the strength of Sin is the Law 1 Cor. 15. 56. The Law does thunder out a Curse as well as a Rigid Obligation the one from Mount Ebal as well as the other from Mount Sinai upon every Soul of man who shall but fail in the least Iota For it is written saith St. Paul who only saith it out of the Law Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law to do them Or to consider it yet more distinctly admit Aeternal Life had been expected from the Law by this Inquirer yet sure it may sooner be ask't than answer'd To which of the Laws he should have had recourse for it Certainly not to the Ceremonial for That was but a shadow of things to come whereof the Body is Christ Coloss. 2. 17. The very Sacrifice of the Law was not able to expiate but only to commemorate the Peoples Sins Heb. 10. 3. Therefore in vain would he have sought to the Ceremonial Law And as vainly to the Iudicial For that was a Politick Constitution peculiar only to the Iews and reaching no farther than to a Civil Iurisdiction Much less yet could he seek to the Moral Law of Moses for Life Eternal For the Moral Law exacted so Universal an obedience and also denounced so great a Curse as I said before on the least omission that he could look for nothing thence but the justest matter of Despair For first our Nature is so corrupt and our Persons so much corrupter since our having found out many Inventions that if we say we have no sin we deceive our selves and the Truth is not in us 1 John 1. 8. And secondly if Righteousness come by the Law then is Christ dead in vain Gal. 2. 21. What then remain'd to this inquisitive Iew but that the Law should be his Schoolmaster to bring him unto Christ Gal. 3. 24. The Law being adapted by the infinite Wisdom of God's oeconomy either to lead or to drive him thither For requiring more from him than he was able to perform and yet denouncing a Curse on his Non-Performance it could not but make him stand affrighted at the ugly Condition he was in I mean his desperate Impossibility of ever attaining to Life Eternal by the meer perfection of his obedience Hence he saw it concern'd him to seek somewhere else He found it clear by Demonstration and by the woful Demonstration of sad Experience he stood in need of a Saviour and of such a Saviour too as might deliver him from the Curse and from the Rigour of the Law by being made both a Curse and a Ransom for him Again he saw both by the Doctrins and by the Miracles of Christ that He was most likely to be That Saviour to wit a Saviour from whom he was to look for such a Clue as might be able to conduct him out of the Labyrinth he was in And therefore just as this Saviour was gone forth into the way This kind of Neophyte in my Text came running to him and asked him meekly kneeling upon his Knees Good Master what shall I do that I may inherit Eternal Life Now if Christ was His Oracle who only liv'd under the Law How much more must he be ours who were born and bred under the Gospel Shall men of our Dignity and Profession of our Proficiency and Growth in the School of Christ an holy Generation a Royal Priesthood a Peculiar People shall such as We go in Inquest of Life Eternal to such deceivable Oracles as either Zuinglius or Calvin Piscator or Erastus or Iohn of Leyden to the Sepulchres of Martyrs to the Discipline of Monasteries to daily Ave Maries and Masses to Papal Indulgences or Bulls or to the outward Scarrifications and Buffettings of the Flesh shall we lean upon such Reeds as will but run through our Elbows or shall we inlighten our selves by Candles when behold the Sun of Righteousness is long since Risen in our Horizon or to fly for Refuge to the Saints when behold a Saviour Christ is called very fitly the Sun of Righteousness Mal. 4. 2. to whom the Apostles are but as Stars in the Firmament of the Gospel which only shine forth with a borrowed light and have no other brightness than what He lends them Now all the Stars in the Firmament cannot make up one Sun or afford us one Day without his Presence Just so All the learned and the good men on Earth All the Angels Saints in Heaven cannot make up one Saviour or but light us the way to Eternal Life without the Influence and Lustre of Jesus Christ. Iairus a Ruler of the Synagogue a man that wanted no worldly means whereby to Cure his only Daughter did yet despair of her Recovery until he fell down at the Feet of Christ Luke 8. 41. And so the Woman who had been sick of a bloody Flux no less than twelve years together and had spent all she had in Physicians Fees was not the better but the worse until she crowded towards Christ and touch't the Hemm of his Garment Luke 8. 43. That we are every one sick of a bloody Flux too appears by our scarlet and crimson Sins Which Flux and Fountain of our Sins can never possibly be cur'd unless by Him who is the Fountain for Sin and for Uncleanness Zach. 13. 1. For as Red wine is good for a bloody Flux in the Body so is That which gushed out of our Saviour's Body who called himself The True Vine the only Good thing for this Disease in the Soul And of this Wine we drink in the Cup of Blessing which we Bless in the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ. To him alone must we fly as to the Physician of our Souls who saith to us under the Gospel as once to Israel under the Law I am the Lord God that healeth thee Exod 15. 26. He alone saith St. Peter is the Head-stone of the Corner nor is there Salvation in any other Acts 4. 11 12. It pleased the Father that in him should all Fulness dwell Coloss. 1. 19 And of his Fulness have all we received Grace for Grace John 1. 16. All things necessary to life and to life Eternal are delivered to him of the Father Matth. 11. 27. And this 't will be easy out of Scripture for I am speaking to Believers I should not else produce a Text to make apparent by an Induction For first if we are hungry He alone is the Bread of Life which whoso eateth shall live for ever John 6. 58. Next if we are thirsty He alone is the living Water which whoso drinketh shall never thirst John 4. 13. Thirdly if we are foul He alone has that Blood by which we may be cleansed from all our Sins 1 John 1. 7. Fourthly if we are foolish He is the Wisdom of the Father who hath laid up in Him all the Treasures of Knowledge Coloss. 2. 3. He is Doctor Catholicus and only He.
fill it up with as good a Zographesis as I am able § 10. First then to strengthen our Resolutions of accustoming our selves to Law and Discipline And not to wear the Yoke of Christ just as the Ox wears his Master's meerly for fear of being goaded but from a principle of Love to the Yoke it self let us consider how those Commandments which do make up the Law or the Yoke of Christ do but exact the things of us which are agreeable to our Reason and therefore suitable to our Nature and therefore consonant to our Desires I mean our Rational Desires which we Injoy as we are Men though not our brutish ones which we suffer as we are Animals and which without any difference are common unto us with the Beasts that perish It should be natural for us as Men indued with Reason to Love the Beauty of our Lord and to fear his Power Because we naturally incline to the Means of Safety at least as far as we do know them or believe them to be such Now all that tends unto our Safety may be reduc't to two Heads Seeking God and Eschewing Evil. And Rational Nature does incline as well to the first as to the Second Nay as Things which are good and have a Tendency to our Safety are more or less excellent and useful to us so Nature whilst it is Rational must needs incline to That of the Higher more strongly than to That of the Lower Value And that which saves a man for ever being of much an higher value than that which saves him but for a Time 'T is plain that Nature being Rational does most incline towards the former And all the Commandments of our Lord having a Tendency unto That are by consequence agreeable to human Nature Especially when our Nature is also rectified by Grace which does not fail to work with any who do not fail to work with It And however insufficient to make us Sinless is yet abundantly sufficient to make us single and sincere Less than which in our Service our Master's Iustice cannot exact And the Equity of his Gospel exacts no more § 11. The Truth of which may be evinced from the Absurdity which would follow its being supposed to be False For the Moral Commands of Christ like the Moral commands of Moses must be acknowledged to be Holy Iust and Good Which yet I know not how they could be were they not adequate to the Faculties of Grace and Reason For what Goodness can there be in an Impossibility of doing the Good that is required or what holiness can there be in unavoidable transgressions for want of strength Or what Iustice can it be that any Rational Agent should be accomptable for the Things he could never help To command Impossibilities is not agreeable to Reason in Him who threatens an Endless Punishment for not performing what is commanded And therefore no such hard Yoke can be imposed by our Lord on the Neck of Any No such heavy and grievous Burden can be laid by a Saviour on any Shoulder For though 't is true that the Reprobates both men and Devils being left and forsaken and finally given over by the Iudge of all the world are under a sad Impossibility of doing Good yet it is as true too that they drew upon themselves such a deplorable Necessity of doing evil They were not created in That Condition For God created them upright and made them capable of Duty But they found out and follow'd their own Inventions whereby to lose the Capability which God had given them Eccles. 7. 29. If men are so wilful in using the Liberty of their Wills as to make an absolute Covenant with Death and with Hell to be at Agreement if they will Sin with both hands as one Prophet words it and draw Iniquity as with a Cart-rope as it is in Another No wonder if in the words of the Book of Wisdom they pull Destruction upon Themselves with the work of their hands And in These considerations All who are Lovers of Christ indeed and think ingenuously of him and are not grosly injurious to him nor have an evident pique at him must either say that he commands us in proportion to our Talents of Grace and Reason or will not punish us for the Not doing what is impossible to be done Thus as the Antinomian Error may be sufficiently confuted by Arguments leading ad Absurdum so the Truth of Christ's Doctrin is as sufficiently confirmed by the Absurdity which would follow its being supposed to be false § 12. Again if we are not out of our Wits nor have cast off the Gentleness and Humanity of our Nature we are not able to give an Instance in any one of Christ's Commands which is truly grievous we cannot pitch on That precept which is not agreeable to our Nature For what other is the Sum of all his Commandments put together than that we do to all others as we would that all others should do to us And what is That but the Law of Nature not only written by Severus a meerly Heathen Emperour in all his Plates and publick works But by the invisible finger of God in the natural Heart and Conscience of man as man till Tract of Time and Evil Custom in some depraved persons have raz'd it out Let us keep but This precept and break the rest if we are able For what does our Lord require of us in any one or more parts of his Royal Law which is not easily reducible to this one Head Deal we as righteously with men as by men we would be dealt with And let us do the Will of God with as much singleness and Zeal as we desire that God himself will be pleas'd to do ours And then we have at once fulfill'd the Law of Nature and of Christ too § 13. Now if the Yoke of Christ's Precepts is thus easy in it self how smooth and easy is it to Them who have inur'd themselves to it by their Obedience an Argument taken from Experience will be as cogent as any can be David found after a great and a long Experience that the Commandments of God were sweeter to him than the Hony and Hony-comb Psal. 19. 10. where the word Hony being us'd by a kind of a Proverb among the Hebrews for all imaginable objects of Sensual Pleasure 't is plain the meaning of the Prophet must needs be This that the Pleasure arising to him from the Rectitude of his Actions and an uniform obedience to Gods Commands was as much greater than any pleasure which he had ever yet injoy'd in the Breaches of them as the Pleasure which smites the Soul is greater than That which affects the Body Betwixt which two there is so signal and wide a Difference that by an obvious Antimetabole the Pleasure of the Soul is the Soul of Pleasure to which the pleasure of the Body is in comparison nothing more than a
assent unto the Creed do still confute their own Belief of the two last Articles The Resurrection of the Body and the Life Everlasting For is it possible that a man should very seriously believe he shall last for ever and not be vehemently solicitous whether in Heaven or in Hell or that he really should believe there is a Heaven and a Hell without a minutely concernment to which of the two he must needs belong If a man's Neck be but obnoxious to the Gallows or the Block or his Goods but in danger of Confiscation sleep it self will not be strong enough to give him rest until he has us'd his whole strength to purchase a Pardon or a Reprieve And did he as really believe that he shall rise after Death to a Day of Iudgment when evil Doers shall be cast into a Bottomless Asphaltites a Lake which evermore is burning with Fire and Brimstone ô with what Horror and Indignation would he look back upon his Sins with what Remorse and Self-Revenge would he afflict himself for them in Soul and Body with what a vehement desire would he demonstrate his Repentance by Change of Life ô with what Carefulness and Concernment would he endeavour to make his Peace with abused Iustice with what strong crying and Tears would he sue for Mercy Not in the language of St. Peter when transported out of his wits by his great Amazement Depart from me ô Lord for I am a sinful man But rather with Christ upon the Cross where he recited in Syriac those words of David My God my God why hast thou forsaken me How much rather would he choose to do it now to some purpose and that but once than at last to no purpose and that for ever Say then good Reader and say without Partiality Can a man in good earnest believe his own Immortality whilst he so seldom or never mindes the future condition of his Soul and is not solicitous what to do that he may be sav'd There can be nothing more incredible than that a man of such a Faith should be so destitute of Fear For what accompt can be given why a man should shrink at Death a great deal more than at Damnation and more provide against the pains of a dying Life than the Torments of a Death which will live for ever that is more against the first than the second Death but that he steadily believes the first may easily come to pass whilst he hopes that the second is but a Fable They who hitherto have thought they were True Believers whilst yet their Infidel Lives have strongly prov'd that they were none will confess what I say if they ever shall have Patience enough to meditate and shall meditate long enough to comprehend the whole force of my present reason Now in order to my purpose which is to rouze up some or other out of the Lethargie they are in and to set them on work in this Grand Inquiry I shall reason a little farther with the Paganish Professors of Christianity And first of all let it be granted what ought not yet to be suppos'd That what they have not in Themselves an active Power to demonstrate cannot have a passive Power of being demonstrated by others that so they may not be offended at the uncivil possibility of other mens being deeper or quicker sighted than Themselves For some are so strongly of opinion that their particular Comprehension is the Adaequate measure of all Existence that they are apter to deny and to disbelieve that there is any thing in the World beyond the Horizon of their Conceipt than to suspect or confess that their Souls are short-sighted Not vouchsafing to consider how great a number of Things there are about the Body of a Flea which are invisible to their Eyes whilst unassisted and yet are evident unto any who shall behold them through a Microscope And if to the natural Eye of Reason we add the Telescope of Faith which is the Evidence of Things not seen we shall have an easy Prospect of that Salvation which the Iailour of Philippi enquired after And discern the true reason why the Sciolists of the Age who are call'd the Wits do first contend there are no Spirits and thence infer there is no Hell and so conclude they need not ask what it is they must do that they may be saved even because they have too much and too little wit For if they had less they would not raise their Objections and if they had more they would be able to refute them But be it so that they themselves are not able to demonstrate there is a Hell to be saved from Dare they say they are better able to demonstrate that there is none Can they say that they have dyed to make a Decision of the Question And been restored again to life to declare the Negative by Experience Do they suspect the Galilaean whom we commonly call Iesus in what he saith of an outer Darkness and therein of a Worm which never dyes and of a Fire which is not quenched And do they so far suspect him that they resolve to make an Essay of his Veracity and therefore trust not his Doctrin till they have try'd it will they admit of no Philosophy but what they call Experimental and therefore stay till they are dead for a Determination of their Doubt because forsooth until the time that they have tasted the first Death they know not if they can feel a second I say admit they do not know that there are Torments after Death to indure for ever Should not this suffice to Awe them that such there are for ought they know Or are their Souls so wholly drown'd and swallow'd up in Sensualities as that they have not any leisure wherein to consider their latter End Have they not Melancholy enough in their Constitutions to fix their volatil spirits no not so much as for an hour upon that which concerns them the most that may be even the Subject of a joyful or sad Eternity Or have they the leisure to consider their latter end but only want sufficient Courage and Resolution to indure it as being a pungent and a dismal and not only a sad but an insupportable Consideration This methinks is as absurd as whatsoever it is that hath been alledg'd For if they have not the patience to think or meditate upon Hell for a little season How much less will they be able to undergo it with Patience to all Eternity If the wages of Sin is such whilst it is yet but in the earning Lord how terrible will it be at the Time of Payment And what a strange Contradiction does this imply in some mens humours That they should dare incur the danger of induring those Torments of Hell it self whereof they dare not indure so much as a deep consideration no not long enough to inquire what they must do to be saved from them But all this is no more than an
He is the End of the Law to every one that believeth Besides need we care to be Better or better advised than St. Paul That great Apostle of the Gentiles and pretious Vessel of Election Do we not find him confessing and that in the time of his Apostleship That He was carnal and sold under sin That the Good he would he did not But the evil which he would not That he did whereby he sinn'd against God and his Conscience too That no good Thing did inhabit in him and that he was brought into Captivity to the Law of Sin which was in his Members Well therefore did he desire in his Epistle to the Philippians to be found only in Christ not having his own righteousness which is of the Law but That which is through the Faith of Christ The righteousness which is of God by Faith Why then should we be going such a long way about whilst behold in the Scriptures so much a neerer way home what need we shut up our selves from a thousand Pleasures and Contentments by our endeavour of living up to the Moral Law by a Contempt of this World by mortifications of the Flesh by daily contendings against the Devil by bearing both the Yoke and the Cross of Christ by frequent watchings and fastings and other Denials of our selves by making Prayers and hearing Sermons and by a world of good works which are commonly very chargeable or at least troublesom in the performance I say what need of all This whilst Salvation may be had upon easier Terms We cannot certainly be wiser nor need we probably be warier than Paul and Silas in the Text. Who being ask'd as Ghostly Fathers and that by a newly-converted Heathen what he was to do that he might be sav'd gave him no other Answer of Direction or Advice than That He must believe in the Lord Iesus Christ. § 3. Which in the sense of the Solifidians Antinomians and Fiduciaries for whom I have hitherto been objecting if not as well as they can wish at least as strongly as I am able is just as if they had answer'd Thus. Jailour be of good Comfort For we were lately in as much jeopardy as Thou canst possibly be in And though thy Danger is great thy Escape is easy For do not think that Christianity is such a Difficult Religion as some would make it It is rather the easiest and most indulgent as well as the safest in all the World It hath indeed many Praecepts but by vertue of One alone which we shall presently tell thee of all the rest will be wav'd or dispensed with So that although it is a Law 't is a Law of Liberty A Law of Liberty from the Rigors and Austerities of the Law A special part of Christ's Purchase and the great Priviledge of a Christian. Nor is it only his Priviledge but Duty too He being commanded and so oblig'd not only suffer'd or allow'd to stand fast in that Liberty wherewith Christ hath made him free What Sins soever thou hast committed which cannot be expiated for amongst Iews or Gentiles by thy Conversion unto Christ will be blotted out Be it so that thou hast liv'd in perfect Enmity to God yet to Us hath He committed the word of Reconciliation We are Embassadours for Christ in whom alone we preach pardon and forgiveness of Sins not an absolute necessity of moral obedience and good works which assist not our Faith but declare it only He hath satisfied by his Death for all the Debt we ow'd to it and is the Propitiation for all our Sins He is our Wisdom and our Redemption and all besides that which we are able to want or pray for Nor stand we in need of an Inhaerent as being safe by a transferr'd and imputed Righteousness For as Abraham believed and 't was imputed to him for Righteousness Rom. 4. 22. So also to Us shall it be imputed if we Believe on him that raised up Iesus from the dead v. 24. We have been scourg'd on his Back and born a Cross on his Shoulders we have been cleans'd by His blood and still are heal'd by His stripes we are beheld in His Face and shall be judg'd in His Person Just we are by His Righteousness and for ever repriev'd by His Condemnation It is for Christians to distinguish betwixt external and internal Grace and so betwixt an outward and inward Holiness For our Holiness without us that is in Christ does supersede the necessity of one within us And is extremely more effectual to the saving of the Soul than any Holiness within us could ever possibly have been We shall not therefore need to load thee with heavy Burdens which neither we nor our Fathers have been able to bear Nor shall we trouble thee at once about many Things For though thy Quaestion is very Copious and of ineffable Importance as to the End inquired after Thy being sav'd yet 't is so easy to be resolv'd as to the means of its Attainment that all The Answer we shall give thee is only This 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Believe in the Lord Iesus Christ and thou shalt be saved § 4. And now it would be high time to divide the Text after such a pleasant and easy Paraphrase as the wit of Flesh and Blood is too too apt to make of it especially when assisted by learned Patrons but that I think the way to it is not sufficiently praepar'd For should so weighty a Quaestion be so very lightly answer'd as with a bare 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Believe and be sav'd This is short work indeed and such as would make Paul and Silas to be the comfortablest Preachers in all the World I mean the pleasantest and the most popular I say not the faithful'st and most sincere For if This Answer is sound and Orthodox That nothing more needs be done towards any man's being sav'd than to believe in the Lord Iesus Christ Why then saith our Saviour Narrow is the way and strait is the Gate that enters into Life And few there be that go in thereat or to what purpose are we commanded That we strive to enter in and also told at the same time That many shall seek who shall not enter Or why does St. Paul in other places press so earnestly for Obedience to the Commandments of Christ which are at least comprehensive of the whole Moral Law or why do we read in the New Testament That every man is to work out his own Salvation to fight and to labour and to use all diligence for the making of his Calling and Election sure Are These things necessary for others but not for the Iailour of Philippi was He alone to be sav'd at so cheap a Rate as a single Belief on the Lord Iesus Christ or was he not one of those Philippians of whom St. Paul required more Or did he require at other men a great deal more than there was need Or does He now joyn
Fortunes are our Conversation will be above 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. we shall behave our selves as men who are free of God's City Our Hearts will evermore be There unless our Treasure is somewhere else If the Kingdom of Heaven is that Pearl of great Price to which our Lord in his Parable thought fit to liken it And if we are those Merchants that traffick for it we cannot choose but be busy in our Inquiries after the Price still resolving upon the Purchase at any Rate that can be ask't and ever asking what we shall give or as here what we shall do that we may any ways inherit Eternal Life So it follows again on the other side That if we are commonly looking downwards and behave our selves here as men at home as if we did not intend any farther Iourney If the Burden of our Inquiries is such as This What shall we do to live long upon the Earth and not see the Grave or what shall we do to escape going to Heaven 'till such time as we are pass't the pleasant Injoyments of the Earth how shall we put the evil Day afar off how shall we be saved without Repentance or repent without Amendment or amend no more than will serve our turn what shall we do to be good enough and yet no better than needs we must what shall we do to serve two Masters and reconcile the two Kingdoms of God and Mammon and so confute what is said by our blessed Saviour in the Sixteenth of St. Luke what for a Religion wherein to live with most pleasure and one to dye in with greatest safety what shall we do to live the Life of the sensual'st Epicure and yet at last dye the Death of the strictest Saint If I say our Affections are clinging thus unto the Earth It is an absolute Demonstration that all our Treasure is here below and that we are men of the present world in whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds For our Saviour's famous Rule is at once of universal and endless Truth Wheresoever the Carkass is there the Eagles will be gathered together wheresoever our Treasure is there our Hearts will be also And whither our Hearts are gone before the Case is evident and clear our Tongues and our Actions will follow after § 7. Now since these are the Inquiries of several Seekers to wit of Them who do affect to dwell here and of them that look out for a better Country that is an heavenly And since we may judge by their Inquiries to which kind of Master they do belong to God or Mammon 'T is plain the Lesson or the Use we are to take from it is This that when we find our selves beset with a twofold evil the one of Sin and the other of Affliction in so much as we know not which way to turn there being on the right hand a fear of Beggery or Disgrace and on the left hand a fear of Hell when I say we are reduced to such an hard pinch of our Affairs we must not carnally cast about and tacitly say within our selves what shall we do to keep our Livelyhoods or what shall we do to hold fast our Lives But what shall we do to keep a good Conscience and to hold fast our Integrity And since 't is nobler to be led by the hope of a Reward than to be frighted into our Duties by the fear of being punish't if we neglect them let us not ask like the Children of Hagar in the spirit of Bondage which is unto fear what shall we do that we may not inherit a Death Aeternal But as the Children of Sarah in the spirit of Adoption which is unto hope what shall we do that we may inherit Aeternal Life Which Life being hid with Christ in God as St. Paul speaks to the Colossians for God's sake whither should we go either to seek it when it is absent or to find it when it is hid or to secure it when it is found unless to Him who hath the words of Eternal Life that is the words which are the means by which alone we may attain to Eternal Life The words which teach us how to know it the words which tell us where to seek it the words which shew us how to find it the words which afford us those Rules and Precepts by our conformity unto which we cannot but take it into possession There is no other Name to make us Inheritors of Eternity but only the Name of our Lord Iesus Christ Acts 4. 12. And considering what is said by our blessed Saviour That This and this only is Life Eternal to know the only true God with a practical knowledge and Iesus Christ whom he hath sent John 17. 2. we should religiously resolve not to know any thing else Not I mean in comparison of Iesus Christ and him crucified nor yet to any other end than to serve and assist us in that one knowledge Look what carking and caring any Covetous man useth to get his wealth look what industry and labour an Ambitious man useth to get his Honour look what vigilance and solicitude any Amorous man useth to get his Idol the same solicitude and diligence is each Religious man to use for the getting of an Interest in Iesus Christ. Which gives me a passage from the second to the third Observable I proposed from the Nature and Quality of the young man's Inquiry to the condition of the Oracle inquired of As he sought for nothing less than Eternal Life so did he seek it from Him alone who is the way to that Life and the Life it self He did not go to take Advice from the Witch of Endor for the madness of Saul had made him wiser or more at least in his wits than to knock at Hell-door for the way to Heaven Nor did he ask of Apollo Pythius or go to Iupiter Ammon to be inform'd about the way to Eternal Life for all the Oracles of the Heathen were put to silence by our Messias as Plutarch and others of their own great Writers have well observ'd and should they speak never so loudly he very well knew they could not teach him Nor did he go to Aaron's Ephod to ask the Urim and Thummim about the means of his Salvation for he knew that That Oracle was now grown Dimm and that in case it had been legible it could not help him Nor did he betake himself to Moses the Iewish Law-giver much less to the Scribes the learned Interpreters of the Law for he found Mysterious Moses had still a Veil upon his Face which the Scribes and Pharisees were not able to Remove much less durst he go to the Law it self for a Relief there being nothing more plain than that the Law worketh wrath Those Tables of Stone are as the Hones or the Grindstones at which the Sting of Death is whetted and made more sharp For as the sting of Death is Sin so
we are glued in our Affections to the things here below we think the World to be a Great and a Glorious thing so the higher we fly above it the more contemptibly Little 't is natural for it to appear And therefore § 17. Secondly let us consider That as the way whereby to escape the glorious Dangers of which I speak is to sequester our Affections from the Things of this World and to take wing towards a Better so that our Flight may be the higher we are to take some ready Course whereby to make our selves light For however it is natural for Birds to fly yet the most they can do is but to flutter if they are laden with thick Clay a Phrase by which the Prophet Habakkuk describeth Mony and denounceth a Woe to them that load themselves with it The reason of which is very obvious For notwithstanding it is natural for the spirit of man to fly upwards yet what in one Case is natural may be impossible in an other A man may fly just as soon with a weight of Lead at his Feet as with a Burden of Silver upon his Back The lightest Birds commonly do fly the highest And considering 't is a Duty for a man so to buy as if he were never to possess To deny his dear self and to take up Christ's Cross and to follow Him it seems to follow thereupon that He who hath least of this World and the least to do in it is probably the fittest for That great Duty Though 't was not meerly for being poor that Lazarus was carried to Abraham's Bosom yet 't was That that his Poverty dispos'd him for And St. Peter said fitly touching Himself and his Condisciples Lo we have left All and followed Thee Because they could not follow Christ and carry all they had with them For every Follower of Christ has a very narrow way wherein to walk and a very strait Gate whereat to enter So that the Body of a Christian is Load enough unto the Soul and therefore many more Impediments may well be spar'd Our Bodies saith St. Paul are but Earthen Vessels but Dust and Ashes saith Abraham Gen. 20. 27. And sure the way to keep our selves unspotted from the World is not to bury our selves alive even by adding Earth to Earth Ashes to Ashes Dust to Dust. That being the way of our being buried not in sure and certain Hope but in sure and certain Fear of a Resurrection For when the Minions of this World who are dead whilst they live shall by the just Judgment of God live again when they are dead too and shall be summon'd out of their Graves as Malefactors out of a Dungeon they will say to the Mountains fall on us and to the Hills cover us that is they will desire to be once more buried Now to prevent so sad a Rising we are to Rise whilst we are here from the Death I mean of Sin and from the Grave of Carnality And that we may rise the more nimbly we must be Levis Armaturae must not lay upon our selves too great a load of thick Clay which commonly brings with it another load whether it be of worldly Cares or of Carnal Pleasures Whatsoever most Christians may think of This 't was sadly consider'd by many Heathens of which I shall but instance in four or five Diogenes was a poor but yet a very great Man because his Poverty was his choice and he was one who did not want but contemn the Gayeties of the World How did he fly above the Vices and Follies of it by stripping himself of its Impediments and by imping the wings of his brave Ambition 'T was his Ambition to be at Liberty not to give Hostages to Fortune to live a life disingaged from things below him He found that one Tub was enough to lye in and one wooden Dish enough to drink in and was resolved that his Housholdstuff should hold proportion with his House Yea even That he thought too much for its being somewhat more than was strictly needful And therefore he brake his wooden Dish upon his first consideration That the Hollow of his Hand had made it needless Now I the rather choose to instance in this remarkable Philosopher because I know him very much censur'd and think him as little understood For that which is taken by a Proverb to be the Cynicalness and sowrness was thought by diverse ancient Authors the lovely Nobleness of his Temper His choice of Poverty was the result of his very deep Knowledge and Contemplation Nature and Industry had both conspir'd to his Perfections of which it was not the least that he knew the whole World and always had it under his Feet too as having weigh'd it in a Ballance and found its lightness He had been sued to and courted by the Great Potentates of the Earth whose Prosperities stoop't down to receive the Honour of his Acceptance But what Solomon out of his Wisdom both infused and acquired acquir'd both by joious and sad experience the same Diogenes concluded I shall not dare to say how That All is vanity under the Sun Now we all know that Vanity is of extremely little weight if put in the Ballance of Diseretion and in the Ballance of the Sanctuary of none at all Nay the Psalmist concludes that Man himself is but Vanity who yet is very much the noblest of any Creature under the Sun And sure if every man is Vanity and the greater he is the greater Vanity and not only Vanity but Vexation of Spirit how could Godfrey Duke of Bulloin have done more prudently for himself than in refusing to accept a Crown of Gold where Christ Himself wore one of Thorns or why should any of Christ's Followers buy the Friendship of a Prince when Xenocrates an Heathen would not deign to sell His no not to Alexander Himself who would fain have bought it Why should a Christian affect Dominion when Atilius an Heathen made choice to leave it why should one of Christ's Disciples court and covet That Plenty which was despis'd by Fabricius an arrant Heathen Why should a Christian set his Heart upon the getting and leaving a vast Revenue to his Posterity when the Heathen man Socrates thought it a Charity to his Children to leave them none Not that he thought it a Breach of Charity to make Provision for his Family but that he durst not betray them to great Temptations As He himself had refused half the Kingdom of Samos when offer'd to him so was he willing that his Children should inherit his Temper and Frame of Mind He knew the Providence of God was the surest Patrimony And had been taught by his experience that Friends well got were the next great Treasure 'T was his Duty as a Father to leave his Children very well and by consequence in a condition not the richest but the most suitable and safest for them and therefore