man should be so far gone from himself through Drink or any other Course as that like Lot he should not know hedoth commit the sin when he doth commit it It is a Sin that requires much study in most Cases how to contrive and compass the commission of it and therefore especially in such Cases is a Sin of knowledge a Sin committed with deliberation and therefore is a wilful Sin and such Sins are wounding Sins to the Soul wasting Sins to the Conscience the first Act wounds the second wasts and the Habit of it when it grows to that quite destroys the Conscience the custom of sinning takes away all both Sense and Conscience of Sin like those Gentiles spoken of by St. Paul Eph. 4.17 18 19. who walked in the vanity of their mind having their understanding darkned being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that was in them because of the blindness or rather hardness of their heart who being past feeling gave themselves over unto lasciviousness to work all uncleanness with greediness Which blindness and hardness senselesness and stupidity of Mind and Heart when men once have through continued custom of sinning in this way brought upon themselves then it is but just that God should give them up in a Judicial way unto Uncleanness and unto vile Affections and even give them over unto a reprobate mind a mind void of Judgment as he did those Romas St. Paul speaks of Rom. 1.24 26 28. And this to be given over to a reprobate sense to have the Conscience cauterized to be under a benummedness of mind and a brawniness of heart to be without Sense and Conscience of sin is to be under a most dismal Judgment the high Road to and the very Gate into and month of Hell For when once a man is past seeling or sin he is the past sorrowing for sin and past repenting of it without an extraordinary and miraculous Work of Conviction wrought upon him and without Repentance there can be no Salvation And therefore that sin which brings a man into this desperate Condition is a sin that is mischievous with a Witness it blinds the mind perverts the judgment benumbs the heart sears the Conscience leaving the mind under stupefaction and senselesness hardness and impenitency 5. It distracts him in those Duties to God whereby he should obtain the Grace of God and preserve and encrease it when it is obtained This fleshly Lust will not suffer him rightly to attend to any spiritual Duty it will not suffer him to have any Communion with God either by hearing God speak to him in his Word or speaking to God himself in Prayer it so takes up all his Thoughts that he can mind nothing of the Worship and Service of of God as he ought When he should be thinking of God he is thinking of his Whore and instead of praying for Grace to abstain from his sin and to mortifie his Lust he is plotting how to fulfil his Lust and commit his sin So true is that of St. Ambrose Nullus peccandi modus inexplexibilis scelerum sitis nisi morte amantis extingui non potest This sin is unmeasurable unsatiable the burning Thirst whereof never quenched by any thing but Death Now surely it is a very great mischief to be so distracted in ones Duty to God that is a plaguy Lust that will not let a man be quiet till he hath said his Prayers but be as ill or worse a Tempter to a man than the Devil himself And yet such a mischievous sin Lust is that whereby the Fornicator is swayed and governed in his Course of Uncleanness And no marvel for it besots and fools him so that he neither minds nor regards what he is about unless it be when he is getting satisfaction to his Lust It dispirits and unmans the man and turns him all into Beast well nigh saving what he is in shew and shape Who could think any other that should find Hercules the only Worthy and Wonder in his time for strength and Valour stooping to the meanness of being a Servant to Omphale and in the quality of a Wench working at the Rock and Spindle And what other can we think was meant by the ancient Poets when they tell us of the strange Transformations of Jupiter and other Gods into a Bull a Swan and the like bruitish Creatures for the love of and to satisfie his lust with this or that admired Beauty but that lust this lust of Fornication transforms and turns men even the greatest of them into very Beasts makes them do brutish things as if they had no more of the Heart of a man in them than Nebuchadnezzar had when he was turned to Grass than the Beasts of the Field have And this probably was meant by the Prophet Hosea when in his fourth Chapter and cleventh Verse he makes Fornication to be one of those things that take away the Heart Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the Heart do turn a man into a very beast and suitably the Prophet Jeremy compares these unclean sinners to Horses lustful Creatures Jer. 5.8 They were as fed horses saith he every one neighed after his Neighbours Wife And so the Apostle St. Peter speaking of those that walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness compares them to natural bruit beasts made to be taken and destroyed and even to Dogs and Swine two most unclean Creatures and more irrational than any other Creatures in their lusts 2 Pet. 2.10 12 22. which is a great mischief to a man as being the turning of him out of himself and the degrading of him into a Beast rendring him unfit for any manly acting and dissolving him all into softness and folly And having bereft him of Judgment and Spirit the less marvel is it if it do also bereave him of his Freedom and make a very Slave of him It is an imperious lust this it makes them in whom it reigns very Servants and Slaves to it Hence these kind of people are by the Apostle St. Peter called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 servants of corruption adding this for the reason of his so calling them because that of whom a man is overcome of the same is he brought into bondage 2 Pet. 2.19 And so the Apostle St. Paul Rom. 6.16 Know ye not 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 unto righteousness And after v. 19. speaks of their having yielded their members servanos to uncleanness So that this sin of Uncleanness is a tyrannous lust it bereaves its Subjects of their Liberty and Freedom and brings them under bondage and slavery A fornicator and a Free-man are two terms that cannot be said of the same Man He that is a worker of Uncleanness is in a state of very servitude and a base a wretched servitude is it that he serves He is made a Servant to
that is used to make the like Courtship to a common Strumpet But it does not only stab and wound a man's Honour and Reputation but also ruines his Estate Solomon tells in Prov. 29 3. He that keepeth company with Harlots spendeth his substance And in Prov. 6.26 That by means of a whorish Woman a man is brought to a piece of bread And in consideration of that in Prov. 5.10 he exhorts to avoid keeping Company with a strange Woman that is an Whose or Harlot lest strangers be filled with thy Wealth and thy labours be in the house of the Stranger that is lest thou ruine thy Estate and bring thy self to Poverty thereby whilst others in the mean time run away with thy Estate A Proof whereof we have in the Prodigal Son Luke 15. who having gathered all his Substance together took his journey into a far Country and there wasted his Substance with riotous living v. 13. that is he spent all upon Whores Whence it is that in v. 30. his elder Brother tells his Father that his Son had devoured his living 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with Harlots or Whores And if we had not this Instance we have deplorable Example enough in our Times and Countries every day almost before our Eyes But of this we made mention before in our Discourse upon the Expensiveness of this sin and therefore shall not here much enlarge thereon only we shall note that besides all those ways of Expence whereon we touched before as the Hire of Whores and the Treatments of them Gifts and Presents to them and Bribes to those about them Expence in Diet and Drink Physick or Fees even that carelesness of ones own Estate and Affairs which the following of this sin causes and occasions is enough and enough again to ruin and undo one When the Master attends not to his own Concerns but leaves all at sixes and sevens and is abroad day by day and night by night perhaps Week by Week following his pleasure of Whore-hunting besides that few will regard to preserve his Estate there will be enow ready to counsel and forward to help on that which will tend to his undoing Now to be ruined and undone to be brought from Wealth to Want from Plenty to Poverty is a misery so great in it self and yet so much greater in that the Wickedness by which it is procured renders a man no Object of Pity whilst he is in misery that the sin that brings all this upon a man may well be said to be a mischievous sin it is so ruinous and so undoing But which is more it destroys his Body too it weakens his Strength impairs his Health shortens his Life and hastens his Death How many are suddenly cut off in the midst of their days and in the strength of their years being killed in Dueis or other Quarrels about Whores or in Suppritals with them as Pope John the Thirteenth was by the Husband of a Woman with whom he was found by him in the Act of Adultery and as Zimri was being taken by Phineas in the Act of Fornication with Cozbi Numb 25.8 or by close Stratagems by them or others as Pope John the Eleventh was stiffed with a Pillow by his Strumpet Marozia that her Son might obtain the Popedom In reference to which that of Solomon may be interpreted to be spoken when he tells us of a young Man void of Understanding whom a Harlot with much fair speeches caused to yield to her and forced with the flattering of her Lips and of whom he saith he goeth after her straightway as an Ox to the slaughter or as a Fool to the correction of the Stocks Till a dart strike through his Liver as a Bird he hasteth to the Snare and knoweth not that it is for his life Prov. 7.6 to 24. And of those that escape such sudden Death yet how many are brought by their filthy doings to filthy Diseases shameful to name loathsom to behold tormenting to endure deadly if not cured in time and both troublesom and chargeable to be cured if a Cure be got so they rot alive and stink above-ground and if they die not upon Dung-hills as some have done yet whilst they live they are but as Dung upon the Earth For besides the Infection which they are apt to take from the diseased pocky Bodies of Whores even their own Lasciviousness and immoderate use of Venery is apt to wast their Spirits and dry up their radical moisture and extinguish natural heat whereby they are brought to Consumptive Diseases which wear them away to untimely Deaths And the fear of something of this nature * See Dr. Patrick ' Paraph. upon the place Solomon thought fit to interpose as an Argument to disswade from this sin when he counsels to avoid the Company of an Harlot lest thou mourn at the last when thy flesh and thy body are consumed Prov. 5.12 And by which destroying it as well as defiling it the Fornicator sins against his own Body as our Apostle may well be thought to mean in the latter end of the Text the Argument by which he strengtheneth his Exhortation in the beginning of it to flee Fornication Now certainly that which brings upon a man so much evil as in the burning of Diseases or sudden Deaths of Fornication who if not killed by others which is ill yet are generally killed by themselves which is worse that must needs be judged by every rational person to be a very mischievous thing No man sure will ever follow it that hath not a mind to ruine and destroy his own Body to shorten the time of his own Life and procure and hasten on his own Death But this is not all the Mischief it doth For Eighthly It turns him out of the Church Militant and Triumphant First It turns the Fornicator out of the Communion of the Church of Christ on Earth A Fornicator is such as Christ will not have to be a Member of so much as his outward visible Church he will not have such a Person to have any external Communion with him or Relation to him he allows not those that are his Members so much as to have Civil Converse with them if after their having given up their Names to Christ they shall addict themselves to this hearthenish Sin And therefore St. Paul 1 Cor. 5.9 11. wrote unto the Corinthians not to keep company with Fornicators and if any man that is called a Brother should be a Fornicator with such a one no not to eat that is to have no either sacred or so much as civil Converse withal * D. Ambros in loc Cum fratre in quo hoc vitia reperiuntur non sacramenta edenda sed ne communem escam docet ut erubescat cum vitiatur se corrigat And in all the new Jerusalem in that Vision which St. John had of the Church of Christ under that notion Rev. 21 22. or Representation the Evangelist could not
espy one Fornicator They were with Companions like themselves Dogs Sorcerers Murderers and Idolaters in another place without that City Rev. 22.15 that being a place into which there was not in any wise to enter any thing that defileth Rev. 21.27 And Fornication is one of the things that our Saviour declareth to be defiling things Mat. 15.19 20. and so there is no coming for such Persons to nor continuing of such Persons in that Place Now cortainly to be cut off from Communion with the Church of Christ is a mischief great in it self whatever thought of by profane Worldlings For they upon whom the Churches Censure falls in that kind and measure are excluded from the Benefit of the Churches Ordinances the Word and Sacraments the Food of their Souls they are excluded from communicating with the Churches Prayers and having any share in the Blessings sought and obtained by those Prayers they are excluded from inward Union and Fellowship with Christ outed of all relation as Members unto him and so are deprived of the influence of his Spirit into them In a word they are delivered up unto Satan and their Sins so bound on Earth that they are bound also in Heaven not to be loosed either here or there without Repentance and a Desire at least and Endeavour to have Absolution Which Mischief was so dreaded by Offenders in the primitive Times that rather than not to be re-admitted into the Communion again they would continue in the state of Pennance and do the Pennance of Offenders a long time many years standing at the Church-door and lying prostrate on the ground with Prayers and Tears beseeching and begging the Prayers of those that went into the Church And besides all this I might add that even upon Persons that continue obstinate Despisers of this Ecclesiastical Censure and will not be reduced to obedience and brought to Reformation by this Chastisement the Civil Law hath used to fall very heavily in Fines and Imprisonments or both But without and besides this the Church's Censure or Excommunication even allow it and of it self is enough to make any afraid of doing any thing whereby to deserve and incurr it to abstain from and flee Fornication But this is not all for it not only ejects out of the Church of Christ but also excludes out of the Kingdom of God What earthly Possessions soever the Fornicator hath on Earth he is never like to have any Inheritance in Heaven For this ye know saith St. Paul to the Ephesians 5.5 no Whoremonger hath any inheritance in the Kingdom of Christ and of God * D. Ambros in loc Qui talis fuerit partem in regnum coelorum non habebit quod est Patris Filii Hath not doth he say no nor shall have And he saith expresly in his first Epistle to the Corinthians c. 6. v. 9 10. Neither Fornicators nor Adulterers shall inherit the Kingdom of God And so again to the Galatians They who do such things shall not inherit the Kingdom of God and Fornication is one of these things Gal. 5 19 20. Now if the Punishment of Loss be greater than the Punishment of Sense as Casuists conclude then inasmuch as the loss of Heaven is the loss of the greatest Good that which brings upon a man that loss does him the greatest mischief that possibly can be done O who is able to imagine what mischief it is to be shut out of Heaven It imports to be shut out from the Enjoyment of the greatest Good that can be desired or imagined from Society with God and Christ and Angels and Saints from all those Joys and Pleasures Delights and Felicities wherewith the Souls of emparadised Persons are bathed and blissed and filled and ravished even into Extasies of most delightful Admiration Now this may be a weighty Consideration to induce the Fornicator if he hath any regard in the least to his own Souls eternal Good to abstain from that Wickedness by the commission whereof he shall forfeit and lose so great a Happiness But this is not the height of this sins mischief for it not only debarrs from Heaven but it damns to Hell plunges the Fornicator into that Lake of Fire and Brimstone which burneth to Eternity So our Apostle in Rev. 21.8 Whoremongers Sorcerers Idolaters Lyars shall have their part in the Lake that burneth with Fire and Brimstone which is the second Death So deep it seems is the silth of this sin that nothing else but Floods of Fire and Brimstone can wash it out and nothing less than Eternity can be time enough even for that to wash it out in Now when to the mischief of Heavens loss is added the mischief of Hells Pain there is nothing that I know that can be added to make it more mischievous And yet such is this sin of Fornication to the Fornicator it debars him from Heaven it damns him to Hell it sends him to those Regions where is Darkness without light Torment without ease Sorrow without end where his Bed he must lie down on shall be a fiery Pile of unconsumable Fuel and the Sheets wherewith he must be inwrapped shall be scorching Flames of that inextinguishable Fire The Consideration of this tremendous Catastrophe of the Fornicator's play this dreadful Punishment which he is like to be condemned to should as any reasonable man would think be enough if any thing can be enough to work with him and perswade him to abstain from the commission of so mischievous a sin and to flee Fornication And yet is not this neither all the Mischief that it doth for hitherto we have spoken only of the Mischief that it doth to the Fornicator himself Secondly There is still a Mischief that it doth to Others besides himself And First It is mischievous to the Woman with whom the sin is committed For first it involves her in the same Guilt of sin with the Fornicator It is not his Temptation that will acquit her from the Guilt of so sinful a Commission To be tempted is no sin but to yield to Temptation to consent to the Tempter to act the thing tempted to that is sinful And indeed the Law of Fornication lay not against the Man only but against the Woman also for it is expresly said Deut. 23.17 There shall be no Whore of the Daughters of the Children of Israel The Fornicator therefore cannot commit this sin alone but he must draw sin by that Act upon another too as well as upon himself and so aggravate still his own more as not having only sinned himself but made another sin too by consenting to and acting that filthiness with him inasmuch as there ought to be no consenting unto the Enticement of Sinners unto Wickedness Prov. 1.10 no partaking with Adulterers Ps 50.18 no having fellowship with the unfruitful Works of darkness Eph. 5.11 And the Woman that hath to do with such Persons in such Actions is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Sinner a Person eminently
also shew our selves most unworthy and ingrateful towards him in crucifying him afresh and putting him over again unto an open Shame and trampling his Blood even under our Feet as an insignificant thing When therefore we are under any Temptation to this sin to think a while calmly and cooly with our selves if we can get but so much time to think thus This that I am a going to act is that which brought Jesus to his Death that which God was so much angred with that he was no way to be appeased for it but by the Death of his Son This is that that Jesus died to redeem me from that I might not act it but preserving my Vessel in Sanctification and Honour and shall I be so wicked and so unworthy as notwithstanding all this to act it Thus to meditate on his Passion might b e a means so to crucifie our Lust mortifie our Flesh and subdue our Passions that we should remain in our Integrity and persevere in our Chastity abhor and flee from Fornication Lastly Infinite was the Love of Christ that brought him being so pure in Life to undergo such a Passion at his Death and to undergo it not for any Offence of his own but all for love of us to save us from our sins to redeem us from our Iniquities to deliver us from the Guilt of them in our Justification and to deliver us from the filth of them in our Sanctification and so to make us Members of himself to joyn us to his own Body that being Partakers of his Holiness here we might be Partakers of his Happiness hereafter Has he had has he shewed such Love to us and shall we then act that which is so hateful to him Cannot all the Love that he hath shewn us engage us to abstain from that which he so much abhors Shall we violate the Temple of his Spirit Shall we take the members of Christ as the Apostle speaks and make them the members of an Harlot Shall we prefer the enjoyment of a Lust before Communion with Christ and love a Whore better than Jesus better than Jesus that so loved us as not to love himself even to the Death for us but give his Life for us God forbid If we thus would meditate on the Love of Christ when we are under Temptation to uncleanness the Love of Christ would damp and dead all other Love subdue and cruecifie and kill all carnal Lust We should never be able to love any thing in competition with him much less lust after any thing in Contradiction to him and so abstain from all uncleanness detest and flee Fornication And thus much for my seventh Direction There is but one thing more that I know of requisite to give you for a Direction and that is Prayer Prayer O what will not that do It hath a kind of Omnipotency in it it can do any thing even with God himself he cannot because he will not resist it Fervent and effectual Prayer O it Availeth much as St. James tells us c. 5. v. 16. To this means therefore betake your selves for Preservation of your Chastity and for Protection against Temptation to Incontinency 'T is our Saviou'rs own Direction Watch and pray that ye enter not into temptation Mat. 26.11 Nothing so forcible for the overcoming of this Temptation as Prayer Surely never was any man foiled with it that used this Weapon against it and did not first forsake his Weapon and give over his Defence Whatever therefore else ye do be sure to betake your self to Prayer Prayer will interest and concern God himself in your Preservation and engage his Omnipotency in your Quarrel It will obtain Grace to subdue Lust strength to withstand Satan Constancy to continue chaste and in one word conquest in and over every Temptation To this weapon therefore betake your selves and doubt not of Success in every Encounter He was never finally overcome by Lust who continued praying sincerely And now I have given you my Directions to preserve you from falling into the Sin of Fornication I must now leave the Readers to the Tryal of them and my Prayer is That God would so bring these Directions into your Minds and so incline your Hearts to the using of them and so bless your Endeavours in their Use that they prove as so many powerful Antidotes against Lust strong Remedies against Uncleanness and effectual Preservatives against Fornication So shall God have Glory so shall you have Profit and I shall have the and I propounded to my self in this Discourse And all this and much more the Lord be pleased to do for you and me and all for the Son of his Love's sake our ever blessed Lord and only Saviour Jesus Christ to whom with the Father and the Holy Ghost be all Honour Glory and Power ascribed now and for evermore Amen The END of the Treatise of Fornication
and highly sinful Luke 7.37 And how can she but be a great Sinner who is an Actor in that which in the Scripture is called a great Wickedness Gen. 39.9 And after this sin committed it brings upon her Shame if a Maid it robs her of her Glory which was her Virginity if a Widow it robs her of her Honour which was her Integrity In Levit. 19.29 it is said Do not prostitute thy Daughter to cause her to be a Whore What in the Text is read prostitute in the Margent is profane So Lev. 21.17 the Priest was not to take a Wife that was a Whore or profane so also v. 9. so that to be a Whore is to be a profane Woman her Whoredom is a Profanation to her When Tamar had a mind to deceive her Father-in-law she covered her self with a vail and wrapped her self and sate in an open place And when Judah saw her he thought her to be an Harlot because she had covered her face Gen. 38.14 15. The thing as it would seem by this was in those days so shameful that she that acted it was ashamed to show her face when she did it both before and after the doing of it In our Laws the shame of the Fact lights on the Woman as well as the Man who is to be a publick Spectacle to all Beholders whether in Church or Market as well as the Man The very Name of a Whore which she gets unto her self thereby hath so much of Shamefulness and Reproach Dishonour and Disgrace in it as nothing can have more No greater filth can be thrown upon any than what is comprehended in that Name worse cannot well be said of a Woman than that she is a Whore 't is all Shame in one Word And therefore mischief abundance he doth to a Woman that brings her under that Shame And which is consequent to her Shame it brings upon her Punishment or if you will other Punishment besides the Shame If the Daughter of any Priest profaned her self by playing the whore she was to be burned with Fire Lev. 21.9 If the Daughter of any other person did it she was to be stoned to death Thus runs the Law in that Case Deut. 22.21 They shall bring out the Damosel to the door of her Fathers house and the men of the City shall stone her with Stones that she die because she hath wrought folly in Israel to play the whore in her Fathers house The Adulteress as well as the Adulterer was surely to be put to death Lev. 20.10 If a Bond-maid were found guilty in this Case tho she was not to be put to death because she was not free yet she was to be scourged Lev. 19.20 So sharp Punishment was the female Offender in this kind to undergo by the Law and there is no exemption from Punishment for them in the Gospel but Fornicators of what Sex soever are to be thrown out of the Church to be shut out of Heaven and to be turned into Hell as we have already shown in the former part of this Discourse This sin is as mischievous to the Woman with whom it is committed as well as to the Man that commits it with her Secondly It is mischievous to the Child that is if any be got by such sinful Copulation The Schoolmen make this sin of Fornication simple Fornication to be a deadly sin and that in such measure that * Tom. 2. sol 11. c. 7. Peraldus a Papist concludes That if one who had never before sinned in Thought Word or Deed but had done all the good that could be imagined should once and but once commit this sin ex necessitate damnabitur he must of necessity be damned if he die without Repentance Insomuch that if all the Masses that ever shall be said by the Church to the Worlds end should be said for him non liberarent eum à morte eternâ they could not deliver him from eternal Death which they may do well by the way to take notice of that make so light a matter of this deadly sin as is commonly made of it Now if we enquire into the ground of the deadliness of this sin we shall find it placed by them in the mischievousness of it to the Children of Fornication ‖ 22 dae q. 159. a. 3. Fornicatio simplex cum contra bonum educendae prolis sit its illicit a est ut etiam sit â—â—thale crimen This is the Conclusion of Aquinas in the Case Simple Fornication inasmuch as it is against the good of the Off-spring to be brought forth is so unlawful as that it is a deadly sin There is not that care ordinarily in Fornicators for the preserving and providing for their Children begotten in and born of Fornication that Nature obliges all Parents to take and have of their Off-spring and then doth this sin become unto the Committers of it a deadly sin And to look a little nearlier into this business How many Children so begotten are by one means or other stifled in their Mother's Womb and murdered before they are born or expelled thence before the time to bring forth and so killed in their very Birth Again How many of them to hide the Infamy and Shame of their Birth are by the Hands of the very Mothers of them strangled or drowned or otherwise destroyed as soon as they are born We need not go so far for instance as to the Popes Ponds out of which six thousand murdered Infants Skulls were taken How seldom is there an Assize with us wherein there are not some or other arraigned for such Facts as these the Murthers of Bastards Again how many of them are if not at first violently strangled to death yet afterwards leisurely starved to death and quite lost for want of looking after Tho some do yet not very many of them live to be Men and Women The Mother is ashamed of it and tho she hath not a Heart out-right to kill it or hath no mind to be hanged for killing of it yet wishes it dead and is wanting in affording it means of Health and Life And the Father as not being certain that it is his for she that is false with one may be so with another and so none that hath to do with her can be assured that it is his more than anothers he hath no affection for it takes little or no care for the Maintenance and Education of it and so it seldom thrives and comes to good The sight of it is the remembrance of its Parents sin and a renewal of the shame and therefore they ordinarily have neither that love to it nor care of it that Parents have or ought to have to and for the Fruit of their Bodies so that wanting the Effects of that Love and Care it commonly dwindles away until it die Yet again if it live it becomes incapable of Inheritance until it be legitimated by Act of Parliament and so is disinherited before it be
his Eye too as well as all others could be shut out he durst not do it by which means he preserved his Integrity from violation So effectual is this Consideration towards the preventing of the Commission of this sin And therefore St. Ambrose was pleased himself to take notice of it Putas te solum esse cum fornicaris non recordans quia oculi Domini vident orbem terrarum Do you think you are alone all in secret when you are committing Fornication And do you not call to mind and remember that the Eyes of the Lord have this World and all the things contained therein within the view and prospect of them Which is as if he had said to remember and consider that the Eye of God will be upon you in the commission is enough to perswade you to fly Fornication O remember therefore if ever you be under Temptation to this sin that ye cannot do it but in the sight of God and that Thought will no doubt be mightily prevailing with you to forbear so sinful an Act you will not dare to do such filthiness in the sight of his divine Purity you will not be so impudent as to put so high an Affront upon his sacred Majesty as to act Whoredom in his presence 2. Beside the Eye of God upon you who is to be your Judge you have also the presence of Satan with you who does mean to be your Accuser The Devil is Pimp Paramount to the World not a piece of filthiness is committed not an act of Fornication done in it but he is as one at it by his Enticements and Pimperies helping to it Ipse suggerit ministrat fomenta luxuriae He finds and furnishes with fuel for Lust And as he knows all ye do now so he will tell all ye have done hereafter both where and when and with whom and how oft ye have committed that sin As therefore you would not have him accuse you of it hereafter so dread to commit it in his presence here As he now tempts you to it so he will be with you at the doing of it and afterwards accuse you for it 3. Even the Angels of God who loath to behold you in it yet do and will take so much notice of you at it as that they will be Witnesses against you when you shall come to be judged for it They will with Grief and Detestation declare how that whereas they were deputed to guard you from Temptation you refused to hearken to their Perswadings of you to the contrary and by the nastiness and filthiness of your Conversation drave them to forsake their Station and relinquish their Charge and leave you to your selves to be made a Slave to Satan and Lust and to commit Fornication 4. Besides the Eyes of all without you there is the Eye of your Conscience within you which will also be one day a thousand Witnesses against you The Apprehension of which were there nothing else were enough to deterr from so foul a fact Your own Conscience without other Accuser Witness or Judge will accuse convict and condemn you Nay more it will not only be Accuser Witness and Judge but Executioner too O how it will lash and scourge you both now and hereafter the gripings of it for present are very terrible but the gnawings of it for future will be intollerable It makes a Hell of your Heart here and will be another Hell to your Heart in the midst of Hell hereafter for there the Worm doth no more die than the Fire is quenched This the purblind Heathens were sensible of and represented under the Mythological Fictions of the Livers of Titius and Prometheus continually gnawed upon and eaten up yet without consumption thereof by an Eagle and Vultur Scelerati conscientiâ obstrepente condormire non possunt agitant eos furiae saith Philotas in Curtius Wicked Men cannot sleep in quiet for their Conscience which haunts and terrifies them like Furies In consideration whereof doubtless it was that Pythagoras gave that good and wise Counsel of his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That no man should commit any filthiness either with another or alone by himself and that above all others he should stand in awe of himself that is dread and fear his own Conscience which will be privy to all you do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Isocrates observes how privately soever you act your Wickedness and out of the Eye and Knowledge of others No more running away from Conscience than from God which lindeed with Menander is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a kind of God to all men that is Gods Viceroy and Deputy as it were placed by him in and over men to see and censure correct and condemn men for their Vices and Wickedness Having then Eyes such and so many as well within you as without you all upon you in every act of filthiness you commit how can you if you but take it into any Consideration be able to do a thing of so much loathsomness in the sight and presence in the view and beholding of so many and those such Eyes Think but of this and think of it well and by the thought of it with the Concurrence of God's Grace you will be able to overcome all Temptations to Lust and to flee Fornication Fifthly Consider of and meditate upon what is behind Let the last Things come into your Thoughts when you are under any Temptation to sin and especially to the sin of Uncleanness of any sort and the thought of them will be mightily conducing towards your preservation from that or any other sin What are they Why they are four Death Judgment Heaven and Hell and the serious Thought of any one of these is enough to give a stop to the Course of any Sinner in the height of his most eager Pursuit and Career to sin Fornicator Adulterer unclean person of any sort Death is behind Thou caust not live for ever here thou must die and die thou mayst thou knowest not how soon even in the very act of thy Uncleanness thou mayst expire and be cut off and O how dismal would thy Condition be if that should befall thee What can befall a man more woful and dreadful than to be catcht and cut off by Death in the very Act of sin And yet how many have been so surprized and seized upon taken and carried away by Death And what hath befaln any may justly be feared by all Remember thy end therefore and be afraid of such an end as this to be cut off at once both for sin and in sin and this will much conduce to a making thee fearful to commit this or any other sin But secondly not Death only but Judgment also is behind Thou Adulterer Fornicator unclean Person thou must not only die but be judged too for thy filthiness and uncleanness after Death For Whoemongers and Adulterers God will judge Heb. 13.4 Death will not so hit thee as
to make an end of thee it will but seize on thee like a Serjeant and imprison thee until the general Goal-delivery at the end of the World and then it will bring thee forth to Tryal and so and in such a case as it found thee it will bring thee forth to the great Tribunal and present thee to be judged by the great God and righteous Judge of quick and dead in the sight of Men and Angels Who would not tremble and be amazed to think of it that he should be brought forth and made appear in such an Assembly as will be at that great Assize at the end of the World in that Condition that he is in when he is in the act of his lewdness and in all the Circumstances of his filthiness O think of it that in such condition you may be brought into that Assembly and cannot possibly be assured but that in that Condition you shall be brought into it And such a Thought if well ruminated upon may be highly conducible to the prevailing with men to flee Fornication Yet thirdly there 's Heaven behind And Oh what have I said when I said Heaven Why I said a Place and a State of Pleasure Joy Glory and Happiness beyond all that the World hath or ever had or was so much as said or thought fancied or imagined by any man in it As it is written in 1 Cor. 2.9 Eye hath not seen nor Ear heard neither hath it entred into the Heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him The Poets Elysian Fields the Garden of Aloadine the Paradise of Mahomet are yea the Eden of God in this World was nothing to it The summ of it is full enjoyment of highest Blessedness without interruption or abatement to all Eternity But who is this for Why for the Godly and amongst them for those that possess their Vessel unto Sanctification and in Honour that defile not themselves with Women For neither Fornicators nor Adulterers nor Idolaters nor effeminate Persons nor Abusers of themselves with Mankind shall inherit the Kingdom of God 1 Cor. 6.9 10. And therefore think of this when at any time you are tempted to Uncleanness and say Shall I for the love of a Whore lose my Heaven lose my Happiness Can the pleasure of all the Beauties in the World had I the Enjoyment of them all countervail the loss of Heaven Is not one days fruition of Heavens Joys beyond a Year yea a life spent it bruitish Pleasures If ye would but remember and shew your selves men and act according to right reason you would conclude Heaven too good to be forfeited upon so silly a Consideration as the Pleasure which Bruits have one with another and so would by that Consideration be mightily fortified against the Temptations which you may be assaulted with to uncleanness and much enabled to abstain from all the sins of the flesh and to flee Fornication Lastly There is Hell behind O what is that Why a Place and State of perfect Misery where is an utter deprivation of all Comfort and an exquisite infliction of bitterest Torment where is weeping and wailing and gnashing to Teeth where the Worm dieth not and the Fire is not quenched where the damned are implunged into a Lake of Fire and Brimstone that burneth to Eternity for ever living in the Extremities of the most dolorous and tormenting Pains And who are to be turned into this Why the Wicked and amongst the rest Fornicators Adulterers and such like Defilers of the Image of God and Members of Christ and Temple of the Holy Ghost There in that Lake that burns with Fire and Brimstone is their part set out to be Rev. 21.7 And this shall they have at Gods hand for their Wickedness that they shall lie down in Sorrow and burn in the Sparks of their own kindling for evermore Now certainly if this were well thought of and considered by any man that were under Temptation to uncleanness he would never be so far overcome with the Lust so as to commit the sin What shall I go to Hell for a Whore Have I a mind to be damned for a Doxie Shall I plunge my self into Fire and Brimstone there to lie and burn and roar to all Eternity for the little short nasty Pleasure which is had in the Embraces of a Strumpet Thus thus at any time when you come under the Temptations of Lust call to mind and meditate a while upon this and all the other three last things Death and Judgment and Heaven and you will by Gods Grace be so wrought on in that Meditation and Consideration that you will both fly the Acts and detest the Thought of any such thing and abstain from all appearance of that evil Sixthly Consider and meditate upon the Purity Passion and Love of Christ There is Argument in all to perswade to Continency and Chastity It was a life of Purity that Christ led there was not the least Unchastity either acted syllabled or imagined done said or thought by him And his Life is that great Exemplar which we are to copy out in our Conversation He that saith he ahideth in him ought himself to walk as he walked When therefore you are at any time under Temptation to this sin thus say with and to your selves And is this to be Partaker of Christ's Holiness Is this to be conformable to Christ's Purity Did he ever any thing of or like to this kind of acting Was he either a Deflowerer of Maids or a Corrupter of Wives an Actor of or a Tempter to Uncleanness Where read ye any thing of his gallanting it to Ladies or so much as amorous courting or be-complementing of Women To think then how unsuitable such acting is unto the Conversation of Christ and how disagreeing with his Purity all manner of filthiness is may be one good Consideration to restrain us from all Impurity and to perswade to retain our Chastity Again Bitter was the Passion that Christ suffered Scoffs and Scorns Staves and Whips Nails and Thorns in one word the Cross the ignominious cruel and accursed Death on that he endured But what was all this for Why to redeem us from the guilt of sin that we might not be damned after our Repentance for what had passed before our repenting and not that only but to redeem us also from the filth of sin that being made whole by his Stripes we should sin no more So the Apostle expresly He gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all Iniquity and purisie unto himself a peculiar People zealous of good Works Tit. 3.14 And now did Christ suffer for all and so for this sin of ours and shall we again do that that he suffered for Shall we bring upon our selves that Guilt and Filth which he shed his precious Blood to cleanse us from How shall we not only render his Passion fruitless and in vain as to any good to our selves by it but
8.18 23. 1 Thess 4.7 Sin which is so far from Purity that it is the direct contrary thereto and called by the name of corruption uncleanness pollution filthiness the lust of uncleanness ungodly lust a spotting and defiling thing And what indeed is in the whole story and business of it but nastiness and beastliness filthiness and uncleanness not to be seen by Christian Eye not to be spoken by Christian Mouths not to be heard by Christian Ears Whence the Apostle would not have it once named among Saints and saith it is a shame even to speak of those things Eph. 5.3 12. And thirdly It is a Sin against all the Persons in the sacred Trinity Father Son and Holy Ghost 1. Against the Father in that it is a dishonouring of his Creature abusing that to vileness and baseness and bruitishness which he made for himself and for his own Honour and Glory Whence the Apostle cells us above v. 13 that the Body is not for Fornication but for the Lord and helow v. 20. bids that we should glorifie God in our Body as being that which is his upon a double right first of Creation and after of Redemption and therefore is only to be used according to his Will in all Purity and not to be abused according to our Lust in any Uncleanness 2. Against the Son for it is a Dishonouring and a defiling of a Member of him even so far as to make it a Member of a Harlot Know ye not says our Apostle v. 15. that your bodies are the members of Christ Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of an harlot God forbid As by Marriage the two Parties become one in Body so by Religion which imports a holy tye of a Christian unto Christ Christ and the Christian become one in Spirit there is a spiritual Union betwixt them as a civil Union betwixt married couples But then Fornication is the breaking of this Union for by a mans joyning himself to another to a Harlot he becomes one body with a Whore which is a high disloyalty against Christ and a breaking off from Union with Christ a forsaking of him to follow after and be joyned with a Whore which is a strong Argument against this Sin Memento quia Christo sacrata sunt menbra tua nou misceantur membris meretricis Chrysost O remember that your Members are consecrated unto Christ and that is reason enough why you should not commit Fornication inasmuch as that 't is the making of your Members to become the Members of an Harlot or Whore 3. Against the Holy Ghost For it is a dishonouring and a defiling of his Temple and a turning it into a Stve or rather a Den of Uncleanness What says the Apostle here v. 19. know you not that your body is the Temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you So that this defiling of the Body is the defiling of the Temple of the Hold ghost and to a doing of despite unto that Spirit of Grace a forcing him with our nastiness to forsake his Habitation which is also a sure way to bring on our Destruction For says our Apostle 1 Cor. 3.16 17. Know ye not that ye are the Temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you If any man defile the Temple of God him shall God destroy for the Temple of God is holy which Temple are ye Now this Consideration raises up this Sin to so exceeding an height of sinfulness as that it seems not needful to add any thing more to shew the sinfulness of it And yet more may be said to shew it For it is a Sin against a mans own Body and abusing of a mans self a doing a Dishonour and Despite to their own bodies Rom. 1.24 And our Apostle argues by way of Motive to disswade from this Sin in the following members of the Text Flee Fornication Every Sin that a man doth is without the Body but he that committeth Fornication sinneth against his own body The meaning is That whereas most other Sins are against others God or our Neighbour this is a Sin against a man's own self whereby he defiles that part of himself into filthy abuse which was sanctified by God to an use of holiness even to be the Temple of his most holy Spirit It is a robbing of a man's self of so great an Honour and so great an Happiness as to have his Body to be the Temple of Gods Spirit than which what worse Discourtesy what greater Mischief can a man do unto himself And not only against himself but it is a Sin also against the body of Another the Body of her with whom Fornication is committed as well as his own Body It is a doing to her as much mischief as to himself bringing as great a Sin upon her and involving her into as great a share of Punishment as himself For this is a Sin that cannot be committed by one there must ever be two at it A man may commit Murder or Thiest alone he may forswear and lye alone he may gluttonize and be drunken himself alone but he cannot play the fornicator alone by himself he must have a Partner with him in his Sin whereby he doubles his Sin as being guilty not only of his own act but others also whom he tempted to the consenting to him in the acting of that filthiness which is a great aggravation to the sinsulness of it And yet neither is this all For In the next place it is a Sin committed against clear light and knowledge and so cannot but be against Conscience For the Scripture hath clear and plain Prohibitions and Dehortations from it and Denunciations or Threatnings against the Committers of it which none can be ignorant of that knows any thing of the Scriptures of God Prohibitions and Dehortations we have mentioned before and such is this in my text Flee Fornication Such is that in Act 15.29 where abstaining from Fornication is made a necessary Injunction upon all that would be Christians Such again that in 1 Thess 4.3 where it is declared to be the will of God that we should abstain from Fornication And for Denunciations or Threatnings they are plain nad clear and full Such is that of the Apostle Hib. 13.4 Whoremongers and Adulterers God will judge Such that of his again in Eph. 5.5 No Whoremonger nor unclean Person hath any inheritance in the Kingdom of Christ and of God So v. 6 For these things cometh the wrath of God upon the Children of Disobedience And to name no more such is that Rev. 21.8 where Whoremongers are of that number that shall have their part in the Lake which burneth with Fire and Brimstone which is the second Death Are not these clear and plain Prohibitions and Denunciations And do these lie fair and clear in our Books to read And are they not frequently read in our Churches and published in our Congregations Who then can plead ignorance of
them unless it be to excuse one Sin with another which nothing mitigates the faust but rather greatens the guilt So that this must needs be acknowledged a very great Sin which is committed against so many so clear so known Declarations of the Will of God against it and Denunciations of the Wrath of God against the Commuters of it And yet neither is this all For Lastly The Considerations of the Punishments threatned and assuredly inflicted unless prevented by a timely repenting do as it were with a beam of the Sun point out unto declare and display the greatness of the Crime the blackness of the Sin Great Punishments are ordained for great Sins so that in the greatness of the Punishment denounced we may read the greatness of the Sin committed Now what is the Punishment denounced against this Sin Why first in general the Judgment of God That God will judge the Committers of it Heb. 13.4 Which how far that may extend God knows being that remporal and eternal Judgments all Curses and Plagues both in this lise and in the lise or rather death that is to come may lie infolded within the arms of its Comprehension Secondly Excommunication out of the Church Militant With a Foruicator Christians are not to eat not so much as the ordinary Food of the Body much less the Sacramental Food of our Souls no not so much as keep compamy with him 1 Cor. 5.10 I know not what some may think of this but sure in the Primitive Times it was accounted a heavy Punishment insomuch that they upon whom it fell were reckoned of as Persons delivered up unto Satan 1 Cor. 5.5 As indeed he must uceds be put under the Dominion of Satan who is expelled the Kingdom of Christ Thirdly Exclusion out of the Church Triumphant Neither Fornicators nor Adnlterers nor effeminate Persons nor Abusers of themselves with Mankind are admitted to an Inheritance in Heaven such 't is expersly said shall not inherit the Kingdom of God 1 Cor. 5.9 10. And so again Epb. 5.5 No Whoremonger nor unclean ' Person nor covetous Man which Expression relates to matters of Uncleanness hath any inheritance in the Kigdom of God Fourthly Condemnation unto the Torments of Hell Whoremongers among the rest of these wicked ones are threatned to have their part in the Lake which burneth with Fire and Brimstone Rev. 21.8 All which laid together do shew the Punishment denounced against Fornicators to be a very grievous Punishment and that is Proof abundantly enough that the Sin that it threatned with that Punishment is a very grievous Sin a heinous Offence a Sin that is exceeding sinful And tho' we may flatter our selves with a hope of escaping for leffer Sins and so out of that hope venture the more boldly upon the commission of them yet for such grand Offences mortal Sins deadly Crimes as this we cannot but be hugely afraid of suffering the deserved Punishment And therefore this may be one weighty Consideration to press on by way of Motive to abstain from this Sin and to flee Fornication A second may be the shamefulness of it Things that are honest pure and lovely and of good report vertuous and praise-worthy those are thing for Christians to think of to have their Minds and Hearts upon Phil. 4.8 But things of dishonesty things that are shameful and of evil report these Christians should with the greatest care that can be avoid And indeed if we consider this Sin of Fornication in every Circumstance of it it is a very shameful Sin 1. The Actors of it are ashamed to be seen in it and therefore chuse darkness and secrecy to act it in In the twilight in the evening in the black and dark night as the Wise Man observed Prov. 7.9 Whence this and the like Sins are called the Works of darkness Eph. 5.11 done in secret in private and close Chambers whence Chambering and wantonness go well together Rom. 13.13 or other places of conveniency for privacy and secrecy as furthest removed from Observation and Discovery which why need it be if it were a thing of honesty if it were not a shameful thing 2. The Parts and Members of the Body wherewith the Sin is acted are things which were a Shame to see or name Whence the Greeks call them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Latins pudenda shameful things things which People that have any thing of Modesty in them are ashamed to look upon Shem and Japhet when the Father so lay that his nakedness appeared took a Garment and laid it upon both their Shoulders and went backward and covered it without seeing of it and for that Modesty of theirs got their Father's Blessing whenas Cham for his Immodesty looking upon it had his Father's Curse Gen. 9.22 c. The Fall of our first Parents into Sin was not so great as to take away from them all Shame But as soon as they perceived themselves naked they had so much remains of Modesty left them as to make themselves A prons tho' but of Fig-leaves to cover themselves withal Gen. 3.7 which God himself did after change into a better covering of Coats made of Skins v. 21. God would not have an Altar with steps made up to it lest that ascent should be an occasion of discovering of the nakedness of such as should sacrifice thereon Gen. 20.26 and gave special order that for prevention of the like discovery in the Priests they should have linnen Breeches made them reaching down from the loins to the thighs Exod. 28.42 Hence by was of allusion Raiment is counselled to be bought by the Angel of the Church of the Laodiceans that the Sbame of his nakedness might not appear Rev. 3.18 and he is pronounced blessed that watcheth and keepeth his garments lest he walk naked and they see his Shame Rev. 16.15 Throughout the whole Scripture those Parts are never found mentioned by name but by some other modest way of Expression Neither amongst the Heathens would the People of Modesty have any of those words in their Mouthe The more shame for those Christians whose delight it is upon every occasion to mouth them in most immodest sort Of these People may it be truly said what St. Paul spoke of some in his times That they glory in their shame Phil. 3.19 or as St. Jude expresseth it they foam out their own Shame v. 13. 3. Thé Act if self wherein this Sin is committed is so shameful as that it cannot be mentioned in greatest privacy without Shame and therefore the Apostle speaks of it as a thing not to be named among Saints Eph. 5.3 and saith it is a sham to speak of those things v. 12. And well he might as being a thing fitter for Bruits as Dogs and Bitches to delight in rather than for Men. Whence * Epist 50. ad Ocean St. Hierome calls the acts of Fornication Caninas Nuptias the nuptical Weddings or Marriages of Dogs And being a thing much delighted