in approaching to God yet he has no pleasure in God he comes not to him as his exceeding Joy though may be he cannot pass evening and morning without saluting him in a formal complementing way in such a manner as men use to many they care not for and indeed many know no other use of their prayers than of their formal Salutes and Complements viz. to keep fair terms with such as they care little for yet are not willing to disoblige Is it any wonder that God regard not such prayers any unmortified sin shuts Heaven and lays an Arrest upon the profit of thy Duties there 's no profitable trading between the Soul and Heaven there 's no profiting by Means or Ordinances if thou would lose the Arrest mortifie thy sin give up thy Idol cast over board thy Jonah's If thou hast any suit depending before the Throne of Grace if in the mean while thou offend God or grieve his Spirit thou art like to lose thy cause who will provoke the Judg when his cause is before him Hence that word Deut. 23.9 When thou goest forth against thine Enemies then keep thee from every wicked thing When a man has some special dependance on God and has some special expectation from him it 's unseasonable then to provoke him to Jealousie 5. Think what thou wouldst do in a dying day how will you look upon your Idols What will you do in the day of Visitation where will you hide your glory How would you look upon a Temptation or upon the tempting Objects of your darling lusts all your sweet morsels and stollen waters will then be bitter but the more sweetly any sin went down the bitterer will it be when it comes up again may be your Idols and you were pleasant in your lives but they are sad Company in the valley of Death Can the Camel go through the Needles-eye nay if there were no more to hinder but the bunch upon his back he could not Can you go through the strait gate if there were no more but one unmortified lust you cannot Can you think to leap into Heaven warm and smoaking with sin as many times you come to speak with God when the last word you spoke was with your Idol Can you sing that sweet triumphant Song O Death where is thy sting O Grave where is thy victory 1 Cor. 15.55 For lo here sin that is the sting of death and the victory of the Grave sticks in thee when others shall be singing Hallelujah and harping with Harps Death is no dark shade to the Son of Righte ousness having lightned it by his passing through it thou shalt be little better than the Hypocrite whom fearfulness surprizeth c. If the Master knock when thou art either asleep or wasting his goods or eating and drinking with the drunken thou will be afraid to go down and open he must break open the gates if he get in O what sad work will any living lust make when thou comes to die Let us now mention a few advantages you shall have by the mortification of sin especially your most potent sin 1. The mortification of your most predominant lust will be a great evidence to you of your sincerity Psalm 18.23 I was also upright before him c. When any lust is strong or when any Idol has a great interest in the Soul the heart is as 't were divided and then cannot know whether Christs interest or its prevails and bears most sway in the Soul but where there is no competition the case is clear when one can say If any thing interfere with Christ it 's this If any thing render my case suspicious or intrench upon Sincerity it 's this Corruption this Idol But sure I am this is so far under that it cannot disprove my integrity when the Lord tryes his peoples sincerity he uses to hit their sore to prove them in their Idols indeed when he intends to discover their weakness he puts them to tryal in the grace they excel most in as Peter in his Courage Moses in his Meekness if thou can deny thy self in this if thou can offer up thy Isaac hereby thou mayst know thou fears God and that thou loves God Now the knowledg of this fills the Soul with exceeding Joy 2 Cor. 1.12 O the sweet Calm it brings in it 's better felt than can be told whereas the prevalency of any Corruption deprives you both of the Testimony of the Spirit of God and of your own spirit 2. If thou can mortifie thy predominant lust thou may with the more ease mortifie other Corruptions Commonly all a mans lusts are made subservient to some one though indeed sometimes they thwart as pride and covetousness pride and sensuality or covetousness and sensuality if you can kill that the greatest difficulty in Mortification is over if you can take the strong City all the Villages and Countrey about will be subject to you If Goliah be slain the Philistins will fly may be you complain of many things and innumerable evils compass you about but see if some one unmortified Corruption do not maintain them all and you cannot conquer these till you have subdued that which sets these on work and which feeds and recruits them this would ease you of many evils you complain of the cutting off one member of sin will weaken the Body of sin they are so united that it will make all the other members of sin to languish and does help on to a through Conquest 3. Consider that there is more real satisfaction in mortifying lusts than in making provision for them or in fulfilling them There 's more true pleasure in crossing and pinching our flesh than in gratifying it were there any true pleasure in sin Hell would not be Hell for the more sin the more Joy you cannot satisfie one lust if you would do your utmost and make your self never so absolute a slave to it you think if you had your hearts desire you would be at rest you much mistake they had it Psalm 78.29 but yet they were not estranged from their lusts ver 30. How many a man in the fulness of his sufficiency is yet in pain for more Job 20.22 O but the mortification of that sin makes a Jubiles in the Soul Who are they that sing Triumphs here and set up Trophies of Victory and divide the spoils when others are living under troubles without and within and have their Soul removed far from peace who shall wear Crowns on their heads in Heaven and Palms in their hands and have High-praises in their mouths but they who turn the Battel to the Gate who have overcome their Enemies Would you be able to sing a Triumph even when drawing your last breath See what 's the Tune what 's the matter and the ground of Pauls Song 2 Tim. 4.8 and with what a Transport of Spirit he sings it as on the other hand it tells us that it 's faint or
out then call them in and examine them as Elisha did to Gehazi be sure your hearts will be such as your thoughts you cannot have a serious heart if vain thoughts lodg within you Jer. 4.14 3. Fly the society of such as are sick of that disease thou dreads most and which thou art aptest to be infected with It is not good fighting against the Devil says one in the midst of his own Camp Mens bold venturing on this has often brought them off wounded It 's hard to keep up a due abhorrence of sin that we daily see and hear some ill savour at least will stick to us if it bring you not to a compliance yet it abates your zeal against it therefore shun such Employments Occasions and Company as may draw forth thy Corruption It was Peters snare to be in the High-priests Hall and Judas's that he carried the Bug. It 's hard for Powder and Flax to be near Fire and not kindle The 5th Direction Improve Afflictions for the mortification of thy sin by these the Lord takes away sin and makes us partakers of his holiness the finer any Vessel be and the more used the oftner it's scoured and the more it be rubbed the cleaner it is Lev. 6.28 and 11.33 The earthen pots when they were fouled by boiling of the Sacrifices they were to be broken in pieces but the brazen pots were to be reinsed with Water and scoured and cleaned the oftner you are on the fire the cleaner should you be Now when God is wounding your Pride your Covetousness your Sensuality take the advantage of slaying these lusts when he makes thy right-hand or Eye to ake then pluck it out c. Canst thou love the World when it pinches and straitens and desames and reproaches thee Canst thou love thy flesh when pain and grief have taken up their dwelling in it and when it 's such a trouble to thee Will you not now cry out upon all as vanity and vexation when your sense and your Experience tells you so when you feel the bitter fruits of sin you have now great advantage against your sin and to help on the mortification of it when sense and Experience disparage and decry it and your very flesh is convinced of the folly of flesh-pleasing O that you would take this advantage and use this World as it does or will use you and use your sins as they do or will use you There be indeed some unmortified men who when they suffer by sin and by the World will speak hardly enough of them but their friendship which is rooted in their Nature is soon made up again But should it not heighten your Enmity with them the Lord makes your sin buffet and abuse and rend and wound you that by the pain and smart and sorrow it breeds he may maintain and encrease your enmity and excite diligent endeavours to destroy it he had rather that sin should pain you here than torment you in Hell and he would have sins stroke to fall upon it self as sin killed it self in killing Christ so he would have it in his people Let your afflictions let the death of your Creature-comforts be the death of sin If it turn your very breath into groans let these groans be against sin if it turn your Joy into mourning your Songs into sighs and cries and tears let all these be against sin and so your Life and your Light and your Comfort shall rise out of the ruins of your sin O let sin gain nothing by the hurt it does you If it has brought a cross upon thy Person or Family take it and crucifie it upon this Cross else thou losest the benefit of it if thus thou dealest with it it 's a happy Cross and thou hast fellowship with Christ in his Cross on which sin suffered Many have been convinced of the ill of Sin that have fought but faintly with it till it has wounded them And now let me a little enquire if this has been the fruit of your personal or Family-afflictions or of the sore astonishing Judgments of God upon this place You have seen many Houses and Streets burnt down in fewer days than they were hundreds of yeares in building You have seen Riches that were many years in gathering scattered or may be in a few hours consumed and the Lord knows how many have lost their Souls and forfeited eternal happiness to build and furnish and gather that which a few moments pulled down scattered and consumed and yet when you have but a little intermission and breathing-time are you not as eagerly at it again You have seen or heard of what desolations God did make and what a Cry was almost in every House not the cry of Egypt not the first-born only but as a man emptieth a Dish and turneth it upside down so did God with many Families and many Houses Have the dismal Looks and Out-cries of these days mortified you to carnal Mirth Have you learned Righteousness Have you made your dwellings Bethels You have seen or heard of but a few years ago many as delicate Persons as your selves whose Carcasses were carried out in Dung-carts and thrown into pits heaps upon heaps and will you yet please and pamper such Carcasses Will you gather and patch up as it were their rags to adorn your Bodies with Ah! the ashes of London and the dust of those dead Bodies shall be witnesses against the present Inhabitants Does your Houses your Tables your Apparel speak any growth of Mortification the highest Turret or Pyramid is but a poor childish Memorial Is there a Memento written upon each of these But alas what then means your ceiled and well-furnished Houses while the House of God lies waste What means your strange Apparel and sumptuous Tables while may be there be few Backs or Bellies of Christs Disciples that are blessing you Have you not fallen into Old London's sins sooner than men took up the Old Worlds sins Noah did indeed for once border upon the sin that God had buried in the Waters And are not many Professors more guilty in reviving sins that God has burnt up to speak so Ah! Will you break through not only Armies of Ordinances but Armies of Judgments Will you in your pride of heart and in your practice also say the Bricks are fallen and we will build with hewen stone the Sycamores are cut down but we will exchange them into Cedars Will you say we will have better Houses and finer Cloaths If you have forgotten what your Eyes have seen and your Ears have heard come and behold yet the works of the Lord and see what desolation he is now making amongst others Not only London but other places that were like the Vinetrees amongst the Trees of the Forest God has given them to the fire for fewel Ezek. 12.20 He hath made Lebanon to open its doors to the fire to devour the Cedars that are fallen and the Fir-tree howls also yea the Oaks
and which the smallest temptation will excite And in many reason and conscience and affection and all is in bondage to sin and there is nothing to present its proceedings but there 's a thorough satisfaction with its servitude Sin is in thee as in its proper place and therefore feels not heavy 4. Thou mayest easily mistake when thou compares thy self with others whose Corruptions some sharp tryals or strong temptations has brought forth there may be much more sin at bottom in thee 5. Know that such as Satan has possession of he does not so much trouble them he cares not how peaceably they come to hell he lashes few till they begin to turn out of his road he cares not how neat a way they come to hell nor how swept and clean the house be and how well garnished There may be access and room for the more evil spirits And truly I think that Satan may be as careful to keep temptations from some lest they should be discovered to themselves and to others as he is to multiply temptations to others here 's the misery of many God bindeth them and Satan bindeth them and they cry not God blinds men and Satan blinds men and they feel not discern it not and will not believe it Joh. 9.39 40. He hardens them and they know not how the stone in the heart grows as insensibly as the stone in the bladder 2. Some Carnal hearts may object the pain that is in mortifying a sin that 's dear and useful and that to mortifie sin is to mortifie mirth This has been formerly obviated In short you must know 1. That this is not the proper time nor place for mirth Joh. 16.20 Ye shall weep and lament but the world shall rejoyce and when we rejoyce our mirth must not be a-kin to theirs We read but once that Jesus rejoyced in spirit and that was not with the joy of this world Luk. 10.21 He was a man of sorrows and it becomes not his Disciples to be men of mirth I speak this the rather because that under pretence of removing an occasion of offence and stumbling of some at the way of God many drown themselves in Carnal mirth No man comes leaping and laughing to heaven then and not till then shall all tears be wip't away were there none there needed no wiping as long as sin is not throughly purged away sorrow must not fly away 2. There is indeed pain and trouble in mortifying sin as there is in cutting off a living member of the body and as there is in the rending of the soul from the body for sin cleaves as close to the soul and to the body as the soul and body doth to one another Yet 3. This pain is only or at least more especially at some times as when a man first sets about the mortification of sin But when sin has once begun to fall before him he is heartned and his work goes more easily on and difficulties fly away 4. It is the being of sin and the strength of sin that breeds trouble and grief and pain to the godly man not so much the mortifying of sin for that relieves him 5. As we formerly told you there 's a great deal of more pain in serving and satisfying any lust than in mortifying it Job 20.22 Psal 78.29 30. Would you set about the mortification of sin and make tryal you should find it so The reason why men think not their lusts burdensome is their love to them and their being habituated to them disingages the affections to them and they torment a man that which makes them sweet is the vicious constitution of their souls and bodies when a man is recovered of his disease they are like gall and wormwood to him that which lessens their trouble and pain in serving of them is their imputing it to the scantness of provision for them whereas when they have multiplied and diversified the objects of them they are ne're the nearer satisfaction in them 6. Man is born to affliction as the sparks flie upward and if the godly man find pain and trouble in mortifying sin he has rest in the evil day to compensate that If sin be mortified it 's easie to bear a cross if sin be dead it 's easie for a man to die Whereas others are uneasie under afflictions and on a death bed unmortified sin makes a man feeling of affliction the trouble and pain of it is more than the pleasure of sin and more than the pain of mortification and how much more does the pain and sorrow of hell exceed these Will you chuse to pine away in pain rather than let a gangrene Limb be cut off or a broken Limb be set again Will you lye a million of years in torment ere you indure a moments pain the odds is not so great as between time and Eternity 7. Where there is a principle of true Grace it 's greater pain to the new man to sin then to mortifie sin 8. It is no pain or trouble to a man in so far as he is renewed to oppose and mortifie sin he does it with delight and the more effectually he do it the more is his peace and joy 9. If at any time sin prevails the heart is drawn forth into acts of godly sorrow and indeed the godly man chuses that before the worlds mirth and therefore cherishes it whereas the trouble and anguish others have is a kin to that of hell which makes them shun it and fly from it Yea 10. The very trouble which the mortification of sin breeds to the old man is a pleasure to the new then one rises upon the ruins of the other and when he considers what assurance of a final conquest he has he is heartned he knows that the death of sin is his life that if he through the spirit mortifie sin he shall live he can bear to have a right hand cut off when his life is at the stake and if he feel pain and trouble and complain of it as Rom. 7.24 he checks himself next word and turns his moan into a Song Act. 25. 8.1 3. Some object the impossibility of mortifying such and such Corruptions some will acknowledg a self-denyed and mortified life to be the best life but say you No body knows my temptations and circumstances there 's such a woful proneness in my nature to such and such things that I know not how to withstand it though I have prayed and resolved and hoped against it Answ It 's true thou art utterly impotent and by thy own endeavours thou cannot mortifie any sin but art thou a Christian and hast no faith or in Christ and hast thou not the spirit of Christ Hast thou Christ in thee and the Spirit of the living God in thee and yet no strength or cannot mortifie a beloved lust by it But does not this excuse them that want the Spirit and his special assistance Answ No 1. Because some such at