Inimica est multorum conversatio I never bring home well from a Crowd the manners which I took out with me Something is disordered of that which I had set in order Something of that which I had banished doth return The conversation of many I find an enemy to me O how many vain and foolish words corrupt the minds of those that converse with an ungodly World when your Ears and Minds who live in Solitude are free from such Temptations You live not in so corrupt an Air as they You hear not the filthy ribbald Speeches which fight against modesty and chastity and are the bellows of Lust You hear not the discontented complaining words of the impatient nor the passionate provoking words of the offended nor the wrangling quarrelsom words of the contentious nor the censorious or slanderous or reproachful words of the malicious who think it their interest to have their Brethren taken to be bad and to have others hate them because they them selves hate them and who are as zealous to quench the Charity of others when it is destroyed in themselves as holy persons are zealous to provoke others to Love which dweâ—â—eth and ruleth in themselves In your Solitude with God you shall not hear the lyes and malicious revilings of the ungodly against the generation of the just Nor the subtile cheating words of Hereticks who being themselves deceived would deceive others of their Faith and corrupt their lives You shall not there be distracted with the noise and clamours of contending uncharitable professors of Religion endeavouring to make odious first the Opinions and then the persons of one another one saying here is the Church and another there is the Church One saying This is the true Church Government and another saying Nay but that is it One saying God will be worshipped thus and another not so but thus or thus You shall not there be drawn to side with one against another nor to joyn with any faction or be guilty of divisions You shall not be troubled with the Oaths and Blasphemies of the wicked nor with the imprudent miscarriages of the Weak with the Persecutions of Enemies or the falling out of Friends You shall not see the cruelty of proud Oppressors that set up lyes by armed violence and care not what they say or do nor how much other men are injured or suffer so that themselves may tyrannize and their wills and words may rule the World when they do so unhappily rule themselves In your solitude with God you shall not see the prosperity of the wicked to move you to envy nor the adversity of the just to be your grief You shall see no Worldly pomp and splendor to be fool you nor adorned beauty to entice you nor wasting calamities to afflict you You shall not hear the laughter of Fools nor the sick mans groans nor the wronged mans Complaints nor the poor mans murmurings nor the proud mans boastings nor the angry mans abusive ragings As you lose the help of your gracious friends so you are freed from the fruits of their peevishness and passions of their differing opinion and ways and tempers of their inequality unsuitableness and contrariety of minds or interests of their levity and unconstancy and the powerful temptations of their friendship to draw you to the errors or other sins which they are tainted with themselves In a word you are there half delivered from the VANITY and VEXATION of the world and were it not that you are yet undelivered from your selves and that you take distempered corrupted hearts with you O what a felicity would your solitude be But alas we cannot overrun our own diseases we must carry with us the remnants of our corrupted nature our deadness and dulness our selfishness and earthly minds our impatience and discontents and worst of all our lamentable weakness of faith and love and heavenly mindedness and our strangeness to God and backwardness to the matters of eternal life O that I could escape these though I were in the hands of the cruellest enemies O that such a heart could be left behind How gladly would I overrun both house and land and honour and all sensual delights that I might but overrun it O where is the place where there is none of this darkness nor disaffection nor distance nor estrangedness from God! O that I knew it O that I could find it O that I might there dwell though I should never more see the face of mortals nor ever hear a human Voice nor ever taste of the delights of flesh Alas foolish Soul such a place there is that hath all this and more than this But it is not in a Wilderness but in Paradise not here on Earth but above with Christ And yet am I so loath to die yet am I no more desirous of the blessed day when I shall bâ— uncloathed of flesh and sin O death what an Enemy art thou even to my Soul By affrighting me from the presence of my Lord and hindring my desires and willingness to be gone thou wrongest me much more than by laying my flesh to rot in darkness Fain I would know God and fain I would more love him and enjoy him But O this hurtful love of life O this unreasonable fear of dying detaineth my desires from pressing on to the happy place where all this may be had O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of death this carnal unbelieving heart that sometime can think more delightfully of a Wilderness then of Heaven that can go seek after God in desert solitude among the Birds and Beasts and Trees and yet is so backward to be loosed from flesh that I may find him and enjoy him in the World of glory Can I expect that Heaven come down to Earth and that the Lord of glory should remove his Court and either leave the retinue of his Celestial Courtiers or bring them all down into this drosly World of flesh and sin and this to satisfie my fleshly foolish mind Or can I expect the translation of Henoch or the Chariot of Elias Is it not enough that my Lord hath conquered Death and sanctifyed the passage and prepared the place of my perpetual abode Well! for all this though a Wilderness is not Heaven it shall be sweet and welcom for the sake of Heaven if thence I may but have a clearer prospect of it and if by retiring from the crowd and noise of Folly I may but be more composed and better disposed to converse above and to use my Faith alas my too weak languid Faith until the beatifical Vision and Fruition come If there may be but more of God or readier access to him or more heart quickning flames of Love or more heart-comforting intimations of his Favour in a wilderness than in a City in a Prison than in a Palace let that Wilderness be my City and let that Prison be my Palace while I must abide on Earth If in
The Christians CONVERSE with GOD OR THE Insufficiency and Vncertainty OF Human Friendship And the Improvement of SOLITUDE IN CONVERSE with GOD With some of the AUTHOR's Breathings after him By Richard Baxter Recommended to the Reader 's serious thoughts when at the House of Mourning and in Retirement By Mr. Matth. Silvester LONDON Printed for John Salusbury at the Rising Sun over against the Royal Exchange in Cornhill 1693. TO THE READER· THis Excellent Discourse breathing the Excellence of it's now Deceased Authors Spirit craves thy most serious perusal and it will plentifully reward the hours which shall be spent thereon It greatly savours of deep thoughts strict observations and long and great experience of God of Things and Persons Creatures look best when at a distance and in prospect but when nearer to us they are then easily looked through and seldom found to correspond with their Appearances to us and with our expectations from them But God is such a deep and boundless Abyss of Perfection as most delightfully will endure and recompence all the severity and closeness of our eternal Thoughts about him Perfected Spirits are all thought concerning God and find their Hearts enflamed and all their Powers invigorated thereby eternally to inexpressible Satisfaction And what varieties of pleasant Thoughts the Innumerable Instances and Mirrours of Divine Excellencies in the Heavens will endlesly Minister unto I do not know nor dare I guess too boldly at them But how those Souls can look for Heaven or truly be accounted gracious who never retire solemnly to converse with God I know not Surely where God is not more than all to us he can be comfortably nothing And our religious Exercises and Pretences must needs be mean and dull whilst God is triflingly and seldom thought on and conversed with by us Can holy Walking be preserved and promoted without love Can love to God and Christ and to the invisible State be kindled cherished and continually advanced without Faith Can Faith be any thing but Fancy and Presumption without Thought and Knowledge And can the Life of Faith Hope Love and holy Walking be fixt and vigorous and proficient without our serious and frequent representations of God unto our selves by solemn Contemplations of his excellent Perfections free Communications plentiful Provisions and glorious Designs whereto he hath entitled us seeing our Religion and Devotions in all the parts thereof can have no Life and Soul but this What is it to converse with God in Solitude but to actuate our Thoughts of what we know concerning God in Christ and to accomodate them to all the needful and useful Purposes of Religion and Devotion and to make Thoughts solemnly serviceable to the great Ends thereof viz. our due and seasonable Representations of our God to us and of our selves to him in Christ pursuant to the stated and occasional Ends and Interests of Christian Godliness as the matter may require Conversing thus with God wants not its great Advantages in life and death And if these Thoughts contained in this Book which did so greatly reconcile the Author to the Thoughts of his then approaching but now experienced Death were more in Exercise at Funeral Solemnities and this Book then put into the hands of Mourners it would be no matter of Repentance that I know of These are the hasty Thoughts and Sentiments of thine in and for the Lord whilst Matthew Sylvester London Sept. 12. 1692. THE CONTENTS· THE Context opened p. 1 Why Christ was forsaken by his Disciples p. 6. Use 1. Expect by the forsaking of your Friends to be conformed unto Christ Reasons for your Expectation p. 12 The Aggravations of their forsaking you p. 34 Some quieting Considerations p. 38 The Order of Forms in the School of Christ. p. 51 The Disciples scattered every Man to his own p. 57. Selfishness contrary to friendly fidelity p. 58. Considerations to quiet us in the death of faithful Friends p. 60 Whether we shall know them in Heaven p. 71 Whether Creatures be any matter of our Comfort in Heaven p. 73. Quest. Shall I have any more Comfort in present friends than in others p. 76 Doct. 3. When all forsake us and leave us as to them alone we are far from being simply alone because God is with us p. 80. The advantages of having God with us p. 81 Quest. How he is with us p. 82 Use. 1. Imitate Christ Live upon God alone though men forsake you yet thrust not your selves into Solitude uncalled p. 91 In what cases Solitude is lawful and good p. 92 Reasons against unnecessary Solitude p. 94 The Comfort of Converse with God in necessary Solitude The Benefits of Solitude The Reasons from God Improved largely in some Meditations p. 102.111 Directions for Conversing with God in Solitude p. 149 Concluded in further Meditation p. 160 A Caution p. 166 Books Printed for John Salusbury in Cornhill THE certainty of The Worlds of Spirits fully evinced by unquestionable Histories of Apparitions and Witchcrafts Operations Voices c. Proving the Immortality of Souls the Malice and Miseries of the Devils and the Damned and the Blessedness of the Justified By Richard Baxter An End of Doctrinal Controversies which have lately troubled the Churches by â—econciling explication without much Disputing By Richard Baxter The Protestant Religion truly stated and justified by the late Reverend Divine Mr. Richard Baxter Whereunto is added by way of an Epistle some Account of the Learned Author never before published By Mr. Matth. Sylvester and Mr. Daniel Williams The Harmony of the Divine Attributes in the contrivance and accomplishment of Mans Redemption by the Lord Jesus Christ. By William Bates D. D. The Changableness of this World with respect to Nations Families and particular Persons with a practial Application thereof to the various conditions of this Mortal Life By Timothy Rogers M. A. The Christian Lover or a discourse opening the Nature of Participation with and Demonstrating the necessity of Purification by Christ. By T. Cruse The Duty and blessing of a Tender Conscience plainly stated and earnestly recommended to all that regard acceptance with God and the prosperity of their Souls By the same Author Five Sermons on various Occasions By the same Author The Mirrour of Divine Love unvail'd in a Paraphrase on the High and misterious Song of Solomon By Robert Fleming V. D. M. The Mourners Memorial in two Sermons on the death of the truly Pious Mrs. Susannah Some With some Account of her Life and death By T. Wright and Robert Fleming V. D. M. A new Examination of the Accidence and Grammar in English and Latin wherein all the Rules of Properi quae Maribus Que Genus As in presenti Sintax and Praesodia are made plain and easie that the meanest Capacity may speedily learn the Latin Tongue OF CONVERSING WITH God c. Joh. XVI 32 Behold the hour cometh yeâ— is come that ye shall be scattered every Man to his own and shall leave me alone And yet
God Therefore they shall know them and take some comfort in their presence 6. Love even to the Saints as well as unto God is one of the graces that shall endure for ever 1 Cor. 13. It is exercised upon an Immortal object the Image and Children of the Most High and therefore must be one of the Immortal Graces For Grace in the Nature of it dyeth not and therefore if the Object cease not how should the Grace cease unless you will call it's perfecting a ceasing It is a state too high for such as we and I think for any meer Creature to live so Immediately and only upon God as to have no use for any fellow Creature nor no comfort in them God can make use of Glorified Creatures in such subserviency and subordination to himself as shall be no diminution to his All-sufficiency or Honour nor to our glory and felicity We must take heed of fancying even such a Heaven it self as is above the capacity of a Creature as some very wise Divines think they have â—one that tell us we shall Immediately see Gods Essence his Glory being that which is provided for our intuition and felicity and is distinct from his Essence being not every where as his Essence is And as those do that tell us because that God will be All in All therefore we shall there have none of our comfort by any Creature Though flesh and blood shall not enter into that Kingdom but our Bodies will then be Spiritual Bodies yet will they be really the same as now and distinct from our Souls and therefore must have a felicity suitable to a Body glorified And if the soul did immediately see God's Essence yet as no reason can conclude that it can see nothing else or that it can see even Created Good and not Love it so the Body however must have objects and felicity fit for a Body Obj. But it is said If we knew Christ after the flesh henceforth know we him no more Answ. No doubt but all the carnality in Principles matter manner and ends of our knowledge will then cease as it's imperfection But that a carnal knowledge be turned into a spiritual is no more a diminution to it than it is to the glory of our Bodies to be made like the stars in the Firmament of our Father Obj. But then I shall have no more comfort in my present friends than in any other Answ. 1. If you had none in them it is no diminution to our happiness if indeed we should have all in God immediately and alone 2. But if you have as much in others that you never knew before that will not diminish any of your comfort in your antient Friends 3. But it is most probable to us that as there is a twofold Object for our love in the Glorified Saints one is their Holiness and the other is the Relation which they stood in between God and us being made his instruments for our conversion and salvation so that we shall love Saints in Heaven in both respects And in the first respect which is the chiefest we shall love those most that have most of God and the greatest Glory though such as we never knew on Earth And in the second respect we shall love those most that were employed by God for our greatest good And that we shall not there lay by so much respect to our selves as to forget or disregard our Benefactors is manifest 1. In that we shall forever remember Christ and love him and praise him as one that formerly Redeemed us and washed us in his Blood and hath made us Kings and Priests to God And therefore we may also in just subordination to Christ remember them with Love and Thankfulness that were his Instâ—uments for the Collation of these benefits 2. And this kind of Self-love to be sensible of Good and Evil to our selves is none of the sinful or imperfect selfishness to be renounced or laid by but part of our very Natures and as inseparable from us as we are from our selves Much more were it not digressâ—ve might be said on this subject but I shall only add that as God doth draw us to every holy Duty by shewing us the excellency of that duty and as perpetuâ—ty is not the smallest excellency so he hath purposely mentioned that Love endureth for ever when he had described the Love of one another as a principle motive to kindle and encrease this Love And therefore those that think they shall have no personal Knowledge of one another nor personal Love to one another for we cannot Love personâ—lly if we know not personally do take a most effectual course to destroy in their souls all holy special Love to Saints by casting away that principal or very great motive given them by the Holy Ghost I aâ— not â—ble to Love muâ—h where I fâ—â—eknow that I shall not Love long I cannot Love a comely Inn so well as a nearer dwelling of my own because I must be gone to morrow Therefore must I love my Bible better than my Lawbooks or Physickbooks c. Because it leadeth to Eternity And therefore I must Love Holiness in my self and others better than meat and drink and wealth and honour and beauty and pleasure because it must be Loved for ever when the Love of these must needs be transitory as they are transitory I must profess from the very experience of my soul that it is the belief that I shall Love my friends in Heaven that principally kindleth my Love to them on Earth And if I thought I should never know them after death and consequently never love them more when this life is ended I should in reason number them with temporal things and Love them comparatively but a little even as I Love other transitory things allowing for the excellency in the nature of Grace But now I converse with some delight with my Godly friends as believing I shall converse with them for ever and take comfort in the very Dead and Absent as believing we shall shortly meet in Heaven And I Love them I hope with a Love that is of a Heavenly Nature while I Love them as the Heirs of Heaven with a Love which I expect shall there be perfected and more fully and for ever exercised 12. The last Reason that I give you to move you to bear the Loss or Absence of your friends is that it gives you the loudest call to retire from the world and to converse with God himself and to long for Heaven where you shall be seperated from your friends no more And your forsaken state will somewhat assist you to that solitary converse with God which it calls you to But this brings us up to the third part of the Text. AND yet I am not alone because the Father is with me Doct. When all forsake us and leave us as to them alone we are far from being simply alone because God is with us He is not
Friends on Earth is nothing to his Love O how plainly hath he declared that he loveth me in the strange condescention the Sufferings Death and Intercession of his Son What Love hath he declared in the communications of his Spirit and the operations of his Grace and the near Relations into which he brought me What Love hath he declared in the course of his Providences In many and wonderful preservations and deliverances In the conduct of his Wisdom and in a Life of Mercies What Love appeareth in his precious Promises and the glorious Provisions he hath made for me with himself to all eternity O my Lord I am ashamed that thy Love is so much lost that it hath no better return from an unkind unthankful heart that I am not more delighted in thee and swallowed up in the contemplation of thy Love I can contentedly let go the Society and converse of all others for the converse of some one bosom Friend that is dearer to me than they all as Ionathan to David And can I not much more be satiâ—fied in thee alone and let go all if I mâ—y continue with thee My very Dog will gladly forsake all the Town and all Persons in the world to follow me alone And have I not yet found so much Love and Gooâ— ness in thee my dear and blessed God as to be willing to converse alone with thee All men delight most in the company of those that love them best They choose not to converse with the Multitude when they look for solace and content but with their dearest Friends And should any be so dear to me as God O were not thy Love unworthily neglecteâ— by an unthankful heart I should never â—e so unsatisfied in thee but should take up or seek my comforts in thee I should then say Whom have I in Heaven but thee and there is none on Earth that I desire besides thee Though not only my Friends but my Flesh and Heart themselves should fail me it is thou that will still be the strength of my heart and my portion forever it is good therefore for me to draw near to thee how far soever I am from Man O let me there dwell where thou wilt not be strange for thy loving kindness is better than life Instead of the multitude of my â—uâ—moiling thoughts let me be taken up in the believing views of thy reconciled Face and in the glad Attendance upon thy Grace or at least in the multitude of my thoughts within me let thy celestial comforts delight my soul. Let me dwell as in thy Family and when I awake let me be still with thee Let me go no whither but where I am still following thee Let me â—o nothing but thy work nor serve any other but when I may truly call it a serving thee Let me hear nothing â—ut thy voice and let me know thy voice by whatever instrument thou shalt speak Let me never see aâ—y thing but thy self and the glass that representeth thee and the Books in in which I may read thy Name And let me never play with the out-side and gaze on Words and Letters as insignificant and not observe â—hy Name which is the sense Whether it be in company or in solitude let me be continually with thee and do thou vouchsâ—fe to hold me by my right hand And guide me with thy counsel and afterwards receive me unto thy Glory Psal. 73.23 24 25 26 28. Psal. 63.3 4. If God be with me I am not alone for I shall be with him whose Love is of greater use and benefit to me than the love of all my Friends in the world Their Love may perhaps be some little comfort as it floweth from His But it is His Love by which and upon which I Live It is His Love that gives me Life and Time and Health and Food and Preservation that gives me Books gives me books and giveth me understanding that giveth me provision and saveth me from turning it to pernicious fleshliness and excess that giveth me even my friends themselves and saveth me from that abuse which might make them to me worse than enemies The Sun the Earth the Air is not so useful or needful to me as his Love The Love of all my friends cannot make me well when I am sick It cannot forgive the smallest of my sins nor yet assure me of Gods forgiveness It cannot heal the maladies of my soul nor give a solid lasting peace to the conscience which is troubled If all my friends stand about me when I am dying they cannot take away the fears of death nor secure my passage to everlasting life Death will be Death still and danger will be danger when all my friends have done their best But my Almighty friend is All sufficient He can prevent my sickness or rebuke and cure it or make it so good to me that I shall thank him for it He can blot out my transgressions and forgive all my sin and justifie me when the world and my conscience do condemn me He can teach me to believe to repent to pray to hope to suffer and to overcome He can quiet my soul in the midst of trouble and give me a well grounded everlasting peace and a joy which no man can take from me He can deliver me from all the corruptions and distempers of my froward heart and ease me and secure me in the troublesom war which is daily managed in my breast He can make it as easie a thing to dye as to lye down and take my rest when I am weary or to undress me at night and go to bed He can teach Death to lay by its terrible aspect and to speak with a mild and comfortable voice to bring me the joyfullest tydings that ever came unto my ears and to preach to me the last and sweetest Sermon even the same that our â—aviour preached on the Cross Luke 23.43 Verily I say unto thee To day shalt thou be with Christ in Paradise And is this the difference between the Love of man and of God And yet do I lament the loss of man And yet am I so backward to converse with God and to be satisfied in his Love alone Ah my God how justly mayest thou withhold that Love which I thus undervalue and refuse that converse which I have first refused and turn me over to man to silly man to sinful man whose converse I so much desire till I have learnt by dear experience the difference between man and God and between an Earthly and an Heavenly friend Alas have I not tryed it oft enough to have known it better before this day Have â— not 〈◊〉 enough sound what man is in a time of tryal Have I not been tolâ— it over and over and told it to the quick by deceitful friends by self-seeking friends by mutable erroneous deceived scandalous backslding friends by proud and selfconceited friends by passionate quarrelsom vexatious friends by self-grieved troubled