the thing is often exhibited us in the notation of the term whereby it is expressed I shall premise something of the name then present to you its nature 1. For the Name There is not one word which precisely signifieth the Conscience whereby 't is expressed in the Old Testament Sometimes it is expressed by Spirit Prov. 18.14 Psal 34.14 and therewith accords Pauls mention of it 1 Cor. 2.11 The spirit of man i.e. his Conscience which is in him Sometimes by heart 2 Sam. 24.10 1 King 2.44 with which agrees that of 1 Joh. 3.20 21. If our heart i.e. our Conscience condemn c. I shall not omit what is observed by A. Burges * Of Orig. sin par 3. c. 2. s 1. that the first signification of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 leb rendred heart is a conspersion or meal sprinkled with water which points us how the heart or conscience of man is conspersed and water'd with some common principles and notions about good and evil and accordingly is to make application of them The Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Latin Conscientia from whence we have our English word Conscience signifie a knowledg together Conscientia est quasi conjuncta scientia Conscience is a conjunct science both as it respects several subjects and several objects A knowledg together of many Subjects or by and with others and of many objects or of others 1. 'T is a knowledg together with others Conscientia est cum alio scientia as Aquinas * Sum q. 79. a 13. And that not so much with other men though the sincerely conscientious would fain commend himself to every mans Conscience in the sight of God and is careful of keeping close to that universally received rule of Conscience Math. 7.12 Luk. 6.31 2 Cor. 4.2 2. Nor so much with a mans own self when the heart and head are agreed in the judgment which is made And a man can say with Paul My conscience also bearing me witness Conscientia est quasi cordis scientia saith Bernard * De interior Domo Cor quando se novit appellatur Conscientia quando praeter se alia scientia Id. ib. Knowledg in the head alone is barely science as one saith * Sheffield Good Conse c. 1 p. 17. but knowledg in the heart too is Conscience rightly so called 3 But 't is a knowledg together with God Cum Deo scientia Behold my witness is in heaven and my record is on high saith Job Ch. 16.19 And Paul I speak the truth in Christ and lie not my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost Rom. 9.1 He produceth three witnesses say our Annotators * Ad loc Christ Conscience and the Holy Ghost 2. 'T is a Knowledg together of many objects These Conscience doth not abstractly or apart consider but always conjoyns in its proceeds and operation knitting one knowledg and object to another and conjoyning one to another Adding science unto science as one saith b Sanders de Oblig Conse Praelect 1. §. 6. The universal knowledg or the knowledg of law and right to the particular knowledg or the knowledg of the fact by applying one unto the other 2. The nature of Conscience I shall briefly discuss in explicating this definition Conscience in man is mans judgment of himself i.e. of his estate and actions as it and they are subjected to the judgment of God The definitions and descriptions hereof are variously given by various Authors This of Dr. Ames a De Cons l. 1. c. 1. n. 1. seems to me very consonant and comprehensive enough which is closed with by devout Fenner b Treat of Cons p. 32 and by Dr. Anneslie c Cripleg Lect. Ser. 1. p. 3. This speaks its nature and suits with Scripture Judg you Judg in your selves If we would judg our selves Judg between me and my Vineyard Act. 14.19 1 Cor. 11.13 31. Isa 5.3 First I say 't is mans judgment I know there is who likes not the mention hereof in the definition of Conscience Because saith he some acts of Conscience cannot without some force or straining be referred hither But I must acknowledg without any ill reflection had on an Author whom I do so highly reverence that the force of this reason is not so ponderous and pressing with me while this which I adhere unto hath the favour and countenance of the Scripture as before and while in a fair construction Conscience judgeth what is the matter of law before it in the first proposition what is the matter of fact in the second proposition and is most strictly and plainly acknowledged to be a Judg in the third proposition Q. What is the subject of the Conscience wherin it resideth Conscience then is mans Judgment and so appertaineth to the Understanding not to the Speculative understanding which judgeth only of things as true and hath this alone for its object but to the practical underderstanding which judgeth of things not only as true but in their tendency also or as they are operable or ordinable to action Conscience appertaineth then to the practical intellect c Vid. Saunders de oblig Cons Prae. 1. § 21. Rutherf Libert of Consc c. 1. p. 4 5. Baldw. Cas Cons l. 1. c. 3. not to the speculative nor to the will Conscience is a conjunct science as hath been said The heart knoweth its own bitterness Prov. 18.14 Oft times also thine heart knoweth that thou also hast cursed others Eccles 7.22 But the will is a blind and no knowing power as is generally acknowledged Nevertheless it is true that as the will hath no small influence upon the Conscience to interrupt it in and to encline and engage it to the discharge of its acts and offices so the Conscience doth in the discharge thereof include therewith at least infer thereupon suitable inclinations ordinarily in and impressions on the will I might add and upon the affections also its judgment usually being received either with delight and joy on the one hand or with displicence Q. Whether Conscience be an act power or habit dread and grief on the other But now whether Conscience be an habit or act or power of the practical understanding is of a more strict and subtil disquisition among the School-men for accommodation whereof consult our own learned Saunderson * De Obl. Conscient Prael 1. §. 7. ad 2◠Burges Or. sin part 3. c. 2. s 1. Truth is 't is but very little we understand of our own selves a labour of unquestionable difficulty to define and discriminate things of so near a cognation in nature and connexion in use and exercise as powers habits and acts are Yet something must be left for loosing and untying this knot Conscience is sometimes of a larger sometimes of a stricter and more limited acceptation 1. Conscience is sometimes largely taken and in the vulgar use of this term it is of a very large
according to a consecution or emanation from Mans nature As when we say Man is by nature endowed with an Understanding Will c. Thus the powers and properties of Mans nature are said to be natural to him 3. Or for that which is by and according to a connexion with Mans nature as Paul saith We were by nature children of wrath Eph. 2.3 This condition was connexed with our nature we were subject to the revenging justice of God as soon as we received the nature of man Thus the pravity and pollution of Mans nature is said to be natural to him The import of this question is not Whether the Conscience be evil either in regard of its natural constitution or essence In this sense it must needs be good because it is by the special efficience and gift of God Job 32.8 Chap. 20.7 Or 2. in regard of any natural consecution or emanation from its nature Thus it cannot be bad but good for the same reason because it cometh from the blessed God whose work is perfect Deut 32.4 But 3. in regard of a natural connexion i.e. Whether Conscience in man by and according to the condition which is connexed with his nature be morally evil or sinful yea or no That every mans Conscience is by nature sinful in the sense last mentioned appears First From the notorious defilement of every man by nature These propositions are of Apostolical proof That all have sinned and that they are all under sin That all the world is become guilty before God And that they are all by nature children of wrath Rom. 3.9 19 23. Ephes 2.3 What is man that he should be clean and that which is born of a woman that he should be righteous saith Eliphaz All persons and all the parts of man are impure and defiled Job 15.14 15 16. Rom. 3.9 19. And who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean To them that are defiled is nothing pure but even their mind and conscience is defiled Job 14.4 Tit. 1.15 The leaven of sin hath over-spread the whole lump The leprosie of sin hath left no faculty untainted The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint It reacheth from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot So that the Conscience is corrupt as well as the corporeal part 1 Cor. 5.6 Isa 1.4 5 6. Secondly From the notable declarations in the Covenant of Grace What on Gods part is therein more clearly proposed than this I will put a new spirit within you I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh and I will give you an heart of flesh I will circumcise your hearts I will put my law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts c. Ezek. 11.19 20. Chap. 36.26 Jer. 31.33 Deut. 30.6 And what can on mans part then be more clearly supposed than this That the heart of man is of a stony adamantine and uncircumcised temper without the sculpture of any saving truth e're grace takes him within the Covenant And surely by nature the sons of men are all strangers from the Covenants of Promise Zach. 7.12 Jer. 9.26 27. 2 Cor. 3.3 Eph. 2.12 cum 3. Thirdly From the known design of the Commandments and conveyance of Grace A good Conscience is the end of Gods Commandments 1 Tim. 1.5 1 Pet. 3.16 If Conscience were good by nature how should the goodness thereof be the end and effect of the Gospel of Grace A good Conscience was not found by the Gospel in the regions where it came but was the fruit of the Gospel The Gospel was sent amongst them not as supposing their Conscience already good but to set them right and leave them good whom it found bad Act. 26.18 20. 1 Cor. 14.24 25 Heb. 4.12 A good Conscience is the effect of the grace of faith in Christ God purifying mens hearts by faith Act. 15.9 Heb. 10.22 Before the coming of faith then the Conscience is defiled To the unbeliever nothing 〈◊〉 pure And manifest enough it is that faith it Christ never grew in the garden of nature when most pure from the weeds of sin which the Fall hath brought in but is an eflux of divine grace and an especial gift of God Tit. 1.15 Heb. 11.6 Eph. 2.8 Phil. 1.29 Fourthly From the necessary diffusion of sanctifying grace throughout the whole nature of Man The God of peace sanctifie you wholly the whole then was sinful And I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless c. The upper region of Mans soul then and which is rational as well as the lower region and which is more sensitive were stained and culpable The Conscience therefore cannot but be corrupted 1 Thes 5.23 The Conscience could neither require nor receive the renovation of grace if it were righteous by nature But renovation passeth through all the parts and powers Behold all things are become new This is to put on the new man and to put off the old man Sin did and Sanctification now doth extend it self over all the man especially the mind To be renewed is eminently in the spirit of our mind 2 Cor. 5.17 Eph. 4.22 23 24. Fifthly From the noted derivation of a good Conscience to us by means of Christ Till his blood be sprinkled on us the Conscience is not sanctified in us as is implied Heb. 9.14 'T is the blood of Christ Who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God which purgeth your Consciences from dead works to serve the living God Hebr. 9.14 Conscience is impure then till Christ purgeth it 'T is he freeth it from sin and fitteth it for Gods service But by nature we are all without Christ alienated and enemies in our minds by wicked works Men do not come by nature but are called by grace unto the fellowship of the Son Jesus Christ Eph. 2.12 cum 3. Col. 1.21 1 Cor. 1.9 Sixthly From the notable defilement of Conscience in the discharge of its acts and offices Now laesae actiones laesas facultates indicant It must needs be a maimed and diseased power that puts forth such maimed and diseased performances These I shall briefly instance in the next Question and judg needful to pluck down the pride of Man and to preserve you from the dangerous precipices of many who cry up Conscience and its conduct for Salvation instead of calling men to Christ and to the conduct of the Scriptures Q. 2. What are the evils of Mans Conscience naturally which we should be heedful of and and humbled under Though I cannot fully open that sink of sin which lieth here a work that is more accurately done by an acute and able hand * Anth. Burgess Orig. sin par 3. c. 2. §. 1 8. and though a further manifestation hereof must follow in our ventilation of the several sorts of an evil Conscience of which hereafter yet something shall be done for the discovery of this evil and putrefaction Conscience may
curses your rich estates will be the ruin of your souls your eminent pleasures will end in perdition and the greater is your confluence the greater will be your confusion if guilt shall still abide upon your Conscience If ye will not lay it to heart saith the Lord of Hosts I will even send a curse upon you and I will curse your blessings yea I have cursed them already because ye do not lay it to heart Deut. 28.15 ad finem Eccles 7.13 Jam. 5.3 6. Rev. 18.7 Mal. 2.2 4 Is Conscience evil you have no interest in Christ An interest in Christ and an evil Conscience are things inconsistent who doth always purge their Conscience whom he proprietateth in his choice benefits True it is the priviledges by Christ are large but as Peter told Simou Magus so must I tell thee upon the same reason Thou hast neither part nor lot in this matter for thy heart is not right in the sight of God Heb. 9.14 c. 10.22 Act. 8.21 5 Is Conscience evil your choicest endeavours are also evil because you frustrate the end of the Commandment which is to free you from an evil Conscience and are not framed to that entireness which the Commandment enjoyneth and expecteth unless your hearts are sprinkled from an evil Conscience you have no access to God nor can hope for acceptance much less can you have assurance your prayers are turned into sins and provocations So long as Conscience was statedly sinful God accounted the most costly Sacrifices of the Jews wherewith went supplications also but as so many splendid mockeries and they were so far from receiving acceptation that they were reckoned abomination 1 Tim. 1.5 Jam. 4.8 Heb. 10.22 Psal 109.8 Isa 66.3 4. Prov. 21.27 6 Is Conscience evil be sure the consequence will be evil if you continue this evil So long as Conscience is bad no one capacity or faculty can be good which are all under the empire and influence of Conscience If thine eye be evil the whole body is full of darkness and if the light that is in thee be darkness how great is that darkness Mat. 6.23 But this is not all mind the place of Conscience miserable must be the issue of an evil and polluted Conscience Corruptio optimi pessima You that are fearless of its sin now shall feel its sting hereafter and shriek and roar with the corrodings of that worm which you would not here attempt to kill or cure It s evil of sin will issue in extreamest and eternal sufferings if not timely salved Cure it or it will kill and condemn you and you will contract condemnation from God unto you Mar. 9.44 Isa 66.24 1 Joh. 3.20 IV. Speed your â—onversion from sin your Conscience must needs be sinful so long as your sin continueth If you continue in a sinful state the state of Conscience must needs be sinful If you are defiled this is defiled If you are after the flesh so is this also Tit. 1.15 Rom. 8.5 6 7 8. If you would heal Conscience then hasten your conversion do not only try your ways but turn to the Lord who will bind up that which is broken Lam. 3.40 Hos 6.1 The change of your condition includeth the change of Conscience Turn you at Gods reproof and he will pour out his spirit upon you and then you are no more in the flesh but in the spirit the motions and mindings of Conscience shall be no more so fleshly Prov. 1.27 Rom. 8.9 c. 7.5 6. V. Strike in with Christ The stain of Conscience is such that none but the sprinklings of Christs blood upon it can purge it from dead works to serve the living God Heb. 10.22 c. 9.14 The evil of Conscience came in originally by the first Adam and is only healed by the second Adam Hasten to him by an active faith This is that bunch of Hysop which sprinkleth this blood upon you and so the Conscience becomes clean in the sight of God Psal 51.7 Would you have Conscience cured from its evil state close with Christ by a sound faith He dwelleth in the heart by faith Eph. 3.17 VI. Search and put the Covenant into suit follow him that did create and can alone cure the Conscience with iterated prayers and with the instance and pressing of his promises Peruse his Promises I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh c. Ezek. 11.19 20. c. 36.26 27. Deut. 30.6 Plead them in your petitions He will yet for this be enquired of by the house of Israel Ezek. 36.37 Unfold the pravity of your Hearts and Consciences Lord I acknowledg my Conscience is miserably corrupted far departed from thy first Creation and foully depraved both by the fall of Adam and my own voluntary dâ—fections Behold I bring thee an old and obdurate Heart Lord renew and mollifie it a diseased and defiled Heart Lord repair and purge it an Heart of stone and adamant inflexible to thy ducture impenetrable by thy displeasure c. Lord remove it and renew me Urge him with his Promises to do it and thine own heart there-with also to deliberate and draw from them Lord hast thou not said A new heart will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you I will â—ake away the stony heart out of your flesh and I will give you an heart of flesh O make good â—hy word to thy poor creature who can no â—ore cure this heart of stone than I can â—reate another world Create in me a clean heart 〈◊〉 God and renew a right spirit within me So David Psal 51.10 See further helps hereâ—â—ter Q. 4. How may we know whether our Consciences are Evangelically good or bad Be plain with Conscience § 1 and let it be â—ain with thee But in regard our Conâ—â—ience may and doth put a paralogism upon 〈◊〉 and its argumentation is oft-times sophiâ—â—cal and fallacious through the depravedness of our natures of which hereafter and so men deceive their own selves Jam. 1 2◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It therefore requireth the stricter care and caution in your part and circumspection on mine how we manage thiâ— work To which end before I propound marks * See Dik Good Conscience ch 7 8 9. p. 73. ad 128. Sheffield Good Conscience ch 24. Bald wins cas Conscience ch 12. I would promise this brief animadversioâ— for preventing mistakes * See Sheffields Good Conscience ch 18 2â— that you may 〈◊〉 conclude the goodness of your Conscienâ—â— either from their past or present 1 scrupulosâ—â— 2 smart or trouble on the one hand 3 stillâ—â— or quiet on the other without further aâ— fuller evidence Which I shall put upon a 〈◊〉 deliberate enquiry hereafter The stated habitude of your Conscienâ—â— may be discerned by these five things Tâ—â— adjuncts the acts the absoluteness the aspeâ— the answer of the Conscience First § 2 By the Adjuncts of Conscience aâ— your Consciences Evangelically pure or defiled Evangelically at peace or disquieted
it self evil as in the Polygamy of the Patriarchs And should not this power be good whose power is so great both for evil and for good 5. From the Principles it owneth 1. In Nature Doth not even Nature it self teach me that my Conscience be good whatsoever pains it cost me or whatever be the persecutions from men wherewith it may be consequenced The very Heathens have therefore prescribed means and pressed motives 2. In Grace how much more am I taught to exercise my self herein and engage my self hereunto by all the principles of godliness and by all the Promises of the Gospel 6. From the Offices it is to perform Can my Conscience do well if it be evil do not its Offices for God require that it be holy and good Conscience hath the office of 1. A Minister and is therefore obliged to be good a bad Minister being the worst of Men there is little hopes of its ministring good unless it be a good Minister 2. Of a Magistrate who should be most eminently and exemplarily good and a Minister to thee for good 3. Of a Witness 4. And of a Judg which must be good or they will do evil do evil themselves and not deliver Souls from extremity and injustice 3ly Direct 3 Apply you to the Causes of a good Conscience The Causes improved the effect will ensue These are principal or less principal 1 The Principal is God Every good and every perfect gift is from above and cometh down from the father of Lights The good Conscience is from the God of Conscience The God that made thy Conscience can alone make thy Conscience good Acknowledg him then in all thy ways and he shall direct thy paths Ask of him by prayer and strong crys as David did Thou art good and dost good teach me thy Statutes Incline my heart to thy Testimonies Let my heart be sound in thy Statutes Create in me a clean heart O God Jam. 1.17 Psal 119.36 68 80. 1. It proceedeth from the good-will of the Father The Inspiration of the Almighty giveth Understanding 'T is He that putteth Wisdom in the inward parts and giveth Understanding to the Heart Press thy Heart to consider it and plead with him in Supplication who delights to be urged with the liberousness of his own acts of Grace and giveth liberally to him that asketh Job 32.8 c. 38.36 Jam. 1.5 2. It is procured by the great worth of the Son who was made sin for us to take sin from us and in the likeness of sinful flesh by a sacrifice for sin hath condemned sin in the flesh and so brings us to God 2 Cor. 5.21 1 Joh. 3.5 Rom. 8.3 marg 1 Pet. 3.18 The good Conscience costs no less price than the Blood of God the Blood of Christ was shed that the besmeared Conscience might be sprinkled and purged for the peculiar service of God Act. 20.28 1 Pet. 1.18 19. Heb. 10.22 c. 9.4 Apply then the meritorious and medicinal vertue that is in the Blood of Christ for cure of those maladies and bruises that are in thy Conscience Apply it by an hand of Faith make it thine Put thou on the Lord Jesus Christ Bring it down to thy case let this Blood be sprinkled on thy Conscience apply it in ardent prayer come unto God by him present his Merit with thy malignity to Divine mercy Plead his worthiness in thy unworthiness his stripes for thy healing the righteousness of Christ for the renovation of thy Conscience Pursue thy petitions upon the price he hath paid 3. It is produced by the gracious work of the Spirit If Conscience be spiritual and gracious it comes from the spirit of Grace if pure if holy 't is by the power of the Holy Ghost 'T is carnal till the Spirit comes never spiritual till born of the Spirit It is the spirit of life which sets it free from the law of sin and death Joh. 3.5 Rom. 15.13 16. Rom. 8.2 What Evangelical Truths are imprinted on the good Conscience they are of the Spirit 's writing 2 Cor. 3.3 What Evangelical Testimony is imparted by the good Conscience 't is of the Spirit 's working of his working for us who also witnesseth therewith in us Rom. 8.15 c. 9.1 Put not off the Spirit then in its motions and essays upon you which he maketh ply to him with all diligence and dearness put him not off with delays much less shouldst thou provoke him with a denial Let Steven speak why the Jews were uncircumcised in heart Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost Act. 7.51 Rather pray in the Spirit which God hath promised to pour out And who knows but Beggars may be blest in that branch of the Promises of his Grace I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and ye shall keep my judgments and do them Prov. 1.23 Luk. 11.13 Ezek. 36.27 2 The less principal Causes are 1. an operative faith and love within you 2. the ordinances for faith and love without you 1. Let there be an operative faith and love within you These like Judah and Simeon his Brother come up into each others lots to subdue the Canaanites and set right the Conscience Let there be Charity out of a pure heart and Faith unfeigned and thou canst not be left without a good Conscience which the Apostle lodgeth in the midst of these as the Tabernacle of the Congregation was in the midst of the Camp Judg. 1.3 1 Tim. 1.5 Numb 2.17 Both of them have a blessed operation and tendency first to purifie then to pacifie the Conscience Of which hereafter 2. Live in the Ordinances for Faith and Love Be much in Praying Hearing Reading Meditation Conference the end of all these Commandments of God is to make thy Conscience good Cry after him and continue in them for this end make God's end thy errand to them and your heart shall live that seek God 1 Tim. 1.5 Psal 69.32 You wrong your own Souls that wave the Ordinances of our Saviour How many an evil Conscience hath been healed and cured by them How many a bad Conscience have been made good and how many a good Conscience have been made better The way is as open to you as it was to them follow God in them forsake not the ways of his Gospel you shall know if you follow on to know the Lord. Continue at the gates of Wisdom come for Wisdom to her gates and thou shalt not come off a loser yea if thou criest after knowledg and liftest up thy voice for understanding If thou seekest her as silver and searchest for her as for hid treasures then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledg of God Prov. 8.33 ad finem Hos 6.3 Prov. 2.1 6. 4. Attend Conscience throughout Direct 4 If Conscience be not good throughly 't is not good truly See that this goodness go throughout Conscience To this is requisite 1. a right apprehension of
oppress Briefly what or whence those secret inward records of what you have declined and done and suitable inclinations and recalls thereof to your hearts especially when death or some notable distress is come upon you or coming on What I say are all or any of these but the exertings and acts and therefore evidences and arguments of that spirit or conscience in man which is the candle of the Lord searching the innermost parts of the Belly Prov. 20.27 3. Will you confer with such who never heard of Christ or have read the Scriptures Read their written Confessions or review the workings of their Consciences There are few things that more fully or frequently occur in their Writings than the presence and power of Conscience in every man which God say they hath given to every one (a) Consciamens ut cuique sua est ita concipit intra Pectora pro facto spemque metumque suo Ovid. Fastor l. 1. s p. 2. as his deputy and for their direction over-rule and over-sight (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Menand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hierocl That from this is no subterfuge nothing latent (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Isocrat ad Demonic Nunquam fides latendi fit etiam latentibus quia coarguit illos conscientia ipsos sibi ostendit Senec. Epist 97. That its Testimony is of all others the strongest (d) Conscientia mille testes Turpe quid acturus te sine teste time Consciamens recti famae mendacia ridet Ovid. Fastor l. 1. Magna vis est conscientiae judicis magna in utramque partem Vt neque timeant qui nihil commiserint paenam semper ante oculos versari putent qui peccâ—rint Cicer. pro Milon its tranquility sweetest (e) Hic murus aheneus esto Nil conscire sibi nullâ pallescere culpâ Horat. l. 1. Epist 1. Conscientia rectae voluntatis maxima consolatio rerum incommodarum Cicer. Epist tam. 4. l. 6. Nullâ re tam laetart soleo quà m officiorum meorum conscientiâ Id. Quae etiâ—m obruta delectat quae concioniâ— ac famae reelomat in se omnia reponit cum ingentem ex altera purte turbam contra-sentientium aspexit non numerat suffragia sed unsâ— sententiâ vincit Sen. de Benef. l. 4. c. 21. Licet ipsum Corpus plenum bonâ conscientiâ stillet placebit illi ignis per quem bona fides coâ—â—ucebit Id. ibid. its torments sharpest They therefore abundantly counsel man to study his own Conscience (g) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tecum habita Pers Sat. 4. Nec te quaesiveris extra Pers Sat. 1. and affectionately complain that men search not into but slight their own Consciences (h) Vt nemo in se tentat descendere nemo Persius Sat. 4. As for the workings of their Consciences that of the Apostle is written (f) Nihil est miserius quà m animus hominis conscius Plaut Occultum quatiente animum tortore flagellum Mens sibi conscia facti Praemetuens adhibet stimulos torretque flagellis Luer Poena autem vehemens multò saevior illis quos Caeditius gravis invenit Rhadamanthus Nocte dieque suum gestare in pectorâ—-testem Juven as with a Sun-beam in their life as well as his Letters The Gentiles which have not the Law are a Law to themselves which shew the work of the Law written in their hearts their Consciences also bearing witness or their Consciences witnessing with them and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another Rom. 2.14 15. 'T is true we commonly say such and such are of no Conscience or have lost all Conscience But this is and must be understood with reference had rather to the quality than to the faculty i.e. they are of no good or honest Conscience or as Conscience is considered in act rather than in habit they have lost their Conscience as we say men have lost their reason i. e. the free and uninterrupted use of it And it is true also that there are who have made shipwrack of all good Conscience that have seared their Consciences and that there are such whom God hath justly given over to a reprobate and remorsless Conscience cannot be denied 1 Tim. 1.19 Rom. 1.28 But Conscience it self ceaseth not though such qualities may cease or are changed Conscience is not destroyed when defiled 't is Conscience though contemned Tit. 1.15 1 Tim. 4.2 We find the arrests and acts of Conscience even among the damned the devils Mat. 8.29 Mar. 9.44 So that there is a Conscience universally in all and cannot utterly be extinct in any * See D. Taylor Ductor Dubitan 1 l. 1. ru.n. x. 5.6 7. Even they that say unto God depart from us we desire not the knowledg of thy ways are not therein without the evident self-reflections of an evil and seared Conscience Job 21.14 15. Q. 2. There being a Conscience in every man implanted by God how ought every man to imploy his Conscience in order to God Though Conscience be under the Sovereign command and of the sole Creation of God yet hath he substituted every man to be the keeper of his own Conscience under him and must surrender an account thereof to him Prov. 4.23 Mal. 2.15 Rom. 14.12 And if God hath implanted in every man a Conscience then every man should imploy his Conscience 1. In the behalf of God who hath made both them and it for himself Isa 43.7 Prov. 16.4 And so in pursuance of his holy inclinations furthering his supream Government in promoting his holy interest vindicating his sovereign glory in patronage of his holy image forwarding serious godliness in propugning his holy intentions and institutions frustrating in what they may the strong hopes and oppositions of his enemies sin the world and satan 2. As before God who as he made the Conscience will assuredly manifest the counsels of the heart 1 Cor. 4.5 'T is good to mind her often of her original and of his omniscience which will both quicken her to her employment and keep her from extreams Yea 't is necessary that all the acts of Conscience and of you toward Conscience be done as before the all-seeing Creator lest they lose their efficacy and authority upon you and you lose your end and attempts upon her whose pravity is so desperate and policies are so deep Rom. 2.15 Jer. 17.9 10. Psal 64.6 Let her often know from you that God who created and implanted her hath a most intuitive knowledg therefore of her and all her intrigues lye open to him Wo to her if she would hide counsel from him Psal 9.4.7 12. Heb. 4.13 Is 29.15 16. 3. In the business appointed her of God Look what are those offices which he hath deposited with her and see that neither you nor she decline them Look what are those operations which he hath designed by her and see that she do them and that you accordingly demean your selves toward
Gen. 39.9 And charging us to such as are good to do them 1 Pet. 3.16 The object of Conscience then is very large and extensive So that as one saith * Annesley qu. supra 'T is much easier to reckon up what is not the object of Conscience then what is In brief whatsoever is morally operable is the object of Conscience whatsoever Conscience doth or may operate about in a Moral sense and so takes in both our estate toward God and all our actions not only such as are moral operables in a stricter sense but such as are only thus in a larger sense as is Evangelical faith it self to be accounted * Sanders Prael 1. §. 23. This being as the command so the work of God that we believe in his Son Jesus Christ Joh. 6.29 1 Joh. 3.23 Nay there is not an act of that Moral indifferency which we may call properly humane the indeliberate and immoral actions of man which grow out of the imagination and disposition of natural qualities I except as being not in propriety of speech humane as not proceeding from the Soul as reasonable * Aquin. Sum. 12. q. 18. a. 9. I say there is not so indifferent an act which comes not within the sight and censure of Conscience though not as such or secundum speciem yet in its singular existence and as 't is circumstanced by which circumstances Conscience considers it made either morally good or else morally evil Thus Davids heart smote him but for cutting off the skirt of a garment an act in it self indifferent But Conscience attends the circumstances It was the skirt of Saul his Sovereign and Gods Substitute and therefore a sin in him who was his subject servant c. 1 Sam. 24.5 6. Thirdly Q. What is the end of Conscience to which it resers 'T is Mans judgment of himself i.e. of his estate and actions as it and they are subjected to the judgment of God Conscience being Gods Substitute and set by God himself upon the throne of Judicature doth therefore subordinate all to God all its objects and in all its operations It eyes God as the supream Judg both of it and of them in its regular acts and exercises Search me O God and know my heart try me and know my thoughts Psal 139.23 24. Nor doth Conscience ascite either the estate or any action into or sit upon them in judgment but as they and it are subjected to him who is superiour to the Conscience greater than the heart and knoweth all things 1 Joh. 3.20 21. Truth is when Conscience acts it self it is steered by and subordinated to the judgment of God in its whole judicial process In the first proposition 't is ruled by and subjected to the judgment of God in point of truth or as to matter of law In the second proposition 't is ruled by and subjected to it in point of testimony or as to matter of fact and therefore in the third proposition which is but a result from and upon the two former there cannot but be a subordination and subjection still had and made either virtually or formally to the same righteous and unerring judgment How shall I do this great wickedness and sin against God saith Conscience in Joseph As I have done so God hath requited me saith Conscience in Adoni-bezek Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God judg ye say Peter and John to the Jewish Rulers when they would set Conscience in them at work Gen. 39.9 Judg. 1.7 Act. 4.19 The office of Conscience then in general is to judg for from and under God which is inclusive of many particular acts or as some please to phrase it offices whereof I shall give you a succinct view in opening a sixth Question Q. 6. What are the Offices of Conscience and how may we so order her and our selves in them as to come off with more clearness The Offices of Conscience are best observed and opened by a review of the manner of its operation or judgment which is by way of Discourse in a practical Syllogism as hath been already mentioned Let me offer two instances more Thus All that have the Lord for their God are in an happy or blessed estate But I have the Lord for my God Therefore I am in an happy or blessed estate Again All sin is to be avoided for it self But this idleness of mine is sin Therefore This idleness of mine is to be avoided for it self Here are two Syllogisms which shew the manner of Conscience its operations both as concerns my estate in the first Syllogism and as concerns action of mine in the latter In each Syllogism there are as you see three propositions This is the proceeding of Conscience in all the judgments it maketh The offices of Conscience are obviously pointed us out in and by these several Propositions The first Proposition still manifestly contains some general law or rule whereby I may come to a clear issue in judgment what my actions have been or else should be and what my estate is Thus Conscience hath the office of a Law-giver thus she is to conserve for us and 1. to communieate or dictate to us laws or rules of general right and verity as concern our estates and actions And so the Apostle sometimes appeals it Know ye not i.e. do not your Consciences tell you that the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God 1 Cor. 6.9 Know ye not that to whom ye yield your selves servants to obey his servants ye are to whom ye obey whether of sin unto death or of obedience to righteousness Rom. 6.16 i.e. Do not your Consciences dictate as much as this So 1 Cor. 11.13 14. Judg in your selves c. Conscience is appealed to in this general concernment Is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered Again Doth not even nature it self i.e. doth not even natural Conscience teach you that if a man have long hair it is a shame unto him 3. To chalk out and descry our liberty As it is to dictate law or what must be in matters necessary so it is to discern liberty what may or may not be in matters of indifferency * Ames de Consc l. 1. c 3. n. 1. Q. 5 p. 26. That Conscience hath to order and officiate for us in thing adiaphorous is afore premised the Apostle prompteth 1 Cor. 10.25 27. I know there are that approve not the mention of these acts to the account of Conscience But the twofold acceptation of Conscience tendered you Quest 5. pag. 21. a more large and in a more limited sense may salve their exceptions And that such dictates and laws appertain to Conscience in the common and received usage of Conscience which I am particularly concerned to attend needs no other proof than the frequency of such speeches among us My Conscience tells me Men should do to others as they would
to accuse and condemn Rom. 2.15 Their Conscience also bearing them witness and their thoughts the mean while excusing or else accusing one another 1. If the estate and actions be or have been good Conscience is accordingly to acquit and clear This it doth 1. to and before God as its superior in judgment whom it doth 1. sometime appeal as the supream Judg. Judg me O Lord according to my righteousness and according to mine integrity that is in me Psal 7.8.26 1. And 2. sometimes it apologizeth and excuseth us to him not by extenuating our sin * Excusatio enim hic non strictiore sensu accipitur quo diminutionem vel attenuationem culpae designat sed illo quo plenam culpae reatus amotionem notat Ames but by insisting on our sincerity Lord saith Abimelech in the integrity of my heart and innocency of my hands have I done this Remember O Lord how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart So Hezekiah Gen. 20.5 6. Isa 38.3 This it doth also 2. from God as his substitute in the judgment from whence Conscience is by office to approve and absolve 1. To approve the good and so our hearts are assured before and we have confidence toward God 1 Joh. 3.19 21. I have finished my course saith Paul I have kept the faith Conscience approves it and so assures him Henceforth is laid up for me a Crown of Righteousness which the Lord the righteous Judg shall give me c. 2 Tim. 4.7 8. 2. To absolve from evil 1. from evils threatned by Gods laws the evil of divine indignation 1 Joh. 3.21 22 Nay saith Conscience whatever be the charges laid against him or crosses lay before him Who is he that condemneth it is God that justifieth In all these things I am more than a conquerour through him that loved me Rom. 8.31 to the end 2. â—â—rom evils thrown upon him by mens lusts the evils of humane imputations and hard censures Amidst all calumnies Conscience acquits Job and asserts his integrity Let his adversaries write a book against him he can bind their censures as a crown unto him Let them reproach him of hypocrisie Yet saith he till I die I will not remove my integrity from me My righteousness I hold fast and will not let it go My heart shall not reproach me so long as I live Job 31.5 to the end 27.5 6. 2. If the estate or actions be or have been bad Conscience is by office judicially to accuse and condemn I say judicially to accuse because it 's accusation per modum testis as a witness appertaineth to the second Proposition Thus it likewise doth 1. As to and before God to and before whom it accuseth us and causeth us to acknowledg our guilt Thus Davids heart smote him after he had numbred the people and David said unto the Lord I have sinned greatly in that I have done c. 2 Sam. 24.10 And after he had gone in to Bathsheba Against thee thee only I have sinned and done this evil in thy sight c. Psal 51.4 2. As from and under God who is greater than the Conscience So Conscience is by office 1. To convict the sinner and doth conclude it as to the sinful state and actions for which it stands arraigned before it Witness those Jews Joh. 8.9 Who were convicted by their own Consciences 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Significat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 convincere causam eò deducere ut obijci enti praetexi nihil amplius queat Hyperius So shut up by arguments and by the authority of this Judg that they could not start from it 2. To censure and set a brand and mark of infamy upon the sin So David in the Text before 2 Sam. 24.10 I have done very foolishly And elsewhere So foolish was I and ignorant I was a beast before thee Psal 73.22 Here the least Conscience as a Judg can do is dislike and displicence with the sin and with it self for sin The evil which I do I allow not saith Paul Rom. 7.15 3. To condemn 1 Joh. 3.20 i.e. to pronounce the sentence which is a sentence of condemnation to the sinner where the estate is bad whereof is no reversal but upon repentance Act. 2.37 38. Tit. 3.11 A sentence of castigation and to contrition where the estate is good Jer. 31.19 and is still a sentence of condemnation to the sin and for the crucifying of the same whether the estate be good or bad Lam. 3.39 40 41. Secondly as it respects time future and what is to be Thus Conscience is by office in particular not only 1. to tell us or hold forth what is right and what is wrong what is good and what is evil to us in particular agreeable to the general law in the first Proposition But 2. to tye and oblige us respectively to that evil and to this good agreeably still to the same law in the same proposition And 3. to thrust forward excite or impell us for the avoiding of that evil and for the attaining or doing of this good with accord still to that general light or law In relation to these Offices the holy Scriptures speaks of the Conscientious man as one stirred as one bound as one pressed in his own spirit Act. 17.16 18.5.20 22. He is not only a debtor Rom. 1.14 But there is a necessity upon him as from Gods command so from his own Conscience He is constrained and cannot chuse unless he should offer violence to his own Conscience but do what his Conscience dictates 1 Cor. 9 16. 2 Cor. 5.14 Act. 4.20 I am not ignorant that these three last Offices of Conscience are commonly placed elsewhere and conceived to appertain rather to the first Proposition But in that Conscience doth therein dictate but the general right or law and these acts do evidently include a particular respect and application to a mans own estate or action and this conclusive as to his estate and action As the operation of Conscience aforesaid doth obviously witness I do therefore rather chuse to place them here Not that I blame others for the liberty which they please to take nor shall bind up my self strictly this order in the progress of this Discourse Q. 7. How may and should we so order our Conscience in relation to the first Proposition that they offer us true and right Laws and Rules and none but such concerning our estates * See Q. 3. Direct 1. in Chap. 3. and actions To this end it is necessary that you 1. Direct 1 Store your Conscience that she have a stock and treasury of knowledg a bank and habit of all necessary laws and rules of practice that as a scribe instructed to the Kingdom she may bring forth out of her treasury things both new and old as any occasion offers For how shall she be able to give rules if she hath them not or teach you if her self be untaught
shuffle in thy witness when the interess of his government glory c. is at stake before thee shall not his excellency make thee afraid Job 13.7 8 9. 3 Art thou not to witness to him Doth thy testimony terminate with me Nay 't is transmitted to the supream Judg. The records of it must lie in heaven with him And canst thou impose by lying upon an infinite truth or hide any thing by a loose and fraudulent testimony from his immensity 4 Art thou not to witness as before God As of God in the sight of God so shouldst thou speak The answer of a good Conscience is towards God Whether it be right in the sight of God is her grand enquiry And durst thou withhold or wrench and obtort thy testimony before his eye should not his presence better poyze and be of more prevalence with thee 2 Cor. 2.17 1 Pet. 3.21 Act. 4.19 5 And what is God from for to and before whom thou art to witness Doth not he know both all the matters of fact and all thy manifold frauds with the highest exactness Thy witness cannot add to nor thy wrestings abate from his knowledg Jer. 17.9 10. Psal 119.168 Or will he cover either because thou concealest them or castes a vail over them Nay if thou sayest Behold I know it not Doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it and he that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it And shall not he render to every man according to his works Prov. 12.24 3. Direct 3 Purge out that habitual guil and aversation which naturally adhereth to her of which elsewhere Chap. 2. Qu. 2. and principle her with holy habits Purity will be an excellent preservative from the temptations proffered her from without and the treachery she is prone to from within As for the pure his work is right The witness of a pure Conscience will not be blinded with or blinded by any carnal interess 't will continue pure like her self 2 Tim. 1.3 Prov. 21.8 Tit. 1.15 Fidelity is not less effectual then expedient and necessary She will not be either bought off by temptations or brow-beaten by trouble nor will she bruise upon the truth or baffle in her testimony A faithful witness will not lie A true witness delivereth souls Prov. 14.5 25. Chap. 12.17 4. Direct 4 Prevent her from allurements There will be enough to tamper with her and be taking her off from her testimony 1. Self-love will be prompting arguments from thy own ease c. to abstain or however to adjourn or at least to allay her testimony 2. Secret lusts will be putting in for some countenance at least connivance Why shouldst thou make a full discovery Look back upon the profits and pleasures we have ministred to thee shall thine own testimony destroy both ours and thine own tranquillity 3. Satan will be pleading and perswading with thee either to pass it over or palliate it up or at least to put it off to a more convenient season Nay 4. the several powers of the Soul which are subordinated to Conscience and must sense the consequence of a just and impartial testimony will be plucking her back and press her to a forbearance from the extent and fearful effects of a severe testimony Why shouldst thou so far prejudice the peace of thy self and us who have taken sweet counsel together heretofore Come spare thy self and us at least a little longer Thorns and snares thou seest are strew'd in the way of Conscience's witness-bearing The more it concerns thee to keep her with thy utmost circumspection Suffer her not to play with these baits as thou wouldst not have her perish by the hook that is hid under them Prov. 4.23 Chap. 22.5 Act. 24.16 Let Conscience know 1. allurements are fallacious and deceitful they are but to betray her from her irksome duty into the more irrecoverable danger And however they now briskly sparkle in the cup and entrance yet in the consequence and end they will bite like a Serpent they will sting like an adder 2. Their arguments are all frivolous and sophistical The true spiritual self-love easily seeth through and scattereth them all She seeth that the witness of Conscience serves our best welfare and comfort And if troubles ensue upon her testimony she will see and say they are but preparatory to our everlasting tranquillity and preventive oâ— eternal torments Or suppose the worst iâ— you weigh their suggestions in the scales oâ— self-love indeed she will soon inform you 'T is better to bleed once than to burn for ever Better you should smart once than suffer always Better Conscience should be giving witness on earth than be a gnawing worm in hell To be now testifying than for eveâ— tormenting c. Luk. 16.23 24 25. 5. Direct 5 Prize her attestation and be well pleased with it Receive her testimony with thankfulness to God and tenderness toward herâ— yea though her testimony should give cheâ—â— to your carnal interest and corrupt inclinations yet congratulate and bid her welcome when she bears her witness as Daviâ— sometime did Abigail Blessed be the Lord which sent thee to meet me this day and blessed be thy advice and blessed be thou of the Lord 1 Sam. 25.32 33. 'T is good for you 1 to invite her and that in sincerity if she seems strange There is a saying to the heart which the Scripture suggests to us Hos 7.2 If Conscience seems to withdraw speak to her the more winningly and say not to thy self by her as Judah did to his servant concerning Tamar Let her alone enquire not after her lest we be ashamed Gen. 38.23 But see that thou do it in integrity Do not invite her as Amnon did his Sister to deflowre her testimony first and then turn her out of doors afterward 2 Sam. 13.17 2 Entertain her with promises of security if she seems suspicious and â—earful Tell her thou wilt bear with and shalt bless God for her integrity and wilt bear her but against her enemies As David to Abiathar Abide thou with me fear not for he that seeketh by life seeketh my life But with me thou shalt â—e in safety 1 Sam. 22.23 3 Encourage â—er if she yet seems shy and doubtful as Moses was to encourage Joshua and as God â—couraged Paul Be of good cheer Paul as thou â—ast testified of me in Jerusalem so thou must bear â—itness also at Rome Speak out freely fully â—ithfully I shall not oppose but own it thankâ—lly Tell her as wisdom doth her Children With me thou shalt dwell in safety and shalt be â—iet from fear of evil Deut. 5.38 Act. 23.11 â—ov 1.33 Receive her testimony then and â—at in reality and with all readiness whereâ—â— you shall eminently disappoint the hopes 〈◊〉 sin and Satan and encourage her to the disâ—arge of her office You receive the witness 〈◊〉 men the witness of God is greater and the witness of Conscience is Gods witness iâ— and to you 't is the
deceits under the covert of generals This unravels all the clue 2. More compleat in her witness For by this means many of those actions which lay out of sight upon her records are suggested by and to Conscience afresh 3 More cogent in her witness and it being more particular it will be more prevalent with us when Conscience can now say to us as Job's friends to him Lo this I have searched it so it is hear then at and know it for thy good Job 5.27 4 More constant in her witness and more quick hence-forth and ready to her work Her frequent converses with these rules and comparings therewith form her unto a more habitual promptness and present activity to cherish good and check evil while 't is yet but in the egg and entrance 3. Stay thy Conscience with the rule and upon the reflections which thou now makest Let her not give a glance only and so go off but consider Hebr. Set your heart on your ways as David I considered Heb. I thoughted my ways Hag. 1.5 7. Psal 119.59 By this means if consideration be taken up in making such comparisons your work will thrive upon your hands to a greater extension and a more gracious intension Consideration will fetch in the whole compass of Gods commands and our conversations If Conscience reflect upon an evil this will rip it up in all its circumstances as it did in the Patriarchs and pious David If upon a good this will run down its enquiry into the root and efficient of it and then run it up again into the exemplar and end of it and so returns fraught with repentance on that hand with rejoycing on this Gen. 42.21 22. Psal 51.3 4 c. 2 Cor. 4.2 c. 2.17 1.12 'T is necessary then that there should be some immoration of our Conscience in an intent consideration when we are imployed in these self-converses The worth hereof is great the efficacy of such reflections depending eminently thereupon David thoughted his ways and immediately turneth his feet to Gods word The Preacher considers and is forthwith cured of his trouble and tentation Whereas others through inconsiderateness run on in sin and some are held upon the rack of sorrow and anguish Psal 119.59 Eccles 9.1 Isa 1.3 Psal 73.21 22. Let me add a fourth 4. Shake off whatsoever will retard you in or retain you from this work Sin and Satan will be suggesting disswasives and determents Slothfulness will be sticking at the difficulty and diligence which must be used The sensual and sensitive part will be startling and bogling at the displeasingness and danger of it as that which will hazard all her ease and self-enjoyment Yea your selves will be but too shy of such a duty if you shake not off all such insinuations and suggestions and set to it with all your might 3. Direct 3 Speak to thy Conscience that she will reflect more constantly or at least that she will reckon with thee in the close of every day 1 That she reflect more constantly Herein do I exercise my self saith Paul to have always a Conscience void of offence Act. 24.16 And elsewhere he speaks of it in the present tense Not we had or shall have but we have a good Conscience Heb. 13.18 And that is the good Conscience which gives the quick reflex It is true I acknowledg that your actions are quick and sudden in their motions but Conscience is as quick and sudden and though those may have gotten the start of her as Cushi did of Ahimaaz yet she can easily overtake and out-run them as Ahimaaz did Cushi because she runneth as he did by the way of the Plain There are many more things to interrupt their motion than hers Truth is 1. When an action is yet but in purpose or in the proposal Conscience should reflect immediately as she is capacitated accordingly to promote it if good as in Solomon or prevent it if evil as it did in Joseph 1 King 5.8 Gen. 39.9 2. Or when an action is passing from the inward intention to outward execution Conscience should catch it by the heel in the place of the breaking forth of Children as Jacob did his Brother and as being Gods Centinel should require its pass and certificate and remand it back if it it be bad or rescue it from its assailants if it be good as Paul did Hos 12.3 Rom. 7.15 24. 3. Or is an action past forth without her animadvertence she should forthwith pursue it and put the arrest of her reflection upon it and be asking what have I done Or ask us as Joab ask'd David What hast thou done Jer. 8.6 2 Sam. 3.24 To this end labour for tenderness of Conscience of which hereafter which will soon reflect upon the least touch and pressure 2 King 22.19 But alas where is the Conscience that hath not abused us more or less in all these who can say my heart is clean therefore urge her 2 To reckon with thee at least in the close of every day Conscience should be still every day a doing with us but there are two seasons in the day wherein we especially should have to do with Conscience viz. in the morning that she may tell us what we have to do this day and in the evening that she tell us what we have done Commune with your own heart upon your bed Psal 4.4 'T is good communing with our selves and speaking to Conscience before we compose our selves to sleep Job reflected every day upon the carriage of his Sons and therefore no doubt upon the carriage of himself Thus did Job continually Heb. all the days Job 1.5 This is the way to keep your accounts both more short and more sure Well if conscience be shy or sullen plead the cause with her as the very heathen could do * Quotidie apud me causam dico c. v. Senec. de Irâ l. 3. c. 36. and then put her to the question What good have I done or else declined this day or if she return thee that thy actions have been good for the matter Return upon her yet again Yea but in what manner did I it upon what motives with what mind in what method c. So what evil have I committed or cherished or else given check to or crucified this day or if this and that were not evil in it self have not I wounded it by some evil circumstances Believe it Christians it would be of excellent advantage to your actual growth and eternal good if you had such a compendium of sins and duties by you or rather in you as Conscience might call it over every evening and comparing your employments that day with it might be able to witness clearly your estate and actions of the day now past you 4. Shew kindness to thy Conscience Direct 4 when she doth reflect yea though it be in thy own reproof Tell her thou art thankful as well as sensible and dost more congratulate thy self in
the wounds of such a friend than in the kisses of such as flatter For by this thou dost encourage her now and invite her for hereafter and shalt henceforth enjoy more of thy self and of her society He that heareth reproof getteth understanding Heb. possesseth an heart Prov. 15.32 Be not of those that can reflect on a mote in their brother's eye but not on a beam if in their own eye The more censorious abroad the more blind or at best blear-eyed will Conscience be at â—ome The kind treatments of a self-reflecting Conscience will produce most circumspection in her and most compassion towards others Mat. 7.3 4. Gal. 6.1 3. Welcome her reflections there is not so much vinegar as oyl in them If she chideth reproveth 't is but like Jeremy to keep thee from ruin Therefore do not smite her and put her in prison as Pashur did by that Prophet She may so forbear reflecting and for a while fall to remorslesness But assure thy self if she forbears thee now 't is to fetch a greater blow at thee hereafter Jer. 20.2 Rom. 1.28 5. Direct 5 Stir up thy Conscience if she be remiss speak to her if she be silent towards thee 1. There are some speaking providences that invite her to reflect and do suggest matter suffer her not to break from these Who knoweth but they may be as prosperous to you as they were to Joseph's Brethren and Pharaoh's Butler Gen. 42.21 cum 7. c. 41.9 cum 8. 2. There are some speaking portions of Scriptures and Sermons that enlighten her for reflecting and are a special means Do not baffle with these For how knoweth thou but there may be the same spiritual and saving effect obtained oâ— thee as hath been on others Heb. 4.12 1 Cor. 14.24 25. 3. There be many speaking perswasives to enduce and engage thee to reflect and serve for motives do not baulk these I have set many before you already and shall only subjoyn these 1. God seeth whether thou dallyest in it and his revenge wiâ—â— be severe if thou dost not reflect in season Psal 50.21 22. Jer. 8.6 c. Hos 7.2 2. 'T is a grievous sin to decline it thou dost not act like a man thou art brutish in thy knowledg yea below the brutes 't is not only vanity but a sore travel Isa 1.3 Eccles 4.8 3. What good success mayst thou arrive to by diligence Davids reflection ended in his reformation Pauls in eminent rejoycing the Jews in the reception of their prapers remission and pardon of their sins and restoring of them into signal favour both with God and man Psal 119.59 2 Cor. 1.12 1 King 8.47 51. Q. 11. How manifold is Conscience The definition of Conscience being dispatcht the distribution regularly follows to be next enquired into Herein I may not be too nice or acurate but attending the design of a practical Casuist I shall accordingly guide my self in the distribution hereof Thus more generally as both common experience and clear Scripture evidence instruct us There is 1 the good Conscience Heb. 13.18 1 Pet. 3.16 21. 2 The evil Conscience Heb. 10.22 The good and evil conscience may be considered and distributed either 1 according to the stated habitude Or 2 according to the several acts of mens Consciences First if we consider the state or according to the stated habitude of mens Consciences so the Conscience may be called good or evil either 1 in an ethical and moral Or 2 in an Evangelical and Spiritual sense 1. Ethically good or good upon a common account so is the Conscience which from a principle of moral righteousness is habitually disposed toward and actually dischargeth its offices according to Ethical or Moral principles In this sense many Pagans had and Paul before his Conversion was not without a good Conscience Act. 23.1 I have lived in all good Conscience before God until this day i.e. I have lived up to the light of my Conscience Or as the Dutch Annotators * Ad locum I have served God uprightly i.e. without hypocrisie according to the knowledg I had 2. Evangelically good or good upon the Christian account so only is that Conscience which from a spiritual principle of renovation is habitually disposed toward and actually dischargeth its offices according to evangelical principles Paul therefore incloseth this between charity out of a pure heart and faith unfeigned 1 Tim. 1.5 Let me add that the same Conscience as that of Paul before his effectual calling and as is commonly found in Moral persons which we may and do call good sensu ethico in an ethick sense we must call an evil Conscience sensu Evangelico in an Evangelical sense For so still it is an evil Conscience till it be purged from dead works by the blood of Christ to serve the living God Heb. 9.14 10 22. There is a double goodness found with the Conscience evangelically good a goodness of purity and a goodness of peace or a goodness of sincerity and of security as a practical Writer of ours speaketh * Sheffield Good Cons c. â— p. 26. Or a goodness of integrity and of tranquillity as another * Dykes Good Cons p. 20. See Ames de Consc l. 1. c. 12. Hence there is 1 the purified or pure Conscience instanced 2 Tim. 1.3 And 2 the pacified or peaceable Conscience intimated Phil. 4.7 Opposite to this double goodness of Conscience there is a double evil of defilement to sin habitual and allowed and 2. of distress to sorrow and anguish of heart Accordingly there is 1 the defiled Conscience propounded Tit. 1.15 And 2 the disquiet Conscience pointed at Prov. 12.25 It must be herewith remembred that neither this twofold evil nor that twofold goodness do always co-exist in the same Conscience There may be purity yet no peace and peace of Conscience such as it is yet no purity There may be an habitually impure or defiled Conscience which yet is not distressed And there may be a distressed Conscience which is not habitually impure or defiled as will be seen in the further progress of this discourse Oh happy conjunction when both goodnesses of peace and of purity of sincerity and of security do meet in the fame Conscience * Faelix conscientiâ— in qua osculatae sunt pax justitia Bern. de inter dom Happy when both evils of defilement and of distress of transgression and of trouble are cast out and kept out of the doors of Confcience together Secondly the good and evil Conscience may be distributed according to the several acts of Conscience viz. Either 1. as it apprehends and dictates matters of law or right where by it cometh to an issue in judgment Or 2. as it applys and draws them down to the matter before it for judgment Both which it doth either firmly and strongly or but feebly and weakly Agreeable whereunto there is 1 the weak and infirm Conscience And 2 the well-inabled firm or strong Conscience Of
c. Mal. 1.13 Job 21.15 Chap. 35.3 Amos 8.5 Exod. 5.2 2. Sometimes 't is outs in the measure generally it is in one extream or other either over or under Conscience accused Cain as also Judas but to that extremity as ended in despair and horrour It accused Ahab and Felix but not as might infer the hatred of their sins or alteration of their states Gen. 4.13 c. Mat. 27.3 4 5. 1 King 21.29 cum Chap. 22. Act. 24.25 26 27. 3. Most times 't is out in the method and circumstance of time Conscience should be checking and curbing in the first motion of sin within but concupiscence ordinarily conceiveth and bringeth forth e're Conscience checketh it or censureth the sinner Conscience should have anticipated that act of pride and carnal confidence in Davids numbring the people at least should have been accusing while that act was a consummating But nine months and twenty days are run out e're Conscience gives him a rebuke And Davids heart smote him after that he had numbred the people Conscience condemned the sin of Judas but not till he saw the condemning of Jesus 2 Sam. 24.8 10. Mat. 27.3 4. At all times 't is out in the manner if God should be severe and weigh it in the scales of his Justice Who can say I have made my heart clean I am pure from my sin That his Conscience hath discharged its office with that freedom and faithfulness with that openess and holiness with that sincerity and self-denial c. as is due from us Who can understand his errors Prov. 20.9 Eccles 7.20 Psal 19.12 2. With relation to future things and tims Conscience is authoritatively to direct and determine 1. Subordinately under God and as from God as the chief Governour 2. Supreamly to and for God as the chief good and end But alas how sinful is it here likewise 1. How little doth it attend insomuch as God complains None saith restore and calls out Who will hearken and hear for the time to come Isa 42.23 How few are there that with Mary ponder those things in their hearts which concern the after-times and their eternal peace But how many that hold fast deceit that refuse to return and set their heart on their iniquity rather than to seek out their duty And because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil Luk. 2.19 Jer. 8.5 Chap. 5.3 Hos 4.8 Eccles 8.11 2. How lost is its authority Conscience hath much-what left its subordination to God and his word Lo they have rejected the word of the Lord and what wisdom is in them Jer. 8.9 Chap. 6.10 The Commandments of Men are received and the Commandments of God are rejected by the Pharisees and Conscience is pretended and pleaded Mat. 15.1 10. Mar. 7.1 14. Conscience hath much what lost also its superiority over the Will and Affections which it should over-rule and order God calls and Conscience calls Return ye every one from his evil way and make your ways and your doings good And they said There is no hope but we will walk aster our own devices and we will do every one the imagination of his evil heart And so Conscience is often enslaved though it cannot be wholly extinguished by corrupt affections Jer. 18.11 12. Chap. 2.24 25. Rom. 1.18 21 c. 3. How low is its aspect Conscience should order every business to be done as for and as before God and should hold back from sin as that which displeaseth dishonoureth and is contrary to God But alas how far distant are mens counsels which abundantly speak the defilement of Conscience Ahab humbleth himself but 't is to anticipate the sufferings denounced from God not in abhorrence of the sin done against God Jehu reforms but 't is to ensure the Government not to exalt Godliness Conscience calls the Pharisees to prayer and almes-deeds but 't is to be seen of men rather than serve God Calls the People and the Priests to fasting at some times to feasting at others But keeps them within themselves carrieth them not up to God as their end in either 1 King 21.21 ad finem 2 King 10.28 cum 31. Mat. 6.2 c. Zach. 7.5 6. 4. How languid are its acts Conscience is 1. to inform and dictate what we are to do what to decline but this it doth many times falsly most times ineffectually calling evil good and good evil putting darkness for light and light for darkness Or if it presenteth our duty right yet not so as to prevail to the doing thereof regularly Isa 5.20 Rom. 1.21 2. Conscience is to engage and bind us from iniquity to duty But this it doth either very feebly or forbears and lets fall its bonds in an affliction happily these bonds seem fast and firm but the heart is not right with God nor remains stedfast with him and they soon fall of again And as for the word spoken to them in the name of the Lord when the rod is over they are ready to say We will not hearken to thee but we will certainly do whatsoever seems good in our own eyes c. Hos 5.15 chap. 4.6 Ps 78.34 37. Jer. 44.16 17. 3. Conscience is to impell and instigate but alas how faintly doth it this or else forbears it insomuch as the Prophet complains There is none that stireth up himself to take hold of thee Isa 64.7 And the best of Believers have sound frequent cause of awakening and alaruming their Conscience Psal 57.8 chap. 103.1 2. 4. Yea Conscience is ready to engage against all this so corrupt it is as to be angry with the strict and searching Truths of God and with Ahab to quarel with Gods Elijahs Hast thou found me O mine enemy And to conclude with him against the messengers of God as he touching Micajah He never prophesieth good concerning me but evil Yea to hate the good and love the evil to hate him that rebuketh in the gate to hate the light and will not come to the light lest his deeds should be reproved 1 King 21.20 ch 22.8 Mich. 3.2 Amos 5.10 Joh. 3.19 20. How extream then is the evil of Conscience further than it is purged by the blood of Christ What cause have we then of continual humiliation and of highest circumspection How careful should we be to get Conscience cleansed and cured which leads us to the next Question Q. 3. How may we be cured of an evil Conscience The cure of the several evils or sicknesses of Conscience as also the cure of the several sorts of an evil Conscience must be expected by you and will be endeavoured by me more particularly hereafter The cure of the evil state of the Conscience is the concernment I have now before me I suppose you sensible that the state thereof is bad In order to the setting right of it I advise that I. You submit to your Convictions These Convictions
come from the spirit do not quash them as thou wouldst not quench the spirit or wouldst consult thy Salvation Joh. 16.8 Gen. 6.3 Hos 4.4 5. See 1 Thou do not stifle or suppress them They held the truth down in unrighteousness and liked not to retain God in their knowledg Rom. 1. What became of it Therefore God gave them over to a reprobate mind And now farewell Convictions farewell Conscience till they feel the effect of such a constupration happily in eternal condemnation they are filled with all manner of unrighteousness and are fatting for eternal ruin ver 18 21 24 28 29 c. This is the hazard thou runnest especially upon iterated acts of rebellion Prov. 1.24 33. Psal 81.11 12. Mat. 13.14 15. Prov. 29.1 And though justice may not take this advantage against thee yet every stifled Conviction will now add to the hardning of thy Conscience and to the augmenting of thy shame sorrow and self-confusion when God shall awaken Conscience Zeph. 7.11 12. Rom. 2.4 5. Jer. 31.19 2 Thou do not sit down or sit still under them Is Conscience convinced how canst thou be quiet Are these chains to sleep in What! condemned of thy self and yet sit quiet What if God should condemn thee too Methinks we should hear thee crying out with the Jaylor and those Jews Men and Brethren what shall we do Sirs what must I do to be saved And like the two blind men the more others are complaining the more should you be crying Tit. 3.11 1 Joh. 3.20 Act. 2.37 c. 16.29 30. Mat. 20.30 31. I say therefore to you as the Lepers said among themselves Why sit you here until you die Arise and be doing if Conscience kill you you can but die 2 King 7.3 4. 3 See thou do not shift them off They were convicted by their own Conscience Joh. 8. but it came to no good they stealing away from Christ and shifting away from Conscience every one to his course of life Cain baffles Conscience with building Cities and a crowd of secular businesses Saul is melancholy happily Convictions might be upon him from the Lord though this was not all and he must have the Ministrel the musick Joh. 8.9 Gen. 4.15 17. 1 Sam. 16.23 See thou be not diverted from thy Convictions by any company especially which is sinful or by any secular contrivance and that thou do not dismiss them as Felix did his till another convenience whose Conscience as far as appears did ever after contract more guilt and filthiness Act. 24.25 26 27. To day therefore while it is called to day hear Gods voice and do not harden your hearts lest to your voluntary hardning and aversation from Conviction God add a judicial hardning and afford you no more Convictions Hebr. 3.7 16.4 7. II. Speak to Conscience and suffer that to speak to unto you commune often with it and ask it What have I done and as the Lord asked Cain What hast thou done As ever you would have Conscience throughly salved you must throughly search let your probe go to the bottom of its ulcerated nature let thy spirit make diligent search Psal 4.4 Jer. 8.6 Gen. 4.10 Psal 77.6 Having searched it speak to it tell it of its sick sad perilous and pitiful estate tell it of its rottenness and Gods revenging justice Shew it its extensive diseases and the eternal death that will ensue without its effectual change Speak to it of the searcher of hearts and that he seeth all its sins and shifts God often imputeth the sinfulness of mens hearts to this that they say not in their hearts they set not to their heart and particularly that they say heart not to their Heb. that I remember all their wickedness Jer. 5.24 Isa 44.19 Hos 7.2 Marg. Yea and suffer Conscience to speak to you while it tells you of your sins or of its sinfulness The knowledg of your case is a fair step towards your cure Do not silence or suspend Conscience or shut its mouth or thy ears against its clamors Conscience calls to you as Jotham to the men of Shechem Hearken unto me that God may hearken unto you and if you will not hear and if you will not lay it to heart be sure the end will be full of hazard Wrath is like to come upon you to the uttermost who charge Conscience as the Jews sometimes did the Ministers of Christ That they teach no more in this Name Or are ready to chide Conscience as Amaziah sometime quipped the Prophets confidence Art thou made of the Kings counsel forbear why shouldst thou be smitten Judg. 9. Mal. 2.2 1 Thes 2.16 Act. 4.18 2 Chr. 25.16 17. III. Stir up and strengthen consideration The badness of Conscience grows out of your backwardness to consider Israel doth not know my people doth not consider What cometh of it Ah sinful Nation a people laden with iniquity c. Isa 1.34 They considered not in their heart thence were they so corrupt both in their hearts and actions Hos 7.1 2 c. When God would have men rectifie their Conscience he would therefore have them to recall and consider with themselves Psal 50.21 22. Isa 44.19 c. 41.20 Hearken then Oh careless sinner and consider 1 If Conscience be bad your Conversations are bad if not in the account of man yet in the account of God who seeth not as man seeth Man looketh on the outward appearance but the Lord looketh on the heart 1 Sam. 16.7 Can the salt-spring yield fresh streams or will the sharp thorn bring forth sweet grapes Every tree saith our Saviour is known by his own fruit For of thorns men do not gather figs nor of a bramble-bush gather they grapes He applies it to the case in hand An evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth evil things Let Conscience be evil and thy Conversation thy Communication is not like to be good For these things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart and they defile the man And this know though thy conversation be bad thy Conscience is worse Here is the treasures 't is out of the abundance of the heart Jam. 3.11 12. Luk. 6.44 45. Mat. 15.18 19. 2 Is Conscience evil your callings are evil though not in themselves yet to your selves If this be depraved there is nothing pure to you your tables become a snare and your trading becomes a sin Is Conscience corrupt the Farm the Oxen the Wife will keep you from Christ which should carry you to him and your plowing yea your praying is sin Tit. 1.15 Psal 69.22 Luk. 14.18 19 20. Prov. 21.4 Psal 109.8 3 Is Conscience evil your comforts are evil Inward comforts are but ensnaring cheats and the illusions and cousenliges of the evil one For all true and gracious comforts arise from the testimony of a good Conscience otherwise while you bless God doth curse Job 8.19 2 Cor. 1.12 Deut. 29.19 20. Your outward comforts are overgrown with
〈◊〉 lightned or still in darkness are they sinceâ—â— and upright or but hollow and hypocriticâ—â— soft and tender or but hardened and obduraâ—â— These things will be put upon a distinct tâ—â—â— hereafter Secondly § 3 By the acts of your Conscienâ—â— acts speak the powers and habits wheâ— they are good acts speak them good 〈◊〉 acts speak them evil you shall know them their fruits a good tree cannot bring foâ— evil fruit neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit Mat. 7.16 17 18. Thus the acts of Conscience naturally good bespeak a good natural Conscience the acts of Conscience which are morally good bespeak a good moral Conscience and the acts of Conscience which are Evangelically good bespeak a good Evangelical Conscience Of this is the enquiry Q. May we conclude our Consciences are good because their acts are good I answer 1. § 4 Though you may not conclude it from a few occasional acts for even a bad Conscience may call and keep you to that which is good for a fit as long as the force of such an occasion or inducement lasts witness Saul Simon Magus and those Psal 78.34 38. 1 Sam. 24.16 c. 26.21 c. Act. 3.13 Yet when such acts become fixed and ordinary when though there may be some diversions as were in Job and Paul yet the main stream and current of its acts are carried in an Evangelical channel from sin to righteousness you may now conclude the goodness of your Conscience Job 27.3 4. cum 5. Rom. 7.25 cum praeced 2. Though the good acts of Conscience materially considered will not â—rgue the goodness of Conscience for there have been acts for their matter very good where the heart and mind have been very â—ad Joh. 8.9 Rom. 2.15 Psal 78.34 35 â—6 yet its good acts formally considered as â—e take in with the matter of these acts the â—anner also wherein and motives whereupon they are put forth do argue a good Conscience for such grapes cannot grow upon thistles nor can a salt fountain yield such sweet water We may argue from the effect to the cause from holy and good operations to a good and holy Origine as Paul doth in this case Heb. 13.18 Act. 24.16 What are the acts of your Conscience then what ordinarily doth it thence you may conclude its habitude and how 't is ordinarily disposed There are the elicit and imperate acts of Conscience how are these discharged is it from Evangelical motives and in an Evangelical manner Conscience is 1. to dictate truth and doth it dictate Gospel-truths and duties Repentance towards God and Faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ To deny your selves and take up your cross To love your enemies and bless them that hate you To endure grief suffering wrongfully and overcome evâ—â— with good c. Act. 20.21 Mar. 8.34 Mat. 5.44 1 Pet. 2.19 Rom. 12.21 Are the Consciences not only enlightned in but engaged bâ— these commands But more particularly doth the Conscience dictate these Gospel-truths to be done upon Gospel-terms To be done 1 to and for Christ as your head and ruler And can your Conscience say in sincerity The Lord is oâ— Judg the Lord is our King the Lord is our Law-giver And that you esteem all but loss foâ— the excellency of the knowledg of Jesus Chriâ—â— your Lord Isa 33.22 Phil. 3.8 2. To be done in and through Christ as your Intercessour and Redeemer To do all in the name of our Lord Jesus with the rejecting of your own righteousness and resting upon the grace of God in him alone for your reward and acceptance Col. 3.17 Phil. 3.9 Dan. 9.18 1 Pet. 2.5 And doth not thy Conscience only dictate this in the Theory but descends to the Praxis And doth it not only inform this in the notion but doth it infer and induce it in the ordinary course of thy Conversation Thou hast then a good Conscience 2. Conscience is to deliver its testimony How doth your Conscience testifie Doth it testifie to and for the Gospel to the authority thereof above all laws over you to the amiableness thereof above all doctrines to you to the sin-subduing and soul-saving efficacy thereof upon you and to the singular and surpassing excellency thereof unto you Act. 4.19 20. Rom. 1.16 1 Thes 1.5 6. Psal 119.72 Doth Conscience testifie with and according to the Gospel Are you wont to pray for the especial teachings of the spirit in prevention of a false testimony To put your selves as in his sight and presence that it may produce a good and true testimony And do you prize and prefer the Spirits testimony before that of your spirits and are prevailingly steered by his witness with your Conscience and can provoke and call in with Peter his all-seeing knowledg Lord thou knowest all things and thou knowest that I love thee Job 34.32 Psal 139.23 24. 2 Cor. 2.17 Rom. 8.16 Joh. 21.17 This is a good Conscience I forbear to instance further Thirdly § 5 By the absoluteness and universality of the good Conscience that Conscience is not good at all that is not good in all Paul trusts he had a good Conscience but whence appeared it In all things he was willing to live honestly Heb. 13.18 Q. May we argue the goodness of our Conscience by and from their Vniversality and Absoluteness I answer you may and should as Paul doth § 6 but must attentively consider that the Universality by which you prove it is not to be an Universality in the degrees of goodness which is reserved for glory but an Universality as to the parts of goodness which is inseparable from grace 1 King 9.4 Luk. 1.6 1 Chron. 29.19 So then the Conscience that is unfeignedly good is universally good as it respects all the parts though it cannot here reach all the perfection and degrees of goodness I. § 7 'T is good as to all concernments good at first Table and good at second-Table-duties Willing in all things to live honestly Heb. 13.18 'T is not good at matters of holiness and bad at matters of honesty or good at matters of honesty and bad at matters of holiness but good both as to holiness and as to honesty whereof the good Conscience ever makes a good conjunction 1 Tim. 2.2 Luk. 8.15 Let the formal hypocrite be for inoffensiveness to God while he indulgeth himself in his offensiveness to man let the civil Justiciary be for inoffensiveness to man while be indulgeth his inobedience and offensiveness to God But the great exercise and endeavour of the good Conscience is to preserve it self void of offence both towards God the object of all those religious dues required in the first table and towards men the object of all that righteousness required in the second Table Act. 24.16 It provides for honest things not only in the sight of the Lord but in the sight of men 2 Cor. 8.21 Your Consciences are evil who are careless of either Table She that was for dividing the Child
was not indeed the Mother 1 King 3.26 27. Though you are devout towards God if you are dishonest towards men or dissolute in your selves you have an evil Conscience And though you are upright in your transactions and dealings with men if you are regardless of the truths and duties of godliness or sobriety you have still but an evil Conscience See these instances Mat. 23.14 ch 15.4 5. Isa 58.2 9. Prov. 7.13 16. Luk. 18.11 12. Mat. 19.20 21 22. The good Conscience is not disjunctive but copulative in its duties and will give Christ his due and Caesar his You then that impartially consult both Tables in your practice that knit religion towards God with righteousness towards Men that follow after both things holy and things honest things just and things pure and are taught to live both soberly righteously and godly in this present world your conversations are in godly sincerity and you have a good Conscience May you rejoyce in its testimony Psal 15.2 Isa 33.15 Phil. 4.8 Tit. 2.12 2 Cor. 1.12 II. § 8 'T is good as to all the Commandments The good Conscience is set to do all Gods Commandments God chargeth all his Commandments upon the Conscience Keep and seek for all the Commandments of the Lord your God 1 Chron. 28.8 Deut. 11.8 22. ch 26.18 And the good Conscience chargeth them all upon the godly to keep all the command he knoweth and to seek all the command he knoweth not that he may keep them We are all here present before God saith Cornelius to hear all things that are commanded of God Act. 10.33 The good Conscience countâ— all Gods Commandments to be good Aâ—â— thy Commandments are sure all thy Commandments are faithful It saith not only that they are all truth but all thy Commandments are righteousness Psal 111.7 c. 119.86 151 172. The good Conscience would know all Gods Commandments because good and that he may keep them Oh that my way were directed saith he to keep thy statutes 〈◊〉 let me not wander from thy Commandments O hide not thy Commandments from me Teaâ—â— me O Lord the way of thy statutes and I shaâ—â— keep it unto the end Give me understanding anâ— I shall keep thy Law yea I shall observe it with my whole heart Psal 119.5 10 19 33 34 'T is true corrupt flesh may and will ever and anon be retracting and impleading it buâ— the good Conscience fights it out and is finally victorious He hath sworn and he wiâ—â— perform it that he will keep Gods righteouâ— judgments And I will walk at liberty saith this Soul for I seek thy precepts ver 106 45. The good Conscience would keep all Gods Commandments which he knoweth He may be weak in many things but he is willing in all things to live honestly He allows himself in no known aversation from any one of Gods Testimonies His heart is inclined to perform Gods statutes always If the habitual temper be enquired into whatever his declinings be under the heat of tentation with his mind he serves the law of God Heb. 13.18 Rom. 7.15 25. Psal 119.112 How is it with your Consciences then Adhere they closely to the commands and traditions of men but mean while are careless of the Commands and Truths of God Or are they herein observedly strict in Mint Annise and Cummin the lesser matters of the Law while mean time they omit Mercy Judgment and Faith the greater matters of the Law Are they partial and upon reserves in the matters of Piety and of his Precepts And do they ordinarily allow the forbearance of or formality in any self-displeasing secret or inobserved duties You have then an evil Conscience Mar. 7.6 10. Mat. 23.23 Mal. 2.9 1 Joh. 2.4 But do they esteem all Gods Precepts concerning all things to be right Do you walk in all the Commandments and Ordinances of God with Zachary and Elizabeth Have you a respect to all Gods Commandments Then shall you not be ashamed it is well with Conscience and shall be well you in the conclusion Psal 119.6 128. Luk. 1.6 Jer. 7.23 The integrity of Davids heart hath the divine impression and allowance or approbation while it was set to do according to all that God had commanded him 1 King 9.4 2 Chron. 7.17 3 'T is good as concerns all Corruptions § 9 which it doth both avoid and abhor He would abstain from and doth hate every false way Psal 119.2 3 128. It refrains the feet from every evil way that we may keep to the Word of God without us and keep up the work of God within us Psal 119.101 104. This Soul may actually and doth often sin but he allows not what he doth and may say with Paul What I hate that do I Rom. 7.15 A good Conscience then will not allow of any evil of corruption not any manner or any measure any kind or to any degree It would have iniquity all iniquity and all of iniquity taken away the pollution and power as well as punishment and will rather choose the greatest suffering than the least sin Hos 14.2 Psal 139.24 Heb. 11.25 How can I do this great wickedness and sin against God This is the reasoning of the good Conscience I will take heed to my ways that I sin not I am purposed that my mouth shall not transgress These are the resolutions of the good Conscience Gen. 39.9 Psal 39.1 c. 17.3 How is it with Conscience Happily it hath not with Joab turned after Absalom but hath it turned after Adonijah Vile and refuse sins it will destroy utterly But the fatlings and the best of the sheep that will best serve your carnal pleasures and profits especially Agag the predominant and pleasing sin must they be spared Baals Temple and Priests must fall but must Jeroboams Calves stand Sins against the interest of worldly self be crucified but must sins that feed thy interest be cherished Ah wicked and wretched Conscience 1 King 1.7 1 Sam. 15.9 2 King 10.29 Jam. 4.4 Your Consciences happily strain at Gnats such and such smaller sins But can they swallow Camels greater sins Your Consciences abhor Idols but do you commit Sacriledg You cannot violate a rash Oath with Herod but can you swear rashly and slay the innocent servants of the Lord rather than it shall be said you have not accomplished it Ah deplorable and desperate Consciences Mat. 23.24 Rom. 2.22 Mar. 6.26 27. Again it may be your Consciences cannot but accuse for and do abhor flagitious and open sins You are not extortioners unjust adulterers c. But can they allow those of a fresher dye and less obvious to sight such as are more small or more secret Then surely 't is an evil Conscience Luk. 18.11 Ephes 5.12 Sirs you whose Consciences are both against small and great sins open and in secret against darling sins as well as displeasing sins that would build up as well as such as will break down your fleshes interest You you are the men and women
that have this good Conscience Psal 19.12 13. 4 'T is good as concerns all our capacities § 10 The good Conscience goeth the whole compass of a Christian of Christianity and of his calling For the Christian the good Conscience will have him good without and good within 'T is for inward renovation as well as outward reformation for washing the heart the affections as well as whiting the appearances the actions It 's taken up most about the inward and hidden man calls first for truth in the inward parts the transforming of the Understanding into divine Truths and turning in of the Will unto and determining it upon the Divine goodness And you shall ever find a good Conscience followed with a good Conversation Ephes 4.23 24. Jer. 4.14 1 Pet. 3.4 Psal 51.6 Rom. 12.2 Deut. 26.17 1 Pet. 3.16 For Christianity the good Conscience will forgo none and is found good in all the doctrines and duties and graces both of faith and charity 'T is not only almost but altogether perswaded to be a Christian From the heart hath this Soul obeyed the form of Christian doctrine This Conscience is as were it cast into it and cometh from it as the vessel from the mould into which it was melted * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 1.5 Act. 26.28 29. Rom. 6.17 For our callings the good Conscience will be good in our particular Callings and relations as well as good in our general and as concerns Religion Good as a Subject as well as good as a Saint Innocency was found in me before God and also before thee O King I have done no hurt saith Daniel Chap. 6.22 Good as a Minister of a flock not seeking his own profit but the profit of many that they may be saved Good as a Master of a Family He and his house will serve the Lord He will walk within his house with a perfect heart 1 Cor. 10.33 Josh 24.15 Psal 101.2 In short the good Conscience considers the business as well as the benefit of the relation and calling Conscience directs the business that it be done in the Lord and as he hath limited discusses the business whether it be done or not and calls over the carriage of it and asks the son servant c. as Samuel did Saul What hast thou done And in a word dictates that all businesses be done for the Lord and for Conscience sake Ephes 5.22 chap. 6.10 1 Sam. 13.11 Jer. 8.6 Rom. 13.5 1 Pet. 2.18 19. How is it with you then let Conscience speak an evil Conversation doth loudly proclaim an evil Conscience Or is the outside clean but the inside mean while corrupt You name the name of Christ but are your natures still unchang'd and carnal You are good at the doctrine of Christianity but are you bad at the duties Good at the Temple and in Gods house but bad at your Trades and in your own Houses Good at the Bible with Judas but bad at the Bag Good at your general profession of Religion but bad in your particular places and relations You have then but an evil Conscience Mat. 23.25 28. 2 Tim. 2.19 21. Tit. 1.16 Jer. 7.4 13. Joh. 12.6 Luk. 16.10 11. But as for you whose Consciences run all points of the Compass respects all parts of your callings you into whose conversations Conscience like Christs coat is woven from the top throughout You that are willing in a◠things to live honestly to wear the comfort of a good Conscience as Paul did and Peter directs tacitely Heb. 13.10 2 Cor. 1.12 1 Pet. 3.16 5 'T is good in its whole Compass § 11 The Conscience that is truly good is throughly good This goodness is not at the list only but runs throughout the whole piece 'T is often called the perfect heart 2 Chron. 25.2 1 King 11.4 c. 15.3.14 There is no piece or part of the Conscience but is renewed with Grace though it be renewed but in part 'T is good at the rule in the first Proposition It hath learnt not only the truth of Jesus but the truth as 't is in Jesus Good at the reflection it is to make and the report it is to manifest in the second Proposition Good at the result from both in the third Proposition 'T is good as a rule good as a witness good as a judg So that the Christian is habitually disposed to do what it enjoyneth and endure what is imposed for Conscience sake 1 Pet. 2.19 Rom. 13.5 Is Conscience then sanctified throughout Hath the leaven of special grace leavened the whole lump Is your heart not only studied but sound in Gods statutes Then shall you not be ashamed 1 Thes 5.23 Psal 119.80 6 'T is good for continuance § 12 and in all conditions The good Conscience is good as concerns all times as well as all things I do exercise my self to have always a Conscience void of offence saith Paul Act. 24.16 Though the good Conscience be not always in exercise yet the good man doth exercise himself to have always a good Conscience A good Conscience saith one holds out constantly in a good cause without deflection and in a good course without defection * Dykes Good Cons c. 8. p. 113 Particular failings thereof cannot but be confessed but this is the prevailing frame and ordinary constitution of it Let the times frown or favour be times of prosperity to or persecution of the Church and cause of God yet the good Conscience whether it rain or shine holds on his way and he that hath clean hands shall be stronger and stronger Job 17.9 He may sometimes go out of his way but never will give it over This Soul breaketh for the longing it hath to Gods Testimonies at all times and hath respect unto his Statutes continually his heart may turn aside but is not turned back and though it may sometimes deal foolishly and most times feebly yet dealeth not falsly in Gods Covenant Psal 119.20 117. c. 44.17 18. Let Satan tempt Job the Sabeans trouble c. his Cattel his Corn his Sheep his Servants his Children and all are taken from him but this good Conscience still tarrieth with him He could hold fast none of that great confluence but still he holdeth fast this good Conscience as God himself is witness and Satan doth not withstand it Job 1.13 20. cum 2.3 Still he holdeth fast his Integrity Put it upon the enquiry then in your own spirits What! like Reuben unstable as waters Doth Conscience shift as the winds of worldly profit or preferment sit Now for the Word and now for the World with Demas Would you fain have saved Christ and his concernments as Pilat would from the cruelty of the Jews even now and do you by and by sentence him to death when others would else say you were no friends to Caesar What! good only while Jehojadah your Tutor or Minister c. lived and now grown evil Good only till Balak offers the wages of unrighteousness to
you Good only till the storms of tribulation arise and then farewell Conscience and the house falls Oh miserable and mistaking Consciences Gen. 49.4 2 Tim. 4.10 Joh. 19.21 2 Chron. 24.2 17 18. Num. 22.16 1 Tim. 1.19 Mat. 7.26 27. Yours is the good and honest heart and conscience who bring forth fruit with patience or perseverance * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luk. 8.15 Review your principles Can you say I have enclined my heart to perform thy Statutes always even to the end Reflect on your purposes and are these your practical and permanent resolutions I will never forget thy precepts I will keep thy Law continually for ever and ever I will walk in the name of the Lord my God for ever and ever And if Religion will make me vile I will be more vile Recall your practice Have you taken his Testimonies as an heritage for ever Many perhaps may have been your Persecutors yet have you not declined from his Testimonies And will you yet keep his Precepts with the whole heart vvhatever be the exigencies befall you or enticements to flatter you And shall this God be your God and your portion for ever Go and glorifie God and congratulate thy self in the happiness of a good Conscience Psal 119.112 93 44. Mic. 4.5 2 Sam. 6.22 Psal 119.111 157 69. 48.14.73.26 Fourthly § 13 By the aspect of a good Conscience you may acquaint your selves whether your Consciences are good This is towards God the creator commander of and that alone infallibly knoweth the Conscience 1 Pet. 2.19 Or if towards Man 't is but secondarily and subordinately and towards God primarily First towards God then towards Man towards Man in and for God towards God above and beyond Man Act. 24.16 Q. § 14 Whether we may argue the goodness of our Conscience from their aspect towards God I answer you may But what you are chiefly to attend and ask after is whether God be chief and principal in its aspect For an evil Conscience may have an eye upon God but God is not highest or upmost Joh. 12.43 Tit. 3.3 And a good Conscience may have an eye upon its own happiness and the approbation of others but 't is upon God first and chiefest Heb. 11.16 2 Cor. 4.2 When God â—s the supream in your intentions and your â—ighest aims and ambitions are to be accepted of him and approved by him it is an argument a good Conscience and affords great confidence 2 Cor. 5.8 9 10 17 18. The good Conscience then is 1 For the Power and Authority of God § 15 as by which it is principally ruled The good Conscience will give unto Caesar the things which are Caesars he shall have our subjection not only for wrath but for Conscience sake But it will not give unto Caesar the things which are Gods or set Christ beneath Caesar Conscience remembers there is one Law-giver and resolves it the Lord is our Law-giver Mat. 22.21 Joh. 4.12 Isa 33.12 The good Conscience is for acts of obedience to Governours but 't is limited therein and led thereunto principally by the authority of God 'T is limited thereby if Governours command what God countermands the good Conscience dares not comply to it saith he We onght to obey God rather than men Daniâ—â— purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the Kingâ— meat prohibited by the law Nor will he decline his prayers to God whatever be the decree and prohibition of the supream Governour Let Baals worship bear the Princes and publick warrant Elijah and seven thousand more dare not bow the knee to him oâ— in it Act. 5.29 Dan. 1.8 c. 6.10 1 King 19.18 'T is led thereby also the good Conscience submits to every ordinance of Man but 't is for the Lords sake It counsels us to keep the King's commandment but it s principally quickned by his obligation from and in regard of the Cath of God 1 Pet. 2.13 Eccles 8.2 How is it then can your Conscience willingly pass the commands of Goâ— for the commands of Men and keep their statutes that are contrary to his Commandment and your knowledg rather than you will come to suffer Or do you obey the commands and take up the ordinances of God as Hamor and Shechem and the men of their City did that of Circumcision But 't is for compassing Dinah and the designs they have for Jacob's substance You own the concernments of Christ and officiously assist to his cause and interest as the people sometimes did the Jews and the rulers of the Provinces brought them their assistance but is it because the fear of the Jews or the fear of Mordecai the Christian Magistrate is fallen upon you This is an evil Conscience Hos 5.11 Mic. 6.16 Gen. 34.22 23 24. Esth 8.17 c. 9.3 You that vail the commands of Men to the commands of God and in fulfilling his or their Commandments which correspond with his have your first respects not to humane commands censures or customs or your carnal ends but to the divine command and constitution with good will doing service as to the Lord and not to men you have one good evidence of a good Conscience Act. 4.19 Isa 26.13 Ephes 6.7 2 § 16 'T is for the presence and all-seeing eye of God which it principally respects The good Conscience eyes principally God's knowâ—edg O Lord saith he thou hast searched me and â—nown me Not a word in my tongue not a working of my thoughts but thou knowest it â—ltogether Unto him therefore he openeth his cause sets him before his face and is not so much over-ruled by this that man seeth as by this ordinarily that God seeth him and searcheth his heart and reins This perfect heart is not only for doing that which is good in it self but for doing it as in God's sight Psal 139.1 14. Jer. 20.12 Psal 16.8 c. 7.3 2 King 20.3 I have kept thy Precepts saith this pious Conscience for all my ways are before thee Psal 119.168 How is it then are you most for God's or most for man's eye You make broad your Phylacteries you do works of Piety perhaps and works of Charity but are they done for to be seen of Men Is this the mark you shoot at principally Oh gross hypocrisie and unsound Consciences Mat. 23.5 c. 6.5 Noah and Enoch walked amongst men but with God God was most in their eye The light of Christians shines before men and as their good works may be seen of them But it stays not here they subordinate this to an higher sight and scope that others seeing their good works may glorifie their Father which is Heaven Gen. 5.22 c. 6.9 Mat. 5.16 You that as of God and as in the sight of God so do and so speak who are more preponderated in the course of their practice by his presence than Mens privity or perswasives that walk as before him and are wrought to a greater willingness in his service by his
heart-searching than if any others saw you you have great cause of gratitude to him and of joy in your selves as those who have a good Conscience 2 Cor. 2.17 Psal 44.20 21. Gen. 17.1 1 Chr. 28.9 3 § 17 'T is for the praise and approving it self to God which it principally regardeth The good Conscience is first and most for commending it self and us to God Indeed 't is not he who commendeth himself or whom man commendeth is approved but whom God commendeth 2 Cor. 10.18 'T is true he would by manifestation of the truth commend himself to every mans Conscience and that his service might be accepted of the Saints But 't is as in God's sight and for God's sake that he may be the more serviceable to his glory in their good and 't is first to God then to their Consciences 2 Cor. 4.2 5. Rom. 15.31 2 Cor. 5.11 The great care therefore of the good Conscience is to prove and approve what is acceptable unto the Lord This is that he so aimeth at and is so ambitious of that he may be accepted of him and have grace whereby he may serve him acceptably Ephes 5.10 2 Cor. 5.9 Heb. 12.28 Enquire then do you seek the praise and approbation of Men more than the praise and approbation of God court their applause c. Oh wretched Consciences ye are they which justifie your selves before men but God knoweth your Heartsâ— and this know that which is highly esteemed amongst men is abonâ—nation in the sight of God Joh. 5.44 c. 12.43 Luk. 16.15 But you that seek the honour that cometh from God only and set the highest account upon his comprobation whose praise is not of men but of God that seek his favour with your whole heart and that the words of your mouth and meditations of your heart may be acceptable in his sight Yours yours is the good Conscience Joh. 12.43 Rom. 2.29 Psal 119.68 c. 19.13 14. 4 § 18 'T is for pleasing and applying himself to God to which it principally refers The good Conscience is for Compliance to Gods Will and would so carry it self in its whole work as it and we might receive Enochs Testimony That he pleased God And this one argument is of most observed avail with it That God is pleased Heb. 11.5 c. 13.16 'T is true it is willing to please his Neighbour for his good and would fain please all men in all things that consist with his place and their profit but 't is not for his own ends that he seeks his own profit but for their edification and to exalt God and his Gospel if by any means he may save some the profit of many that they may be saved Rom. 15.2 1 Cor. 10.33 c. 9.19 24. The greatest care of the good Conscience is not so much to please man as to please God If he seeks to gratifie them 't is because he is set to glorifie him 't is with singleness of heart fearing God This is his greatest care to walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing and as he hath received how he ought to walk and to please God so he would fain abound more and more Nothing so pleases him as that God is pleased nothing so provokes him as that God is provoked 1 Cor. 7.32 2 Tim. 2.4 Col. 3.22 c. 1.10 1 Thes 4.1 Psal 69.30 31. How is it then do you seek to please men and to do them a pleasure do not stick to omit the duties of your place and with Herod Felix and Festus to oppress also the defenders of piety Or in the duties of your place is your design ordinarily to please man before God or rather than him If you yet seek to please men how are you then the servants of Christ Nor have you this singleness of heart and Conscience whereto we are speaking Act. 12.3 c. 24.27.25.9 Gal. 1.10 Ephes 6.5 6. You whose desires and designs are principally levelled at the pleasing of God and would be always doing the things which are pleasing in his sight you whose duties to men are not discharged with eye-service as men-pleasers but in singleness of heart as unto Christ you who walk not as pleasing men but as pleasing God which trieth our hearts you have an happy argument of having a good Conscience Joh. 8.29 1 Joh. 3.22 Col. 3.22 1 Thes 2.4 5 § 19 'T is for the possessing and enjoyment of God which it principally requireth and in which it principally rests The good Conscience is for Communion with God above the greatest Comforts whilst others are for Corn and Wine Creature-comforts and Immunities this is for the light of God's Countenance As for me saith he I will behold thy face in righteousness Here is his Blessedness Blessed is the man whom thou choosest and causest to approach unto thee Here is his Business This is the one thing he desireth of the Lord and that he will seek after Psal 4.6 7. c. 17.15 c. 65.4 c. 27.4 'T is true he doth not slight but diligently seeks a competency also of the Goods of this life but first he seeks the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness and would fain see the goodness of God in this Worlds Goods and by them serve his Glory The first and great Commandment as in it felf so to this Soul to the good Conscience is to love the Lord his God with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his mind Prov. 30.8.9 Mat. 6.33 Psal 104.33 34. compared with the former verses Mat. 22.37 38. How is it then What! God not in all your thoughts Is the friendship and fruition of the World sought before the friendship and fruition of God Is the World upmost and God under You can part with God rather than part with your Grandeur Goods c. You can venture the loss of him rather than the loss of them Happily you pray and profess to Him but do you most prize them mean while Do you cry more for Corn and Wine than for the incomes of his Grace the influx of his Goodness the Interest of his Gospel c. Oh sensual and sinful Consciences Psal 10.4 Jam. 4.4 2 Tim. 3.4 c. 4.10 1 Tim. 6.9 10. Hos 7.14 But do you prefer one God to all other Goodness Do you pant most after the grace of his Favour to you and the grace of his Spirit in you Do your Souls pursue after him and will not be put off with Secular commodities and enjoyments Is he the â—oortion that doth best please you Is your Propriety in and intercourse with him of higher price then all other priviledges and possessions to you What! have you none in Heaven but God and is there none upon Earth you desire in comparison with God Certainly you have chosen the better part and may comfortably possess your selves in this sign of a good Conscience Psal 62.5 6 7. c. 42.1 c. c. 63.1 c. c. 16.5 6 7. c. 84.10 c. 73.25 26. Luk. 10.42 6 § 20
'T is for praise to the advancement and glorifying of God which it principally reckons of and finally refers unto The good Conscience is for celebrating God and his Glory in which it ultimately terminates the discharge of its Offices and the debts and obligations it inferreth on us this is Gods end in renewing the Conscience and the great end of Conscience renewed that he might be glorified Isa 43.7 21. c. 60.21 1 Tim. 1.17 This it chargeth most upon it self Bless the Lord O my soul and all that is within me bless his holy Name Bless the Lord O my soul c. Awake up my Glory awake Psaltery and Harp I my self will awake right early This also comforteth it self most in and he is not ashamed but can cheerfully acquiesce whatsoever he doth or endureth for Conscience sake toward God while Christ is magnified in his body and while on his part God is glorified Psal 103.1 2. c. 57.8 Phil. 1.20 1 Pet. 2.19.4.14 This is the great matter which he purposeth with himself and to which he provoketh other Souls I will praise thee O Lord my God with all my heart and I will glorifie thy Name for evermore I will bless the Lord at all times his praise shall be continually in my mouth My soul shall make her boast in God O magnifie the Lord with me and let us exalt his Name together Yea let all such as love thy Salvation say continually the Lord be magnified Psal 86.12 c. 34.1 2 3. 70.4 Let Conscience answer then Do not you like to retain God in your knowledg you know God but are you careless of glorifying him as God And say what is the Almighty that we should serve him and what profit should we have if we pray unto him Or do you scoff at your Brethren which you may have cast out with those in Isaiah saying Let the Lord be glorified O miserable Consciences Rom. 1.21 28. Job 21.14 Isa 66.5 cum ch 5.19 Or while you pretend to Gods glory do you prefer your own Are your acts of piety your almes or acts of charity done principally that you may have glory of men unto whom ye would outwardly appear righteous Verily you have your reward and still remain with rotten and unsound Consciences Mat. 6.2 1 Thes 2.6 Mat. 23.27 28. But you that vail your own glory to Gods the bias and bent of whose good works which men behold is to this mark that they may glorifie not so much you as God in and for you in the day of Visitation you that can venture and forgo all for Gods glory when he calls for it and count of nothing so high as his honour you whose fruits of righteousness are with this final respect that your Father may be glorified and you may shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light You that have glorified him and are resolved you will glorifie him again Go eat your bread with joy and drink your wine with a merry heart for God now accepteth thy work He that speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory but he that seeketh his glory that sent him the same is true and no unrighteousness is in him Joh. 8.50 1 Pet. 2.12 Mat. 5.16 2 Cor. 12.9 10. Phil. 1.11 1 Pet. 2.9 Eccles 9.7 Joh. 7.18 Fifthly § 21 By the answer of a good Conscience which if Peter be consulted is towards God 1 Pet. 3.21 Quest Whether we may argue the goodness of our Conscience from their answer towards God I answer you may But then 't is not so much from your present earnestness therein as from the powerful efficacy and proportionate extent thereof that you must take your evidence for you shall find bad Consciences furnished with quick and ready answers as if they would not abridge God of the least he calls for Deut. 5.27 28 29. Jer. 42.5 6. You are concerned to discuss the deliberateness of the answer and its due extent The good Conscience answers to Gods Call § 22 Commands c. 1 To Gods Call No sooner is the Conscience effectually convinced or hath Christ effectually called but you have the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle phrases it of the good Conscience Conscience answers with Samuel Speak Lord for thy servant heareth and with David Lo I come I delight to do thy will O my God yea thy Law is within my heart 1 Sam. 3.10 Psal 40.7 8. Yea Conscience asks with Saul Lord what wilt thou have me to do Teach me thy way O Lord I will walk in thy truth Vnite my heart to fear thy name Conscience sets him upon the Tower with Habakkuk and will watch to see what God will say unto him and what he shall answer when he is convinced or argued with Act. 9.6 Psal 86.11 Hab. 2.1 How is it then hath God called but ye would not answer Hath he spoken but ye would not hear Have you set at nought his counsel and despised his reproof Have you chosen your own ways and doth your Soul delight it self in your abominations You have then sinful and stupid Consciences Prov. 1.24 25. Isa 65.12 c. 66.3 4. But you whose Ears are bored to hear and your Hearts are brought to embrace the Calls of Grace You that with Simon and Andrew his Brother with James the Son of Zebedee and John his Brother at the Call of Christ can quit all when he once said Come ye after me You that attend the saving motions of his Spirit and addict your selves to this mystery of Godliness whose Hearts are determined upon God in Christ and to whom no Calls are so acceptable as are the Calls from sin and to his service you may comfortably reflect and repose your selves in the witness of a good Conscience Mar. 1.16 21. 1 Cor. 16.15 Job 22.21 22. ch 27.6 2 To Gods Commands § 32 The good Conscience corresponds to Gods Commandments not only as it conserves and apprehends Law Here is a Copy and Transcript within of the Command and Truths without The Law of God is in his Heart the Spirit of the living God hath written it in these fleshly Tables Psal 37.31 Jer. 31.33 2 Cor. 3.3 But as it comes and applies Law hath God said Seek ye my face Conscience speaks back My Heart said unto thee Thy face Lord will I seek Hath God commanded us to keep his Precepts diligently Conscience corresponds and crys out O that my ways were directed to keep thy statutes Doth God require that we do his will I delight to do thy wiâ—â— saith Conscience Psal 27.8 c. 119.4 5. c. 40.7 8. Try then what agreement find you between his Commands and your Consciences Are you afraid of the restraint of God's Laws and would break these bands from you and can you not bear these cords Do you hate him that rebuketh in the Gate and abhor the Ministry that speaks uprightly and searcheth the inward parts of the belly as Ahab did Micajah for saith he He
never prophesieth good but always evil to me Surely this is an evil Conscience Psal 2.3 Amos 5.10 2 Chron. 18.7 Or how do your Hearts answer and are accommodated to his Testimonies Have God's Commands a counter-part in your Consciences Have you hid his Law in your Hearts that you may not sin against him And are your Hearts enclined to perform his Statutes always even to the end Gods Law commands you Do your Hearts readily accept and return answer to it I will run the way of thy Commandments and have respect unto thy ways I will delight my self in thy Statutes I will not forget thy Word Psal 119.11 15 16 32 112. Gods Law chides and threatens you How do your Hearts rellish it and acquiesce under it Is it a kindness Do you count it an excellent Oyl Do you compose your selves to submission under it and to serve the ends of God by it Psal 141.5 Isa 39.8 1 Sam. 3.18 Mich. 7.9 Here is one answer of a good Conscience 3 To Gods Covenant § 24 The good Conscience gives answer to Gods Covenant 1. to the tenour of it God saith unto them which were not his people Thou art my people The good Conscience speaks back again Thou art my God O my Soul saith David thou hast said unto the Lord thou art my God Hos 2.23 Psal 16.2 Ezek. 11.20 c. 36.28 2. To the terms of it The Lord avoucheth Believers to be his peculiar people and that they should keep all his Commandments The good Conscience restipulates and avoucheth the Lord to be his God and to walk in his ways and to keep his Statutes and his Commandments c. Deut. 26.17 18. Exod. 19 5. 9.3 To the Truths in it The good Conscience hath a Transcript of all the important Truths of Gods Covenant This shall be the Covenant I will make with them after those days saith the Lord I will put my Law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts Jer. 31.33 Heb. 8.8 9 10. Come then who is he that hath engaged his heart to approach unto me saith the Lord Have you taken the Lord for your God and alone chief good and given back your selves unto him his servants to obey and that for ever Have you none in Heaven but God and is there none upon Earth that you desire besides God And have you taken his Testimonies as an Heritage for ever and chosen the way of his Truths This may let you know that you have a good Conscience Jer. 30.21 22. c. 32.28 Psal 73.25 c. 119.30 111. I will give them an heart to know me that I am the Lord and they shall be my people and I will be their God for they shall return unto me with their whole heart Jer. 24.7 Is there a Conversion to God the Conscience is good But no Conversion no good Conscience Hath God commanded you saying Obey my voice and I will be your God and ye shall be my people and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you that it may be well with you But you hearken not nor encline your ears and walk in your own counsels and imaginations refuse Communion with God or reject any of the known Commands of God or regard any iniquity or any interest above God you have then evil Hearts and your Consciences are not right in the sight of God Jer. 7.23 24. c. 3.17 Numb 85.39 Psal 66.18 4 To the cause of God § 25 The good Conscience is for Gods cause above others above its own this is the bottom in which it sails all its concernments and therefore with Paul and with Moses is cool and gentle in transacting his own matters but quick and transported with great heat in the matters of God and Godliness forgives and is submissive to his own enemies but flames with zeal and is stiff and inflexible to Gods enemies Gal. 4.12 cum 5.12 Act. 13.9 c. Num. 12.3 cum Exod. 30.19 If the Cause of God calls for his part in action he is ready and willingly offers himself according to his office and the capacity and circumstances he is in If it calls for a passive part he can for Conscience toward God endure grief suffering wrongfully and is ready not only to be bound but also to die for his sake 2 Cor. 9.2 Judg. 5.2 9. 2 Cor. 8.3 1 Pet. 2.19 Act. 21.13 You that like Gallio care for none of these things that seek your own things not the things which are Jesus Christs whose Spirits are abundantly raised in your own Cause but ordinarily remiss in Gods Cause have no good Conscience Act. 18.17 Phil. 2.21 Psal 137.5 6. But you that prefer Hierusalem to your chief joy that say unto Zion because of the house of the Lord our God we will seek thy good that will very gladly spend and be spent for the good of Souls and glory of their Saviour that sacrifice your own Concernments to those of Christ and his Church and would rejoyce to be offered upon the sacrifice and service of their faith and rejoyce in your sufferings with respect to his service Receive this sign and may you reap the sense of a good Conscience Psal 137.6 122.9 2 Cor. 12.15 Phil. 2.17 Col. 1.24 5 To the counsels of God § 26 and his dispensations towards them The good Conscience would hold Communion with God in his Works as well as in his Word and doth especially consider of and commemorates what God hath done for his Soul Psal 107.43 94.19 66.16 Hath God accepted his person answered his prayers afforded him his presence of Grace c. it binds him the faster to God Blessed be God saith he who hath not turned away my prayer nor his mercy from me He will love God the more choicely live with God the more closely lean on and trust in God the more constantly Ps 66.19 20.116 throughout 146.1 2. Doth God afflict and is angry with him with-draws the sense of his Salvation with-holds the spirit of Peace and the waters are come even into his Soul He considers and confesses his sin communes with himself converts and turns himself to God crieth for his Salvation chargeth his Soul to hope in to obey to remember and to repose it self in God Psal 32.5 c. 38.6 c. 42.5 11. 51.1 12. 77.1 13. 13.1 6. I should be too large if I left particular instances as may concern either the inward or outward man Put it upon the enquiry The Providences of God are various toward you How do you answer the acts of God and his aimes by them What no laying them to heart Happily he may have brought his judgments at the doors and yet do not you lay it to heart not so much as ask what have I done nor hearken to him for all this to observe his Counsels or obey his Commandments Happily he may have multiplied his mercies or you and do you not yet say in your hearts Let us now fear
the Lord our God but the mercies which he gave to humble and to prove you you abuse to pride and luxury c. Oh sinful and sensless Consciences Isa 42.25 Jer. 8.7 Hos 7.2 Jer. 5.24 Deut. 8.16 17. Or do you answer his administrations of justice with trying your ways and turning to the Lord Do you labour to see his mind in them and to learn more skill in his Statutes through them And doth Conscience call upon you Come and let us return to the Lord our God and by sound Conversion to seek a cure for them In administrations of Mercy doth Conscience ordinarily attend abett and argue from thence to duty And when it hath put the question What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits toward me Doth it proceed to the Psalmist's conclusive resolution I will take the 〈◊〉 of Salvation and call upon the name of the Lord I will pay my vows unto the Lord I will wâ—â— before the Lord in the land of the living c. Iâ— short is Conscience wont to answer the dispensations of mercy with more dearness foâ— God and his glory and with more degrees 〈◊〉 humility as it did in Jacob and in David theâ— is yours a good Conscience Psal 103. through out Ezra 9.13 14. Gen. 32.10 2 Sam. 7.18 19. 6 To the Copy of God § 27 The Conscience which is statedly good setteth the Christian upon Conformity to God he abhorreth sauciness with God as blasphemous and aspireth after similitude to God as his eminent business He knoweth that God is righteous and thence concludeth to be a doer of righteousness God is pure and as his hope is in him so he purifieth himself in Conformity to him God hath made it an argument Be ye boly for I am holy Conscience bearing his Authority brings the same argument also and Christ binds it upon the Conscience 1 Joh. 2.29 c. 3.3 1 Pet. 1.15 16. Mat. 5.48 Little Children let no man deceive you if God hath not drawn out his resemblance upon you if you are not doers of Righteousness as God is righteous If Conscience can permit you to walk in darkness while you profess to that God who is a pure light whatever be your pleas that your Consciences are good they are but pretensions not proofs your Consciences are still bad You that are ordinarily looking at and labouring to come as nigh as you may unto your Copy That are followers of God as dear Children that are created after God in righteousness and true holiâ—ess and whose care it is to be as immutable â—ntensive and extensive as you can in goodâ—ess You are the Children of God our Father who hath given to you a good Conscience 〈◊〉 Joh. 3.7 9. c. 1.5 6 7. 1 Pet. 1.14 Eph. 5.1 c. 4. â—4 Mat. 5.45 I have used a greater length and liberty of Speech in this Question than I have in former or shall in future Cases the importance thereof enforced me If Conscience be good your condition is good if Conscience be naught your condition is naught too as will be seen hereafter Be therefore the more thorough and serious in the trial of your selves still remembring this just Limit in all thy helps for knowledg hereof given you That your ordinary or usual tendency and habitude must be attended 'T is not what your Conscience is for a fit or in some sudden flash either as to good or as to evil but what your common frame and general or most usual temper is must be consulted Q. 5. Whether we may know that our Consciences be statedly and Evangelically good Though your Consciences are lockt up from the knowledg of others and are comprehensively and fully known only by God himself for who can understand his errors Psal 19.12 Yet every man may know what the stated habitude of his Conscience is if he will but deliberately discuss and carefully commune with and impartially attend and improve the judgment of his own Conscience As seems evident 1 By the description of its Nature 'T is the candle of the Lord searching not some but all not only the outward parts of the body but the inward parts of the belly i.e. the inwards acts and thoughts and therefore the the habitude and temper of the Heart elsewhere expressed by the Belly Prov. 20.7 cum Job 15.2 35. c. 32.18 19. The Spirit of Man i.e. the Conscience of Man knoweth the things of Man and within Man The Heart i.e. the Conscience knoweth its own bitterness and therefore may know its own blessedness 1 Cor. 2.11 Prov. 14.10 2 By the demands from and for it in Scripture Know ye not your selves i.e. your Consciences and so what your and their state and condition is whether you be in the faith whether Christ be in you 2 Cor. 13.5 Let every man prove his work and then shall he have rejoycing in himself which springs from the Testimony of a good Conscience Gal. 6.4 2 Cor. 1.12 3 By the declared sense hereof we find among the Saints Job's record is on high and in his own heart Job 16.19 c. 27.5 6. David and Hezekiah can and do confidently appeal the all-knowing God in it Psal 26.2 3. 17.3 Isa 38.3 Hear Paul We trust we have a good Conscience 'T is not we think or we hope but we trust 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we are perswaded are confident of it which confidence we may raise upon the same foundation that he did In all things willing to live honestly Heb. 13.18 Q. 6. How may we get or obtain a good Conscience The Premises in answer to the former Question are of place and pertinent use here also as likewise whatsoever shall be prescribed hereafter for obtaining a pure peaceable upright faithful Conscience c. Here I advise you these few things * See Perkin's Tom. 1. Treat of Conscience c. 4. p. 551. Sheffield's good Conscience ch 25. Dyke's good Consc c. 5 6. That you Direct 1 1 Act Consideration * See Motives in Dyke's good Cons c. 10. ad finem Consideration is the next step to the Conversion of thy self the change of thy estate and the setting of thy Conscience right in the sight of God Psal 119.59 60. 45.10 11. 50.21 22. See Q. 4. Direct 3. Consider therefore in thy Heart Deut. 4.39 c. 8.5 If my Conscience shall be good Then 1 My Condition will be good secure Conscience for the main and thou securest thy Condition for the main Thy Condition is as thy Conscience is good or bad as this is good or bad in the sight of God Amaziah's Condition was bad though the current of his Actions was materially good because his Conscience was bad he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord but not with a perfect heart nor like his father David 2 Chron. 25.2 2 King 14.3 Jehoshaphat's Condition was good though he were chargeable with some things that were signally bad because his Conscience was good Nevertheless
there are good things found in thee in that thou hast prepared thine heart to seek God 2 Chron. 19.2 3. 2 My conversation will be good Conscience hath the ducture of it the dominion over it as it goeth well or ill in Conscience within so it will be in thy Conversation without See Q. 4. Make the Tree good and his Fruit is good * Non erit fructus bonus nisi arboris bonae muta Cor mutabitur opus Aug. de verb. Dom. Ser. 12. Make the Tree corrupt and his Fruit is corrupt Mat. 12.33 34. Rehoboam's course of life was bad in that his Conscience was bad Because he prepared not his heart to seek the Lord. Ezra's on the contrary was good in that his Conscience was good Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the Law of the Lord 2 Chron. 12.14 Ezra 7.10 See 1 Pet. 3.16 3 My Capacities will be good These are regulated by the Conscience and are renewed with the Conscience 1. Your receptive Capacities whereby you receive from God will be enlarged and enabled to take in more from him both of his truth and goodness Natural Conscience cannot receive the things of the Spirit of God but the Renewed can receive them and that with all readiness and in much riches Grace for Grace from Christ the Word joy and gladness from and with the Word of Christ the Spirit of Adoption sweet and full assurance c. 1 Cor. 2.12 14. Act. 17.11 Col. 2.2 Joh. 1.16 1 Thes 1.6 Rom. 8.15 Heb. 10.22 2. Your active Capacities whereby you return to God and work out your everlasting good Have you a good Conscience you will be willing in all things to live honestly Heb. 13.18 The evil Conscience contracts and straitens the good Conscience dilates and wâ—â—ens the Capacity of Man here is true largâ—ess of Heart the fetters of Sin now fall off the Mind will be enlarged to know and consider the Will to elect and embrace the Lord and his Laws the Memory to record and recall and the very Members to run the way of his Testimonies 1 King 4.29 Prov. 2.10 11 12. Psal 119.32 4 Then and not else are others Commendations good As the fining-pot for silver and the furnace for gold so is a man to his praise Prov. 27.21 The sense is variously given this seems to me most full and consonant if ch 17.3 be compared where the same comparison is used So is a man to the trial of his Praise Others Commendations are to be case into the fining-pot of our own Consciences If these convince that we are dross what are we the better though they cry us up for Gold Let thy Conscience be good or their Commendatio will not do good but hurt * Non ideo bona est Conscientia quia vos illam laudatis Quid enim laudatis quod non videtis Aug. de Verb. Dom. Serm. 49. 'T is not whom Man commendeth but whom God commends and Conscience commends in and under God that is approved 2 Cor. 10.18 1 Joh. 3.20 5 My Comforts will be great Who knoweth the great Comforts of a good Conscience Of which hereafter 'T is acknowledged that Comfort doth immediately grow rather out of the Testimony of a good Conscience than out of its truth of goodness But this is the root and fountain-head of it that the Conscience is truly good and this streams shame and consternation to accusers support and comfort to such as have this good Conscience 2 Cor. 1.12 1 Pet. 3.16 Let the fountains of the deep be broken up this will be an Ark of safety from the Deluge and a continual feast in the days of affliction and distress 1 Pet. 3.21 Prov. 15.15 6 My Crown will be glorious Assure the Conscience good here and I dare assure you the Crown of Glory hereafter The good Conscience hath its record on high and is assured of its reward on high Its Witness is in Heaven and it ensureth a welfare in Heaven also There is a great recompense of reward if you keep your Conscience and cast not away your confidence No sooner shall you have discharged your Consciences but God will deliver you the Crown I have fought a good fight saith Paul I have finished my course henceforth is laid up for me a crown of righteousness which the Lord the righteous Judg shall give me at that day and not to me only but unto all them also that love his appearing Job 16.19 Heb. 10.35 2 Tim. 4.7 8. 2ly Argue it with Conscience Direct 2 Self-reasoning conduceth much to self-reformation arguing with Conscience to the amendment of Conscience Psal 42.5 11. 43.5 1. Argue from its preferring honour by this it is that I am difference from and dignified beyond the bruits and shall my glory descend in shame and my best honour in a worse than brutish obstinacy shall their brutish goodness out-brave mine who have the principles of a man and bear the profession of a Christian shall they know and I not consider shall their knowledg be according to its kind good and my Conscience continue bad Let mens credit be never so great if their Conscience be not therewith good they are accounted no better than beasts in the sight of God Isa 1.3 Jer. 8.7 Psal 49.20 2. From the place it holds 1. In Man Conscience is not placed in the lower sensitive and earthly but in the higher intellectual and heavenly part of Man shall my best be evil my light darkness my heaven-born power but as an earthen pitcher If I be not good in this where should where shall I be good 2. Over Man God hath given it dominion over the whole man and 't is to have the ducture in all matters and shall not my Conscience be good whose command is so great shall that abide yet further evil whose authority is of so vast extent 3. Under God He hath made it a god to thee as Moses sometimes was to Pharaoh Exod. 7.1 It is God's Vicegerent in thee who is and doth good and shall not this be good that holds next under God 3. From the perfections it had How choice were they as Conscience was created and came off from the workmanship of God! Eccles 7.29 Col. 3.10 Ephes 4.24 And doth not every Creature even to the crawling worm contend toward the recovery of its lost perfection and proper good Shall man then or shall I only who am endowed with an intelligent and immortal Spirit sit down at rest in the evil lost by me and not reach after the good that lieth before me and is tendered to me 4. From the power it hath It can as one saith * Annesly Lect. Ep. 5. do any thing but make evil good Let Conscience be bad and it maketh not only an indifferent but a good action bad as before Let Conscience be good and it maketh an indifferent Action good and though it doth not alter the nature yet it abateth the malignity of an Action that is in
to have that he pluck it away also and that he punish this violence and their voluntary resistance with a final remorslesness Psal 51.10 1 Tim. 1.19 Jer. 9.3 Rom. 1.28 9. Inordinate cares shame and fears which overcharge Conscience and are offended with the Cross You must expect contempt and to endure the Cross if you will exercise and enjoy a good Conscience shame and fear decline those and you must therefore decline these divert them rather upon their proper Objects Be ashamed and afraid of sin as the greatest evil and of losing the sight and salvation of God who is the greatest good as you are advised by the Apostle for having a good Conscience 1 Pet. 3.14 15 16. c. 4.12 13 16. 'T is no matter of shame or fear to suffer for Conscience 't is a fearful thing indeed to suffer in or from Conscience But â—â—o this is thank-worthy an expression beyond any other in all the Bible if a man for Conscience toward God endure grief suffering wrongfully 1 Pet. 2.19 Secondly There are some things to be done If you would ensure the custody of a good Conscience 1. Employ your strictest care Sin and Satan lay their main Batteries against this the good Conscience is the grand Citadel of a gracious Christian get this and they get all keep this and ye keep all You are proportionably concerned to preserve the outer guards in your Conversations but you are principally concerned to preserve the inner and main guard of your Conscience Keep this and it will keep thee But remember as it was not gotten idly so neither is it kept but with industry Keep thy heart with diligence nay with all diligence and above all keeping and good reason for out of it are the issues of life Prov. 2.10 11. c. 4.20 21 23. 2. Extend this care to all the sorts and kinds of a good Conscience To the pure peaceable sincere soft and tender Conscience c. and touching which we shall instruct hereafter yea and to the whole circuit and compass of Conscience Take a prospect of every part in every proposition that it may be good both as a Rule and as a Witness and as a Judg Of which also you may expect in the ensuing parts of this Discourse 3. Hear Conscience Conscience hath a voice within you as well as Christ in his Word without you a voice * of correction in case of evil Why art thou cast down O my soul c Psal 43.5 A voice of counsel and direction for continuance and growth in good as David's had My reins also instruct me in the night-season Psal 16.7 Hear counsel then and receive instruction that thou mayst be wise in the latter end Conscience never hardens till it is not heard the more attention is given by you the more authority is gained to it and the better advise it giveth to you Attend the directions and discourse of Conscience then as Joseph and Nehemiah did who thereby kept an unspotted Conscience amidst all aspersions and calumnies Prov. 19.20 Gen. 39.9 Neh. 6.11 4. Estate it often by its Copy or Original rather the Holy Scriptures These are the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the prime rule and standard by which you must pass and square Conscience Christians must write them a Copy of this Law in the Book of Conscience if they would be kept incorrupt and from crooked ways and examine this exscript often by that as the Kings of Israel must Conscience is to be instead of a mouth to Scriptures as Aaron was to Moses but the Scripture is to be instead of a God to Conscience as Moses was to Aaron Deut. 17.17 18 19. Exod. 4.16 Conscience is to every man as his Book as Bernard * Vnicuique suus libeâ— est conscientiu Conferamus itaque libros nostroscum librovitae ne fortè in illa ultima discussione abjiciantur si non fuerint emendati De Cons l. 1. c. 9. well observeth but such as must be examined by the Bible compared with and corrected by it Order my steps in thy Word saith David Thy Testimonies also are my delight and my counsellors Psal 119.133 24. Order Conscience by this through all its offices and proceeds Is Conscience a rule The Word must be the Regula regulans Conscience is but Regula regulata Conscience must take the rule from Christ in his Word and then give it to the Christian for the weighing of his Estate and Actions The Word is the lamp for the feet and light for the paths Psal 119.105 Is Conscience a witness If you look that it witness the Truth and in truth have it to the Law and to the Testimony Isa 8.20 Is Conscience a Judg If you would have it judg righteous judgment away with it to the Word of Righteousness which shall judg you in the last day Joh. 12.48 5. Engage the choice and constant resolutions of your wills It is well with Conscience while the Will is constant and cleaves unto God with full purpose let the Will be preserved steady and its welfare will be preserved in safety The weal of Conscience much-what follows the Will 's choice and when this is found divided that is faulty and diseased Act. 11.23 Hos 10.2 'T is said 1 Tim. 1.19 they put away a good Conscience and concerning Faith made ship-wrack Their loss did not arise as from its next cause from other's violence but their own voluntariness Satan seducers sufferings could never have pulled it away if they themselves had not put it away They made ship-wrack rather than endured ship-wrack Well then if you would still have a good Conscience be willing in all things to live honestly Heb. 13.18 6. Eye God's all-seeing knowledg Let thy Conscience keep its eye upon God who keepeth his eye upon thy Conscience Set the Lord alway before thy face with David and set thy self always before the face of the Lord with Paul As of God as in the sight of God so steer thy whole course Keep thy Conscience on God and God will keep thy Conscience who hath said Walk before me and be thou perfect Psal 16.8 2 Cor. 2.17 Gen. 17.1 Conscience is a knowledg together with the Lord look to it then in every creek and turn of thy life Doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it and he that keepeth thy soul doth not he know it Prov. 24.12 Psal 44.21 The prospect David took of Gods omniscient knowledg preserved a tender gracious and holy Conscience Psal 139. I have kept his precepts and thy testimonies saith he elsewhere for all my ways are before thee Eye him that is invisible with Moses whose eye is upon all thy goings Tell Conscience as Laban told Jacob No man is with us But see God is witness betwixt me and thee And forget not his Mizpah that is a Beacon or Watch-tower and say to it with him The Lord watch between me and thee when we are absent one from another Psal 119.168 Heb. 11.27 Gen. 31.49 50.
7. Exercise your selves to have always a good Conscience So Paul Herein do I exercise my self to have always a Conscience void of offence toward God and toward men Act. 24.16 Conscience will not be ensured or preserved without consideration exercise and pains 1. Co-united endeavours there must be as respects the subject Herein do I exercise my self 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this is his study his labour his work his business which took up his outward specially his inward man Of so large an import is that word Here is matter enough to take up the whole Man Mind Memory Will Affections Members which had need be all imployed either for informing of or conforming to Conscience 2 Continued endeavours they must be as respects the circumstances Herein do I exercise my self always Let the times frown or favour the good Conscience let Conscience smite or smile whether you are under the arrests of Judgment or the happy liberties of mercy whether men speak well or ill whether the Candle of the Lord shine upon you on the one hand or the calumnies of men like so many arrows stick fast in you on the other whatever business be before you this business must not be behind or be neglected by you and herein use an holy constancy as you would maintain an holy Conscience and be able to say with Paul I have lived in all good Conscience before God until this day 1 Pet. 3.15 Job 27.6 3 Comprehensive endeavours they must be both as respects the state of Conscience that it be void of offence and the objects it regardeth likewise both toward God and toward man Keep the Conscience inoffensive if you would keep it entire and Evangelically good 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is sometimes passively taken Phil. 1.10 Sometimes actively 1 Cor. 10.32 that Conscience neither give nor take offence either offend or be offended Eye Conscience in both kinds and herein exercise your selves constantly nor only as respects God nor only as respects man but as respects both God and Man first as respects God then as respects Man Let Religion toward God and Righteteousness toward Man be your continued exercise and you will neither impair the tranquillity nor injure the tenderness of your Conscience Job 2.3 Psal 15. Isa 33.15 16. Conscience hath both Tables of the Law committed originally to it The Conscience again committeth them as Josiah did to the other Powers as its inferior Officers when these bring Conscience word as Shaphan brought the King back word again saying All that was committed to thy servants they do it Then we have both a sincere and inoffending and also a secure and inoffended Conscience 2 Chr. 34.15 16. 8. Exercise Conscience oftner if you would have it always good The weal of Conscience lyes much-what within the walls of conscience If you vvould keep conscience vvell you must keep conscience at vvork sloth vvill beget sickness beget sin and incense justice to take away your talent Mat. 25.28 2. 1 Be frequent in examining Conscience ask how the case stands the frequent'st trier is usually the forward'st thriver in the School of Christ and of Conscience as well as of humane Literature The more you prove and examine Conscience the more you provoke and engage it for after-times and improve the experiences antecedent Psal 77.6 c. 2 Be forward in exciting Conscience Is it incident to drowsiness distempers deadness call upon it the oftener rouse it up by awakening Considerations thy Conscience is keeper of the Vineyards the other faculties and thine own Vineyard hast thou not kept Put it in remembrance of its duty and thy danger Provoke it by arguments of mercy and alarums of justice that if thou must say with the Spouse I sleep yet thou may'st say with her my heart waketh Psal 108.2 Cant. 1.6 c. 5.2 3 Be faithful in exonerating Conscience Whatever Conscience directed by the Word of God dictateth fail not to do it whatever it forbids thee forbear it else thou teachest Conscience to forbear thee limiting Conscience and not listning to Conscience are a ready way to the losing of Conscience 'T is miserable when men are churlish with Conscience and it must be said of you as Nabal's servants said of him He is such a son of Belial that Conscience cannot speak to him 1 Sam. 25.17 Listen to Conscience then and be led by it so shalt thou live in all good Conscience As God said to Abraham so say I to thee In all that Sarah in all that Conscience shall say unto thee hearken unto her voice If you would hold a good Conscience obey a good Conscience if it may not be heard it will away If it may command thee it will continue with thee Act. 23.1 Gen. 21.12 2 Tim. 1.3 1 Tim. 3.9 9. Exercise the good that is in and with your Conscience Actuate and imploy your implanted habits of Grace and these will grow into greater increases Keep up the lively exercise of Faith Love and Repentance and you keep up the exercise and enjoyment of a good Conscience These say to Conscience as David sometime did to Abiatbar Abide with us fear not he that seeketh thy life seeketh our life With us thou shalt be in safety Prov. 4.18 1 Sam. 22.23 Rinse Conscience upon every fall thou catchest from the filth which thou contractest in the waters of repentance The more tears of Contrition the more tenderness of Conscience and transcendent comfort Psal 51. Job 11.14 15. Raise and quicken Faith this will subdue enemies without sanctifie Conscience within sprinkle the blood of Jesus on it and suck continued virtue from his blessed promises 1 Joh. 5.4 5. Act. 26. Heb. 10.22 23. Repeat and continue the dear and delicious acts of Love which will facilitate the Commandments to you free Conscience in you and fits you to whatever capacity Christ shall call you 1 Joh. 5.3 1 Cor. 13.4 8. CHAP. III. Of the Pure and Defiled Conscience Q. 1. Whether the Conscience in man be naturally pure or defiled Touching this I must return you to what hath been already spoken Chap. 2. Quest 2. and 3. Q. 2. Whether a pure Conscience be attainable by man in this life THere is a double purity of the Conscience 1. Exact and legal as fully answers to what the Law asks 2. Evangelical and more large as fitly agrees with what the Gospel allows That excludes all degrees of pollution and includes all degrees of perfection this allows no degree of pollution and aspires after the highest degree of perfection 1. That legal and exact purity of the Conscience neither can nor ever was attained since the Fall by any meer man in this life 1. Who was ever priviledged in this life from the pollution of Conscience Who can say I have made my heart clean I am pure from my sin Who can understand his errors Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean as man is not one There is not a just man upon the earth
that doth good and sinneth not Prov. 20.9 Psal 19.12 Job 14.4 Eccles 7.20 2. Who was ever possessed in this life with the perfection of Conscience Conscience is never perfected till the Christian is perfected and the body of sin and this sinful body be put off fully 1 Cor. 13.10 c. Phil. 3.12 c. What is man that he should be clean His Conscience is miserably polluted and seared who durst pretend to perfection in the sight of God and wretchedly deceiveth himself and denieth the Scriptures of God Job 15.14 15 16. c. 25.4 5 6. c. 11.4 5. 1 Joh. 1.1 8 10. 2ly This Evangelical purity of the Conscience is attainable in this life and should be attained 't is possible we may and God's pleasure that that we do and must endeavour for and ensure it Lo 1. Man is admonished and called upon for it Purifie your hearts ye double minded Wash your hearts from your wickedness Have them sprinkled from an evil Conscience Purge your selves cleanse your selves from all filthiness of the spirit Hold the mystery of faith in a pure Conscience which implicitely requireth that you have a pure Conscience wherein to hold it In short the end of the Commandment is Charity out of a pure heart and of a good Conscience Jam. 4.8 Jer. 4.14 Heb. 10.22 2 Tim. 2.21 2 Cor. 7.1 1 Tim. 3.9 c. 1.5 2. Means are afforded and communicated for it Without us the Word and Ordinances within us Faith Hope c. Above us the Blood and Spirit of Christ whereby the Conscience may be purged from dead works Of which some things have been premised and more will be subjoyned hereafter Q. 5. If this mercy were not to be attained wherefore are these means they were as to this in vain and to no purpose appointed 3. Many have attained it Paul thanks God whom he served from his forefathers with a pure Conscience The Deacons held the mystery of faith in a pure Conscience Wherefore should I multiply instances in whomsoever there was or is a living faith and lively hope it did and doth purifie the Heart and Conscience 2 Tim. 1.3 1 Tim. 3.9 Act. 15.9 1 Joh. 3.3 In short whosoever believeth is pure hath all things pure to himself and his Mind and Conscience purified in him Tit. 1.15 Q. 3. Whether a Man's Conscience may be habitually impure and defiled and he not apprehensive of it Though all the Sons of Men may know de facto and should know de jure Whether their Consciences are pure or polluted yet many a man's Conscience is habitually impure and polluted and he knoweth it not 1. Witness Scriptures There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes yet is not washed from their filthiness Prov. 30.12 Laodicea saith I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing and knoweth not that she is wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked Instances would be endless Luk. 18.11 12. Isa 65.5 2. What else is the work of the Spirit of the Scriptures and of the servants of God by office but to convince of sin and shut up the Conscience of sinners in the sense of their sinful condition to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light that they that see not may see the defiled and deplorable state in which they have been and yet are and be at length convicted as those Pharisees were by their own Conscience Joh. 16.8 9. Act. 26.18 Psâ—l 19.8 Joh. 9.39 c. 8.9 Shall I point you whence it ariseth 1. Partly from want of self discussion Conscience is seldom or never put to the question by them or they by Conscience They consider not in their hearts Heb. They say not to their hearts Hos 7.2 How could those loose and wicked wretches so insolently insist upon it We are wise and the law of the Lord is with us But that they held fast deceit and no man said in his heart what have I done Jer. 8.5 6. cum 9.2 Principally from a wretched self-indulgence Self-love flatters men into a fond opinion of themselves and pride inflames them into a foolish ostentation and both render them averse to the knowledg of the worst by themselves afraid that Conscience do its work with much strictness and arms them also against â—orreign arguments and convictions with deâ—ensive pleas and pretensions lâ—t him hear the words of the Curse Yet he blesseth himself in â—is own heart saying I shall have peace though I walk in the imagination of mine heart c. Deut. 29.19 Q. 4. How may we know whether our Consciences are habitually pure or defiled Put Conscience to it press home upon your hearts as in the presence of the most high God these three Questions which I here present and tender you First What is thy Conscience purified in If Conscience be purified at all 't is purified in all in every orb every office every part and proper officine of the Conscience 't is frequently called the perfect heart 1 King 15.14 1 Chron. 28.9 c. 29.19 2 Chron. 25.2 Understand it of an integral perfection there is no part of Conscience but is purified 1. Conscience is pure as a law it conserveth pure and holy laws and because they are very pure therefore doth this soul love them Psal 19.8 c. 119.140 2. Conscience is pure as it applyeth this law as for the pure his work is right that which this Conscience eyes is purity both in it self and in what is subordinated to it by all the acts generally it puts forth Prov. 21.8 Heb. 10.22 'T is an heart after God's own heart and therefore with the pure will shew himself pure and preserves the mysteries of faith in a pure mind and Conscience 1 Sanâ— 13.14 Psal 18.26 1 Tim. 3.9 Call Conscience then before thee commune with thâ— own heart Hath the water of purifying passeâ— upon the whole Conscience Is every veâ—â— thereof like those in Solomon's house of pure Gold Do you love pureness of heart Would you approve your selves in all things by pureness as the servants of God And whatsoever things are pure do you think on them and that with best complacence and most contentation Then are your Consciences purified Psal 4.4 1 King 10.21 Prov. 22.11 2 Cor. 6.4 6. Phil. 4.8 Secondly What is my Conscience purified from The pure Conscience in Scripture stands opposed not only to that which is defiled Tit. 1.15 but to that which is double Purifie your hearts ye double-minded Jam. 4.8 Let me ask then and thy heart answer 1. Is thy Conscience purified from its doubleness This is specially when Conscience will be making or maintaining a coalition and compounding of interests uniting and contempering of gain and godliness God and the World or as the Samaritans Fearing the Lord and serving their own Gods 1 Tim. 6.5 Jam. 4.4 2 King 17.33 Enquire then 1. into the object whereto it doth or should determine thee Is not thy heart divided between God and Mammon If so thou
we get or obtain a pure Conscience Answ This enquiry is not how we may get it pure from some new actual tincture of which see Q. 7. but from its old habitual taint and pollution for which take these Directions 1. Behold the necessity of a pure Conscience and be awakened 1. Without this there is no Society with God He is of purer eyes than to entertain you in your habitual impurity There is no having nor so much as hoping Communion with or a propriety in him unless Conscience be purified in you Hab. 1.13 Psal 18.26 1 Joh. 3.3 Jam. 4.8 2 Without this there is no Salvation by God Wash thine Heart as ever thou wouldst to Heaven There is nothing entereth which is unclean that happy place is reserved only for the pure in heart Jer. 4.14 Rev. 21.27 Psal 24.3 4. A polluted Conscience is neither fit for the business nor blessedness of that pure and perfect condition 3 Without this there is no serving of God at least with acceptance to him or with advantage to you The Heart must be purified that would attempt his Presence Josh 24.19 Heb. 9.14 c. 10.22 Jam. 4.8 Till Conscience be purified the pure God will not endure thy presence nor will thy impure Conscience easily bear his Presence 4 Without this there is no sincerity in thee Clean or pure acts will never put ye beyond an hypocrite without a clean or pure Heart 'T is not a pure Conversation but a pure Conscience that speaks thy condition prosperous and secures from the condemnation of Pharisees Psal 73.1 2 Tim. 1.3 Mat. 23.25 29. 5 Without this there is no security for thee thy condition can never be safe till Conscience be sanctified All that God secures Conscience is but on this condition If thou be pure and upright And for the security of Conscience 't is grounded upon the sincerity of Conscience 't is first pure then peaceable as David points us in his prayer and 't is the pure in Heart are first pronounced Blessed by our Saviour 1 Thes 5.23 Job 8.6 Jam. 3.17 Ps 51.7 8. Mat. 5.8 2. Behold the nature of an impure Conscience and be ashamed Thou art not so pure in thine own eyes but thou art as impure and vile in God's eyes Be convinced of this and thou wilt be cleansing that and begging him to cleanse thee Prov. 30.12 Isa 65.5 Mich. 6.11 13. Job 40.4 1 Think what is defiled Conscience that choice that curious piece that so dignifieth Man next the Angels and differenceth him from the Brutes Conscience that is God's Tabernacle in Man and maketh Man the Temple of God Conscience that is chief among the faculties and is under God to command the whole frame of our Hearts and Lives What Conscience that by Creation was like the Nazarites purer than Snow whiter than Milk more ruddy than Rubies whose polishing was of Saphire should be now blacker than a coal and she that was clothed in Scarlet should embrace Dunghils That thy Gold should become thus dim and the most fine Gold be changed into dirt This cannot but procure a Lamentation especially when thou shalt consider that this thou hast contracted upon thy self who knowest how great a crime it is if through thy means the Conscience but of a weak brother should be desiled Prov. 20.27 1 Cor. 3.17 Lam. 4.1 9. 1 Cor. 8.7 2 Think what it doth defile A defiled Conscience 1. defiles all of thee it defiles the Man the whole Man the Spirit Soul and Body are defiled even the Mind the most pure and precious part is defiled wheresoever the Conscience is defiled Mat. 15.18 1 Thes 5.23 Tit. 1.15 2. It defiles all to thee there is nothing pure to thee The taking of God's Covenant into thy mouth thy very Table-comforts thy Meat become a sin and snare to thee Conscience being unclean whatever it toucheth doth become unclean likewise Tit. 1.15 Psal 50.16 17. 69.22 Lev. 5.2.3 It defiles all that comes from or is done by thee It streams sin upon every service Thy Civil actions thy very plowing is sin and thy sacred actions thy very praying is sin likewise For who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean Mat. 15.18 Prov. 21.4 c. 28.9 Job 14.4 3. Betake ye to the known provision which God hath made for purifying the Conscience and be active The pure Conscience is from God as the principal Cause 't is he that purifieth and he that pacifieth the Conscience He that cureth its diseases and cleanseth it from defilements He creates and so the Heart is clean 1 Thes 5.23 Ezek. 36.25 Psal 51.7 10. But though it be his work principally 't is our work partly too as himself presseth it Wash ye make you clean c. Isa 1.16 'T is his work to bless the means unto purifying and our work to be in the use of those means whereby he purifieth Asking the mercy of him and applying the means to us 1 Then ask this mercy from him with the greatest ardour thou may'st acknowledging thy pollution with shame and sorrow aggravating it also in his presence abhorring thy self and acknowledg with thy impotency his power as who alone can purifie thee So David Psal 51.2 11. His promises of it do not preclude but should provoke rather thy prayers for it Ezek. 36.25 cum 37. 2 Apply thee to the means and the means to thee with the greatest activity thou can'st These are the Word Water and Blood * See Sheffield's good Cons c. 2. p 33. c. 1 The Word Ye are clean through the Word saith Christ Job 15.3 This is not only pure in it self but purifying the Soul that attendeth the preaching of it Psal 19.8 Joh. 17.17 Ephes 5.26 Submit thy Conscience to the Commands of it Purity is the end of them and will be the effect in thee 1 Tim. 1.5 1 Pet. 1.22 If you obey Then 2. Skill thy Conscience in the Promises of it Every Promise is both a motive to and means for cleansing as of the flesh so likewise of the Spirit But there is an especial Promise in God's absolute Covenant I will sprinkle clean water on you and ye shall be clean Which you may urge upon your self in secret and urge God with in supplication 2. Cor. 7.1 Jer. 33.8 Ezek. 3.6.25 cum 37. 2 Water Ezek. ibid. Ephes 5.26 The Sacrament of Water should not only be remembred by thee but re-inforced on thee by due and doubled consideration Though I cannot say to thee as Ananias said unto Saul Arise and be Baptised and wash away thy sins if thou wert baptized in thy infancy yet I must counsel thee to apply thy Baptism by fetching arguments from thence and by eying the ability and efficacy of the Blood and Spirit of Christ thereby exhibited till thou findest the answer thereunto of a good Conscience toward God And then thy Infant-baptism will be as effectual to the washing away of thy sins in thy adult estate as the Circumcision of the Hands was
to the adult Jews who were then Circumcised and not till then with the Circumcision of the Heart * See Fords pract use of Infant-â—aptis Rom. 6.3 4. Act. 22.16 1 Pet. 3.21 Phil. 3.11 12 13. 2. The waters of sorrow or sincere repentance Contrition will cleanse thy Conscience Evangelical tears will expunge these tinctures No dirt will fix where these drops fall witness David Repentance will blot out these stains from thy Soul and thy sins also before God Smite thy rocky Heart then with the Rod of God and the Waters will gush out Draw Water and pour it out before God Repentance is called the washing of the Heart from wickedness Ezek. 18.30 31. Jer. 31.18 19. Psal 51. Act. 3.19 Exod. 17.6 1 Sam. 7.6 Jer. 4.14 3. The Waters of the Spirit sanctifying and regenerating the Spirit is not only compared to Water as quenching the drought of the Soul but as cleansing the defilements of the Soul Joh. 7.37 38 39. Ezek. 36.25 Conscience will continue sinful till he comes and cleanses its filth is not to be washed off by any work of flesh but by the effectual work of God's Spirit 'T is God's Spirit must sanctifie our Spirits or we stick in the sink and mud of our sin and uncleanness Isa 4.4 Rom. 15.16 1 Pet. 1.2 Resist not the Spirit then but receive those influences he sheds abroad Listen not to the flesh look within the vail of the Covenant where God hath promised to put his Spirit within you yea and to pour out his Spirit on you and plead his Promise in your Prayers Ezek. 11.19 Isa 44.3 Psal 51.12 143.10 3 Blood The Bath for Conscience is the Blood of Christ Here is the Fountain opened for Sin and for Uncleanness this cleanseth from all sin and there is not any sin which doth not need this cleansing or any power of the Soul Both the Tabernacle and all the Vessels of the Ministry were to be purged by Blood Moses sprinkled therewith both the Book and all the People Consider Conscience then in any capacity it needs this cleansing as a Book as a Witness as a Judg as it 's the Mansion of God and as it ministers to and in Man Zach. 13.1 1 Joh. 1.7 Heb. 9.14 19. 23. Sprinkle then this Blood of Jesus upon thy Conscience The People were to sprinkle the Blood with a bunch of Hysop dipt therein as well as the Priests Exod. 12.22 Lev. 16.14 To note there must be an Application of Christ's blood made by us as well as an Application made to us of this Blood by Christ and thus have we our Hearts sprinkled from an evil Conscience as by the Spirit on his part sprinkling it on us so by Faith on our part which sprinkleth us with it Faith is that bunch of Hysop which being dipt in this Blood purifieth the Heart Purge me with Hysop and I shall be clean saith the Psalmist Purifying their hearts through faith saith Peter Heb. 10.22 1 Pet. 1.2 Psal 51.7 Act. 15.9 Believe then in the Lord Jesus Faith is not only effectual through the Blood of Christ to purge the Conscience from the guilt of sin to the justification of thy person but also from the filth of sin to the Sanctification of thy Nature Rom. 5.1 Act. 26.18 4. Behold the noted excellency of a pure Conence and be assiduous For at 1 Mind the noted place of Conscience it 's the upmost part of the Soul next under God and above all that is in Man A pure Conscience is of Angelical perfection Purity is the Gem and Diamond in the Crown both of the clear and pure Conscience this renders it like the New Hierusalem a City of pure Gold 2 The noted power of this Conscience The pure Conscience hath a power of converting even the basest Mettals like the Philosopher's Stone into pure Gold afflictions into advantages To the pure Conscience all things are pure like that Perfume which the Lord prescribeth Moses whatever they are asunder being tempered together they are pure and holy 1 Pet. 2.19 c. Tit. 1.15 Exod. 30.35 3 The noted price of this Conscience What cost it no less rate than the precious Blood of the pure and immaculate Lamb of God What print carrieth it no lower than the resemblance of the purest Essence and Excellency of God Of what preciousness and pleasance doth God account it Of no less than his Habitation his Throne his Resting-place Heb. 9.14 cum 1 Pet. 1.19 1 Joh. 3.3 Isa 57.15 4 The noted Priviledges of this Conscience How great here boldness in prayer the blessing of peace the beauties of God's Presence c. Heb. 10.22 Phil. 4.7 Psal 18.26 But how glorious hereafter in a pure and perfect state most pure and beatifick sights Psal 24.3 4. Mat. 5.8 But consider this and you cannot be careless God Glory Christ Comfort do all severally bespeak Conscience as Christ sometime did Peter If I wash thee not thou hast no part in me But wash this and thou art clean every whit Joh. 13.8 10. Q. 6. How may we preserve our Conscience pure Though I must remit you for fuller satisfaction to what hath been already spoken Chap. 2. Q. 6. Yet I shall not refuse to subjoyn something more in this place 1. Continue at your work Conscience is clean but not all therefore is neither all your work done for its cleansing till hope pass into enjoyment ye ought to be purifying both the Promises hoped for and the principle of hope put upon and perswade unto it 2 Cor. 7.1 1 Joh. 3.3 Neglect not any of the means already prescribed you Qu. 5. Direct 3. The same word and work of Faith Hope c. which made thy Conscience pure will maintain its purity 2. Keep Conscience to its work Keep it doing and you keep it from defiling The pure Gold never rusts or cankers till it rests or is coffered up Paul kept it on employment and so kept it pure 2 Tim. 1.3 Act. 24.16 Conscience hath its work within door upon it self and upon the whole Soul and Spirit and without door upon the Sense and their Objects and Organs If it rests like a standing Pool it putrifieth and gathers stench If it runs like a living Fountain it purifieth it self and whatever is put into it 3. Keep Conscience upon its watch Consciscience is the Centinel to watch over and for it self and the whole Soul beside Watch therefore in all things He that would be clean must be circumspect 2 Tim. 4.5 Psal 119.9 1 Watch against Sinners These will be throwing forth and throwing on of dirt Press not unnecessarily into their Society Be not partakers with their sin keep thy self pure Isa 57.20 Ephes 5.7 11. 1 Tim. 5.22 Yea in the very Society of the Saints be yet still upon thy Watch looking diligently One defection hath defiled many and the more weak thou art the more watchful be thou A weak Conscience is defiled quickly Heb. 12.15 1 Cor. 8.7 2 Watch
Tell him with Job Behold I am vile and with Agur Surely I am more brutish than any man I have not the understanding of a man Prov. 28.13 Psal 32.5 6. Job 40.4 Prov. 30.2 3 Abhor thy self in the sense of it A prostrate self-abhorrence will surely purge thy Conscience and blot that consciousness of sin thou hast contracted both out of God's debt-book and thy own day-book Whereof Job and David are plain and pregnant instances Job 42.6 Psal 51. This Medicament is a sure preventive and safe purgative of a putrified Conscience it includeth these two as the principal ingredients 1. Self-displicence in sorrow and indignation with thy self as David Oh! that I should be such a fool such a sot such a beast 2 Cor. 7.11 Psal 73.21 22. 2. Self-defiance in shaming and judging thy own self renouncing thy righteousness and ripping up thy follies and filthiness and loathing thy self in thy own sight O Lord righteousness belongeth to thee but to me shame and confusion of face O my God I am ashamed and blush to lift up my face c. Ezek. 6.9 c. 16.63 Dan. 9.7 8. Ezra 9.6 3. Rev. 2.5 Renew Do over the first works for thy former washing The door of Mercy stands as open as heretofore Thy duty to use the means and the efficacy of the means upon a due use of them is as observable as heretofore Then thou wert without strength and couldst not co-operate with divine Grace nor any more cleanse thy sin than the Ethiopian can change his skin In that first work thou wert meerly passive Rom. 5.6 Jer. 13.23 Job 14.4 * See Saryl ad loc But now the case is altered the least Saint is not without a little strength Grace is communicated and doth expect thy co-operation with it self that a man purge himself Rev. 3.8 2 Tim. 2.21 2 Cor. 7.1 Renew then 1 the advised provision Q. 5. Dir. 3. Particularly 2 the application of the Promises this is not only an excellent congruity and an evident connexion between the Promises of Christ and the purging of our Conscience but they exhibit a Copy how we should purge and effectually conveigh a power whereby ye shall purge the Conscience and escape the corruption that is in the world through lust 2 Cor. 7.1 2 Pet. 1.4 3 Renew the ardour of thy Prayers these will engage and sanctifie all other endeavours engage Heaven and thy own Heart follow thy work close here and with much constancy Double the duty and thy diligence therein Remember the Psalmist how he reiterated this Petition Wash me purge me cleanse me create a clean heart in me Wash me throughly from mine iniquity and cleanse me from my sin Psal 51.2.7 10. 4 Renew the Acts of these holy Principles in thee Faith Hope and Love as they were of past so are they of present and perpetual efficacy so the expressions intimate Act. 15.9 1 Joh. 3.3 Purifying 't is not said having purified their Hearts by Faith He that hath this hope purifieth himself c. Send Faith afresh then to the Blood of Christ and the blessed Covenant of Grace for cleansing and let this stir up and streng then the other implanted Habits to their several imployments Shew Hope a further sight of those pure and perfect Glories which God hath prepared and promised The more this glorious Purity becomes the matter of thy Hope for hereafter the more will a gracious Purity become the matter of thy attempts and aspirings here And to besure the more thou lovest pureness of heart the more wilt thou apply thy self for and shalt attain of heart-purity CHAP. IV. Of the Peaceable and Disquiet Conscience Q. 1. Whether the Conscience that is not Evangelically good or pure may yet enjoy great peace and so whether a Man may safely conclude his Conscience is pure because 't is quiet and at peace I. Prop. 1 IF you understand peace of Conscience in the most proper precise and strict notion thereof then can there be no peace of Conscience where there is no purity 'T is first pure then peaceable There is no peace saith my God to the wicked Others may sing a Requiem to them Peace peace and they may bless themselves in their own hearts saying I shall have peace but my God saith there is no peace Jam. 3.17 Jer. 6.14 Deut. 29.19 Isa 57.21 The quiet of such Consciences some please to call a Truce but cannot allow it the name of peace If that here is only a temporary suspension of arms no total cessation * See Dyk good Cons p. 31 32. the quarrel is not taken up Conscience is but taking more time to right it self and revenge their stubbornness Peace of Conscience if we understand it strictly imports more than an immunity from inward Concertations and Concussions it implieth also an enjoyment of it self with a victorious serenity in the felicitating smiles of God's Countenance and in viewing the spoils of Sin and Satan its vanquished adversaries Rom. 15.13 Phil. 4.7 Joh. 14.27 It presupposeth peace with God as its prime basis upon which it rests and into which it is resolved as its principal cause Peace of Conscience being originally but the reflex of this that God is reconciled and at peace with us Rom. 5.1 2. Job 22.21 Men of impure Consciences are upon terms of enmity not of peace with God they are against him and he against them Ephes 2.16 Psal 18.26 2. It presupposes a propriety in Christ who is our Peace whose death for us is the sole price of our reconciliation and peace with God and whose Union with us and the communion with and conformity to him is the signal evidence thereof But the impure Conscience hath no interest in Christ he is not only without Christ but at war and enmity with Christ Ephes 2.14 Rom. 5.1 10. 2 Cor. 5.18 19. Fph. 2.12 Col. 1.21 3. It is produced by Faith Faith Evangelical giveth us peace with God and God giveth us peace in and by the exercise of faith Faith unites us with God in Christ and so 't is peace in Heaven here is its direct act and then Faith unfolds and reviews this Union and so 't is peace in the Heart here is its reflex act Now the impure Conscience hath no saving Faith which doth still first purifie then pacifie the Conscience Rom. 5.1 c. 15.13 Ephes 3.17 18 19. 1 Joh. 5.11 12 13. Joh. 5.44 Act. 15.9 4. Besides this peace is made the priviledg the incommunicable priviledg of the Church and Kingdom of Christ who are said to be clean through his word Peace I leave with you my peace I give unto you c. i. e. to you not only eminently above others but exclusively to you and not to any others Rom. 14.17 Joh. 14.27 cum 15.3 II. Prop. 2 But if you understand peace of Conscience in a larger and less proper sense in the vulgar notion and latitude of this expression as it imports the quietness thereof from inward arrests
CASES OF Conscience Practically Resolved By the Reverend and Learned JOHN NORMAN late Minister of Bridgwater LONDON Printed by A. M. for Edw. Brewster at at the Sign of the Crane in St. Paul's Churchyard 1673. THE PREFACE THe reverent Author of this ensuing Treatise Mr. John Norman some few years since deceased is by that state secured both from flattery or obloquy why then should we light a candle of Praise behind his back In short the sole motive to these few lines was this Some dear Relations and Friends of his desirous that his name and worth might be made known to such as knew him not as it was in the Orb wherein he both moved and shined have importuned this unfeigned character and testimony of him What therefore we have seen and heard we testifie While he lived in the Ministry he shined as an eminent light in this world holding forth the word of life His Race while he was in his work was not long yet did he run his race with great diligence and patience out-stripping many A workman that needed not to be ashamed adorning his talent and province and fulfilling I had almost said the Apostles character 2 Cor. 6.4 5 c. And thus when his Lord came and called him off he found him doing Thus he shined in all his motions and trials following the Lamb where ever he led him For the time of my intimacy with him I found him a man of a choice spirit He was relatively godly as a Pastor Husband Father God endowed him with rare natural Parts blessed with no small acquests both of grace and learning he was acute clear and solid in his reasonings and in his converse grave condescending communicative and of an amicable sweetness True to his own light yet not Magisterially imposing it as a rule to others No superstitious admirer or adorer oâ— his own notions and sentiments especially in small and disputablâ— matters no supercilious censor of another mans liberty or latitude as ready to borrow light as to â—end it accounting it a character of little souls to be too nice in little things and yet not refusing the â—earch of any thing by others judged material Among all other his arâ—ainments he had a Scholastical â—exterity able to tye and untye Gordian knots and no mean caâ—uistical faculty wherein it were to â—e wisht more of our Nation beâ—â—des Mr. Perkins and Ames had â—udied to excell Hereof this enâ—ing piece is some taste intended â—y him but as an Essay in this part â—f Theology Which thou hast Christian Reader presented to thee without correction or alteration wherein if any defect appear his own Revisal prevented by death would have supplied accept and peruse it now as it is A Treatise of Conscience requires a conscientious Author which this had and a conscientious Reader which it calls for This is needful in every age and state of the Church and perhaps principally in ours both to point our judgments rectifie mistakes reduce strayers heal divisions settle unstableness and steer our course For it is a subject practical and hath influence into the very vitals of Religion and though it is a duty and withal some difficulty to observe a rule yet much more to give a rule this requires a Master-workman though we are cast into an age critical curious too much quarrelous which God heal yet be thou rather in thy study conscientious practical and peaceable this time as well as this Treatise calls for it I have purposed with my self to intermix nothing of mine as to the Rhetorick part of this subject or the praxis This Torch is set before thee singly by it self shining in its own lustre walk while thou hast the light lest darkness come upon thee If thou I by such helps as these rise up to this blessed frame attain this inestimable Jewel a good conscience which is my prayer thou hast thy advantage and he his aim who is thine in the Lord William Cooper CASES OF Conscience CHAP. I. Of Conscience in General Quest 1. Whether there be such a thing as Conscience in Man A CASE of Conscience is any such Practical Question as falls under the Judgment or if you will under the disquisition and determination of Conscience Having propounded to my self in so great a defect and in so general a desire of Casuistical Tractates in our English Tongue to contribute whatever my poor abilities can afford to a work of so important a nature and of so eminent need I think it very agreeable to your expectation and my employment in my entrance upon this work The an sit and quid sit as also the quotuplex be put upon the enquiry And so what some arrogant Scepticks foolishly start and Atheistical sinners would fain shake off is the subject of this preliminary Question * See Baldw. Cas Cons l. 1. c. 1. Fenner Treat of Cons p. 33 ad 41. Binchi Mellif Theol. par 2. p. 121. The question is not whether there be the same Conscience in all men the same it is in genere naturae though not morum But whether there be found such a thing as is Conscience in all men Which I affirm In this 1. Will you consult the Scriptures Lo These suppose a Conscience in all 1 Cor. 10.29 1 Cor. 10.19 2 Cor. 4.2 2. Send all to consult with their own Consciences Ps 4.4 1 Cor. 11.13 3. Set all upon cleansing and keeping of their Consciences with the utmost diligence Prov. 4.23 1 Tim. 1.5 4. Shew you a Cloud of Witnesses not only among the Pious but the Profane the Pagans in the exercise of Conscience Act. 24.16 Gen. 42.21 22. Rom. 2.15 5. And speak the kinds the keeping the comforts concussions acts authority c. of Conscience of which hereafter So that though the Scriptures never attempt to prove that there is a Conscience as being a proposition of clear evidence in Nature and of confessed evidence among all Nations yet do they abundantly proclaim that there is a spirit a Conscience in Man and that the inspiration of the Almighty hath given him understanding Job 32.8 2. Will you but commune with your own selves Whence are those seeds and dictats of such religious dues from you to God of righteousness to men and of sobriety in your selves which so frequently put forth within you What or whence those suggestions for refraining sin and for rouzing up your selves to and in the service of the eternal God and for securing your everlasting good which are so often prompted to and pressed upon you What or whence those silent reasonings and motions within your own breasts and the several returns you make into your own bosoms or hearts What or whence those searchings and self-reflections upon what you are and act And secret rebukes when you are or act amiss though no eye seeth it As also those sweet refreshments you inwardly feel in consciousness of your own innocency when others unjustly censure you or injuriously
her of which Q. 4. God hath surrogated and set her up 1. To be a law-giver from him imploy her in the study and revelation of what his laws are and your lives should be and see that you receive the truths she dictateth from him 2. To be a witness for and with him Imploy her in the observation and report of his works and your ways and see that you refuse not the testimony she delivereth for him 3. To be a judg under him Imploy her in the search and determining of your condition and see you remove not the sentence which she receiveth from him while you remain in this condition Rom. 2.14 15. Joh. 8.9 2 Cor. 5.11 4. In a befittingness and accord to God who hath invested men with it and imprinted his mind upon it 1. In accord to his work herein Men should not call their concupiscence humour lust illusion contumaciousness by the precious name of Conscience It reflects disparagement and an odium to its divine rise and original 2. In accord to his worth If Conscience be implanted in you by him she is inferiour to him and should not impose upon you against or above his commission She is then under the rule and authority of him and must render an account to him 3. In accord to his will as may best express his superiority over her his similitude upon her and best exemplifie those sacred instructions which he hath left upon record concerning her 5. Beyond and above all for him If Conscience be first implanted by him she should be finally imployed for him 'T is a sordid employment to put Conscience upon the palliation or extenuating of a mans corruption or upon the provision and erecting of a mans credit c. And 't is a sorry end to determine her high-bôrn operations within the narrow confines of the object sense or of a mans felf If she be of an higher efficient she should be busied for an higher end Her acts and answers should be all towards God 1 Pet. 2.19.3.21 Men should study to approve their Conscience to him to assure their Conscience before him and to advance and celebrate him by all the elicit and imperate acts of their Conscience 2 Cor. 5.9 11. 1 Joh. 3.19 Psal 34.1 2 3. 6. So as to behold and steadily own whatsoever truths he hath ordered out for man's knowledg and observation by implanting him with a Conscience And the more eminent any of them are the more firm should be mans assent to them and the more full and vigorous his adherence to and asserting of them Q. 3. What great truths may every man know and gather up from hence that there is a Conscience in him Among and above others every man may hence know and infallibly conclude these ensuing verities Is there a Conscience in every man then let every man 1. Behold a Deity * Conscientia optimus testis divinatis Tert. lib. de testim animae That which may be known of God is manifest in them from within as well as manifest to them from without so far at least as will render them inexcusable in sin though not as far as may be requisite and effectual to Salvation The eternal power and Godhead are written in lively and legible Characters not only upon the Creatures but in the Conscience enough to convince the Atheist and whereby he may arrive to the knowledg both that he is and to a good degree what he is also Rom. 1.19.20 2.14 15 The several truths which are conserved in the Conscience doth she not dictate as the will of God The special testimonies the Spirit communicateth doth she not declare as a witness for and with God The sentence and judgment wherewith the Spirit concludeth doth she not deliver as a substitute from as the sentence of God I need no other evidence for this than your own experiences which do plainly enough acquaint you that all the offices Conscience doth discharge are done under and for God and that the obligation she infers is as from so by God So that the being and acts of Conscience are both a pregnant proof that there is a God and do powerfully perswade men to acknowledg his Government and ascribe him worship and glory 2. Behold the Doctrine of Eternity rewards of good and evil that extend beyond death and all duration of time Behold your Consciences do not confine themselves in their converses with you within the narrow limits of mortality They carry engraven on them an immortal state with accord to the immortality of your Souls and by the prospect of this they inhibit and restrain from vice instigate and rouze us to vertue refresh mens hopes at one time and raise fears and torments at another Manifest it is that Conscience principally restrains and rules by the hopes and fears of a future immortality of glory and misery And if there were no such thing her government should be for the most part frivolous and delusory 2. Gods giving her to many persons would be vain and unnecessary for how should she contain armed force or artificial fraud within the bounds of duty when the one can sin safely beyond the punishments of this life and the other secretly Besides 3. her glory in being thus capacitated and raised above the brute Creatures would be hers and our shame and misery and render her and us beneath them while her hopes she ruleth by are frustrate and her fears are vexing which are things utterly to be rejected by all rational men 3. Behold a Dooms-day or day of judgment If every man hath a Conscience then every man must give an accompt and come to judgment and necessary it is that the several judgments of Conscience may be set right and the secrets of Conscience may be revealed and set open Rom. 2.12 17. 1 Cor. 4.5 Conscience is praejudicium judicii as Tertullian well 'T is an Emblem and evidence of the day of judgment Conscience keeps many a Court before hand as a Judg but lo she conducts men as by the hand to a more solemn and supream judgment Yea how often doth she cite men hither and arrest men from hence So that Paul preaching of Judgment maketh even a Pagan Judg to tremble Act. 24.25 Plain it is that the judgment of Conscience refers higher and reminds men often of a more impartial Judg and Judicature that is future and certain Conscience contains the records of Gods Laws and mens lives as a Book Here men often keep this Book clasped and sealed but the righteousness of God in and for the reward of men requireth that the Books be and they shall be opened Revel 20.12 Conscience is the Candle of the Lord searching yea and shewing what men are and have done as a witness whose work it is to give evidence in judgment Here men sometimes baffle at other times bribe this witness It shall therefore be brought into an open and impartial Court where it may neither be flattered nor
circumference and comprehension It is of known and confessed observation that the judgment of Conscience is not consummate or perfected but by discourse in some practical Syllogism which is still formally or else virtually done * Vid. Ames de Consc l. 1. c 1. n. 7 8 9 10. As thus He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved But I believe and am baptized Therefore I shall be saved In the first proposition you have the Truth which Conscience dictates and therein still shines forth the light and laws of Conscience In the second you have the Testimony which Conscience delivers and therein we still see the written Records and witnessing reflections and reports of Conscience In the third you have the Sentence denounced by Conscience and herein Conscience sits most properly as a Judg. Now thus within the circumference of Conscience are these three things with a different respect unto which Conscience may be accounted either a power or habit or act 1. there is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or conserved truths and laws of Conscience which are still had in the first proposition 2. And the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Conscience more properly so called or the consentient Testimony of Conscience which is still assumed in the second proposition 3. And the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or conclusory judgment which is still made in the last proposition All these fall vvithin Conscience its lines of communication its large and usual acceptation * Rutherf Libert of Consc c. 1. p. 6 7. And indeed all these are manifestly included in the having and exercise of a good Conscience professed by Paul Heb. 13.18 Act. 24.16 and in the advice and exhortation which is pressed by Peter 1 Pet. 3.16 Having a good Conscience c. i.e. a Conscience well principled with truth as concerns the former proposition and well performing its testimony and judicial sentence as concerns the two latter A Conscience conserving good laws and conformably giving a good suffrage or testimony and a good sentence or judgment With respect to the former unless as it is subjectively taken for that intellective practical power wherein these laws are engraven which yet we usually say are written in the Conscience it is an intellective habit as the Schools * Aquin. Sum. 1. q. 79. a. 12. Sayr clav reg c. 2. generally determine and ours * Ames de Consc l. 1. c. 2 n. 1. c. also of the first principles about good and evil With respect to the latter I humbly conceive it is a power of the practical understanding of which by and by And as it is taken effectivè for an act or motion of the Conscience as it is used in 1 Pet. 2.9 If a man for Conscience sake towards God endure grief c. i.e. for the dictates and directions and so discharge o◠his Conscience so it may be described by an act 2. Conscience is strictly taken as hath been noted And that it is not an act in this sense as Aquinas * Sum. q. 79. a. 13. and his Followers do contend seems to me evident Partly because there are the acts of Conscience as to accuse acquit c. and acts do not flow from acts but either from some forms or power or habit 2. And because of the absurdity thereupon consequent If Conscience were an act then Conscience were not when it acted not and should cease to be as often as we sleep or Conscience doth cease to act which is against the evidence both of Nature and Scripture which states it to be Conscience still though now seared 1 Tim. 4.2 I close with them rather who call it a power a See Perkins Treat of Consc vol. 1. p. 517. Baldw. cas l. 1. c. 3. Rutherf lib. of cons c. 1. p. 3. c. Huit of Consc p. 87. rather than an habit of the practical intellect◠though it be true that the other opinion hath its strong and subtil patrons b Scotus Duran l. 2 Distin. 39 and specious and shrewd pretensions Not only 1 in that Conscience cites and calls before it all the other powers sifts sits upon and censureth them c Harris Pauls Exercise But in that 2 it is contradistinguished from another power viz. the Mind Tit. 1.15 3 In that by this men have their potency to the acts hereafter mentioned Qu. 4. 4 And also in that it is proper to and inseparable from any the sons of men and therefore is as natural as any other power of man whatsoever Yet that Conscience may in no sense be called an habit as well as is science for the reasons by a Modern d Sanders ibid. §. 16 17 18. given I shall not impugn Secondly Q. What is the object of Conscien which it respecteth and treats I add Conscience is Mans judgment of himself i.e. of his estate and actions Conscience rides circuit throughout all the man ând reflects upon all in and of man 'T is set up as a Judg not only in Mans self 1 Cor. 11.13 but of mans self v. 31. Conscience is therefore placed as it were in the midst between God and man as an arbitrator to give sentence and to pronounce either with man or against man unto God So Perkins * Treat of Consc c. 1. There is nothing of us or ours hid from the inspection enquiries and judgment of Conscience neither our estate nor actions * See Annesley Cripl lect p. 4. 'T is the candle of the Lord. searching all the inward parts of the belly Prov. 20.27 1. For Mans Estate It is not only put upon the scrutiny of our estates once and again 2 Cor. 13.5 Psal 4.4 cum 3. but passeth sentence frequently Conscience told the Goaler and those Jews that they were in a lost and miserable estate so that they cried out Sirs what must we do to be saved Act. 16.30 2.37 Conscience tells John and other Believers in Jesus that they were in a safe and happy estate We know that we are passed from death to life Joh. 3.14 See also ver 19 21. 2. As for Mans Actions It sees into and sits upon and sentenceth all of them whether external or internal whether duties and services or defects and sins whether toward God or toward man all acts concerning holiness or honesty Act. 24.16 Heb. 13.18 Conscience looks inward to and judgeth of the root spring and sincerity of our actions Heb. 9.14 2 Cor. 1.12 Outward to the fruits and circumstances of our actions 2 Cor. 4.2 2 Tim. 1.3 4. Upward to approve its actions in Gods eye and to answer Gods ends and his engagements 2 Cor. 2.17 1 Pet. 3.21 Downward by an holy activity and self-judging to avoid the severe judgments there prepared 1 Cor. 11.31 32 It looks backward upon former actions and smiteth for them if they have been evil 2 Sam. 24.10 And forward also toward future actions cautioning us against such as are evil that we decline them
or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which speaks back what they should have been or now should be So that Conscience in her reflection is both to consult her own records and to compare the concern before her wherein she is to witness with those holy rules I advise then that you 1. Direct 1 Send your Conscience to search her own Records Here her actions are all bookt as before Q. 9. let her reflect hither remember and read them over without which you cannot now reach the end or reap the benefit of their being so reposited Remember this how they are enrolled and why Call it again to mind O ye transgressors to use the words of the Prophet Isa 46.8 Now that you may consult these records aright and have Conscience to reflect It s requisite that there be 1 Self-denial without which this work will not be done at all or not aright but Conscience like the unjust Steward will be writing fifty for an hundred For be sure your wills and affections yea Conscience it self through the corruption that cleaves to it will be drawing back from such a difficult and flesh-displeasing work or at most will not dwell long upon it And therefore the Apostle doubleth the charge Examine your selves prove your own selves as knowing how hardly we are brought to it and how the heart hangs back from it Luk. 16.6 2 Cor. 13.5 2 Serious deliberation lest you misread and misunderstand her records and the result be a mistake and misrepresentation of your case which will minister nothing but matter for repentance as it did unto David I said in my haste c. Psal 31.22 and 116.11 3 A steady diligence My spirit made diligent search Psal 77.6 1. In rubbing up and ransacking the memory where these records lie as in their most proper repository For many of our actions lie there rather as so much rubbish which we have swept out of sight then as so many records that are orderly shelv'd up for a surveigh 2. In reiterating this method our actions many times lie so far off and so many things interpose between them and the eye of Conscience that there must be a raised and repeated diligence yea and giving all diligence to remove other matters and to reduce them again to our minds 'T is therefore called a bringing back to the heart 2 Pet. 1.10 1 King 8.47 Isa 46.8 3. In the reception and right nicking of the means The court of records stands not always open and 't is ill slipping the first season Now diligence would be doing e're the doors are shut and the draught by Conscience is yet fresh and unsullied As David sometimes immediately reflected upon the cutting off of Sauls garment and upon his numbring the people But at another time when he yields to his own sloth and falls not in with the first season Vriah is murdered and his Wife constuprated by him c. and he never casts a reflex upon either of these prodigious acts yea notwithstanding the Parable came so pat and plain upon him till the Prophet was fain to put himself in the place of Conscience and tell him Thou art the man and you know what this negligence cost him 1 Sam. 24.5 2 Sam. 24.10 Chap. 11 and 12. Psal 51. 2. Direct 2 Set Conscience by those holy rules whereon she must reflect The rule is of necessary reflection on and of as needful resolution in witness-bearing For how shall Conscience witness or reflect on this as good or on that as good but by comparing this and that with the rule which can alone resolve her what is good and what is bad Now as Gods revealed will is the only rule and measure of all moral good and evil so the reflection of Conscience connoteth a respect to this rule For Conscience doth not cast back an enquiry after the physical being of an action as whether I have eat or drunk but after the moral being of that action as whether I have eat or drunk to Gods glory c. as his law enjoyns me or else to excess c. as his law inhibits me Mic. 6.8 1 Joh. 3.4 1 Cor. 10.31 Eph. 5.18 Now hereunto these three things are requisite which though they are not of that obvious necessity and distinct use in those sudden and transient reflections which Conscience often maketh yet are they of very needful observation and useful distinctness in her more solemn and abiding reflections in the more serious returns we are to make upon our selves as before the Sacrament c. or when we undertake the solemn examination of our selves 1. Set the rule before thy Conscience in its spiritual power purity and in the several parts of it On this she is to reflect and by this she must be regulated 'T is not enough that you have them lying in habit with the sunteresis but they should be now actually educed and brought forth to view For in that you are now to search your selves by them you must take an actual surveigh of them David therefore did not satisfie himself that the laws of God were ever with him but he did expose and lay them before him Thy judgments have I laid before me Psal 119.30 cum 98. And without this the course you are now taking will be much-what ineffectual and can never be fully commensurate with your design this duty or Gods demand who bids you take heed to your ways according to his word Psal 119.9 2. Sift your Conscience and therewith your lives and actions by the rules compare her and them with this Examine your selves prove your own selves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as men try metals by bringing them to their proper measure as Gold and Silver to the touch-stone 2 Cor. 13.5 Self-discussion by the divine standard is of singular advantage both for the discovery of your sins as David and Paul found it and for the drawing out a discovery of your sincerity as Job Ps 19.11 12. Rom. 7.8 9 c. Job 23.10 11. Will you but cast an eye on this glass you should see more of the nature and number of your sins the nature necessity and beauty of Gods service and continuing therein should contract his blessing on your selves Jam. 1.25 But in your solemn examinations let me advise you to call forth the laws of God and rules of godliness successively and distinctly and so to compare the several periods of your lives with them both in the matter and manner of your actions Hath the matter of my life born accord to this that and the other precepts or hath there not been an attempt on and violation of both this and that and the other prohibition For the manner of my actions have they been done upon that account and with those aimes affections c. that these rules prescribe me and whereupon they promise a blessing to me By this course Conscience will be 1. Less complicated in her work through the artifices of sin or Satan They usually hide their
which see 1 Cor. 8.7 10 12. Rom. 15.1 As Conscience 1 apprehends and dictates laws duly and aright or defectively and amiss So far as to this Conscience is either due right and good Here is the true Conscience Or 2. defective wrong and evil Here is the false Conscience between which as participating sometimes of this sometimes of that extream stands the 3d. probable Conscience 1. If Conscience dictates laws duly and aright these laws it dictateth are either imprinted and drawn forth upon the mind within and so are known by the light of natural reason Or 2. imparted by divine manifestation from without and so are known only by a star of greater magnitude the light of supra-natural revelation With accord to this there is 1 the natural Conscience and 2 the enlightned Conscience And we find the Apostle sometimes appealing that and sometimes this 1 Cor. 6.2 3 9 15 16 19. Know ye not c. i.e. Do not your Consciences tell ye as much 2. If Conscience dictates laws defectively and amiss then it is either 1. through the darkness and ignorance thereof or 2. through the delusion and error or through the doubtfulness and hesitancy thereof Agreeably there is 1 the ignorant or blind Conscience as some phrase it though improperly enough 2 and the erroneous Conscience 3 and the hesitating or doubtful Conscience Eph. 4.18 Jam. 1.13 cum 16. Mat. 14.30 31. But in that these doubts may be and often are of various and different degrees therefore the doubtful Conscience may be and is variously distinguished There is 1 the opining 2 the scrupulous and 3 the doubtful Conscience strictly so called which are in brief thus differenced The doubtful Conscience entertains not either part of the matter in question before it so as either to affirm or deny it but hesitates and hangs as it were between both The scrupulous and opining Conscience do both close with one or other part either affirming on the one hand or denying on the other The opining doth this but feebly the scrupulous doth it vexatiously The scrupulous Conscience is by this eminently differenced from the opining that its close with one part or other is still conjoyn'd with some anxious suspicion of and sollicitation to the other part As Conscience 2 applys and draws down matters of law to the matter of fact before it for judgment either 1 aright or 2 amiss well or ill so the Conscience as to this is either 1 aright and good or 2 amiss and bad This application is not perfected but in and by several acts some whereof respect our good others our evil actions According to these different acts of which Q. 7. Conscience is by some distributed and so there is the accusing the excusing Conscience c. But this I purposly omit And in that Conscience is denominated either good or evil as to this respect according to its discharge of these acts and offices I shall therefore distribute it rather with relation had 1 to the manner 2. and to the measure of its discharge of these acts 1. If we consider the manner Conscience proceeds in these acts and offices either 1 entirely and uprightly or 2 hypocritically Either 1 faithfully or 2 unfaithfully Either 1 inoffensively or 2. offensively And thus there is 1 the entire Heart or Conscience Psal 78.72 And 2 the hypocritical Jer. 42.20 1 The faithful Conscience 2 Chron. 19.9 2 And the unfaithful Psal 5.9 1 The inoffensive Conscience Act. 24.16 2 And the offensive 1 Cor. 8.7 10. Hereof the first in each pair is an evil Conscience the second in each pair is a good Conscience 2. As concerns the measure of this application these acts are either 1 by and according to the just standard and so far the Conscience whose acts these are is good Or 2. below the just standard and measure in the defect Or 3. above and beyond it in the excess And so far the Conscience that thus applys is bad With respect to the former extream in the defect there is a double vice of Conscience There is 1 the sluggishness and oscitancy thereof which respects principally the imployment of Conscience 2. The senselesness and obduracy thereof which respects principally the impressions on Conscience Opposite to the former is the sedulity of Conscience in its transactions and operations Opposite to the latter is the softness and tenderness of Conscience with respect to its object So that here are 1 the sluggish Conscience Luk. 24.25 And 2 the senseless Conscience Eph. 4.18 19. on the one hand which are evil And the 1 stirring Conscience Exod. 35.21 And 2 the soft or tender Conscience 2 Chron. 34.27 on the other hand which are good I shall only add that as with respect to the former vices which are of different degrees the evil Conscience may be distinguished into that which 1 is sleepy Rom. 11.8 2. and that which is stupified Isa 6.10 3. and that which is seared 1 Tim. 4.2 So with respect to the latter virtues the good Conscience may be also differently distinguished according to those different degrees And so there is 1 the awakened Conscience Cant. 5.2 2 the attentive Conscience Deut. 32.46 3 The attrite or eminently tender Conscience Psal 51.17 With respect to the latter extream in the excess there is a twofold evil of Conscience 1. There is the dread and terrors of Conscience flying and declining Gods presence Gen. 3.10 2 There is the despair and horrors of Conscience accompanied with a fearful looking for of punishment and judgment Mat. 27.3 4 5. Heb. 10.27 So that there is 1 the distracting and troubled Conscience Prov. 15.13 2 The despairing and tormenting Conscience Gen. 4.13 14. Opposite hereunto there is a twofold good of Conscience There is 1 the acquiescence and rest of Conscience Mat. 11.29 2 The assurance and rejoycing of Conscience 2 Cor. 1.12 Agreeably whereunto there is 1 the appeased and quiet Conscience Psal 116.7 2 The assured and comforted Conscience Heb. 10.22 Prov. 15.15 These things will require and receive aâ— fuller enquiry into and explication of them in the ensuing tract This Corollary shall conclude the present question Since the good and the evil Conscience are so manifold the greater is your work and should be your watchfulness for the obtaining and ordering of a good Conscience and for the preventing and purging out of an evil Conscience CHAP. II. Of the good and evil Conscience according to their stated habitude Q. 1. Whether we are to look upon our Consciences as such that are by nature evil THat we may prevent mistakes some distinctions must be premised of this term by nature It may be and sometimes is understood for 1. That which is by and according to the constitution of Mans nature as when we say Man doth by nature consist of a true body and a reasonable soul Thus whatsoever is a principle or part of Mans nature is said to be natural to him 2. For that which is by and
be considered either as it is to conserve and ark up laws and rules of practice or as it is to come and apply these laws and rules 'T is miserably corrupt in both How far it falls short as to the former will be of particular discussion hereafter when I come to speak of the natural Conscience Oh how it is darkned depraved disabled as concerns the matter of an holy life in this world and the means of an happy life in the world to come How are men alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness of their heart Rom. 1.21 Eph. 4.18 1 Pet. 1.14 The main concernment of Conscience is to apply rules of practice And here how deplorably corrupt it is 1 Sometimes it doth not apply at all How many practical notions are swimming in the head that never sink into the heart and the heart is never set to consider of or concoct them into practice How much science and confidence find we in these Rom. 2.19 23. but no Conscience large and sound apprehensions but little or no self-application 1. The evil of Conscience is as to this so eminent that a general command is not thought enough by God but it must be particular and expressive Thou shalt have no other Gods c. Thou shalt not covet c. Exod. 20.3 18. The parable as pertinent as it was to Davids case never pinched Davids Conscience the Prophet himself was fain to do the office of Davids Conscience for him And Nathan said to David Thou art the man c. 2 Sam. 12.1 14. 2. When it doth apply oft-times it is not articulately and timeâ—y Christ hath told Peter Before the Cock crow twice thou shalt deny me thrice But the Cock crows the first and second time e're Conscience in Peter maketh application of this advice Mar. 14.30 68 72. Conscience should have applied in Josephs Brethren before their contract and his captivity in Egypt but till themselves are captives their Conscience was much-what silent Gen. 37.20 c. cum 42.21 22 3. Or else it doth not apply so auâ—horitatively and throughly as it should Conscience in man hath the command and empire â—ut how often is concupiscence too hard for Conscience and carnal appetitions subjugate Conscience its application so that bad men â—eep down the truth in unrighteousness and â—are not to retain God in their knowledg â—nd good men are sometimes captivated as â—o the law of their minds by and unto the law of sin which warreth in their members Rom. 1.18 21 28. Rom. 7.23 25. 4. Or not soâ— abidingly Conscience applys and Felix trembles but the fit is soon over Conscience the Preacher in the bosom must not be attended nor Christs Preacher at the Bar heard out till a better convenience Act. 24.25 Conscience is at work with Pharaoh and while he is heated in the furnace of successive judgments Conscience is hearkning and applying but after he is out of the fire like iron his heart groweth the harder and less apt to receive an impression Exod. 8 1â— 32 c. But more particularly Conscience maketh application either peâ— modum testis or per modum judicis as a witness or as a judg and in both it is very bad 1. As a witness see how wicked it is 1. 〈◊〉 registring how few of mens faults doth iâ— file up and book down So that Daviâ— brings it to a question Who can understanâ— his errors Psal 19.12 But if there be a vertuouâ—action or but an appearance this is forth with put upon the file and record witneâ—â— the common practice besides the curse of thâ— Pharisees Luk. 11.42 Mat. 23.23 2. 〈◊〉 reflecting How few reflections are made up on our actions how few returns are maâ—â— upon our hearts insomuch as God saith hearkned and heard and no man repented him 〈◊〉 his wickedness saying what have I done Jeâ— 8.6 No man put Conscience to the question touching his conversation 3. In ruminatinâ— or considering How defective and diseased 〈◊〉 Conscience here likewise as the consequents do evidently demonstrate insomuch as God is fain to call once and again for it Now consider this ye that forget God Now consider your ways c. And doth often complain of the general want of it None considereth in his heart They consider not in their hearts that I remember all their wickedness now their own doings have beset them about They say not in their heart in the confluence of mercies let us now fear the Lord our God that giveth the rain the former and latter rain in his season c. Psal 50.22 Hag. 1.5 Isa 44.19 Hos 7.2 Jer. 5.24 4. In reporting Oh how corrupt and partial Conscience is in this Not a word doth Samuel hear from Saul till necessitated thereunto in aggravating his sin but how many in apologizing for it Not a syllable is to be seen in the Pharisees plea and prayer for self-judging or for self-abasing but the substance of it is for self-justifying and self-advancing 1 Sam. 13.11 12. Chap. 15.13 15 20 c. 2. Conscience makes application as a judg and herein it miscarrieth likewise How severe is it ordinarily abroad but how slight at home further than it is sanctified Are there not many who judg even the mote in their brothers eye that yet can indulge a beam mean-while in their own eyes Mat. 7.2 3 4. And damn the same things in others which they do themselves Rom. 2.1 c. The faithful themselves have not been free under a preâ—ailing temptation Hath Tamar plaid the strumpet Bring her forth saith Judah and let her be burnt But never a blow is given by Conscience as concerned his sin and folly with her till the Bracelets and staff and Signet are produced Gen. 38.13 27. Davids anger was greatly kindled and as the Lord liveth saith he the man shall surely die that had stollen the poor mans lamb in Nathans Parable But mean-while his Conscience had no sense of nor gave sentence for his own provocation which run parallel therewith till the Prophet presseth it and putteth it home upon him 2 Sam. 12.5 6 7 c. The judgment Conscience is to make is either with relation to former things and times or else to future 1. With relation to former things and times Conscience is to accuse or excuse But in each it is ordinarily very evil 1. Sometimes 't is out in the the matter It excuseth and covereth where it should accuse and condemn They all with one consent began to make excuse Luk. 14.18 where their Conscience should have been accusing and they have been manifesting their repentance for their sin and making ready for the supper It accuseth and condemneth sometimes where it should rather excuse yea commend Ye said also behold what a weariness is it and ye have snuffâ—â— at it saith the Lord of hosts c. Conscience counts and judgeth Gods service and a godly strictness profitless painful irksome evil
principles so that you must get Conscience well-principled for which God calls upon you My Son keep my words and lay up my Commandments with thee Let thine heart retain my words Prov. 7.1 c. 4.4 2. A right application of these principles both as a witness and as a judg to which purpose as I shall particularly direct hereafter so you must endeavour the right purifying and the right pacifying of your Consciences and get Conscience both well-purified and well pacified of which I shall speak distinctly in the Questions that ensue to which I must here dismiss you Q. 7. How may we keep a good Conscience This Question supposeth you in the possession of a good Conscience and is subjoynfor the preservation of your Conscience good * See Perkins T. 1. Treat of Conscience c. 4. §. 2. pag. 553. Sheff good Cons c. 25. with the goodness of Evangelical purity immediately and with the goodness of Evangelical peace mediately and remotely of which more afterwards In order hereunto there are some things to be declined and taken heed of and others to be done and taken heed unto First There are some things in order hereunto to be declined viz. 1. An itch after curious questions frothy speculations fabulous and vain bablings in and about the matters of Religion which will eat as a canker effeminate the Conscience and will encrease unto more ungodliness from these withdraw And let the words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the doctrine which is according to godliness take up your deliberations and discourses the end whereof is a good Conscience 2 Tim. 4.3 4. c. 2.16 17. 1 Tim. 6.3 4 5. c. 1.4 5. 2. Ill Companions These corrupt both the Conversations and Consciences of each other witness Hymeneus and Alexander Hymeneus and Philetus Phygellus and Hermogenes 1 Tim. 1.19 20. 2 Tim. 2.17 c. 1.15 As you would preserve your Conscience partake not with their company unnecessarily Can a man take fire in his bosom and his Clothes not be burnt Can one go upon hot coals and his Feet not be burnt See how Ahab's Company and Solomon's Concubines debauched his and Jehoshaphat's Conscience and drew upon them God's displeasure Ephes 5.7 11. Prov. 6.27 28. 2 Chron. 18.3 c. 19.2 1 King 11.4 c. Beware of the communion of evil men as you would not blemish Conscience in the eye of God Psal 26.4 5. c. 119.63 Prov. 13.20 c. 14.7 3. An idle corrupt and soothing Ministry that lull Conscience asleep in sin or lash the Conscience of strictness These are the pests of any people My Son cease to hear the instruction that causeth to err from the words of knowledg Hearken not unto the Prophets that make you vain and speak a vision out of their own heart crying peace peace when there is no peace Prov. 19.27 Jer. 23.16 21. c. 6.14 Ezek. 13.10 c. Attend rather the most strict and soul-searching Ministry enquire and take counsel from the Seer whose Sermons are most sharp and searching even to the thoughts and intents of thy heart follow these and account of their correptions as an acceptable kindness Heb. 13.17 1 Sam. 9.9 10 18. Heb. 4.12 1 Cor. 14.25 Ps 141.5 4. Intemperance of all kinds and toward any Creature-comforts or Secular contentments Take heed to your selves lest at any time your Hearts be overcharged with any of them be crucified to the World and let the World be crucified to you or Conscience will be captivated by the World the rational Will to the sensitive or brutish appetite If you are set upon it that you will be rich you shall be snared and enslaved by it and shall not be innocent Luk. 21.34 Gal. 6.14 1 Tim. 6.9 Prov. 28.20 5. Indulgence of any one corruption which speaks Conscience already defective in its Office and steals off its tenderness c. by degrees Sin is never at a stay if Conscience let alone Concupiscence it will soon conceive quicken and bring forth first sin then death Jam. 1.15 Psal 1.1 You must exercise a good Conscience if you would eschew sin and eschew sin every sin if you would exercise a good Conscience specially eye the beginnings and entrance of sin that you be not hardened through the deceitfulness of sin Principiis obsta Corruption gaineth by steps Peter first casts off fear then closes with falshood then curses and forswears His faint denial at first time fetcheth out a dreadful Oath at second time and a most daring imprecation the third Heb. 3.13 Mat. 26.69 75. Conscience looseth by steps also Sin happily hath been unportable now it may be it is heavy take up betimes within a while it will become portable next time pleasant to thee and perhaps within a while thou mayst plead for it To such extremities some have arrived gradually as Bernard observeth * Primò importabile processu temporis grave Pauló post leve postea placet dulce est Ad extremum quod erat impossibile ad faciendum est impossibile ad continendum Bern. de Cons c. 3. Beware of secret sins these are a moth that eat out its integrity beware of smaller sins these make way for greater and do as surely though not as suddenly sink the vessel of Conscience as greater leaks or the springing of a plank doth Beware of the shews and seeds and inducements to sin come not nigh her corner these contract carelesness upon Conscience admit not so much as thread or shoo-latchet beware especially of staring and scandalous sins which are like the wild Boar of the Forrest to root up rend and devour Refrain thy foot from every evil way Psal 19.12 17. Eccles 10.1 Jude 23. Psal 51. 119.101 6. Idling away the checks and convictions of Conscience Observe its sayings as Jacob did Joseph's whilst others do as Joseph's Brethren did envy it or them If thou wilt be deaf to Conscience now Conscience within a while may be dumb to thee David doth not hear Conscience but hastens into Bathsheba and how long was it e're he heard from Conscience and when he doth 't is such a voice as maketh his ears to tingle and his heart to tremble Gen. 37.11 2 Sam. 11. 12. cum Psal 51. 7. Indispositions and evils of Conscience What these are hath been premised how these are best healed and cured will be prescribed hereafter Beware of its sleepiness searedness c. every disease hath a tendency toward a dissolution as in Nature so also in Grace 8. Inforcing and violating Conscience Sins against Conscience are of saddest consequence and do of all others most wound and wast the Conscience One sin deliberately committed against the Dictates of Conscience doth more to the corrupting and defilement thereof than many others contracted through weakness David's sin against the light of Conscience lost him the sense and savour of a good Conscience Men that force Conscience do at length flight Conscience and 't is just with God while these put away the good Conscience which they seemed
them Prov. 4.23 Mat. 26.41 Prov. 22.5 3. Close with her Testimony though she speak against thee Let not thy Affections kick and thy Will cast it back upon Conscience to give a more favourable witness for thee 'T is better Conscience should be a severe Witness here than a never-dying Worm hereafter The more fully and faithfully she testifieth the more friendly is she and the more it turneth to thy felicity Faithful are the wounds of a friend but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful Psal 141.5 Prov. 27.6 4 Let Conscience be told ever and anon of the Testimony she must deliver in the day of Judgment Then the Books shall be opened the Book of Conscience within as well as of Creatures and Scriptures without Then must thou shalt thou O my Conscience give a plain and impartial Testimony to all things done in the body Then all thy frauds and fallacies which thou now puttest upon me shall be unvailed and pluckt off before God Men and Angels Then shalt thou bear the shame of them and must suffer for them Thy flatteries and unfaithfulness shall be all laid bare and open Oh how much better were it for thee and me to bring forth thy righteous Testimony now to our Conversion than in that day to our Confusion Alas what can be hid from him who knoweth all things Doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it Thou mayst deceive me but canst thou deceive my God also That day shall discover it If thou fearest the shame and sting of such a Witness in this day shouldst not thou rather fear and fly the shame and sting thereof in that day Now it may be eased and healed by Repentance Defer thy Testimony till then and the shame and torment will be easless endless and remediless Rev. 20.12 2 Cor. 5.10 Eccles 12.14 Mar. 9.44 5 Let Conscience be demanded to give her Witness as in the presence of God the great Judg. Charge her to speak to thee as she would speak to and before him Is not the answer of a good Conscience towards God O my Conscience is not God greater than thy self and knoweth all things Wilt thou witness this thing to God for me as Peter's did Thou knowest all things thou knowest that I love thee And canst thou appeal him as a Witness in the case with and for thee as he also did Canst thou attest him as they did Josh 22.21 22. The Lord God of Gods the Lord God of Gods he knoweth Canst thou say and say truly Behold my witness is in heaven and my record is on high as Job did And wilt thou answer to him for me what thou now answerest me as before him Lo O Lord thou knowest Thou O Lord knowest me thou hast seen me and tried mine heart Thou hast tried me and shalt find nothing Thou knowest that I am not wicked 1 Pet. 3.21 1 Joh. 3.20 Joh. 21.15 17. Job 16.19 Psal 40.9 Jer. 12.3 Psal 17.3 Job 10.7 Direct 3. Touching the Conclusion wherein Conscience is to denounce the sentence upon the trial made agreeable to the truth she dictateth in the Proposition and to the testimony which she delivereth in the Assumption Here I advise 1 See that Conscience pronounce the sentence upon thee Or why are all these proceeds hitherto Why are 1. the word and statutes of Heaven consulted 2. The Court set 3. The Witness sworn and heard Shall the Records of Heaven be produced and the Records of my Heart proved to no purpose Hast thou done so many things O my Conscience in vain if it shall be yet in vain But because Conscience is so prone to protract the sentence and to forbear the conclusion which should follow upon the Premisses and doth naturally and necessary follow upon the Proposition and Assumption in a Logical discourse as one well observeth * See Ames de Consc l. 1. c. 9. §. 5. 10. I advise these things 1. If Conscience be silent suspect thy condition is not well or that at least it is not well with Conscience I shall not say that her suspending of the Conclusion doth always speak the condition and state of the Soul to be a state of sin Because deserted Saints through the power of fear and temptations and the weakness of their faith in such troubles may not be able to derive and draw it down to themselves But ordinarily and out of the case of desertion it speaks the condition ill and lyable to suspition 'T was not well with David when he turns the conclusion and sentence to another which he should have taken to himself and the Prophet was fain to take up the office of Conscience and tell him Thou art the man c. He cannot be apprehended to have been either ignorant of God's Law or of his own lascivious and murtherous fact But Conscience did not conclude or argue and apply it home And it was very ill with them who knowing the judgment of God that they who did such things were worthy of death and that they did them yet concluded not their estate upon it but continued in their sin Nor was their condition safe or Conscience sound that could wave the Conclusion when the Premisses were so clear Neither say they in their heart let us now fear the Lord c. Jer. 5.23 24. 2 Sam. 12.5 6 7. Rom. 1.32 2. If Conscience do not speak to thee do thou speak to Conscience God complaineth when men do not set and say to their hearts when they do not call upon and converse with them Isa 44.19 Hos 7.2 Argue it with her and urge her to proceed to sentence and to perfect her discourse in giving judgment Urge her by her past proceeds of which before By her place and power Hath not God made thee a Judg in Israel set thee next under himself and over me that thou shouldst shew me the sentence in judgment Is not thy commission Divine His concurrence declared who is with you in the judgment to behold if thou judgest falsly to approve if thy judgment be according to verity Deut. 17.9 2 Chron. 19.6 1 Joh. 3.20 21. By her Precedency Thou expectest from inferiour Judges that they proceed to judgment and wilt expostulate and rebuke them if they shall adventure to retard it and judgment goeth not forth Thou art superiour to any to all of them God hath set thee as Solomon set his Mother next himself on the Throne And if thou shalt clear no matter if they all condemn me But if thou condemn not all of them can quit me May not they dare to adventure upon unnecessary delays in Civil concernments and durst thou to delay and defer the sentence in Spiritual in Soul-matters and of eternal consequence Deut. 16.18 19 20. Hab. 1.4 1 King 2.19 Rom. 8.33 c. 1 Joh. 3.20 By her Principles Civil Judges have severals to consult without them ere they can come to sentence But thou O my Conscience containest all within thee whereby thou mayst be
both clear and quick or expeditious in the judgment Thou needst not call for Law-books or foreign Witnesses With thee is a treasury of Laws and thou art more than a thousand Witnesses 3. If Conscience yet suspends judgment cite her before the supream Judg. Behold Conscience the Judg standeth before the door He is greater than the Conscience to him thou must accompt Thou mayst apologize to me but how wilt thou answer it to him who made thee his deputy and substituted thee upon this very design And hath said to Conscience as Jehoshaphat to his Judges Take heed what ye do for ye judg not for man but for the Lord who is with you in the judgment Wherefore take heed and do it Jam. 5.9 1 Joh. 30.20 2 Chron. 19.5 6 7. 2 See that Conscience pronounce the sentence fully and clearly upon thee An half-sentence can give but half-satisfaction If the sentence be dubious thy Soul will still be in the dark Why all this pains Not for airy hopes but for assurance of the heart before God 1 Joh. 3.19 To this end 1. Be full and clear with Conscience in exposing all thou art and dost to her sentence without any of the restraints of self-love without any reserve for any secret lusts Self-love will be putting in for her immunities A clear and impartial sentence will shake all her foundations hitherto of quiet and self-ease And therefore importuneth Conscience as David sometime did his chief Commanders Deal gently for my sake yea and for thy own sake for thou must sustain the effects of such a sentence 2 Tim. 3.2 cum 5. 2 Sam. 18.5 Secret lusts will be putting in for an indemnity which it may be Conscience hath cockered or at least hitherto connived at Wherefore should we be slain Have not we took sweet counsel together and walked to the house of God in company c. But Conscience must quit them ere it can clear thec 'T will be a partial sentence if she parteth not with these sins Or if she speak peace it will be but the shew and paint of it so long as ye will walk after the imagination of your own hearts Psal 19.12 13. 18.23 Deut. 29.19 Bring all then before the Bar of Conscience and that Bar without any vails or coverts and tell her as Cornelius told Peter we are all here present before God to hear all things that are commanded thee of God Act. 10.33 2. Be free yet close with Conscience You may remember her there will be another audit and what will attend if she shall give a loose or partial judgment Cursed be he that perverteth judgment But remember her withal that therefore this thy appearance is made before her throne of Judicature and thou demandest it as thy right not as a matter of courtesie from her but as of debt and duty As of old it was ordained Thou shalt come to the Judg and enquire and he shall shew thee the sentence of judgment Deut. 27.19 c. 17.9 See thou do not see her by any carnal indulgence for a gift blindeth the eyes of the wise and perverteth the words of righteousness and fire shall consume the tabernacles of bribery Deut. 16.19 Job 15.34 Nor flatter her by any corrupt inducements The flattering mouth worketh ruin Psal 36.2 Prov. 26.28 Be plain with Conscience Lo I have now put my self my state my salvation upon thy sentence 'T is thy work to condemn or clear me thy eternal wo or weal is concerned in it I require thee as before the supream and all-seeing Judg to judg righteously I do not sollicite for favour but seek justice at thy mouth How long shall I take counsel in my soul When wilt thou bring it to a conclusion that I may know my estate what I am Follow her with arguments and importunities till she answereth thee in the words of the Psalmist I will judg uprightly Psal 75.2 Q. 4. How may we difference the Peace of a good and of an evil Conscience and so discern that ours is a sound and an Evangelical Peace Doubtless there is a difference * See Fenner's Treat of Consc p. 137. to 167. Robinsons Christ all in all p. 187 188 Collin's right way to true peace p. 51. ad 62. or our Saviour had not delivered it as he doth Joh. 14.27 cum 22. But he that would drive this nail to the head for the discovery of his own peace whether it be true or false should discuss it thorowly with his own Conscience how it came to take up this peace The peace that an evil Conscience bears groweth usually out of one of these two roots 1. Either out of the sluggishness of Conscience that puts not the estate upon trial 2. Or from the shifts and unfaithfulness of Conscience if it proceed to trial 1. Fither in the Proposition 2. Or in the Assumption 3. Or in the Conclusion as hath been shewed You should dig to the very bottom in this business Whether this peace be the product of pains prayers and of proving your hearts and states once and again What pains did Conscience take in it What proceed did Conscience make in it Did it give full and infallible marks for the trial of your estates Did it give a faithful and impartial testimony in the trial And did it give a free and unbiassed judgment upon the trial of your estates Produce and prove thy Evidences That your enmity against godliness is turned into peace and therewith amity That you are as earnest for holiness as you were for sin or are for happiness and as great a friend to the purity as to the peace of Conscience Prove that the spirit of peace hath renewed and sanctified you That the Prince of Peace Christ Jesus ruleth in and hath the Soveraignty over you That the God of peace is related as a Father to you and is that supream good and end to whom you finally refer your selves in point of felicity and duty and then your peace which is gathered from these Premisses is proved therewith to be true pious and Evangelical But to give you the difference enquired after though every thing I herewith offer doth not serve to discover it effectually in such a practical inquiry without some further reference The Evangelical peace of the good Conscience and the quiet or peace of an evil Conscience are different 1. In the eminency of this Evangelical Peace 1. In point of truth That other is but the shadow and semblance of peace but this is solid substantial peace 'T is peace peace Isa 26.3 c. 57.19 not only the resemblance or appearance of peace but real rich assured abundant peace But there is no peace saith my God unto the wicked ver 21. Isa 48.22 Let men call it by the title of peace yet God accounts it to be in truth no peace 2 In point of tranquillity That other is mostly but negative a freedom from storms but this is positive a fulness of serenity There
Conscience is asleep and therefore quiet but here it 's awake and at work and therefore are they comforted yea filled oft-times with comfort under variety of crosses They are not only not vexed not frighted or only fed by Conscience but find a continual feast in the peace of their Conscience 2 Cor. 1.1 2. c. 7.4 Prov. 15.15 3 In point of transcendency That soon evaporates into airy imaginations and intoxicates affections But this peace is both serious and superlative The Soul feels what the other never found or can fathom Nay he feels more than himself can utter or indeed comprehenlively understand This peace passeth all understanding not only others but his own Rev. 2.17 Phil. 4.7 4 In the principle transfering it Peace I leave with you saith Christ my peace I give unto you not as the world giveth give I unto you Joh. 14.27 5 In the proper treasury of it These things have I spoken saith he that in me ye might have peace Joh. 16.33 This is not a peace then of the world's giving nor of our own getting We neither get it of our selves nor get it out of our selves 'T is a peace of Christs giving the Christian goeth to him for it in the purity of peace and glorieth in him as the procurer and peculiar object of his peace He is our peace say Believers Rom. 5.1 c. 2.7 Ephes 2.14 2. In the extent of Evangelical peace See 1 from what it extendeth it self 1. From the indwelling of Satan He like a strong man armed keeps the other's heart as his house and so its peace while his possession is undisturbed Being willing captives in whom he works effectually he suffers them to walk at ease and quiet Luk. 11.21 2 Tim. 2.26 Ephes 2.2 But this peace alway presupposeth his dispossession and devestment from power the binding of him for you and the bruising of him under you the taking of his armor from him and treading of him under the feet of you The God of peace shall bruise or tread satan under your feet shortly Luk. ibid. 22. Col. 1.13 Rom. 16.20 2. From the dominion of sin The security of the evil Conscience is in that sin hath the entire command and suffers not conviction to embroil Conscience Rom. 1.21 c. 7.9 Amos 6.1 3 c. But Evangelical security is founded upon the excussion of sin and extrusion thereof out of command and authority in the Soul While sin reigns there is no sound rest To be carnally minded is death to be spiritually minded is life and peace Psal 19.13 Rom. 2.8 9 10. c. 7.9 10 11. c. 8.6 3. From the displeasure of God The tranquillity of evil Consciences is taken up mostly either from God's seeming silence at their sins and suspending of his severities or from their insensibleness of what he threatens and shifting it from themselves to others or from the smiles of his providence upon them in common enjoyments and blessings When yet all this while he reserves his anger and it shall smoke against such sinners Psal 50.21 22. Eccles 8.11 Deut. 29.19 20. Mal. 2.2 But Evangelical peace extends it self beyond God's not punishing or not threatning or not being provoked and beyond God's prospering and preserving His comforts are that God is his portion God is pleased his person justified and his works accepted His cares are how he may please God and walk worthy of his good pleasure and never is he so cheery as in the Conscience of this that he pleaseth God which trieth our hearts Psal 4.8 Rom. 5.1 Eccles 9.7 1 Cor. 7.32 Col. 1.10 Heb. 11.5 1 Thes 2.4 In examining then the truth of this peace let these be some of thy principal enquiries Whether Satan was ever disturbed and dethroned and thy Soul delivered from under his power in the dominion of the Prince of Peace and to do and endure his pleasure Whether sin be dead in thee and thou to sin and thy Soul desireth as well peace from sin and power against sin as to be preserved from smart and anguish Whether God be pleased with thee and thy greatest care be to please him and to commend thy Conscience and Conversation to his sight and approbation 2 See what this Evangelical Peace extendeth it self unto 1. To all the subject the whole Conscience yea the whole Christian to comfort keep confirm him in his Communion with God But especially it shall keep your hearts and minds and these in believing your inward powers in the inward power of godliness Phil. 4.7 Rom. 15.13 2. To all Circumstances for the enjoyment of it self under them and the improvement of it self by them While he senseth this peace he can swallow any persecution nor only rejoyce in hope of the glory of God but glory in tribulation also c. Rom. 5.1 2 3. 3 To all the Causes Supream subordinate Supream Oh! how it extendeth it self to the God of Peace Father Son and Holy Ghost in an enriching Communion with them an exact Conformity to them and a most endearing Complacency in and with them while the God of Love and Peace is with these Rev. 1.4 5. Phil. 4.9 Heb. 13.20 21. Subordinate How are their own feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of Peace and how beautiful are others feet to them that preach the Gospel of Peace and bring the glad tydings of these good things Ephes 6.15 Rom. 10.15 Wouldst try the truth of thy Peace turn in hither and examine the extent of it by these particulars that false peace falls short and though like those Locusts St. John mentioneth which had the faces of men Rev. 9.7 10. it may have some appearance of and approaches toward this peace yet as they were fierce and far from the nature of men so it is utterly alien from and adverse unto it in these particulars 3. In the efficient matter form and end of this Evangelical Peace These kinds of peace are widely different when the causes are so wide and different 'T is called the Peace of God Phil. 4.7 This is a peace that cometh from God he is the maker of it 2. In Communion with God here is the principal matter of it 3. Conformable to God here is the mould and form of it 4. Carried after and concludeth in and with God he is the ultimate end of it 1 Enquire then into the efficient of your peace The Principal Came it from the God of Peace That other peace is of our own or others coyning but this is of God's creating 'T is he that fills with peace in believing Isa 57.19 Rom. 15.13 If it came from God it carrieth thee to and keeps thee with God Hither doth this Soul turn alone for peace On him he trusts for peace and with him he tarries till he shall speak peace Hos 6.1 Isa 26.3 Psal 85.8 The Procatarctick Came it through and by the blood of Christ Peace of Conscience is of Christ's procuring He got it for you by the merit of Redemption He
gives it to you by the spirit of Regeneration This Man shall be the peace when Divine justice on the one hand or the Devil on the other hand like the Assyrian shall invade Conscience Joh. 14.27 Phil. 4.7 Mich. 5.5 Is the blood of his Cross then that peace-offering you present unto the Father the peace you plead for is it upon the account of your service or of his satisfaction of your deserts or of his death for you There is no preaching peace but by Jesus Christ Col. 1.20 Act. 10.36 The prime instruments of your peace what were or what are they Was it the Gospel of Peace then will the Ministration and Ministry thereof be more beautiful in your eyes Nah. 1.15 Isa 52.7 Was it the grace of faith 'T is first grace then peace throughout the Gospel No peace before grace much less without grace 'T is believing in Christ that brings the calm upon the Conscience Being justified by faith we have peace with God Rom. 1.7 1 Cor. 1.3 Joh. 14.1 Rom. 5.1 Try your faith then whether it be beyond temporary whether it be truly justifying ere you take up with peace He cannot be the God of peace to you if he be not the God of hope and faith unto you The God of hope fill you with peace in believing saith the Apostle Rom. 15.13 2 Enquire into the matter of your Peace not so much that of which it consisteth as about which it is conversant To mention but an head or two 1. Is it Communion with God which consists in that mutual relation and those mutual returns which pass 'twixt God and a Believer in the descending of his graces and ascending of our duties What say you are these the matters that take up the tranquillity of your mind the mutual interest that God and you have in each other that he is yours and you are his the mutual intercourse that you have with each other in his mercies and your duties while he draweth nigh to you in extending the grace of his favour and you draw nigh to him in exercising the graces of his Spirit This this is the heart of Evangelical Peace acquaintance with God fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ Here the believing Soul doth lye down in Peace Job 22.21 1 Joh. 1.3 4. Psal 4.6 8. 2. Is it the Kingdom of God specially in and over you That false peace is never thorow in the former and taketh its leave in this latter It may be taken with God's love but turns aside from his laws especially from that part which is cross to his carnal interest But Evangelical peace hath endearing and precious thoughts of the very laws the rule and restraints of Divine Government He rejoyceth and worketh righteousness and the work of righteousness is his peace and rejoycing Psal 119.165 169. Isa 65.5 c. 32.17 How is Conscience pleased then with the commands of God in that he hath the dominion of Conscience and will not dispense with the least corruptions and will have the ducture of your whole Conversations Read the language and resolution herein of the good and peaceable Conscience Isa 26.12 13. 3 Enquire into the formal cause There is no Gospel-peace of Conscience but what is spoken by God thorow Christ in the Gospel The peace spoken by Conscience through the Gospel standing in an accord to what is spoken by Christ in the Gospel And it is not only therefore called the peace of God * Phil. 4.7 in that it is caused principally by him he is the fountain of it But in regard of the conformity thereof to his pleasure which gives form and being to it Thus Evangelical Conscience doth not absolve or justifie before or without God but with and because God absolves and justifies * Rom. 5.1 9. It 1. reads and reviews God's sentence of peace in the Gospel Peace be with you all that are in Christ Jesus There is now no condemnation to them that are in Christ c. As many as walk according to this rule peace shall be upon them 1 Pet. 5.14 Rom. 8.1 Gal. 6.16 2. It reflects and resumes But I who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit am in Christ I walk after this rule as God himself is my witness Hence 3. he reports and agrees God's sentence in the Gospel to his own Soul in particular Therefore to me is peace God hath cleared me therefore Conscience cleareth me And so have I quietness in and confidence toward God Behold my witness is in heaven and my record is on high 1 Joh. 3.21 Job 34.29 c. 16.19 Well then it must be peace in Heaven or there can be no peace to speak properly in your hearts Your hearts are at peace because heaven is at peace and this heart-peace bears accord with heavens peace * Luk. 2.14 19.38 And be sure God can never speak peace in you upon any other terms than he hath in the Gospel spoken peace to you 4 Enquire into the final cause This peace of God is finally for the God of peace it sits not down in self-ease but is set for his service and the enjoyment of himself Yea it not only pursueth good works but would be made perfect to every good work Nor doth this Soul content it self in the sweets of this joy and peace but his care and character is that in these things he serveth Christ Heb. 9.14 chap. 13.20 21. Rom. 14.17 18. Whither doth your peace then extend and where doth it terminate it self True peace of Conscience can never take up short of God in Christ This is its earnest expectation and hope that shall be magnified and his service maintained and his own Soul shall more abound in holiness and in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost The thoughts of this heart are not only taken up about his own felicity and peace but about the furtherance of God's praise the fulfilling of his pleasure and the peaceable fruits of righteousness If there be any vertue if there be any praise he thinks on these things Phil. 1.20 Rom. 15.13 Jam. 3.18 Phil. 4.7 8. In short as this peace is by reception from God so its rest is in and with God It lifts up the Soul unto him lifts him upmost in the Soul lays its charge thereon to repose her self upon him to rejoyce in him and upon every miscarriage to return to him as her only rest and center Psal 86.4 c. 73.25 26. 62.5 116.7 4. The peace of a good and evil Conscience are differenced in and by the effects of it The peace of an evil Conscience usually renders men less circumspect and inobservant of spiritual dangers more slight and overly in spiritual duties c. But Evangelical peace ends in 1 Greater vigilance over himself and against sin satan as also in the objects of sense that he turn not again to solly Psal 85.8 Rom. 16.19 20. 1 Thes 5.5 6 8 9. Doth this peace
then make you draw off your guards and centinels or make you more diligent and circumspect 2 Greater fortitude of spirit forbearing troubles breaking thorow tentations and baffling all the assaults of flesh and blood upon the sanctified habits and faculties The peace of God shall keep your hearts and minds saith the Apostle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall keep it as with a garrison as that word is elsewhere used Joh. 16.33 Phil. 4.7 cum 2 Cor. 11.32 It shall fit you for resistance fill you with resolution and free you from those returns of fraud and force which make others become their prisoners * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gr. Scho. Doth this peace then cool and slacken your resolutions for duty especially in case of discouragements and difficulty or doth it quicken and add spurs and wings to it 3 Greater vigors of obedience A formal peace is the best effect usually of that Pharisaical peace But this Evangelical peace is not without an Evangelical power upon the heart within and in the acts without Rom. 14.17 cum 1 Cor. 4.20 2 Tim. 1.3 cum 6. This Soul not only maintains a course or track in spiritual matters but manageth them with a spiritual mind His spiritual peace begets a spiritual plenty and now he can easily step over what heretofore stumbled him No offence is so great to him as that his obedience is no greater He not only liveth up to Gods testimonies but he loves him exceedingly Rom. 8.6 Psal 119.165 169. Doth your peace then make you more slight and formal in duty or more spiritual and vigorous Are they not only more bulky but more strong and sincere fuller of the sap of love and of the spirit of life 4 Greater vivacity of Holiness Evangelical peace is ever prospered to Evangelical grace and growth See how it fructifieth and clusters Rom. 5.1 6. Gal. 5.22 23. Let the day of that false peace be as the harvest-time to the formal hypocrite His righteousness is now all gathered into barn But 't is as the seed-time to the faithful soul The fruit of righteousness is sown in peace Jam. 3.18 Now is this Soul's time to be distributing the seeds of righteousness for God and among men and by the oyl of gladness to make increase likewise of the oyl of grace This holy peace puts him upon perfecting holiness in himself and provoking others Souls to take and taste thereof likewise Heb. 13.20 21. Psal 66.16 34.8 51.12 13. Q. 3. May not the Soul that enjoys ease and tranquility after eminent troubles of Conscience infer that his is Evangelical peace In no wise * See Sheffield's good Cons c. 18. pag. 263 c. Though a good Conscience may prove greatly troublesom after great tranquility yet the greatest tranquility after the greatest troubles cannot simply and by it self prove Conscience good Because the Devil turns in men hither and a deceitful heart often taketh up here I have felt the terrors of the Lord but now find tranquility and taste of his love as they did Heb. 6.4 5 6. cum 9. Hear me therefore a few things 1. Prop. 2 Every trouble is not a trouble of Conscience that may be so called 1. There is a trouble of carnal policy Herod is troubled and all Hierusalem with him but 't is that Christ is born who might shake his Secular Kingdom not that he was born without Christ or seeth no title to an eternal Kingdom So is the King of Assyria sore troubled But 't is for the defeating of his Counsels not for destroying his corruptions Mat. 2.3 2 King 6.11 2. There is a trouble of Concupiscence and iniquity Ahab is so troubled as he taketh his bed upon it not for want of faith in or forgiveness from God but for want of the Vineyard So is Amnon not that his lust may be subdued but that it may be satisfied upon his Sister Tamar 1 King 21.4 2 Sam. 13.2 3. There is a trouble that is but corporeal and bodily through excess of Melancholy c. which is sometimes mixt sometimes meerly such This disordereth the imagination or fancy This again distempereth the passions these discompose the natural spirits these again drive to and fro and agitate the humours of the body and so all is in a commotion nothing is quiet And now happily a mans own spirit falls upon him within and an evil spirit from the Lord also from without And then terrour taketh hold of him on every side as it did upon Saul But what are these troubles Rather of sickness than for sin from the oppression of nature rather than in order to grace at least originally if not only 1 Sam. 16.14 I presume you will not call it peace of Conscience to have a period or conclusion put to any or all of these 2. Eminent troubles of Conscience there may be Prop. 2 and often are which are neither preparatory to nor productive of peace but rather a providential fulfilling of God's threatnings and a preface sometimes to greater torments as they were to Cain and Judas Will you read his threatning The Lord shall give thee a trembling heart and failing of eyes and sorrow of mind and thou shalt fear day and night In the morning thou shalt say would God it were even and at even thou shalt say would God it were morning for the fear of thine heart wherewith thou shalt fear Deut. 29.65 67. Lev. 26.36 Isa 8.21 22. God may remit then or remove such troubles as he doth other temporal judgments without renovation of the person or the blessing of a religious peace 3. Prop. 3 Eminent troubles of Conscience may and have ended in a still and sapless formality without sincerity or sanctifying the Conscience The Pharisees are a clear and confessed instance Conscience arrests the Jews with fears and conscernation Away they betake them to a course of prayer and fasting but in both formal And so Conscience is at rest but as the Psalmist observeth was not right in them Isa 58.2 c. Psal 78.33 37. Ananias and Sapphira seem pricked in their heart but were not purified in their heart Formality drew out that prick but drew on their perdition Conscience takes hold on Magus on Ahab and others and they are troubled But wherein ended their pangs of Conscience In a sound peace No but in a spiritless profession and practice of some external duties without any saving change upon them Act. 2.37 cum 5.1 c. 8.13 c. 1 King 21.27 cum c. 22. This amounts to no more than a silencing of such troubles not the sanctifying of them Formality is as bad an evidence of the truth of our peace as it is of the truth of our grace 4. Prop. 4 Eminent troubles and distresses of Conscience may and have ended in stupidity and dedolence The smiting reproving Conscience may become a seared remorsless Conscience witness Pharaoah Felix Belshazzar What pangs of Conscience might you have sometime found them in who within
themselves were comforted of God 2 Cor. 1.4 Confession is not confined to a Priest only or a Pastor by Saint James Confess your faults one to another saith he Jam. 5.16 Private persons might purifie the unclean as well as the Priest Numb 19.18 19. 2. But especially I advise you to experienced Ministers whose experiences may be supposed more and better because they have besides their own the accession of the experiments of others Yea they are more interested in intrusted with and enabled for this work than others God hath committed to them the word of reconciliation and hath given them the tongue of the learned that they should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary 2 Cor. 5.19 Isa 50.4 If there be then ever a Paul or Silas a Peter or Barnabas about you a son of Consolation betake your selves to him as these here did Open your Spiritual sores to him Let his probe go to the very bottom Refuse not his Corrosives if there be any proud flesh to be eaten off Especially receive his Cordials and apply the healing Medicines which he prescribeth and have a probatum est upon them The Priests lips should keep knowledg and the people should seek the law at his mouth for he is the Messenger of the Lord of hosts Act. 2.37 c. 16.29 30. c. 4.36 Mal. 2.7 Hag. 2.11 Direct 6. Advise your Company especially as to their counsels They pickt out other company as soon as they were prickt in their own Conscience Act. 2. 16. So did Paul Act. 9. Gal. 1. Whom they formerly opposed now they own Thy old sinful company in thy new spiritual Convictions is worse than new wine for old bottles Beware especially of such as 1. Would drive out this nail out of thy heart with another fetcht from and that would fasten thee to Hell That call thee from thy Convictions to their compotations corruptions As if thou couldst never find peace but in their fleshly pleasures Thou must run riot with them or there is no rest for thee My Soul be not thou partaker with them Enter not into their path Avoid it pass not by it turn from it and go away Ephes 5.7 Prov. 4.14 15. c. 1.15 16. 2. Such as will dig and rake in these wounds persecuting him whom God hath smitten and talking to the grief of those whom he hath wounded Ay this is your Religion Here is the fruits of your hearing Sermons c. That maketh you amaz'd or in Festus's language even mad again Let thine ear be deaf to their discouragements O the dreadful imprecations of the Psalmist upon such men Psal 69.20 29. 109.16 21. Act. 26.24 3. Such as deride and would scoffe thee out of thy Convictions What! you 'l be a Convert I warrant you Will you grow mopish and a melancholy fool too c. Job and David no sooner put on mourning but there are some presently mocking Are there not mockers with me saith Job Hypocritical mockers they are called by David they shoot out the lip and shake the head c. Job 17.2 Psal 35.16 c. 22.7 Shut thine ear to such Scoffers A void them as the pests of any place So they are called by the Septuagint Psal 1.1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Surely God scorneth the Scorners Prov. 3.34 4. Such as dawb and sooth thee under these Convictions with untempered mortar Why such hard thoughts of your self What need so much ado 'T is well enough already No evil shall come upon you c. Ezek. 13.10.18 Lam. 2.14 These are miserable Surgeons that when they should apply Corrosives and Causticks to your corruptions apply only lenitive or stupifying Medicaments Cruel kindness that kills the Conscience instead of curing it by preaching comfort without pressing conversion I am against these Prophets saith the Lord that steal my word every one from his neighbour that heal the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly saying peace peace when there is no peace Jer. 23.30 14 17. c. 6.14 c. Listen not to such Syren-songs Better are the wounds of a friend that presseth you with the necessity of Conversion than the kisses of an enemy that precipitateth your consolation 'T is better to have your wounds search'd and so salv'd than to have them skin'd over but stink and rankle under Direct 7. Apply thy self to the course prescribed thee for thy cure and preservation They that askt What shall we do Act. 2. 16. were resolved to do what they were advised Now is the time of action at least of resolution Listless and lazy desires will leave thee at a deplorable perhaps irrecoverable loss The soul of the sluggard desireth and hath nothing but the soul of the diligent shall be made fat How long wouldst thou sleep Oh sluggard Canst see all thy hopes failing thee thy House fired about thee Hell flaming before thee and doth thy heart even faint within thee and yet talk of folding thy hands to sleep I say to thee as David to Solomon Arise and be doing and the Lord be with thee Prov. 13.4 c. 6.9 10 11. 1 Chro. 22.16 God hath not bound thee in these fetters nor holds thee in these cords of affliction to shut thee up from working but to shew thee thy work and set thee on it with more speed and seriousness and he is ready to give thee strength for and success in it Job 36.8 12. c. 33.16 31. Is the iron blunt put to the more strength Is thine inability before thee Pray in the more of the Spirit Lord help my unbelief Lord turn me and I shall be turned Eccles 10.10 Mar. 9.24 Jer. 31.18 'T will be no excuse for idleness that we cannot effectually do any thing without his especial influence and assistance Remembring that he hath made this an encouragement which you would make your excuse Work out your own Salvation c. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure Phil. 2.12 13. I shall not here prescribe a method of cure See Q. 5. But return thee the same short answers which were long ago given to the same question askt by those Act. 2. 16. Repent Believe * See Dykes good Conscience c. 4. p. 36. ad 45. 1 Repent Act. 2.37 38. i.e. Return from thy sins to God himself Act. 26.20 Ezek. 14.6 Well may Conscience continue smiting if thou continuest sinning and God be pouring in his wrath while thou art pouring out thy wickedness If you will walk contrary to him he also will walk contrary to you Lev. 20.18 21 24 28. Or if God and Conscience forbear smiting when you do not forbear sinning 't is in greater wrath not of good will Not that he favours or respects you but that his fury may rest upon you and the stupidity of your Consciences may seal you up to condemnation Ezek. 24.13 Psal 81.11 12. Rom. 1.24 28. Off with these Sheba's heads and over the wall with them
of the design of this present dispensation He hath me in the furnace of affliction but it may be not to consume me but to cleanse and purifie me to cast me into the precious mould of his pure and holy mind and will which in his word is revealed to me He breaketh up the fallow ground of my heart but 't is to sow me with the seeds of righteousness And were there no plowing and harrowing I could expect no harvest But of this before Direction 1. Direct 9. Attend thy Cure with patience and do not too hastily press after comfort Thou art in the hands of a most wise and gracious Physician who knoweth how to time his Cordials to thy constitution and temper and will do it Do not limit his Eternity to thy time his infiniteness to thy measure Those Act. 2. 16. enquire what course they would prescribe them to take not what comfort they could presently tender them And the Apostles let them know that Conscience must first attend the duties of repentance and faith ere it could arrive to a delicious rejoycing in God's favour This is thy time to be getting of grace let God take his time for giving of peace The effect of righteousness will be peace Ply thy work and wait patiently He is a God of judgment that knows best when and how to order out his blessings Blessed are all they that wait for him You never knew that it went ill with any such as waited on him Isa 32.17 c. 30.18 Psal 33.20 21. 40.1 I do not blame the seeking of peace and comfort so it be submissive and ordinate But would have you 1. Stay God's time for it The fruit of the lips peace peace must have time to ripen It will but beget crudities if if you eat it raw Early joys are none of the safest enjoyments Those hearers that anon received Word with joy were by and by offended when the heat of tribulation did once arise for the Word's sake 'T is good to hear till God shall speak peace Hâ—b 6.4 5. Mat. 13.20 21. Psal 85.8 2. And to set grace above and seek grace beyond it This is of absolute necessity to you to your very being that is necessary but to your better being God hath never said he will not save you without peace but he will not cannot save you with accord to his honour his holiness without grace Heb. 12.14 1 Cor. 6.9 Besides it will argue better for you Natural Conscience will put you upon endeavors for peace 'T is an enlightned Conscience that puts you upon endeavours for grace And 't is an home at least an hopeful evidence of saving illumination when you do prefer grace in your endeavours to peace and that you love it for its own comeliness and not only in order to your quiet 3. To stay the galling anxieties and vexations anhilations of your hearts for and after it Cutting and corroding cares even for this are faulty You should make known your case to God in prayer and cast these cares into the lap of his Providence continuing in the means which he hath prescribed you and so peace will come in his appointed time which is the most acceptable and advantageous time Phil. 4.6 7. Hab. 2.3 Othervvise you expose your self to the artifices of Satan vvho vvill soon abuse your eagerness to his ends either dravving you off from your vvork in the failer and vvant of peace or dravving you into his vviles in a false and ungrounded peace Q. 6. How may we obtain a peaceable or sound peace of Conscience The Premisses Quest 5. are of pertinent consideration Here likewise I only add Direct 1. Affect thy heart not only with the possibility of peace after all these perplexities of which before but with the preciousness of this peace * See Jenkins on Jude vers 2. This will excite and engage endeavours 'T is a peace that the world cannot give nor would the Soul that senseth it give it for the whole world 'T is the peace of God a peace in Christ the peace of Christ 'T is for the truth and transcendency of it called peace peace Joh. 14.27 Phil. 4.7 Joh. 16.33 Isa 57.19 Of what an excellency must this Peace needs be which is produced by no lower power than the blessed God he creats it is procured by no lower price than the blood of God who was crucified for it is proclaimed by no lower persons than the Blessed Angels they celebrate it Isa 57.19 Col. 1.20 Luk. 2.14 What a peace that can grasp Heaven into the heart of him that hath it and make an Heaven upon earth and in any place can behold a Paradise and God his portion Psal 16.5 c. Joh. 16.22 Why should thy Soul sit down in sadness Here is a feast a continual feast * See Dykes good Conscience c. 13 p 18. to p. 201. Thou mayst come with the Wedding-garment on and welcome Prov. 15.15 Here mayst thou eat of the hidden manna and have given thee the white stone and in the stone a new name written which no man knoweth but he that receiveth it Eye hath not seen nor ear heard nor can it enter into the heart of man to conceive what is here prepared This peace passeth all understanding 'T is so sweet so signal so surpassing Rev. 2.17 1 Cor. 2.9 Phil. 4.7 Wert thou but possest of this peace thou might'st look on Satan as not only disarm'd but destroy'd on Sin not only as disabled but destroyed on Sufferings not only as not harmful but advantageous and helpful on the sentence of the law and severities of God not only as satisfied for thee but as sweetned to thee Eph. 2.15 Rom. 6.16 c. 8.33 to the end Thou might look on death and not be discouraged Thou shalt depart in peace Look on the grave and hell and not be dismayed Thou shalt enter into peace Look up to Heaven and there see nothing but rest and peace rest from work at least from weariness as well as rest from wars Luk. 2.29 Isa 57.2 Luk. 19.38 Rev. 14.13 Direct 2. Hasten thy best attempts for the prerequisite of Peace Purity Conscience is first pure then peaceable as hath been said The goodness of Security is founded upon the goodness of Sincerity 'T is true Conscience may be Evangelically purified yet not pacified But 't is as true never was Conscience Evangelically pacified but it was first Evangelically purified Of this before An impure Soul must expect the same return from Conscience to all his messengers enquiries for peace which Jehn returned Joram's messengers Turn thee behind me what hast thou to do with peace 2 King 9.17 18 19. Direct 3. Abandon all those ways and means which made and maintained the war between God and thy Soul Conscience is God's Officer The war it maketh and manageth is by his commission and in his cause to revenge thine injuries done him to return thee to thy duty to him and in both to right him
go and seek the Lord their God They shall ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward saying come and let us joyn our selves to the Lord c. Gen. 3.8 Isa 50.5 Jer. 50.4 5. Who is this that engageth his heart to approach unto me saith the Lord. He requires it Seek ye my face and you must resolve upon it thy face Lord I must and I will seek 'T is good for you and God hath annexed his special promise to to it Jer. 30.21 Psal 27.8 73.28 4 There must be an hearty conjunction with him For of what avail is acquaintance as long as the heart hangs loose in our converses Your heart must be knit and cleave unto him as Jonathan's did unto David Psal 86.11 Act. 11.23 1 Sam. 18.1 What acquaintance with omniscience while your hearts stand off and God is near in your mouth but far from your reins Behold he desireth truth in the inward parts He searcheth the heart and trieth the reins And if thy heart be not right with him thy other applications will be reckoned flattery not friendship Jer. 12.2 3. Psal 51.6 Jer. 17.10 Psal 78.7 36 37. 1 Chron. 28.9 5 Be actually and often communicating thy self to him If you will hide your heart from him what hopes of acquaintance with him He that intends acquaintance should be emptying and unbosoming his heart to him and making him partaker of his secrets Pour out your heart before him then especially in Prayers and Supplications Present him your particular cases and concernments Hide nothing from him from whom indeed nothing is hidden Let all thy pangs of sorrow have vent like Hannahs in the pouring out of thy Soul It may be when thou art pouring out thy case he may be pouring in his comforts Psal 62.8 32.5 38.9 1 Sam. 1.15 Prayer hath the promise of his Presence and indeed of peace In every thing by prayer and supplication let your requests be made known unto God And the peace of God shall keep your hearts c. Psal 145.18 Job 33.26 Phil. 4.6 7. 6 Add to all this an affectionate correspondence and communion with him Acquaintance doth not barely note an interest in another but intimacy but endearedness at least intercourse with that other I would have you secure an interest in him that thou be able with Thomas to say My Lord and my God This will serve thee in with choice peace in that this God is the God of peace Psal 16.2 Joh. 20.28 1 Thes 5.23 But I would not have you think it enough to have obtain'd an interest in him but you should maintain an holy open intercourse with him for herein lieth the crop and confluence of Evangelical peace and it is the end for which one whole Epistle was written 1 Joh. 1.3 4. Oh! what a calm and serenity of Conscience do such holy converses of faith love c. breathe forth What a conflux of joy are they blessed with Who ever came down from this Mount but his face shone with the irradiations of Divine love Or did not say of being on this Mount as Peter of being on that Mat. 17. 'T is good for us to be here let us build Tabernacles c. Isa 26.3 Exod. 34.29 30. Psal 65.4 36.7 8.9 Mat. 17.4 Direct 7. Argue this state and ascertain it to Conscience if thou wouldst arrive to peace Adjure her throughout all her proceedings or argumentations and articulate converses about it to be plain and full with thee as ever thou wouldst attain to a sound and well-setled peace Peace of Conscience is not the birth of rash and precipitate conjectures at an adventure but of rational and pondering self-converses and arguings by comparing a mans self with the signs or marks which the Scriptures give him for judging his estate and condition Hereby know we that we are of the truth and shall assure our hearts * Inde fit ut pacatam conscientiam habeamâ—â— Bez. 〈◊〉 not ad 〈◊〉 or as the Syriack make our hearts quiet before him Hereby we know that we know him viz. to be our advocate with the father and that he is the propitiation for our sins and therefore our peace if we keep his commandments 1 Joh. 3.18 19. c. 2.1 2 3. Call Conscience to attend its office for clearing thy estate and charge it to be open and down-right with thee in the discharge of every part as it proceedeth in way of ratiocination and discourse It proceeds as I have said in a practical Syllogism As thus To be spiritually minded is life and peace But I am spiritually mind do mind spiritual Objects first and fullest Ergo I have life and peace Adjure hereby the living God to tell thee nothing but the truth in all the parts of her discourse Let artificial Logick be found only among Scholars yet is there natural Logick in every mans Conscience as one * Fenners Treat of Conscienc p. 231 232. well observeth Charge her before God and the Lord Jesus Christ to be clear and impartial with thee throughout In the first Proposition adjure her not to give thee unsound marks on the one hand as a very hypocrite may have nor unsafe marks on the other hand as are only to be had where there is height or growth in grace and are therefore improper in the present case which concerns only the truth of grace In the second Proposition adjure her to be full and faithful with thee in her testimony Wilt thou say this before the all-seeing God for me Wilt thou speak it to thy superiour as well as to my self Canst thou say Behold my witness is in heaven and my record is on high Psal 139.1 23 24. Joh. 21.17 Job 16.19 In the third Proposition urge her to speak home and speak out as she will answer it to God the supream Judg. Give her no rest if she either suspends her sentence or is short in it till she saith Shibboleth plainly and roundly that ye may bring things to some certainty as they did Job 16.30 2 Tim. 1.12 1 Joh. 2.5 See this fully prosecuted Q. 3. Direct 8. Attend the spirit of peace Spiritual peace is an effect of pouring out the spirit upon us Isa 32.15 16 17. Not as if it did exclude the efficiency of Father or Son 'T is both from him and them Rev. 1.4 5. It was through the eternal Spirit that Christ offered his spotless blood to purge and therewith pacifie the Conscience from dead works It is the same eternal Spirit that mouldeth us into the mystical union with Christ maketh application of his blood to the Conscience and manifests the same to its peace and comfort Heb. 9.14 1 Cor. 12.13 Tit. 3.5 6 7. Abuse not the Spirit then but attend his work upon thee his ways before thee and his witness in and with thee 1 Attend his work upon thee What he is doing what he is demanding and with what designes * See Fords spir of bond c. 10 11.
See thou do not baffle with or break from him Quench none of his motions be they never so strict or seem they never so severe They all tend to grace they all end in peace And though he be as yet a spirit of bondage to fear it is not to exulcerate Conscience more sharply but to heal it the more soundly and that he may be a spirit of adoption to thee whereby thou maist cry Abba father 1 Thes 5.19 Isa 61.1 Rom. 8.15 2 Attend his ways before thee not only his ways in the Sanctuary without thee in the means of grace as praying hearing c. but his ways that are more spiritual within thee in the motions of grace and minding of Spiritual and gracious matters The less spiritual-mindedness the less serenity of mind What blustrings are there here beneath But above 't is all in an happy tranquility There are no tempests or thundrings in the upper region Call up thy Conscience and its Colleagues thither and keep them conversant about spiritual and heavenly Objects and thou shalt then soon know what is the communion of the Spirit and what these suavities of Conscience are To be carnally minded is death but to be spiritually is life and peace Phil. 3.20 21. cum 18 19. Col. 1.9 10. Rom. 8.5 6. 3 Attend the witness of the Spirit in and with thee It is the Spirit that beareth witness saith the Apostle 1 Joh. 5.6 Which he doth not only externally in the Scriptures but internally to and with our spirits 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 8.16 A single witness under the law was of no moment But at the mouth of two witnesses shall the matter be established Deut. 19.15 Jo. 8.17 Lo two witnesses are tendered upon the case to clear it God's spirit and our spirit both of them needful and useful to testifie the things of God and the things of man For what man knoweth the things of man save the spirit of man which is in him Even so the things of God knoweth no man but the spirit of God 1 Cor. 3.11 The spirit witnesseth to and with our spirit or Conscience in and throughout its whole argumentation and progress whereupon it concludeth its peace E. g. All those that with child-like appretiation affiance and affections can cry Abba father are the children of God But I can with a child-like appretiation affiance and affections cry Abba father Therefore I am a child of God Rom. 8.15 16. The Spirit witnesseth with my Spirit 1. To the truth of the Proposition by an internal manitestation or revelation of that truth to the mind whereof he hath already made an outward revelation in the Scriptures Joh. 14.26 Psal 119.18 2. To the truth of the Assumption by irradiating the Conscience and enabling her in and upon the reflections she maketh to apprehend feel and descry such appretiations and affections in me or whatsoever other mark or medium I am making use of to clear up my estate thereby Eph. 1.17 18. 1 Cor. 2.12 14. 3. To the truth of the Conclusion not only by strengthning her to conclude my state and condition from such appretiations and affections but by shedding abroad such beams of joy and comfort as confirm me therein and seal it up unto my soul 1 Cor. 2.9 10. Rom. 5.5 Eph. 1.13 c. 4.30 Though you must not attend for an external audible testimony from the Spirit * See Hollingw Hol. Ghost on the bench p. 74 75. Ball 's Lif of Faith p. 79. which was never promised and hardly if ever pattern'd Yet you may and must attend for the internal and effectual testimony of the Spirit in effecting exciting heightning and evidencing of his own graces to and in you and in the effusion of the love of God and of his joy upon you which is called the joy in and of the Holy Ghost and is the companion of peace of Conscience Rom. 14.17 1 Thes 1.5 6. Let me only add Thou must not expect as if the Spirit would or could witness peace to thee before it hath wrought grace in thee For its testifying peace to the Conscience is by testifying the truth of thy grace and closing with Christ Thou must first set thy scal to the truth of God in the reception of his testimony by faith in his Son ere the Spirit of truth will seal thee up to the day of redemption Joh. 3.33 cum Eph. 4.30 2 Cor. 1.22 In whom after that ye believed * Quasi dicat non citiùs nec ante sed post sidem in Christum Zanch. ad loc ye were sealed with the holy spirit of promise Ephes 1.13 Thus appealing Conscience into and adjuring her by the divine presence will be of notable advantage It will not only awaken and engage Conscience but will awe her from extreams to which Sin and Satan may otherwise incline her and put the more authority and undeniableness into her testimony and sentence as being given not only upon God's commission but with God's contestation and comprobation and so will be the more powerful to arrest and stay scruples to anticipate or answer Satan and ascertain the Soul in the sweetest and steadiest affiance while the testimony and judgment of Conscience to a mans righteousness and reconciliation c. is after such severities and as in the sight of God And her language to the Soul is like that of Eliphaz to Job Lo this we have searched it so it is hear it and know thou it for thy good Psal 17.2 3. 7.3 9 10. 26.1 2 3. Job 13.15 16. c. 23.10 c. 27.2 5 6. c. 5.27 Q. 7. How may we keep Peace of Conscience when once gotten The former Directions C. 2. Q. 7. and those even now given you Q. 7. are of useful review here likewise * See Fenners Treat of Consc p. 200 c. But I shall be particular Direct 1. Keep out sin This is THE make-bate and like a mad man it casteth firebrands arrows and death Her entrance and first embraces its true may promise a mellifluous sweetness But her end is bitter as wormwood sharp as a two-edged sword that pierceth even to the Conscience And if anothers abuse of his liberty may wound your Conscience much more will the ardour of your own lusts Prov. 26.19 c. 3 4. Rom. 6.21 1 Cor. 8.12 Psal 38.3 5. Keep out especially 1 Scandalous sins These fly at God and his glory His name is blasphemed through them and shall you be blessed in them Had Zimri peace who slew his master Though David was the darling of Divine Providence yet farewell his peace when he once fell into such a provocation 2 Sam. 12.14 2 King 9.31 Psal 51.8 11. 2 Self-condemned sins Think not to sin against Conscience and yet sin in quiet Such sins are a daring of Conscience to do its worst and do implicitely condemn her as she doth explicitely condemn them And how can she in such a circumstance acquit and clear Remember what it
* See Fenner 's Treat of Consc p. 205 c. as it anticipateth what would trouble and confound the terms of our peace but as it affordeth a testimony to Conscience of the truth of our peace Hereby we know that we know God and are known and acknowledged by him Hereby we assure our hearts before him 2 Cor. 1.12 1 Joh. 2.3 5. c. 3.19 Yea God assureth the true Evangelical obedience an happy tranquility and peace The work of righteousness shall be peace Glory honour and peace to every one that worketh good As many as walk according to this rule peace shall be upon them Isa 32.17 Rom. 2.10 Gal. 6.16 I advise especially that you preserve 1. Loving affections The more you love his precepts the more you shall live in peace Great peace have they which love thy law Psal 119.165 166 167 132. 2. Loyal aims Let the preponderating motive be to please the Lord that you walk worthy of him unto all pleasing And he will reciprocate with you Every thing shall work together to pleasure you your enemies shall be at peace with you God himself shall take pleasure in you And therefore Conscience must needs be at peace with you No testimony speaks that peace to Conscience as this that I please God 2 Tim. 2.4 Col. 1.10 Rom. 8.28 Prov. 16.7 Psal 149.4 Heb. 11.5 Direct 8. In short keep a foot consideration and your most awakened and active circumspection Look backward and consider your pangs and plaints ere it came your prayers and promises that it might come the price you then set upon it the pains you then spent for it c. Look forward and consider the end it pointeth at the effects it promiseth the enjoyments to which it predisposeth c. Look upward and consider the principle whence it cometh the price which it cost the proprieties and priviledges which it cleareth c. Look downward and consider not only others horrors but how ominous hopeless c. your thoughts of hell and of the grave would be if you should lose your peace You cannot miss of motives whither soever you convert your minds In a word lose this and you lose all God Glory Heaven Happiness though not as to themselves yet as to your sense Keep this and you keep all the sweets the security of all Nay if you keep not this you cannot keep your selves at least in any quiet and composure For 't is the peace of God that keeps your hearts and minds all your rational faculties Phil. 4.7 Keep thy heart therefore with all diligence Be diligent that you may be found of God in peace without spot and blameless Watch thou in all things Prov. 4.23 2 Pet 3.14 2 Tim. 4.5 Watch the adversaries oâ— Conscience that they neither flatter her oâ—â— of her peace or fright her with their power neither feed her with prejudice nor force her upon any precipice that they neither cause an invasion nor cherish an insurrection Watch the acts of Conscience both imperate which she injoyneth other powers of the Soul and elicit which issue immediately from her self that they neither decline the rule nor discontinue their exercise nor be distorted to either extream but be discharged regularly Watch her answers that they be the answers of a good Conscience toward God In fine watch every avenue that nothing pass in or out but what you can give a good account for to the God of peace Mat. 26.41 1 Cor. 16.13 c. 8.9 Hebr. 3.12 1 Pet. 3.21 Luk. 21.34 36. Q. 8. Whether a pious Christian may not live for some time without Peace of Conscience Doubtless he may For though we may admit Piety to be the practical foundation of Peace yet we must allow some time between laying the foundation and raising up the frame or building 'T is true the end of that man is peace but his entrance is most times perplex as Manassebs Ephraims the Jews and Jaylors was Psal 37.37 2 Chron. 33.12 c. Jer. 31.18 c. Act. 2.37 c. c. 16.29 c. It is plain 1 there can be no peace before grace Q. 1. 'T is first grace then peace in all the options of the Apostle Rom. 1.7 2 Cor. 1.2 2 There is and must be grace in order of time and nature before peace For the true peace of a gracious Christian ariseth from the testimony of Conscience to the truth of his grace So that Conscience in pronouncing peace doth alway presuppose grace and maketh use of the truth of our grace as a medium whereby it proveth that we are upon terms of peace 2 Cor. 1.12 Isa 26.12 Psal 4.8 3 There may be a considerable interval between the implanting of grace in us and the imparting of peace to us whether we consider the ground of peace or the giver of peace 1. The ground of peace The immediate rise of peace is not the simple existence of grace in us but the sense and evidence of this grace to us And it is manifest that grace may exist in that subject which hath no evidence or sense of it and that for a long time Witness Heman David c. 'T is one thing to know God 't is another to know that we know him This is the product usually of much time many thoughts and trials of our selves Christ tells his Disciples Whither I go ye know and the way ye know But Thomas saith unto him Lord we know not whither thou goest and how can we know the way There is no contradiction They knew it but did not know that they knew it notwithstanding so long continuance with him Science there was at least a dark and confused knowledg but not Conscience no distinctness or clearness of knowledg though they had so long converse with him in whom were laid up the treasures of wisdom and knowledg Psal 88.3 9 15. c. 42.3 8. 1 Joh. 2.3 Joh. 14.4 5. 2. Let the giver of peace be considered Grace and peace are from the same Spirit But not at the same time or with the same circumstances 'T is the same spirit that sanctifieth us in the day of our renovation and that sealeth us up to the day of our redemption But it is not by the same act That is antecedaneous this afterward After ye believed ye were sealed with that holy spirit of promise Isa 32.15 17. Rom. 15.13 16. Ephes 1.13 How long or how little time he will take ere the ensealing of the deed is not for us to determine while he hath not declared it in his word and is pleased to diversifie so much in his works Pauls peace was not so early as Lydias was 'T is not for us to know the times and scasons which the Father hath put in his own power Act. 9.9 17 18. c. 16.14.1.7 This is certain Grace is from the Spirit as working out sin and writing out the similitude of God upon the Soul Peace is from him as witnessing with our spirits our Sonship and Salvation So that
of thy estate How is the most fine Gold changed Consternation fills my heart the crown is fallen from my head the joy of my heart ceaseth But especially thou must deplore the signalness of thy sins Wo unto me that I have sinned I will be sorry for my sin My sin is ever before me Against thee thee only have I sinned c. Lam. 4.1 c. 5.15 16 17. Psal 38.18 51.3 4. 'T is not sorrow simply but sorrow for sin which is the salve for a wounded spirit Yea this is not only a salve to heal but a sacrifice to expiate Psal 41.4 51.17 So that were thy heart more broken for sin it would be less burdened with sighing For this would interest God in thy case The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit Nay this would engage him in the cure He healeth the broken in heart and bindeth up their wounds He undertaketh to cordial and revive them yea to come down and dwell in them Psal 34.18 147.3 Isa 57.15 3 Return from thy sins unto the Lord in conversion Whence are all thy maladies but from turning to them from him And what remedy is there without returning to him from them Lo this is God's own prescription who is the great Physician and hath his promise of a cure sealed up with it and the Saints probatum est subscribed to it Hear how he calls encourageth cheareth quickeneth thee Hos 14.1 7. Jer. 3.1 12 13 14 22. Return ye back-sliding children and I will heal your back-slidings When will you speak back to him Behold we come unto thee for thou art the Lord our God who alone hast right in us and art alone able to give rest to us The misery is men turn into themselves or unto second causes with Ephraim to be healed of their wound and then cry out with Jeremy Why is my pain perpetual and my wound incurable which refuseth to be healed And thence complain and fly out even against God's faithfulness Wilt thou be altogether unto me as a lyar and as waters that fail To such strange heights of diffidence do such diversions sometimes drive them But alas they disoblige God from comforting them by these courses of theirs and open a way for severer corrections while they decline him and deifie others Hos 5.13 14 15. Jer. 15.18 19. Psal 13.1 2 3. 77.7 11. Come then and let us return unto the Lord. There is no recovery of our peace out of his presence 'T is he woundeth and his hands make whole Return we hither and we are sure to recover He hath torn and he will heal us he hath smitten and he will bind us up We have his promise for it Hos 6.1 2. Zach. 1.3 Job 5.18 Deut. 4.29 30 31. Direct 5. Take the Balsome that is in the blood of Christ Is there no balm in Gilead Is there no Physician there Why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered Though there were none there that could heal their civil wounds Isa 8.22 c. 46.11 yet there is enough here to cure thy spiritual wounds For the blood of Jesus cleanseth from all sin cureth and redeemeth from all iniquity 1 Joh. 1.7 Tit. 2.14 His blood is the most sovereign confection and 〈◊〉 blessed self the most skilful Chirurgeon and Physitian No sore no sickness ever came amiss to him He hath healed infirmities of eighteen yea of eight and thirty years standing Isa 53.5 Mar. 2.17 Luk. 13.11 12. Joh. 5.5 c. Yea he is not only the Physiâ—ian but the Physick as one saith * D. Reynolds on Hos 14. Serm. 4. and gives himself his own flesh his own blood for a purgative a cordial a plaister to the Soul of his patient There is no balm for Conscience like the blood of Christ § 14 It both cleanseth and comforteth It purgeth her from dead works and pacifieth her with the living God and like the tree of life it is both for meat and for medicine Heb. 9.14 c. 10.19 22. Eph. 2.13 14. Ezek. 47.12 See then that you apply this blood to you and see him applying it for you 1 See that you apply his blood to you The best Balsoms become ineffectual without a befitting application Conscience is the part affected apply this plaister close to it You are not come to blackness and darkness but to the blood of sprinkling Heb. 12.18 24. Think it not enough that Christ's blood might be shed for you but it must be sprinkled on and by you The remission of your sins both in it self and in the sense of it doth immediately flow from this not that We have sinned and so God is provoked This is the burden and matter of pain to Conscience Christ is the propitiation for our sins this breatheth forth peace to Conscience But how is he the propitiation for our sins Through faith in his blood So that without an intervening act and application of faith Conscience is not blessed with peace notwithstanding the blood of Christ 1 Pet. 1.2 1 Joh. 2.1 2. Rom. 3.25 Come then and apply this choice and happy Balsom the precious blood as Peter calls it of our Lord Jesus Christ 1 Pet. 1.19 Apply and bring down the vertue of it to thine own case and condition Oh the advantages of an holy application which Christ assures us of under the metaphor of drinking his blood Joh. 6.54 55 56. Accept it then from the hands of thy dear Physician who to save thy blood hath shed his own and hath washed us from our sins in his own blood Appropriate it especially to the ulcerous and diseased part Take it for thine own 'T is no presumption while the Physician tenders it to thee and that freely and tells thee thou must not so much as dream of life without drinking his blood i.e. without applying and appropriating it Act. 20.28 Rev. 5.9 c. 1.5 c. 22.17 Joh. 7.37 c. 6.53 I allow that there is a difference between the act of the Will in chosing and accepting of Christ for mine and the act of the Conscience whereby I know and am assured that he is mine and I am his And though the latter be only immediately productive of this peace yet the former is eminently preparative thereunto and doth beget an initial and inchoative peace at least it will baffle many troubles Go then as far with Conscience as you can in it in answering her pleas from hence if you cannot accord all in peace Doth Conscience suggest the foulness of thy sins speak back again to Conscience His blood was shed for many for the remission of sins yea and of my sins if I am but throughly willing to take him for my Lord and Saviour Doth Conscience tell thee of thy several forfeitures and spiritual vassallage to Divine justice Tell Conscience his blood hath obtained eternal Redemption yea there is redemption for me through his blood if I can receive
and rest upon him Doth Conscience terrifie thee with being an enemy to God and God's being an enemy to thee Tell her the blood of his Cross hath made reconciliation for the sins of his people And for me if I renounce my enmity and return unto him Mat. 26.28 Rom. 3.25 26. Heb. 9.12 Col. 1.14 20. Heb. 2.17 Oh if Conscience could but lay a clear claim to this blood farewell such cramps and convulsions quickly Could she but say The blood of our Lord Jesus was shed for me I have redemption through his blood Now there would be a most ample serenity Well Conscience cannot yet put forth an act of assurance after it yet may she and should put forth an hand of acceptance towards it and of an holy acquiescence on it as knowing sin cannot write so bitter things against us but this blood of sprinkling speaks better things for us 1 Tim. 1.15 Isa 26.3 Heb. 12.24 2 See Christ applying his blood for you presenting the merit of it to his Father and thereby pleading for mercy to the faithful in his Intercession He is not gone into the Holiest of all as the high Priest with the blood of goats and calves was wont which he offered for himself as well as others But by his own blood he is entered into the holy place and this not for himself but to appear in the presence of God for us And if that blood sprinkling the unclean sanctified to the purifying of the flesh how much more shall this blood sprinkled in the Conscience purge it from dead works Heb. 9.7 15 24. c. 7.25 Direct 6. Try the Breasts of the Church you may suck and be satisfied These are breasts of Consolation Breasts for beauty and benefit fair and full of milk and nutritive vertue As the clusters of the Vine as clusters of grapes full of vinous spirits succulency and sweetness Isa 66.11 Caut. 7.7 8. You that are athirst i.e. in distress and desirous of relief may come freely Christ invites you encourages injoyns you to come away Isa 55.1 2. Joh. 7.37 Rev. 21.6 Mat. 11.28 1 Try the Breasts of the Promises Do not put them from you they are full of affecting delicacies and as it were ake for want of drawing In them is not only sure but strong consolation For he is faithful who hath promised Lay but the mouth of faith to the promise as Sara and Abraham did and the fears you plead from the improbabilities and seeming impossibilities of peace will melt away and vanish Isa 55.3 Heb. 6.18 c. 10.23 c. 11.11 Rom. 4.19 20 21. Sayest thou I see no peace of Conscience within nothing but puzling calamities without me But the Promises shew that there is peace in Christ for thee In the world ye shall have tribulation but in me ye shall have peace Joh. 16.33 Object Alas for peace I have great bitterness Answ Yet hear what God the Lord will speak for he will speak peace to his people he will bless his people with peace Psal 85.8 29.11 Object What! I have peace Alas I have not deserved the least peace but the greatest punishments 'T is not all the world can give me peace Ans But in the Promises you have to do with the God of peace They ask not for deserts accept desires and afford all of free gift Peace I leave with you my peace I give unto you not as the world giveth give I unto you Let not your heart be troubled neither let it be afraid Joh. 14.27 Obj. But alas I see no cause no foundation of peace Matter of provocation God may find enough and too much in me but no matter of peace whence he may educe this blessing for me Ans The Promises exhibit peace as not only of God's causing but of God's creating And creation is out of no pre-existing or no predisposed matter I create the fruits of the lips peace peace I create Hierusalem a rejoycing and her people a joy Isa 57.19 c. 65.18 Ply these and the like promises as Phil. 4.7 Isa 26.3 c. 27.5 c. 54.10 c. 57.16 17 18. c. 55.12 c. 66.12 c. with the strongest desires of their goodness and with your steadiest dependance on their truth Who ever went to God in the promises for peace that went away without the peace of God 2 Try the Breasts of the publick and solemn Ordinances These are full of milk and marrow and fatness not for support only but to abundantly satisfie us Let thine heart preserve them and they will add peace to and preserve thee Psal 36.8 65.4 Prov. 3.2 17.1 Essay the Sacraments which some will have to be those two Breasts Cant. 4.5 Certain it is that Christ who is our peace is the internal substance of them And he doth not only outwardly signifie but inwardly seal righteousness and therefore peace by them Ephes 2.14 1 Cor. 10.3 4. Rom. 4.11 c. 14.17 Reflect on thy Baptism It ministreth powerful arguments not only for the killing of sin but for the quieting of the soul as being baptized into Christ and under the bond and therefore having the benefits of the Covenant thereby confirmed and sealed This is another Ark against the deluge of wrath as Noah's was against the deluge of waters Rom. 6.3 4. Gal. 3.26 27. 1 Pet. 3.20 21. Renew thy presence often at and participation in the Supper of the Lord. Here is Bread to strengthen and Wine also that maketh glad the heart of man the Communion both of the Body and of the Blood of our Lord Christ Lo here is both a peace-offering for thee and an offer of peace to thee under the broad-seal of the God of peace How many Souls have unloaded all their pressures and soul-distresses at this port and have gone away loaden under full sail with peace and joy in the Holy Ghost O let not thy weaknesses so much deter thee hence as thy wants drive thee hither and Christ's willingness to communicate himself to his weak believers draw thee even to those who are filled with troubles of heart Psal 104.15 1 Cor. 10.16 Eph. 5.2 Cant. 2.3 4 5. Joh. 14.1 27. c. 16.6 22. cum c. 13. Cant. 5.1 2. Essay Sermons The Lord will speak peace But he is not wont to speak it immediately by himself but through the ministry of his own Ordinances and offices who must therefore preach the Gospel of peace Yea he creates peace but so as the word preached is of place and use in this Creation as the word of his power was in the first Creation I create the fruit of the lips peace peace The Priests lips are to be a storehouse of comfort as well as of knowledg God hath committed to them the Ministry of Reconciliation Nor doth the word they preach only propound the matter of peace but their preaching of the Word is a powerful and oft-times a present means of peace thorough his benediction Psal 85.8 Rom. 10.15 Mal. 2.5 6 7. Isa 57.19 2 Cor. 5.18 19 20. Isa
40.1 2. Direct 7. Turn in upon your own bosoms Commune with your own hearts as Asaph did in this very case and let your spirits make diligent search Psal 4.4.77.6 'T is one observation of Dr. Sibs on Psal 42.5 * Soul's Conflict c. 5. p. 51. That one way to raise a dejected Soul is to cite it before it self You have often heard of the Court of Conscience see you call and keep it and convene the troubles of your heart before it For herein it is that your case must be audited argued and determined I wish there were no Christians did carry it to Conscience as Ahab to Micajah Either they call not Conscience into the consultations of peace as afraid she will not prophesie good but evil concerning them Or if she comes and deals clearly them they commit her to prison and carve out nothing for her but the bread of affliction till they shall come again in peace 1 King 22.8 27. Whereas there is no sound peace but of Consciences speaking as hath been abundantly shewn Arraign your troubles before Conscience then here audit here answer here argue them For self-communing is one of the speediest and safest ways to stillness and self-quieting Psal 4.4 42.5 1 Audit and require an account of them 1. Of what kind or what they are Are they not secular troubles the troubles of some Secular emergence and interposition The Shuâ—emitess hath lost her Son and her Soul is vexed within her By the solicitous importunities of Sampson's Wife was his Soul vexed unto the death 2 King 4.27 Judg. 16.16 Or are they not Sickness troubles the troubles of a sickly indisposition which oft-times discomposeth the natural spirits and faculties and by reason of the Soul's sympathy with the Body puts the whole frame in a commotion or combustion Or are they but self-conceived troubles the troubles of a strong and stirring imagination whose false and hasty representations do frequently prevent the trial of our judgments and produce as insuperable troubles as if the grounds were real witness Jacob's imagination of his Son 's being slain till they are brought to answer it at the Bar of Conscience and Reason Gen. 37.33 36. Now though such kind of troubles call for due consideration of them in their place yet will they be cast out of Court as of another cognizance and of alien and improper consideration here when the Question is put touching troubles of Conscience 2. From what cause or why are these troubles I intend not hereby the cause why God inflicteth them but why the godly imbrace them Thus demand a reason of them and desist not till you have brought it to a resolution Thus David in his distress doubles and trebles the question Why art thou cast down O my soul and why art thou disquieted within me Psal 42.5 11. 43.5 Many of your troubles would cease and shrink away were they but summoned to appear before the Tribunal of Conscience as having nothing to say for themselves especially such as have no stronger foundation than your fancy For such as durst appear in Court 2 Here answer them Christians usually lose their peace by listning to and being led by the sudden pleas of sense instead of laying them in the scales of a judicious Discourse They hastily admit those pleas as argumentative and conclusive against their peace in private conference which do require and would receive an easie and advised answer in publick Court if Conscience may deliberately proceed upon them And it is seldom in such a case that they are ever extricated out of their difficulties and disquiets till they come to discuss them over again in the Court of Conscience And then you have them correcting sense and chiding themselves for such indeliberateness and precipitancy I said in my haste c. This is my infirmity Oh that I should be so foolish and ignorant c. Psal 31.22 77.10 73.13 15 23. Lam. 3.18 54. Isa 38.10 11. Whatever then are the pleas and pretensions in impeachment of thy peace let them be produced in open Court Let Conscience consider and compare them with the rules of the Court the standard of Evangelical peace And then how many of thy doubts and troubles will successively have TEKEL on them Thou art weighed in the ballances and art found wanting Dan. 5.27 I forbear to mention here the just answers may be given to what argument may be happily insisted on wherewith you may furnish your selves in the respective cases 3 Here argue it with them If thou canst not evince thy peace by it yet it will ease thee in thy perplexities to expostulate and argue out the case in the Court of Conscience How forcible are right words David's iterated expostulations were effectual to the recovery of his dependance and to the remitting if not removing of his disquiets and diffidence Job 6.25 Psal 42.5 c. Men are prone to plead it out with Heaven and reason it forth with God It were the more easie and expeditious way to plead it with their own hearts No arguings unless of prayer and faith being admitable with God Who is a fit opponent or respondent to argue with Omniscience and Omnipotence or can chuse out words to reason with him Job 13.3 c. 23.4 c. 9.14 Psal 77.7 10. Here argue it then and bid thy fears as Job did his Friends to attend and listen Hear now my reasoning and hearken to the pleading of my lips Job 13.6 Argue 1. from thy past serenities and sweetnesses Old experiences will become new evidences I have considered the days of old saith Asaph the years of ancient times I call to remembrance my song in the night And thence he resolveth that it was his weakness This is my infirmity to â—ield so far to his own despondency and disquiets and should be his work to devolve all into the hands of God and fortifie his dependance on him in the sense of his former happiness I will remember the years of the right hand of the most high I will remember the works of the Lord. Surely I will remember thy wonders of old c. Psal 77.5 13. David's spirit was overwhelmed within him My heart within me is desolate saith he And what doth he I remember the days of old c. Psal 143.4 5. God's ancient kindnesses afford new arguments to Conscience whereby she may and many times doth quiet her self and confute her sorrows Psal 31.21 22. 71.18 20. Well then if you would not cast away your confidence call your former comforts to remembrance Are your Souls cast down within you Revive and cheer them up with the remembrances of God from the land of Jordan and of the Hermonites what he spake to you in such a Sermon sealed in such a Sacrament secured in such a solitariness And thence reason with Manoah's Wife If the Lord would slay us would he have shewn us such things as these Heb. 10.32 35. Psal 42.6 Judg. 13.23 Argue 2. from
thy present succours and supports Your sighs are many and your heart is faint but the seed of peace as well as of grace remaineth Distressed you are but not in despair cast down but not utterly for the Lord upholdeth you with his hand Whither had Satan and your own sins and sorrows hurried you if the everlasting arms had not been under you Lam. 1.22 Psal 97.11 1 Joh. 3.9 2 Cor. 4.8 Psal 37.24 Deut. 33.27 Besides are there not some secrets hints and intimations now and then suggested you that your grounds of peace are better and God is better pleased with you than your prejudices will admit Your beloved standeth behind the wall but doth he not look forth sometimes also at the windows and shew himself through the lattess And must you not tell him if you would speak truth with the Psalmist When my spirit was overwhelmed within me then thou knewest my path Cant. 2.9 Psal 142.3 Would you hereupon argue it with your selves as the Psalmists doth it would cheer and quicken hopes if not quiet your hearts He reasons off his anxious conceptions hereby at one time and rebukes his hasty conclusions against himself at another Psal 42.11 43.5 31.22 Q. 11. Whether and how far a pious Christian besides the loss of his peace may be burdened with and live under great perplexity and distress of Conscience No doubt he may if we mind but what is â—ready delivered The premisses on Q. 8. and 〈◊〉 may seem proof enough But in that the â—ghs and self-censures of many precious Saints â—â—e such as call upon us to behold and see if there were ever any sorrow like unto their â—rrow Or if ever under the whole Heaven â—â—th been done upon any pious Soul as hath â—een done upon their particular selves I am â—erswaded therefore to be more particular * See Symond's Deserted Soul cap. 25 36. Lam. 1.12 Dan. 12.2 I say therefore your Conscience may not only deny you peace but denounce war and the dreadfullest punishments and yet you may be devoutly pious Instances have been already premised Q. 9. and more will be added in the progress of this Discourse Be it but admitted or granted which hath been already asserted and made good that a pious Christian may lose the Evidences of Grace and may look upon himself as in the estate of nature and I need say little to confirm the Proposition that he may be in deep distress and passionate perplexities Whether Conscience be considered or the concourse of other causes to afflict him in such a condition as this 1 Let Conscience be considered Your Conscience was created with a capability of sustaining the evils of sense as well as the evils of loss By her receptive capacity she is disposed to take in the impressions of both and as well to let in the sense of guilt and misery upon the perpetration of sin as the sense of good and felicity upon perseverance in sanctity By its active capacity it is disposed to accuse and condemn as well as to acquit and clear Yea the activity of Conscience doth much further the Christians anguish and sharpens the sword in the hand of Conscience and doubleth its strokes especially while unbelieâ— leaves the Conscience destitute of the succours she should receive from Christ and the Covenant c. without her and lays her naked and deplorably subject to her own cutting accusations and killing aggravations of this estate without the least resistance from within her Besides the authority of Conscience doth much heighten and hasten on such self-afflictions while Conscience is both law and plaintiff and witness and judg and executioner and all this from God So that if the Soul would in this case make its appeal to him Conscience doth arrest and stay it Nay saith she 't is God that chargeth God that condemneth you I am but his mouth his officer c. Yea hereupon it aggravateth and abetteth the sadness of this Soul's estate If I that know or can recall so few things by you if your heart condemn you God is greater than your heart who knoweth all things So that if the Conscience of the pious may thus conclude of their estate as hath been premised to be without God and grace c. the product must needs be calamitous Distress of Conscience is the deepest distress the bones are dried by it the spirit is broken by it And Solomon puts it to requestion Who can bear it Prov. 17.22 c. 15.13 c. 18.14 2 What a concourse of other causes is there often times that all wring their wormwood into this bitter cup Shall I mention and but mention some of them 1. The principal is God He doth not only â—ide his face from his yet at that the Soul is â—oubled but he encreaseth his frowns sharpâ—eth his eyes against them tears them in his â—rath as was Job's case yet a none-such for â—ncerity Psal 30.7 Job 13.24 c. 16.9 c. 19.11.1.8 He tells his Church I have wounded thee with the wound of an enemy with the chastisement of a cruel one c. He tells others I was wroth and smote him I hid me and was wroth c. Jer. 30.14 Isa 57.17 Oh how must this cut the Saint at the heart and fill his mind with consternation and his mouth with complaints That God his God on whom he had pitcht all his hopes in whom he had placed all his happiness with whom he had sometime as he then thought such pleasant intercourse and of whom he had such precious experiences that this God so good so great so desirable so dear so respected so related c. hath unsheathed his sword against him or rather sheathed it in him and made Conscience his best friend to become now his bitterest foe 2. The procuring cause is Sin which is now set forth before the Soul in its nature number dismal sequel dreadful circumstances c. which are as Oyl to the flames and winds to this Sea of troubles that make Conscience rage and roar in more abundance Wo to me that I have sinned I am not able to look up An heavy burden are they God is pressed with them Christ was pierced by them they are too heavy for me Lam. 5.16 Psal 40.12 38.3 4. 3. The promoting causes are several Satan roareth as a Lion upon them and would swallow them up in these sorrows and castâ— in his fiery darts to keep up those flamesâ— 1 Pet. 5.8 2 Cor. 2.7 cum 11. Ephes 6.16 Sinners either censure or scoffe at them which even slays the broken in heart Ay! this is that your religion comes to I thought you would grow mad c. Psal 109.16 25. 69.26 Act. 26.24 Saints it may be either stand aloof as strangers or smite with causeless and cruel censures yea even good men great friends and such as have been of our most inward and intimate familiarity and perhaps of our own family Which must needs add weight to their burdens Such
in them And where canst thou devolve them better than on him with whom is the multitude of tender mercies and who careth for thee Were thy strength the strength of stones or thy flesh of brass thou art not able to stand up under them But with him is omnipotence he is able to keep that which thou committest to him And in the day of thy calamity will be thy stay Psal 51.1 1 Pet. 5.7 2 Tim. 1.12 Psal 18.18 2. The door stands open to thee Thou hast free liberty to unload all thy burdens here as the Saints have done I poured out my complaint before him I shewed before him my trouble Yea thou maist leave thy burdens with him and lean thy whole business and blessedness upon him Trust in him at all times ye people pour out your heart before him God is a refuge for us Selah Nay they that know his name will put their trust in him I will trust and not be afraid saith one Prophet At what time I am afraid I will trust in thee saith another Psal 142.2 55.22 62.8 Isa 12.2 Psal 56.3 3. 'T is thy duty and that God now demands of thee Who is among you that walketh in darkness and hath no light let him trust in the name of the Lord and stay upon his God Behold 't is not only thy liberty thou maist do it therefore no presumption but 't is his law thou must do it or thou sinest against his prescription both here and elsewhere Come then if thou tremblest at sin turn in hither and trust in him Ye that fear the Lord trust in the Lord he is their help and their shield You that cannot reflect on him as yours with comfort yet may and should rest in and roll your ways upon him with much composedness such is God's all-sufficience in your insufficience his everlasting strength in your temporary weakness Trust ye in the Lord for ever for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength Isa 50.10 c. 10.20 Psal 4.5 115.11 37.3 5. Isaiah 26.4 Q. 13. What if a Pious Soul after all his self-examinings and sedulous endeavours cannot only not gather up any present grounds for peace but gives over all his past evidences of grace and peace as unsound and false what shall he do to attain Peace The Premisses in answer to the former Question are of proper and pertinent application hereunto But I add Direct 1. Quicken thy dull heart to a present acceptance of Jesus Christ as thy only Mediator and of God as thy only portion and principal good Happily you might with more ease and less expence by this time have reared up a new fabrick of comfort by falling in with Christ than you have been at for repairing the old frame in which you find so many leaks and cracks However a present close will clear all the suits that are brought against your former tenure For if God be once yours and Christ yours which is the inseparable effect of a present faith then peace is yours too for he is the God of Peace and Christ is the Prince of Peace Isa 26.3 Eph. 2.12 13 14. Rom. 5.1 c. 15.33 Isa 9.6 I grant there is a good and great use of reviewing old evidences and reviving old experiences of which before but in this circumstance when Conscience damns them all as alien or absolete 't is best to fall in with the most present and most proper way to diver the impending extremity and to draw the difference to an immediate head which I apprehend is not so expeditiously done by discussing what is past whether you have sincerely believed or not as by determining the present that you put all out of doubt by a present faith God directs you hereto by his command in case of darkness when you have no light you cannot see him c. The godly have drawn it down into practice also David reflects inwardly and there is nothing but disquiet he therefore resolves to sit poring no longer for pillars of hope within him but by a present trust and hope in God to put his case into more clearness and the result is praise to him and peace to himself Isa 50.10 Job 35.14 Psal 42.11 13.5 cum 3. Let it be supposed then that thy former securities have been unsound yet the door is open by which thou maist enter into peace and live for ever Consult the Directions Quest 6. Art thou not weary and heavy laden lo Christ calls thee Come unto me and I will give you rest You shall find rest for your Souls God quickens and encourageth thee Hast thou played the harlot with many lovers and dealt treacherously with him Yet return again to me saith the Lord. Return and I will heal thy back-slidings c. Mat. 11.28 29. Jer. 3.1 12 14 20 22. Direct 2. Be quiet under this hard dispensation Be still and know that he is God who cannot be conquered must not be complained of Murmurings and complaints as if he were rigorous can never cure thee of thy wounds Well may they cut them wider and pierce them deeper and make them smart with more anguish and bleed in more abundance 'T is quietness under the hands of thy Surgeon and confessing his righteousness and thy rebellion that doth dispose thee to a cure Witness Job's case and Elihus counsel Psal 46.10 Job 6.33 34. 35. 36. Doth God pervert judgment or doth the Almighty pervert justice shall not the judg of all the earth do right How long did he forbear you How much hath he given if not forgiven you If desert be urged he might have lain you ere this in the lowest hell and lodged you in eternal flames for the wages of every sin is no less than eternal death So that his punishment is in no proportion to your desert but far less far below it Rather say God is righteous but I have rebelled Righteousness belongeth to him but to me confusion of face as at this day Job 8.3 Gen. 18.25 Rom. 6.23 Ezra 9.13 Lam. 1.18 Dan. 9.7 Quietness I mean from murmuring aggravations not from matter of action is the most proper and pleasant way to peace with God and peace of Conscience Yea quietness is not without some peace and sedateness from unruly commotions as its inseparable companion And now God doth by Souls as he doth by Ships He maketh the storm a calm so that the waves thereof are still Then are they glad because they be quiet so he bringeth them unto their desired haven Psal 107.29 30. Q. 14. What Considerations are there to quiet the heart in such agonies and distress of Conscience There are many many ways I shall present you some of them and but some which you may gather up from others and from the ordinary effects ends and operation of such troubles on the pious First From others 1 What is there yea what is there not in God which may quiet your hearts If all-sufficience can do it here it
be done by My Conscience tells me such and such things must be done which are matters of general right and equity And they that deny such clear and commonly received laws of general right are in common speech said to offer violence to their Consciences So my Conscience tells me such and such matters may be declined and forborn which are matters of indifferency 'T is true there is no small difference between the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the conservation of such laws and rules and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Conscience strictly so called * See Baldw. Cas Cons l. 1. c 4. But I must follow the vulgar usage and sense of this term as most fitting my design There is an habit bank and treasury of light and laws with Conscience and which it conserves Here is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There is the application of them had and made by Conscience here is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The second and third Propositions still make application of some general law or rule had in the first Proposition to a mans particular estate or actions Thus it is the office of Conscience to apply general Propositions and Canons to a mans personal and particular case and concern And indeed the Thomists * Aquin. Sum. 1. q. 79. a. 13 do make Conscience to be nothing else but an application of the knowledg or light which is in the Synteresis and therefore define it to be an act Though to speak properly as one * Sanders Prael 1. de Consc §. 14. observeth the application of science is not Conscience it self but an act of it And as another * Rutherf libert of Consc c. 1. p. 6. saith 'T is the same Conscience that acts all three parts of a law of a witness and of a judg The second Propofition contains the direct testimony of Conscience and with respect to this the office of Conscience in general is that of a witness Thus Paul suggests of his own and touching the Conscience of the Gentiles My Conscience also bearing me witness Rom. 9.1 Their Consciences also bearing witness Rom. 2.15 The witness of Conscience may be either considered 1. as it is in habit and rests upon record Or 2. as it is in act or is reduced thereunto which is by two steps 1. Conscience casts back a reflection upon its own records of our estate and actions and considers and ruminates upon them And then 2. Conscience comes forth and reports to us how the case now stands or hath stood agreeable to those records and to this reflection The office or act of Conscience then in respect of the second Proposition is threefold 1. To register and book down what a man is and doth And in truth Conscience is as one * Sheffield good Cons c. 4. p. 52. well the great Register and Recorder of the world It hath the pen of a ready writer Not a word from the mouth not a work of man not a thought of the mind can escape or pass its swift pen. It is Gods Historian saith Dr. Reynolds * Of the Passions c. 41. that writes not Annals but Journals Conscience hath its book and had its table whereon it did indelebly write both the sins of Judah and the sincerity of Job Rev. 20.12 Jer. 17.1 Job 27.6 2. To reflect and bring back to the heart as the expression of Solomon is in the margin of 1 King 8.47 Conscience is to every man not only as his private Notary but as his petty-Constable to search into and seize upon every miscarrying act and habit Conscience reviews its register recalls and reads over its records Here are those sayings in and sayings to the heart that Scripture and experience tell us of Jer. 5.24 Hos 7.2 marg Those communings with our hearts and calling upon our own actions and estates those countings and self-searches how the case stands Psal 4.4.77.6 Herewith Conscience comparing our past actions and intentions with the Canons and rules conserved in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ruminates and bethinks according to the case and concern before it Conscience considers the matter I considered in my heart saith the Preacher or I gave or set to my heart Hebr. Eccles 9.1 Conscience is not only to consult its books or cast back an eye but to consider the affair before it attentively Now therefore thus saith the Lord of Hostes consider your ways Hebr. Set your heart on your ways Hag. 1.5.7 Here are those layings to heart we read of in the Prophets Jer. 5.24 Mal. 2.2 3. To report and bring forth its testimony according as the matter hath been or is Thus Conscience in Josephs Brethren had taken and bookt down their sin after this turns back and tells them of it and of the circumstances wherewith Conscience considered it to be aggravated We saw the anguish of his Soul and we would not hear c. Gen. 42.21 22. Conscience in Pharaohs Butler had recorded did recall rip up and read him his faults Gen. 41.9 David Job and Paul are contumeliously censured and cried out upon Conscience casts back a reflection consults its own records considers their uprightness and the others reproaches and cleareth up their righteousness Psal 7.3 4. Job 27.5 6 c. 2 Cor. 1.12 As this is the office of Conscience to give testimony in relation to what is past so also in relation to what is present Conscience witnesseth both 1. what we are or what our estate is The spirit witnesseth with our spirits that we are the Sons of God Rom. 8.16 2. And what we act or what our actions are Witness Pauls example I speak the truth in Christ I lye not my Conscience also bearing me witness Rom. 9.1 3. And whatever you are or intend Psal 17.3 2 Cor. 1.17 The third Proposition contains the decisive judgment of Conscience and with respect to this most properly and strictly the office of Conscience is to judg If we would judg our selves we should not be judged 1 Cor. 11.31 Confcience is herein judicially to apply the truth dictated in the first Proposition upon the testimony delivered in the second Proposition and doth infer the Conclusion from those premises according to its apprehension of the rule or law in the first or major Proposition and according to its attestation and report of our life or actions in the second or minor Proposition The judgment conscience pronounceth sometimes respects our estate and sometimes respecteth our actions and both of them either 1. as good or else 2. as evil And thus again either 1. as it respects the time past or present or else 2. as it respects the time future either as they have formerly been or now are or henceforth should be First as it respects the time past and present The office of Conscience in regard of what is and hath been good is to acquit and clear In regard of what is and hath been evil it 's