the Children of God elect to this Inheritance none are the Children of God but those that have the Spirit of God none have the Spirit of God but those that suffer with Christ that mortifie their own sins and are grieved for the sins of others Be not deceived Beloved with flattering dreams and phansies This is the very Truth of God and according to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And this Truth being so apparently true I need not exhort in many words to those Christian Sufferings Stand fast in the true Faith of the Power of God and quit your selves like men Cast away all softness and effeminateness and be so stout-hearted as to endure the pangs of Death of the mortification of your sinful flesh and carnal mind for his sake that dyed for you Resist unto Blood even unto the effusion of the wicked Life and unrighteous devilish Spirit that resideth in you For this is the good will of your God that you be mortified that you be thoroughly sanctified that you destroy all things contrary to God in you 1 Thess. 4. And let this be the First Motive to run with patience the race that is set before us Secondly These our Sufferings though great are not comparable to the rich Reward that Glorious Inheritance in Heaven 2 Cor. 4. For which cause we faint not but though our outward man perish yet the inward man is renewed day by day For our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory Thirdly If we compare the future state of the Wicked and the Godly how all their Glory and Pleasure vanisheth and how the Children of God are received into Everlasting Happiness crown'd with Eternal Light it will more firmly establish us in our Christian resolutions It cannot be better described then it is in the Book of Wisdom The iniquities of the wicked shall convince them to their own face and they shall approach the tribunal of God with fear and quaking But then shall the righteous man stand in great boldness before the face of such as have afflicted him and made no account of his labours When they see it they shall be troubled with terrible fear and shall be amazed at the strangeness of his salvation And they repenting and groaning for anguish of spirit shall say within themselves This is he whom we had some time in derision and a proverb of reproach We fools counted his life madness and his end to be without honour How is he numbred among the children of God and his lot is among the saints Wisd. 5. You may read the whole Chapter at your leasure Fourthly and Lastly The Inheritance of Heaven is conditional If we suffer with him we shall be glorified with him which implies if we do not suffer with him we shall not be glorified with him 2 Tim. 2. 11. This is a faithful saying that if we be dead with him we shall also live with him if we suffer with him we shall also reign with him Wherefore Beloved sooth not up your selves in vain hopes and flatteries For without killing of your sinful Lusts without Mortification there is no Salvation He that hath not the Spirit of Christ is none of his Now no body hath the Spirit of Christ unless he be dead unto sin For if he be dead unto Sin then shall he be raised from Death to Life by the Spirit of Christ that quickeneth us to Righteousness But if he be dead unto Righteousness and alive unto Sin he is a son of Belial a child of the Devil a vessel of perdition a faggot for Hell and the devouring Wrath of God remains upon him No Heir of God no Coheir with Christ but he shall have his portion with those infernal Fiends to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever Wherefore Beloved awake from your beds of ease shake off your idle dreams and bewitching phansies that either the Devil or his false Prophets have buz'd at any time into your heads If you will be the Sons of God and Disciples of Christ take up the Cross of Christ afflict your own carnal minds give not way to wrath to envy to anger to revenge to lust to wantonness to back-biting to swearing to revelling to drinking to pride to contemning to reproaching to fighting to contesting to censuring to defaming or whatsoever else Flesh and Blood is easily carried out to but deny your selves in abstaining from all those evil acts and so give no encouragement to the Devil to assault you Which if you shall do in the precious Christian Patience even to the mortification of all manner of Sin in you God shall stir up in you the Spirit of his Son and enrich you with the Power and Wisdom of the Holy Ghost And the Peace of God which passeth all understanding shall fill your hearts with all joy and you shall find in your selves an unexpressible taste of the delights of Heaven and receive an infallible earnest of your Eternal Inheritance Which God grant that we may all do through Iesus Christ our Lord to whom c. DISCOURSE X. JAM i. 27. Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted from the world THE Text is a description of pure and undefiled Religion And certainly if any thing Religion it is that wants the pointing out by the most evident plain and conspicuous descriptions that may be to be writ in Capital Letters in so large and visible Characters that he that runs may read it For indeed most men are but at leasure to read it running 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the by tanquam aliud agentes still keeping on their course in that broad way that beaten path that leads to the reward of impiety and irreligiousness But yet I know not how it comes to pass that though men make not Religion their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their main business and work yet they prove most-what far more fortunate in this than in their worldly occasions and employments where though they take a great deal more pains yet we shall more ordinarily hear them complain of ill success But as for Religion how few are there that find themselves at a loss therein nay that are not suited to their own hearts liking and from these slight and transient glances cast upon it are kindled into so hot a passion and inflammation of love and zeal for it that finding their own breasts too strait and narrow for such a violent heat would even force open the hearts of other men that there may be more room and freedom for so ample a flame Not content to keep alive this Vestal fire within the walls of its own Temple but to disthrone the Sun and ordain it the sole Lamp of the Universe where all other Religions and Worships must like the lesser Stars disappear and vanish Every rash Religion is Popery
in and drown the Soul and choak all Life of Vertue and Goodness This is that great Deity of the Heaten This is the Idol of the Daughters of Moab whose stay and confidence is in this visible World whose joy and pleasure is in the Life of the Flesh. I will conclude with the Conclusion of the Psalmist Save us O Lord our God and gather us from among the Heathen to give thanks unto thy holy name and to triumph in thy praise Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting and let all the people say Amen Praise ye the Lord. DISCOURSE XV. COL iii. 1. If you then be risen with Christ seek those things which are above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God THIS Text contains in it that precious mystery of the internal or inward Resurrection of Christ in our Hearts or Souls which is the chief if not only saving Knowledge of that part of our Christian Religion For alas Beloved what will that outward Resurrection of our Saviour according to the flesh profit us though we have the History of it never so accurately nay though we had seen it with our own eyes We may lye in the grave of sin our selves for all that We may sink like a dead stone into the bottomless pit and have our portion with the damned Devils who have an Historical Faith of all the passages of Christs doings or sufferings here on Earth it may be better than our selves And those wicked Souldiers that watched his Sepulchre were perfectly convinced that he had escaped the jawes of Death But what was this to them who were yet dead in their trespasses and sins Surely nothing at all And as little is it to us Beloved if we be dead in sin and have not risen from the strong holding bands of iniquity and vanity Wherefore it is not enough to say Christ dyed for our sins and rose again for our justification and so to imagine his Resurrection to be our raising from wickedness and corruption But we our selves also really and in truth are to rise from the grave of sin by the power of the enlivening Spirit of Jesus Christ. And whether we be thus risen indeed or no this present Text of Scripture will teach us If you be risen with Christ seek those things or you do seek those things which are above For the Greek Text will bear both senses I will first briefly run through the Sense of the words and then raise such Doctrines and Uses as shall most naturally flow from the Text and shall be most profitable for the promotion of that main work of our Salvation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If then you be risen with Christ That is If you be risen in your Souls as Christ in Body rose from the grave If your Souls have scaped the bands of the Spiritual Death which is the nature and life of Sin for that maketh us truly dead unto Righteousness and unto God as Christs Body broke from the Prison of the Sepulchre Then you seek those things that are above It must needs be understood of the Resurrection of the Soul from Sin because the Apostle did not Preach to dead men departed this Life once and again clothed with this Fleshly Tabernacle but to men who were alwayes alive from their first being born into this visible World In vain then had he taught them a sign of that which he knew would never come to pass till the Colossians were past his Preaching to to wit at the last day the time of the Resurrection of our Bodies And according to this manner doth the Apostle speak also of the Crucifixion of Christ making the outward Passion and Death of Christ a sign or resemblance of something in our Souls viz. our dying to Sin as here he hath made his Resurrection an emblem of our rising to Righteousness Rom. 6. 2 c.. How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein Know you not that all we that have been baptised into Iesus Christ have been baptised into his death We are buried then with him by baptism into his death that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father so we also should walk in newness of life For if we be grafted with him into the similitude of his death even so shall we be into the similitude of his resurrection Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him that the body of sin might be destroyed that henceforth we should not serve sin The Apostle there plainly compares our dying to Sin to the Crucifixion of our Saviour and that as he dyed on the Cross Corporally so we ought to crucifie the body of Sin in us by the power of God in our Spirits Thus have we good warrant from the example of the Apostle to look upon the Mystery of Christianity with Spiritual eyes The Birth the Death the Resurrection and Ascension of our Saviour Bodily have their similitude Spiritually in our Souls The Birth of Christ a resemblance of Christs being born in us Gal. 4. 19. My little children of whom I travail in the birth again till Christ be formed in you His Death of our dying to Sin as I have already declared Or of Christs being dead in us For we are also said to crucifie Christ by our ungodliness and by extinguishing his Spirit of power and illumination in us Heb. 6. 4. For it is impossible that they which were once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost and have tasted of the good word of God and of the powers of the world to come If they fall away that they should be renewed by repentance seeing they have crucified again to themselves the Son of God and put him to an open shame Crucified again For verily Beloved from our very youth up we have laid dead the Son of God the suggestions of the Holy Life in our Consciences But yet it pleaseth God to raise his Son in us and recover him to Life by the Preaching of the powerful Messengers of God and the secret working of his Holy Spirit upon the Heart And here is Christ risen as it were from the grave But if we by loose and negligent courses destroy this Life of Christ in us and extinguish the Spirit of God in our Souls then do we crucifie the Son of God afresh and shame the profession of Regeneration and the Spirit of God and the true and living Christianism by our open revolting from the living God and taking part with the wicked of this World and their ungodly and sensual courses But now as Christ is thus in a Spiritual manner killed and crucified so when he is in us restor'd to Life it must needs be fittingly termed his Resurrection from Death And according to this sense may those words of my Text be understood also If you be risen with Christ That is If your Souls have become living
we may come to be temperate to be sober to be chast to be modest to be humble to study mortification of all wickedness in Flesh and Spirit being so persuaded that Wisdom will not inhabit where these be absent and in conclusion a dreadful thing to think of we may fall into the same Heresie with S. Iames and Solomon That Wisdom is the gift of God and that it is a point of Wisdom to think so But that no men rashly and arrogantly take upon them this gift before it be given I could wish that all that are forward to profess themselves the Scholars of God nay his Secretaries his Closet-counsel his only Children born and brought up of him the only wise and holy Off-spring of God full of Wisdom and Celestial Understanding that they would examine themselves by that Rule in S. Iames chap. 3. Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge amongst you Let him shew out of a good conversation his works with meekness of wisdom But if you have bitter envying and strife in your hearts glory not an lye not against the Truth This wisdom descendeth not from above but is earthly sensual devilish For where envying and strife is there is contention and every evil work But the wisdom that is from above is first pure then peaceable gentle and easie to be entreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality and without hypocrisie Whosoever therefore is fervent and vehement in maintaining the Truth let him first be assured that he has the right Knowledge and the true mind of the Spirit of God And before he ascribes this Spirit of Wisdom or Heavenly Understanding to himself let him try if he have the qualifications of that Celestial Wisdom which are Meekness Purity Peaceableness Gentleness Affability Mercy Bounty Impartialness and Simplicity He that hath not these hath not the Truth but is liable to be made the habitation of seducing Devils and to create mischief to men and shame and eternal confusion to his own self As sure as God doth impart his Spirit of Truth and Divine Knowledge to his Children so surely true it is that that Spirit suggesteth no Cruelty nor Unrighteousness but Patience Benignity Compassion and boundless and unlimited Charity And if men otherwise qualified pretending to the Spirit as Histories testifie have plainly shewn that they were led by some Fanatick erroneous Fury lodging in spiritual pride and infernal bitterness and distemper yet this is no sufficient excuse of that common Civil Atheism in the World that excludeth the operation of Gods Spirit in the hearts of men and attributes all to Nature and Humane Industry For as nihil generat seipsum is true in Philosophy so that no man can regenerate himself is as true in Divinity But now that this New Creature born at this Second Birth should have its old Eyes and the same sight with the Earthly Adam seems to me a thing monstrous and prodigious Surely there is a renovation of the Understanding as well as the Will and both by the Divine Spirit the Wisdom of God that worketh all in all I but here some mischievous piece of modesty will object Can that Spirit be communicable to us also that hath such magnificent Titles in the 7th of Wisdom She is the breath of the power of God and a pure influence that floweth from the glory of the Almighty She is the brightness of the everlasting light the undefiled mirrour of the majesty of God and the image of his Goodness I Answer Here is the treasure of those precious promises S. Peter speaks of And hitherto may be referr'd that in the Psalms Glorious things are spoken of thee O thou city of God But I need not have gone out of the same Chapter an answer being so nigh at hand As there be many Epithets of Height and Majesty so there is one of Humanity and Courtesie But these words are too weak to express that affection which is attributed there to this good Spirit of Wisdom It is said in the Greek Text to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a lover of men Therefore you shall find this Spirit descending in the 27th of that Chapter even sliding down into the Souls of Holy and Humble men And that not once or twice as if it were afraid of such debasement but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from age to age But there is yet a more plentiful Testimony of this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the 6th Chapter ver 16. She goeth about seeking such as are meet for her and sheweth her self chearfully unto them in the wayes and meeteth them in every thought And at the 12th Verse Wisdom shineth and never fadeth away and is easily seen of them that love her and found of such as seek her She preventeth them that desire her that she may first shew her self unto them Whoso awaketh to her betimes shall have no great travail For he shall find her sitting at his doors Blessed is the man that exerciseth himself in her and he that layeth up her commandments in his heart shall be wise If he do them he shall be strong in all things For he setteth his steps in the light of the Lord which giveth wisdom to the godly The Lord be praised for evermore So be it So be it AND here I should willingly end did I not suspect that that which hath been spoken might move some Scruples in the minds of the Younger Auditors As whether wicked men have any Knowledge at all or no whether this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or rather 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exclude the use of Books with such others as misapprehension is the most ready and plentiful suggestor of doubts and difficulties But I will meddle only with these two I have named 1. And first with the former It would be a very distastful position to Flesh and Blood to say that wicked men are mere Ignaroes For there being not many that are not conscious to themselves of some dearly fosterd wickedness in their breast they would be put to a shreud strait for they must either undergo the doleful death of dying to their beloved Corruption or else be content to count themselves Fools so long as they live Both which are Gall and Wormwood to Natural Pride and Concupiscency But let us brook it as we can that Spirit in Esaiah dares give Sentence in this cause Behold all you that kindle a fire and are compassed about with sparks walk in the light of your fire and in the sparks that you have kindled This shall you have at my hand you shall lye down in sorrow 'T is true the Prophet here allowes them some light but a light of their own kindling And if Foolishness be the School-Mistress the Scholars are not likely to be very wise Weak quickly-dying sparks they have blindly and boldly mounting up though their Vehicle be but a filthy fuliginous vapour of darkness But the Sun of Righteousness hath not yet shone upon them Gross fire
there is no darkness I am the light of the world saith our Saviour And the Apostle rouzing us out of this sleep of Sin saith Awake thou that sleepest that Christ may give thee light To walk therefore in the Light is to walk in the Life of Christ as in the Presence of the Father and he that thus walketh knoweth both whither he and others go But he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth because that darkness blindeth his eyes 1 Ioh. 2. And no wonder then that fear attends his footing that ever and anon he is afraid that the next step he stumbles into the pit of destruction The wicked fear where no fear is but God is in the generation of the righteous saith the Psalmist It fares so with them as with those that travel in Arabia who if they chance to set their foot upon Iron Stone or any cold thing by night they are even ready to dye with fear suspecting they have trodden upon a Serpent So ungodly men whose stay and trust is not on God are subject out of the suggestions of an ill Conscience in every harsh thing they meet with to think that God hath forsaken them and that they now have stumbled upon that Old Serpent the Devil The rising of the morning may restore the other to peace and security but what will chace away the terrour of this inward darkness Nor the glorious light of the Sun nor the beautiful aspect of the Moon nor the chearful collustration of the sparkling Stars can yield them light or refresh their troubled Spirit Hunc igitur terrorem animi tenebrasque necesse est Non radii Solis nec lucida tela diei Discutiant sed naturae species ratioque As the Poet speaks and may be understood in a better sense than his earthly mind could ever reach to Till that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or idea or Truth of all things free us from this misery we shall not be truly freed from it But if not freed from it how evil do we think his dayes are whom the clearness of the day and common light cannot deliver from the tormenting fears of that continual night Vide qualis affectus sit timor saith Cardan qui crepitare cogit dentes c. See what a kind of passion Fear is that makes a mans teeth chatter in his head which symptom saith that Physitian is proper to those that labour with some deadly Disease But sure the Horrour of that Eternal Darkness is worse where is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth which is the Fear of the ungodly here and their Portion hereafter 3. Deformity in Body doth a little diminish ones Happiness But the Vgliness of Sin in a mans Soul if it could be seen with outward eyes it would even fright a man out of his wits to behold it For it is the very Impression or Character of that evil Fiend the ill shap'd Devil himself as Righteousness is the Image of God 4. Feebleness also of Body is a miserable thing But Weakness of Soul is worse when that every blast of vain Doctrine is able to blow us down when every Temptation makes us yield to our Enemy and to become a wretched Vassal of the Devils cruelty 5. But that I run not too much upon one point That which is most terrible is Death But the Death of the Body is but to be hid in the Grave but the Death of the Soul is to be excluded the Presence of God and not that only but to be vexed and tormented with those Spirits of torture which in their fury lay on sure strokes Thus it is manifest that every Evil of the Soul is worse than that of the Body that answers to it And so that Poverty which consists in the want of good things and the presence of evils that ensue from this want is a great deal worse in the Soul than in outward things concerning the Body Now when I say Poverty I know not what to add either for misery of Body or Soul it including all in both Hunger Thirst Nakedness Filthiness Sickness Heaviness Disconsolateness these and all manner of mischiefs accompany Poverty But be it what it will in the Body it is unspeakably worse in the Soul and a certain cause of making that poor mans life miserable so long as he continueth in that sense poor I but will some say how can this thing be When as dayly experience shows that men that are as destitute of all Spiritual and Heavenly Riches as they abound in Earthly live in all Jollity and Pleasure in all Mirth and Merriment But this is no good Argument if we believe the Wise Man Prov. 14. 13. Even in laughing the heart is sorrowful and the end of that mirth is heaviness So Eccles. 7. As the crackling of thorns under a pot so is the laughter of a fool The flame and the noise go away together and at last is nothing left but scorching coals or dead ashes Would a man count a man in good plight because the poyson he takes makes him dye laughing as it is said of that Herb in Sardo and of the biting of the Tarantula We commonly count the case of a sick man more miserable when upon his bed he sings merry songs and finds out fond toyes from the weakness and distemper of his troubled Brain These men are miserable enough though they think not nor perceive themselves to be so And so it fares with all them that be ungodly and yet seem to flow in all joyes pleasures and contentments It 's but the phansie of a sick Brain Wise men are sorry to see them in such Distemper to have such an ill Symptom upon them And surely that that is miserable in their judgments is miserable and not in theirs whom misery hath made mad false pleasure hath infatuated So we see now plain enough That the poor man that is he that is destitute of Grace and Vertue all his dayes are sufficiently evil sometime in the judgment both of himself and others other sometime or rather ever in the judgment of others that is of wise and holy men Or that this Truth may be the stronglyer established in the judgment of God himself who is the measure of all Truth Thou sayest that I am rich and increased with wealth but thou knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable and blind and naked c. Rev. 3. But of poverty wretchedness and misery enough It would seem more desirable to point out some way to be enriched The same Spirit that tells the Church of Laodicea of her miserable poverty shews her a way how to become rich Vincenti dabitur To him that overcomes will I grant to sit with me in my throne even as I overcame and sit with my Father in his throne Here 's no ordinary Riches Here 's the fulness of a Kingdom But take the condition I pray you Vincenti dabitur He that overcomes he shall be endued with large
he doth not a good man count every day a Festival Surely if it be so he must needs count it so And that it is so my Text can witness Solomon hath asserted it and the Devil himself cannot deny it nor good men conceal it nor wicked men confute it for they have not experience of it But do I not seem to Tantalize you all this while by describing so desirable a Banquet and not shew you the way to be partakers of it Verily neither God nor good men do envy us it But to say the truth the way to it is as undesirable as the Feast is to be wished for Abstinence and emptyness is the way to be filled with this precious Food The full soul saith Solomon loatheth the honey-comb And if we be taken up with and filled with the delights of this sensible World and the pleasures of the Flesh we shall never relish the sweetness of this Banquet never so much as taste of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If false transitory pleasures get possession of the Soul they will exclude that true light and safe delight in God What 's the way then to this continual Happiness A contemptible thing they call Self-denyal or abstinence from our own Wills and Desires Upon which if I should enter a Discourse you especially of the younger sort might account it or a dull Melancholick Dream or a pretty solemn Night-piece but when you have viewed it immerse your selves again into the false light of this bewitching World and closely embrace that life and pleasure that I should wish you to part with But be you assured that he that is so slightly affected with the most solemn and solid Duties of Christianity is so far off from the good Conscience or good Heart named in the Text that he is not so much as in a preparation to it which is Contrition and Brokenness of Spirit But he that even now begins and sets himself seriously upon the curbing of his Lusts and denyal of his own wayes and endeavours cordially from the very depth of his Heart to perform whatsoever he conceives is the Will of God and allowes himself in no fault this man shall in due time be wrought into the Life and Spirit of Christ And shall continually enjoy in a more eminent manner whatsoever or Sight or Hearing or Smelling or Tasting shall judge pleasant and delectable such Beauty such Harmony such Fragrancy such Deliciousness as no man can conceive but he that hath it nor he that hath it can know how to utter it To this Happiness God grant that we may all arrive through Iesus Christ our Lord to whom c. DISCOURSE VIII PSAL. xvii 15. As for me I will behold thy face in righteousness I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness THE Excellency of this Holy resolution and High aspires of the Prophet David will be better set off and more-savourly relished if we bring into view that lively character of men of a quite contrary dispensation in the foregoing Verse which are stiled men of the world which have their portion in this life who are very Belly-gods and Cormorants greedy devourers of the Temporary good things which God has treasured up in these lower Regions of the Universe These they dig out and rake up together and lay on heaps that they may satisfie their own Worldly Appetite and gratifie themselves in the lusts of the Flesh in the lusts of the Eyes and in the pride of Life that they may eat and drink plentifully yea riotously fill their Bellies with the choicest delicates and feed their Eyes with the inexhaustible store and plenty of their riches and their treasure being inexhaustible when they have lived in all the jollity and gayity of this World in all the affluency and felicity this present Life will afford bequeath or entail upon their Posterity the like Happiness themselves enjoy'd by leaving the rest of their Substance to their Babes as is described in the foregoing Verse This is the state of that Blessedness which the meer Natural man breaths after neither his foresight nor desire piercing any further But this Holy man of God who was inspired from above has a thirsty presage of matters of far greater moment whose mind is not fixt upon these hid treasures of the Earth but upon that treasure which is reserved in Heaven whose neither hopes nor enjoyments are in the things of this Life but deems this Life as Death or Sleep in comparison of that which is to come who evangelizes before the Gospel and speaks the language of Christians before the coming of the Messias as if he would anticipate the words of S. Paul Col. 3. 3. Our life is hid with Christ in God But when Christ which is our life shall appear then shall we also appear with him in glory Wherefore let others enjoy themselves as much as they will let these men of the World have all things succeed according to their desire and please themselves to the height in their Wealth Pleasure and Honours I do not at all envy their condition nor place my Happiness in these things While these mens Eyes and Minds while their Affection and Animadversion is wholly taken up with these Worldly Objects the pantings and breathings of my Soul are entirely directed towards God and to the blissful enjoyment of the Light of his Countenance As for me I will behold thy face in righteousness I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness Or as the Psalms in our Liturgy have it When I awake up after thy likeness I shall be satisfied with it That Saying of Heraclitus in Clemens Alexandrinus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All that we see waking is Death and what we see dreaming Sleep which is the Brother of Death as another termed him as if in this Body whether sleeping or waking it were in the valley of the shadow of Death I say this Speech of Heraclitus may seem to savour much of a very deeply Melancholized Spirit yet if to speak conformably to inspired men were an Argument of Inspiration Heraclitus his Melancholly would approve it self Divine by the apparent conformity it bears with the most notable passages of those who certainly were inspired God forbid saith S. Paul that I should glory save in the cross of the Lord Iesus Christ whereby the world is crucified to me and I unto the world What was it not sufficient that S. Paul was crucified to the World but the World must be also crucified unto him That he was dead to the World but the World must be also dead to him Or who ever except S. Paul ventur'd on such a Phrase as the Worlds being crucified or dead to us though we be rightly said to be crucified or dead to it Why yes Heraclitus said so long before 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All these things which we see with these Bodily Eyes it is but a Scene of Death That vivid and chearful colour of the Heavens which
recreates the Eyes of ordinary Mortals seem'd to him not a bright azure but a funeral black nor Sun nor Moon real and true Lights but two painted Scutcheons Or and Argent hung upon the Melancholly Tapestry of this House of Mourning Wherefore to be buried in the Body with him is a real Death and this Terrestrial Region wherein we seem to live but one great Caemeterium or Dormitory No life no joy no pleasure is here no not amongst those that seem to enjoy most that have the greatest portion in this Life nay their only portion therein Wherefore what expectation of Happiness before that blessed Resurrection When we shall see the Face of God and be satisfied with his Likeness in whose presence there is fulness of joy and at whose right hand there are pleasures for evermore But for the present Interval that is the time of our Immersion into the Sense of this Body the Prophet David as well as Heraclitus does plainly deem it a state of Sleep or Death which are the same in Scripture every where as to any Mystical meanings or purposes As for me I shall behold thy face in righteousness I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness Munster piously and I believe truly paraphrases thus upon the Text. Egó verò omnes electi tui Domine non ita quaeremus has temporarias transitorias divitias ut in illis deliciemur sed justè piè vivemus in hoc seculo ut aliquando in futuro seculo videamus faciem tuam eâ satiemur cum scilicet è pulvere evigilaverimus reformati fuerimus ad similitudinem Christi tui And this may go for the Philosophical sense of the Text. But there is a Moral sense thereof which Castellio seems to reach at and is indeed the most easie to the words of the Text which run thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of which the easie and accurate Sense is I will behold thy face in Righteousness at the awaking of thy image I shall be satisfied according as Castellio has also rendered it Tum satiandus cum tua experrecta fuerit imago And his Gloss is accordingly Per Christi resurrectionem qui Dei imago est plenam consecuturus justitiam foelicitatem For the Image of God is Christ who is called also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the brightness of the Glory of God answerably to the LXX Translation of my Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I shall be satisfied when I shall see thy Glory Which Glory like the beams of the Sun reach and touch the very eye-lids of him that is asleep but are not seen nor enjoy'd till he awake for then the image of the Sun is also awoke in him that is to say excited into actual being According to which Analogy is that Saying of the Apostle Awake thou that sleepest and Christ shall give thee light The Evigilation therefore or Resurrection of the Image of God in us is our Evigilation or Resurrection in a Mystical or Moral Sense into it which as soon as it does appear we also do appear in Glory with it but while Christ is thus hid or dead or asleep in us we are in a state of Death or Sleep and the true Life of our Soul is hid in him And this I would have the First Truth comprised in my Text viz. That the immersion of the Soul into the life of the Body and love of this present World which is the Image of the Earthly Adam is as it were the Sleep or Death of the Soul The Second That there is no true Satisfaction in this Worldly or Terrestrial Life which is but a torpid Sleep and the very shadow of Death The Third That the true Evigilation and real Life of the Soul is the recuperation of the Image of God the Resurrection of Christ in us according to the Spirit The Fourth That this Mystical Resurrection of Christ is the only solid Enjoyment and Satisfaction to the Souls of the Faithful even in this Life The Fifth and Last That the way to attain to this Satisfaction which arises from the Evigilation of that Divine Image in us which is also stiled the Face of God or if you will the Image thereof whereby we see his Face so far forth as he is visible to Man is Righteousness and Sincerity of Heart I shall behold thy face in righteousness These are the precious Truths comprized in the Text which I shall handle with all possible brevity 1. That the Image of the Earthly Adam is as it were the Sleep or Death of the Soul the very Text does apparently intimate especially that Translation in our Liturgy When I shall awake into thy Image which is the Image of the Heavenly Adam I shall be satisfied therewith which implies that till this awaking we are in a state of Sleep or Death For in that we can eat and drink and go up and down these are no Arguments that we are truly alive no more than the growing of the Hair and the Nails of them that have lain long buried in the ground is any Argument of Life in them I mean of the Sensitive Life Nor though the Flesh be full of Worms will the man be thought ever the more alive for that For neither is Sense the Life of a man nor meer Carnal and Worldly Reason the Life of the Child of God The Divine Image is the Soul of his Soul and the Life of his Life of which seeing every Soul is capable it is rightly deemed dead till it partake thereof till it be awaken'd into this Image of God But so long as the mind is addicted to the things of this World to the Law of the Body which is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so long is she dead or asleep call it which you will Hierocles calls it Death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the Death of every Rational Essence sayes he is the loss or suppression of her Divine and Intellectual excellencies Plotinus Sleep 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So far forth as the Soul is immerged into the Body so far she is asleep And therefore those that are wholly taken up with the concerns thereof as relishing nothing but what is Worldly and Carnal may justly be look'd upon as fallen into a deep Sleep And what if they can walk and talk and go up and down and do such things as men that are awake also do do not the Noctambuli do the same Whose eyes being shut yet unwittingly do they several exploits some hazardous others ridiculous other some as it some seldomer times happens safe and congruous if the chain of Phantasms that leads them attract luckily and to convenient Objects But in the mean time they know not what they do but without any free consultation or deliberation are carried out hoodwink'd to action by the meer suggestion of Dreams and Phansies And is not this the very condition of those who have arriv'd no higher than to the Image of the Earthly
manners of the Sufferings of Holy Martyrs which they underwent under the tyranny of bloody salvage Heathen Heading and Hanging and Crucifying were nothing for the satisfaction of their fury They were broyl'd on Grid-irons they were fryed in Frying-pans they were boyl'd in Cauldrons they were put in the Brazen Bull they were fired at the Stake cast into Ovens fired in Ships and so thrust from the shore into the deep fired in their own Houses cast upon burning Coals made to walk upon burning Coals burnt under the Arm-pits with hot Irons They had their Hearts riven out of their warm Body had their Skin flean off from their live Flesh had their Feet tyed to boughs of two near Trees which boughs being at first forcibly brought together suddenly let go rent their Body in twain They were trodden down by Horses cast bound and naked into Vaults to be eaten of Rats and Mice They had their Flesh pulled off with Pinsers torn off with Iron-rakes were squeezed to death in Wine-presses were tyed upon Wheels which turning rub'd their naked Body against sharp pegs of Iron They were hung by their Hands and Feet with their Face downward over choaking Smoak They were set out on high in the Sun having their naked Skin besmeared with Honey to be stung with Bees and Waspes The Devil spent all the skill and malice he had in finding wayes and engines of Torture for them God make us truly thankful unto him for his Mercy so long continued to us that we have without terrour or torment so many years enjoy'd the Christian Religion in such Purity And give us Grace to repent us of our unworthy walking and unbeseemingly of so great a Light But as concerning these Sufferings of the Body Beloved such is the love of God to Mankind and so reasonable is his Service that he hath made it no necessary condition of Eternal Life actually to suffer them But we ought to be so minded that rather than to relinquish the true Christian Faith or do any thing which we know offends God we would rather dye a thousand deaths And this was S. Pauls resolution Acts 21. I am ready not only to be bound but also to dye for the name of the Lord Iesus But yet there is a Suffering in the Body that we must needs suffer if we will approve our selves the Children of God and Heirs of that Glorious Kingdom And this Suffering we must inflict upon our own selves 1 Cor. 9. 27. But I keep under my body and bring it into subjection These Sufferings are most acceptable to God and requisite fore-runners of Eternal Life If you live after the flesh you shall dye but if you through the Spirit do mortifie the deeds of the body you shall live Verse 13. of this 8th Chapter to the Romans 1 Pet. 2. 11. Dearly beloved I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims abstain from fleshly lusts that war against the soul. And Galat. 4. 24. They that are Christs have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts You see plainly then That we are not Christs nor Gods nor Heirs of God with Christ unless we suffer with Christ in mortifying all Bodily Lusts in curbing our inordinate Desire of eating or drinking unless we study to keep under the Body and live chastly and continently If we will be Heirs of that Heavenly Inheritance we must bring under all evil and carnal concupiscence If we will partake of that Eternal Glory in Heaven we must be content to suffer reproach and evil speeches amongst men If any man ask what Necessity what Reason is there I will briefly shew him how it comes about First For suffering in Name for I will step so much back There is no man loves to be disquieted in mind or vext But it would disquiet us and gall us exceedingly to be found fools so that we have not the heart to find our selves so it would so discontent our natural proud Spirit Hence we blame other men rather than our selves and say they be in the false way So did the Pharisees to our Saviour and to his Apostles And thus were the Prophets used before them because their wayes were of another sort their speeches and actions of another fashion from the World You will better understand it in some Examples A Carnal or Natural man that hath no Sense of the Spirit of God and is unacquainted with its Operations derides such performances as Prayers Exhortations or what so else may proceed from thence as truly and extraordinarily proceeding from the Spirit of God and counts those men that acknowledge Gods power in them in the performance of such things weak men crack'd-brain'd Enthusiasts Fanatical Fools silly Lunaticks But all this proceeds out of Pride Envy and Self-love he himself being not able to perform such Duties or at least not in that manner So some that have got the trick of Praying ex tempore by Custom the Mother of Confidence and Dexterity Ignorance and want of a true Sense of the Majesty of Heaven upholding them in their rash performance these men will vilifie Justice and Uprightness Humility and Patience and the mortification of our Sensual Lusts because they find in themselves no such Vertues nor intend to trouble themselves so much as to practise them Then for the upholding of their own credit they must give them poor contemptible terms that they are but Heathenish Vertues such as Socrates or Plato had and make but a Moral man and that there is no such need for a Christian to have them But Beloved be not so deceived but observe this Truth Though Moral Vertue carries us no higher than an Heathen yet without the exercise of Moral Vertue and inward life and liking of it we are no true Christians The Summe is this That the good ways of God are spoken against and miscall'd that wicked men may keep their credit and yet walk indeed in the wayes of the Devil To the Second I answer That it is necessary that we suffer in the Flesh because that if we do not keep down the Flesh and its suggestions the Spirit will be choaked and stifled by that filth and corruption The carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject to the law of God neither indeed can be Ver. 7. The carnal mind that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the bent will intent liking or desire of the Flesh is enmity with God desires against the Will of God and will not be obedient to the Law of God nor indeed can be Wherefore we are to kill it to mortifie it to crucifie it that we may be dead to sin or the desire of the Flesh and alive to God by his enquickening Spirit through Jesus Christ our Lord. Here is the Patience of the Saints Here their great Suffering 4. But I go on to their last Affliction which is in Spirit And that is twofold 1. The wrestling or conflict with spiritual wickedness in Heavenly places 2. The suffering with
by that Spirit of Christ being alive in you then you seek those things that be above For it is as impossible that the Spirit of Christ should be alive in us and not we alive by it to him as it is that light should be let into a room and the air in the room not enlightened Wherefore if Christ be risen in us we are also risen with him But the Sign that we are thus risen with Christ is that we seek those things that be above But how above What Is the contemplation of the Stars or the knowledge of Meteors viz. of Comets of Rainbows of falling Stars of Thunder of Lightning of Hail of Snow or such like commended to us Nor Astronomy nor Astrology nor Meteorology seem considerable things in the eyes of God Those things that be above That is in Heaven But how in Heaven Or what is Heaven We are therefore to understand that this word Heaven has a threefold signification in Holy Writ First It signifies the Air. Psal. 79. 2. The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat to the fowls of Heaven That is of the Air. Secondly It signifies that space where the Stars the Sun and the Moon and the rest of the Host of Heaven do move Isa. 13. 10. For the stars of heaven and the planets thereof shall not give their light the sun shall be darkened in his going forth and the moon shall not cause her light to shine Thirdly It signifies that aboad of the holy spirits of men where the eternal light and lustre of God is present where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God At the right hand of God That is the Power Majesty or Glory of God For God hath neither a Right hand nor a Left because he hath not a Body or any palpable distinct Members Wherefore when any sensible parts of a Body are ascribed to him they are to be understood by way of Analogy or resemblance So when his eyes are said to be upon the hearts of men and his eye-lids to try their wayes when his ear is said to be open to the prayers of the faithful these signifie nothing else but that God doth perfectly both know and discern and approve or disallow as certainly and as clearly nay infinitely more clearly than we see or hear any thing with our eyes or ears Now as by the organs of sense attributed to God the Knowledge of God is set forth so by the organs or instruments of action or operation is his Power decyphered And most eminently by this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the instrument of instruments or best of all instruments the Hand The hand of God is the Power of God ordinarily in Scripture So is he said to deliver the Israelites with a mighty hand and stretched-out arm that is by exceeding great Power Now the Right hand being more active than the Left the more usual instrument in outward works or manufactures it may intimate the exceeding abundance of the Power of God Or the Right-hand of his Power may intimate the Power of God to good the more large effusion or pouring out of Benignity the enlargement and exaltation of the Soul of Christ and his Fellow-members as many as have been conformable to him in the death or mortification of the Old Man For these also God will raise up with him to Eternal Riches and Glory and irresistible Power which the Devil Death and Sin shall never be able to overcome But the Power of his Left-hand is the Power of destruction the fury and wrath and strong tempest of God which doth sieze the Children of Disobedience which abideth in Hell for them for an endless woe and toil and torment for ever And this is the distinction of the Sheep and the Goats on the Right hand and the Left these shall be plagued with the vengeance and anger of God in the power and dominion of Hell but those shall be strengthened and comforted with those pleasures that flow at the Right-hand of God for evermore Thou wilt not leave my soul in the grave neither wilt thou suffer thine holy one to see corruption Thou wilt shew me the path of life In thy presence is the fulness of joy and at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore What therefore the Right-hand of God is we plainly see viz. the full and strong stream of his Goodness and Divine Benignity To sit here what can it be but to remain in this Happiness unshaken unmov'd steadily and securely But he that stands is next going or departing AND thus much by way of Explication of the words which will afford us these Doctrines 1. That there is a Spiritual Resurrection of the Soul belonging to every true Christian 2. That those that do partake of this Spiritual Resurrection seek those things that be above that is Divine and Heavenly things 3. That they seek them where Christ sitteth at the Right-hand of God First of the first viz. That there is a Spiritual Resurrection of the Soul in this Life I will not go far for my first Proof I will only step back into the Chapter foregoing my Text viz. the Second Chapter of this Epistle to the Colossians at the 11th and 12th Verses In whom i. e. in Christ also ye are circumcised with circumcision made without hands by putting off the sinful body of the flesh through the circumcision of Christ in that you are buried with him through baptism In whom ye are also raised up together through the faith of the operation of God which raised him from the dead And ye which were dead in sins and in the uncircumcision of the flesh hath he quickened together with him forgiving you all your trespasses And then follows my Text for all the residue of that Chapter may be very well Parenthetical If ye then be risen with Christ c. which he doth assert or affirm in the forenamed Verses when as he saith they are buried with him in Baptism There 's the Death we are to imitate in our Soul that is to have the body of Sin dead and buried In whom you are also raised up by the operation of God There 's the Spiritual Resurrection of the Soul And in the next Verse Ye which were dead in sins There 's the Death of the Soul hath he quickened together with him There 's the Resurrection of the Soul from its Death which is Sin For Sin is the Death of the Soul as Obedience Righteousness or the Holy Spirit of God is the Life thereof But for further and more manifest proof of this point it will not be amiss to rehearse again to you that place at the 6th of Romans for it suits exceeding well with the place I expounded to you just now Ver. 3 c. Know you not that all we that have been baptised into Iesus Christ have been baptized into his death We are buried then with him by baptism into his death that like as Christ was raised
up from the dead by the glory of the Father so we also should walk in newness of life For if we be grafted with him into the similitude of his death even so shall we be into the similitude of his resurrection Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him c. The words do plainly describe the Spiritual Death of the Soul as also the inward Resurrection thereof from Sin to a newness of life as the Apostle speaks And so Rom. 8. 10. And if Christ be in you the body is dead because of sin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is mortified for sin As we would say such an one is kill'd for Robbing or is let blood for an Ague So dead for sin is either the mortifying our Bodily and Carnal Affection in a just vengeance on our selves for the sin they suggest and made us commit Or dead or mortified for sin is that Sin may be quite dislodged of our Bodies as a man is said to be let blood for an Ague to rid himself quite of that disease or to prevent its unwelcome returns But the Spirit is life or righteousness that is the Spirit is our life vivification or the cause of our inward or Spiritual Resurrection 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for righteousness that is that we may be righteous or live righteously For Beloved if we take the sense of this place of Scripture in a natural meaning It will not prove true For those Romans bodies to whom the Apostle writes were not dead for if so they had not been able to read the Epistle or to have heard others read it And beside this the words would imply that Christs being in us destroyed this Body or the health of it when as Piety unfeigned preserves both Body and Soul in good temper much less doth Christs being in us make the Body dead unto Righteousness Therefore it is plain that this is the sense of this place viz. That if Christ be in us the Body or Flesh of a man is dead or mortified to sin and that our Life then is the Spirit of God to live in Righteousness Now mark the following Verse But if the spirit of him that raised up Iesus from the dead dwell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his spirit that dwelleth in you O behold the mighty power and dominion of the Spirit of God in a man Not only our Will and Understanding is swayed ruled and enlivened by it but it descends even to the enquickening of our Bodies too when they be once mortified that is the Passions and Lusts thereof destroyed so that we exercise not our Affections in the things of this World Then will God enliven it with better and more Divine Passions and Affections For Anger against our Brother unadvisedly it shall be moved with holy and discreet Zeal against all wickedness in every body For Sorrow and inordinate Grief for its own private crosses with a sweet and tender Compassion and Pitty toward all that be in any Affliction For Lust and Sensual or Carnal Love with Divine Charity and a large embracement of all the Creatures of God they having some resemblance of his lovely Wisdom and Beauty Thus shall a man exult and rejoyce in the ways of God both Body and Soul serving willingly and chearfully with the whole man For our mortal Bodies even those earthly tabernacles lyable to death and dissolution shall the Spirit of Christ enliven by his powerful working if so be that our Bodies be first made dead unto Sin and the Spirit of God be in us indeed As the Apostle doth plainly witness A further proof for this purpose may we gather out of Phil. 3. 10 11. That I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable to his death If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead Not as though I had already attained either were already perfect That this is meant of a Spiritual Resurrection seems reasonable from these grounds First because it is ranked with Spiritual sufferings and Spiritual conformableness unto the Death of Christ And then because the Apostle useth this way of apologizing Not as though I had already attained either were already perfect which caution he need not have put in about the Bodily Resurrection For could the Apostle think the Philippians to be so mad as to conceive that the Apostle had now risen out of the grave already clothed with his glorious Body which should be incorruptible Wherefore the Apostle speaks there of a Spiritual Resurrection And that this Doctrine want no Authority to confirm it I will add those words of our blessed Saviour Iohn 5. 25. Verily verily I say unto you The hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and they that hear shall live That Life and Resurrection from the dead can it be understood of the Resurrection of the Body out of the grave That was not then when our Saviour Christ spoke nor hath been yet fulfilled saving in one single example of Lazarus whom Christ called out of the grave But that was not the Life that is meant here for it is called everlasting life in the foregoing Verse which Lazarus was not raised up to else Lazarus would be alive at this very day which no man will acknowledge to be true But remember what our Saviour Christ saith Iohn 11. 25 26. I am the resurrection and the life he that believeth in me or trusts in me or my power though he dye or be mortified or though he be dead yet he shall live And whosoever liveth and believeth in me that is is alive in me or to me The everlasting Righteousness of God and trusteth this living power shall never dye but be ever alive to Righteousness and to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. This must be understood of a Spiritual Life or Resurrection or else it will follow that all true Believers in Christ shall not dye at all that their Bodies shall never descend into the grave And now Beloved if this Discourse of the Spiritual Resurrection of the Soul seem to us subtle nice or obscure it is our fault not the fault of Truth The Sun is clear enough and easie to be seen but he that is blind dead or asleep beholds it not Nor can the unbelieving and unregenerate while he lies dead or asleep in Sin discern the truth of the Spirit of God in the Holy Scripture But all things are discovered and made manifest by the light For whatsoever doth make manifest is light Wherefore he saith Awake thou that sleepest and arise from the dead and Christ shall give thee light Eph. 5. 13 14. Wherefore this point is plain to him whose eyes are open to behold it viz. That there is a Spiritual Resurrection or Vivification of the Soul But now if you be desirous to know what
this Resurrection of the Soul is I will also endeavour to satisfie you in that too but very briefly It is the inward Life of Righteousness it is the renewing of the Soul the shaping of it again into the image and similitude of God in a word it is the Life or Spirit of Christ whereby a mans Soul is alive to all Spiritual and Heavenly things I will explain it by a comparison When a mans Natural Life is gone all his imaginations and machinations perish He desires not any thing belonging to this Natural Life nor Food nor Clothing he feels not though his Body be rent or cut or rot away goes not about to preserve or recover the Health or Life of his dead Body thinks not of Wife nor Children nor any Natural thing else But when a man is alive according to Nature he desires Food Meat and Drink for the preservation of his Natural Life Cloths both for shelter and ornament is sensible of what hurts his living Body provides for his Health and Strength is active in the deeds of Nature and if he be a mere Natural man all his joy pleasure and content is in the same Just thus it is Beloved in the Death and Life of the Soul While the Soul is dead Spiritually it hath no true desire to the Word of God which is the Food of the Soul but doth come to the Church only for fashion sake gives no ear to the Voice of God rebuking her in her Conscience hath no unfeigned thirst after Righteousness nor is she sensible of the violent heat of Passion how wicked it is nor feels her self frozen and stark cold to all Charity and due Devotion she goes not about to obtain that saving Health even Jesus Christ that precious Balsam of the Soul nor is she a whit moved whatever mischief betides him But when the Soul hath risen from this Death and hath got the new Life of Christ being enquickened by his Spirit Then hath she a right healthful appeal to that Heavenly Bread and those Spiritual Waters those Refreshments from above the sweet Comforts of the Holy Ghost Then doth she heartily abhor all filth of Sin and keeps her Affections unspotted before her Lord and Husband Jesus Christ clothed in fine Linnen pure and white which is the Righteousness of the Saints Then is the living Law of God to her sweeter than the Honey and the Honey-comb so delightful and pleasant that she meditates thereon day and night She is very sensible of whatsoever is disgraceful to Christ or wounds or hurts his precious Body in any thing very tenderly loves the Communion of Saints and hath a very forward desire to propagate and enlarge the true and living Church of God She never falls by any infirmity or surprisal but is grieved and hurt as the Natural man is vexed when his Body chanceth to fall upon stones and is bruised Beloved where there is Life there is also Sense and where there in Sense there is also Grief and Joy Grief at such things as are contrary or destructive of the Life and Joy at such things as are agreeable and healthful for the same BY this time I hope you are sufficiently instructed concerning the Spiritual Resurrection both that it is and what it is Let us now make some Vses of this Doctrine That there is a Spiritual Resurrection belonging to every true Christian. 1. Then it is plain from hence That every Christian be he what he will that hath been made partaker of this Resurrection was once dead himself For as rising presupposeth a being down first so doth also a rising from death or being quickened presuppose a being dead Hence therefore it is plain That every Christian man or if you will even every man or was once or is at this present Spiritually dead Now the Nature of Death you know is such that nothing that is held therewith nothing that is Dead can recover it self to Life As it is also said in the Book of Psalms No man hath quickened his own Soul Wherefore Beloved this is the proper Vse we can make of this Consideration That if we find the fruits of the Resurrection of Christ Spiritually in our Souls we give God alone the Glory For it is he alone that killeth and maketh alive that leadeth down to Hell and bringeth up again He it is that is the death of deaths and a mighty destruction to the destroyer He it is that is the Resurrection and the Life as he himself witnesseth of himself He it is I mean the Spirit of Christ in us that fights against all the powers of Death and Darkness in our Souls and triumpheth gloriously over his and our enemies He is the strong arm of Salvation from God He hath wrought all our works in us Therefore not to us but unto God be the praise for his mercy and truths sake Nor only are we to praise God but also to live humbly and meekly before our Neighbour For thou whoever thou art that presumest thou hast attained to the Resurrection or enquickening or enlivening of the Spirit of Christ If hereby thou contemnest thy sinful Brother and settest him at nought and art not mercifully and kindly affected toward all men acknowledging very sensibly and inwardly that wherewith thou conceivest thy self to excel others or to be distinguished from them to be the Grace of God and his free work Thou art a lyar and a deceiver and jugglest with God and thine own Soul and art vainly puffed up in thy Carnal Mind For where Pride is there is not the saving Spirit of Christ where harshness of Mind is and contempt of our Neighbour there abides not the Love of God 2. If men be dead till they partake of the Resurrection of Christ then such neither can nor ought to take upon them any office of the living Who will make a Blind man judge of Colours or a Sick man of Tasts or a Deaf man of Musick But he that is Dead is worse than Sick or Blind or Deaf Wherefore no man that is devoid of the Resurrectiod of Christ in the Spirit is fit to judge in Spiritual things or in the secret Mysteries of God It is the Spiritual man that judgeth all the Heavenly man the Lord from Heaven and yet with man upon Earth the true Emanuel God with us and in us by his Spirit the true Judge of the Quick and the Dead As it is written The first man is of the earth earthly the second man is the Lord from heaven As is the earthly such are they that are earthly and as is the heavenly such are they that are heavenly Wherefore Beloved judge nothing before the time that is till the coming of our Lord and Saviour Jesus till his glorious appearing from Heaven when he shall make every work of man manifest and shall judge with right judgment 3. I will only add an Vse of Examination and so conclude Is there such a State of the Soul belonging to every
Christian such a State I say as the Resurrection from Death Then it is worth our pains to try our selves whether we be in that state or no. We have seen many Easter-Mornings God be praised but if the Sun of Righteousness hath not yet risen upon us with healing in his Wings all those solemnizations of the Resurrection of Christs Body from the grave is but Death and Darkness unto us is no Health no Light nor Life It was the manner of Primitive Christians to salute one another with this Salutation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Lord is risen If we could this Easter-Sunday and every Lords-day make such Salutations as this in the very Spiritual Truth The Lord is risen That is is risen from Death in our Souls and we by him become enlivened to all Righteousness O what Mutual Rejoycing and true Spiritual Triumph would there be in the Church of God! Verily Beloved if you partake not of the Mysteries of Christianity in the Spirit and Truth of them as well as in the History and Ceremony your Profession is but vain you are still in your Sins and dismal Sentence of Damnation remaineth still upon you DISCOURSE XVI Appendix to DISCOURSE XIII 1 PET. 1. 22 23. Seeing ye have purified your Souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren See that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently Being born again not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible by the word of God which liveth and abideth for ever I Have already insisted upon the Doctrines or Truths which are as so many enforcements to the great Duty in the Text 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That which may be observed out of this Precept is a fourfold Doctrine 1. That we are to love one another 2. That we are to love one another out of a pure Heart 3. That we are to love one another fervently 4. That we are to love one another universally and continually The First of these I have done with I come now to Doct. II. That we are to love one another out of a pure Heart This Purity may be set out in these three Constitutives or at least Consecutives of Love viz. Complacentia Benevolentia Beneficentia 1. The Purity of Complacency consists in this that we love and like that of a man that is the adequate object of honest Love and that is Divine Beauty which is not in the Body but in the Soul adorn'd with all Moral and Divine Vertues He that loves not according to this in a man he loves after the same manner he may love an horse a dog or any beast that is fitted for the satisfying of his natural or extravagant humours For if there be no ground of right Friendship but Vertue then is there no Love in vain and leud men but after the manner of Brutes that is eating together as Sheep and Kine in one pasture or sporting together like young Greyhounds at their going out into the fields or better natur'd Spaniels or such like fond Animals I but the gaudes of Phansie and queint toyes of Wit or at least the subtilty thereof Art and accomplishment of the Intellectual parts these all of them put together at least may make up an object of Complacency and friendly delight Verily as much as a well proportioned Body clear Complexion a vigorous Eye gentle Deportment c. which are so far from that living object of Pure Love that by the same Law we may join Friendship with a well wrought Statue or some more curious Picture Complacency in any person saving for Vertues sake is as far removed from pure and Divine Love as the affections of Xerxes Glauca the Youth of Athens and that others of Sparta who loved trees statues rams geese c. were distant from Natural Vid. AElian lib. 1. cap. 39. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And as ridiculous and absurd will their Love prove in respect of that more pure and holy affection that can take Complacency in the person of men that have but the outward accomplishment of parts and abilities or outward artifice or natural well-favouredness their Souls being dead to Vertue and Righteousness For beside that these are as helpless to the best things as a dumb statue or a dead picture they are also very dangerous for either hindering the first shooting out of divine worth in the Soul of man or for corrupting and destroying what already is grown up of Vertue and Goodness For so it is with man that so soon as he is capable of Vertue he must either have it or the contrary Mans Nature is no barren Soil it brings forth or good grain or stinking weeds And where once corruption has taken hold it is even worse than a Gangrene it catches hold on the companion and is the very pest of the Souls of men But if the Love and Complacency of those be not pure that can love notwithstanding the foulness of their friends what pollution is there in theirs that can love for foulness it self viz. whose society pleaseth one another for some bad quality as for being a vain Gamester Swearer for their Lasciviousness or that delicious condiment of Friendship good Fellowship which some loving Souls are so taken with When as it s nothing but the similitude of their evil manners or equality of their enlarged bellies do thus joyn their affections Fellow-wine-bottles of the same size or Ale-tap-urinals c. And as this Impurity in Love is Bestial so there is also that is Devilish as when men like one another the better for being alike imbittered against this or the other party Such complyance as this is but like the twining together of Snakes and venomous Serpents in one bed A Paradox That that which is the most ugly of all the affections viz. embittering Malice and Hatred should make men so amiable one to another Thus Hags and Imps love one another And there is a knot of Friendship that is as Fond at least as this is Devilish viz. endearment from Identity of opinion Fellow-Thomist Fellow-Scotist c. And when it riseth no higher than Scholastick siding or Philosophical altercations it is not much worse than fondness or childishness But when this unskillful affection interweaves it self with matters of Religion and toucheth upon the Attributes actions or designs of the highest God where men are very loth to be deceiv'd though no where more subject to err Fondness is then too mild a term for that which is boil'd up to Fury and Fanaticalness For here men of the same Sect are not content with the pleasure and good-will they exhibit one to another but they grow to that heat as to scorch all gainsayers as well as warm themselves at these misguided flames God forbid that I should go about to slack any mans affection in the pursuit and profession of Divine Truth such as is plainly contained in the Scripture or evidenced by palpable experience in his heart But that which is but
signifie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What a dismal darkness will there be then For the blind then leading the blind both will fall into the Infernal Pit THE meaning of the Text I conceive is now abundantly plain and that the scope and end of our Saviours uttering this Parable to his Disciples was to stir them up to a constant and earnest endeavour of utterly disentangling themselves from all the attractions of the relish of the Flesh or Spirit of the World and of joyning themselves entirely and cordially with and of dwelling wholly in the relish sense and life of the Spirit of God or of that Divine Spirit whose suggestions are no dictates of self-love or partial interest but the substantial concerns of the Kingdom of God and the good of the whole World For which he who has this Divine relish will not stick to lay down his Life if need require according to that endearing Example of our ever-blessed and adored Saviour Let it be therefore my task at this time to exhort you earnestly to endeavour after this great and indispensable attainment of this Single Eye this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Wisdom of the Spirit which this Parable of our Saviour points to and is indeed the proper Spirit of Christ concerning which S. Paul expresly declares He that hath not the Spirit of Christ is none of his Which ought to be a rousing Argument to awaken us into a due sense of so great a want For unless we regain this Single Eye we shall never see the right way to Heaven There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Iesus namely to such as walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Iesus hath freed me from the law of sin and of death For the relish of the flesh or carnal-mindedness is death But the relish of the spirit or spiritual-mindedness is life and peace But the carnal mind is enmity against God because it cannot submit it self to the law of God but is in perpetual opposition against it ever suggesting what is contrary to it Wherefore we must wholly withdraw our selves out of that Principle as we hope to attain to the glorious liberty of the Sons of God And assuredly whosoever has that Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Iesus it will free him and rid him from the power of all the urgings suggestions or subtil insinuations of that Law of the sinful flesh of self-love and self-interest Though he may feel these self-savouring suggestions and the more clearly discern them to be such by the perspicuity of the Single Eye the Spirit of Christ yet he is so freed from their power that he will never act according to them but constantly act according to the relish and suggestion of that pure Principle of the Spirit which has not the least tincture of self-love or carnal interest And there is a neceffity of perfectly clearing up at last into this Single-mindedness by reason of the war and enmity betwixt the Carnal Principle and this of the Spirit for without this there is no peace nor joy nor enjoyment in this Life nor in that which is to come The Law of the sinful life of the Flesh therefore is utterly to be abrogated nulled and annihilated and we are to judge and act in all things according to the discernments of that Single Eye or pure Principle of the Spirit of Christ. But I will rather confine the Arguments of my Exhortation to the Text and content my self with what it will afford namely the four Analogies I have produced and explained and so conclude 1. The light of the Body is the Eye What therefore the Eye is to the Body that is some vital and sensible leading Principle in the Soul to the Soul Is it not therefore of infinite consequence what this leading Principle is when it is of as much consequence to the Soul as the Eye is to the Body and the Soul of incomparably more worth than the Body What man would have the Eye of a Batt of an Owl or of a Mole for the guidance of his Body unless he were to have his abode under the Earth with the Mole or to venture abroad only in the Night with the Batt and Owl Every Animal is to have an Eye congenerous to its own Nature And therefore that Divine Animal which we call Man I mean the inward man the Soul is to have an Eye congenerous to hers she is to have this Single Spiritual Eye unless she will converse only with Brutes or Devils in their Kingdom of Darkness 2. Again The Single Eye makes the whole Body full of light that is it is a fit and faithful guide to it which way soever it goes And that is the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Iesus to the Soul Which assuredly is the Law of Divine love which is not the love of a mans self or any particular or partial Interest but the hearty love of God and a mans Neighbour that is of all mankind when with a single heart he wishes them and is ready to do them all the good they are capable of and himself in a capacity to administer to them This is that pure and lovely Eye of the Soul indeed which fills her full of Celestial light and enrolls her in the Book of Life and of the Children of Light This is that Vnction from the Holy one even from the Father of Lights whereby we know all things appertaining to Life and Godliness and that Iesus that stupendious Pattern of this Divine Love is the Lord and Christ And that that man of sin that exalts himself above all that is called God and supports his Power Pride and Pomp with gross Imposture and barbarous Bloodshed is that notorious Antichrist he that has this Single Eye easily discerns this and can hardly forbear to suspect that they that do not see it are blind through the Spirit of the World or else drunk with the steames of that Cup of abominations and see double This Simple and Unself-interested Spirit of Love is that Anointing of which S. Iohn saith that if it abide in us we need not that any man teach us but the same Anointing will teach us of all things and is truth and is no lie It is very Truth substantial and essential without any shadow of vanity or imposture in it and such as will seal our hearts with an eternal adhesion to our ever-blessed Saviour as being the communication of his own Spirit to us and be evermore a safe guide to us in our passage thorough this present life He that loveth his brother abideth in the light and there is no occasion of stumbling in him Wherefore as we tender our safe conduct through the wilderness of this World through all the dangers and perils of so difficult a journey we must earnestly endeavour the recovering of this Single-mindedness this amiable Eye of the pure love
affirming that some things are so vile and wicked that a man ought rather 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to undergoe death it self with the most grievons circumstances thereof than submit to the doing of them And is there any thing more base and vile than for a man knowingly and wittingly for the fear or favour of men to sin against his Maker and gracious Redeemer Which if he can do in any case how can he be secure but that he will do it in all cases where his Carnal Interest is highly concerned and that he may not at last be brought off even to worship the Devil himself For they whose guidance is by this Evil Eye this mixt Principle that worship God conditionally if it be safe if it be profitable if it be plausible when these conditions fail they are naturally left in the lurch and may easily apostatize to the grossest practises imaginable He that lives in this Principle it is impossible but that he must walk in dark and slippery places and can have no fast hold at all on Truth and Righteousness And therefore a man is never to rest till his Soul clear up into such a Simple principle of life that he is conscious to himself that neither security of his Person nor Fortunes nor the good opinion or applause of men nor any sinister respects or conditions whatsoever move him to do what he does but the plain and hearty love of the Truth and the sense of his indispensable duty to his gracious Maker and Redeemer according to which he will act and for which he will suffer though he have no witness of either but God and his own Conscience This is to be a true Single-eyed Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile But whatever is on this side of it is besmeared and smutted with rottenness and Hypocrisie 4. Fourthly and Lastly If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 how great is that darkness Indeed it will puzzle a man to say how great it is It is even infinite for space and so it will be for time if we be not timely cured of this blindness A man whose Eye is pure and entire in a dark Dungeon indeed he sees nothing and in a Winter-night cannot so much as discern his own hand but bring a Candle into the Dungeon or let but Day-light return he discerns all Objects very well for the light in him is not darkness that is he is not blind But travel with a blind man from Sun to Sun nay from one Vortex to another so that every Star may be as a Sun to him yet in this infinite and endless Journey he is still in the dark and discerns nothing Even so it is with him that has the Evil Eye in the Mystical Sense he that is Spiritually blind that instead of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is under the guidance of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Carnal mind he is every where in the dark there is nothing sincere in all his actions he can do no Duty as he ought neither to God nor Man but not sensible of any more enlarged Principle or Prospect hugs himself every where and seeks nothing ultimately but the satisfaction of his own Carnal Will and Pleasure Carry him from one Object to another from one Duty to another he is so blind that he will not fail of doing all things sordidly and basely in every place He may indeed endeavour to flatter God Almighty and crouch to him but he cannot sincerely worship him He may fear his Prince but not affectionately honour him and heartily wish him well as the Vicegerent of God He may be tickled with popularity and yet set as little by the common good and welfare of the people as he does by his meanest Cattle that he will not stick to kill and flea or sell away for his own advantage And lastly he may caress his Friend and Neighbour but it will be ever with an eye to Himself that he may lay the seeds of some Worldly advantage But if the service of these stand in any considerable competition with his own Interest he cannot fail having no better Principle but to betray both his God his Religion his Prince his Country and his Friend to serve himself These are his acts of darkness his abode in which will make him so blind that in the conclusion he will betray himself also to that everlasting darkness wherein is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth for evermore For to be carnally-minded is death but to be spiritually-minded is life and peace These short Intimations from our Saviours Parable methinks should be sufficient to well-disposed minds to quicken their speed towards this great and necessary attainment of that Single Eye of the Spirit that we may live according to that one simple Principle of the Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Iesus casting out the spirit of the World that there may be no cross vibrations or Paralytical motions in our Soul but that our whole man may be throughly actuated by the Spirit of God we being born to this Divine State even to be members of God and Christ to whom till we be united we are in an unnatural diluxation from our Body and being devoid of this Spirit though we cannot but depend of him yet we hang off from him as dead or Paralytical members of which the Spirit of Life has left its due hold which must be to every discerning Eye a sad and calamitous Spectacle God of his infinite Mercy amend it in us all DISCOURSE IV. PROV i. 7. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Philosopher in his Metaphysicks And indeed most men are so eager and vehement in the pursuit of Knowledge that they either afford not themselves time enough to consider and deliberate concerning the most efficacious means for obtaining it or have not the patience to use the means though they be well perswaded of it But in the heat of their pursuit make a God of their own industry and take it for the shortest cut to be their own carvers Not Line upon Line but Tractate upon Tractate Volume upon Volume Ossa upon Olympus Plainly according to the attempts of that sottish and boisterous generation of Giants thinking to hale away captive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 her that assists God on his Glorious Throne in Heaven by Spider-web fetters spun and twisted out of the corrupt apprehensions of Earthly-minded men Those did not the Lord choose neither gave he the way of Knowledge unto them But they were destroy'd because they had no Wisdom and perished through their own foolishness Who hath gone up to Heaven and taken her and brought her down from the clouds Who hath gone over the Sea and found her and will bring her for pure Gold No man knoweth her way nor thinketh on her path What then Is it impossible to attain unto her No. Her
See how they go about to vilifie the Meat rather than any way suspect the foulness and weakness of their own ill Stomachs But as all are not to stretch out their hand to every dish and intemperately and unseemlyly to seize upon that which is not meant for them Seek not out the things that are too hard for thee saith Siracides neither search the things rashly that are too mighty for thee But that which God hath commanded think upon that with reverence c. Ecclesiasticus 3. I say as we are modestly to decline that which we are not as yet fitted for receiving So no man hath excuse from receiving some or other of the variety of meats that He hath prepared who feedeth with his goodness every living thing Old men and babes young men and children they all are sustained by the Word according to every ones necessity and capability Or else how could the young ones increase Or they of full age subsist Both which is the Will of God That which Theophrastus hath in his First Book of his History of Plants belongs indifferently to all kind of Generation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nature is not content with the bestowing of a being upon things but works them up to the perfection of that being As an little Plants that in time grow to their just bulk blooming and bearing Fruit plentifully And it is said of our Saviour that he shall grow up like a plant And our Saviour saith of the Kingdom of Heaven that it is like the growth of the mustard-seed tree Now as this new Life is called a Plant for its vegetation so is it also termed a Child for its tender sense and simplicity of meaning That therefore that hath knowledge and sense having also an appetite to nourishment and that a nourishment proper to sustain its own Nature and the Word being the proper nourishment of those spiritual new-born babes then if there be no such desire in us to this Word it 's a sign there is no such Principle of life in us or if there be that it is sick or the Stomach past by over-much fasting But if this Life by not giving it its due nutriment either for measure or quality come to be extinguished we prove our selves it's an horrible thing to think of it no better than Murderers of the Innocent and Just one For Murder is not the cutting and slashing of the Visible Body but the extinguishing of Life And thus we have seen in brief That for the raising of our Souls from Death for the begetting of the Holy Life and for the conservation and increase of the same we ought to be Hearers of the Word II. WE pass on now to that other Doctrine proposed That we ought not only to be Hearers but Doers also of the Word That awing sense of God which is impressed if not upon all yet at least upon most mens Souls together with a Natural desire of security and tranquillity of mind and every pleasing good That experience and acknowledgment of our own imbecillity and insufficiency walking in the fear of darkness and knowing not as the Apostle speaks whither we go doth easily induce even our Natural and Fleshly minds out of love to our selves to lay hold upon somewhat which we conceive stronger than our selves And this we call God and that outward erected form of Religion in all Churches as Hearing and saying of Prayers and giving Attention to the Word we call Gods Worship And a Worship it is surely too too easie and so fit for the vafrous and subdolous Spirit of the Natural man to play its wily pranks in that it being well instructed by the sly and subtle counsels of that Old Serpent the Devil and Satan it turns those good constitutions which should have been introductions to further Holiness into a strong fort or castle of false satisfaction of Conscience and most pernicious diabolical delusion whiles we take our selves to be distinguished from the wicked reprobate brood by outward performances of Ear-labour and Lip-labour without the practice of that which is taught us out of Moses or Christ plainly according to the Pharisees in our Saviours time whom the Holy Baptist sharply rebukes for such kind of imaginations Bring forth fruit worthy amendment of life saith he And think not to say within your selves we have Abraham to our father For I say unto you that God is able even of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham Surely it is out of the want of that feeling Knowledge of that which is so acceptable to God and a fond over-estimation of our own poor naked and contemptible Souls or a conceit that God would want persons if we Christians be excluded to make up the number of the Inheritors of Heaven that makes us think that such superficial performances will make us allowable before God But nothing is acceptable to him but a simple humble and unfeigned obedient Spirit Nothing glorious in his eyes but his own Life the Soul inacted and quickened by Christ. All flesh is grass and all the glory thereof as the flower of the field The grass withereth the flower fadeth but the word of our God endureth for ever This is the Word and Eternal Life on whom whosoever doth believe and by true Faith in his strength is Regenerate into shall obtain Everlasting Life otherwise he abideth in the Sentence of Death and the Wrath of God is upon him 'T is true there be notable Preheminences and Priviledges given even to the Natural Fleshly Adam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Hermes The whole World subsists for Mans sake But this Prerogative howsoever hath its condition which follows 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The World for Man but Man for God And how for God To wit that his Life may be in us that his Christ may be in us Not so many verbal points of Christianity not so many notions of Divinity not so many moon-shine imaginations from the Word heard or read in Books in our Hearts in the Visible World in Heaven in Earth in Men. Christ is not dead and unprofitable phansie but the vigorous ebullition of Life Which Life if it be not in us then are we not partakers of that we were destinate to for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Man was made for a Tabernacle for God he 's Materials for his Holy Temple But if we will not be living stones as the Apostle speaks we shall have the same doom that unprofitable trees or timber They are fit for nothing but to be hewn in pieces and cast into the fire This is the end of that frustraneous brood of the Sons of Belial the off-spring of unprofitableness that fall short of the end they were intended to by their own disobedient perversness The best of them fare no better Man being in honour hath no understanding but is like to the beasts that perish I but we learned Scholasticks have Vnderstanding enough or at least as much as any As much as we have
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Are they animo Dei formi Where the Poet plainly makes the form or image of God consist in Love in Righteousness or Iustice and Courteousnes they being contrary to Injury brutish Fierceness Cruelty and Injustice The Divine Philosopher speaks out more expresly though in fewer words To be like unto God is to be holy just and wise I might multiply words here for the setting forth of the manifold Benefits and Graces that accrue to the Soul of Man from his Conversion to God and Obedience to his Holy Word But nothing more can be said than this Image of Christ doth either express or at least imply Justice Holiness and Prudence comprize all Excellence That generous Magnanimity of mind that bears it self above all the contempt that can follow the practice of that which is Good or abstinence from that which is Evil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pure Temperance Manly and awful-eyed Fortitude Gravity and Modesty gently moving in all peaceful and steady tranquillity and a God-like Vnderstanding watering with showers of Light this flourishing Paradise of Piety and Vertue This and whatsoever else we can conceive that Good is is contained in this Divine Image nay more than we can conceive before we be transformed into that likeness The Wisdom of him that is regenerate into this image and conformity with God dives into the depth of Darkness unties the knots of that Old Serpents train breaks off the bonds of Death and Hell pierceth like Lightning into the inwardness of things stands before the Throne of Immortal Glory That Holiness winds it self from all corruption of the Flesh flyes above the bewitching attraction of the Body looks upon God in unspotted purity That Iustice gives every thing it s own That which is Caesars to Caesar and that which is Gods to God But nothing to it self seeketh nothing for it self exulteth not in it self But gives all to God seeks all for God rejoyceth alwayes in God Thou art worthy O Lord to receive honour and glory and power for thou hast created all things and for thy wills sake they are and have been created Rev. 4. Thus be they nothing in their own eyes as indeed they are nothing but in profound Humility and Gratitude which is the most exquisite act of Iustice give all to the Eternal and Everlasting Majesty This is that lovely beautiful and most desirable Image of Christ the Son of the Father Who hath part here is an Inheritor of Eternity But he that by false and lazy imagination and phansie remains in the Devils deformed Nature his doom is everlasting Death and unspeakable Misery AND thus much for the Reasons Why we should be Doers of the Word I will only speak a word or two of the Proposition that is left and so end this Text. The Proposition is this III. That we are not to deceive our selves Errare falli decipi c. To err or be deceived saith Tully turpe est And that methinks should be a sufficient Argument to avoid it But to deceive ones self is a double fault He that deceives himself is both Fool and Knave as we say both the gull and the cheater the deceived and the deceiver Though to say the truth he that is deceived by another was first deceived by himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Aristotle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The same defective Principles that expose a man to be deceived of another exposeth him as well to be deceived of himself No man is discovered to be a fool by another but he was so in himself first And who made him so then But how can this be That man should be so wise as to circumvent himself and so foolish as to be circumvented by himself Certainly it implies more Natures than one in a Man The Platonists reckon up three in general there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1. There is Vnderstanding that lamp of Heavenly Truths or Intellectual illumination 2. There is the Soul in the middle where Will and Reasoning is situated 3. In the last place there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Life which resides in the Body and is but a shadow of the Soul the darkened Cave of evil delusions falshood and deceit a den of all Serpentine Natures false Spectrums Magical Allurements thick Mists benumming Vapours execrable Whisperings vain Terrour false Delight bewitching Apparitions fair flitting Phantasms deceivable Suggestions besotting Attractions Here 's that damn'd cell where those three grand Impostors and Conspirators against the Soul plot their fraudulent mischiefs the Flesh the World the Devil Or rather here is a World of Devils in this Life of the Flesh where the Prince of Darkness rules Well hath Zoroastre described this place He calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a World whose light is the blackness of darkness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A World whose bottom is the depth of unfaithfulness It 's foundation is laid in Hell a Hell whose fense is pitchy clouds and thick darkness whose treasure is corruption inhabitants vanity and shadowes wisdom senslesness prudence precipitancy simplicity of heart inextricable labyrinths of deceit and hypocrisie constancy or steddiness a vertiginous circuit of glowing phrensie and gross madness He that here doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which those wise Oracles forbid He that looks down indangers his sight indangers being carryed away with this rapid course and hurrying flux of tumultuous motions It 's enough to turn his Brain to change his Understanding to bereave him of his right Senses Here 's the fountain of ignorance and well-spring of all evil deceits So long as the Soul leans toward this and its loving and liking is toward this shadow of falshood it carries its deceiver about with it self and no deceit there is without but it is from this first or in vertue of this That which the Platonists call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Scripture calls Spirit Soul and Flesh. This Flesh is that whorish Woman that Solomon speaks of so oft and describes her subtil carriage But all her fair speaking is but false allurement and her flattering utter destruction For a whore is a deep ditch and a strange woman a narrow pit saith the Wise Man Nay the high way to the very pit of Hell Her house are the wayes of hell whose descent is into the chambers of death Prov. 7. Now the Soul of man betwixt these two the Spirit and the Flesh Heaven and Hell God and the Devil is so placed that accordingly as it inclines or cleaves to so is its Wisdom and Life If it continually struggle to work it self upward toward God God will put out his merciful arm to draw it out of those Infernal Waters If it cleave unto the Flesh and its deceivable Lusts the warmth of wickedness will attract it down lower and lower till Satan hath insnared it in all his nests and hath chained it in his own chains So that being made an absolute Vassal of
Adam Surely every such man walketh like a vain image or shadow or like a winking Noctambulo that sees not whither he goes nor in what plight he is nor whom he may meet nor what Eyes are upon his nakedness nor what sad events may attend his fortuitous motions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every wicked man or unregenerate not yet awak'd into the Image of God has the eye of his mind closed as these Noctambuli those of the body and do not walk by sight but by fortuitous phansie their whole Life being but a series of dreams and all the transactions thereof the execution of the dictates of their imagination impertinently busie in this profound Sleep For these Phantasms under whose conduct they are in this condition and which is their first mover in all their actions creep upon them by meer chance as dreams in the Night suggested by the temper of the external Air or of their own Blood or from some other casualty and so one Phantasm or commotion occasions another and the man like a Ship at Sea whose Pilate is asleep may be driven one while one way another while another in a right tract or out of it as it happens there being neither judge nor guide to stear to any end that due examination or mature deliberation has made choice of And therefore all the passages of such a Life whether thoughts or actions are so as it fares in dreams either fatal or fortuitous And although there be a great confidence that things are true and real and such as they appear and that we have concluded sure yet in all this we do but imitate those that dream 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thinking those things they see to be clear Realities while they are but Dreams as Plotinus speaks and few but do experience it Nor can we give judgment what is right or wrong what false or what true whether we have dreamt luckily and divinatorily or all be falshood and delusion till that Mystical Resurrection the Resuscitation of the Image of God in our Souls And this briefly may suffice for the First Particular That the immersion of the Soul into the Life of the Body and love of this World is as it were the Death or Sleep of the Soul 2. The Second is That there is no true Satisfaction in this condition And indeed how can any true Satisfaction be there expected where we suppose nothing but Delusions and Dreams nor any one in a case to profess himself satisfied as being utterly unable to compute right or make a due estimate of things No man thinks him that is grosly cheated truly satisfied no not though he give it under his own hand he is so And is not this state of Sleep and Dreams a meer cheat and delusion There only is true Satisfaction where that which satisfies is truly that which it would appear to be and will be found so by a man when he can judge aright For that which every man means in all his pursuits is Happiness nor would he put forth his hand towards any thing that did not bear upon it that Inscription Which if it be false he must needs at last find himself in a wrong box and what profit is there in those things whereof he then must be ashamed And as in the sequels of Reason some one latitant falshood being admitted it will discover it self by the inference of some more gross and palpable absurdity to be false it self So some practical mistake in adhering to some false good though pleasing and alluring for the present will in the conclusion prove it self a real evil by the calamitous Consequence that will necessarily issue from it For the end of such things is Death as the Apostle speaks Thus plain it is that though we should dream pleasingly and prosperously it is no true Satisfaction because at the long run we shall find our selves disappointed and deceived But the truth is that those that dream most successfully are not happy no not so much as in this Dream but have an unquiet Night of it there being so many interruptions and disturbances from the fortuitous clashings of flying Phantasms that rise by chance and bring in scenes of Discontent as well as Pleasure Insomuch that those that have cast up the compute most accurately have concluded it best never to be born but next to that quickly to dye as the Epigrammatist inferrs upon his Synopsis of all the wayes and conditions of Humane Life And Solomon who was a King whose Reign also was Peaceable Splendid and Prosperous yet when he had laid all things together and compleated his account the whole summe was Vanity and vexation of Spirit Nay the scene of things in this present World seem'd to him so sad and Tragical that he praises the Dead which are already dead more than the Living which are yet alive and accounts him better than them both which hath not yet been because he hath not seen the toil that is done under the Sun So far is this Worldly or Terrestrial Life from affording any true Satisfaction to them that are immerse into it But this is a Theme so trite that it had been enough only to have named it and therefore we will pass to the Third Particular 3. That the true Evigilation and real Life of the Soul is the recuperation of the Divine Image The truth of which assertion we shall easily understand if we but consider what Life is and wherein its fulness does consist as also what is the Image of God For we know that Death is a privation of Life and Sleep a partial Death as being a partial privation of the Vital Functions And therefore the recovery of the Soul into more full and ample Functions of Life must needs be her expergefaction if not resuscitation from the dead Now I conceive the fulness of Life to be compleated in these three things in self-motion or self-activity in sense or speculative perception and in pleasure love or joy And that the heightning or enlargement of these in several degrees is the enlargement of Life and a releasement from such a measure of Sleep or Death These Principles are so plain and manifest that scarce any one can be so dull and sleepy but that he will acknowledge them at the first sight What the Image of God consists in we shall easily understand if we have recourse to the Attributes of his Nature by which only he is cognoscible to us Which Nature of God consists in Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness Whence the Image or Face of God as it is called in the Text so far forth as it is visible to us is nothing else but our perception approbation or rather devotional admiration of these Divine Excellencies and the being effectually impressed upon by them to the transfiguration of our Souls into this similitude so far forth as Humane Nature is capable to be assimilated unto God For we cannot be absolutely Omnipotent nor Omniscient nor Infinitely
point of Religion exerciz'd all the time God himself bears witness against them Ezekiel 33. They speak every one to his brother saying Come I pray you and hear what is the word that cometh from the Lord. They come unto thee and sit before thee as my people and they hear thy words but they will not do them with their mouth they shew much love but their heart goeth after covetousness And lo thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice and can play well on an instrument for they hear thy words but they do them not And Reading of the Scripture privately is so like the publick Preaching of it that I need not take any new pains to refute the vanity of it if it be not accompanied with due obedience We may fetch that up to Divinity which Epictetus hath both wittily and gravely of Moral Theorems The Sheep tell not their keeper how much Fodder or Grass they eat but shew that they feed sufficiently by their Milk and Wooll Let us not therefore Beloved do as vain Limners they say have done drawn Venus and the Virgin Mary according to the feature of some Face they themselves love best Let us not I say picture out Religion to our own liking and then be in love with an Idol of our own making but love and like that which the Apostle has so plainly pourtray'd to us That whose description consists in visiting the fatherless and widows in their affliction and keeping our selves unspotted of the world Which in two words is this Charity and Purity Of these two consists that true Religion acceptable to God For I conceive visiting the Fatherless and Widows in their affliction excludes not other good deeds from this definition but by a Synecdoche is put for the whole office of Charity 1. The First branch is Charity I will not curiously and artificially set out the bounds of this Vertue It will be enough to intimate that it is not confin'd to the relief of the Body only as he is not only Fatherless that wants his Natural Parent but he much more that has not God for his Father through the seed of the new birth Nor she alone a Widow that has lost her Natural Husband but every Soul is a Widow that is estranged and divorced from her God whose sins have made a separation betwixt her and her Maker Thy Maker is thy Husband Esa. 11. 54. He is so indeed to those that are not faithless and play the Harlot for of such saith the Lord She is not my Wife neither am I her Husband Hosea 2. 2. He therefore that can reconcile a Soul unto God doth not only relieve the Fatherless and Widow but procures an Husband and Father for them and wholly rids them out of their distressful estate These outward transient actions tending to the spiritual or temporal good of our Neighbour are fit testimonies of our sincere Religion before men but for every mans private satisfaction concerning himself there be divers inward and immanent motions of the Soul which will abundantly help on this confirmation I will reckon them up out of the mouth of the Apostle 1 Cor. 13. Where I will not balk those that be at ad extra too they being all very well worth our taking notice of Charity suffereth long and is kind Charity envieth not Charity vaunteth not it self is not puffed up Doth not behave it self unseemly seeketh not her own is not easily provoked thinketh no evil rejoyceth not in iniquity but rejoyceth in the truth Beareth all things believeth all things hopeth all things endureth all things 2. I pass on now to the Second branch Purity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to keep himself unspotted from the World 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word signifies properly such kind of spots as are in Clothes by spilling some liquid or oyly thing on them An hard task certainly to be Religious at this height Is it to be thought possible that we should wear this Garment of Mortality every day nay every hour and moment for thirty forty fifty sixty years together and soil it by no mischange or miscarriage either of careless Youth violent Manhood or palsied Old Age To pass through the hurry and tumult of this World and never be crouded into the dirt nor be spattered by them that post by us But verily this is not the meaning of the Apostle or of his description of Religion that no man is Religious but he that is absolutely spotless But he sets before us an Idea or Paradigme of true Religion that men having their eyes upon it may know how much or rather how little of Religion they have attained to By how much nearer conformable to this pattern by so much more Religious by how much further off by so much the less Religious He that is not so much as within the sight of it has not so much as seen the least glimpse or glance of Godliness but may be without any wrong to him writ down Atheist Let every man herein examine himself and ask his own Conscience how unspotted he has kept himself from the World And here as hard a difficulty represents it self if not harder than before To keep himself unspotted from the World Is it not pure Irreligiousness to think so Impossible to be so Who can keep himself pure I answer it may be a mistake in the Idiom of the Tongue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is no more than 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be kept unspotted from the World Hithpael for Niphai as there is elsewhere Niphal for Hithpael Acts 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So Beza Or to keep himself unspotted from the World is to be understood so far forth as is in our power which in truth is very little Here therefore steps in the power of Christ that strong Arm of God for our Salvation the stay and trust of all Nations and the hope of the ends of the Earth For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Iesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh God sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us that walk not after the flesh but after the spirit Rom. 8. We walk though it be in the power of that Spirit of Life in Christ as our Body moves by vertue of our Natural Spirit But whether this act of purification or keeping our selves pure be so from God that it is not in any wise from us I leave to them to dispute that are more at leasure That it must be in us if there be any Religion in us is all that the Text affords me and 't is enough for the tryal of our Religion Pure Religion is to keep our selves unspotted from the World What to keep our selves