ—â—h â— â— 1 Sam. 2. 7. Matth. â— 2â— c. 〈…〉 8. 2◠〈…〉 14. 11. 〈…〉 16. 9. 〈…〉 3 15. 〈…〉 9 〈…〉 30 31. 〈…〉 3â— 25. 〈…〉 1â— 14. 〈…〉 5. 22. 〈…〉 9. 20. 〈…〉 4. â— 10. Rom. 8. 28. Heb. 13. 5. and God best knoweth what will do you good or hurt 2. That it is rebellion to grudge at the Will of God which must dispose of us and should be our Rest. 3. Look over the life of Christ who chose a life of poverty for your sakes and had not a place to lay his head He was not one of the Rich and voluptuous in the world and are you grieved to be conformed to him Phil. 3. 7 8 9. 4. Look to all his Apostles and most holy Servants and Martyrs Were not they as great sufferers as you 5. Consider that the Rich will shortly be all as poor as you Naked they came into the world and naked they must go out And a little time makes little difference 6. It is no more comfort to dye Rich than poor but usually much less because the pleasanter the world is to them the more it grieveth them to leave it 7. All men cry out that the world is vanity at last How little is it valued by a dying man and how sadly will it cast him off 8. The time is very short and uncertain in which you must enjoy it We have but a few dayes more to walk about and we are gone Alas of how small concernment is it whether a man be rich or poor that is ready to step into another world 9. The Love of this world drawing the heart from God is the common cause of mens damnation And is not the world liker to be over-loved when it entertaineth you with prosperity than when it useth you like an enemy Are you displeased that God thus helpeth to save you from the most damning sin and that he maketh not your way to Heaven more dangerous 10. You little know the troubles of the Rich He that hath much hath much to do with it and
If it be not then it is a sin to swear or promise to it and here there is no case of error But if it be really lawful and the vowing of it lawful then the obligations that lye upon this man are these and in this order 1. To have a humble suspicion of his own understanding 2. To search and learn and use all means to discern it to be what it is 3. In the use of these means to acknowledge the truth 4. And then to promise and obey accordingly Now this being his duty and the order of his duty you cannot say that he is not obliged to any one part of it though he be obliged to do it all in this order and therefore not to do the last first without the former For though you question an hundred times What shall he do as long as he cannot see the truth the Law of God is still the same and his error doth not disoblige him Nemini debetur commodum ex sua culpa So many of these acts as he omitteth so much he sinneth It is his sin if he obey not the Magistrate and it is his sin that he mis-judgeth of the thing and his sin that he doth not follow the use of the means till he be informed So that his erring conscience entangleth him in a necessity of sinning but disobligeth him not at all from his obedience 2. But yet this is certain that in such a case he that will swear because man biddeth him when he taketh it to be false is a perjured prophane despiser of God but he that forbeareth to swear for fear of sinning against God is guilty only of a pardonable involuntary weakness § 26. Direct 14. Take heed lest the secret prevalency of carnal ends or interest and of fleshly wisdom Direct 14. do byas your judgement and make you stretch your consciences to take those vows or promises which otherwise you would judge unlawful and refuse Never good cometh by following the reasonings and interest of the flesh even in smaller matters much less in cases of such great importance Men think it fitteth them at the present and doth the business which they feel most urgent but it payeth them home with troubles and perplexities at the last It is but like a draught of cold water in a Feavor You have some present charr to do or some straight to pass through in which you think that such an Oath or Promise or Profession would much accommodate you and therefore you venture on it perhaps to your perdition It is a foolish course to cure the parts yea the more ignoble parts with the neglect and detriment of the whole It is but like those that cure the Itch by anointing themselves with Quicksilver which doth the charr for them and sendeth them after to their graves or casteth them into some far worse Disease Remember how deceitful a thing the heart is and how subtilly such poyson of carnal ends will insinuate it self O how many thousands hath this undone that before they are aware have their Wills first charmed and inclined to the forbidden thing and fain would have it to be lawful and then have brought themselves to believe it lawful and so to commit the sin and next to defend it and next to become the champions of Satan to fight his battels and vilifie and abuse them that bâ— holy wisdom and tenderness have kept themselves from the deceit Tit. 2. Directions against Perjury and Perfidiousness and for keeping Vows and Oaths § 1. Direct 1. BE sure that you have just apprehensions of the Greatness of the sin of Perjury Direct 1. Were it seen to men in its proper shape it would more affright See Tom. 1. Ch. 9. Tit. 2. 3. them from it than a sight of the Devil himself would do I shall shew it you in part in these particulars § 2. 1. It containeth a Lye and hath all the malignity in it which I before shewed to be in The heinousness of Perjury Lying with much more 2. Perjury is a denyal or contempt of God He that appealeth to his Iudgement by an Oath and doth this in falshood doth shew that either he believeth not that there is See Causaâ—â—ons Exercâ—â— 202. * Cotta iâ— Cic. de Nat. Deor. l. 1. to prove that some hold there is no God saith Quid de sacâ—â—kgis de impiis de perjuris dicâ—mus si Carbo c. â—u aslet esse Deos tam perjurus aut impius non fuâ—sset pag. 25 26. a God or that he believeth not that he is the righteous Governour of the world who will justly determine all the causes that belong to his Tribunal The Perjured person doth as it were bid defiance to God and setteth him at nought as one that is not able to be avenged on him 3. Perjury is a calling for the vengeance of God against your selves You invite God to plague you as if you bid him do his worst you appeal to him for judgement in your guilt and you shall find that he will not hold you guiltless Imprecations against your selves are implyed in your Oaths He that sweareth doth say in effect Let God judge and punish me as a perjured wretch if I speak not the truth And it is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the Living God Heb. 10. 31. For Vengeance is his and he will recompence v. 30. And when he judgeth the wicked he is a consuming fire Heb. 12. 29. 4. Perjury and perfidiousness is a sin that leaveth the conscience no ease of an extenuation or excuse but it is so heinous a villany that it is the seed of self-tormenting desperation Some sins conscience can make shift a while to hide by saying It is a Controversie and Many wise men are of another mind But perjury is a sin which Heathens and Infidels bear as free a testimony against in their way as Christians do Some sins are shifted off by saying They are little ones But †Onâ— of Canutus Laws 26. was that Perjured person with Sorcerers Idolaters Strumpets breakers of Wedlock be banished the Realm cited by Bilson of Subject p. 202. How few would be left in some lands if this were done Christians and Heathens are agreed that Perjury is a sin almost as great as the Devil can teach his servants to commit Saith Plutarch * Plut. in Lysaâ—d Cicer. de Leg. l. 3. Cuâ—t l. 7. Arist. Rhâ—t c. 17. He that deceiveth his enemy by an Oath doth confess thereby that he feareth his enemy and despiseth God Saith Cicero The penalty of Perjury is destruction from God and shame from man Saith Q. Curtius Perfidiousness is a crime which no merits can mitigate Read Cicero de Offic. l. 3. Saith Aristotle He that will extenuate an Oath must say that those villanous wretches that think God seeth not do think also to go away with their perjury unpunished In a word the Heathens commonly take the revenge of Perjury
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
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
order to our Absolution and Communion 4. Especially so far as is necessary to subdue our fleshly lusts and tame our bodies and bring them into a due subjection to our faith and to avoid our sin for the time to come And also by 2 Cor. 7. 9 10 11. 1 Cor. 9 27. Col. 1. 5 6. Rom. 13 13 14. the exercise of sober mortification prudently to keep under all our worldly phantasies and love of this present world without unfitting our selves for duty 5. And so far as is needful by such mortification to fit us for fervent prayer especially by fasting on dayes of humiliation and to help us in our meditations of death and judgement and to further our heavenly contemplations and conversation 6. The greatest difficulty is Whether any self-revenge be lawful or due which is answered by Psal. 69. 10. Lev. 16. 29 31. â—3 27 32. Numb 29. 7. 30. 13. Ezra 8. 21. what is said already None such as disableth us for Gods service is lawful But true Repentance is an anger or great displeasure with our selves for sin and a hatred of sin and loathing of our selves for it And to judge condemn and afflict our own souls by a voluntary self-punishing is but that exercise of justice on our selves which is fit for pardoned sinners that are not to be condemned by the Lord and indeed the just exercise of Repentance and displeasure against our selves On which accounts of sober self-revenge we may cherish such degrees of godly sorrow fasting course cloathing as Sackcloth and denying our selves the pleasures of this world as shall not be hurtful but helpful to our duty And if great and heinous sinners have of old on these terms exceeded other men in their austerities and self-afflictings we cannot condemn them of superstition unless we more particularly knew more cause for it But popishly to think that self-afflicting without respect to Isa. 58. 5. such causes or necessities is a meritorious perfection fit for others is superstition indeed And â—o think as many of the Melancholy do that self-murder is a lawful self-revenge is a heinous sin and leadeth to that which is more heinous and dangerous Quest. 101. Is it lawful to observe stated times of fasting imposed by others without extraordinary occasion And particularly Lent Answ. REmember that I here meddle not with the question how far it is lawful for Rulers to 2 Chron. 20 3. Ezâ—a 8. 21. Jonah 3. 5. Zech. 8. 19. Joel 2. 15. Read Dallaeus Treatise de Iejuniis impose such Fasts on others save only to say 1. That it is undoubtedly fit for Kings to do it by Precepts and Churches by Consent in extraordinary cases of defection sin or judgements 2. That it is undoubtedly sinful usurpation for either Pope or any pretended Ecclesiastical Universal Rulers to impose such on the Universal Church Because there are no Universal Rulers Or for a neighbour Bishop by usurpation to impose it on a neighbour Church 3. And that it is sinful in all or many Churches to make by their Agreements such things to be necessary to their Union or Communion with their neighbour Churches so that they will take all those for Schismaticks that differ from them in such indifferent things But as to the Using of such fasts omitting the imposing I say I. 1. Thâ—â— so great and extraordinary a duty as holy fasting must not be turned into a meer Isa. 58. 3 5 6 7 8. formality oâ— ceremony 2. No particular man must be so observant of a publick commanded anniversary fast as for it to neglect any duty commanded him by God which is inconsistent with it As to rejoyce or keep a day of Thanksgiving in Lent upon an extraordinary obliging cause To keep the Lords day in Lent as a day of Thanksgiving and Rejoycing To preserve our own health c. It is not lawful in obedience to man to fast so much or use such dyet as is like to destroy our lives or health These being not so far put into the power of man Nor can man dispence with us as to the duty of self-preservation If God himself require us not to offer him our lives and health needlesly as an acceptable Sacrifice nor ever maketh self-destruction our duty no nor any thing that is not for mans own good then we are not to believe without very clear proof that either Prince or Prelates have more power than ever God doth use himself 3. Such an Anniversary fast as is meet for the remembrance of some sin or judgement if commanded is to be kept both for the Reason of it and for the Authority of the Commander For 1. It is not unlawful as Anniversary For 1. It is not forbidden and 2. There may be just occasion Some arbitrarily keep an anniversary fast on the day of their Nativity as I have long done and some on the day that they fell into some great sin and some on the day of the death of a friend or of some personal domestick or National Calamity and none of this is forbidden 2. And that which is not unlawful in it self is not therefore unlawful to be done because it is commanded seeing obedience to superiours is our duty and not our sin unless in sinful things 4. Whether it be lawful or meet to commemorate Christs sufferings by anniversary fasts is next to be considered II. As for Lent in particular We must distinguish 1. Between the antient Lent and the later Lent 2. Between keeping it on a Civil account and on a Religious 3. Between true fasting and change of dyet 4. Between the Imitation of Christs fourty dayes fasting and the meer Commemoration of it Which premised I conclude 1. The keeping a true Fast or Abstinence from food for fourty dayes on what account soever being impossible or self-murder is not to be attempted 2. The Imitation of Christ in his fourty dayes fasting is not to be attempted or pretended to Because his miraculous works were not done for our imitation And it is presumption for us to pretend to such a power as is necessary to Miracles or yet to make any Essayes at such an imitation any more than at the raising of the dead 3. The pretending of a fast when men do but change their dyet Flesh for Fish Fruit Sweet-meats c. is but hypocritical and ridiculous Most poor labourers and temperate Ministers do live all the year on a more flesh-denying dyet and in greater abstinence than many Papists do in Lent or on their fasting dayes And what a ridiculous dispute is it to hear e. g. a Calvin that never eateth but one small meal a day for many years to plead against the keeping of the Popish fasts and their Clergy call him voracious and carnal and an Epicure and plead for fasting as holy mortification who eat as many meals and as much meat on a Lent day or fasting day as Calvin did in three feasting dayes and drink as much Wine in
to pull them down on pretence of setting up him that hath appointed them whose Kingdom personal is not of this world § 42. Direct 18. When you are tempted to dishonourable thoughts of your Governours look over the Direct 18. face of all the earth and compare your case with the nations of the world and then your murmurings may be turned into thankfulness for so great a mercy What cause hath God to difference us from other nations and give us any more than an equal proportion of mercy with the rest of the world Have we deserved to have a Christian King when five parts of the world have Rulers that are Heathens and Mahometans Have we deserved to have a Protestant King when all the world hath but two more How happy were the world if it were so with all nations as it is with us Remember how unthankfulness forfeiteth our happiness § 43. Direct 19. Consider as well the Benefits which you receive by Governours as the sufferings Direct 19. which you undergo And especially consider of the common benefits and value them above your own He that knoweth what man is and what the world is and what the Temptations of Great men are and what he himself deserveth and what need the best have of affliction and what good they may get by the right improvement of it will never wonder nor grudge to have his earthly mercies mixt with crosses and to find some salt or sowreness in the sawce of his pleasant dishes For the most luscious is not of best concoction And he that will more observe his few afflictions than his many benefits hath much more selfish tenderness of the flesh than ingenuous thankfulness to his benefactor It is for your good that Rulers are the Ministers of God Rom. 13. 3 4 5. Perhaps you will think it strange that I say to you what I have oft said that I think there are not very many Rulers no not Tyrants and persecutors so bad but that the Godly that live under them do receive from their Government more good than hurt and though it must be confest that better Governours would do better yet almost Dicunt Stoici sapientes non modo liberos este verum Reges cum sit Regnum imperium nemini obnoxium quod de sapientibus soliâ— asseritur Statuere eâ—im oportere principem de bonis malis haec autem malorum scire neminem Similiter ad Magistrarus judicia oratoriam solos illos idoneos neminemque malorum Laâ—rt in Zenone the worst are better than none And none are more beholden to God for Magistrates than the Godly are however none suffer so much by them in most places of the world My reason is 1. Because the multitude of the needy and the dissolute Prodigals if they were all ungoverned would tear out the throats of the more wealthy and industrious and as Robbers use men in their houses and on the high way so would such persons use all about them and turn all into a constant war And hereby all honest industry would be overthrown while the fruit of mens labours were all at the mercy of every one that is stronger than the owner and a robber can take away all a night which you have been labouring for many years or may set all on fire over your heads And more persons would be killed in these wars by those that sought their goods than Tyrants and persecutors use to kill unless they be of the most cruel sort of all 2. And it is plain that in most Countreys the universal enmity of corrupted nature to serious Godliness would inflame the rabble if they were but ungoverned to commit more murders and cruelties upon the Godly than most of the persecutors in the world have committed Yet I deny not that in most places there are a sober sort of men of the middle rank that will hear reason and are more equal to Religion than the Highest or the Lowest usually are But suppose these sober men were the more numerous yet is the vulgar rabble the more violent and if Rulers restrained them not would leave few of the faithful alive on earth As many volumes as are written of the Martyrs who have suffered by persecuters I think they saved the lives of many more than they murdered Though this is no thanks to them it is a mercy to others As many as Queen Mary Martyred they had been far more if She had but turned the rabble loose upon them and never meddled with them by Authority I do not think Nero or Dioclesian Martyred near so many as the people turned loose upon them would have done Much more was Iulian a protector of the Church from the popular rage though in comparison of a Constantine or Theodosius he was a plague If you will but consider thus the benefits of your common protection your thankfulness for Rulers would overcome your murmurings In some places and at some times perhaps the people would favour the Gospel and flock after Christ if Rulers hindered them not But that would not be the ordinary case and their unconstancy is so great that what they built up one day in their zeal the next day they would pull down in fury § 44. Direct 20. Think not that any change of the form of Government would cure that which is Direct 20. caused by the peoples sin or the common pravity of humane nature Some think they can contrive such Eam Rempublicam optimam dicunt Stoici quae sit mixta ex regno populari dominatu optimor umque potentia Laâ—rt in Zenone forms of Government as that Rulers shall be able to do no hurt But either they will disable them to do good or else their engine is but glass and will fail or break when it comes to execution Men that are themselves so bad and unhumbled as not to know how bad they are and how bad mankind is are still laying the blame upon the form of Government when any thing is amiss and think by a change to find a cure As if when an Army is infected with the Plague or composed of Cowards the change of the General or form of Government would prove a cure But if a Monarch be faulty in an Aristocracy you will but have many faulty Governours for one and in a Democracy a multitude of Tyrants § 45. Direct 21. Set your selves much more to study your Duty to your Governours than the duty Direct 21. of your Governours to you as knowing that both your temporal and eternal happiness dependeth much more upon your selves than upon them God doth not call you to study other mens duties so much as Bad people make bad Governours In most places the people are so willful and tenacious of their sinful customes that the best Rulers are not able to reform them Yea many a Ruler hath cast off his Government being wearyed with mutinous and obstinate people Plato would not meddle
of them confess For if once the Sword were taken from them the world would quickly see that their Church had the hearts of few of those multitudes whom by Fire and Sword they forced to seem their members or at least that when the windows were opened the light would quickly deliver poor souls from the servitude of those men of darkness For then few would fear the unrighteous excommunications of meer Usurpers It is a manifold Usurpation by which their Kingdom is upheld For a Kingdom it is rather to be called than a Church 1. They Usurp the Power of the Keyes or Ecclesiastical Government Lege Epist. Caroli Calvi ad Papam inter Hincâ—ari Rhemeâ—sis Epistolas cont Papae usurpationes Isidor Hispal sent 3. c. 51. Cognoscant Principes seculi Deo debere se rationem reddere propter Ecclesiam quam a Christo tuâ—ndam suscipiuâ—t Nam five augeatur pax disciplina Ecclesiae per fideles Principes sive solvatur ille ab eis rationem exigit qui eorum potestati suam Ecclesiam credidit Leo Ep. ad Lâ—onem Imp. Debes incunctanâ—er advertere Regiam potestatem tibi non solum ad mundi regimen sed maxime ad Ecclesiae praesidium esse collatam See the judgement of Io. Paâ—isiensis Francis Victoria and Widdrington in Groâ— de Imper. p. 23. Lege Lud. Molinâ—i Discourse of the Powers of Cardinal Chigi over all the world and make themselves Pastors of those Churches which they have nothing to do to Govern Their Excommunications of Princes or people in other Lands or Churches that never took them for their Pastors is an Usurpation the more odious by how much the power usurped is more holy and the performance in so large a Parish as the whole World is naturally impossible to the Roman Usurper 2. Under the name of Ecclesiastical Iurisdiction they usurp the Magistrates Coercive power in such causes as they call Ecclesiastical 3. Yea and they claim an immunity to their Clergy from the Civil Government as if they were no subjects of the King or the King had not power to punish his offending subjects 4. In ordine ad spiritualia they claim yet more of the Magistrates power 5. And one part of them give the Pope directly in Temporals a Power over Kings and Kingdoms 6. Their most eminent Divines do ordinarily maintain that the Pope may excommunicate Kings and interdict Kingdoms and that an excommunicated King is no King and may be killed It is an Article of their Religion determined of in one of their approved General Councils Later sub Innoc. 3. Can. 3. that if Temporal Lords will not exterminate Hereticks from their Lands such as the Albigenses that denyed Transubstantiation mentioned Can. 2. the Pope may give their Dominions to others and absolve their Vassals from their fealty And when some of late would have so far salved their honour as to invalidate the authority of that Council they will not endure it but have strenuously vindicated it And indeed what ever it be to us with them it is already enrolled among the Approved General Councils Between the Erastians who would have no Government but by Magistrates and the Papists who give the Magistrates power to the Pope and his Prelates the truth is in the middle that the Pastors have a Nunciative and Directive Power from Christ and a Discipline to exercise by the Word alone on Volunteers much like the Power of a Philosopher in his School or a Physicion in his Hospital supposing them to be by Divine Right § 55. Direct 26. Refuse not to swear Allegiance to your lawful Soveraign Though Oaths are Direct 26. fearful and not to be taken without weighty cause yet are they not to be refused when the cause is weighty as here it is Must the Soveraign be sworn to do his Office for you and must he undertake so hard and perillous a charge for you which he is no way able to go through if his Subjects be not faithful to him and shall those Subjects refuse to promise and swear fidelity This is against all reason and equity § 56. Direct 27. Think not that either the Pope or any power in the world can dispense with this Direct 27. your Oath or absolve you from the bond of it or save you from the punishment due from God to the perjured and perfidious Of this see what I have written before against Perjury § 57. Direct 28. Do nothing that tendeth to bring the sacred bonds of Oaths into an irreligious contempt Direct 28. or to make men take the horrid crime of Perjury to be a little sin Soveraigns have no sufficient Perjurii poenâ— diviâ—â—a exitium humana dedecus Cicero Agesilaus sent thanks to his enemies for their perjury as making then no question of their overthrow Perjuri numinis contemptores Plutarch Thâ—odosius execrabatur cum legisset superbâ—am dominantium praecipue perfidos ingratos Paul Diaconus l. 2. security of the fidelity of their Subjects or of their lives or Kingdoms if once Oaths and Covenants be made light of and men can play fast and loose with the bonds of God which lye upon them He is virtually a Traytor to Princes and States who would bring perjury and perfidiousness into credit and teacheth men to violate Oaths and Vows For there is no keeping up humane Societies and Governments where there is no trust to be put in one another And there is no trust to be put in that man that maketh no Conscience of an Oath or Vow § 58. Direct 29. Be ready to your power to defend your Governours against all Treasons Conspiracies Direct 29. and Rebellions For this is a great part of the duty of your relation The Wisdom and Goodness necessary to Government is much personal in the Governours themselves But the strength without which Laws cannot be executed nor the people preserved is in the People and the Princes interest See the instance of loyalty in Mascelzer against his own Brother Gildo a Rebel Paul Diacon l. 3. initio in them Therefore if you withdraw your help in time of need you desert and betray your Rulers whom you should defend If you say It is they that are your Protectors I answer True but by your selves They protect you by Wisdom Counsel and Authority and you must protect them by obedience and strength Would you have them protect you rather by mercenaries or foreigners If not you must be willing to do your parts and not think it enough in Treasons Invasions or Rebellions to sit still and save your selves and let him that can lay hold on the Crown possess it What Prince would â—s the Governour of a people that he knew would forsake him in his need § 59. Direct 30. Murmurr not at the payment of those necessary Tributes by which the common safety Direct 29. must be preserved and the due honour of your Governours kept up Sordid Covetousness hath been the ruine of
the authority which he committed to their trust § 86. 3. The Christian Religion bindeth subjects to obedience upon sorer penalties than Magistrates can inflict even upon pain of Gods displeasure and everlasting damnation Rom. 13. 2 3. And how great a help this is to Government it is so easie to discern that the simpler sort of Atheists do perswade themselves that Kings devised Religion to keep people in obedience with the fears of Hell Take away the fears of the life to come and the punishment of God in Hell upon the wicked and the world will be turned into worse than a den of Serpents and wild beasts adulteries and murders and poysoning Kings and all abomination will be freely committed which wit or power can think to cover or bear out Who will trust that man that believeth not that God doth judge and punish § 87. 4. The Christian Religion doth encourage obedience and peace with the Promise of the Reward of endless happiness caeteris paribus Heaven is more than any Prince can give If that will not move men there is no greater thing to move them Atheism and Infidelity have no such motives § 88. 5. Christianity teacheth subjects to obey not only good Rulers but bad ones even Heathens themselves and not to resist when we cannot obey Whereas among Heathens Princes ruled no longer than they pleased the Souldiers or the people so that Lampridius marvelled that Heliogabalus was no sooner butchered but suffered to reign three years Mirum fortasse cuipiam videatur Constantine venerabilis quod haec clades quam retuli loco principum fuerit quidem propè trienio ita ut nemo inventus Cicero saith that every Good man was in his heart or as much as in him lay one that killed Caesar. fuerit qui istum à gubernaculis Romonanae majestatis abduceret cum Neroni Vitellio Caligulae caeterisque hujusmâ—di nunquam tyranniceda defuerit § 89. 6. Christianity and Godliness do not only restrain the outward acts but rule the very hearts and lay a charge upon the thoughts which the power of Princes cannot reach It forbiddeth to curse the King in our bed-chamber or to have a thought or desire of evil against him It quencheth the first sparks of disloyalty and disorder And the rule of the outward man followeth the ordering of the heart And therefore Atheism which leaveth the Heart free and open to all desires and designes of rebellion doth kindle that fire in the minds of men which Government cannot quench It corrupteth the fountain It breaketh the spring that should set all a going It poisoneth the heart of Common-wealths § 90. 7. Christianity and Godliness teach men Patience that it may not seem strange to them to bear the Cross and suffer injuries from high and low And therefore that Impatience which is 1 Pet. 4. 12. the beginning of all rebellion being repressed it stayeth the distemper from going any further § 91. 8. Christianity teacheth men self-denyal as a great part of their religion And when selfishness Luk. 14. 29 33. is mortified there is nothing left to be a principle of Rebellion against God or our superiors Selfishness is the very predominant principle of the ungodly It is only for themselves that they obey when they do obey No wonder therefore if the Author of Leviathan allow men to do any thing when the saving of themselves requireth it And so many selfish persons as there be in a Kingdom so many several Interests are first sought which for the most part stand cross to the Interests of others The Godly have all one common center They unite in God and therefore may be kept in concord For Gods will is a thing that may be fulfilled by all as well as one But the selfish and ungodly are every one his own Center and have no common center to unite in their interests being ordinarily cross and inconsistent § 92. 9. Christianity teacheth men by most effectual arguments so set light by the Riches and honours of the world and not to strive for superiority but to mind higher things and lay up our Ungebantur Reges non pet dominum sed qui caeteris crudeliores existerent paulo post ab unctoribus non pro veri examinatione trucidabantur aliis electis trucioribuâ— Gildas de exc Brit. treasure in a better world and to condescend to men of low degree It forbiddeth men to exalt themselves lest they be brought low and commandeth them to humble themselves that God may exalt them And he that knoweth not that Pride and Covetousness are the great disquieters of the world and the cause of contentions and the ruine of States knoweth nothing of these matters Therefore if it were but by the great urging of humility and heavenly mindedness and the strict condemning of Ambition and Earthly-mindedness Christianity and Godliness must needs be the greatest preservers of Government and of order peace and quietness in the World § 93. 10. Christianity teacheth men to live in the Love of God and man It maketh Love the very heart and life and sum and end of all other duties of Religion Faith it self is but the bellows to kindle in us the sacred flames of Love Love is the end of the Gospel and the fulfilling of the Law To Love all Saints with a special Love even with a pure heart and fervently and to Love all men heartily with a common love To love our Neighbour as our selves and to Love our very enemies this is the life which Christ requireth upon the penalty of damnation And if Love thus prevail what should disturb the Government peace or order of the world § 94. 11. Christianity teacheth men to be exact in Justice distributive and commutative and to do to others as we would they should do to us And where this is followed Kings and States will have little to molest them when Gens sine justitiâ est sine remige navis in undâ § 95. 12. Christianity teacheth men to do good to all men as far as we are able and to abound in good works as that for which we are Redeemed and new made And if men will set themselves wholly to do good and be hurtful and injurious to none how easie will it be to govern such § 96. 13. Christianity teacheth men to forbear and to forgive as ever they will be forgiven of Rom. 14 15. 1. God and the strong to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please themselves but one another to their edification Not to be censorious harsh or cruel nor to place the Kingdom of Gal. 6. 1 2 3 4. Jam â—3 15 16 17. Titus 3. 2. God in meats and drinks and dayes but in righteousness peace and joy in the Holy Ghost To bear one anothers burdens and to restore them with the Spirit of meekness that are overtaken in a fault and to be peaceable gentle easie to be intreated full of mercy and good
fruits without partiality and hypocrisie and to speak evil of no man And where this is obeyed how quietly and easily may Princes govern § 97. 14. Christianity setteth before us the perfectest pattern of all this humility meekness contempt of worldly wealth and greatness self-denyal and obedience that ever was given in the world The Eternal Son of God incarnate would condescend to earth and flesh and would obey his Superiours after the flesh in the repute of the world and would pay tribute and never be drawn to any contempt of the Governours of the world though he suffered death under the false accusation of it He that is a Christian endeavoureth to imitate his Lord And can the imitation of Christ or of Luke 20 18. Matth. 21. 42 44. Acts 4 11. 1 Pet. 2. 7. 8. Zâ—ch 1â— 3. his peaceable Apostles be injurious to Governours Could the world but lay by their Serpentine enmity against the holy doctrine and practice of Christianity and not take themselves engaged to persecute it nor dash themselves in pieces on the stone which they should build upon nor by striving against it provoke it to fall on them and grind them to powder they never need to complain of disturbances by Christianity or Godliness § 98. 15. Christianity and true Godliness containeth not only all these Precepts that tend to peace and order in the world but also strength and willingness and holy dispositions for the practising of such precepts Other Teachers can speak but to the ears but Christ doth write his Laws upon the heart so that he maketh them such as he commandeth them to be Only this is the remnant of our unhappiness that while he is performing the Cure on us we retain a remnant of our old diseases and so his work is yet imperfect And as sin in strength is it that setteth on fire the course of nature so the relicts of it will make some disturbance in the world according to its degree But nothing is more sure than that the Godliest Christian is the most orderly and loyal subject and the best member according to his parts and power in the Common-wealth and that sin is the cause and holiness the cure of all the disorders and calamities of the world § 99. 16. Lastly Consult with experience it self and you will find that all this which I have spoken hath been ordinarily verified What Heathenism tendeth to you may see even in the Roman Government for there you will confess it was at the best To read of the tumults the cruelties Read the lives of all the Philosophers Orators and famous men of Greece or Rome and try whether the Christians or they were more for Monarchy Arcesilaus Regum neminem magnopere coluit Quamobâ—em legatione ad Antigonum fungens pro patria nihil obtinuit Hesich in Arces It s one of Thales sayings in Laert. Quid difficile Regum vidisse tyrannum senem Chrysippus videtur aspâ—rnator Regum modice fuisse Quod cum tam multa scripserit libros 705. nulli unquam regi quicquam adscripserit Senâ—ca faith Traged de Herc. fur perillously Victima haud ulla amplior Potest magisque opima mactari Jovi Quam Rex iniquus Cicero pro Milon Non se obstrinxit scelere siquis Tyrannum occidat quamvis familiarem Et 5. Tusc. Nulla nobis cum Tyrannis societas est neque est contra naturam spoliare eum quem honestum est necare Plura habet similia the popular unconstancy faction and injustice How rudely the Souldiers made their Emperours and how easily and barbarously they murdered them and how few of them from the dayes of Christ till Constantine did dye the common death of all men and scape the hands of those that were their subjects I think this will satisfie you whither mens enmity to Christianity tendeth And then to observe how suddenly the case was altered as soon as the Emperours and Subjects became Christian till in the declining of the Greek Empire some Officers and Courtiers who aspired to the Crown did murder the Emperours And further to observe that the rebellious doctrines and practices against Governours have been all introduced by factions and heresies which forsook Christianity so far before they incurred such guilt and that it is either the Papal Usurpation which is in its nature an enemy to Princes that hath deposed and trampled upon Emperours and Kings or else some mad Enthusiasticks that over-run Religion and their wits that at Munster and in England some lately by the advantage of their prosperity have dared to do violence against Soveraignty but the more any men were Christians and truly Godly the more they detested all such things All this will tell you that the most serious and Religious Christians are the best members of the Civil Societies upon Earth § 100. II. Having done with the first part of my last Direction I shall say but this little of the second Let Christians see that they be Christians indeed and abuse not that which is most excellent to be a cloak to that which is most vile 1. In reading Politicks swallow not all that every Author writeth in conformity to the Polity that he liveth under What perverse things shall you read in the Popish Politicks Contzen and abundance such What usurpation on Principalities and cruelties to Christians under the pretence of defending the Church and suppressing Heresies 2. Take heed in reading History that you suffer not the Spirit of your Author to infect you with any of that partiality which he expresseth to the cause which he espouseth Consider in what times and places all your Authors lived and read them accordingly with the just allowance The name of Liberty was so pretious and the name of a King so odious to the Romans Athenians c. that it is no wonder if their Historians be unfriendly unto Kings 3. Abuse not Learning it self to lift you up with self-conceitedness against Governours Learned men may be ignorant of Polity or at least unexperienced and almost as unfit to judge as of matters of Warr or Navigation 4. Take heed of giving the Magistrates power to the Clergy and setting up Secular Coercive power See Bilson of Subject p. 525 526. proving from Châ—ysost Hilary Oâ—â—gen that Pastors may use no force oâ— terror but only perswasion to recover their wandering sheep Bilson ibid. p. 541. Parliamenâ—s have been kept by the King and his Barons the Clergy wholly excluded and yet their Acts and Statutes good And when the Bishops were present their voices from the Conquest to this day were never Negative By Gods Law you have nothing to do with making Laws for Kingdoms and Common-wealths You may teach you may not command Perswasion is your part Compulsion is the Princes c. Thus Bishop Bilson So p. 358. under the name of the power of the Keys And it had been happy for the Church if God had perswaded Magistrates in all ages to have kept the
for them whose cause you undertake and where God who is the Lover of Justice doth require it § 7. Direct 5. Be acquainted with the temptations which most endanger you in your place and Direct 5. go continually armed against them with the true remedies and with Christian faith and watchfulness and resolution You will keep your innocency and consequently your God if you see to it that you love nothing better than that which you should keep No man will chaffer away his commodity for any thing which he judgeth to be worse and less useful to him Know well how little friends or wealth will do for you in comparison of God and you will not hear them when they speak against God Luke 14. 26. 17. 33. When one of his friends was importunate with P. Rutilius to do him an unjust courtesie and angrily said What use have I Chilon in Laert p. 43. mihi saith Sibi non esse conscium in tota vita ingratitudinis una tamen re se modice moveri quod cum semel inter amicos illi judicandum esset neque contra jus agere aliquid vellet persuaserit amico judicium à se provocaret ut sic nimirum utrumque legem amicum servaret This was his injustice of which we repented of thy friendship if thou wilt not grant my request he answered him And what use have I of thy friendship if for thy sake I must be urged to do unjustly It is a grave saying of Plutarch Pulchrum quidem est justitia regnum adipisci pulchrum etiam regno justitiam anteponere Nam virtus alterum ita illustrem reddidit ut regno dignus judicaretur alterum ita magnum ut id contemnerit Plut. in Lycurg Numa But specially remember who hath said What shall it profit a man to win all the world and lose his soul And that Temptations surprize you not be deliberate and take time and be not too hasty in owning or opposing a cause or person till you are well informed As Seneca saith of Anger so say I here Dandum semper est tempus Veritatem enim dies aperit Potest poena dilata exigi cum non potest exacta revocari It s more than a shame to say I was mistaken when you have done another man wrong by your temerity CHAP. V. The Duty of Physicions NEither is it my purpose to give any occasion to the learned men of this honourable profession to say that I intermeddle in the mysteries or matters of their art I shall only tell them and that very briefly what God and Conscience will expect from them § 1. Direct 1. Be sure that the saving of mens lives and health be first and chiefly in your Intention Direct 1. before any gain or honour of your own I know you may lawfully have respect both to your maintenance and honour But in a second place only as a far lesser good than the lives of men If money be your Ultimate end you debase your profession which as exercised by you can be no more to your honour or comfort than your own intention carryeth it It is more the End than the Means that ennobleth or debaseth men If gain be the thing which you chiefly seek the matter is not very great to you whether you seek it by medicining men or beasts or by lower means than either of them To others indeed it may be a very great benefit whose lives you have been a means to save but to your selves it will be no greater than your intention maketh it If the honouring and pleasing God and the publick good and the saving of mens lives be really first and highest in your desires then it is God that you serve in your profession Otherwise you do but serve your selves And take heed lest you here deceive your selves by thinking that the Good of others is your end and dearer to you than your gain because your Reason telleth you it is better and ought to be preferred For God and the publick good are not every mans end that can speak highly of them and say they should be so If most of the world do practically prefer their carnal prosperity even before their souls while they speak of the World as disgracefully as others and call it Vanity how much more easily may you deceive your selves in preferring your gain before mens lives while your tongue can speak contemptuously of gain § 2. Direct 2. Be ready to help the poor as well as the rich Differencing them no further than the Direct 2. publick good requireth you to do Let not the health or lives of men be neglected because they have no money to give you Many poor people perish for want of means because they are discouraged from going to Physicions through the emptiness of their purses In such a case you must not only help them gratis but also appoint the cheapest Medicines for them § 3. Direct 3. Adventure not unnecessarily on things beyond your skill but in difficult cases perswade Direct 3. your patients to use the help of abler Physicions if there be any to be had though it be against your own commodity So far should you be from envying the greater esteem and practice of abler men and from all unworthy aspersions or detraction that you should do your best to perswade all your patients to seek their counsels when ever the danger of their lives or health requireth it For their Lives are of greater value than your gain So abstruse and conjectural is the business of your profession that it requireth very high accomplishments to be a Physicion indeed If there concur not 1. A natural strength of Reason and sagacity 2. And a great deal of study reading and acquaintance with the way of excellent men 3. And considerable experience of your own to ripen all this you have cause to be very fearful and cautelous in your practice lest you sacrifice mens lives to your ignorance and temerity And one man that hath all these accomplishments in a high degree may do As over-valuing mens own understandings in Religion is the ruine of souls and Churches so overvalluing mens â—aw unexperienced apprehensions in Physick costeth multitudes their lives I know not whether a â—ew able judicious experienced Physâ—cions cure more oâ— the rest kill more more good than a hundred smatterers And when you are conscious of a defect in any of these should not reason and conscience command you to perswade the sick to seek out to those that are abler than your selves Should mens lives be hazzarded that you may get by it a little fordid gain It is so great a doubt whether the ignorant unexperienced sort of Physicions do cure or hurt more that it hath brought the vulgar in many Countreys into a contempt of Physicions § 4. Direct 4. Depend on God for your direction and success Earnestly crave his help and blessing in Direct 4. all your undertakings Without this all
till their heads are setled and they come to themselves and that is not usually till the hand of God have laid them lower than it found them and then perhaps they will again hear reason unless pride hath left their souls as desperate as at last it doth their bodies or estates The experience of this Age may stand on record as a teacher to future generations what power there is in great successes to conquer both Reason Religion Righteousness Professions Vows and all obligations to God and man by puffing up the heart with pride and thereby making the understanding drunken CHAP. VIII Advice against Murder § 1. THough Murder be a sin which humane nature and interest do so powerfully rise up against that one would think besides the Laws of Nature and the fear of temporal punishment there should need no other argument against it And though it be a sin which is not frequently committed except by Souldiers yet because mans corrupted heart is lyable to it and because one sin of such a heynous nature may be more mischievous than many small infirmities I shall not wholly pass by this sin which falls in order here before me I shall give men no other advice against it than only to open to them 1. The Causes and 2. The Greatness and 3. The Consequents of the sin § 2. I. The Causes of Murder are either the Neerest or the more radical and remote The opening of the Neerest sort of Causes will be but to tell you how many wayes of murdering the World is used to And when you know the Cause the contrary to it is the prevention Avoid those Causes and you avoid the sin § 3. 1. The greatest Cause of the cruellest murders is unlawful wars All that a man killeth in an unlawful war he murdereth And all that the Army killeth he that setteth them a work by Command or Counsel is guilty of himself And therefore how dreadful a thing is an unrighteous war and how much have men need to look about them and try every other lawful way and suffer long before they venture upon war It is the skill and glory of a Souldier when he can kill more than other men He studyeth it he maketh it the matter of his greatest care and valous and endeavour He goeth through very great difficulties to accomplish it This is not like a sudden or involuntary act Thieves and Robbers kill single persons but Souldiers murder thousands at a time And because there is none at present to judge them for it they wash their hands as if they were innocent and sleep as quietly as if the avenger of blood would never come O what Devils are those Counsellers and incâ—ndâ—ries to Princes and States who stir them up to unlawful wars § 4. 2. Another Cause and way of Murder is by the Pride and tyranny of men in power When they do it easily because they can do it When their Will and Interest is their Rule and their Passion seemeth a sufficient warrant for their injustice It is not only Nero's Tiberius's Domitian's c. that are guilty of this crying crime but O what man that careth for his soul had not rather be tormented a thousand years than have the blood-guiltiness of a famous applauded Alexander or Caesar or Tamerlane to answer for So dangerous a thing it is to have Power to do mischief that Uriah may fall by a Davids guilt and Crispus may be killed by his father Constâ—mine O what abundance of horrid murders do the histories of almost all Empires and Kingdoms of the World afford us The maps of the affairs of Greeks and Romans of Tartariuns Turks Russians Germans of Heathens and Infidels of Papists and too many Protestants are drawn out with too many purple lines and their Histories written in letters of blood What write the Christians of the Infidels the Orthodox of the Arrians Romans or Goths or Vandals or the most impartial Historians of the mock Catholicks of Rome but Blood Blood Blood How proudly and loftily doth a Tyrant look when he telleth the oppressed innocent that displeaseth him Sirra I 'le make you know my power Take him Imprison him Rack him Hang him Or as Pilate to Christ Joh. 9. 10. Knowest thou not that I have power to Crucifie thee and have power to release â—hee I 'le make you know that your life is in my hand Heat the Furnace seven times horter Dan. 3. Alas poor worm Hast thou power to kill So hath a Toad or Adder or mad Dâ—gg or pestilence when God permitteth it Hast thou power to kill But hast thou also power to keep thy self alive and to keep thy Corpse from rottenness and dust and to keep thy soul from paying for it in Hell or to keep thy Conscience for worrying thee for it to all Eternity With how trembling a heart and ghastly look wilt thou at last hear of this which now thou gloriest in The bones and dust of the oppressed Innocents will be as great and honourable as thine And their souls perhaps in rest and joy when thine is tormented by infernal furies When thou art in Nebuchadâ—ezzara glory what a mercy were it to thee if thou mightest be turned out among the beasts to prevent thy being turned out among the Devils If killing and destroying be the glory of thy greatness the Devils are more honourable than thou And as thou agreest with them in thy work and glory so shalt thou in the reward § 4. 3. Another most heynous Cause of Murders is a malignant enmity against the Godly and a persecuting destructive Zeal What a multitude of innocents hath this consumed and what innumerable companies of holy souls are still crying for vengeance on these persecutors The Enmity began immediately upon the fall between the Womans and the Serpents seed It shewed it self presently in the two first men that were born into the World A malignant envy against the accepted Sacrifice of Abel was able to make his Brother to be his Murderer And it is usual with the Devil to cast some bone of carnal interest also between them to heighten the malignant enmity Wicked men are all Covetous voluptuous and proud And the doctrine and practice of the Godly doth contradict them and condemn them And they usually espouse some wicked interest or engage themselves in some service of the Devil which the servants of Christ are bound in their several places and callings to resist And then not only this resistance though it be but by the humblest words or actions yea the very conceit that they are not for their interest and way doth instigate the befooled world to persecution And thus an Ishmael and an Isaac an Esau and a Iacob a Saul and a David cannot live together in peace Gal. 4. 29. But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the spirit even so it is now Sauls interest maketh him think it just to persecute David and religiously he
to find them out so that the blood-thirsty man doth seldome live out half his dayes The Treatises purposely written on this subject and the experience of all Ages do give us very wonderful Narratives of Gods judgements in the detecting of murderers and bringing them to punishment They go about awhile like Cain with a terrified Conscience afraid of every one they see till seasonable vengeance give them their reward or rather send them to the place where they must receive it 3. For it is eternal torment under the wrath of God which is the final punishment which they must expect If very great Repentance and the blood of Christ do not prevent it There are few I think that by shame and terrour of Conscience are not brought to such a Repentance for it as Cain and Iudas had or as a man hath that hath brought calamity on himself and therefore wish they had never done it because of their own unhappiness thereby except those persecutors or murderers that are hardened by Errour pride or power But this will not prevent the vengeance of God in their damnation It must be a deep Repentance proceeding from the Love of God and man and the hatred of sin and sense of Gods displeasure for it which is only found in sanctified souls And alas how few Murderers ever have the grace to manifest any such renovation and repentance Tit. 2. Advice against Self-murder THough Self-murder be a sin which Nature hath as strongly inclined man against as any sin in the World that I remember and therefore I shall say but little of it yet experience telleth us that it is a sin that some persons are in danger of and therefore I shall not pass it by The prevention of it lyeth in the avoiding of these following Causes of it § 1. Direct 1. The commonest cause is prevailing Melancholy which is neer to madness therefore Direct 1. to prevent this sad disease or to cure it if contracted and to watch them in the mean time is the chief prevention of this sin Though there be much more hope of the salvation of such as want the use of their Understandings because so far it may be called involuntary yet it is a very dreadful case especially so far as reason remaineth in any power But it is not more natural for a man in a Feaver to thirst and rave than for Melancholy at the height to incline men to make away themselves For the disease will let them feel nothing but misery and despair and say nothing but I am forsaken miserable and undone and not only maketh them aweary of their lives even while they are afraid to dye but the Devil hath some great advantage by it to urge them to do it so that if they pass over a Bridge he urgeth them to leap into the Water If they see a Knife they are presently urged to kill themselves with it and feel as if it were something within them importunately provoking them and saying Do it Do it now and giving them no rest In so much that many of them contrive it and cast about secretly how they may accomplish it Though the cure of these poor people belong as much to others care as to their own yet so far as they yet can use their reason they must be warned 1. To abhor all these suggestions and give them not room a moment in their minds And 2 To avoid all occasions of the sin and not to be neer a Knife a River or any instrument which the Devil would have them use in the execution And 3. To open their case to others and tell them all that they may help to their preservation 4. And especially to be willing to use the means both Physick and satisfying Counsel which tends to cure their disease And if there be any rooted cause in the mind that was antecedent to the Melancholy it must carefully be lookt to in the cure § 2. Direct 2. Take heed of worldly trouble and discontent for this also is a common Cause Direct 2. Either it suddenly casteth men into Melancholy or without it of it self overturneth their reason so far as to make them violently dispatch themselves Especially if it fall out in a mind where there is a mixture of these two Causes 1. Unmortified love to any Creature 2. And an impotent and passionate mind there discontent doth cause such unquietness that they will furiously go to Hell for ease Mortifie therefore first your worldly lusts and set not too much by any earthly thing If you did not foolishly overvalue your selves or your credit or your wealth or friends there would be nothing to feed your discontent Make no greater a matter of the world than it deserveth and you will make no such great matter of your sufferings And 2. Mortifie your turbulent passions and give not way to Bedlam fury to overcome your reason Go to Christ to beg and learn to be meek and lowly in spirit and then your troubled minds will have rest Matth 11. 28 29. Passionate Women and such other feeble spirited persons that are easily troubled and hardly quietted and pleased have great cause to bend their greatest endeavours to the curing of this impotent temper of mind and procuring from God such strengthening grace as may restore their Reason to its power § 3. Direct 3. And sometimes sudden passion it self without any longer discontent hath caused Direct 3. men to make away themselves Mortifie therefore and watch over such distracting Passions § 4. Direct 4. Take heed of running into the guilt of any heynous sin For though you may Direct 4. feel no hurt from it at the present when Conscience is awakened it is so disquieting a thing that it maketh many a one hang himself Some grievous sins are so tormenting to the Conscience that they give many no rest till they have brought them to to Iudas's or Achitophel's End Especially take heed of sinning against Conscience and of yielding to that for fear of men which God and Conscience charge you to forbear For the case of many a hundred as well as Spira may tell you into what Calamity this may cast you If man be the master of your Religion you have no Religion For what is Religion but the subjection of the soul to God especially in the matters of his Worship And if God be subjected to man he is taken for No-God When you Worship a God that is inferiour to a man then you may subject your Religion to the will of that man Keep God and Conscience at peace with you if you love your selves though thereby you lose your peace with the World § 5. Direct 5. Keep up a Believing foresight of the state which Death will send you to and then if Direct 5. you have the use of Reason Hell at least will hold your hands and make you afraid of venturing upon death What Repentance are you like to have when you dye in the very
Son and Holy Ghost when they have in Baptism vowed themselves unto his service Of all men on earth these men will have least to say for their sin or against their condemnation § 22. 12. Lastly Remember that Christ taketh all that is done by persecutors against his servants for his cause to be done as to himself and will accordingly in judgement charge it on them So speaketh he to Saul Acts 9. 5 6. Saul Saul why persecutest thou me I am Iesus whom thou persecutest And Matth. 25. 41. to 46. Even to them that did not â—eed and clothe and visit and relieve them he saith Verily I say unto you in as much as ye did it not to one of the least of these ye did it not to me What then will he say to them that impoverished and imprisoned them Remember that it is Christ reputatively whom thou dost hate deride and persecute § 23. Direct 3. If you world escape the guilt of persecution the cause and interest of Christ in the Direct 3. world must be truly understood He that knoweth not that Holiness is Christs end and Scripture is his Word and Law and that the Preachers of the Gospel are his messengers and that preaching is his appointed means and that sanctified believers are his members and the whole number of them are his mystical body and all that profess to be such are his visible body or Kingdom in the world and that sin is the thing which he came to destroy and the Devil the world and the flesh are the enemies which he causeth us to conquer I say He that knoweth not this doth not know what Christianity or Godliness is and therefore may easily persecute it in his ignorance If you know not or believe not that serious Godliness in heart and life and serious preaching and discipline to promote it are Christs great cause and interest in the world you may fight against him in the dark whilst ignorantly you call your selves his followers If the Devil can but make you think that Ignorance is as good as Knowledge and Pharisaical formality and hypocritical shews are as good as spiritual worship and rational service of God and that seeming and lip-service is as good as seriousness in Religion and that the strict and serious obeying of God and living as we profess according to the principles of our Religion is but hypocrisie pride or faction that is that all are hypocrites who will not be hypocrites but seriously Religious I say if Satan can bring you once to such erroneous malignant thoughts as these no wonder if he make you persecutors O value the great blessing of a sound understanding For if Error blind you either impious error or factious error there is no wickedness so great but you may promote it and nothing so good and holy but you may persecute it and think all the while that you are doing well John 16. 2. They shall put you out of the Synagogues yea the time cometh that whosoever killeth you will think that he doth God service What Prophet so great or Saint so holy that did not suffer by such hands Yea Christ himself was persecuted as a sinner that never sinned § 24. Direct 4. And if you would escape the guilt of persecution the cause and interest of Christ Direct 4. must be highest in your esteem and preferred before all worldly carnal interests of your own Otherwise the Devil will be still perswading you that your own interest requireth you to suppress the interest of Christ For the truth is the Gospel of Christ is quite against the interest of carnality and concupiscence It doth condemn ambition covetousness and lust It forbiddeth those sins on pain of damnation which the proud and covetous and sensual love and will not part with And therefore it is no more wonder to have a proud man or a covetous man or a lustful voluptuous man to be a persecutor than for a Dog to fly in his face who takes his bone from him If you love your pride and lust and pleasures better than the Gospel and a holy life no marvel if you be persecutors For these will not well agree together And though sometimes the providence of God may so contrive things that an ambitious hypocrite may think that his worldly interest requireth him to seem religious and promote the preaching and practice of godliness this is but seldome and usually not long For he cannot choose but quickly find that Christ is no Patron of his sin and that Holiness is contrary to his worldly lusts Therefore if you cannot value the Cause of Godliness above your lusts and carnal interests I cannot tell you how to avoid the guilt of persecution nor the wrath and vengeance of Almighty God § 25. Direct 5. Yea though you do prefer Christs interest in the main You must carefully take Direct 5. beed of stepping into any forbidden way and espousing any interest of your own or others which is contrary to the Laws or interest of Christ. Otherwise in the defence or prosecution of your cause you will be carryed into a seeming Necessity of persecuting before you are aware This hath been the ruine of multitudes of great ones in the world When Ahab had set himself in a way of sin the Prophet 1 Kings 22. 8 27. 1 King 13. 2 4. must reprove him and then he hateth and persecuteth the Prophet because he prophesied not good of him but evil When Ieroboam thought that his interest required him to set up Calves at Dan and Bethel and to make Priests for them of the baâ—est of the people the Prophet must speak against his sin and then he stretcheth out his hand against him and saith Lay hold on him If Asa sin and 2 Chron. 16. 10. the Prophet tell him of it his rage may proceed to imprison his reprover If Amaziah sin with the Idolaters the Prophet must reprove him and he will silence him or smite him And silenced he is 2 Chron. 15. 16. and what must follow 2 Chron. 15 16. The King said to him Art thou made of the Kings counsel forbear why shouldst thou be smitten This seemeth to be gentle dealing Then the Prophet forbore and said I know that God hath determined to destroy thee because thou hast done this and hast not hearkned to my counsel It Pilate do but hear If thou let this man go thou art not Caesars friend he thinketh John 19. 12. it his interest to crucifie Christ As Herod thought it his interest to kill him and therefore to kill so many other Infâ—nts when he heard of the birth of a King of the Jews Because of an Herodias Matth. 2. 16 17 18. Matth. 14. 6 7 8 9. Mar. 6. 19. 21 22. Acts 12. 2 3 4. and the honour of his word Herod will not stick to behead Iohn Baptist And another Herod will kill Iames with the Sword and imprison Peter because he seeth that it pleaseth
is good neither to eat flesh or drink wine or any thing whereby thy brother stumbleth or is scandalized or offended or made weak It is a making weak So 2 Cor. 11. 29. Who is offended that is stumbled or hindered or ready to apostatize So much for the nature and sorts of Scandal § 22. IV. You are next to observe the Aggravations of this â—in Which briefly are such as these 1. Scandal is a murdering of souls It is a hindering of mens salvation and an enticing or driving them towards Hell And therefore in some respect worse than murder as the soul is better than the body 2. Ssandal is a fighting against Jesus Christ in his work of mans salvation He came to seek and to save that which was lost and the scandalizer seeketh to lose and destroy that which Christ would seek and save 3. Scandal robbeth God of the hearts and service of his creatures For it is a raising in them a distaste of his people and word and wayes and of himself and a turning from him the hearts of those that should adhere unto him 4 Scandal is a serving of the Devil in his proper work of enmity to Christ and perdition of souls Scandalizers do his work in the world and propagate his Cause and Kingdom § 23. V. The means of avoiding the guilt of Scandal are as followeth § 23. Direct 1. Mistake not with the vulgar the nature of scandal as if it lay in that offending Direct 1. men which is nothing but grieving or displeasing them or in making your selves to be of evil report But remember that Scandal is that offending men which tempteth them into sin from God and Godliliness and maketh them stumble and fall or occasioneth them to think evil of a holy life It is a piâ—iâ—ul thing to hear religious persons plead for the sin of man-pleasing under the name of avoiding scandal yea to hear them set up a Usurped dominion over the lives of other men and all by the advantage of the word scandal misunderstood So that all men must avoid what ever a censorious person will call scandalous when he meaneth nothing else himself by scandal than a thing that is of evil report with such as he Yea Pride it self is often pleaded for by this misunderstanding of Scandal and men are taught to overvalue their reputations and to strain their consciences to keep up their esteem and all under pretence of avoiding scandal And in the mean time they are really scandalous even in that action by which they think they are avoiding it I need no other instance than the case of unwarrantable separation Some will hold communion with none but the re-baptized Some think an imposed Liturgy is enough to prove communion with such a Church unlawful at least in the use of it And almost every Sect do make their differences a reason for their separating from other Churches And if any one would hold communion with those that they separate from they presently say that it is scandalous to do so and to joyn in any worship which they think unlawful and by scandal they mean no more but that it is among them of evil report and is offensive or displeasing to them Whereas indeed the argument from scandal should move men to use such communion which erroneous uncharitable dividing men do hold unlawful For else by avoiding that communion I shall lay a stumbling block in the way of the weak I shall tempt him to think that a duty is a sin and weaken his charity and draw him into a sinful separation or the neglect of some Ordinances of God or opportunities of getting good And it is this Temptation which is indeed the scandal This is before proved in the instance of Peter Gal. 2. who scandalized or hardened the Jews by yielding to a sinful separation from the Gentiles and fearing the Censoriousness of the Jews whom he sought to please and the offending of whom he was avoiding when he really offended them that is was a scandal or temptation to them § 24. Direct 2. He that will escape the guilt of Scandal must be no contemner of the souls of others Direct 2. but must be truly charitable and have a tender love to souls That which a man highly valueth and dearly loveth he will be careful to preserve and loth to hurt Such a man will easily part with his own rights or submit to losses injuries or disgrace to preserve his Neighbours soul from sin Whereas a despiser of souls will insist upon his own power and right and honour and will entrap and damn a hundred souls rather than he will abate a word or a Ceremony which he thinks his interest requireth him to exact Tell him that it will ensnare mens souls in sin and he is ready to say as the Phariseâ—s to Iudâ—s What 's that to us See thou to that A Dog hath as much pity on a Hare or a Hawk on a Partridge as a carnal worldly ambitious Diotrephes or an Elymas hath of souls Tell him that it will occasion men to sin to wound their Consciences to offend their God it moveth him no more than to tell him of the smallest incommodity to himself He will do more to save a Horse or a Dog of his own than to save anothers soul from sin To lay snares in their way or to deprive them of the preaching of the Gospel or other means of their salvation is a thing which they may be induced to by the smallest interest of their own yea though it be but a point of seeming honour And therefore when carnal worldly men do become the disposers of matters of Religion it is easie to see what measure and usage men must expect Yea though they assume the office and name of Pastors who should have the most tender fatherly care of the souls of all the flocks yet will their carnal inclinations and interests engage them in the work of Wolves to entrap or famish or destroy Christs Sheep § 25. Direct 3. Also you must be persons who value your own souls and are diligently exercised in Direct 3. saving them from temptations or else you are very like to be scandalizers and tempters of the souls of others And therefore when such a man is made a Church Governour as is unacquainted with the renewing work of grace and with the inward Government of Christ in the soul what Devilish work is he like to make among the sheep of Christ under the name of Government What corrupting of the Doctrine Worship or Discipline of Christ What inventions of his own to ensnare mens Consciences and driving them on by armed force to do that which at least to them is sin and which can never countervail the loss either of their souls or of the Church by such disturbances How merciless will he be when a poor member of Christ shall beg of him but to have pity on his soul and tell him I cannot do this or swear
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
thing as Mine by which I may justly have it possess it use it and dispose of it This Dominion or Propriety is either Absolute and that belongeth to none but God or subordinate respective and limited which is the only Propriety that any creature can have Which is such a Right which will hold good against the claim of any fellow creature though not against Gods And among men there are Proprietors or Owners which are Principal and some who are but dependant subordinate and limited The simple Propriety may remain in a Landlord or Father who may convey to his Tenant or his child a limited dependant propriety under him Injuriously to deprive a man of this Propriety or of the thing in which he hath propriety is the sin which I speak of in this Chapter which hath no one name and therefore I express it here by many Whether it be Theft Robbery Cousenage Extortion or any other way of depriving another injuriously of his own These General Directions are needful to avoid it § 2. Direct 1. Love not the world nor the things that are in the world 1 John 2. 15. Cure covetousness Direct 1. and you will kill the root of fraud and theft As a drunkard would easily be cured of his drunkenness if you could cure him of his thirst and love to drink so an extortioner thief or deceiver would easily be cured of their outward sin if their hearts were cured of the disease of worldiness The love of money is the root of all this evil Value these things no more than they deserve § 3. Direct 2. To this end acquaint your hearts with the greater riches of the life to come Direct 2. And then you will meet with true satisfaction The true hopes of Heaven will cure your greedy desires of earth You durst not then forfeit your part in that perpetual Blessedness for the temporal supply of some bodily want You durst not with Adam part with Paradise for a forbidden bit nor as Esau prophanely sell your birthright for a morsel It is the unbelief and contempt of Heaven which maketh men venture it for the poor commodities of this world § 4. Direct 3. Be contented to stand to Gods disposal and suffer not any carking discontented Direct 3. thoughts to feed upon your hearts When you suffer your minds to run all day long upon your necessities and straits the Devil next tempteth you to think of unlawful courses to supply them He will shew you your neighbours money or goods or estates and tell you how well it would be with you if this were yours He shewed Achan the Golden Wedge He told Gehezi how unreasonable it was that Naamans money and Rayment should be refused He told Balaam of the hopes of preferment which he might have with Balak He told Iudas how to get his thirty pieces He perswaded Ananias and Saphira that it was but reasonable to retain part of that which was their own Nay commonly it is discontents and cares which prepareth poor wretches for those appearances of the Devil which draweth them to Witchcraft for the supplying of their wants If you took God for your God you would take him for the sufficient disposer of the world and one that is fitter to measure out your part of earthly things than you your selves And then you would rest in his wisdom will and fatherly providence and not shift for your selves by sinful means Discontentedness of mind and distrust of God are the cause of all such frauds and injuries Trust God and you will have no need of these § 5. Direct 4. Remember what Promises God hath made for the competent supply of all your wants Direct 4. Godliness hath the promise of this life and of that to come All other things shall be added to you if you seek first Gods Kingdom and the righteousness thereof Matth. 6. 33. They that fear the Lord shall want nothing that is good Psal. 37. All things shall work together for good to them that love God Rom. 8. 28. Let your conversation be without covetousness and be content with such things as ye have for he hath said I will never leave thee nor forsake thee Heb. 13. 5. Live by faith on these sufficient promises and you need not steal § 6. Direct 5. Overvalue not the accommodation and pleasure of the flesh and live not in the sins Direct 5. of gluttony drunkenness pride gaming or ryotous courses which may bring you into want and so to seek unlawful maintenance He that is a servant to his flesh cannot endure to displease it nor can â—ear the want of any thing which it needeth But he that hath mastered and mortified his flesh can endure its labour and hunger yea and death too if God will have it so Large revenues will be too little for a fleshly minded person But a little will serve him that hath brought it under the power of reason Magna pars libertatis est bene moratus venter saith Seneca A well nurtured fair-conditioned belly is a great part of a mans liberty because an ill-taught and ill-conditioned belly is one of the basest slaveries in the world As a Philosopher said to Diogenes If thou couldst flatter Dionysius thou needest not eat herbs But saith Diogenes If thou couldst eat hearbs thou needest not flatter Dionysius He took this for the harder task So the Thief and deceiver will say to the poor If you could do as we do you need not fare so hardly But a contented poor man may better answer him If you could fare hardly as I do you need not deceive or steal as you do A proud person that cannot endure to dwell in a Cottage or to be seen in poor or patcht apparel will be easily tempted to any unlawful way of getting to keep him from disgrace and serve his pride A Glutton whose Heaven is in his throat must needs fare well how ever he come by it A Tipler must needs have provision for his guggle by right or by wrong But a humble man and a temperate man can spare all this and when he looketh on all the proud mans furniture he can bless himself as Socrates did in a Fair with Quam multa sunt quibus ipse non egeo How many things be there which I have no need of And he can pity the sensual desires which others must needs fulfill even as a sound man pitieth another that hath the itch or the thirst of a sick man in a Feavor that cryeth out for drink As Seneca saith It is Vice and not Nature which needeth much Nature and necessity and duty are contented with a little But he that must have the pleasure of his sin must have provision to maintain that pleasure Quench the fire of pride sensuality and lust and you may spare the cost of fuel Rom. 13. 13 14. 8. 13. § 7. Direct 6. Live not in Idleness or sloth but be laborious in your Callings that you may
Sedition among the people and accounting them as the filth and off-scouring of the world That zeal which murdered and destroyed many hundred thousand of the Waldenses and Albigenses and thirty thousand or forty thousand in one French Massacre and two hundred thousand in one Irish Massacre and which kindled the Marian Bonefires in England and made the Powder Mine and burnt the City of London and keepeth up the Inquisition I say that zeal will certainly think it a service to the Church that is their Sect to write the most odious lyes and slanders of Luther Zuinglius Calvin Beza and any such excellent servants of the Lord. So full of horrid impudent lyes are the writings of not one but many Sects against those that were their chief opposers that I still admonish all posterity to see good evidence for it before they believe the hard sayings of any factious Historian or Divine against those that are against his party It is only men of eminent conscience and candour and veracity and impartiality who are to be believed in their bad report of others except where notoriety or very good evidence doth command belief above their own authority and veracity A siding factious zeal which is hotter for any Sect or party than for the common Christianity and Catholick Church is alwayes a railing a lying and a slandering zeal and is notably described Iames 3. as earthly sensual and devilish causing envy strife and confusion and every evil work Direct 4. Observe well the Commonness of this sin of backbiting that it may make you the more afraid Direct 4. of falling into that which so few do scape I will not say among high and low rich and poor Court and Countrey how common is this sin but among men professing the greatest zeal and strictness in Religion how few make conscience of it Mark in all companies that you come into how common it is to take liberty to say what they think of all men yea to report what they hear though they dare not say that they believe it And how commonly the relating of other mens faults and telling what this man or that man is or did or said is part of the chatt to waste the hour in And if it be but true they think they sin not Nay nor if they did but hear that it is true For my part I must profess that my conscience having brought me to a custome of rebuking such backbiters I am ordinarily censured for it either as one that loveth contradiction or one that defendeth sin and wickedness by taking part with wicked men And all because I would stop the course of this common vice of evil-speaking and backbiting where men have no call And I must thankfully profess that among all other sins in the world the sins of SELFISHNESSE PRIDE and BACKBITING I have been most brought to hate and fear by the observation of the commonness of them even in persons seeming godly Nothing hath fixed an apprehension of their odiousness so deeply in me nor engaged my heart against them above all other sins so much as this lamentable experience of their prevalence in the world among the more Religious and not only in the prophane Direct 5. Take not the honesty of the person as sufficient cause to hear or believe a bad report of Direct 5. others It is lamentable to hear how far men otherwise honest do too often here offend Suspect evil speakers and be not over-credulous of them Charity thinketh not evil not easily and hastily believeth it Lyars are more used to evil speaking than men of truth and credit are It is no wrong to the best that you believe him not when he backbiteth without good evidence Direct 6. Rebuke backbiters and encourage them not by hearkning to their tales Prov. 25. 23. Direct 6. The north wind driveth away rain So doth an angry countenance a backbiting tongue It may be they think themselves religious persons and will take it for an injury to be driven away with an angry countenance But God himself who loveth his servants better than we is more offended at their sin and that which offendeth him must offend us We must not hurt their souls and displease God by drawing upon us the guilt of their sins for fear of displeasing them Tell them how God doth hate backbiting and advise them if they know any hurt by others to go to them privately and tell them of it in a way that tendeth to their repentance Direct 7. Use to make mention of the good which is in others except it be unseasonable and will Direct 7. seem to be a promoting of their sin Gods giâ—ts in every man deserve commendations And we have allowance to mention mens vertues oftner than to mention their vices Indeed when a bad man is praised in order to the disparagement of the good or to honour some wicked cause or action against truth and godliness we must not concur in such malitious praists But otherwise we must commend that which is truly commendable in all And this custome will have a double benefit against backbiting It will use your own tongues to a contrary course and it will rebuke the evil tongues of others and be an example to them of more charitable language Direct 8. Understand your selves and speak often to others of the sinfulness of evil speaking and Direct 8. backbiting Shew them the Scriptures which condemn it and the intrinsecal malignity which is in it as here followeth Direct 9. Make conscience of just reproof and exhorting finners to their faces Go tell them of Direct 9. it privately and lovingly and it will have better effects and bring you more comfort and cure the sin of backbiting Tit. 3. The Evil of Backbiting and Evil Speaking § 1. 1. IT is forbidden of God among the heinous damning sins and made the character of a notorious wicked person and the avoiding of it is made the mark of such as are accepted of God and shall be saved Rom. 1. 29 30. it is made the mark of a reprobate mind and joyned with murder and hating God viz. full of envy debate deceit malignity whisperers backbiters Psal. 15. 2 3. Lord who shall abide in thy tabernacle Who shall dwell in thy holy hill He that backbiteth not with his tongue nor doth evil to his neighbour nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour And when Paul describeth those whom he must sharply rebuke and censure he just describeth the factious sort of Christians of our times 2 Cor. 12. 20. For I fear lest when I come I shall not find you such as I would and that I shall be found unto you such as ye would not Lest there be debates envyings wraths strifes backbitings whisperings swellings tumults Ephes. 4. 31. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamour and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice and be kind one to another and tender hearted § 2. 2. It is
his head His clothing you may read of at his crucifying when they parted it As for money he was fain to send Petâ—r to a â—â—â—â—h for some to pay their tribute If Christ did scrape and care for Riches then so do thou Iâ— he thought it the happiest life do thou think so too But if he contemned it do thou contemn it If his whole life was directed to give thee the most perfect example of the contempt of all the prosperity of this world then learn of his example if thou take him for thy Saviour and if thou love thy self Though he was rich yet for our sakes he became poor that you through his poverty might be rich 2 Cor. 8 9. § 31. Direct 10. Think on the example of the primitive Christians even the best of Christs servants Direct 10. and see how it condemneth worldliness They that by miracle in the name of Christ could give limbs to the lame yet tell him Silver and Gold have we none Acts 3. 6. Those that had possessions sold them and laid the money at the Apostles feet and they had all things common to shew that faith overcometh the world by contemning it and subjecting it to charity and devoting it entirely to God Read whether the Apostles did live in sumptuous houses with great attendance and worldly Cheâ—â—â—â—stome saith his enemies â—harged him with many crimes but never with Covâ—tousness or Wantonâ—ess And so it was with Christ and his enemies plenty and prosperity And so of the rest § 32. Direct 11. Remember to what ends all worldly things were made and given you and what a Direct 11. happy advantage you may make of them by renouncing them as they would be provision for your lusts and by devoting your selves and them to God The use of their sweetness is to draw your souls to taste Et siâ—uâ— in patria Deâ—s est speculum in quo reiucent creaturae sic è converso in via creaturae sunt speculum quo creator videtur Paul Scaâ—iger in Ep. Câ—th l. 14. Thes. 123. p. 689. by faith the heavenly sweetness They are the Looking-glass of souls in flesh that are not yet admitted to see things spiritual face to face They are the provender of our bodies our travelling furniture and helps our Inns and solacing company in the way they are some of Gods Love-tokens some of the lesser pieces of his Coin and bear his Image and superscription They are drops from the Rivers of the eternal pleasures to tell the mind by the way of the senses how good the Donor is and how amiable and what higher Delights there are for souls and to point us to the better things which these foretell They are messengers from Heaven to testifie our Fathers care and love and to bespeak our thankfulness love and duty and to bear witness against sin and bind us faster to obedience They are the first Volume of the Word of God The first Book that man was set to read to acquaint him fully with his Maker As the Word which we read and hear is the Chariot of the Spirit by which it maketh its accesses to the soul so the delights of sight and taste and smell and touch and hearing were appointed as an ordinary way for the speedy access of heavenly love and sweetness to the Heart that upon the first perception of the goodness and sweetness of the creature there might presently be transmitted by a due progression or deep impression of the goodness of God upon the soul That the creature being the Letters of Gods Book which are seen by our eye the sense even the Love of our great Creator might presently be perceived by the mind and no letter might once be lookt upon but for the sense no creature ever seen or tasted or heard or felt in any delectable quality without a sense of the Love of God That as the touch of the hand upon the strings of the Lute do cause the melody so Gods touch by his mercies upon our hearts might presently tune them into Love and Gratitude and Praise They are the Tools by which we must do much of our Masters work They are means by which we may refresh our brethren and express our love to one another and our love to our Lord and Master in his servants They are our Masters stock which we must trade with by the improvement of which no less than the Reward of endless Happiness may be attained These are the Uses to which God gives us outward mercies Love them thus and Delight in them and Use them thus and spare not yea seek Even Dyonisius the Tyrant was bountiful to Philosophers To Plato he gave above fourscore Talents Laert. in Platoâ—e and much to Aristippus and many more and he offered much to many Philosophers that refused it And so did Croesus them thus and be thankful for them But when the creatures are given for so excellent a use will you debase them all by making them only the fuell of your lusts and the provisions for your flesh And will you love them and dote upon them in these base respects while you utterly neglect their noblest use You are just like children that cry for Books and can never have enouw but its only to play with them because they are fine but when they are set to learn and read them they cry as much because they love it not Or like one that should spend his life and labour in getting the finest clothes to dress his Dogs and Horses with but himself goeth naked and will not wear them § 33. Direct 12. Remember that God hath promised to provide for you and that you shall want Direct 12. nothing that is good for you if you will live above these worldly things and seek first his Kingdom and the righteousness thereof And cannot you trust his promise If you truly believe that he is God Matth. 10. 30. Luke 12. 7. and that he is true and that his particular providence extendeth to the very numbring of your hairs you will sure trust him rather than trust to your own forecast and industry Do you think his provision is not better for you than your own All your own care cannot keep you alive an hour nor cannot prosper any of your labours if you provoke him to blast them And if you are not content with his provisions nor submit your selves to the disposals of his love and wisdom you disoblige God and provoke him to leave you to the fruits of your own care and diligence And then you will find that it had been your wiser way to have trusted God § 34. Direct 13. Think often on the dreadful importance and effects of the Love of Riches or a Direct 13. worldly mind 1. It is a most certain sign of a state of death and misery where it hath the upper The mischiefs of a worldly mind Look upon the face of the calamitous world and enquire
into the causes of all the oppressions rapines cruelties and inhumanity which have made men so like to Devils Look into the corrupted lacerated Churches and enquire into the cause of their contentions divisions usurpations malignity and cruelty against each other And you will find that Pride and Worldliness are the Causes of all When men of a Proud and Worldly mind have by fraud and friendship and Simony Usurped the Pastorship of the Churches according to their Minds and Eâ—ds they turn it into a Malignant Domination and the Carnal worldly part of the Church is the great enemy and Persecutor of the spiritual part and the fleshly Hypocrite as Cain against Abel is filled with envy against the serious believer even out of the bitter displeasure of his mind that his deceitful Sacrifice is less respected What Covetousness hath done to the advancement of the pretended Holy Catholick Church of Rome I will give you now but in the words of an Abbot and Chronicler of their own Abbas Urspergens Chron. p. 3â—â— Vix remansit aliquis Episcopatus sive dignitas Ecclesiastica vel etâ—am Parochialis Ecclesiae quae ron fieâ—et litigâ—osa Romam deduceretur ipsa causa sed non manu vacua Gaude mater nostra Roma quonâ—am aperiuntur cataractae thesaurorum in teâ—ra ut ad te consâ—uant rivi aggeres nummoâ—um in magna copia Laetare super iniquitate filiorum hominum quonâ—am in recompensationem tantorum malorum datur tibi precâ—um Jocundare super adjutrice tua discordia quia erupit de puteo infernalis abyssi ut accumulentur tibi multa pecuniaâ—um praemia Habes quod semper sitisti decanta Canticum quia per malitiam hominum non pâ—â— tuam Religionem orbem vicistâ— Ad te trahit homines non ipsorum devotio aut pura Conscientia sed sâ—â—lerum multiplicium perpetratio litium decisio precio comparata Foâ—tun Galindas speaking of Pope Paul the fifth his love to the Iesuites for helping him to money saith Adeo praestat acquirendarum pecuniarum quam animarum studiosum peritum esse apud illos qui cum animarum Christi sanguine redemptarum in se curam receperint vel quid anima sit nesciunt vel non pluris animam hominis quam piscis faciunt quod credo suum officium Piscatum quendam esse aliquando per strepitum inaudierint quibus propterea gratior fuerit qui Animam auri cum Paracelso quam animam Saxoniae Electoris invenisse nuntiet Arcan Soci Iesu. pag. 46. Lege ibid. Iâ—struct secret de Iesuitarum pâ—axi Et Ioh. Sarisbur l. 7. c. 21. de Monach. Potentiores ditiores favore vel mercede recepta facilius absolutione exâ—nerant peccatis alienis humeros supponentes jubent abire in tunicas vestes pullas quicquid illi se commisisse deplorant Si eis obloquetâ—s Religionis inimicus veritatis diceris impugnator hand It is the departing of the heart from God to creatures See the malignity of it before Good men have been overtaken with heinous sins but its hard to find where Scripture calleth any of them Covetous A heart secretly cleaving most to this present world and its prosperity is the very killing sin of every hypocrite yea and of all ungodly men 2. Worldliness makes the Word unprofitable and keepeth men from believing and repenting and coming home to God and minding seriously the everlasting world What so much hindereth the Conversion of sinners as the love and caâ—es of earthly things They cannot serve God and Mammon Their treasure and hearts cannot be chiefly be both in Heaven and Earth They will not yield to the terms of Christ that love this world They will not forsake all for a treasure in Heaven In a word as you heard The love of money is the root of all evil and the Love of the Father is not in the lovers of the world 3. It destroyeth holy meditation and conference and turneth the thoughts to worldly things And it corrupteth Prayer and maketh it but a means to serve the flesh and therefore maketh it odious to God 4. It is the great hinderance of mens necessary preparation for death and judgement and stealeth away their hearts and time till it is too late 5. It is the great cause of contentions even among the nearest relations and the cause of the Wars and calamities of Nations and of the woful divisions and persecutions of the Church when a worldly generation think that their worldly interest doth engage them against self-denying and spiritual principles practices and persons 6. It is the great cause of all the injustice and oppression and cruelty that rageth in the world They would do as they would be done by were it not for the love of money It maketh men perfidious and false to all their friends and engagements No vows to God nor obligations to men will hold a Lover Iâ—m â— 1. 2 3 4 5. 1 Iohn â— â—â— of the world The world is his God and his worldly interest is his rule and law 7. It is the great destroyer of Charity and Good works No more is done for God and the poor because the Love of the world forbids it 8. It disordereth and proâ—aneth families and betrayeth the souls of Children and Servants to the Devil It turneth out prayer and reading the Scripture and good books and all serious speeches of the liâ—e to come because their hearts are taken up with the world and they have no relâ—sh of any thing but the provisions of their flesh Even the Lords own Day cannot be reserved for holy works nor a duty performed but the world is interposing or diverting the mind 9. It tempâ—eth mâ—n to sin against their knowledge and to forsake the truth and fit themselves to the rising side and save their bodies and estates whatever become of their souls It is the very price that the Dâ—vil gives for souls With this he bought the soul of Iudas who went to the Pharisâ—es with a What will you give me and I will deliver him to you With this he attempted Christ himself 2 Tim 4. 10. Matth. 4. 9. All these will I give thee if thâ—u wilt fall down and worship me It is the cause of Apâ—â—â—â—acy and unfaithfulness to God And it s the price that sinners sell their God their Conscience and their salvation for 10. It depriveth the soul of holy communion with God and comfort from 1 â—im 6. 17 1â— him and of all foretaste of the life to come and finally of Heaven it self For as the Love of the world keepeth out the Love of God and Heaven it must needs keep out the hopes and comforts Christs Sheep mark is 〈◊〉 on the Sheep that are shorâ— When the Hâ—ece groweth long the Mark wears out which should arise from holy love It would do much to cure the love of money and of the world if you knew how pernicious a sin it is § 35.
man is bound to punish himself As when the Law against Swearing Cursing or the like doth give the poor a certain mulct which is the penalty He ought to give that money himself And in cases where it is a necessary cure to himself And in any case where the publick good requireth it As if a Magistrate offend whom none else will punish or who is the Judge in his own cause he should so far punish himself as is necessary to the suppression of sin and to the preserving of the honour of the Laws As I have heard of a Justice that swore twenty Oaths and paid his twenty shillings for it 2. A man may be bound in such a Divine Vengeance or Judgement as seeketh after his particular sin to offer himself to be a sacrifice to Justice to stop the Judgement As Ionah and Achan did 3. A man may be bound to confess his guilt and offer himself to Justice to save the innocent who is falsly accused and condemned for his crime 4. But in ordinary cases a man is not bound to be his own publick accuser or executioner Quest. 10. May a Witness voluntarily speak that truth which he knoweth will further an unrighteous Quest. 10. cause and be made use of to oppress the innocent Answ. He may never do it as a confederate in that intention Nor may he do it when he knoweth that it will tend to such an event though threatned or commanded except when some weightier accident doth preponderate for the doing it As the avoiding of a greater hurt to others than it will bring on the oppressed c. Quest. 11. May a witness conceal some part of the truth Quest. 11. Answ. Not when he sweaâ—â—â—â—h to deliver the whole truth Nor when a good cause is like to suffer or a bad cause to be furâ—â—â—â—ered by the concealment Nor when he is under any other obligation to reveal the whole Quest. 12. Must a Iudge and Iury proceed secundum allegata probata according to evidence and Quest. 12. proof when they know the witness to be false and the truth to be contrary to the testimony but are not able to evince it Answ. Distinguish between the Negative and the Positive part of the Verdict or Sentence In the Negative they must go according to the evidence and testimonies unless the Law of the Land leave the case to their private knowledge As for example They must not sentence a Thief or Murderer to be punished upon their secret unproved knowledge They must not adjudge either Moneys or Lands to the true Owner from another without sufficient evidence and proof They must forbear doing Iustice because they are not called to it nor enabled But Positively they may do no Injustice upon any evidence or witness against their own knowledge of the truth As they may not upon known false witness give away any mans Lands or Money or condemn the innocent But must in such a case renounce the Office The Judge must come off the Bench and the Jury protest that they will not meddle or give any Verdict what ever come of it Because God and the Law of Nature prohibit their injustice Object It is the Law that doth it and not we Answ. It is the Law and you And the Law cannot justifie your agency in any unrighteous sentenâ—e The case is plain and past dispute Tit. 2. Directions against Contentious Suits False Witnessing and Oppressive Iudgements § 1. Direct 1. THe first Cure for all these sins is to know the intrinsick evil of them Good Direct 1. thoughts of sin are its life and strength When it is well known it will be hated and when it is hated it is so far cured § 2. I. The Evil of Contentious and unjust Law-Suits 1. Such contentious Suits do shew the power of selfishness in the sinner How much self-interest is inordinately esteemed 2. They shew the excessive love of the world How much men over-value the things which they contend for 3. They shew mens want of Love to their neighbours How little they regard another mans interest in comparison of their own 4. They shew how little such mens care for the publick good which is maintained by the concord and love of neighbours 5. Such contentions are powerful Engines of the Devil to destroy all Christian Love on both sides and to stir up mutual enmity and wrath and so to involve men in a course of sin by further uncharitableness and injuries both in heart and word and deed 6. Poor men are hereby robbed of their necessary maintenance and their innocent families subjected to distress 7. Unconscionable Lawyers and Court-Officers who live upon the peoples sins are hereby maintained encouraged and kept up 8. Laws and Courts of Justice are perverted to do men wrong which were made to right them 9. And the offender declareth how little sense he hath of the authority or Love of God and how little sense of the grace of our Redeemer And how far he is from being himself forgiven through the blood of Christ who can no better forgive another § 3. II. The Evil of False Witness 1. By False Witness the innocent are injured Robbery and Murder are committed under pretence of truth and justice 2. The Name of God is horribly abused by the crying sin of Perjury of which before 3 The Presence and Justice of God are contemned When sinners dare in his sight and hearing appeal to his Tribunal in the attesting of a lye 4. Vengeance is begged or consented to by the sinner who bringeth Gods curse upon himself and as it were desireth God to plague or damn him if he lye 5. Satan the Prince of malice and injustice and the Father of lyes and murders and oppression is hereby gratified and eminently served 6. God himself is openly injured who is the Father and Patron of the innocent and the cause of every righteous prson is more the cause of God than of man 7. All Government is frustrated and Laws abused and all mens security for their reputations or estates or lives is overthrown by false witnesses And consequently humane converse is made undesirable and unsafe What good can Law or right or innocency or the honesty of the Judge do any man where false-witnesses combine against him What security hath the most innocent or worthy person for his fame or liberty or estate or life if false witnesses conspire to defame him or destroy him And then how shall men endure to converse with one another Either the innocent must seek out a Wilderness and flye from the face of men as we do from Lyons and Tygers or else Peace will be worse than War For in War a ma 〈…〉 ay fight for his life but against false witnesses he hath no defence But God is the avenger of the innocent and above most other sins doth seldome suffer this to go unpunished even in this present world but often beginneth their Hell on Earth to such perjured
instruments of the Devil § 4. III. The Evil of Unrighteous Judgements 1. An unrighteous Judge doth condemn the Cause of God himself For every righteous cause is his 2. Yea he condemneth Christ himself in his members For in that he doth it to one of the least of those whom he calleth Brethren he doth it to himself Matth. 25. It is a damnable sin Not to relieve the innocent and imprisoned in their distress when we have power What is it then to oppress them and unrighteously condemn them 3. It is a turning of the remedy into a double misery and taking away the only help of oppressed innocency What other defence hath innocency but Law and Justice And when their refuge it self doth fall upon them and oppress them whither shall the righteous flye 4. It subverteth Laws and Government and abuseth it to destroy the ends which it is appointed for 5. Thereby it turneth humane society into a state of misery like the depredations of hostility 6. It is a deliberate resolved sin and not done in a passion by surprize It is committed in that place and in that form as acts of greatest deliberation should be done As if he should say Upon full disquisition evidence and deliberation I condemn this person and his cause 7. All this is done as in the Name of God and by his own Commission by one that pretendeth to be his Officer or Minister Rom. 3. 3 4 5 6. For the Iudgement is the Lords 2 Chron. 19. 8 10. 19. 5 6 7. And how great a wickedness is it thus to blaspheme and to represent him as Satan an enemy to truth and righteousness to his servants and himself As if he had said God hath sent me to condemn this Cause and person If false Prophets sin so heinously who belye the Lord and say He hath sent us to speak this which is untruth the sin of false Judges cannot be much less 8. It is sin against the fullest and frequentest prohibitions of God Read over Exod. 23. 1 2 3 c. Lev. 10. 15. Deut. 1. 16 17. 16 18. Isa 1. 17 20 23. Deut. 24. 17. 27. 19. Cursed be he that perverteth the judgement of the stranger the fatherless and widow and all the people shall say Amen Ezra 7. 26. Psal. 33. 5. 37. 28. 72. 2. 94. 15. 106. 3. 30. Prov. 17. 27. 19. 28. 20. 8. 29. 4. 31. 5. Eccles. 5. 8. Isa. 5. 7. 10. 2. 56. 1 2. 59. 14 15. Ier. 5. 1. 7. 5. 9. 24. Ezek. 18. 8. 45. 9. Hos. 12. 6. Amos 5 7 15 24. 6. 12. Mic. 3 9. Zech. 7. 9 8. 16. Gen. 18. 19. Prov. 21. 3 7 15. I cite not the words to avoid prolixity Scarce any sin is so oft and vehemently condemned of God 9. False Judges cause the poor to appeal to God against them and the cryes of the afflicted shall not be forgotten Luke 18. 5 6 7 8. 10. They call for Gods Judgement upon themselves and devolve the work into his hands How can that man expect any other than a judgement of damnation from the righteous God who hath deliberately condemned Christ himself in his cause and servants and sate in judgement to condemn the innocent Psal. 9. 7 8 9. The Lord hath prepared his throne for judgement and he shall judge the world in righteousness he shall minister judgement to the people in uprightness he will be a refuge for the oppressed Psal. 37. 6. He will bring forth righteousness as the light and thy judgement as the noon day Psal. 89. 14. Iustice and judgement are the habitation of his throne Psal. 103. 6. The Lord executeth righteousness and judgement for all that are oppressed Psal. 146. 7. In a word the sentence of an unjust Judge is passed against his own soul and he calleth to God to condemn him righteously who unrighteously condemned others Of all men he cannot stand in judgement nor abide the righteous doom of Christ. § 5. Direct 2. When you well understand the greatness of the sin find out and overcome the root Direct 2. and causes of it in your selves Especially selfishness covetousness and passion A selfish man careth not what another suffereth so that his own ends and interest be promoted by it A covetous man will contend and injure his neighbour when ever his own commodity requireth it He so much loveth his money that it can prevail with him to sin against God and cast away his own soul much more to hurt and wrong his neighbour A proud and passionate man is so thirsty after revenge to make others stoop to him that he careth not what it cost him to accomplish it Overcome these inward vices and you may easily forbear the outward sins § 6. Direct 3. Love your neighbours as your selves For that is the universal remedy against all Direct 3. injurious and uncharitable undertakings § 7. Direct 4. Keep a tender conscience which will not make light of sin It is those that have Direct 4. seared their consciences by infidelity or a course of sinning who dare venture with Iudas or Gehezi for the prey and dare oppress the poor and innocent and feel not nor fear not whilst they cast themselves on the revenge of God § 8. Direct 5 Remember the day when all these causes must be heard again and the righteous God Direct 5. will set all strait and vindicate the cause of the oppressed Consider what a dreadful appearance that man is like to have at the Bar of Heaven who hath falsly accused or condemned the just in the Courts of men What a terrible inditement accusation conviction and sentence must that man expect If the hearing of righteousness and the judgement to come made Faelix tremble surely it is infidelity or the plague of a stupified heart which keepeth contentious persons perverters of justice false witnesses and unjust Judges from trembling § 9. Direct 6. Remember the presence of that God who must be your final Iudge That he seeth Direct 6. all your Pride and Covetousness and all your secret contrivances for revenge and is privy to all your deceits and injuries You commit them in his open sight § 10. Direct 7. Meddle not with Law Suits till you have offered an equal arbitration of indifferent Direct 7. men or used all possible means of love to prevent them Law Suits are not the first but the last remedy Try all others before you use them § 11. Direct 8. When you must needs go to Law compose your minds to unfeigned love towards him Direct 8. that you must contend with and watch over your hearts with suspicion and the strictest care lest secret disaffection get advantage by it And go to your neighbour and labour to possess his heart also with love and to demulce his mind that you may not use the Courts of Iustice as Souldiers do their weapons to do the