woman that is forced though she cries out and strives and an alluring Adulteress Again the thoughts of the godly are godly of the wicked worldly and by these good and evil men are best and truliest differenced one from another Would we know our own hearts and whether they be changed by a new birth examine we our thoughts words actions passions especially our thoughts will inform us for these cannot be subject to hypocrisie as words and deeds are Sect. XXXIX Then by way of caution know that a child may as soon create it self as a man in he state of Nature regenerate himself We cannot act in the least unlesse God bestowes upon us daily privative grace to defend us from evil and daily positive grace inabling us to do good And those that are of Christs teaching know both from the word and by experience that of themselvs they are not onely weak but even dead to what is good moving no more then they are moved that their best works are faulty all their sins deadly all their natures corrupted originally You hath he quickned that were dead in trespassâ—s and sins Ephes. 2. 1. Yea we are altogether so dead in sin that we cannot stir the least joint no not so much as feel our own deadness nor desire life except God be pleased to raise and restore our souls from the death of sin and grave of long custom to the life of grace Apt we are to all evil but reprobate and indisposed to all grace and goodness yea to all the means thereof My powers are all corrupt corrupt my will Marble to good but wax to what is ill Insomuch that we are not sufficient of our selves to think much lesse to speak least of all to do that which is good 2 Cor. 3. 5. Joh. 15. 4 5. If we have power to choose or refuse the object to do these well we have no power We have abilitie we have will enough to undo our selvs scope enough hell-ward but neither motion nor will to do good that must be put into us by him that gives both power and will and power to will Finally each sanctified heart feels this but no words are able sufficiently to expresse what impotent wretches we are when we are not sustained So that we have no merit but the mercy of God to save us nothing but the blood of Christ and his mediation to cleanse and redeem us nothing but his obedience to enrich us As for our good works we are altogether beholding to God for them not God to us nor we to our selvs because they are onely his works in us Whatsoever thou art thou owest to him that made thee what ever thou hast thou owest to him that Redeemed thee Therefore if wee do any thing amiss let us accuse our selvs if any thing well let us give all the praise to God And indeed this is the test of a true or false Religion that which teacheth us to exalt God most and most to depresse our selves is the true that which doth most prank up our selvs and detract from God is the false As Bonaventure well notes Sect. XL Now to winde up with a word of exhortation if thou beest convinced and resolvest upon a new course let thy resolution be peremptory and constant and take heed you harden not again as Pharaoh the Philistins the young man in the Gospel Pilate and Judas did resemble not the iron which is no longer soft then it is in the fire for that good saith Gregory will do us no good which is not made good by persevarance If with these premonitions the Spirit hath vouchsaâ—ed to stir up in thine heart any good motions and holy purposes to obey God in letting thy sins go quench not grieve not the Spirit 1 Thes. 5. 19. Return not with the Dog to thy vomit least thy latter end prove seven-fold worse then thy beginning Matth. 12. 43 45. O it is a fearful thing to receive the grace of God in vain and a desperate thing being warned of a rock wilfully to cast our selves upon it Neither let Satan perswade you to defer your repentance no not an hour least your resolution proves as a false conception which never comes to bearing Besides death may be sudden even the least of a thousand things can kill you and give you no leisure to be sick Thirdly if thou wilt be safe from evil works avoid the occasions have no fellowship with the workers of iniquity neither fear their scoff for this be sure of if your person and waies please God the world will be displeased with both If God be your friend men will be your enemies if they exercise their malice it is where he shews mercy But take heed of losing God's favour to keep theirs Bâ—da tells of a great man that was admonished by his friends in his sicknesse to repent who answered He would not yet for that if he should recover his friends and companions would laugh at him but growing sicker and sicker they again prest him but then his answer was that it was now too late for I am judged and condemned already A man cannot be a Nathanaël in whose heart there is no guile but the world couâ—ts him a fool But Christ saies Verily except ye be converted and become as little children ye shall not enâ—er into the Kingdome of Heaven Mat. 18. 3. Again Satan and your deceitfull heart will suggest unto you that a Religious life is a dumpish and mellancholly life but holy David will tell you that light is sown to the righteous and joy to the upright Psal. 97. 11. Isa. 65. 14. And experience tells that earthly and bodily joyes are but the body or rather the dregs of that joy which Gods people feel and are ravished with As O the calm and quietness of a good conscience the assuraâ—ce of the pardon of sin and joy of the Holy Ghost the honesty of a virtuous and holy life how sweet they are Yea even Plato an Heathen could say that if wisdome and virtue could but represent it self to the eies it would set the heart on fire with the love of it And the like of a sinners sadness as hear what Seneca sayes if there were no God to punish him no Divell to torment him no Hell to burn him no man to see him yet would hee not sin for the ugliness and filthiness of sin and the guilt and sadness of his conscience But experience is the best informer wherefore take the councell of holy David Psalm 34. 8. O tast and seek that the Lord is good blessed is the man that trusteth in him To which accordeth that of holy Bernard Good art thou O Lord to the soul that seeks thee what art thou then to the soul that finds thee As I may apeal to any mans conscience that hath been softned with the unction of grace and truly tasted of the powers of the world to come to him that hath the love of God shed abroad in his
secure then the worst of sinners they can strut it under an unsupportable Mass â—f oaths blasphemies thefts murthers adulteries drunkness and other the like sins yea can easily swallow these spiders with Mithridates and digest them too when one that is regenerate shrinkes under the burden of wandring thoughts and want of proficiency But why is it they are dead in sin Ephes. 2. 1. Revel. 3. 1. Now lay a mountain vpon a dead-man he feels not once the weight To a Christian that hath the life of grace the least sin lyes heavy upon the conscience but to him that is dead let his sins be as heavy as a mountain of lâ—â—d hee feels in them no weight at all Again they are insensible of their fin and danger because ignorant for for what the eye seeth not the hear trueth not Security makes wordlings merry and therefore are they secure because they are ignorant A dunce wee know seldome makes doubts yea a fool sayes Solomon boasteth and is confident Prov. 14. 16. neither do blind-men ever blush And the truth is were it not for pride and ignorance a world of men would be ashamed to have their faces seen abroad For take away from mens minds vain opinions flattering hopes false valuations imaginatious and the like you will leav the minds of most men and women but poor shâ—unken things full of melancholly indisposition and unpleasing to themselves Ignorance is a vail or curtain to hide away their sins whereupon they are never troubled in conscience nor macerated with cares about eternity but think that all will be welâ— The divâ—l and the flesh prophesy prosperity to sin yea life and salvation as the Pope promised the powder-traitors but death and damnation which Gods spirit threaâ—eâ—s will prove the crop they will reap For God is true the divell and all flesh are lyers When wee become regenerate and forsake sin then the divell strongly and strangely assaults us as he did Christ when he was newly baptized and Pharoh the Children of Israel when they would forsake Egypt and Herod the Children when Christ was come to deliver his people Whence commonly it coms to pass that those think best of themselves that have least cause yea the true Christian is as fearfull to entertain a good opinion of himself as the false is unwilling to he driven from it They that have store of grace mourn for the want of it and they that indeed want it chant their abundance None so apt to doubt their adoption as they that may be assured of it nor none more usually fear then they that have the greatest cause to hope Wee feel corruption not by corruption but by grace and therefore the more wee feel our inward corruptions the more grace we have Contraries the neerer they are to one another the sharper is the conflict betwixt them now of all enemies the spirit and the flesh are neerest one to another being both in the soul of a regenerate man and in all faculties of the soul and in every action that springeth from those faculties The more grace the more spirituall life and the more spirituall life the more antipathy to the contrary whence none are so sensible of corruption as those that have the most living souls Sect. XXXVI Now for remedy of the contrary there cannot be a better lesson for carnall men to learn then this All the promises of God are conditionall to take place if wee repent as all the threatnings of God are conditionall to take place if wee repent not But wicked men as they believ without repenting their faith being meer presumption so they repent without believing their repentance being indeed desperation and this observe wee are cast down in the disappointing of our hopes in the same measure as we were too much listed up in expectation of good from them Whence these perremptory presumers if ever they repent it is commonly as Francis Spira an Advocate of Padua did and never did any man plead so well for himself as he did against himself One star is much bigger then the Earth yet it seems many degrees less It is the nature of fear to make dangers greater helps lesse then they are Christ hath promised peace and rest unto their souls that labour and are heavy laden and to those that walk according to rule Matth. 11. 29. Gal. 6. 16. even peace celestiall in the state of grace and peace eternall in the state of glory Such therefore as never were distressed in conscience or live loosly never had true peace Peace is the Daughter of righteousnesse Rom. 5. 1. Being justifyed by faith we have peace with God But hee who makes a bridg of his own shaddow will be sure to fall into the water Those blocks that never in their life were moved with Gods threatnings never in any straight of conscience never groaned under the burthen of Gods anger they have not so much as entred into the porch of this house or lift a foot over the threshold of this School of repentance Oh! that wee could but so much fear the eternall pains as wee do the temporary and bee but so carefull to save our souls from torment as our bodies In the mean time the case of these men is so much the worse by how much there fear is the lesse It faring with the soul as with the body Those diseases which do take away all sence of pain are of all others most desperate As the dead palsey the falling sickness the sleepy lethargie c. And the patient is most dangerously sick when he hath no feeling thereof In like manner whilst they suppose themselves to be free from judgment they are already smitten with the heaviest of Gods judgments a heart that cannot repent Rom. 2. 5. In a lethargie it is needfull the patient should be cast into a burning Fever because the sences are benummed and this will waken them and dry up the besotting humors So in our dead securety before our conversion God is fain to let the Law Sin Conscience and Satan loose upon us and to kindle the very fire of Hell in our souls that so we might be rowsed out of our security but thousands of these blocks both live and depart with as great hopes as men go to a lottery even dreaming of Heaven untill they awakein Hell For they too often die without any remors of conscience like blocks or as an Oxe dyes in a ditch Yea thousands that live like Laban dye like Nabal which is but the same word inverted whilest others the dear Children of God dye in distresse of conscience For it is not every good mans hap to dye like Antonius Pius whose death was after the fassion and semblance of a kindly and pleasant sleep However Saint Austins rule will be sure to hold He cannot dye ill that hath lived well and for the most part He that lives conscionably dyes comfortably and departeth rich And so you see how it fares with the wickedest and
worst of men Wherefore if you are truly sensible of your wretchedness it is a good sign that you are in some forwardness to be recovered and really to become so good as formerly you but dream'd or imagined your self to bee And indeed the very first step to grace is to feel the want of grace and the next way to receive mercy is to see your self miserable Therefore our constant and most diligent search should be to find out the naughtiness of our own hearts and to get strenght from God against our prevailing corruptions Sect. XXXVII Loose Libertine But is there any hope for one so wicked as I who have turned the grace of God into wantonesse applying Christs passion as a warrant for my licenciousness not as a remedy and taking his death as a licence to sin his â—ross as a Letters pattent to do mischief As if a man should head his dâ—um of rebellion with his pardon For I have most spiâ—efuâ—ly and maliciously taken up arms against my Maker and fought against my Redeemer all my daies Convert Do but unfainedly repent you of your sins and forsake your former evill wayes and lay held upon Christ by a trueâ— and lively â—aith my soul for yours God iâ— very â—eady to forgive them bee they neveâ— so many and innumerable for multitude never so haâ—nous for qualitie magâ—itude Yea I can shew you your pardon from the great King of Heaven for al that is past the which you may read at large Isai. 55 7. Ezek. 18. 21. to 29. and 33. 11. Jo l. 2. 12 13 14. Yea read 1 Cor. 6. 10 11. together with the story of Manâ—sses Mary Mâ—gdelen the Thief and the prodigall Son you shal see presidents thereof Yea the very murtherers of the Son of God upon their serious and unfained repentance and stedfast believing in him received pardon and salvation And indeed dispaiâ— is a sin which never knâ—w Jesus True every sin deserves damnation but no sin shall condemn but the â—â—ing and contiâ—uing in it True Repentance is ever blest with forgiveness And know this that Gods mercy is greater then thy sin what ever it bee you cannot be so infiâ—ite in sinning as he is infinite in pardoning if you repent yea sins upon repentance are so remitted as if they had never been committed I will put away thy transgressions as a cloud and thy sins as a mâ—â—t Isay. 44. 22. And what by corruption hath been done by repentance is undone As the former examples witness Come and let us reason togâ—ther saith the Lord though your sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow Isai 1. 18. Yea whiter then snow For the Prophet David laying open his blood guilâ—inâ—ss and his Originall impurity useth these words Puâ—geme with Hysop and I shall be clean wash me and I shall be whiter then snow Psal. 51. 7. And in reason did Christ come to call sinners to repentance and shall he not shew mercy to the penitent O who would not cast his burthen upon him that desires to give ease As I live saith the Lord I would not the death of a sinner Ezek. 18. 32. and 33. 11. Onely apply not this sâ—lve before the ulcer be searcbed to the bottom Lay not hold upon mercy untill you be throughly humbled The onely way to become good is first to believe that you are evill and by accusing our selvs wee prevent Satan By judging our selvs wee prevent God Are wee as sick of sorrow as wee are of sin then may wee hopefully go to the Physitian of our souls who came into the world onely to cure the sick and to give light to them onely who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death God does not power the oyl of grace but into a broken and contrite heart Wouldest thou get out of the miserable estate of nature into the blessed estate if grace and of Satan's bondslave become the childe of God and a member of Christ Wouldest thou truly kâ—ow thine own heart and he very sensible how evil and wicked it is that so thou maist have a more humble conceit of thy self lay to heart these three particulars 1. The corruption of our nature by reason of Original Sin 2 Our manifold breach of God's righteous Law by actual sin 3. The guilt and punishment due to us for them both This being done thou wilt see and find thy necessity of a Redeemer And it is thirst onely that makes us relish our drink hunger our meat The full stomach of a Pharisee surcharged with the superfluities of his own merits will loath the hony-comb of Christ's righteousness This was it which made the young Prodigâ—l to relish even servants fare though before wanton when full fed at home No more rellish feels the Pharisaicall heart in Christs blood then in a chip But O how acceptable is the fountain of living waters to the chased hart panting braying The blood of Christ to the wearie and tyred soul to the thirsty conscience scorched with the sence of Gods wrath hee that presents him with it how welcome is hee even as a speciall choise man one of a thousand And the deeper the sence of misery is the sweeter the sence of mercy is Sect. XXXVIII Then if you would be satisfied for time to come whether your Repentance and conversion be true and sound these particulars will infallibly informe you If you shall persevere when this trouble for sin is over in doing that which now you purpose it is an infallible sign your repentance is found otherwise not If thou dost call to minde the Vow which thou madest in baptisme and dost thy indeavour to perform that which then thou didst promise If thou dost square thy life according to the rule of Gods word and not after the rudements of the world If thou art willing to forsake all sin without reserving one for otherwise that one sin may prove the bane of all thy graces even as Gidion had Seventy sons and but one Bastard and yet that bastard destroyed all the rest that were Legitimate Judg. 9. 5. Sin is like the Ivie in the wall cut off bow branch body stump yet some strings or other will sprout out again Till the root be pluck't up or the wall be pulled down and ruined it will never utterly die Regeneration or new birth is a creation of new qualities in the soul as being by nature onely evil disposed God's children are known by this mark they walk not after the flesh but after the spirit Rom. 8. 1. If Christ have called you to his service your life will appear more spirituall and excellent then others As for your fails 't is a sign that sin hath not gained your consent but committed a rape upon your soul when you crie out to God If the ravished Virgin under the Law cried out she was pronounced guiltlesse A sheep may fall into the mire but a swine delights to wallow in the mire Great difference between a