admire that patience could bear so long and justice suffer him to live Sure he will admire at this alteration when he shall finde by experience that unworthinesse could not hindâ—r his salvation which he thought would have bereaved him of every mercy Ah Christian There 's no talk of our worthiness nor unwornesse If worthiness were our condition for admittance we might sit down with S. John and weep because none in heaven or earth is found worthy But the Lion of the tribe of Judah is worthy and hath prevailed by that title must we hold the inheritance We shal offer there the offering that David refused even praise for that which cost us nothing Here our Commission runs Freely ye have received Freely give But Christ hath dearly received yet Freely gives The master heals us of our leprosie freely but Gehazi who had no finger in the cure will surely run after us and take somthing of us and falsly pretend it is his masters pleasure The Pope and his servants will be paid for their Pardons and Indulgencies But Christ will take nothing for his The fees of the Prelats Courts were large and our CoÌ„mutation of Penance must cost our purses dear or else we must be cast out of the Synagogue and soul and body delivered up to the Devil But none are shut out of that Church for want of money nor is poverty any eye-sore to Christ An empty heart may bar them out but an empty purse cannot His Kingdom of Grace hath ever been more consistent with despised poverty then wealth and honour and riches occasion the difficulty of entrance far more then want can do For that which is highly esteemed among men is despised with God And so is it also The poor of the world rich in faith whom God hath chosen to be heires of that Kingdom which he hath prepared for them that love him I know the true labourer is worthy of his hire And they that serve at the Altar should live upon the Altar And it is not fit to muzzle the Ox that treadeth out the corne And I know it is either hellish malice or penurious baseness or ignorance of the weight of their work and burthen that makes their maintenance so generally Incompetent and their very livelihood and subsistance so envied and grudged at and that it 's a meer plot of the Prince of darkness for the diversion of their thoughts that they must be studying how to get bread for their own and childrens mouths when they should be preparing the bread of life for their peoples souls But yet let me desire the right aiming Ministers of Christ to consider what is expedient as well as what is lawfull and that the saving of one soul is better then a thousand pound a year and our gain though due is a cursed gain which is a stumbling block to our peoples souls Let us make the Free-Gospell as little burthensome and chargeable as is possible I had rather never take their Tythes while I live then by them to destroy the souls for whom Christ dyed and though God hath ordained that they which preach the Gospell should live of the Gospell yet I had rather suffer all things then hinder the Gospell and it were better for me to dye then that any man should make this my glorying voyd Though the well-leading Elders be worthy of double honour especially the laborious in the word and doctrine yet if the necessity of Souls and the promoting of the Gospel should require it I had rather preach the Gospell in hunger and ragges then rigidly contend for what 's my due And if I should do so yet have I not whereof to Glory for necessity is laid upon me yea wo be to me if I preach not the Gospell though I never received any thing from men How unbeseeming the messengers of this Free-Grace and Kingdom is it rather to lose the hearts and souls of their people then to lose a groat of their due And rather to exasperate them against the message of God then to forbear somewhat of their right And to contend with them at law for the wages of the Gospell And to make the glad-tidings to their yet carnall hearts seem to be sad tidings because of this burthen This is not the way of Christ and his Apostles nor according to the self denying yeelding suffering Doctrine which they taught Away with all those actions that are against the main end of our studies and calling which is to win souls and fie upon that gain which hinders the gaining of men to Christ. I know flesh will here object necessities and distrust will not want arguments but we who have enough to answer to the diffidence of our people let us take home some of our answers to our selves and teach our selves first before we teach them How many have you known that God suffered to starve in his Vineyard But this is our exceeding consolation That though we may pay for our Bibles and Books and Sermons and it may be pay for our freeâ—dom to enjoy and use them yet as we paid nothing for Gods eternal Love and nothing for the Son of his Love and nothing for his Spirit and our grace and faith and nothing for our pardon so we shal pay nothing for our eternal Rest. We may pay for the bread and wine but we shal not pay for the body and blood nor for the great things of the Covenant which it seals unto us And indeed we have a valuable price to give for those but for these we have none at all Yet this is not all If it were only for nothing and without our merit the wonder were great but it is moreover against our merit and against our long endeavoring of our own ruine Oh the broken heart that hath known the desert of sin doth both understand and feel what I say What an astonishing thought it will be to think of the unmeasurable difference between our deservings and our receivings between the state we should have been in and the state we are in To look down upon Hell and see the vast difference that free-grace hath made betwixt us and them to see the inheritance there which we were born to so different from that which we are adopted to Oh what pangs of love will it cause within us to think yonder was my native right my deserved portion those should have been my hideous cries my doleful groans my easless pains my endless torment Those unquenchable flames I should have layen in that never dying worm should have fed upon me yonder was the place that sin would have brought me to but this is it that Christ hath bought me to Yonder death was the wages of my sin but this Eternal life is the Gift of God through Jesus Christ my Lord. Did not I neglect Grace and make light of the offers of Life and sleight my Redeemers Blood a long time as well as yonder suffering
the goats on the left and so on as you may read in the Text. But why tremblest thou Oh humble gracious Soul Cannot the enemies and slighters of Christ be foretold their doom but Thou must quake Do I make sad the Soul that God would not have sad Doth not thy Lord know his own sheep who have heard his voyce and followed him He that would not lose the family of one Noah in a common deluge when him onely he had found faithful in all the earth He that would not over-look one Lot in Sodom nay that could do nothing till he were forth Will he forget thee at that day Thy Lord knoweth now to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust to the day of Judgment to be punished He knoweth how to make the same day the greatest for terror to his foes and yet the greatest for joy to his people He ever intended it for the great distinguishing and separating day wherein both Love and Fury should be manifested to the highest Oh then let the Heavens rejoyce the Sea the Earth the Floods the Hills for the Lord cometh to judg the Earth With Righteousness shall he judg the World and the People with Equity But especially let Sion hear and be glad and her children rejoyce For when God ariseth to judgment it is to save the meek of the Earth They have judged and condemned themselves many a day in heart-breaking confession and therefore shall not be judged to condemnation by the Lord For there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit And who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect Shall the Law Why whatsoever the Law saith it saith to them that are under the Law but we are not under the Law but under Grace For the Law of the Spirit of life which is in Christ Jesus hath made us free from the Law of sin and death Or shall Conscience Why we were long ago justified by faith and so have peace with God and have our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and the Spirit bearing witness with our spirits that we are the children of God It is God that justifieth who shall condemn If our Judg condemn us not who shall He that said to the Adulterous woman Hath no man condemned thee neither do I condemn thee He will say to us more faithfully then Peter to him Though all men deny thee or condemn thee I will not Thou hast confessed me before men and I will confess thee before my Father and the Angels of Heaven He whose first coming was not to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved I am sure intends not his second coming to condemn his people but that they through him might be saved He hath given us Eternal Life in Charter and Title already yea and partly in possession and will he after that condemn us When he gave us the knowledg of his Father and himself he gave us Eternal Life And he hath verily told us That he that heareth his word and beleeveth on him that sent him hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death to life Indeed if our Judg were our enemy as he is to the world then we might well fear If the Devil were our Judg or the Ungodly were our Judg then we should be condemned as Hypocrites as Heretiques as Schisinatiques as proud or covetous or what not But our Judg is Christ who dyed yea rather who is risen again and maketh request for us For all power is given him in Heaven and in Earth and all things delivered into his hands and the Father hath given him authority to execute judgment also because he is the Son of man For though God judg the world yet the Father immediately without his Vicegerent Christ judgeth no man but hath committed all judgment to the Son that all men should honor the Son even as they honor the Father Oh what inexpressible joy may this afford to a Beleever That our Dear Lord who loveth our Souls and whom our Souls love shall be our Judg Will a man fear to be judged by his dearest friend By a Brother By a Father Or a Wife by her own Husband Christian Did he come down and suffer and weep and bleed and dye for thee and will he now condemn thee Was he judged and condemned and executed in thy stead and now will he condemn thee himself Did he make a Bath of his blood for thy sins and a garment of his own Righteousness for thy nakedness and will he now open them to thy shame Is he the undertaker for thy Salvation and will he be against thee Hath it cost him so dear to save thee and will he now himself destroy thee Hath he done the most of the work already in Redeeming Regenerating and Sanctifying Justifying preserving and perfecting thee and will he now undo all again Nay hath he begun and will he not finish Hath he interceded so long for thee to the Father and will he cast thee away himself If all these be likely then fear and then rejoyce not Oh what an unreasonable sin is unbelief that will charge our Lord with such unmercifulness and absurdities Well then fellow Christians let the terror of that day be never so great surely our Lord can mean no ill to us in all Let it make the Devils tremble and the wicked tremble but it shall make us to leap for Joy Let Satan accuse us we have our answer at hand our surety hath discharged the debt If he have not fulfilled the Law then let us be charged as breakers of it If he have not suffered then let us suffer but if he have we are free Nay our Lord will make answer for us himself These are mine and shall be made up with my Jewels for their transgressions was I stricken and cut off from the earth for them was I bruised and put to grief my Soul was made an offering for their sin and I bore their transgressions They are my seed and the travel of my Soul I have healed them by my stripes I have justified them by my knowledg They are my sheep who shall take them out of my hands Yea though the humble Soul be ready to speak against it self Lord when did we see thee hungry and feed thee c. yet will not Christ do so This is the day of the Beleevers full Justification They were before made just and esteemed Just and by Faith justified in Law and this evidenced to their consciences But now they shall both by Apology be maintained Just and by Sentence pronounced Just actually by the lively voyce of the Judg himself which is the most perfect Justification Their Justification by Faith is a giving them Title in Law to that Apology and Absolving
the sinner now enter into a cordial Covenant with Christ. As the preceptive part is called the Covenant â—o he might be under the Covenant before as also under the offers of a Covenant on Gods part But he was never strictly nor comfortably in Covenant with Christ till now He is sure by the free offers that Christ doth consent and now doth he cordially consent himself and so the Agreement is fully made and it was never a match indeed till now 6. With this Covenant concurs a mutual delivery Christ delivereth himself in all comfortable Relations to the sinner and the sinner delivereth up himself to be saved and ruled by Christ. This which I call the delivering of Christ is His act in and by the Gospel without any change in himself The change is onely in the sinner to whom the conditional promises become equivalent to Absolute when they perform the conditions Now doth the soul resolvedly conclude I have been blindly led by flesh and lust and the world and devil too long already almost to my utter destruction I will now be wholly at the dispose of my Lord who hath bought me with his blood and will bring me to his glory 7. And lastly I adde That the believer doth herein persevere to the end Though he may commit sins yet he never disclaimeth his Lord renounceth his Allegiance nor recalleth nor repenteth of his Covenant nor can he properly be said to break that Covenant while that Faith continues which is the condition of it Indeed those that have verbally Covenanted and not cordially may yet tread under foot the blood of the Covenant as an unholy thing wherewith they were sanctified by separation from those without the Church But the elect cannot be so deceived Though this perseverance be certain to true believers yet is it made a condition of their Salvation yea of their continued life and fruitfulness and of the continuance of their Justification though not of their first Justification it self But eternally blessed be that hand of Love which hath drawn the free promise and subscribed and sealed to that which ascertains us both of the Grace which is the condition and the Kingdom on that condition offered SECT VI. ANd thus you have a naked enumeration of the Essentials of this People of God Not a full pourtraiture of them in all their excellencies nor all the notes whereby they may be discerned which were both beyond my present purpose And though it will be part of the following Application to put you upon tryal yet because the Description is now before your eyes and these evidencing works are fresh in your memory it will not be unseasonable nor unprofitable for you to take an account of your own estates and to view your selves exactly in this glass before you pass on any further And I beseech thee Reader as thou hast the hope of a Christian yea or the reason of a man to deal throughly and search carefully and judg thy self as one that must shortly be judged by the righteous God and faithfully answer to these few Questions which I shall here propound I will not enquire whether thou remember the time or the order of these workings of the spirit There may be much uncertainly and mistake in that But I desire thee to look into thy Soul and see whether thou finde such works wrought within thee and then if thou be sure they are there the matter is not so great though thou know not when or how thou camest by them And first hast thou been throughly convinced of an universal depravation through thy whole soul and an universal wickedness through thy whole life and how vile a thing this sin is and that by the tenor of that Covenant which thou hast transgressed the least sin deserves eternal death dost thou consent to this Law that it is true and righteous Hast thou perceived thy self sentenced to this death by it and been convinced of thy natural undone condition Hast thou further seen the utter insufficiency of every Creature either to be it self thy happiness or the means of curing this thy misery and thee happy again in God Hast thou been convinced that thy happiness is only in God as the end And only in Christ as the way to him and the end also as he is one with the Father and perceived that thou must be brought to God by Christ or perish eternally Hast thou seen hereupon an absolute necessity of thy enjoying Christ And the full sufficiency that is in him to do for thee whatsoever thy case requireth by reason of the fulness of his satisfaction the greatness of his power and dignity of his person and the freeness and indefiniteness of his promises Hast thou discovered the excellency of this pearl to be worth thy selling all to buy it Hath all this been joyned with some sensibility As the convictions of a man that thirsteth of the worth of drink and not been only a change in opinion produced by reading or education as a bare notion in the understanding Hath it proceeded to an abhorring that sin I mean in the bent and prevailing inclination of thy will though the flesh do attempt to reconcile thee to it Have both thy sin and misery been a burden to thy soul and if thou couldest not weep yet couldest thou heartily groan under the insupportable weight of both Hast thou renounced all thine own Righteousness Hast thou turned thy Idols out of thy heart So that the Creature hath no more the soveraignty but is now a servant to God and to Christ Dost thou accept of Christ as thy only Saviour and expect thy Justification Recovery and glory from him alone Dost thou take him also for Lord and King and are his Laws the most powerful commanders of thy life and soul Do they ordinarily prevail against the commands of the flesh of Satan of the greatest on earth that shall countermand and against the greatest interest of thy credit profit pleasure or life So that thy conscience is directly subject to Christ alone Hath he the highest room in thy heart and affections So that though thou canst not love him as thou wouldest yet nothing else is loved so much Hast thou made a hearty Covenant to this end with him And delivered up thy self accordingly to him and takest thy self for His and not thine own Is it thy utmost care and watchful endeavor that thou maist be found faithful in this Covenant and though thou fall into sin yet wouldst not renounce thy bargain nor change thy Lord nor give up thy self to any other government for all the world If this be truly thy case thou art one of these People of God which my Text speaks of And as sure as the Promise of God is true this Blessed Rest remaines for thee Only see thou abide in Christ and continue to the end For if any draw back his soul will have no pleasure in them But if all this be
them on the left hand Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his angels For I was c. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment and the righteous into life eternal What sayest thou now to all this Wilt thou not yet believe If thou wilt not believe Christ I know not whom thou wilt believe and therefore it is in vain to perswade thee any further Only let me tell thee the time is at hand when thou wilt easily believe and that without any preaching or arguing when thou seest the great and terrible day and hearest the condemning sentence past and art thy self thrust down to Hell as Luk. 10.15 then thou shalt believe and never doubt again And do not say but thou wast told so much Surely he that so much disswades thee from believing doth yet believe and tremble himself Jam. 2.19 And whereas thou thinkest that God is more merciful why sure he knowes best his own mercifulness His mercy will not cross his Truth Cannot God be infinite in mercy except he save the wilful and rebellious Is a judg unmerciful for condemning malefactors Mercy and Justice have their several objects Thousands of humble believing obedient souls shall know to their eternall comfort that God is merciful though the refusers of his grace shall lye under Justice God will then force thy conscience to confess in Hell that God who condemned thee was yet merciful to thee Was it no mercy to be made a reasonable creature And to have Patience endure thy many yeers provocations and wait upon thee from Sermon to Sermon desiring and intreating thy repentance and return Was it no mercy to have the Son of God with all his blood and merits freely offered thee if thou wouldest but have accepted him to govern and to save thee Nay when thou hadst neglected and refused Christ once twice yea a hundred times that God should yet follow thee with invitations from day to day And shalt thou wilfully refuse mercy to the last hour and then cry out that God will not be so unmercifull as to condemn thee Thy conscience will smite thee for this madness and tell thee that God was merciful in all this though such as thou do perish for your wilfulness Yea the sense of the greatness of his mercy will then be a great part of thy torment And whereas thou thinkest the pain to be greater then the offence that is because thou art not a competent Judg Thou knowest what pain is but thou knowest not the thousand part of the evil of sin shall not the righteous Judg of the world do justly Nay it is no more then thou didst chuse thy self Did not God set before thee Life and Death and tell thee If thou wouldest accept of the Government of Christ and renounce thy Lusts that then thou shouldest have eternal Life And if thou wouldest not have Christ but the World or Flesh to rule over thee thou shouldest then endure eternal torments Did not he offer thee thy choice and bid thee take which of these thou wouldest yea and intreat thee to chuse aright And dost thou now cry out of Severity when thou hast but the consequents of thy wilful choice But it is not thy accusing God of cruelty that shall serve thy turn in stead of procuring thy escape or the mitigation of thy torments it will but make thy burthen the more heavy And whereas thou saist that thou wouldest not so torment thy own enemy I Answ. There is no Reason that thou shouldest For is it all one to offend a crawling Worm of the earth and to offend the eternal glorious God Thou hast no absolute dominion over thine enemy and there may be some fault in thy self as well as in him but with God and us the case is contrary Yet thou makest nothing of killing a Flea if it do but bite thee yea a hundred of them though they did not touch thee and yet never accusest thy self of cruelty Yea thou wilt torment thy Ox all his life time with toilsome labor and kill him at the last though he never deserved ill of thee nor disobeyed thee though thou hast over him but the borrowed authority of a superiour fellow creature and not the soveraign power of the absolute Creator Yea How commonly dost thou take away the lives of Birds and Beasts and Fishes Many times a great many of lives must be taken away to make for thee but one meal How many deaths then have been suffered in obedience to thy will from thy first Age to thy last hour and all this without any desert of the creature And must it yet seem cruelty that the Soveraign Creator who is ten thousand times more above thee then thou art above a Flea or a Toad should execute his Justice upon such a contemner of his Authority But I have given you some Reasons of this before SECT X. BUt methinks I perceive the obstinate sinner desperately resolving If I must be damned there is no remedy rather then I will live so precisely as the Scripture requireth I will put it to the venture I shall scape as well as the rest of my neighbours and as the most of the world and we will even bear it as well as we can Answ. Alas poor creature would thou didst but know what it is that thou dost so boldly venture on I dare say thou wouldest sleep this night but very unquietly Wilt thou leave thy self no room for Hope Art thou such a malicious implacable enemy to Christ and thy own soul And dost thou think indeed that thou canst bear the wrath of God and go away so easily with these eternal Torments Yet let me beg this of thee that before thou dost so flatly resolve thou wouldest lend me thine attention to these few Questions which I shall put to thee and weigh them with the reason of a man and if then thou think thou canst bear these pains I shall give thee over and say no more 1. Who art thou that thou shouldest bear the wrath of God Art thou a God or art thou a man what is thy strength to undergo so much Is it not as the strength of Wax or Stubble to resist the Fire or as Chaffe to the Winde or as the Dust before the fierce Whirlwinde Was he not as stout a man as thy self who cryed to God Job 13.25 Wilt thou break a leaf driven to and fro and wilt thou pursue the dry stubble and he that confesseth I am a worm and no man Psal 22.6 If thy strength were as iron and thy bones as brass thou couldest not bear If thy foundation were as the Earth and thy power as the Heavens yet shouldest thou perish at the breath of his Indignation How much more when thou art but a little piece of warm creeping breathing Clay kept a few days from stinking and from being eaten with Worms by the meer support and favor of him whom thou thus resistest
guilty of all the sin that he committeth in his drunkenness VVill you resolve therefore to set upon this duty and neglect it no longer Remember Eli your children are like Moses in the basket in the water ready to perish if they have not help As ever you would not be charged before God for murderers of their souls and as ever you would not have them cry out against you in everlasting fire see that you teach them how to escape it and bring them up in holiness and the fear of God You have heard that the God of heaven doth flatly command it you I charge every one of you therefore upon your allegiance to him and as you will very shortly answer the contrary at your peril that you neither refuse nor neglect this most necessary work If you are not willing now you know it to be so plain and so great a duty you are flat Rebels and no true subjects of Christ. If you are willing to do it but know not how I will adde a few words of direction to help you 1. Teach them by your own example as well as by your words Be your selves such as you would have them be practice is the most effectual teaching of children who are addicted to imitation especially of their parents Lead them the way to prayer and reading and other duties Be not like base Commanders that will put on their Soldiers but not go on themselves Can you expect your children should be wiser or better then you Let them not hear those words out of your mouths nor see those practices in your lives which you reprove in them No man shall be saved because his children are godly if he be ungodly himself Who should lead the way in holiness but the father and master of the family It is a sad time when he must be accounted a good master or father that will not hinder his family from serving God but will give them leave to go to heaven without him I will but name the rest for your direct dutie for your Family 1. You must help to inform their understandings 2. To store their memories 3. To rectifie their wills 4. To quicken their affections 5. To keep tender their consciences 6. To restrain their tongues and help them to skill in gracious Speech 7. And to reform and watch over their outward conversation To these ends First Be sure to keep them at least so long at School till they can read English It is a thousand pities that a reasonable Creature should look upon a Bible as upon a Stone or a piece of Wood. Secondly Get them Bibles and good Books and see that they read them Thirdly Examine them often what they learn Fourthly Especially bestow the Lords day in this work and see that they spend it not in sports or idleness Fiftly Shew them the meaning of what they read and learn Josh. 4 6 21 22. Psal. 78.4 5 6 34.11 Sixthly Acquaint them with the godly and keep them in good company where they may learn good and keep them out of that company that would teach them evil Seventhly Be sure to cause them to learn some Catechism containing the chief Heads of Divinity as those made by the Assembly of Divines or Master Balls SECT XVII THe Heads of Divinity which you must teach them first are these 1. That there is one onely God who is a Spirit invisible infinite eternal Almighty good merciful true just holy c. 2. That this God is one in three Father Son and holy Ghost 3. That he is the Maker Maintainer and Lord of all 4. That mans happiness consisteth in the enjoying of this God and not in fleshly pleasure profits or honors 5. That God made the first man upright and happy and gave him a Law to keep with Conditions that if he kept it perfectly he should live happy for ever but if he broke it he should die 6. That man broke this Law and so forfeited his welfare and became guilty of death as to himself and all his Posterity 7 That Christ the Son of God did here interpose and prevent the full execution undertaking to die in stead of man and so to Redeem him whereupon all things were delivered into his hands as the Redeemer and he is under that relation the Lord of all 8. That Christ hereupon did make with man a better Covenant or Law which proclaimed pardon of sin to all that did but repent and believe obey sincerely 9. That he revealed this Covenant and Mercy to the world by degrees first in darker Promises Prophecies and Sacrifices then in many Ceremonious Types and then by more plain foretellings by the Prophetâ— 10. That in the fulness of time Christ came and took our Nature into Union with his Godhead being conceived by the holy Ghost and born of the Virgin Mary 11. That while he was on earth he lived a life of sorrows was crowned with Thorns and bore the pains that our sins deserved at last being Crucified to death and buried and so satisfied the Justice of God 12. That he also Preached himself to the Jews and by constant Miracles did prove the truth of his Doctrine and Mediatorship before thousands of Witnesses That he revealed more fully his New Law or Covenant That whosoever will believe in him and accept him for Saviour and Lord shall be pardoned and saved and have a far greater glory then they lost and they that will not shall lye under the curse and guilt and be condemned to the everlasting fire of hell 13. That he rose again from the dead having conquered death and took fuller possession of his Dominion over all and so ascended up into heaven and there reigneth in glory 14. That before his Ascention he gave charge to his Apostles to go Preach the foresaid Gospel to all Nations and persons and to offer Christ and Mercy and Life to every one without exception and to intreat and perswade them to receive him and that he gave them authority to send forth others on the same Message and to Baptise and to gather Churches and confirm and order them and to settle a course for a succeâ—â—â—on of Ministers and Ordinances to the end of the world 15. That he also gave them power to work frequent and evident Miracles for the confirmation of their Doctrine and the convincing of the world and to annex their writings to the rest of the Scriptures and so to finish and seal them up and deliver them to the world as his infallible Word and Laws which none must dare to alter and which all must observe 16. That for all this free Grace is offered to the world yet the heart is by Nature so desperately wicked that no man will believe and entertain Christ sincerely except by an Almighty power he be changed and born again and therefore doth Christ send forth his Spirâ—t with his Word which secretly and effectually worketh holiness in the hearts of the Elect drawing
will not let us have our wils Sirs believe it this is the great reason of our mistakes impatience and censuring of God of our sadness of spirit at sickness and at death because we gaze on the evill it self but fix not our thoughts on what 's beyond it We look only on the blood and ruine and danger in our wars but God sees these with all the benefits to Souls Bodies Church State and Posterity all with one single view We see the Ark taken by the Philistines but see not their god falling before it and themselves returning it home with gifts They that saw Christ only on the Cross or in the Grave do shake their heads and think him lost but God saw him dying buryed rising glorified and all this with one view Surely faith will imitate God in this so far as it hath the glass of a promise to help it He that sees Joseph only in the pit or in the prison will more lament his case then he that sees his dignity beyond it Could old Jacob have seen so far it might have saved him a great deal of sorrow He that sees no more then the burying of the Corn under ground or the threshing the winnowing and grinding of it will take both it and the labour for lost but he that foresees its springing and increase and its making into bread for the life of man will think otherwise This is our mistake we see God burying us under ground but we foresee not the spring when we shall all revive we feel him threshing and winnowing and grinding us but we see not when we shall be served to our Masters table If we should but clearly see Heaven as the end of all Gods dealings with us surely none of his dealings could be so grievous Think of this I intreat thee Reader If thou canst but learn this way to Heaven and get thy soul acquainted there thou needest not be unfurnished of the choisest Cordials to revive thy spirits in every affliction thou knowest where to have them when ever thou wantest thou mayst have arguments at hand to answer all that the devil or flesh can say to thy discomfort Oh if God would once raise us to this life we should finde that though heaven and sin are at a great distance yet heaven and a prison or remotest banishment heaven and the belly of a Whale in the Sea heaven and a Den of Lions a consuming sickness or invading death are at no such distance But as Abraham so far off saw Christs day and rejoyced so we in our most forlorn estate might see that day when Christ shall give us Rest and therein rejoyce I beseech thee Christian for the honor of the Gospel and for the comfort of thy soul that thou be not to learn this heavenly Art when in thy greatest extremity thou hast most need to use it I know thou expectest suffering dayes at least thou lookest to be sick and dye thou wilt then have exceeding need of consolation why whence dost thou think to draw thy comforts If thou broach every other vessel none will come its only heaven that can afford thee store the place is far off the well is deep and if then thou have not wherewith to draw nor hast got thy soul acquainted with the place thou wilt finde thy self at a fearfull loss It s not an easie nor a common thing even with the best sort of men to die with Joy As ever thou wouldst shut up thy dayes in peace and close thy dying eyes with comfort dye daily live now above be much with Christ and thy own soul and the Saints about thee shall bless the day that ever thou tookst this Councell When God shall call thee to a sick bed and a grave thou shalt perceive him saying to thee as Isa. 26.20 Come my people enter into thy Chambers and shut thy doors about thee hide thy self as it were for a little moment untill the indignation be overpast It s he that with Stephen doth see heaven opened and Christ sitting at the right hand of God who will comfortably bear the storm of stones Acts 7.56 Thou knowest not yet what tryals thou mayst be called to The Clouds begin to rise again and the times to threaten us with fearfull darkness Few Ages so prosperous to the Church but that still we must be saved so as by fire 1 Cor. 3.15 and go to heaven by the old road Men that would fall if the storm should shake them do frequently meet with that which tryes them Why what wilt thou do if this should be thy case Art thou fitted to suffer imprisonment or banishment to bear the loss of goods and life How is it possible thou shouldst do this and do it cordially and chearfully except thou hast a tast of some greater good which thou lookest to gain by losing these will the Merchant throw his goods overboard till he sees he must otherwise lose his life And wilt thou cast away all thou hast before thou hast felt the sweetness of that Rest which else thou must lose by saving these Nay and it is not a speculative knowledg which thou hast got onely by Reading or Hearing of heaven which will make thee part with all to get it as a man that onely heares of the sweetness of pleasant food or reads of the melodious sounds of Musick this doth not much excite his desires but when he hath tried the one by his taste and the other by his ear then he will more lay out to get them so if thou shouldst know onely by the hearing of the ear what is the glory of the inheritance of the Saints this would not bring thee through sufferings and death but if thou take this Trying tasting course by daily exercising thy soul above then nothing will stand in thy way but thou wouldest on till thou were there though through fire and water What State more terrible then that of an Apostate when God hath told us If any man draw back his soul shall have no pleasure in him Heb. 10.38 Because they take not their pleasure in God and fill not themselves with the delights of his wayes and of his heavenly paths which drop fatness Psal. 65.11 Therefore do they prove backsliders in heart and are filled with the bitterness of their own wayes Prov. 14.14 Nay If they should not be brought to trial and so not actually deny Christ yet they are still interpretatively such because they are such in disposition and would be such in action if they were put to it I assure thee Reader for my part I cannot see how thou wilt be able to hold out to the end if thou keep not thine eye upon the recompence of reward and use not frequently to taste this cordially or the less thy diligence is in this the more doubtful must thy perseverance needs be for the Joy of the Lord is thy strength and that Joy must he fetcht from the place of thy Joy and if
attamen ex cis confirmari possumus credâ—re Pet. Martyr Loci Commun cap. 8 pag. 38. vid. plura ibidem f Non per alios dispositionem salutis nostrae cognovimus quam perâ— eos per quos Evangelium pervenit ad nos quod quidem tunc preconiavêrunt postea verò per Dei voluntatem in Scripturis nobis tradiderunt fundamentum columnam fidei nostrae futurum Irenaeus adver haeres l. 3. c. 1. * Aquin. summ 3. q. 55. 2. c. §. 5. What the sin against the Holy Ghost is * How Hunnius was assaulted with this temptation that he had sinned against the holy Ghost you may read in his life and death And it is stil a common temptation Matth. 12.24 c. Mar 3.28 Joh 5.39 33. 45 46 47. Joh. 15 22.24 a Act 3.17 b 1 Cor. 2.8 * Nunc non ut olim sunt necessaria miracula priusquam crederet mundus necessaria fuere ad hoc ut mundus crederet ut August de Civit. Dei lib. 22. c. 8. §. 6. * Yet do I believe that that of 2 Pet. 1.20 is generally mistaken as if the Apostle did deny private men the liberty of interpreting Scriptures even for themselves When it is in regard of the object and not of the interpreter that the Apostle calleth it Private As if he should say The Prophets are a sure Testimony of the Doctrine of Christianity but then you must understand that they are not to be interpreted of the Private men that spoke them for they were but types of Christ the Publique person so Psal. 2. 16. c. are to be interpreted of Christ and not of David only a private person and but a type of Christ in all so that Peter answereth the Question of the Eunuch in Acts 8. Of whom doth the Prophet speak of himself privately or some other more publike man This is I think the true meaning of Peter c The Vse of Church Governours and Teachers and how far they are to be obeyed d Oportet discentem credere Aristot. in Analytic post e Tit. 1.7 1 Cor. 4.1 1 Cor. 12.16.17.21 Luke 12.42 Heb. 13.3.17.24 1 Tim. 3.5 Act. 20.28 1 Tim. 3. â— 5. 1 Pet. 5.2 1 Cor. 4.15 d Haec duo dictat ipsa ratio Primò In mysteriis quae superant rationem non nitendum esse ratiocinantis Logicá sed Revelantis authoritate Secundò In consequentiis deducendis aut obscuris in Religione interpretandis magis fidendum esse caetui in nomine Domini legitimè congregatis quam privatis spiritibus seorsim sapientibus recalcitrantibus Doct. Prideaux Lect. 22. de Auth. Eccl. pag. 361. See Doctor Jackson Eternall truth of Scripture lib. 2. chap. 1.2 3 4 5 6. * I may say of many of them for doctrine as Fulbeck of Bracton Britton c. Direct p. 27. There be certaine ancient writers whom as it is not unprofitable to read so to relye on them is dangerous their books are Monumenta adorandae rubiginis of more reverence then authority Argument 2. § 1. I take it for granted that good Angels could not be guilty of forging the Scripture § 2. Not of man * Mahâ—mâ—â— was 〈…〉 by the Arabian soldiers for their commander In his Alcoâ—an he confesseth himself to be a sinner an Idolater an Adulterer given to Lechery His Laws run thus Avenge your selves of your enemies Take as many wives as you can keep and spare not Kill the Infidels he that fighteth lazily shall be damned and he that killeth most shall be in Paradise He saith that Christ had the Spirit and Power of God and the soul of God and that he is Christs servant See Alcoran Azoar 2.3.6 Also Azoar 18.4.11.13 He confesseth that Christ is the Spirit and word and messenger of God that his doctrine iâ— perfect that it enlighteneth the old Testament and that he came to confirm it yet denyeth him to be God Magnus fuit Sanctus magnus Dei amicus magnus propheta c. Vide Thom. Bradwardin de Causa Dei lib. 1. cap. 1. Corol. part 32. § 3. Vid. Wigandum in Method ante comment in mino prophetas Joh. 7 48.49 Acts 10. § 4. Argum. 3. §. 1. Object §. 2. * Cum Romani in victoriosae antiquitatis memoriam templum singulari schemate a facere decrevissent ab omni illâ deorum immo daemoniorum multitudinâ— quaesierunt usquequo durare pusset tam excellentis operis tam operosa constructio Responsum est Donec virgo pareret Illi ad impossibilitatem Oraculum retorquentes templum aeternum solennem illam machinam vocaverunt Nocte autem cum virginali thalamo virginius flos Mariae egressus est ita cecidit confractum est illud mirabile et columnarium opus ut vix appareant vestigia ruinarum Bernard in Natal Domini Serm. 23. 1 Sam. 7.12 * To speak my heart All that I fear is lest Master Herbert be a true Prophet and the Gospel be in its solar motion travelling for the West and American parts and qultting its present places of residence and unworthy professours and possessours And then farewell England But else not §. 3. * Not that Miracles are still necessary but speciall providences do much confirme Nec jam opus est Miraculus cum in omnem terram verbum sonuerit Doct. Humfredus Jesiutis part 1. pag. 114. §. 4. * About the time of the silencing of Ministers how many Churches in England were torne at once with terrible lightning and almost no place else but Churches were touched especially in the lower part of Devonshire where many were scorched maimed and some their brains struck out as they sat in Church And at the Church of Anthony in Cornwall neer Plimouth on Witsunday 1640. See the Relation in Print §. 5. * Was it not neer a Miracle that God wrought for Mistris Honywood when she threw the glass up to the wall saying if this glassbreak not I may be saved c. and yet took it up whole §. 6. Psal. 2.2 3 4 5. a Morneâ— Grotius Doct. Jaâ—â—son Parsons Resolut part 2. c. b Ask them in New England whether Mistris Hutchinsons and Mistris Dyers most hideous monstrous births were not convincing providences against their Antinomian Anti-scriptural heresies as if God from heaven had spoke against them and yet Old England will not take warning See Nicephor Eccl. hist. Tem. 1. li. 4. cap. 13. where Tertulli Jul. Capitolinus Orosius c. do mention c The Legion of Malta in the time of Mar. Aurelius who procured by prayer both Thunder on the enemies and raine for the Army See the Epist. of M. Aurelius in Justin Martyrs Apolo Xiphitin in Vita Aurelij Melch. Adam in vita Myconij Recorded by Sozom. and others Jam. 5.13 14 15 16. Psal. 73.26 August de Civitate Dei lib. 33. Argum. 4. §. 1. §. 2. Lege Epistolam Vâ—ssii de Samuele apparente Saulo in Joan Beverovitii Epistolis Et D. Prideaux Hypomnemata pag. 261 262
THE Saints Everlasting Rest OR A TREATISE Of the Blessed State of the SAINTS in their enjoyment of GOD in Glory Wherein is shewed its Excellency and Certainty the Misery of those that lose it the way to Attain it and Assurance of it and how to live in the continual delightful Forecasts of it by the help of Meditation Written by the Author for his own use in the time of his languishing when God took him off from all Publike Imployment and afterwards Preached in his weekly Lecture And now published by Richard Baxter Teacher of the Church of Kederminster in Worcestershire My flesh and my heart faileth but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever Psal. 73.26 If in this life onely we have hope in Christ we are of all men most miserable 1 Cor. 15.19 Set your affections on things above and not on things on the Earth For ye are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God When Christ who is our life shall appear then shall ye also appear with him in glory Col. 3.2 3 4. Because I live ye shall live also John 14.19 Jan. 15. 1649. Imprimatur Joseph Caryl London Printed by Rob. White for Thomas Vnderhil and Francis Tyton and are to be sold at the Blue-Anchor and Bible in Pauls Church-yard near the little North-door and at the three Daggers in Fleetstreet near the Inner-Temple-gate 1650. To my dearly beloved Friends the Inhabitants of the Burrough and Forreign OF KEDERMINSTER Both Magistrates and People My dear Friends IF either I or my labors have any thing of publike use or worth it is wholly though not onely yours And I am convinced by Providence That it is the Will of God it should be so This I clearly discerned in my first coming to you in my former abode with you and in the time of my forced absence from you When I was separated by the miseries of the late unhappy war I durst not fix in any other Congregation but lived in a military unpleasing state lest I should forestal my return to you for whom I took my self reserved The offers of greater worldly accommodations with five times the means which I receive with you was no temptation to me once to question whether I should leave you Your free invitation of my return your obedience to my Doctrine the strong affection which I have yet towards you above all people and the general hearty return of Love which I finde from you do all perswade me that I was sent into this world especially for the service of your souls And that even when I am dead I might yet be a help to your salvation the Lord hath forced me quite besides my own resolution to write this Treatise and leave it in your hands It was far from my thoughts ever to have become thus publike and burdened the world with any writings of mine Therefore have I oft resisted the requests of my reverend Brethren and some Superiors who might else have commanded much more at my hands But see how God over ruleth and crosseth our resolutions Being in my quarters far from home cast into extream languishing by the sudden loss of about a Gallon of blood after many yeers foregoing weakness and having no acquaintance about me nor any Books but my Bible and living in continual expectation of death I bent my thoughts on my Everlasting Rest And because my memory through extream weakness was imperfect I took my pen and began to draw up my own funeral Sermon or some helps for my own Meditations of Heaven to sweeten both the Rest of my life and my death In this condition God was pleased to continue me about five moneths from home where being able for nothing else I went on with this work which so lengthened to this which here you see It is no wonder therefore if I be too abrupt in the beginning seeing I then intended but the length of a Sermon or two Much less may you wonder if the whole be very imperfect seeing it was written as it were with one foot in the grave by a man that was betwixt living and dead that wanted strength of nature to quicken Invention or Affection and had no Book but his Bible while the chief part was finished nor had any minde of humane ornaments if he had been furnished But O how sweet is this Providence now to my review which so happily forced me to that work of Meditation which I had formerly found so profitable to my soul and shewed me more mercy in depriving me of other helps then I was aware of and hath caused my thoughts to feed on this Heavenly Subject which hath more benefited me then all the studies of my life And now dear Friends such as it is I here offer it you and upon the bended knees of my soul I offer up my thanks to the merciful God who hath fetched up both me and it as from the grave for your service Who reversed the sentence of present death which by the ablest Physitians was past upon me who interrupted my publike labors for a time that he might force me to do you a more lasting service which else I had never been like to have attempted That God do I heartily bless and magnifie who hath rescued me from the many dangers of four yeers war and after so many tedious nights and days and so many doleful fights and tidings hath returned me and many of your selves and reprived us till now to serve him in peace And though men be ungrateful and my body ruined beyond hope of recovery yet he hath made up all in the comforts I have in you To the God of mercy do I here offer my most hearty thanks and pay the vows of acknowledgment which I oft made in my distress who hath not rejected my prayers which in my dolor I put up but hath by a wonder delivered me in the midst of my duties and hath supported me this fourteen yeers in a languishing state wherein I have scarce had a waking hour free from pain who hath above twenty several times delivered me when I was neer to death And though he hath made me spend my days in groans and tears and in a constant expectation of my change yet hath he not wholly disabled me to his service and hereby hath more effectually subdued my pride and made this world contemptible to me and forced my dull heart to more importunate requests and occasioned more rare discoveries of his Mercy then ever I could have expected in a prosperous state For ever blessed be the Lord that hath not onely honored me to be a Minister of his Gospel but hath also set me over a people so willing to obey and given me that success of my labors which he hath denied to many more able and faithful who hath kept you in the zealous practice of godliness when so many grow negligent or despise the Ordinances of God who hath kept you stable in his
my Aphorisms of Justification shew which I wrote to cut the unobserved Sinews of Antinomianism and open the true Scripture Mean in that point and which I am more confirmed in the truth of now then ever by the weakness of all that I can yet hear against it and yet if I should zealously press my judgment on others and seek to make a partie for it and disturb the Peace of the Church and separate from my Brethren I should fear lest I should prove a fire-brand in Hell for being a fire-brand in the Church And for all the interest I have in your Judgments and Affections I here charge you That if God should give me up to any factious Church-rending course against which I daily pray that you forsake me and follow me not a step And for Peace with one another follow it with all your might If it be possible as much as in you lieth live peaceably with all men Rom. 12.18 mark this When you feel any sparks of discontent in your brest take them as kindled by the Divel from Hell and take heed you cherish them not If the flames begin to break forth in Censoriousness Reproaches and hard Speeches of others be as speedy and busie in quenching it as if it were fire in the Thatch of your houses For why should your houses be dearer to you then the Church which is the house of God or then your souls which are the Temples of the Holy Ghost If any heart-burnings arise do not keep strange but go together and lovingly debate it or pray together that God would reconcile you or refer the matter to your Minister or others and let not the Sun go down on your wrath Hath God spoke more against any sin then unpeaceableness If ye forgive not men their trespasses neither will your heavenly Father forgive you which made Endovicus Crocius say That this is the measure and essential propertie of the lest degree of true Faith Syntag. lib. 4. cap. 16. If you love not each other you are no Disciples of Christ nay if you love not your enemies and bless not them that curse you and pray not for them that hurt and persecute you you are no Children of God The Wisdom from above is first pure then peaceable gentle easie to be intreated c. Jam. 3.17 O remember that piercing example of Christ who washed his Disciples feet to teach us that we must stoop as low to one another Sure God doth not jest with you in all these plain Scriptures I charge you in the Name of Christ if you cannot have peace otherwise That you suffer wrongs and reproaches that you go and beg peace of those that should beg it of you yea that you beg it on your knees of the poorest beggar rather then lose it And remember Rom. 16.17 18. 7. Above all be sure you get down the pride of your hearts Forget not all the Sermons I preached to you against this sin No sin more natural more common or more deadly A proud man is his own Idol onely from pride cometh contention There is no Lâ—ving in peace with a proud person Every disrespect will cast them into a Feaver of discontent If once you grow wise in your own eyes and love to be valued and preferred and love those best that think highliest of you and have secret heart-risings against any that disregard you or have a low esteem of you and cannot endure to be flighted or spoke evil of never take your selves for Christians if this be your case To be a true Christian without Humilitie is as hard as to be a man without a Soul O poor England How low art thou brought by the Pride of Ignorant Zealots Dear Friends I can foretel you without the gift of prophecy That if any among you do fall from the Truth mark which are the proudest that cannot endure to be contradicted and that vilifie others and those will likely be they And if ever you be broke in pieces and ruined Pride will be the cause 8. Be sure you keep the mastery over your flesh and senses Few ever fall from God but flesh-pleasing is the cause Many think that by flesh the Scripture means onely our in-dwelling sin when alas it is this sensitive appetite that it chargeth us to subdue Nothing in the world damneth so many as flesh-pleasing while men generally chuse it as their Happiness in stead of God O remember who hath said If ye live after the flesh ye shall die and Make no provision for the flesh to satisfie its desires Rom 8.5 6 7. and 13.14 Think of this when you are tempted to drunkenness and gluttony and lustfulness and worldliness and when you would fain have your dwellings and states more delightful You little think what a sin it is even to please your flesh further then it tends to help you in the service of God 9. Make conscience of the great duty of reproving and exhorting those about you Make not your souls guilty of the oaths ignorance and ungodliness of others by your silence Admonish them lovingly and modestly but be sure you do it and that seriously This is the first step in Discipline Expect not that your Minister should put any from the Sacrament whom you have not thus admonished once and again Punish not before due process 10. Lastly Be sure to maintain a constant delight in God and a seriousness and spirituality in all his Worship Think it not enough to delight in Duties if you delight not in God Judg not of your duties by the bulk and number but by this sweetness You are never stable Christians till you reach this Never forget all those Sermons I preached to you on Psal 37.4 Give not way to a customary dulness in duty Do every duty with all thy might especially be not slight in secret Prayer and Meditation Lay not out the chief of your zeal upon externals and opinions and the smaller things of Religion Let must of your daily work be upon your hearts Be still suspicious of them understand their mortal wickedness and deceitfulness and trust them not too far Practise that great duty of daily watching pray earnestly That you be not lead into temptation Fear the beginings and appearances of sin Beware lest Conscience once lose its tenderness Make up every breach between God and your consciences betime Learn how to live the life of Faith and keep fresh the sense of the love of Christ and of your continual need of his Blood Spirit and Intercession And how much you are beholden and engaged to him Live in a constant readiness and expectation of death and be sure to get acquainted with this Heavenly Conversation which this Book is written to direct you in which I commend to your use hoping you will be at the pains to read it as for your sakes I have been to write it And I shall beg for you of the Lord while I live on this Earth That he will perswade
Now we are stupified with vile and sensless hearts that can hear all the story of this Bloody Love and read all the dolors and sufferings of Love and hear all his sad complaints and all with dulness and unaffected He cries to us Behold and see Is it nothing to you O all ye that pass by Is there any sorrow like unto my sorrow Lamen 1.12 and we will scarce hear or regard the dolorous voyce nor scarce turn aside to view the wounds of him who turned aside and took us up to heal our wounds at this so dear a rate But Oh then our perfected Souls will feel as well as hear and with feeling apprehensions flame again in Love for Love Now we set his picture wounded and dying before our eyes but can get it no neerer our hearts then if we beleeved nothing of what we read But then when the obstructions between the eye and the understanding are taken away and the passage opened between the head and the heart surely our eyes will everlastingly affect our heart and while we view with one eye our slain-revived Lord and with the other eye our lost-recovered Souls and transcendent Glory these views will eternally pierce us and warm our very Souls And those eyes through which folly and lust hath so often stole into our hearts shall now be the Casements to let in the Love of our dearest Lord for ever Now though we should as some do travel to Jerusalem and view the Mount of Olives where he prayed and wept and see the Dolorons way by which he bare his Cross and enter the Temple of the Holy Grave yea if we should with Peter have stooped down and seen the place where he lay and behold his Relicts yet these Bolted doors of sin and flesh would have kept out the feeling of all that Love But Oh! that 's the Joy we shall then leave these hearts of stone and Rock behinde us and the sin that here so close besets us and the sottish unkindness that followed us so long shall not be able to follow us into that Glory But we shall behold as it were the wounds of Love with eyes and hearts of Love for ever Suppose a little to help our apprehensions that a Saint who hath partaked of the Joys of Heaven had been translated from as long an abode in Hell and after the experience of such a change should have stood with Mary and the rest by the Cross of Christ and have seen the Blood and heard the Groans of his Redeemer What think you Would love have stirred in his Brest or no Would the voyce of his dying Lord have melted his heart or no Oh that I were sensible of what I speak With what astonishing apprehensions then will Redeemed Saints everlastingly behold their Blessed Redeemer I will not meddle with their vain audacious Question who must needs know whether the glorified body of Christ do yet retain either the wounds or scars But this is most certain that the memory of it will be as fresh and the impressions of Love as deep and its workings as strong as if his wounds were still in our eyes and his complaints still in our ears and his blood still streaming afresh Now his heart is open to us and ours shut to him But when his heart shall be open and our Hearts open Oh the Blessed Congress that there will then be What a passionate meeting was there between our new-risen Lord and the first sinful silly woman that he appears to How doth Love struggle for expressions and the straitned fire shut up in the brest strive to break forth Mary saith Christ Master saith Mary and presently she clasps about his feet having her heart as neer to his heart as her hands were to his feet What a meeting of Love then will there be between the new glorified Saint and the Glorious Redeemer But I am here at a loss my apprehensions fail me and fall so short Onely this I know it will be the singular praise of our inheritance that it was bought with the price of that blood and the singular Joy of the Saints to behold the purchaser and the price together with the possession Neither will the views of the wounds of Love renew our wounds of sorrow He whose first words after his Resurrection were to a great sinner Woman why weepest thou knows how to raise Love and Joy by all those views without raising any cloud of sorrow or storm of tears at all He that made the Sacramental Commemoration of his Death to be his Churches Feast will sure make the real enjoyment of its blessed purchase to be marrow and fatness And if it afforded Joy to hear from his mouth This is my Body which is given for you and This is my Blood which was shed for you What Joy will it afford to hear This Glory is the fruit of my Body and my Blood and what a merry feast will it be when we shall drink of the fruit of the Vine new with him in the Kingdom of his Father as the fruit of his own Blood David would not drink of the waters which he longed for because they were the blood of those men who jeoparded their lives for them and thought them fitter to offer to God then to please him But we shall value these waters more highly and yet drink them the more sweetly because they are the Blood of Christ not jeoparded onely but shed for them They will be the more sweet and dear to us because they were so bitter and Dear to him If the buyer be judicious we estimate things by the price they cost If any thing we enjoy were purchased with the life of our dearest friend how highly should we value it Nay if a Dying Friend deliver us but a token of his Love how carefully do we preserve it and still remember him when we behold it as if his own name were written on it And will not then the Death and Blood of our Lord everlastingly sweeten our possessed Glory Methinks England should value the plenty of the Gospel with their Peace and Freedom at a higher rate when they remember what it hath cost How much precious blood How many of the Lives of Gods worthies and our most dear friends besides all other cost Methinks when I am with freedom preaching or hearing or living I see my dying friends before mine eyes whose blood was shâ—d for this and look the more respectively on them yet living whose frequent dangers did procure it Oh then when we are rejoycing in Glory how shall we think of the blood that revived our Souls and how shall we look upon him whose sufferings did put that Joy into our hearts How carefully preserve we those prizes which with greatest hazard we gained from the enemy Goliahs sword must be kept as a Trophie and layd up behinde the Ephod and in a time of need David says There 's none to that Surely when
we do divide the spoil and partake of the prize which our Lord so dearly won we shall say indeed There 's none to that How dear was Jonathans Love to David which was testified by stripping himself of the Robe that was upon him and giving it David and his garments even to his sword and to his bow and to his girdle and also by saving him from his fathers wrath How dear for ever will the Love of Christ be then to us who stripped himself as it were of his Majesty and Glory and put our man Garment of flesh upon him that he might put the Robes of his own Righteousness and Glory upon us and saved us not from cruel injustice but from his Fathers deserved wrath Well then Christians as you use to do in your Books and on your Goods to write down the price they cost you so do on your Righteousness and on your Glory write down the price The Precious Blood of Christ Yet understand this rightly Not that this highest Glory was in strictest proper sense purchased or that it was the most immediate Effect of Christs death We must take heed that we conceive not of God as a Tyrant who so delighteth in cruelty as to exchange mercies for stripes or to give a Crown on condition he may torment men God was never so pleased with the sufferings of the Innocent much lesse of his Sonne as to sell his mercy properly for their sufferings Fury dwelleth not in him nor doth he willingly correct the sons of men nor take pleasure in the death of him that dieth But the sufferings of Christ were primarily and immediatly to satisfie the justice that required blood and to bear what was due to the sinner and to receive the blow that should have fallen upon him so to restore him to the life he lost and the happiness he fell from But this dignity which surpasseth the first is as it were from the redundancy of his merit or a secondary fruit of his death The work of his Redemption so well pleased the Father that he gave him power to advance his chosen to a higher dignity then they fell from and to give them the glory which was given to himself and all this according to his counsell and the good pleasure of his own will SECT II. 2. THe Second Pearl in the Saints Diadem is that It 's Free This seemeth as Pharoahs second Kine to devour the former and as the Angell to Balaam To meet it with a drawne sword of a full opposition But the seeming discord is but a pleasing diversity composed into that harmony which constitutes the Melody These two Attributes Purchased and Free are the two chaines of Gold which by their pleasant twisting doe make up that wreath for the heads of the Pillars in the Temple of God It was deare to Christ but free to us When Christ was to buy silver and gold was nothing worth Prayers and Tears could not suffice nor any thing below his Blood But when we come to buy the price is fallen to just nothing Our buying is but receiving we have it freely without money and without price Nor doe the Gospell-conditions make it lesse Free or the Covenant tenor before mentioned contradict any of this If the Gospell-conditions had been such as are the Laws or payment of the debt required at our hands the freeness then were more questionable Yea if God had said to us Sinners if you will satisfie my Justice but for one of your sins I will forgive you all the rest it would have been a hard condition on our part and the Grace of the Covenant not so Free as our disability doth necessarily require But if all the Condition be our cordiall acceptation surely we deserve not the name of Purchasers Thankfull accepting of a free acquittance is no paying of the Debt If life be offered to a condemned man upon condition that he shall not refuse the offer I think the favour is never the lesse free Nay though the condition were that he should begge and wait before he have his pardon and take him for his Lord who hath thus redeemed him All this is no satisfying of the justice of the Law Especially when the condition is also given as it is by God to all his chosen surely then here 's all free If the Father freely give the Son and the Son freely pay the debt and if God do freely accept that way of payment when he might have required it of the principall and if both Father and Sonne do freely offer us the purchased life upon those fair conditions and if they also freely send the Spirit to inable us to perform those conditions then what is here that is not free Is not every Stone that builds this Temple Free-Stone Oh the everlasting admiration that must needs surprize the Saints to think of this Freenesse What did the Lord see in me that he should judge me meet for such a State That I who was but a poor diseaâ—ed despised wretch should be clad in the brightnesse of this Glory That I a silly creeping breathing worm should be advanced to this high dignity That I who was but lately groaning weeping dying should now be as full of joy as my heart can hold Yea should be taken from the grave where I was rotting and stinking and from the dust and darkness where I seemed forgotten and here set before his Throne that I should be taken with Mordecai from captivity to be set next unto the King and with Daniel from the Den to be made ruler of Princes and Provinces and with Saul from seeking Asses to be advanced to a Kingdom Oh who can fathom unmeasurable Love Indeed if the proud hearted selfe-ignorant selfe-admiring sinners should be thus advanced who think none so fit for preferment as themselves perhaps instead of admiring free Love they would with those unhappy Angels be discontented yet with their estate But when the selfe-denying selfe-accusing humble soule who thought himselfe unworthy the ground he trod on and the aire he breathed in unworthy to eat drink or live when he shall be taken vp into this Glory He who durst â—carce come among or speak to the imperfect Saints on earth because he was unworthy he who durst scarce hear or scarce read the Scripture or scarce pray and call God Father oâ— scarce receive the Sacraments of his Covenant and all because he was unworthy For this soul to finde it self rapt up into heaven and closed in the armes of Christ even in a moment Do but think with your selves what the transporting astonishing admiration of such a soule will be He that durst not lift up his eyes to heaven but stood a farre off smiting on his brest and crying Lord be mercifull to me a sinner now to be lift up to heaven himself He who was wont to write his name in Bradfords stile The unthankâ—full the hard-hearted the unworthy sinner And was wont to
every passage of the Blessed Gospel Enough one would think to enter and force the dullest Soul and wholly possess its thoughts and affections and yet how oft doth it fall as water upon a stone And how easily can our hearers sleep out a Sermon time â— and much because these words of Life do die in the delivery and the Fruit of our Conception is almost Still-born Our peoples Spirits remain congealed while we who are entrusted with the Word that should melt them do suffer it to freez between our Lips We speak indeed of Soul-concerning Truths and set before them Life and Death But it is with such Self-seeking affectation and in such a lazy formal customary strain like the pace the Spaniard rides that the people little think we are in good sadness or that our Hearts do mean as our Tongues do speak I have heard of some Tongues that can lick a coâ—l of fire till it be cold I fear these Tongues are in most of our Mouths and that the Breath that is given us to blow up this fire till it flame in our Peoples Souls is rather used to blow it out Such Preaching is it that hath brought the most to hear Sermons as they say their Creed and Pater Nosters even as a few good words of course How many a cold and mean Sermon that yet contains most precious Truths The things of God which we handle are Divine but our maner of handling too Humane And there 's little or none that ever we touch but we leave the print of our fingers behinde us but if God should speak this Word himself it would be a piercing melting Word indeed How full of comfort are the Gospel Promises yet do we oft so heartlesly declare them that the broken bleeding-hearted Saints are much deprived of their Joyes Christ is indeed a precious Pearl but oft held forth in Leprous hands And thus do we disgrace the Riches of the Gospel when it is the Work of our Calling to make it honorable in the eyes of men and we dim the glory of that Jewel by our dull and low expressions and dunghil conversations whose lustre we do pretend to discover while the hearers judg of it by our expressions and not its proper genuine worth The truth is the best of men do apprehend but little of what God in his Word expresseth and what they do apprehend they are unable to utter Humane language is not so copious as the hearts conceivings are and what we possibly might declare yet through our own unbelief stupidity laziness and other corruptions we usually fail in and what we do declare yet the darkness of our peoples understandings and the sad senslesness of their hearts doth usually shut out and make voyd So that as all the Works of God are perfect in their season as he is perfect so are all the works of man as himself imperfect And those which God performeth by the hand of man will too much savor of the instrument If an Angel from Heaven should preach the Gospel yet could he not deliver it according to its glory muchless we who never saw what they have seen and keep this Treasure in Earthen Vessels The comforts that flow through Sermons through Sacraments through Reading and Company and Conference and Creatures are but half comforts and the Life that comes by these is but a half life in comparison of those which the Almighty shall speak with his own mouth and reach forth to us with his own hand The Christian knows by experience now that his most immediate Joyes are his sweetest Joyes which have least of man and are most directly from the Spirit That 's one reason as I conceive why Christians who are much in secret prayer and in meditation and contemplation rather then they who are more in hearing reading and conference are men of greatest life and joy because they are nearer the Well-head and have all more immediately from God himself And that I conceive the reason also Why we are more undisposed to those secret duties and can easilier bring our hearts to hear and read and confer then to secret Prayer Self-examination and Meditation because in the former is more of man and in these we approach the Lord alone and our Natures draw back from the most spiritual and fruitful Duties Not that we should therefore cast off the other and neglect any Ordinance of God To live above them while we use them is the way of a Christian But so to live above Ordinances as to live without them is to live without the compass of the Gospel Lines and so without the Government of Christ. Let such beware least while they would be higher then Christians they prove in the end lower then men We are not yet come to the time and state where we shall have all from Gods immediate hand As God hath made all Creatures and instituted all Ordinances for us so will he continue our need of all We must yet be contented with Love-tokens from him till we come to receive our All in him We must be thankful if Joseph sustain our lives by relieving us in our Famine with his Provisions till we come to see his own face There 's joy in these remote receivings but the fulness is in his own presence O Christians you will then know the difference betwixt the Creature and Creator and the content that each of them affords We shall then have Light without a Candle and a perpetual day without the Sun For the City hath no need of the Sun neither of the Moon to shine in it for the glory of God doth lighten it and the Lamb is the light thereof Revel 21.23 Nay There shall be no night there and they need no candle nor light of the Sun for the Lord God giveth them light and they shall reign for ever and ever Revel 22.5 We shall then have rest without sleep and be kept from cold without our cloathing and need no Fig-leaves to hide our shame For God will be our Rest and Christ our cloathing and shame and sin will cease together We shall then have health without Physick and strength without the use of food for the Lord God will be our strength and the light of his countenance will be health to our souls and marrow to our bones We shall then and never till then have enlightened understandings without Scriptures and be governed without a written Law For the Lord will perfect his Law in our hearts and we shall be all perfectly taught of God his own will shall be our Law and his own face shall be our light for ever Then shall we have joy which we drew not from the promises nor was fetcht us home by Faith or Hope Beholding and possessing will exclude the most of these We shall then have Communion without Sacraments when Christ shall drink with us of the fruit of the Vine new that is Refresh us with the comforting Wine of immediate fruition in the
of few Cities The best Wheat may be cut down before its ripe Therefore it is promised to the Righteous as a blessing that they shall be brought as a shock of Corn into the Barn in season Nay it s possible he may die by his own hands Though some Divines think such Doctrine not fit to be taught least it encourage the tempted to commit the same sin but God hath left preservatives enough against sin without our devising more of our own neither hath he need of our lie in his glory He hath fixed that principle so deep in Nature that all should endeavor their own preservation that I never knew any whose understanding was not crazed or lost much subject to that sin even most of the Melancholly are more fearful to die then other men And this terror is preservative enough of that kinde That such committing of a hainous known Sin is a sad sign where there is the free use of Reason That therefore they make their Salvation more questionable That they die most woful scandals to the Church That however the sin it self should make the godly to abhor it were there no such danger or scandal attending it c. But to exclude from salvation of all those poor creatures who in Feavers Phrensies Madness Melancholly c. shall commit this sin is a way of prevention which Scripture teacheth not and too uncomfortable to the friends of the deceased The common argument which they urge drawn from the necessity of a particular repentance for every particular known sin as it is not universally true so were it granted it would exclude from salvation all men breathing For there was never any man save Christ who died not in some particular sin either of Commission or Omission great or small which he hath no more time to repent of then the sinner in Question But yet this may well be called untimely death But in the ordinary course of Gods dealings you may easily observe that he purposely maketh his peoples last hour in this life to be of all other to the flesh most bitter and in the Spirit most sweet and that they who feared death through the most of their lives yet at last are more willing of it then ever and all to make their Rest more seasonable Bread and drink are alway good but at such a time as Samarias siege to have plenty of food in stead of Doves dung in one nights space or in such a thirst as Ishmaels or Sampsons to have supply of water by miracle in a moment these are seasonable So this Rest is always good to the Saints and usually also is most seasonable Rest. SECT VII SEventhly A further excellency of this Rest is this As it will be a seasonable so a suitable Rest Suited 1. To the Natures 2. To the desires 3. To the necessities of the Saints 1. To their Natures If sutableness concur not with excellency the best things may be bad to us For it is that which makes things good in themselves to be good to us In our choice of friends we oft pass by the more excellent to chuse the more suitable Every good agrees not with every nature To live in a free and open air under the warming Rayes of the Sun is excellent to man because suitable But the flesh which is of another nature doth rather chuse another element and that which is to us so excellent would quickly be to it destructive The choicest dainties which we feed upon our selves would be to our Beast as an unpleasing so an insufficient sustenance The Iron which the Ostrich well digests would be but hard food for man Even among men contrary appetites delight in contrary objects You know the Proverb One mans meat is another mans poyson Now here is suitableness and excellency conjoyned The new nature of the Saints doth suit their Spirits to this Rest And indeed their holiness is nothing else but a sparke taken from this Element and by the Spirit of Christ kindled in their hearts the flame whereof as mindful of its own Divine original doth ever mount the soul aloft and tend to the place from whence it comes It worketh towards its own Center and makes us Restless till there we Rest. Gold and earthly Glory temporal Crowns and Kingdoms could not make a rest for Saints As they were not Redeemed with so low a price so neither are they indued with so low a nature These might be a portion for lower spirits and fit those whose natures they suit with but so they cannot a Saint-like nature As God will have from them a Spiritual VVorship suitable to his own Spiritual Being so will he provide them a spiritual Rest suitable to his peoples spiritual nature As Spirits have not fleshly substances so neither delight they in fleshly pleasures These are too gross and vile for them When carnal persons think of Heaven their conceivings of it are also carnal and their notions answerable to their own natures And were it possible for such to enjoy it it would sure be their trouble and not their Rest because so contrary to their dispositions A Heaven of good-fellowship of wine and wantonness of gluttony and all voluptuousness would far better please them as being more agreeing to their natures But a heaven of the knowledg of God and his Christ a delightful complacency in that mutual love an everlasting rejoycing in the fruition of our God a perpetual singing of his high praises this is a heaven for a Saint a spiritual Rest suitable to a spiritual nature Then dear friends we shall live in our own element We are now as the fish in some small vessel of water that hath only so much as will keep him alive but what is that to the full Ocean we have a little Air let in to us to afford us breathing but what is that to the sweet and fresh gales upon Mount Sion we have a beam of the Sun to lighten our darkness and a warm Ray to keep us from freezing but then we shall live in its light and be revived by its heat for ever O blessed be that hand which fetcht a coal and kindled a fire in our dead hearts from that same Altar where we must offer our Sacrifice everlastingly To be lockt up in Gold and in Pearl would be but a wealthy starving to have our Tables with Plate and ornament richly furnished without meat is but to be richly famished to be lifted up with humane applause is but a very airy felicity to be advanced to the Soveraignty of all the Earth would be but to wear a Crown of Thorns to be filled with the knowledg of Arts and Sciences would be but to further the conviction of our unhappiness But to have a nature like God his very Image holy as he is holy and to have God himself to be our happiness how well do these agree Whether that in 2 Pet. 1.4 be meant as is
be gluttonous no more nor oppress the innocent nor grind the poor nor devour the houses and estates of their brethren nor be revenged on their enemies nor persecute and destroy the members of Christ All these and many more actual sins will then be laid aside But this is not from any renewing of their natures they have the same dispositions still and fain they would commit the same sins if they could they want but opportunity they are now tied up it is part of their torment to be denied these their pleasures No thanks to them that they sin not as much as ever Their hearts are as bad though their actions are restrained Nay it is a great question whether those remainders of good which were left in their natures on earth as their common honesty and morall vertues be not all taken from them in Hell according to that From him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath This is the judgment of Divines generally But because it is questionable and much may be said against it I will let that pass But certainly they shall have none of the Glorious perfection of the Saints either in soul or body There will be a greater difference between these wretches and the glorified Christian then there is betwixt a Toad under a sill and the Sun in the Firmament The rich mans purple robes and delicious fare did not so exalt him above Lazarus at his door in scabs nor make the difference between them so wide as it is now made on the contrary in their vast separation SECT IV. SEcondly But the great loss of the damned will be their loss of God they shall have no comfortable relation to him Nor any of the Saints communion with him As they did not like to retain God in knowledg but did him Depart from us we desire not the knowledg of thy wayes So God will abhor to retain them in his houshold or to give them entertainment in his Fellowship and Glory He will never admit them to the inheritance of his Saints nor endure them to stand amongst them in his presence but bid them Depart from me ye workers of iniquity I know you not Now these men dare belye the Lord if not blaspheme in calling him by the title of Their Father How boldly and conâ—idently do they daily approach him with their lips and indeed reproach him in their formall prayers with that appellation Our Father As if God would Father the Divels children or as if the slighters of Christ the pleasers of the flesh the friends of the world the haters of godliness or any that trade in sin and delight in iniquity were the Off-spring of Heaven They are ready now in the height of their presumption to lay as confident claim to Christ and heaven as if they were sincere believing Saints The Swearer the Drunkard the Whoremaster the Worldling can scornfully say to the People of God What is not God our Father as well as yours Doth he not love us as well as you Will he save none but a few holy Precisians O but when that time is come when the case must be decided and Christ will separate his followers from his foes and his faithfull friends from his deceived flatterers where then will be their presumptuous claim to Christ Then they shall finde that God is not their Father but their resolved foe because they would not be his people but were resolved in their negligence and wickedness Then though they had preached or wrought miracles in his name he wil not know them And though they were his Brethren or sisters after the flesh yet will he not own them but reject them as his enemies And even those that did eat and drink in his presence on earth shall be cast out of his heavenly presence for ever And those that in his name did cast out Divels shall yet at his command be cast out to those Divels and endure the torments prepared for them And as they would not consent that God should by his Spirit dwell in them so shall not these evil doers dwell with him the Tabernacles of wickedness shall have no fellowship with him nor the wicked inhabit the City of God For without are the Dogs the Sorcerers Whoremongers Murderers Idolaters and whatsoever loveth and maketh a lye For God knoweth the way of the righous but the way of the wicked leads to perishing God is first enjoyed in part on earth before he be fully enjoyed in Heaven It is only they that walked with him here who shall live and be happy with him there O little doth the world now know what a loss that soul hath who loseth God! VVhat were the world but a dungeon if it had lost the Sun What were the body but a loathsome carrion if it had lost the soul Yet all these are nothing to the loss of God even the little taste of the fruition of God which the Saints enjoy in this life is dearer to them then all the world As the world when they feed upon their forbidden pleasures may cry out with the sons of the Prophets There 's death in the pot So when the Saints do but taste of the favor of God they cry out with David In his favour is life Nay though life be naturally most dear to all men yet they that have tasted and tryed do say with David his loving kindness is better then life So that as the enjoyment of God is the heaven of the Saints so the loss of God is the hell of the ungodly And as the enjoying of God is the enjoying of all So the loss of God is the loss of All. SECT V. THirdly Moreover as they lose God so they lose all those spiritual delightful Affections and Actions by which the Blessed do feed on God That transporting knowledg those ravishing views of his Glorious Face The unconceivable pleasure of loving God The apprehensions of his infinite Love to us The constant joys which his Saints are taken up with and the Rivers of consolation wherewith he doth satisfie them Is it nothing to lose all this The employment of a King in ruling a kingdome doth not so far exceed the imployment of the vilest scullion or slave as this Heavenly imployment exceedeth his These wretches had no delight in Praising God on earth their recreations and pleasures were of another nature and now when the Saints are singing his prayses and imployed in magnifying the Lord of Saints then shall the ungodly be denyed this happiness and have an imployment suitable to their natures and deserts Their hearts were full of Hell upon earth in stead of God and his Love and Fear and Graces there was Pride and self-love and lust and unbelief And therefore Hell must now entertain those Hearts which formerly entertained so much of it Their Houses on Earth were the resemblances of Hell in stead of worshipping God and calling upon
of those forlorn wretches How they will even tear their own hearts and be Gods Executioners upon themselves I am perswaded as it was none but themselves that committed the sin and themselves that were the onely meritorious cause of their sufferings so themselves will be the chiefest executioners of those sufferings God will have it so for the clearing of Justice and the aggravating of their distress even Satan himself as he was not so great a cause of their sinning as themselves so will he not be so great an instrument as themselves of their torment And let them not think here that if they must torment themselves they will do well enough they shall have wit enough to ease and favor themselves and resolution enough to command down this violence of their passions Alas poor souls They little know what passions those will be and how much beyond the power of their resolutions to suppress Why have not lamenting pining self-consuming persons on earth so much wit or power as this Why do you not thus perswade despairing soul who lye as Spira in a kinde of Hell upon earth and dare not eat nor drink nor be merry but torment themselves with continual terrors Why do you not say to them Sir why will you be so mad as to be your own Executioner and to make your own life a continual misery which otherwise might be as joyful as other mens Cannot you turn your thoughts to other matters and never think of Heaven or Hell Alas how vain are all these perswasions to him how little do they ease him you may as well perswade him to remove a mountain as to remove these hellish thoughts that feed upon his spirit it is as easie to him to stop the stream of the Rivers or to bound the overflowing waves of the Ocean as to stop the stream of his violent passions or to restrain those sorrows that feed upon his soul. O how much less then can those condemned souls who see the Glory before them which they have lost restrain their heart-renting self-tormenting Passions So some direct to cure the Toothach Do not think of it and it will not grieve you and so these men think to ease their pains in Hell O but the loss and pain will make you think of it whether you will or no. You were as Stocks or Stones under the threatnings but you shall be most tenderly sensible under the execution O how happy would you think your selves then if you were turned into Rocks or any thing that had neither Passion nor Sense O now how happy were you if you could feel as lightly as you were wont to hear and if you could sleep out the time of Execution as you did the time of the Sermons that warned you of it But your stupidity is gone it will not be SECT V. 5. MOreover it will much increase the torment of the damned in that their Memories will be as large and strong as their Understandings and Affections which will cause those violent Passions to be still working Were their loss never so great and their sense of it never so passionate yet if they could but lose the use of their Memory those passions would dye and that loss being forgotten would little trouble them But as they cannot lay by their life and beeing though then they would account annihilation a singular mercy so neither can they lay aside any part of that beeing Understanding Conscience Affections Memory must all live to torment them which should have helped to their Happiness And as by these they should have fed upon the Love of God and drawn forth perpetually the Joys of his Presence so by these must they now feed upon the wrath of God and draw forth continually the dolours of his absence Therefore never think that when I say the hardness of their hearts and their blindness dulness and forgetfulness shall be removed that therefore they are more holy or more happy then before No but Morally more vile and hereby far more miserable O how many hundred times did God by his Messengers here call upon them Sinners consider whether you are going Do but make a stand a while and think where your way will end what is the offered Glory that you so carelesly reject will not this be bitterness in the end And yet these men would never be brought to consider But in the later days saith the Lord they shall perfectly consider it when they are ensnared in the work of their own hands when God hath Arrested them and Judgment is past upon them and Vengeance is poured out upon them to the full then they cannot chuse but consider it whether they will or no. Now they have no leasure to consider nor any room in their Memories for the things of another life Ah but then they shall have leasure enough they shall be where they have nothing else to do but consider it their Memories shall have no other imployment to hinder them it shall even be engraven upon the Tables of their Hearts God would have had the Doctrine of their eternal State to have been written on the posts of their doors on their houses on their hands and on their hearts He would have had them minde it and mention it as they rise and lye down as they sit at home and as they walk abroad that so it might have gone well with them at their latter end And seeing they rejected this counsel of the Lord therefore shall it be written always before them in the place of their thraldom that which way soever they look they may still behold it Among others I will briefly lay down here some of those Considerations which will thus feed the anguish of these damned wretches SECT VI. FIrst It will torment them to think of the greatness of the Glory which they have lost O if it had been that which they could have spared it had been a small matter or If it had been a losse repairable with any thing else If it had been health or wealth or friends or life it had been nothing But to lose that exceeding Eternall weight of Glory SECT VII SEcondly It will torment them also to think of the possibility that once they were in of obtaining it Though all things considered there was an impossibility of any other event then what did befall yet the thing in it self was possible and their will was left to act without constraint Then they will remember The time was when I was in as faire possibilitie of the Kingdome as others I was set up on the stage of the world If I had plaid my part wisely and faithfully now I might have had possession of the inheritance I might have been amongst yonder blessed Saints who am now tormented with these damned fiends The Lord did set before me life and death and having chosen death I deserve to suffer it The prize was once held out before me If I had run well I
possessions that thou art willing to have them tryed and fearfull of being deceived that they stir up they desires of enjoying what thou hopest for and the deferring thereof is the trouble of thy heart Prov. 13.12 If thou be sure that thy hopes be such as these God forbid that I should speak a word against them or discourage thee from proceeding to hope thus to the end No I rather perswade thee to go on in the strength of the Lord and what ever men or devils or thy own unbelieving heart shall say against it go on and hold fast thy hope and be sure it shall never make thee ashamed But if thy hope be not of this spiritual nature and if thou art able to give no better reason why thou hopest then the worst in the world may give That God is mercifull and thou must speed as well as thou canst or the like and hast not one sound evidence of a saving work of grace upon thy soul to shew for thy hopes but only hopest that thou shalt be saved because thou wouldest have it so and because it is a terrible thing to despaire If this be thy case delay not an hour but presently cast away those hopes that thou mayest get into a capacity of having better in their stead But it may be thou wilt think this strange doctrine and say VVhat would you perswade me directly to despaire Answ. Sinner I would be loath to have thy soul destroyed by wilful self-delusion The truth is There is a hope such as I have before shewed thee of which is a singular grace and duty and there is a hope which is a notorious dangerous sin So consequentely there is a despaire which is a grievous sin and there is a despaire which is absolutely necessary to thy salvation I would not have thee despaire of the suffiâ—ciency of the blood of Christ to save thee if thou believe and heartily obey him Nor of the willingness of God to pardon and save thee if thou be such a one Nor yet absolutely of thy own salvation because while there is life and time there is some hope of thy conversion and so of thy salvation Nor would I draw thee to despaire of finding Christ if thou do but heartily seek him Or of Gods acceptance of any sincere endeavors nor of thy successe against Satan or any corruption which thou shalt heartily oppose nor of any thing whatsoever God hath promised to do either to all men in generall or to such as thou art I would not have thee doubt of any of these in the least measure much less despaire But this is the despaire that I would perswade thee to as thou lovest thy soul That thou despaire of ever being saved except thou be born again or of seeing God without Holiness or of escaping perishing except thou soundly Repent Or of ever having part in Christ or salvation by him or ever being one of his true Disciples except thou love him above Father mother or thy own life Or of ever having a Treasure in Heaven except thy very heart be there Or of ever scaping eternal death if thou walk after the flesh and dost not by the spirit mortify the deeds of the flesh or of ever truly loving God or being his servant while thou lovest the world and servest it These things I would have thee despair of and what ever else God hath told thee shall never come to passe And when thou hast sadly searched into thy own heart and findest thy self in any of these cases I would have thee despair thy self of ever being saved in that state thou art in Never stick at the sadness of the conclusion man but acknowledg plainly If I die before I get out of this estate I am lost for ever It is as good deal truly with thy self as not God will not flatter thee he will deal plainly whether thou do or not The very truth is This kinde of despair is one of the first steps to Heaven Consider if a man be quite out of his way what must be the first means to bring him in again Why a despair of ever coming to his journies end in the way that he is in If his home be Eastward and he be going Westward as long as he hopes he is the right he will go on and as long as he so goes on hoping he goes further amiss Therefore when he meets with some body who assures him that he is clean out of his way and brings him to despair of coming home except he turn back again then he will return and then he may hope and spare not Why sinner Just so it is with thy soul Thou art born out of the way to Heaven and in that way thou hast proceeded many a yeer Yet thou goest on quietly and hopest to be saved because thou art not so bad as many others Why I tell thee except thou be brought to throw away those hopes and see that thou hast all this while been quite out of the way to Heaven and hast been a childe of wrath and a servant of Satan unpardoned unsanctified and if thou hadst dyed in this state hadst been certainly damned I say till thou be brought to this thou wilt never return and be saved Who will turn out of his way while he hopes he is right And let me once again tell thee that if ever God mean good to thy soul and intend to save thee this is one of the first things he will work upon thee Remember what I say till thou feel God convincing thee that the way which thou hast lived in will not serve the turn and so breaking down thy former hopes there is yet no saving work wrought upon thee how well soever thou mayest hope of thy self Yea this much more If any thing keep thy soul out of Heaven which God forbid there is nothing in the world liker to do it then thy false hopes of being saved while thou art out of the way to salvation Why else is it that God cryes down such hopes in his word Why is it that every faithful skilful Minister doth bend all his strength against the false faith and hope of sinners as if he were to fight against neither small nor great but this prince of iniquity Why alas they know that these are the main pillars of Satans Kingdom Bring down but them two and the house will fall They know also the deceit and vanity of such hopes that they are directly contrary to the Truth of God and what a sad case that soul is in who hath no other hope but that Gods word will prove false when the truth of God is the only ground of true hope Alas it is no pleasure to a Minister to speak to people on such an unwelcome subject no more then it is to a pitifull Physitian to tell his patient I do despair of your life except you let blood or there is no hope of the cure except the gangren'd
Shall we then take these for friendly actions Or rather wish we had spent this time in praying together oâ— admonishing one another O why should we sell such a lasting incomprehensible Joy for one tast of a seeming pleasure Come as we have sinned together let us pray together before we stir that God would pardon us And let us enter into a promise to one another that we will do thus no more but will meet together with the godly in the worship of God and help one another toward Heaven as oft as we have met for our sinfull metriments in helping to deceive and destroy each other This would be the way to prevent this sorrow and a course that would comfort you when you look back upon it hereafter VVho would spend so many dayes and yeers and thoughts and cares and be at so much cost and pains and all to please this flesh for a moment which must shortly be most loathsome stinking rottenness and in the mean time neglect our pretious souls and that state which we must trust to for ever and ever To be at such pains for that pleasure which dyes in the enjoying and is almost as soon gone as come and when we have most need of comfort will be so far from following us as our happiness that it will be perpetual fuel to the flames which shall torment us O that men knew but what they desire when they would so fain have all things suited to the desires of the flesh They would have Buildings VValks Lands Cloathes Diet and all so fitted as may be most pleasing and delightful VVhy this is but to desire their temptations to be increased and their snare strengthened Their Joyes will be more carnall and how great an enemy carnal Joy is to spiritual experienced men can quickly tell you If we took the flesh so much for your enemy as we do professe we could not so earnestly desire and contrive to accommodate it and so congratulate all its contentments as we do CHAP. IV. The greatness of the torments of the damned discovered SECT I. HAving thus shewed you how great their Loss is who are shut out of Rest and how it will be aggravated by those Additional losses which will accompany it I should next here shew you the greatness of those Positive sufferings which will accompany this loss But because I am to Treat of Rest rather then of Torment I will not meddle with the Explication of the quality of those sufferings but onely shew their greatness in some few brief discoveries lâ—st the careless sinner while he hears of no other punishment but that of loss before mentioned should think he can bear that well enough by his own resolvedness and so flatter himself â—â—hopâ— of a tollerable hell That there are besides the loss of Happiness such actuall sensible Torments for the damned is a matter beyond all doubt to him that doth not doubt of the truth of the Scripture and that they will be exceeding great may appear by these Arguments following First From the principal Author of them which is God himself As it was no less then God whom the sinner had offended so it is no less then God that will punish them for their offences He hath prepared those torments for his Enemies His continued Anger will still be devouring them His Breath of Indignation will kindle the flames His Wrath will be an intollerable burden to their souls O if it were but a creature that they had to do with â—hey might better bear it for the Penalty would be answerable to the Infirmity of him that should inflict it A childe can give but an easie stroak but the stroaks of a Gyant will be answerable to his strength Wo to him that fals under the stroaks of the Almighty They shall feel to their sorrow That it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God It were nothing in comparison to this if all the world were against them or if the strength of all creatures were united in one to inflict their penalty They had now rather venture upon the displeasure of God then to displease a Landlord a Master a Friend a Neighbour or their own Flesh but then they will wish a thousand times in vain that they had lost the favor of all the world and been hated of all men so they had not lost the favor of God for as there is no life like his Favor so is there no death like his displeasure O what a consuming fire is his Wrath If it be kindled here and that but a little how do we wither before it as the grass that is cut down before the Sun How soon doth our strength decay and turn to weakness and our beauty to deformity Churches are rooted up Common-wealths are overthrown Kingdoms depopulated Armies destroyed and who can stand before his wrath Even the Heavens and the Earth will melt at his Presence and when he speaks the word at his great Day of Accompt they will be burnt up before him as a scrole in the fire The flames do not so easily run through the dry Stubble or consume the Houses where its violence hath prevailed as the wrath of God will feed upon these wretches O they that could not bear a Prison or a Gibbet or Fire for Christ no nor scarce a few scorns from the mouths of the ignorant how will they now bear the devouring fire SECT II. 2. THe place or state of torment is purposely ordained for the glorifying of the Attribute of Gods Justice As all the Works of God are great and wonderful so those above all which are specially intended for the eminent advancing of some of his Attributes When he will glorifie his Power he makes the worlds by his Wisdom The comely order of all and singular creatures declare his Wisdom His Providence is shewn in sustaining all things and maintaining Order and attaining his excellent ends amongst the confused perverse tumultuous agitations of a world of wicked foolish self-destroying Miscreants When a spark of his Wrath doth kindle upon the earth the whole world save onely eight persons are drowned Sodom Gomorrah Admah and Zeboim are burnt with fire from heaven to ashes The sea shuts her mouth upon some The earth doth open and swallow others The Pestilence destroyeth them up by thousands The present deplorable estate of the Jews may fully testifie this to the world And yet the glorifying of the two great Attributes of Mercy and Justice is intended most eminently for the life to come As therefore when God will purposely then glorifie his Mercy he will do it in a way and degree that is now incredible and beyond the comprehension of the Saints that must enjoy it so that the blood of his Son and the enjoyment of himself immediately in Glory shall not be thought too high an honor for them So also when the time comes that he will purposely manifest his Justice it shall appear to
be indeed the Justice of God The everlasting flames of Hell will not be thought too hot for the Rebellious and when they have there burned through millions of Ages he will not repent him of the evil which is befaln them O wo to the soul that is thus set up for a Butt for the wrath of the Almighty to shoot at and for a Bush that must burn in the flames of his Jealousie and never be consumed SECT III. 3. THe torments of the damned must needs be extream because they are the effect of Divine Revenge Wrath is terrible but Revenge is implacable When the great God shall say I will now be righted for all the wrongs that I have born from rebellious creatures I will let out my wrath and it shall be staied no more you shall now pay for all the abuse of my Patience Remember now how I waited your leasure in vain how I stooped to perswade you how I as it were kneeled to intreate you did you think I would alwayes be slighted by such miscreants as you O who can look up when God shall thus plead with them in the heat of Revenge Then will he be revenged for ever mercy abused for his creatures consumed in luxury and excess for every hours time mispent for the neglect of his word for the vilifying of his messengers for the hating of his people for the prophanation of his ordinances and neglect of his worship for the breaking of his Sabbaths and the grieving of his Spirit for the taking of his Name in vain for unmerciful neglect of his servants in distress O the numberless bils that will be brought in And the charge that will overcharge the soul of the sinner And how hotly Revenge will pursue them all to the highest How God will stand over them with the rod in his hand not the rod of fatherly chastisement but that Iron rod wherewith he bruiseth the rebellious and lay it on for all their neglects of Christ and grace O that men would foresee this And not put themselves under the hammer of revenging fury when they may have the treasure of happiness at so easie rates And please God better in preventing their woe SECT IIII. SECT IIII. 4. COnsider also how this Justice and Revenge will be the delight of the Almighty Though he had rather men would stoop to Christ and accept of his mercy yet when they persist in rebellion he will take pleasure in their execution Though he desire not the death of him that dyeth but rather that he repent and live yet when he will not repent and live God doth desire and delight in the execution of Justice conditionally so that men will repent he desires not their death but their life Ezek 33.11 yet if they repent not in the same place he uttereth his resolution for their death vers 8.13 He tels us Isai. 27.4 That fury is not in him yet he addeth in the next words Who would set the bryers and thorns against me in battel I would go through them I would burn them together What a doleful case is the wretched creature in when he shall thus set the heart of his Creator against him and he that made him will not save him and he that formed him will not have mercy upon him Isai. 27.11 How heavy a threatning is that in Deut. 28.63 As the Lord Rejoyced over you to do you good so the Lord will Rejoyce over you to destroy you and to bring you to nought Wo to the soul which God Rejoyceth to punish Yea he tels the simple ones that love simplicity and the scorners that delight in scorning and the fools that hate knowledg That because he called and they refused he stretched out his hand and no man regarded but set at nought all his counsel and would none of his reproof therefore he will also laugh at their calamity and mock when their fear cometh when their fear cometh as desolation and their destruction as a whirlwind when distress and anguish cometh upon them Then shall they call upon him but he will not answer they shall seek him early but shall not finde him for that they hated knowledg and did not choose the fear of the Lord Prov. 1.22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29. I would intreat thee who readest this if thou be one of that sort of men that thou wilt but view over seriously that part of the Chapter Prov. 1. from the 20. verse to the end and believe them to be the true words of Christ by his Spirit in Solomon Is it not a terrible thing to a wretched soul when it shall lie roaring perpetually in the flames of Hell and the God of mercy himself shall laugh at them When they shall cry out for mercy yea for one drop of water and God shall mock them in stead of relieving them When none in Heaven or earth can help them but God he shall rejoyce over them in their calamity why you see these are the very words of God himself in Scripture And most just is it that they who laughed at the Sermon and mocked at the Preacher and derided the people that obeyed the Gospel should be laughed at and derided by God Ah poor ignorant Fools for so this Text cals them they will then have mocking enough till their heart ake with it I dare warrant them them for ever making a jeast of Godliness more or making themselves merry with their own slanderous reports It is themselves then that must be the woful objects of derision and that of God himself who would have crowned them with glory I know when the Scripture speaks of Gods laughing and mocking it is not to be understood literally but after the maner of men but this may suffice us that it will be such an act of God to the tormenting of the sinner which vve cannot more fitly conceive or express under any other notion or name then these SECT V. 5. COnsider who shall be Gods Executioners of their Torment and that is First Satan Secondly Themselves First He that was here so successful in drawing them from Christ will then be the Instrument of their punishment for yielding to his temptations It was a pittiful sight to see the man possessed that was bound with chains and lived among the Tombs and that other that would be cast into the fire and into the water but alas that was nothing to the torment that Satan puts them to in Hel That is the reward he wil give them for all their service for their rejecting the commands of God and forsaking Christ and neglecting their souls at his perswasion Ah if they had served Christ as faithfully as they did Satan and had forsaken all for the love of him he would have given them a better reward Secondly and it is most just also that they should there be their own tormentors that they may see that their whole destruction is of themselves and they
man that lived in desparation or in some degree of these wounds of spirit that was neer despair How uncomfortable was their conference How burdensome their lives Nothing doth them good which they possesse The sight of friends or house or goods which refresh others is a trouble to them They feel no sweetness in meat or drink They are weary of life and fearful of death VVhat is the matter with these men If the Misery of the damned it self can be endured why cannot they more easily endure these little sparks 10. Again tell me faithfully VVhat if thou shouldest but see the Devil appear to thee in some terrible shape VVould it not daunt thee VVhat if thou shouldest meet him in thy way home Or he should shew himself to the at night in thy bed-chamber would not thy heart faile thee and thy hair stand an end I could name thee those that have been as confident as thy self who by such a sight have been so appaled that they were in danger of being driven out of their wits Or what if some damned soul of thy former acquaintance should appear to thee in some bodily likeness Would not this amaze thee What fears do people live in whose houses or persons have been but haunted with spirits Though they have only heard some noises and seen some sights but never felt any hurt upon their bodies Alas what is this to the Torments of Hell Canst thou not endure a shadow to appear before thee O how wilt thou endure to live with them for ever Where thou shalt have no other company but Devils and the damned and shalt not only see them but be tormented with them and by them And as incredible a matter as this seems to thee if thy through conversion prevent it not thou knowest not how few months thou shalt be out of this estate 11. Lastly Let me ask thee one more Question If the wrath of God be to be made so light of as thou dost Why did the Son of God himself make so great a matter of it When he who was perfectly innocent himself had taken upon him the payment of our debt and stood in our room and bore that punishment that we had deserved it makes him sweat forth water and blood it makes the Lord of Life to cry My soul is heavy even to the death It makes him cry out upon the cross My God my God Why hast thou forsaken me Surely if any one could have born these sufferings easily it would have been Jesus Christ He had another measure of strength to bear it then thou hast And let me tell thee one thing which every one understandeth not Thou wilt have sins of a more hainous nature and degree to suffer for then ever were laid upon Jesus Christ and consequently a punishment of a sorer degree For Christ suffered only for the breaches of the Covenant of workes and not for the violation of the Covenant of grace properly so called that is not for the final non-performance of the conditions of this Covenant There was no mans final unbelief or impenitencie or resisting the Spirit that did lye upon Christ Howsoever the aggregation of all mens sins might aggravate his burden yet the punishment due to those sins particularly was not like the punishment which is due to thine For as the first Covenant gave not so great a reward so neither did it threaten so great a penalty as the later doth And the penalty which the new Covenant threateneth Christ never underwent So that the punishment which thou must suffer is that which the Apostle speaks of Heb. 10.26 Of how much sorer punishment c. and that fearful looking for of Judgment and fire which devoureth the adversaries Heb. 6.8 Wo to poor sinners for their mad security Do they think to finde it tolerable to them which was so heavy to Christ Nay the Son of God is cast into a bitter agony and bloody sweat and dolorous complaints under the curse of the law alone and yet the feeble foolish creature makes nothing to bear also the curse of the Gospel the good Lord bring these men to their right minds by Repentance lest they buy their wit at too dear a rate LECT XI ANd thus I have shewed you somewhat of their misery who miss of this Rest prepared for the Saints And now Reader I demand thy resolution what use thou wilt make of all this Shall it all be lost to thee or wilt thou as thou art alone consider of it in good earnest Thou hast cast by many a warning of God wilt thou do so by this also Take heed what thou dost and how thou so resolvest God will not alwayes stand warning and threatning The hand of revenge is lifted up the blow is coming and wo to him whoever he be on whom it lighteth Little thinkest thou how neer thou standest to thy eternal state and how neer the Pit thou art dancing in thy greatest jollity if thy eyes were but opened as they will be shortly thou wouldest see all this that I have spoken before thine eyes without stirring from the place I think in which thou standest Dost thou throw by the Book and say It speaks of nothing but Hell and Damnation Thus thou usest also to complain of the Minister but wouldst thou not have us to tell thee of these things should we be guilty of the blood of thy soul by keeping silent that which God hath charged us upon pain of death to make known wouldst thou perish in ease and silence and also have us to perish with thee rather then to awake thee or displease thee by speaking the truth If thou wilt be guilty of such inhumane cruelty yet God forbid we should be guilty of such most sottish folly There are few Preachers so simple but they know that this kinde of Preaching is the ready way to be hated of their Hearers And the desire of applause and the favor of men is so natural to all men that I think there is few that delight in such a displeasing way Our temptations to flattery and Man-pleasing are too strong for that But I beseech the consider Are these things true or are they not If they were not true I would heartily joyn with thee against any Minister that should offer to Preach them and to affright poor people when there is no cause and I should think such Preachers did deserve Death or Banishment But if every word of these threatnings be the words of God and if they be as true as thou livest and readest this what a wretch art thou that wouldest not hear it or consider it Why what is the matter If thou be sure that thou art one of the People of God this Doctrine will be a comfort to thee and not a terror but if thou be yet carnal and unregenerate methinks thou shouldest be as fraid to hear of Heaven as of Hell except the bare name of Heaven or Salvation be sufficient sure there
and we play with our clothes and look upon them when we should put them on and wear them we hang upon Ordinances from day to day but we stir not up our selves to seek the Lord I see a great many very constant in hearing and Praying and give us some hopes that their hearts are honest but they do not hear and prâ—y as iâ— it were for their lives O what a frozen stupidity hath benummed us The judgment of Pharaoh is among us we are turned into Stones and Rocks that can neither feel nor stir The plague of Lots wife is upon us as if we were changed into liveless unmoveable Pillars we are dying and we know it and yet we stir not we are at the door of eternal Happiness or Misery and yet we perceive it not Death knocks and we hear not Christ calls and knocks and we hear not God cries to us To day if you will hear my voyce harden not your hearts work while it is day for the night cometh when none shall work Now ply your business now labour for your lives now lay out all your strength and time now do it now or never and yet we stir no more then if we were half asleep What haste doth Death and Judgment make how fast do they come on they are almost at us and yet what little haste make we what haste makes the Sword to devour from one part of the Land to another what haste doth Plague and Famine make and all because we will not make haste The Spur of God is in our sides we bleed we groan and yet we do not mend our pace The Rod is on our backs it speaks to the quick our lashes are heard through the Christian world and yet we stir no faster then before Lord what a sensless sottish earthly hellish thing is a hard heart that we will not go roundly and cheerfully toward heaven without all this ado no nor with it neither where is the man that is serious in his Christianity Methinks men do every where make but a trifle of their eternal state they look after it but a little upon the by they do not make it the taske and business of their lives To be plain with you I think nothing undoes men so much as complementing and jesting in Religion O if I were not sick my self of the same disease with what teares should I mixt this Ink and with what groans should I express these sad complaints and with what hearts-grief should I mourn over this universal deadness Do the Magistrates among us seriously perform their portion of the work Are they zealous for God Do they build up his House and are they tender of his Honor Do they second the Word and encourage the Godly and relieve the Oppressed and compassionate the Distressed and let fly at the face of sin and sinners as being the disturbers of our peace and the onely cause of all our miseries Do they study how to do the utmost that they can for God to improve their power and parts and wealth and honor and all their interests for the greatest advantage to the Kingdom of Christ as men that must shortly give account of their Stewardship or do they build their own houses and seek their advancements and stand upon and contest for their own honors and do no more for Christ then needs they must or then lyes in their way or then is put by others into their hands or then stands with the pleasing of their friends or with their worldy interests which of these two courses do they take and how thin are those Ministers that are serious in their work Nay how mightily do the very best fail in this above all things Do we cry out of mens disobedience to the Gospel in the evidence and power of the Spirit and deal with sin as that which is the fire in our Towns and houses and by force pull men out of this fire Do we perswade our people as those that know the terrors of the Lord should do Do we press Christ and Regeneration and Faith and Holiness as men that believe indeed that without these they shall never have Life Do our bowels yearn over the Ignorant and the Careless and the obstinate Multitude as men that believe their own Doctrine that our dear people must be eternally damned if they be not timely recovered When we look them in the faces do our hearts melt over them lest we should never see their faces in Rest Do we as Paul tell them weeping of their fleshly and earthly disposition and teach them publikely and from house to house night and day with tears And do vve intreate them as if it were indeed for their lives and salvation that vvhen vve speak of the Joys and Miseries of another world our people may see us affected accordingly and perceive that we do indeed mean as we speak Or rather do vve not study vvords and neat Expressions that vve may approve our selves able men in the judgment of critical Hearers and speak so formally and heartlesly of Eternity that our people can scarcely think that vve believe our selves or put our tongues into some affected pace and our language into some forced Oratorical strain as if a Ministers business were of no more weight but to tell them a smooth tale of an hour long and so look no more after them till the next Sermon Seldom do vve fit our Sermons either for Matter or Manner to the great end our peoples salvation but we sacrifice our studies to our own credit or our peoples content or some such base inferiour end Carnal discretion doth controll our fervency It maketh our Sermons like beautiful Pictures which have much pains and cost bestowed upon them to make them comely and desirable to the eye but life or heat or motion there is none Surely as such a conversation is an Hypocritical conversation so such a Sermon is as truly an hypocritical Sermon O the formal frozen lifeless Sermons which we daily hear preached upon the most weighty piercing Subjects in the world How gently do we handle those sins which will handle so cruelly our poor peoples souls And how tenderly do we deal with their careless hearts not speaking to them as to men that must be wakened or damned We tell them of heaven and hell in such a sleepy tone and sleighty way as if we were but acting a part in a Play so that we usually preach our people asleep with those subjects which one would think should rather endanger the driving of some besides themselves if they were faithfully delivered Not that I commend or excuse that reall indiscretion and unseemly language and nauseous repetitions and ridiculous gestures whereby many do disgrace the work of God and bring his ordinances in contempt with the people nor think it fit that he should be an Embassador from God on so weighty a business that is not able to
received it with Joy Mat. 13.20 and have heard the Preacher gladly and done many things after him shall yet perish Mark 6.20 It is time for us to look about us and take heed of loytering When they that seek God dayly and delight to know his ways and ask of him the Ordinances of Justice and take Delight in approaching to God and that in fasting and afflicting their Souls Isai. 58.2 3. are yet shut out with Hypocrites and Unbeleevers When they that have been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and of the good Word of God and of the Powers of the World to come and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost may yet fall away beyond recovery and crucifie to themselves the Son of God afresh Heb. 6.4 5 6. When they that have received the knowledg of the Truth and were sanctified by the blood of the Covenant may yet sin wilfully and tread under-foot the Son of God and do despite to the Spirit of Grace till there is nothing left him but the fearful expectation of Judgment and fire that shall devour the adversaries Heb. 10.26 27 28 29. Should not this rouze us out of our laziness and security How far hath many a man followed Christ and yet forsaken him when it comes to selling of all to bearing the Cross to burning at a stake or to the renouncing of all his worldly Interests and Hopes What a deal of pains hath many a man taken for Heaven that never did obtain it How many Prayers Sermons Fasts Alms good desires confessions sorrow and tears for sin c. have all been lost and faln short of the Kingdom Methinks this should affright us out of our sluggishness and make us strive to out-strip the highest Formalists SECT XXI 20. COnsider God hath resolved That Heaven shall not be had on easier terms He hath not onely commanded it as a duty but hath tyed our Salvation to the performance of it Rest must always follow Labor He that hath ordained in his Church on Earth That he that will not Labor shall not Eat hath also decreed concerning the Everlasting Inheritance That he that Strives not shall not Enter They must now lay up a Treasure in Heaven if they will finde it there Mat. 6.19 20. They must seek First the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness Matth. 6.33 They must not Labor for the food which perisheth but for that food which endureth to Everlasting Life Joh. 6.27 Some think that it is good to be Holy but yet not of such absolute necessity but that a man may be saved without it But God hath determined on the contrary That without it no man shall see his face Heb. 12.14 Seriousness is the very thing wherein consisteth our Sincerity If thou art not Serious thou art not a Christian. It is not onely a high degree in Christianity but of the very life and essence of it As Fencers upon a Stage who have all the skill at their weapons and do eminently and industriously act their parts but do not seriously intend the death of each other do differ from Souldiers or Combatants who fight in good sadness for their lives Just so do Hypocrites differ from serious Christians If men could be saved without this Serious Diligence they would never regard it All the excellencies of Gods ways would never entice them But when God hath resolved That if you will have your ease here you shall have none hereafter is it not wisdom then to bestir our selves to the utmost SECT XXII ANd thus Reader I dare confidently say I have shewed thee sufficient Reason against thy sloathfulness and negligence if thou be not a man resolved to shut thine eyes and to destroy thy self wilfully in despite of Reason Yet lest all this should not prevail I will add somewhat more if it be possible to perswade thee to be Serious in thy Endeavors for Heaven 1. Consider God is in Good earnest with you and why then should not you be so with him In his Commands he means as he speaks and will verily require your real Obedience In his Threatenings he is Serious and will make them all good against the Rebellious In his Promises he is Serious and will fulfil them to the Obedient even to the least tittle In his Judgments he is Serious as he will make his Enemies know to their terror Was not God in good earnest when he drowned the World When he consumed Sodom and Gomorrah When he scattered the Jews Hath he not been in good sadness with us lately in England and Ireland and Germany And very shortly will he lay hold on his Enemies particularly man by man and make them know that he is in good earnest Especially when it comes to the great reckoning day And is it time then for us to dally with God 2. Jesus Christ was Serious in Purchasing our Redemption He was Serious in Teaching when he neglected his meat and drink Joh. 4.32 He was Serious in Praying when he continued all night at it Luk. 6.12 He was Serious in Doing good when his kindred came and layd hands on him thinking he had been beside himself Mark 3.20 21. He was Serious in Suffering when he fasted fourty days was tempted betrayed spit on buffeted crowned with thorns sweat water and blood was crucified pierced dyed There was no Jesting in all this And should not we be Serious in seeking our own Salvation 3. The Holy Ghost is Serious in soliciting us for our Happiness His Motions are frequent and pressing and importunate He striveth with our hearts Gen. 6.3 He is grieved when we resist him Ephes. 4.30 And should not we then be Serious in obeying his Motions and yeelding to his Suite 4. God is Serious in hearing our Prayers and delivering us from our dangers and removing our troubles and bestowing his Mercies When we are afflicted he is afflicted with us Isai. 63.9 He regardeth every groan and sigh He putteth every tear into his bottle He condoleth their misery when he is forced to chastise them How shall I give thee up O Ephraim saith the Lord How shall I make thee as Admah and as Zeboim my heart is turned within me my repentings are kindled together Hos. 11.8 He heareth even the rebellious oft-times when they call upon him in their misery when they cry to him in their trouble he delivereth them out of their distress Psa. 78.37 38. Psa. 107.10 11 12 13 19 28. Yea the next time thou art in trouble thou wilt beg for a serious regard of thy prayers and grant of thy desires And shall we be so sleight in the work of God when we expect he should be so regardful of us Shall we have real Mercies downâ—weight and shall we return such superficial and frothy service 5. Consider The Ministers of Christ are Serious in Instructing and Exhorting you and why should not you be as Serious in obeying their Instructions They are Serious in Study Serious in Prayer
If the Law of the Land did punish every breach of the Sabbath or every omission of family duties or secret duties or every cold and heartless prayer with Death If it were Felony or Treason to be ungodly and negligent in Worship and loose in your lives What manner of persons would you then be and what lives would you lead And is not Eternal death more terrible then temporal 3 Quest. If it were Gods ordinary course to punish every sin with some present Judgment so that every time a man swears or is drunk or speaks a lye or back-biteth his neighbor he should be struck dead or blind or lame in the place If God did punish every cold prayer or neglect of duty with some remarkable plague what manner of persons would you then be If you should suddenly fall down dead like Ananias and Saphira with the sin in your hands or the plague of God should seize upon you as upon the Israelites while their sweet morsels were yet in their mouths If but a Mark should be set in the forehead of every one that neglected a duty or committed a sin What kind of lives would you then lead And is not Eternal Wrath more terrible then all this Give but Reason leave to speak 4 Quest. If one of your old acquaintance and companions in sin should come from the dead and tell you that he suffereth the Torments of Hell for those sins that you are guilty of and for neglecting those duties which you neglect and for living such a careless worldly ungodly life as you now live should therfore advise you to take another course If you should meet such a one in your Chamber when you are going to bed and he should say to you Oh take heed of this carnal unholy life Set your self to seek the Lord with all your might neglect not your Soul Prepare for Eternity that you come not to the place of Torment that I am in How would this take with you and what manner of persons would you afterwards be It is written in the life of Bruno that a Doctor of great note for learning and godliness being dead and being brought to the Church to be buried while they were in their Popish Devotions and came to the words Responde mihi the Corps arose in the Beir and with a terrible voyce cryed out Justo Dei Judicio accusatus sum I am accused at the Just Judgment of God At which voyce the people run all out of Church affrighted On the morrow when they came again to perform the Obsequies at the same words as before the Corps arose again and cryed with a hideous voyce Justo Dei Judicio Judicatus sum I am Judged at the righteous Judgment of God Whereupon the people run away again amazed The third day almost all the City came together and when they came to the same words as before the Corps rose again and cryed with a more doleful voyce then before Justo Dei Judicio Condemnatus sum I am Condemned at the Just Judgment of God The consideration whereof that a man reputed so upright should yet by his own confession be damned caused Bruno and the rest of his companions to enter into that strict order of the Carthusians If the voyce of the dead man could affright them into Superstition should not the warnings of God affright thee into true Devotion 5 Quest. If you knew that this were the last day you had to live in the world how would you spend this day If you were sure when you go to bed that you should never rise again would not your thoughts of another life be more serious that night If you knew when you are praying that you should never pray more would you not be more earnest and importunate in that prayer Or if you knew when you are preaching or hearing or exhorting your sinful acquaintance that this were the last opportunity you should have would you not ply it more closely then usually you do Why you do not know but it may be the last and you are sure your last is near at hand 6 Quest. If you had seen the general dissolution of the world and all the pomp and glory of it consumed to ashes If you saw all on a fire about you sumptuous buildings Cities Kingdoms Land Water Earth Heaven all flaming about your ears If you had seen all that men labored for and sold their Souls for gone friends gone the place of your former abode gone the history ended and all come down what would such a sight as this perswade you to do Why such a sight thou shalt certainly see I put my Question to thee in the words of the Apostle 2 Pet. 3.11 Seeing all these things shall be dissolved what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with fervent heat As if he should say We cannot possibly conceive or express what manner of persons we should be in all holiness and godliness when we do but think of the sudden and certain and terrible dissolution of all things below 7 Quest. What if you had seen the process of the Judgment of the great day If you had seen the Judgment set and the Books opened and the most stand trembling on the left hand of the Judg and Christ himself accusing them of their rebellions and neglects and remembring them of all their former slightings of his grace and at last condemning them to perpetual perdition If you had seen the godly standing on the right hand and Jesus Christ acknowledging their faithful obedience and adjudging them to the possession of the Joy of their Lord What manner of persons would you have been after such a sight as this Why this sight thou shalt one day see as sure as thou livest And why then should not the fore-knowledg of such a day awake thee to thy duty 8 Quest. What if you had once seen Hell open and all the damned there in their easeless Torments and had heard them crying out of their sloathfulness in the day of their visitation and wishing that they had but another life to live and that God would but try them once again One crying out of his neglect of duty and another of his loitering and trifling when he should have been labouring for his life What manner of persons would you have been after such a sight as this What if you had seen Heaven opened as Stephen did and all the Saints there triumphing in Glory and enjoying the End of their labours and sufferings What a life would you lead after such a sight as this Why you will see this with your eyes before it be long 9 Quest. What if you had lien in Hell but one year or one day or hour and there felt all those Torments that now you do but hear of
more consist then in meats or drinks or Questions about the Law or Genealogies Siâ—s shall we who are Brethren fall out by the way home and spend so much of our time about the smaller matâ—ers which thousands have been saved without but never any onâ— saved by them while Christ and our Eternal Rest are almost forgotten The Lord pardon and heal the folly of his People CHAP. VII The third Vse Perswading all men to try their Title to this Rest And Directing them how to try that they may know SECT I. I Now proceed to the third Use which we shall raise hence and because it is of exceeding great importance to thy Soul I intreat thee to read it the more diligently and weigh it the more seriously Is there such a Glorious Rest so neer at hand and shall none enjoy it but the People of God What mean the most of the world then to live so contentedly without assurance of their interest in this Rest and to neglect the trying of their title to it When the Lord hath so fully opened the Blessedness of that Kingdom which none but a little flock of obedient Beleevers shall possess and so fully expressed those torments which all the rest of the world must eternally suffer a man would think now That they that beleeve this to be certainly true should never be at any quiet in themselves till they knew which of these must be their own state and were fully assured that they were Heirs of the Kingdom Most men that I meet with say they beleeve this Word of God to be true How then can they sit still in such an utter uncertainty whether ever they shall live in Rest or not One would think they should run up and down from Minister to Minister enquiring How shall I know whether I shall live in Heaven or Hell and that they should even think themselves half in Hell till they were sure to scape it and to be possessed of Rest. Lord what a wonderful strange madness is this that men who look dayly when sickness summons them and death calls them away and know they must presently enter upon unchangeable Joy or Pain should yet live as uncertain what shall be their doom as if they had never heard of any such State yea and live as quietly and as merrily in this uncertainty as if all were made sure and nothing ailed them and there were no danger Are these men alive or dead Are they waking or are they asleep What do they think on Where are their hearts If they have but a weighty Suit at Law how careful are they to know whether it will go with them or against them If they were to be tryed for their lives at an earthly Judicature how careful would they be to know whether they should be saved or condemned especially if their care might surely save them If they be dangerously sick they will enquire of the Physician What think you Sir shall I scape or no But for the business of their Salvation they are content to be uncertain If you ask most men a reason of their hopes to be saved they will say it is because God is merciful and Christ dyed for sinners and the like general reasons which any man in the world may give as well as they But put them to prove their special interest in Christ and in the special saving Mercy of God and they can say nothing to the purpose at all or at least nothing out of their hearts and experience but only out of their reading or invention Men are desirous to know all things save God and themselves They will travel over Sea and Land to know the scituation of Countries and the Customs of the World They will go to Schools and Universities and turn over multitudes of books and read and study from year to year to know the creatures and to be excellent in the Sciences They will go apprentice seven years to learn a trade which they may live by here And yet they never read the book of Conscience nor study the state of their own Souls that they may make sure of living for ever If God should ask them for their Souls as he did Cain for his brother Abel they could return but such an Answer as he did If God or man should say to them What case is thy Soul in man Is it regenerate and sanctified and pardoned or no Is it in a state of life or a state of death He would be ready to say I know not Am I my Souls keeper I hope well I trust God with my Soul and trouble not my self with any such thoughts I shall speed as well as other men do and so I will put it to the venture I thank God I never made any doubt of my Salvation Answ. Thou hast the more cause to doubt a great deal because thou never didst doubt and yet more because thou hast been so careless in thy confidence What do these expressions discover but a wilful neglect of thy own Salvation As a ship-master that should let his Vessel alone and mind other matters and say I will venture it among the rocks and sands and gulfs and waves and winds I will never trouble my self to know whether it shall come safe to the harbor I will trust God with it it will speed as well as other mens Vessels do Indeed as well as other mens that are as careless and Idle but not so well as other mens that are diligent and watchful What horrible abuse of God is this for men to pretend that they trust God with their Souls for to cloak their own wilful negligence If thou didst truly Trust God thou wouldst also be ruled by him and trust him in that way which he hath appointed thee and upon those terms which he hath promised to help thee on He requires thee to give all Diligence to make thy Calling and Election sure and so to trust him 2 Pet. 1.10 He hath lined thee out a way in Scripture by which thou mayst come to be sure and charged thee to search and try thy self till thou certainly know Were he not a foolish traveller that would hold on his way when he doth not know whether it be right or wrong and say I hope I am right I will not doubt of it I will go on and trust God Art not thou guilty of this folly in in thy travels to Eternity Not considering that a little â—erious enquiry and tryal whether thy way be right might save thee a great deal of labour which thou bestowest in vain and must undo again or else thou wilt miss of Salvation and undo thy self If thou shouldst see a man in despair or that were certain to be damned for ever when he is dead wouldst not thou look upon such a man as a pitiful object Why thou that livest in wilful uncertainty and dost not know whether thou shalt be saved or no art in the next condition to such a person
in some measure sure that he is the Child of God 7. There are some duties that either the Saints only or chiefly are commanded to perform And how shall that be done if we cannot know that we are Saints Psal. 144.5 132.9 30.4 31.23 c. Thus I have proved that a Certainty may be attained an Infallible though not a perfect Certainty such as excludeth deceit though it exclude not all degree of doubting If Bellarmine by his Conjectural Certainty do mean this Infallible though imperfect Certainty as I doubt he doth not then I would not much contend with him And I acknowledg that it is not properly a Certainty of meer Faith but mixt SECT VI. 3. THe third thing that I promised is to shew you what are the Hinderances which keep men from Examination and Assurance I shall 1. Shew you what hinders them from Trying and 2. What hindereth them from Knowing when they do Try That so when you see the Impediments you may avoyd them And 1. We cannot doubt but Satan will do his part to hinder us from such a necessary duty as this If all the power he hath can do it or all the means and Instruments which he can raise up he will be sure above all duties to keep you off from this He is loath the Godly should have that Joy and Assurance and Advantage against Corruption which the faithful performance of Self-Examination would procure them And for the Ungodly he knows if they should once fall close to this Examining task they would find out his deceits and their own danger and so be very likely to escape him If they did but faithfully perform this duty he were likely to lose most of the Subjects of his Kingdom How could he get so many millions to Hell willingly if they knew they went thither And how could they chuse but know if they did throughly try having such a clear light and sure rule in the Scripture to discover it If the beast did know that he is going to the slaughter he would not be driven so easily to it but would strive for his life before he comes to dye as well as he doth at the time of his death If Balaam had seen as much of the danger as his Ass instead of his driving on so furiously he would have been as loath to proceed as he If the Syrians had known whither they were going as well as Elisha did they would have stopt before they had found themselves in the hand of their Enemies 2 King 6.19 20. So if sinners did but know whither they are hasting they would stop before they are engulfed in damnation If every swearer drunkard whoremonger lover of the world or unregenerate person whatsoever did certainly know that the way he is in will never bring him to Heaven and that if he dye in it he shall undoubtedly perish Satan could never get him to proceed so resolvedly Alas he would then think every day a year till he were out of the danger and whether he were eating drinking working or what ever he were doing the thoughts of his danger would be still in his mind and this voyce would be stil in his ears Except thou Repent and be converted thou shalt surely perish The Devil knows well enough that if he cannot keep men from trying their states and knowing their misery he shal hardly be able to keep them from Repentance and Salvation And therefore he deals with them as Jael with Sisera she gives him fair words and food and layeth him to sleep and covereth his face and then she comes upon him softly and strikes the nail into his temples And as the Philistines with Sampson who first put out his eyes and then made him grind in their mills If the pit be not covered who but the blind will fall into it If the snare be not hid the bird will escape it Satan knows how to angle for Souls better then to shew them the hook and the line and to fright them away with a noise or with his own appearance Therefore he labours to keep them from a searching Ministry or to keep the Minister from helping them to search or to take off the edg of the Word that it may not pierce and divide or to turn away their thoughts or to possess them with prejudice Satan is acquainted with all the Preparations and Studies of the Minister he knows when he hath provided a searching Sermon fitted to the state and necessity of a hearer and therefore he will keep him away that day if it be possible above all or else cast him asleep or steal a way the Word by the cares and talk of the world or some way prevent its operation and the sinners obedience This is the first Hinderance SECT VII 2. WIcked men also are great impediments to poor sinners when they should examine and discover their estates 1. Their Examples hinder much When an ignorant sinner seeth all his friends and neighbors do as he doth and live quietly in the same state with himself yea the Rich and Learned as well as others this is an exceeding great temptation to him to proceed in his security 2. Also the merry company and pleasant discourse of these men doth take away the thoughts of his Spiritual State and doth make the understanding drunk with their sensual delight so that if the Spirit had before put into them any jealousie of themselves or any purpose to Try themselves this Jovial company doth soon quench them all 3. Also their continual discourse of nothing but matters of the world doâ—h damp all these purposes for self-trying and make them foâ—gotten 4. Their railings also and scorning at godly persons is a very great impediment to multitudes of Souls and possesseth them with such a prejudice and dislike of the way to Heaven that they settle resolvedly in the way they are in 5. Also their constant perswasions allurements threats c. hinder much God doth scarce ever open the eyes of a poor sinner to see that â—ll is naught with him and his way is wrong but presently there is a multitude of Satans Apostles ready to flatter him and dawb and deceive and settle him again in the quiet possession of his former Master What say they do you make a doubt of your Salvation who have lived so well and done no body harm and been beloved of all God is merciful and if such as you shall not be saved God help a great many What do you think is become of all your forefathers and what will become of all your friends and neighbours that live as you do Will they all be damned Shall none be sâ—ved think you but a few strict precisians Come come if ye hearken to these Puritan books or Preachers they will drive you to despair shortly or drive you out of your wits they must have something to say they would have all lâ—ke themselves Are not all men sinners and
Damnation is in Question and to be determined every mistake is insufferable and inexcusable which might have been prevented by any cost or pains Therefore men will chuse the most able Lawyers and Physicians because the mistakes of one may lose them their Estates and the mistakes of the other may lose them their lives But mistakes about their Souls are of a higher nature 5. If you should continue your mistakes till death there will be no time after to correct them for your recovery Mistake now and you are undone for ever Men think to see a man dye quietly or comfortably is to see him dye happily But if his comfort proceed from this mistake of his condition it is the most unhappy case and pittiful sight in the world To live mistaken in such a case is lamentable but to dye mistaken is desperate Seeing then that the case is so dangerous what wise man would not follow the search of his heart both night and day till he were assured of his safety SECT V. 4. COnsider how small the labour of this duty is in comparison of the sorrow which followeth its neglect A few hours or days work if it be closely followed and with good direction may do much to resolve the Question There is no such trouble in searching our hearts nor any such danger as may deter men from it what harm can it do to you to Try or to know It will take up no very long time Or if it did yet you have your time given you for that end One hour so spent will comfort you more then many otherwise If you cannot have while to make sure of heaven how can you have while to eat or drink or live You can endure to follow your callings at Plow and Cart and Shop to toil and sweat from day to day and year to year in the hardest labours And cannot you endure to spend a little time in inquiring what shall be your everlasting state What a deal of sorrow and after-complaining might this small labour prevent How many miles travel besides the vexation may a Traveller save by inquiring of the way Why what a sad case are you in while you live in such uncertainty You can have no true comfort in any thing you see or hear or possess You are not sure to be an hour out of Hell And if you come thither you will do nothing but bewail the folly of this neglect No excuse will then pervert Justice or quiet your Conscience If you say I little thought of this day and place God and Conscience may reply why did'st thou not think of it Wast thou not warned Had'st thou not time Therefore must thou perish because thou wouldest not think of it As the Commander answered his Souldier in Plutarch when he said non volens erravi I erred against my will he beat him and replied non volens poenas dato Thou shalt be punished also against thy will SECT VI. 5. THou canst scarce do Satan a greater pleasure nor thy self a greater injury It is the main scope of the Devil in all his Temptations to deceive thee and keep the ignorant of thy danger till thou feel the everlasting flames upon thy soul And wilt thou joyn with him to deceive thy self If it were not by this deceiving thee he could not destroy thee And if thou do this for him thou dost the greatest part of his work and art the chief destroyer and Devil to thy self And hath he deserved so well of thee and thy self so ill that thou shouldst assist him in such a design as thy damnation To deceive another is a grievous sin and such as perhaps thou wouldst scorn to be charged with And yet thou thinkest it nothing to deceive thy self Saith Solomon As a mad man who casteth fire-brands arrows and death So is the man that deceiveth his neighbour and saith Am not I in sport Surely then he that maketh but a sport or a matter of nothing to deceive his own soul may well be thought a mad man casting fire-brands and death at himself If any man think himself to be something when he is nothing he deceiveth himself saith Paul Gal. 6.3 Certainly among all the multitudes that perish this is the commonest cause of their undoing that they would not be brought to Try their state in time And is it not pity to think that so many thousands are merrily travelling to destruction and do not know it and all for want of this diligent search SECT VII 6. THE time is neer when God will search you And that will be another kind of Tryal then this If it be but in this life by the fiery tryal of affliction it will make you wish again and again that you had spared God that work and your selves the sorrow and that you had Tryed and Judged your selves that so you might have escaped the Tryal and Judgment of God He will Examine you then as officers do offenders with a word and a blow and as they would have done by Paul Examine him by scourging It was a terrible voyce to Adam when God calls to him Adam where art thou hast thou eaten c and to Cain when God asketh him Where is thy brother To have demanded this of himself had been easier Men think God mindeth their state and ways no more then they do their own They consider not in their hearts saith the Lord Hos. 7.2 that I remember all their wickedness now their own doings have beset them about they are before my face Oh what a happy preparation would it be to that last and great Tryal if men had but throughly Tryed themselves and made sure work before-hand When a man doth but soberly and believing think of that day especially when he shall see the Judgment set what a Joyful preparation is it if he can truly say I know the sentence shall pass on my side I have Examined my self by the same Law of Christ which now must Judg me and I have â—ound that I am quit from all my guilt and am a Justified person in Law already Oh Sirs if you knew but the comfort of such a preparation you would fall close to the work of Self-Examining yet before you slept SECT VIII 7. LAstly I desire thee to Consider What would be the sweet effects of this Examining If thou be upright and Godly it will lead thee straight toward Assurance of Gods Love If thou be not though it will trouble thee at the present yet doth it tend to thy happiness and will lead thee to Assurance of that happiness at length 1. The very Knowledg it self is naturally desireable Every man would fain know things to come especially concerning themselves If there were a book written which would tell every man his destiny what shall befall him to his last breath how desirous would people be to procure it and read it How did Nebuchadnezzars thoughts run on things that after should come
them begin to look about them Let them know that thou speak not to them of indifferent things not about childrens games or worldlings vanities or matters of a few days or years continuance nor yet about matters of uncertainty which perhaps may never come to pass But it is about the saving or damning of their Souls and bodies and whether they shall be Blessed with Christ or tormented with Devils and that for ever and ever without any change It is how to stand before God in Judgment and what answer to give and how they are like to speed And this Judgment and eternal state they shall very shortly see they are almost at it yet a few more nights and days and they shall presently be at that last day a few more breathes they have to breathe and they shall breathe out their last and then as certainly shall they see that mighty change as the Heaven is over their heads and the earth under their feet Oh labour to make men know that it is mad jesting about Salvation or Damnation and that Heaven and Hell be not matters to be playd with or passed over with a few careless thoughts Is it most certain that one of these days thou shalt be either in everlasting unchangeable Joy or Torments and doth it not awake thee Is there so few that find the way of life so many that go the way of death so hard to escape so easie to miscarry and that while we fear nothing but think all is well and yet do you fit still and trifle Why what do you mean what do you think on The world is passing away its pleasures are fading its honours are leaving you its profits will prove unprofitable to you Heaven or Hell are a little before you God is Just and Jealous his Threatenings are true the great day of his Judgment will be terrible your time runs on your lives are uncertain you are far behind hand you have loitered long your case is dangerous your Souls are far gone in sin you are strange to God you are hardened in evil customs you have no assurance of pardon to shew if you dye to morrow how unready are you and with what terror will your Souls go out of your bodies And do you yet loiter for all this Why consider with your selves God standeth all this while waiting your leasure his patience beareth his Justice forbeareth his Mercy intreateth you Christ standeth offering you his blood and merits you may have him freely and life with him the Spirit is perswading you Conscience is accusing and urging you Ministers are praying for you and calling upon you Satan stands waiting when Justice will cut off your lives that he may have you This is your time Now or Never What! had you rather lose Heaven then your profits or pleasures had you rather burn in Hell then repent on Earth had you rather howl and roar there then pray day and night for mercy here or to have Devils your Tormentors then to have Christ your Governor Will you renounce your part in God and Glory rather then renounce your cursed sins Do you think a holy life too much for Heaven or too dear a course to prevent an endless misery Oh friends What do you think of these things God hath made you men and endued you with Reason do not renounce your Reason where you should chiefly use it In this manner you must deal roundly and seriously with men Alas it is not a few dull words between Jest and earnest between sleep and waking as it were that will waken an ignorant dead-hearted sinner When a dull hearer and a dull speaker meet together a dead heart and a dead exhortation it is far unlike to have a lively effect If a man fall down in a Swoun you will not stand trifling with him but lay hands on him presently and snatch him up and rub him and call loud to him If a house be on fire you will not in a cold affected strain go tell your neighbor of it nor go make an oration of the nature and danger of fire but you will run out and cry Fire Fire Matters of moment must be seriously dealt with To tell a man of his sins so softly as Eli did his sons or reprove him so gently as Jehosaphat did Ahab Let not the King say so doth usually as much harm as good I am perswaded the very manner of some mens reproof and exhortations hath hardened many a sinner in the way of destruction To tell them of Sin or of Heaven or Hell in a dull easie careless language doth make men think you are not in good sadness nor do mean as you speak but either you scarce think your selves such things are true or else you take them for small indifferent matters or else sure you would never speak of them in such a slight indifferent manner Oh Sirs deal with Sin as Sin and speak of Heaven and Hell as they are and not as if you were in Jest. I confess I have failed much in this my self the Lord lay it not to my charge Loathness to displease men makes us undo them SECT IX 6. YEt lest you run into extreams I advise you to do it with Prudence and discretion Be as serious as you can but yet with Wisdom And especially you must be wise in these things following 1. In choosing the fittest season for your Exhortation not to deal with men when they are in passion or drunk or in publique where they will take it for a disgrace Mâ—n should observe when sinners are fittest to hear instructions Physick must not be given at all times but in season Opportunity advantageth every work It is an excellent example that Paul giveth us Gal. 2. â— He communicated the Gospel to them yet privately to them of reputation lest he should run in vain Some men would take this to be a sinful complying with their Corruption to yield so far to their pride and bashfulness as to teach them only in private because they would be ashamed to own the Truth in Publique But PAVL knew how great a hinderance mens reputation is to their entertaining of the Truth and that the remedy must not only be fitted to the disease but also to the strength of the Patient and that in so doing the Physician is not guilty of favoring the disease but is praise-worthy for taking the right way to cure and that learners and young-beginners must not be dealt with as open professors Moreover means will work easily if you take the opportunity when the Earth is soft the Plow will enter Take a man when he is under affliction or in the house of mourning or newly stirred by some moving Sermon and then set it home and you may do him good Christian Faithfulness doth require us not onely to do good when it falls in our way but to watch for opportunities of doing good 2 Be wise also in suiting your Exhortation to the quality and
drink with Publicans and sinners but it was only to be their Physitian and not their companion Who knows but God gave you interest in them to this end that you might be means of their recovery They that will not regard the words of another will regard a brother or sister or husband or wife or neer friend Besides that the bond of friendship doth engage you to more kindness and compassion then ordinary SECT IV. 3. PHysitians that are much about dying men should in a special maner make conscience of this duty They have a treble advantage First They are at hand Secondly They are with men in sickness and dangers when the ear is more open and the heart less stubborn then in time of health He that made a scorn of godliness before well then be of another minde and hear counsel then if ever he will hear it Thirdly Besides they look upon their Physitian as a man in whose hand is their life or at least may do much to save them and therefore they will the more regardfully hear his advice O therefore you that are of this honourable profession do not think this a work besides your calling as if it belonged to none but Ministers except you think it besides your calling to be compassionate or to be Christians O help therefore to fit your patients for heaven and whether you see they are for Life or for Death teach them both how to live and to dye and give them some Physick for their souls as you do for their bodies Blessed be God that very many of the chief Physitians of this Age have by their eminent piety vindicated their profession from the common imputation of Atheism and prophaness SECT V. 4. ANother sort that have excellent advantages for this duty is men that have wealth and authority and are of great place and command in the world especially that have many that live in dependance on them O what a world of good might Gentlemen and Knights and Lords do that have a great many of Tenants and that are the leaders of the Country if they had but hearts to improve their interest and advantage Little do you that are such think of the duty that lies upon you in this Have you not all your honor and riches from God and is it not evident then that you must employ them for the best advantage of his service Do you not know who hath said that to whom men commit much from them they will expect the more You have the greatest opportunities to do good of most men in the world Your Tenants dare not contradict you lest you dispossess them or their children of their habitations They fear you more then they do God himself Your frown will do more with them then the threatnings of the Scripture They will sooner obey you then God If you speak to them for God and their souls you may be regarded when even a Minister that they fear not shall be despised If they do but see you favor the way of Godliness they will lightly counterfeit it at least to please you especially if they live within the reach of your observation O therefore as you value the honor of God your own comfort and the Salvation of souls improve your interest to the utmost for God Go visit your Tenants and neighbors houses and see whether they worship God in their families and take all opportunities to press them to their duties Do not despise them because they are poor or simple Remember God is no respecter of persons your flesh is of no better mettal then theirs nor wil the worms spare your faces or hearts any more then theirs nor will your bones or dust bear the badge of your Gentility you must all be equals when you stand in Judgment And therefore help the soul of a poor man as well as if he were a Gentleman And let men see that you excell others as much in piety heavenliness compassion and diligence in Gods work as you do in riches and honor in the world I confesse you are like to be singular if you take this course but then remember you shall be singular in glory for few great and mighty and noble are called SECT VI. 5. ANother sort that have special opportunity to this work of helping others to heaven is The Ministers of the Gospel As they have or should have more ability then others so it is the very work of their calling and every one expecteth it at their hands and will better submit to their teaching then to other mens I intend not these instructions so much to teachers as to others and therefore I shall say but little to them and if all or most Ministers among us were as faithfull and diligent as some I would say nothing But because it is otherwise let me give these two or three words of advice to my Brethren in this office 1. Be sure that the recovering and saving of souls be the main end of your studies preaching O do not propound any low and base ends to your selves This is the end of your calling let it be also the end of your endeavors God forbid that you should spend a weeks study to please the people or to seek the advancing of you own reputations Dare you appear in the Pulpit on such a business and speak for your selves when you are sent and pretend to speak for Christ Dare you spend that time and wit and parts for your selves And wast the Lords day in seeking applause which God hath set apart for himself O what notorious sacriledge is this Set out the work of God as skilfully and adornedly as you can But still let the winning of souls be your end and let all your studies and labors be serviceable thereto Let not the window be so painted as to keep out the light but alwayes Judg that the best means that most conduceth to the end Do not think that God is best served by a neat starched laced Oration But that he is the able skilful Minister that is best skilled in the art of instructing convincing perswading and so winning of souls and that is the best Sermon that is best in these When you once grow otherwise minded and seek not God but your selves God will make you the basest and most contemptible of men as you make your selves the most sinfull and wretched Hath not this brought down the Ministery of England once already It is true of your reputation as Christ saith of your lives They that will save them shall lose them O let the vigor also of your perswasions shew that you are sensible on how weighty a business you are sent O Preach with that seriousness and fervor as men that believe their own doctrine and that know their hearers must either be prevailed with or be damned What you would do to save them from Everlasting burning that do while you have the opportunity and price in your hand that
If God were not more willing of our company then we are of his how long should we remain thus distant from him And as we had never been sanctified if God had stayed till we were willing so if he should refer it wholly to our selves it would at least be long before we should be glorified I confesse that Death of it self is not desirable but the souls Rest with God is to which death is the common passage And because we are apt to make light of this sin and to plead our common nature for to patronize it let me here set before you its aggravations and also propound some further considerations which may be useful to you and my self against it SECT II. ANd first consider What a deal of gross infidelity doth lurk in the bowels of this sin Either paganish unbelief of the truth of that eternal blessedness and of the truth of the Scripture which doth promise it to us or at least a doubting of our own interest or most usually somewhat of both these And though Christians are usually most sensible of the latter and therefore complain most against it yet I am apt to suspect the former to be the main radicall master sin and of greatest force in this business O if we did but verily believe that the promise of this glory is the word of God and that God doth truly mean as he speaks and is fully resolved to make it good if we did verily believe that there is indeed such blessedness prepared for believers as the Scripture mentioneth sure we should be as impatient of living as we are now fearful of dying and should think every day a yeer till our last day should come We should as hardly refrain from laying violent hands on our selvs or from the neglecting of the means of our health and life as we do now from overmuch carefulness and seeking of life by unlawful means If the eloquent oration of a Philosopher concerning the souls immortality and the life to come could make his affected hearer presently to cast himself head long from the rock as impatient of any longer delay what would a serious Christians belief do if Gods Law against self murder did not restrain Is it possible that we can truly believe that death will remove us from misery to such glory and yet be loth to dye If it were the doubts of our own interest which did fear us yet a true belief of the certainty and excellency of this Rest would make us restless till our interest be cleared If a man that is desperately sick to day did believe he should arise sound the next morning or a man to day in despicable poverty had assurance that he should to morrow arise a prince would they be afraid to go to bed Or rather think it the longest day of their lives till that desired night and morning come The truth is though there is much faith and Christianity in our mouths yet there is much infidelity and paganisme in our hearts which is the maine cause that we are so loth to dye SECT III 3. ANd as the weakness of our Faith so also the coldness of our Love is exceedingly discovered by our unwillingness to dye Love doth desire the neerest conjunction the fullest fruition and closest communion Where these desires are absent there is only a naked pretence of Love He that ever felt such a thing as Love working in his brest hath also felt these desires attending it If we love our friend we love his company his presence is comfortable his absence is troublesome when he goes from us we desire his return when he comes to us we entertain him with welcome and gladness when he dyes we mourn and usually over-mourn to be separated from a faithful friend is to us as the renting of a member from our bodyes And would not our desires after God be such if we really loved him Nay should it not be much more then such as he is above all friends most lovely The Lord teach us to look closely to our hearts and take heed of self-deceit in this point For certainly what ever we pretend or conceit if we love either Father Mother Husband Wife Childe Friend Wealth or life more then Christ we are yet none of his sincere Disciples When it comes to the tryall the question will not be Who hath preached most or heard most or talked most but who hath loved most when our account is given in Christ will not take Sermons Prayers Fastings no nor the giving of our goods nor the burning of our bodies in stead of love 1 Cor. 13.1 2 3 4 8 13. 16.22 Ephes. 6.24 And do we love him and yet care not how long we are from him If I be deprived of my bosom friend me thinks I am as a man in a wilderness solitary and disconsolate And is my absence from God no part of my trouble and yet can I take him for my chiefest friend If I delight but in some Garden or Walk or Gallery I would be much in it If I love my Books I am much with them and almost unweariedly poaring on them The food which I love I would often feed on the clothes that I love I would often wear the recreations which I love I would often use them the business which I love I would be much employed in And can I love God and that above all these and yet have no desires to be with him Is it not a far likelier sign of hatred then of love when the thoughts of our appearing before God are our most grievous thoughts and when we take our selves as undone because we must die and come unto him Surely I should scarce take him for an unfeigned friend who were as well contented to be absent from me as we ordinarily are to be absent from God Was it such a joy to Jacob to see the face of Joseph in Egypt and shall we so dread the sight of Christ in glory and yet say we love him I dare not conclude that we have no love at all when we are so loth to die But I dare say were our love more we should die more willingly Yea I dare say Did we love God but as strongly as a worldling loves his wealth or an ambitious man his honor or a voluptuous man his pleasure yea as a drunkard loves his swinish delight or an unclean person his bruitish lust We should not then be so exceeding loth to leave the world and go to God O if this holy flame of love were throughly kindled in our brests in stead of our pressing fears our dolorous complaints and earnest prayers against death we should joyn in Davids Wilderness-lamentations Psal. 42.1 2. As the Hart panteth after the water-brooks so panteth my soul after thee O God My soul thirsteth for God for the living God when shall I come and appear before God The truth is As our knowledg of God is exceeding
hath made this reconciliation Surely not the great Reconciler He hath told us in the world we shall have trouble and in him onely we shall have peace VVe may reconcile our selves to the world at our peril but it will never reconcile it self to us O foolish unworthy soul who hadst rather dwell in this land of darkness and rather wander in this barren wilderness then be at rest with Jesus Christ who hadst rather stay among the VVolves and daily suffer the Scorpions stings then to praise the Lord with the Hosts of Heaven If thou didst well know what Heaven is and what Earth is it would not be so SECT VI. 5. THis unwillingness to dye doth actually impeach us of high Treason against the Lord Is it not a chusing of Earth before him and taking these present things for our happiness and consequently making them our very God If we did indeed make God our God that is our End our Rest our Portion our Treasure how is it possible but we should desire to enjoy him It behoves us the rather to be fearful of this it being utterly inconsistent with saving Grace to value any thing before God or to make the Creature our highest End Many other sins foul and great may possibly yet consist with sincerity but so I am certain cannot that But concerning this I have spoke before SECT VII 6. ANd all these defects being thus discovered what a deal of dissembling doth it more over shew We take on us to believe undoubtedly the exceeding eternal weight of Glory We call God our chiefest Good and say we love Him above all and for all this we fly from Him as if it were from Hell it self would you have any man believe you when you call the Lord your onely Hope and speak of Christ as All in All and talk of the Joy that is in Presence and yet would endure the hardest life rather then dye and come unto him What self-contradiction is this to talk so hardly of the world and flesh to groan and complain of sin and suffering and yet fear no day more then that which we expect should bring our finall freedom what shameless gross dissembling is this to spend so many hours and dayes in hearing Sermons reading Books conferring with others and all to learn the way to a place which we are loth to come to To take on us all our life-time to walk towards Heaven to run to strive to fight for Heaven which we are loth to come to What apparent palpable hypocrysie is this to lye upon our knees in publike and private and spend one hour after another in prayer for that which we would not have If one should over-hear thee in thy daily devotions crying out Lord deliver me from this body of death from this sin this sickness this poverty these cares and feares how long Lord shall I suffer these and withall should hear thee praying against death can he believe thy tongue agrees with thy heart except thou have so far lost thy reason as to expect all this here or except the Papists Doctrine were true that we are able to fulfil the Law of God or our late Perfectionists are truly enlightned who think they can live and not sin but if thou know these to be undoubtedly false how canst thou deny thy gross dissembling SECT VIII 7. COnsider how do we wrong the Lord and his Promises and disgrace his ways in the eyes of the world As if we would actually perswade them to question whether God be true of his Word or no whether there be any such glory as Scripture mentions when they see those who have professed to live by Faith and have boasted of their hopes in another world and perswaded others to let go all for these hopes and spoken disgracefully of all things below in comparison of these unexpressable things above I say when they see these very men so loth to leave their hold of present things and to go to that glory which they talked and boasted of how doth it make the weak to stagger and confirm the world in their unbelief and sensuality and make them conclude sure if these Professors did expect so much glory and make so light of the world as they seem they would not themselves be so loth of a change O how are we ever able to repaiâ— the wrong which we do to God and poor souls by this scandal And what an honor to God what a strengthning to Believers what a conviction to Unbelievers would it be if Christians in this did answer their professions and chearfully welcome the news of Rest SECT IX 8. IT evidently discovers that we have been careless loyterers that we have spent much time to little purpose and that we have neglected and lost a great many of warnings Have we not had all our life time to prepare to die So many years to make ready for one hour and are we so unready and unwilling yet VVhat have we done why have we lived that the business of our lives is so much undone Had we any greater matters to minde Have we not foolishly wronged our souls in this would we have wished more frequent warnings How oft hath death entered the habitations of our neighbors how oft hath it knockt at our own doors we have first heard that such a one is dead and then such a one and such a one till our Towns have changed most of their Inhabitants And was not all this a sufficient warning to tell us that we were also Mortals and our own turn would shortly come Nay we have seen death raging in Towns and Fields so many hundred a day dead of the Pestilence so many thousands slam of the Sword and did we not know it would reach to us at last How many distempers have vexed our bodies frequent Languishings consuming Weaknesses wasting Feavers here pain and there trouble that we have been forced to receive the sentence of death and what were all these but so many Messengers sent from God to tell us we must shortly dye as if we had heard a lively voyce bidding us Delay no more but make you ready And are we unready and unwilling after all this O careless dead hearted Sinners unworthy neglecters of Gods Warnings faithless betrayers of our own souls All these hainous aggravations do lye upon this sin of unwillingness to dye which I have laid down to make it hateful to my own soul which is too much guilty of it as well as yours And for a further help to our prevailing against it I shall adjoyn these following Considerations SECT X. 1. COnsider not to dye were never to be happy To escape death were to miss of blessedness Except God should translate us as Henoch and Elias which he never did before or since If our hopeth in Christ were in this life onely we were then of all men most miserable The Epicure hath more pleasure to his Flesh then
the Christian the Drunkard the Whoremaster and the jovial Lads do swagger it out with gallantry and mirth when a poor Saint is mourning in a corner yea the very beasts of the field do eat and drink and skip play and care for nothing when many a Christian dwels with sorrows So that if you would not dye and go to heaven what would you have more then an Epicure or a beast What doth it availe us to fight with beasts as men if it were not for our hopes of a life to come Why do we pray and fast and mourn why do we suffer the contempt of the world why are we the scorn and hatred of all if it were not for our hopes after we are dead why are we Christians and not Pagans and Infidels if we do not desire a life to come why Christian wouldst thou lose thy faith and lose thy labor in all thy duties and all thy sufferings wouldst thou lose thy hope and lose all the end of thy life and lose all the blood of Christ and be contented with the portion of a worldling or a brute If thou say No to this how canst thou then be loth to dye As good old Milius said when he lay a dying and was asked whether he were willing to dye or no Illius est nolle mori qui nolit ire ad Christum A saying of Austins which he oft repeated Let him be loth to dye who is loth to be with Christ. SECT XI 2. COnsider Is God willing by death to Glorifie us and are we unwilling to dye that we may be glorified would God freely give us heaven and are we unwilling to receive it As the Prince who would have taken the lame begger into his Coach and he refused said to him Opitimè mereris qui in luto haereas Thou well deservest to stick in the dirt So may God to the refusers of Rest You well deserve to live in trouble Me thinks if a Prince were willing to make you his heir you should scarce be unwilling to accept it Sure the refusing of such a kindness must needs discover ingratitude and unworthiness As God hath resolved against them who make excuses when they should come to Christ Verily none of these that were bidden shall tast of my supper So is it just with him to resolve against us who frame excuses when we should come to Glory SECT XII 3. THe Lord Jesus was willing to come from heaven to earth for us and shall be unwilling to remove from earth to heaven for our selves and him Sure if we had been once possessed of Heaven and God should have sent â—s to earth again as he did his Son for our sakes we should then have been loth to remove indeed It was another kinde of change then ours is which Christ did freely submit unto to cloath himself with the garments of flesh and to take upon him the form of a servant to come from the bosome of the Fathers Love to bear his wrath which we should have borne Shall he come down to our hell from the height of glory to the depth of misery to bring us up to his Eternal Rest and shall we be after this unwilling Sure Christ had more cause to be unwilling he might have said What is it to me if these sinners suffer If they value their flesh above their spirits and their lusts above my Fathers Love if they needs will sell their souls for nought who is it fit should be the loser and who should bear the blame and curse Should I whom they have wronged must they wilfully transgress my Law and I undergo their deserved pain Is it not enough that I bear the trespasse from them but I must also bear my Fathers wrath and satisfie the Justice which they have wronged Must I come down from Heaven to Earth and cloth my self with humane flesh be spit upon and scorned by man and fast and weep and sweat and suffer and bleed and dye a cursed death and all this for wretched wormes who would rather hazard all they had and venture their souls and Gods favor then they would forbear but one forbiden morsel Do they cast away themselves so slightly and must I redeem them again so dearly Thus we see that Christ had much to have pleaded against his coming down for man and yet he pleaded none of this He had reason enough to have made him unwilling and yet did he voluntarily condescend But we have no reason against our coming to him except we will reason against our hopes and plead for a perpetuity of our own calamities Christ came down to fetch us up and would we have him loose his blood and labor and go away again without us Hath he bought our Rest at so dear a rate Is our inheritance purchased with the blood of God And are we after all this loth to enter Ah Sirs it was Christ and not we that had cause to be loth The Lord forgive and heal this foolish ingratitude SECT XIII 4. COnsider do we not combine with our most cruel mortal foes and jump with them in their most malitious designe while we are loth to dye and go to heaven where is the height of all their malice and what 's the scope of all temptations and what 's the divels daily business Is it not to keep our souls from God And shall we be well content with this and joyn with Satan in our desires what though it be not those eternal torments yet it s the one half of Hell which we wish to our selves while we desire to be absent from Heaven and God If thou shouldest take counsel of all thine enemies If thou shouldest beat thy brains both night and day in studying to do thy self a mischief What greater then 〈◊〉 could it possibly be To continue here on earth from God Excepting only hell it self O what sport is this to Sathan that his desires and thine should so concur That when he sees he cannot get thee to Hell he can so long keep thee out of Heaven and make thee the earnest petitioner for it thy self O gratifie not the Divel so much to thy own displeasure SECT XIV 5. DO not our daily fears of death make our lives a continual torment The fears of death as Erasmus saith being a sorer evil then death it self And thus as Paul did dye daily in regard of preparation and in regard of the necessary sufferings of his life so do we in regard of the torments and the useless sufferings which we make our selves Those lives which might be full of Joyes in the daily contemplation of the life to come and the sweet delightful thoughts of bliss how do we fill them up with terrors through all these causeless thoughts and fears Thus do we consume our own comforts and prey upon our truâ—st pleasures When we might lye down and rise up and walk abroad with our hearts full of
his chariot so long a coming Why tarry the wheels of his chariots Hovv long Lord Hovv long SECT XX. 11. COnsider vvhat if God should grant thy desire and let thee live yet many yeers but vvithal should strip thee of the comforts of life and deny thee the mercies vvhich thou hast hitherto enjoyed Would this be a blessing vvorth the begging for Might not God in judgment give thee life as he gave the murmuring Israelites Quails or as he oft times gives men riches and honor when he sees them over-earnest for it Might he not justly say to thee Seeing thou hadst rather linger on earth then come away and enjoy my presence seeing thou art so greedy of life take it and a curse with it never let fruit grow on it more nor the Sun of comfort shine upon it nor the dew of my blessing ever water it Let thy table be a snare let thy friends be thy sorrow let thy riches be corrupted and the rust of thy silver eat thy flesh Go hear Sermons as long as thou wilt but let never Sermon do thee good more let all thou hearest make against thee and increase the smart of thy wounded spirit If thou love Preaching better then Heaven go and preach till thou be aweary but never profit soul more Sirs what if God should thus chastise our inordinate desires of living were it not just and what good would our lives then do us Seest thou not some that spend their days on their cowch in groaning and some in begging by the high-way sides and others in seeking bread from door to door and most of the world in laboring for food and rayment and living onely that they may live and loosing the ends and benefits of life Why what good would such a life do thee were it never so long when thy soul shall serve thee onely in stead of Salt to keep thy body from stinking God might give thee life till thou art weary of living and as glad to be rid of it as Judas or Ahitophel and make thee like many miserable Creatures in the world who can hardly forbear laying violent hands on themselves Be not therefore so importunate for life which may prove a judgment in stead of a blessing SECT XXI 12. COnsider how many of the precious Saints of God of all ages and places have gone before thee Thou art not to enter an untrodden path nor appointed first to break the Ice Except onely Henoch and Elias which of the Saints have scaped death And art thou better then they There are many millions of Saints dead more then do now remain on Earth What a number of thine own bosome friends and intimate acquaintance and companions in duty are now there and why shouldst thou be so loth to follow Nay hath not Jesus Christ himself gone this way hath he not sanctified the grave to us and perfumed the dust with his own body And art thou loth to follow him too O rather let us say as Thomas Let us also go and die with him or rather let us suffer with him that we may be glorified together with him Many such like Considerations might be added as that Christ hath taken out the sting How light the Saints have made of it how cheerfully the very Pagans have entertained it c. But because all that 's hitherto spoken is also conducible to the same purpose I pass them by If what hath been said will not perswade Scripture and Reason have little force I have said the more on this subject finding it so needful to my self and others finding that among so many Christians who could do and suffer much for Christ there 's yet so few that can willingly die and of many who have somewhat subdued other corruptions so few have got the conquest of this This caused me to drawforth these Arrows from the quiver of Scripture and spend them against it SECT XXII I Will onely yet Answer some Objections and so conclude this Use. 1. Object O If I were but certain of Heaven I should then never stick at dying Answ. 1. Search for all that whether some of the forementioned câ—uses may not be in fault as well as this 2. Didst thou not say so long ago Have you not been in this song this many yeers if you are yet uncertain whose fault is it you have had nothing else to do with your lives nor no greater matter then this to minde Were you not better presently fall to the tryal till you have put the Question out of doubt Must God stay while you trifle and must his patience be continued to cherish your negligence If thou have played the loyterer do so no longer Go search thy soul and follow the search close till theâ— come to a clear discovery Begin to night stay not till the next morning Certainty comes not by length of time but by the blessing of the Spirit upon wise and faithful tryal You may linger out thus twenty yeers more and be still as uncertain as now you are 3. A perfect certainty may not be expected we shall still be deficient in that as well as in other things They who think the Apostle speaks absolutely and not comparatively of a perfect assurance in the very degree when he mentions a Plerophory or Full assurance I know no reason but they may expect perfection in all things else as well as this VVhen you have done all you will know this but in part If your belief of that Scripture which saith Beleeve and be saved be imperfect and if your knowledg whether your own deceitful hearts do sincerely beleeve or not be imperfect or if but one of these tvvo be imperfect the result or conclusion must needs be so too If you vvould then stay till you are perfectly certain you may stay for ever if you have obtained assurance but in some degree or got but the grounds for assurance said it is then the speediest and surest vvay to desire rather to be quickly in Rest For then and never till then vvill both the grounds and assurance be fully perfect 4. Both your assurance and the comfort thereof is the gift of the Spirit vvho is a free bestovver And Gods usual time to be largest in mercy is vvhen his people are deepest in necessity A mercy in season is the svveetest mercy I could give you here abundance of late examples of those vvho have languished for assurance and comfort some all their sickness and some most of their lives and vvhen they have been neer to death they have received in abundance Never fear death then through imperfections of assurance for that 's the most usual time of all vvhen God most fully and svveetly bestovvs it SECT XXIII OBject 2. O but the Churches necessities are great and God hath made me useful in my place so that the loss vvill be to many or else me thinks I could vvillingly die Answ. This may be the case of some but
same and if we took the right course for fetching in our comfort from these sure our comforts would be more setled and constant though not always the same Whoever thou art therefore that Readest these lines I intreat thee in the name of the Lord and as thou valuest the life of constant Joy and that good conscience which is a continual feast that thou wouldest but seriously set upon this work and learn this Art of Heavenly-mindedness and thou shalt finde the increase a hundred fold and the benefit abundantly exceed thy labor But this is the misery of mans Nature Though every man naturally abhorreth sorrow and loves the most merry and joyful life yet few do love the way to Joy or will endure the pains by which it is obtained they will take the next that comes to hand and content themselves with earthly pleasures rather then they will ascend to heaven to seek it and yet when all is done they must have it there or be without it SECT VI. 4. COnsider A heart in heaven will be a most excellent preservative against temptations a powerful means to kill thy corruptions and to save thy conscience from the wounds of sin God can prevent our sinning though we be careless and keep off the temptation which we would draw upon our selves and sometime doth so but this is not his usual course nor is this our safest way to escape When the minde is either idle or ill imployed the devil needs not a greater advantage when he finds the thoughts let out on Lust Revenge Ambition or Deceit what an opportunity hath he to move for Execution and to put on the Sinner to practise what he thinks on Nay if he finde the minde but empty there 's room for any thing that he will bring in but when he finds the heart in heaven what hope that any of his motions should take Let him entice to any forbidden course or shew us the baite of any pleasure the soul will return Nehemiaes Answer I am doing a great work and cannot come Neh. 6.3 Several ways will this preserve us against Temptations First By keeping the heart imployed Secondly By clearing the Understanding and so confirming the Will Thirdly By prepossessing the Affections with these highest delights Fourthly And by keeping us in the way of Gods blessing First By keeping the heart employed when we are idle we tempt the devil to tempt us as it is an encouragement to a Thief to see your doors open and no body within and as we use to say Careless persons make Theeves or as it will encourage an High-way Robber to see you unweaponed so may it encourage Sathan to find your hearts idle but when the heart is taken up with God it cannot have while to hearken to Temptations it cannot have while to be lustful and wanton ambitious or worldly If a poor man have a suit to any of you he will not come when you are taken up in some great mans company or discourse that 's but an ill time to speed If you were but busied in your lawful Callings you would not be so ready to hearken to Temptations much less if you were busied above with God Will you leave your Plow and Harvest in the Field or leave the quenching of a fire in your houses to run vvith children a hunting of Butterflies vvould a Judg be perswaded to rise from the Bench vvhen he is sitting upon life and death to go and play among the Boys in the streets No more will a Christian vvhen he is busie vvith God and taking a survey of his eternal Rest give ear to the alluring charms of Sathan Non vacat exiguis c. is a Character of the truly prudent man the children of that Kingdom should never have vvhile for trifles but especially vvhen they are imployed in the affairs of the Kingdom and this employment is one of the Saints chief preservatives against temptations For as Gregory saith Nunquam Dei amor otiosus est operatur enim magna si est Si verò operari renuit non est amor The Love of God is never idle it vvorketh great things vvhen it truly is and vvhen it vvill not vvork it is not love Therefore being still thus working it is still preserving Secondly A heavenly minde is the freest from sin because it is of clearest understanding in spiritual matters of greatest concernment A man that is much in conversing above hath truer and livelyer apprehensions of things concerning God and his soul then any reading or learning can beget Though perhaps he may be ignorant in divers controversies and matters that less concern salvation yet those truths vvhich must stablish his soul and preserve him from temptation he knows far better then the greatest Scholars he hath so deep an insight into the evil of sin the vanity of the creature the brutishness of fleshly sensual delights that temptations have little power on him for these earthly vanities are Satans baites which though they may take much with the undiscerning world yet with the clear-sighted they have lost their force In vain saith Salomon the net is spread in the sight of any bird Pro. 1.17 And usually in vain doth Satan lay his snares to entrap the soul that plainly sees them when a man is on high he may see the further we use to set our discovering Centinels on the highest place that 's neer unto us that he may discern all the motions of the Enemy In vain doth the Enemy lay his Ambuscado's when we stand over him on some high Mountain and clearly discover all he doth When the heavenly-minde is above with God he may far easier from thence discern every danger that lyes below and the whole method of the devil in deceiving Nay if he did not discover the snare yet were he likelier far to escape it then any others that converse below A net or baite that 's laid on the ground is unlikely to catch the bird that flyes in the Air while she keeps above she 's out 〈◊〉 of the danger and the higher the safer so is it with us Sathans temptations are laid on the earth earth is the place and earth the ordinary baite How shall these ensnare the Christian who hath left the earth and walks with God But alas we keep not long so high but down we must to the earth again and then we are taken If conversing with wise and learned men is the way to make one wise and learned then no wonder if he that converseth with God become wise If men that travel about the earth do think to return home with more experience and wisdom how much more he that travels to heaven As the very Air and Climate that we most abide in do work our bodies to their own temper no wonder if he that is much in that sublime and purer Region have a purer soul and quicker sight and if he have an understanding full of light who liveth with
the Sun the Fountain the Father of light as certain herbs and meats we feed on do tend to make our sight more clear so the soul that 's fed with Angels food must needs have anâ— understanding much more clear then they that dwel and feed on earth And therefore you may easily see that such a man is in far less danger of temptations and Satan will hardlier beguile his soul even as a wise man is hardlier deceived then fools and children Alas the men of the world that dwell below and know no other conversation but earthly no wonder if their understandings be darkned and they be easily drawn to every wickedness no wonder if Satan take them captive at his will and leade them about as we see a Dog leade a blinde man with a string The foggy Air and Mists of earth do thicken their sight the smoak of worldly cares and business blindes them and the dungeon which they live in is a land of darkness How can Worms Moles see whose dwelling is alwayes in the earth while this dust is in mens eyes no wonder if they mistake gain for godliness sin for grace the world for God their own wils for the Law of Christ and in the issue hell for heaven if the people of God will but take notice of their own hearts they shall finde their experiences confirming this that I have said Christians do you not sensibly perceive that when your hearts are seriously fixt on heaven you presently become wiser then before Are not your understandings more solid and your thoughts more sober have you not truer apprehensions of things then you had For my own part if ever I be wise it is when I have been much above and seriously studied the life to come Me thinks I finde my understanding after such contemplations as much to differ from what it was before as I before differed from a Fool or Idiot when my understanding is weakned and befool'd with common imployment and with conversing long with the vanities below me thinks a few sober thoughts of my Fathers house and the blessed provision of his Family in Heaven doth make me with the Prodigal to come to my self again Surely when a Christian withdraws himself from his earthly thoughts and begins to converse with God in heaven he is as Nebuchadnezzar taken from the beasts of the field to the Throne and his understanding returneth to him again O when a Christian hath had but a glimpse of Eternity and then looks down on the world again how doth he befool himself for his sin for neglects of Christ for his fleshly pleasures for his earthly cares How doth he say to his Laughter Thou art mad and to his vain Mirth What dost thou How could he even tear his very flesh and take revenge on himself for his folly how verily doth he think that there is no man in Bedlam so truly mad as wiful sinners and lazy betrayers of their own souls and unworthy sleighters of Christ and glory This is it that makes a dying man to be usually wiser then other men are because he looks on Eternity as neer and knowing he must very shortly be there he hath more deep and heart-piercing thoughts of it then ever he could have in health and prosperity Therefore it is that the most deluded sinners that were cheated with the world and bewitched with sin do then most ordinarily come to themselves so far as to have a righter judgment then they had and that many of the most bitter enemies of the Saints would give a world to be such themselves and would fain dye in the condition of those whom they hated even as wicked Balaam when his eyes are opened to see the perpetual blessedness of the Saints will cry out O that I might dye the death of the righteous and that my last end might be like his As Witches when they are taken and in prison or at the Gallows have no power left them to bewitch any more so we see commonly the most ungodly men when they see they must dye and go to another world their judgments are so changed and their speech so changed as if they were not the same men as if they were come to their wits again and Sin and Satan had power to bewitch them no more Yet let the same men recover and lose their apprehension of the life to come and how quickly do they lose their understandings with it In a word those that were befool'd with the world and the flesh are far wiser when they come to die and those that were wise before are now wise indeed If you would take a mans judgment about Sin or Grace or Christ or Heaven go to a dying man and ask him which you were best to chuse ask him whether you were best be drunk or no or be lustful or proud or revengeful or no ask him whether you were best pray and instruct your Families or no or to sanctifie the Lords Day or no though some to the death may be desperately hardned yet for the most part I had rather take a mans judgment then about these things then at any other time For my own part if my judgment be ever solid it is when I have the seriousest apprehensions of the life to come nay the sober mention of death sometimes will a little compose the most distracted understanding Sirs do you not think except men are stark devils but that it would be a harder matter to intice a man to sin when he lyes a dying then it was before If the devil or his Instruments should then tell him of a cup of Sack of merry company of a Stage-play or Morrice-Dance do you think he would then be so taken with the motion If he should then tell him of Riches or Honors or shew him a pair of Cards or Dice or a Whore would the temptation think you be as strong as before would he not answer Alas what 's all this to me who must presently appear before God and give account of all my life and straitways be in another world Why Christian if the apprehension of the neerness of Eternity will work such strange effects upon the ungodly and make them wiser then to be deceived so easily as they were wont to be in time of health O then what rare effects would it work vvith thee and make thee scorn the baits of sin if thou couldst always dwell in the views of God and in lively thoughts of thine everlasting state Surely a believer if he improve his faith may ordinarily have truer and more quickning apprehensions of the life to come in the time of his health then an unbeliever hath at the hour of his death Thirdly Furthermore A Heavenly minde is exceedingly fortified against temptations because the affections are so throughly prepossessed with the high delights of another world Whether Satan do not usually by the sensitive Appetite prevail with the Will without any further prevailing with the
great deal of fervor in Affections and Duties and all prove but common and unsound when it is raised upon common Grounds and motives your zeal will partake of the nature of those things by which it is acted The zeal therefore which is kindled by your meditations on Heaven is most like to prove a heavenly zeal and the liveliness of the Spirit which you fetch from the face of God must needs be the Divinest and sincerest life Some mens fervency is drawn onely from their Books and some from the pricks of some stinging affliction and some from the mouth of a moving Minister and some from the encouragement of an attentive Auditory but he that knows this way to heaven and it derives it daily from the pure Fountain shall have his soul revived with the water of Life and enjoy that quickning which is the Saints peculiar By this Faith thou maist offer Abels Sacrifice more excellent then that of common men and by it obtain winess that thou art righteous God testifying of thy gifts that they are sincere Heb. 11.4 when others are ready as Baals Priests to beat themselves and cut their flesh because their sacrifice will not burn then if thou canst get but the spirit of Elias and in the chariot of Contemplation canst soar aloft till thou approachest neer to the quickning Spirit thy soul and sacrifice will gloriously flame though the flesh and the world should cast upon them the water of all their opposing enmity Say not now How shall we get so high or how can mortals ascend to heaven For Faith hath wings and Meditation is its chariot Its office is to make absent things as present Do you not see how a little piece of Glass if it do but rightly face the Sun will so contract its beames and heat as to set on fire that which is behinde it which without it would have received but little warmth Why thy Faith is as the Burning-glass to thy Sacrifice and Meditation sets it to face the Sun onely take it not away too soon but hold it there awhile and thy soul will feel the happy effect The slanderous Jews did raise a foolish tale of Christ that he got into the Holy of Holies and thence stole the true name of God and lest he should lose it cut a hole in his thigh and sewed it therein and by the vertue of this he raised the dead gave sight to the blinde cast out divels and performed all his Miracles Surely if we can get into the Holy of Holies and bring thence the Name and Image of God and get it closed up in our hearts this would enable us to work wonders every duty we performed would be a wonder and they that heard would be ready to say Never man spake as this man speaketh The Spirit would possess us as those flaming tongues and make us every one to speak not in the variety of the confounded Languagues but in the primitive pure Language of Canaan the wonderful Works of God We should then be in every duty whether Prayer Exhortation or brotherly reproof as Paul was at Athens his Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was stirred within him and should be ready to say as Jeremy did Jer. 20.9 His word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones and I was weary with forbearing and I could not stay Christian Reader Art thou not thinking when thou seest a lively beleever and hearest his soul-melting Prayers and soul-ravishing discourse O how happy a man is this O that my soul were in this blessed plight Why I here direct and advise thee from God Try this forementioned course and set thy soul conscionably to this work and thou shalt be in as good a case Wash thee frequently in this Jordan and thy Leprous dead soul will revive and thou shalt know that there is a God in Israel and that thou mayst live a vigorous and joyous life if thou wilfully cast not by this duty and so neglect thine own mercies If thou be not a lazy reserved hypocrite but dost truly value this strong and active frame of Spirit shew it then by thy present attempting this heavenly exercise Say not now but thou hast heard the way to obtain this life into thy soul and into thy duties If thou wilt yet neglect it blame thy self But alas the multitude of Professors come to a Minister just as Naaman came to Elias they ask us How shall I know I am a childe of God How shall I overcome a hard heart and get such strength and life of Grace But they expect that some easie means should do it and think we should cure them with the very Answer to their Question and teach them a way to be quickly well but when they hear of a daily trading in Heaven and the constant Meditation on the joyes above This is a greater task then they expected and they turn their backs as Naaman on Elias or the young man on Christ and few of the most conscionable will set upon the duty Will not Preaching and Praying and Conference serve say they without this dweling still in Heaven Just as Countrey people come to Physitians when they have opened their case and made their moan they look he should cure them in a day or two or with the use of some cheap and easie Simple but when they hear of a tedious Method of Physick and of costly Compositions and bitter Potions they will hazard their lives with some sotish Empirick who tells them an easier and cheaper way yea or venture on death it self before they will obey such difficult counsel Too many that we hope well of I fear will take this course here If we could give them life as God did with a word or could heal their souls as Charmers do their bodies with easie stroaking and a few good words then they would readily hear and obey I entreat thee Reader beware of this folly fall to the work the comfort of Spiritual Health will countervail all the trouble of the Duty It is but the flesh that repines and gain-sayes which thou knowest was never a friend to thy soul If God had set thee on some grievous work shouldst thou not have done it for the life of thy soul How much more when he doth but invite thee Heaven-ward to himself SECT VIII 6. COnsider The frequent believing views of Glory are the most precious cordial in all Afflictions First To sustain our spirits and make our sufferings far more easie Secondly To stay us from repining and make us bear with patience and joy And thirdly to strengthen our resolutions that we forsake not Christ for fear of trouble Our very Beast will carry us more chearfully in travel when he is coming homeward where he expecteth Rest. A man will more quietly endure the lancing of his sores the cutting out the Stone when he thinks on the ease that will afterwards follow What then will not a beleever endure when
thou walk without thy strength how long dost thou think thou art like to endure SECT IX 7. COnsider It is he that hath his conversation in heauen who is the profitable Christian to all about him with him you may take sweet counsel and go up to the celestial House of God When a man is in a strange Countrey far from home how glad is he of the company of one of his own Nation how delightful is it to them to talk of their Countrey of their acquaintance and the â—â—â—airs of their home why with a heavenly Christian thou maist have such discourse for he hath been there in the Spirit and can tell thee of the Glory and Rest above VVhat pleasant discourse was it to Joseph to talk with his Brethren in a strange Land and to enquire of his Father and his brother Benjamin Is it not so to a Christian to talk with his Brethren that have been above and enquire after his Father and Christ his Lord when a worldling will talk of nothing but the world and a Politician of nothing but the affairs of the State and a meer Scholar of Humane learning and a common Professor of Duties and of Christians the Heavenly man will be speaking of Heaven and the strange Glory which his Faith hath seen and our speedy and blessed meeting there I confess to discourse with able men of clear Understandings and piercing Wits about the controverted difficulties in Religion yea about some Criticisms in Languages and Sciences is both pleasant and profitable but nothing to this Heavenly discourse of a Beleever O how refreshing and savory are his expressions how his words do peirce and melt the heart how they transform the hearers into other men that they think they are in Heaven all the while How doth his Doctrine drop as the Rain and his Speech distil as the gentle Dew as the small Rain upon the tender Herb and as the showers upon the Grass while his tongue is expressing the Name of the Lord and ascribing greatness to his God Deut. 32.2 3. Is not his feeling sweet discourse of Heaven even like that box of precious oyntment which being opened to pour on the head of Christ doth fill the house with the pleasure of its perfume All that are neer may be refreshed by it His words are like the precious oyntment on Aarons head that ran down upon his beard and the skirts of his Garments Even like the dew of Hermon and as the dew that descendeth from the Celestial Mount Zion where the Lord hath commanded the blessing even life for evermore Psal. 133.3 This is the man who is as Job When the Candle of God did shine upon his head and when by his light he walked through darkness When the secret of God was upon his Tabernacle and when the Almighty was yet with him Then the ear that heard him did bless him and the eye that saw him gave witness to him Job 29.3 4 5 11. Happy the people that have a Heavenly Minister Happy the children and servants that have a Heavenly Father or Master Happy the man that hath Heavenly Associates if they have but hearts to know their happiness This is the Companion who will watch over thy ways who will strengthen thee when thou art weak who will chear thee when thou art drooping and comfort thee with the same comforts wherewith he hath been so often comforted himself 2 Cor. 1.4 This is he that will be blowing at the spark of thy Spiritual Life and always drawing thy soul to God and will be saying to thee as the Samaritan woman Come and see one that hath told me all that ever I did one that hath ravished my heart with his beauty one that hath loved our souls to the death Is not this the Christ Is not the knowledg of God and Him Eternal life Is not it the glory of the Saints to see his Glory If thou come to this mans house and sit at his Table he will feast thy soul with the dainties of Heaven thou shalt meet with a better then Plato's Philosophical feast even a taste of that feast of fat things Of wines on the lees of fat things full of marrow of wine on the lees well refined Isai. 25.6 That thy soul may be satisfied as with marrow and fatness and thou maist praise the Lord with joyful lips Psal 63.5 If thou travel with this man on the way he will be directing and quickning thee in thy Journey to Heaven If thou be buying or selling or trading with him in the world he will be counselling thee to lay out for the inestimable Treasure If thou wrong him he can pardon thee remembring that Christ hath not onely pardoned greater offences to him but will also give him this unvaluable portion If thou be angry he is meek considering the meekness of his heavenly Pattern or if he fall out with thee he is soon reconciled when he remembreth that in heaven you must be everlasting friends This is the Christian of the right stamp this is the servant that is like his Lord these be the innocent that save the Iland and all about them are the better where they dwell O Sirs I fear the men I have described are very rare even among the Religious but were it not for our own shameful negligence such men we might all be What Families what Towns what Commonwealths what Churches should we have if they were but composed of such men but that is more desirable then hopeful till we come to that Land which hath no other inhabitants save what are incomparably beyond this Alas how empty are the speeches and how unprofitable the society of all other sorts of Christians in comparison of these A man might perceive by his Divine Song and high Expressions Deut. 32. and 33. that Moses had been oft with God and that God had shewed him part of his Glory Who could have composed such spiritual Psalms and poured out praises as David did but a man after Gods own heart and a man that was neer the heart of God and no doubt had God also neer his heart Who could have preached such spiritual Doctrine and dived into the precious mysteries of Salvation as Paul did but one who had been called with a light from heaven and had been rapt up into the third heavens in the Spirit and there had seen the unutterable things If a man should come down from heaven amongst us who had lived in the possession of that blessed State how would men be desirous to see or hear him and all the Countrey far and neer would leave their business and crowd about him happy would he think himself that could get a sight of him how would men long to hear what reports he would make of the other world and what he had seen and what the blessed there enjoy would they not think this man the best companion and his discourse to be of all most profitable Why sirs Every true
believing Saint shall be there in person and is frequently there in Spirit and hath seen it also in the Glass of the Gospel Why then do you value their company no more and why do you enquire no more of them and why do you relish their discourse no better Well for my part I had rather have the fellowship of a Heavenly minded Christian then of the most learned Disputers or Princely Commanders SECT X. 8. COnsider There is no man so highly honoreth God as he who hath his conversation in Heaven and without this we deeply dishonor him Is it not a disgrace to the Father when the Children do feed on Husks and are cloathed in rags and accompany with none but Rogues and Beggers Is it not so to our Father when we who call our selves his Children shall feed on Earth and the garb of our souls be but like that of the naked World and when our hearts shall make this clay and dust their more familiar and frequent company who should always stand in our Fathers presence and be taken up in his own Attendance Sure it beseems not the Spouse of Christ to live among his Scullions and Slaves when they may have daily admittance into his presence Chamber he holds forth the Scepter if they will but enter Sure we live below the rates of the Gospel and not as becometh the Children of a King even of the great King of all the World We live not according to the height of our Hopes nor according to the plenty that is in the Promises nor according to the provision of our Fathers house and the great preparations made for his Saints It is well we have a Father of tender Bowels who will own his Children even in dirt and rags It is well the foundation of God stands sure and that the Lord knoweth who are his or else he would hardly take us for his own so far do we live below the honor of Saints If he did not first challenge his interest in us neither our selves nor others could know us to be his people But O when a Christian can live above and rejoyce his soul in the things that are unseen how doth God take himself to be honored by such a one The Lord may say Why this man beleeves me I see he can trust me and take my Word He rejoyceth in my promise before he hath possession he can be glad and thankful for that which his bodily eyes did never see This mans rejoycing is not in the flesh I see he loves me because he mindes me his heart is with me he loves my presence and he shall surely enjoy it in my Kingdom for ever Because thou hast seen saith Christ to Thomas thou hast beleeved but blessed are they that have not seen and yet have beleeved John 20.29 How did God take himself honored by Caleb and Joshuah when they went into the promised Land and brought back to their Brethren a taste of the Fruits and gave it commendation and encouraged the people And what a promise and recompence do they receive Numb 14.24 30. For those that honor him he will honor 1 Sam. 2.30 SECT XI 9. COnsider If thou make not conscience of this duty of diligent keeping thy heart in Heaven First thou disobeyest the flat commands of God Secondly Thou losest the sweetest parts of Scripture Thirdly And dost frustrate the most gratious discoveries of God God hath not left it as a thing indifferent and at thy own choice whether thou wilt do it or not He hath made it thy duty as well as the means of thy comfort that so a double bond might tie thee not to forsake thy own mercies Col 3 1 2. If ye then be risen with Christ seek those things which are above set your affections on things above not on things on earth The same God that hath commanded thee to believe and to be a Christian hath commanded thee to set thy affections above The same God that hath forbidden thee to murder to steal to commit adultery incest or Idolatry hath forbidden thee the neglect of this great duty and darest thou wilfully disobey him Why makest thou not conscience of the one as well as of the other Secondly besides thou losest the most comfortable passages of the VVord All those most glorious descriptions of heaven all those discoveries of our future blessedness all Gods Revelations of his purposes towards us and his frequent and pretious promises of our Rest what are they all but lost to thee Are not these the stars in the Firmament of the Scripture and the most golden lines in that Book of God Of all the Bible Me thinks thou shouldest not part with one of those Promises or Predictions no not for a world As Heaven is the perfection of all our mercies so the Promises of it in the Gospel are the very soul of the Gospel That VVord whâ—ch was sweeter to David then the honey and the honey comb and to Jeremy the Joy and rejoycing of his heart Jer. 15.16 The most pleasant part of this thou losest Thirdly Yea thou dost frustrate the preparations of Christ for thy Joy and makest him to speak in vain Is a comfortable word from the mouth of God of so great worth that all the comforts of the world are nothing to it and dost thou neglect and overlook so many of them Reader I intreat thee to ponder it why God should reveal so much of his Counsel and tell us before hand of the Joyes we shall possess but onely that he would have us know it for our Joy If it had not been to make comfortable our present life and fill us with the delights of our foreknown blessedness he might have kept his purpose to himself and never have let us know it till we come to enjoy it nor have revealed it to us till death had discovered it what he meant to do with us in the world to come yea when we had got possession of our Rest he might still have concealed its Eternity from us and then the fears of losing it again would have bereaved us of much of the sweetness of our Joyes But it hath pleased our Father to open his Counsel and to let us know the very intent of his heart and to acquaint us with the eternal extent of his Love and all this that our Joy may be full and we might live as the heirs of such a Kingdom And shall we now over-look all as if he had revealed no such matter Shall we live in earthly cares and sorrows as if we knew of no such thing And rejoyce no more in these discoveries then if the Lord had never writ it If thy Prince had sealed thee but a Patent of some Lordship how oft wouldst thou be casting thine eye upon it and make it thy daily delight to study it till thou shouldst come to possess the dignity it self And hath God sealed thee a Patent of Heaven and dost thou let it
old Hiltenius said of Rome Est proprium Romane potestatis ut sit ferreum licet digiti minorentur ad parvitatem acus tamen manent ferrei It is proper to the Romane power to be of iron and though the fingers of it be diminished to the smalness of a needle yet they are iron still The like may I say of our earthly cares It is their property to be hard and troublous and so they will be when they are the least Verily if we had no higher hopes then what 's on earth I should take man for a most silly creature and his work and wages all his travel and his felicity to be no better then dreams and vanity and scarce worth the minding or mentioning especially to thee a Christian should it seem so whose eyes are opened by the Word and Spirit to see the emptiness of all these things and the pretious worth of the things above O then be not detained by these silly things but if Satan present them to thee in a temptation send them away from whence they came as Pellicanus did send back the silver bowl which the Bishop had sent him for a token with this answer Astricti sunt quotquot Tyguri cives inquilini bis singulis annis solenni juramento ne quis eorum ullum munus ab ullo principe accipiat All that are Citizens and Inhabitants of Tigurum are solemnly sworn twice a yeer not to receive any gift from any Prince abroad so say thou we the Citizens and Inhabitants of heaven are bound by solemn and frequent Covenants not to have our hearts enticed or entangled with any forraign honors or delights but only with those of our own Countrey If thy thoughts should like the laborious Bee go over the world from flower to flower from creature to creature they would bring thee no Honey or sweetness home save what they gathered from their relations to Eternity Object But you will say perhaps Divinity is of larger extent then onely to treat of the life to come or the way thereto there are many controversies of great difficulty which therefore require much of our thoughts and so they must not be all of heaven Answ. For the smaller controversies which have vexed our Times and caused the doleful divisions among us I express my minde as that of Graserus Cum in visitatione aegrotorum ad emigrationem ex hac vita beatam praeparatione daeprehendisset controversias illas Theologicas quae scientiam quidem inflantem pariunt conscientias vero fluctuantes non sedant quaeque hodie magna animorum contentione agitantur magnos tumultus in rebuspub excitant nullum prorsus usum habere quinimo conscientias simpliciorum non aliter ac olim in Papatu humana figmenta intricare Caepit ab eis toto animo abhorrere in publicis concionibus tantum ca proponere quae ad fidem salvificam in Christum accendendam ad pietatem veram juxta verbum Dei exercendam veramque consolationem in vita morte praestandam faciebant When he had found in his visiting the sick and in his own preparations for well dying that the Controversies in Divinity which beget a swelling knowledg but do not quiet troubled consciences and which are at this day agitated with such contention of spirits and raise such tumults in Commonwealths are indeed utterly useless yea and moreover do intangle the consciences of the simple just as the humane inventions in Popery formerly did he begun with full bent of minde to shun or abhor them and in his publike Preaching to propound onely those things which tended to the kindling a true faith in Jesus Christ and to the exercise of true godliness according to the Word of God and to the procuring of true consolation both in life and at death I can scarce express my own minde more plainly then in this Historians expressions of the minde of Graserus While I had some competent measure of health and look't at death as at a greater distance there was no man more delighted in the study of controversie but when I saw dying men have no minde on 't and how unsavory and uncomfortable such conference was to them and when I had oft been neer to death my self and found no delight in them further then they confirmed or illustrated the Doctrine of eternal Glory I have minded them ever since the less Though every Truth of God is pretious and it is the sin and shame of Professors that are no more able to defend the Truth yet should all our study of controversie be still in relation to this perpetual Rest and consequently be kept within its bounds and with most Christians not have the twentieth part of our time or thoughts Who that hath tried both studies doth not cry out as Summerhard was wont to do of the Popish School Divinity Quis me miserum tandem liberabit ab ista rixosa Theologia Who will once deliver me wretch from this wrangling kinde of Divinity And as it s said of Bucholcer Cum eximiis a Deo dotibus esset decoratus in certamen tamen cum rabiosis illius seculi Theologis descendere noluit Desii inquit disputare caepi supputare quoniam illud dissipationem hoc collectionem significaet Vidit enim ab iis controversias moveri quas nulla unquam amoris Dei seintilla calefecerat vidit ex diuturnis Theologorum rixis utilitatis nihil detrimenti plurimum in ecclesias redundâsse i. e. Though he was adorned by God with excellent gifts yet would he never enter into contention with the furious Divines of that age I have ceased saith he my Disputations and now begin my Supputation for that signifieth Dissipation but this Collection For he saw that those men were the movers of Controversies who had never been warmed with one spark of the love of God he saw That from the continual brawls of Divines no benefit but much hurt did accrue to the Churches and it is worth the observing which the Historian addes Quapropter omnis ejus cura in hoc erat ut auditores fidei suae commissos doceret bene vivere beate Mori Et annotatum in adversariis amici ejus repererunt permultos in extremo agone constitutos gratias ipsi hoc nomine egisse quod ipsius ductu servatorem suum Jesum agnovissent cujus in cognitione pulchrum vivere mori vero longe pulcherrimum ducerent Atque haud scio annon hoc ipsum longe Bucholcero coram Deo sit gloriosius futurum quam si aliquet contentiosorum libellorum myriadas posteritatis memoriae consecrasset i. e. Therefore this was all his care That he might teach his hearers committed to his charge To live well and die happily And his friends found noted down in his Papers a great many of persons who in their last agony did give him thanks for this very reason That by his direction they had come to the knowledg of Jesus their Saviour in
that makes men Hypocrites but their own wickedness Christ will not keep such out among Infidels for fear of making Hypocrites but when the net is drawn unto the shore the fishes shall be separated and when the time of Harvest comes then the Angels shall gather out of his Kingdom all things that offend and them that work iniquity Matth. 13.41 There are many Saints or sanctified men that yet shall never come to heaven who are onely Saints by their separation from Paganism into fellowship with the visible Church but not Saints in the strictest sense by separation from the ungodly into the fellowship of the mystical body of Christ Heb. 10 29. Deut. 7.6 and 14 2 21. and 26.19 and 28.9 Exod. 19.6 1 Cor. 7.13 14. Rom. 11.16 Heb. 3.1 compared with ver 12. 1 Cor. 3.17 and 14.33 1 Cor. 1.2 compared with 11.20 21 c. Gal. 3.26 compared with Gal. 3.3 4. and 4.11 and 5.2 3 4. Joh. 15.2 Thus far I have digressed by way of Caution that you may not think that I disswade you from lawful converse but it is the unnecessary society of ungodly men and too much familiarity with unprofitable companions though they be not so apparently ungodly that I disswade you from There are many persons whom we may not avoid or excommunicate out of the Church no nor out of our private society judicially or by way of penalty to them whom yet we must exclude from our too much familiarity in way of prudence for preservation of our selves It is not onely the open prophane the swearer the drunkard and the enemies of godliness that will prove hurtful companions to us though these indeed are chiefly to be avoided but too frequent society with dead-hearted Formalists or persons meerly civil and moral or whose conference is empty unsavory and barren may much divert our thoughts from heaven and do our selves a great deal of wrong as meer idleness and forgetting God will keep a soul as certainly from Heaven as a profane licentious fleshly life so also will the usuall company of such idle forgetful negligent persons as surely keep our hearts from heaven as the company of men more dissolute and profane Alas our dulness and backwardness is such that we have need of the most constant and powerful helps A clod or a stone that lyes on the earth is as prone to arise and fly in the Air as our hearts are naturally to move toward heaven you need not hold nor hinder the earth and Rocks to keep them from flying up to the skies it is sufficient that you do not help them And surely if our spirits have not great assistance they may easily be kept from flying aloft though they never should meet with the least impediment O think of this in the choice of your company when you spirits are so powerfully disposed for heaven that you need no help to lift them up but as the flames you are alwayes mounting upward and carrying with you all that 's in your way then you may indeed be less careful of our company but till then as you love the delights of a heavenly life be careful herein As it s reported of a Lord that was neer to his death and the Doctor that prayed with him read over the Letany For all women labouring with childe for all sick persons and young children c. From lightning and tempest from plague pestilence and famine from battel murder and sudden death c. Alas saith he what is this to me who must presently dye c. So maist thou say of such mens conference who can talk of nothing but their Callings and vanity Alas what 's this to me who must shortly be in Rest and should now be refreshing my soul with its foretastes what will it advantage thee to a life with God to hear where the Fair is such a day or how the Market goes or what weather is or is like to be or when the Moon changeth or what news is stirring why this is the discourse of earthly men What will it conduce to the raising of thy heart God-ward to hear that this is an able Minister or that an able Christian or that this was an excellent Sermon or that is an excellent book to hear a violent arguing or tedious discourse of Baptism Ceremonies the power of the Keyes the order of Gods Decrees or other such controversies of great difficulty and less importance Yet this for the most part is the sweetest discourse that thou art like to have of a formal speculative dead-hearted Professor Nay if thou hadst newly been warming thy heart in the contemplation of the blessed Joys above would not this discourse benum thine affections and quickly freez thy heart again I appeal to the Judgment of any man that hath tryed it and maketh observations on the frame of his spirit Men cannot well talk of one thing and minde another especially things of such differing natures You young men who are most lyable to this temptation think sadly of what I say Can you have your hearts in Heaven on an Ale-house bench among your roaring singing swaggering companions or when you work in your Shops with none but such whose ordinary language is oaths or filthiness or foolish talking or jesting Nay let me tell you thus much more that if you choose such company when you might have better and finde most delight and content in such you are so far from a Heavenly conversation that as yet you have no title to heaven at all and in that estate shall never come there For were your Treasure there your heart would not be on things so distant Mat. 6.21 In a word our company will be part of our happiness in heaven and its a singular part of our furtherance to it or hinderance from it And as the creatures living in the several Elements are commonly of the temperature of the Element they live in as the fishes cold and moist like the water the worms cold and dry as the earth and so the rest So are we usually like the society which we most converse in He that never found it hard to have a heavenly minde in earthly company it is certainly because he never tryed SECT IIII. 4. A Fourth hinderance to a heavenly conversation is Too frequent disputes about lesser truths and especially when a mans Religion lyes only in his opinions a sure sign of an unsanctified soul. If sad examples be doctrinal to you or the Judgments of God upon us be regarded I need to say the lesse upon this particular It s legibly written in the faces of thousands It is visible in the complexion of our diseased nation This facies Hypocritica is our facies Hipocratica He that hath the least skill in Physiognomy may see that this complexlon is mortal and this picture-like shaddow-like visage affordeth our state a sad prognostick You that have been my companions in Armies and Garrisons in Cities and Countreyes I know have been
of knowing right evidences to try by so much as for want of skil and diligence in using them so have I seldom known a Christian that wants the joyes of this heavenly Life for want of being told the means to get it but for want of a heart to set upon the work and painfully to use the means they are directed to It is the field of the slothful that is overgrown with weeds Pro. 24.30 31 32 33 34. And the desires of the slothful killeth his Joyes because his hands refuse to labor Prov. 21.25 whiles he lyes wishing his soul lyes starving He saith There is a Lyon there 's difficulty in the way and turneth himself on the bed of his ease as a nor turneth on the hinges he bideth his hand in his bosome and it grâ—â—veth him to bring it to his 〈◊〉 though it be â—o feed himself with the food of life Prov. 26â— 13 14 15 16. what 's this bâ—â— espising the feast prepared and setting light by the dearâ—bough pleasures and consequently by the pretious blood that bough them and throwing away our own consolations For the Sâ—rit hath told us That he also that is slothful in his work is broâ—â—â—r to him that is a great waster Prov. 18.9 Apply this to thâ— spiritual Work and study well the meaning of it SECT VII 7. IT s alo a dangerous and secret hinderance to content our selâ—es with the meer preparatives to this heavenly Life while we are â—tter strangers to the life it self when we take up with the meer studies of heavenly things and the notions and thoughts of theâ— in our brain or the talking of them with one another as if this were all that makes us heavenly people Ther 's none in more danger of this snare then those that are much in publike duty especially Preachers of the Gospel O how easily may they be deceived here while they do nothing more then read of heaven and study of heaven and preach of heaven and pray and talk of heaven what is not this the heavenly Life O that God would reveal to our hearts the danger of this snare Alas all this is but meer preparation This is not the life we speak of but it s indeed a necessary help thereto I intreat every one of my Brethren in the Ministry that they search and watch against this Temptation Alas this is but gathering the materials and not the erecting of the building it self this is but gathering our Manna for others and not eating and digesting our selves as he that sits at home may study Geography and draw most exact descriptions of Countreys and yet never see them nor travel toward them so may you describe to others the joyes of heaven and yet never come neer it in your own hearts as a man may tell others of the sweetness of meat which he never tasted or as a blinde man by learning may dispute of light and of colours so may you study and preach most heavenly matter which yâ—â— never sweetned your own spirits and set forth to others that heavenly Light wherewith your own souls were never illightened and bring that fire for the hearts of your people that never once warmed your own hearts If you should study of nothing but heaven while you lived and preach of nothing but heaven to your people yet might your own hearts be strangers to it What heavenly passages had Balaam in his Prophesies yet little of it its like in his spirit Nay we are under a more subtil temptation then any other men to draw us from this heavenly life If our imployments did lye at a greater distant from heaven and did take up our thoughts upon worldly things we should not be so apt to be so contented and deluded but when we finde our selves imployed upon nothing else we are easier drawn to take up here Studying and preaching of heaven is likes to an heavenly Life then thinking and talking of the world is and the likeness is it that is like to deceive us This is to dye the most miserable death even to famish our selves because we have bread on our tables which is worse then to famish when we cannot get it and to die for thirst while we draw water for others thinking it enough that we have daily to do with it though we never drink it to our souls refreshing All that I will say to you more of this shall be in the words of my godly and â—udicious friend Mr. George Aâ—â—ot which I will transcribe lest you have not the Book at hand in his Vindiciae Sabathi pag. 147 148 149. And here let me in a holy Jealousâ—e annex an Exhortation to some of the Ministers of this Land for blessed be God it needs not to all that they would carefully provide and look that they do not build the Tabernacle on the Lords Day I mean that they rest not in the Opus operatum of their holy imployments and busying themselves about the carnall part of holy things in putting off the studying of their Sermons or getting them by heart except it be to work them upon the heart and not barely commit them to memory till that day and so though they take care to build the Tabernacle of Gods Church yet they in the mean time neglect the Temple of their own hearts in serving God in the Spirit and not in the Letter or outward performance onely But it were well if they would gather and prepare their Manna seeth it and bake it the day before that when the Sabbath came they might have nothing to do but to chew and concoct it into their own spirits and so spiritually in the experience of their own hearts not heads dish it out to their hearers which would be a happy means to make them see better fruit of their labors for commonly that which is not â—oâ—ally delivered is notionally received and that which is spiritually and powerfully delivered in the evidence of the Spirit is spiritually and savingly received for spirit begets spirit as fire begets fire c. It is an easie thing to take great pains in the outward part or performance of holy things which oft proves a snare causing the neglect of the spirit of the inner man for many are great laborers in the Work of the Lord that are starvelings in the Spirit of the Lord satisfying themselves in a Popish peace of conscience in the deed doing in stead of Joy in the Holy Ghost bringing indeed meat to their Guests but through haste or laziness eating none themselves or like Taylors make cloathes for other men to weare so they never assaying their own points how they 〈…〉 may suit with their own spirits but think it is their duty to â—each and other mens duty to do So far the Author CHAP. V. Some general helps to a Heavenly Life SECT I. HAving thus shewed thee the blocks in thy way and told thee what hinderances will resist thee in the Work I
but make it stay to hear its sentence If once or twice or thrice will not do it nor a few days of hearing bring it to issue follow it on with unwearied diligence and give not over till the work be done and till thou canst 〈◊〉 knowingly off or on either thou art or art not a member of Christ either that thou hast or that thou hast not yet title to this Rest. Be sure thou rest not in wilful uncertainties If thou canst no◠dispatch the work well thy self get the help of those that are skilful go to thy Minister if he be a man of experience or go to some able experienced friend open thy case faithfully and wish them to deal plainly And thus continue till thou hast got assurance Not but that some doubtings may still remaine but yet thou maist have so much assurance as to master them that they may not much interrupt thy peace If men did know Heaven to be their own inheritance we should less need to perswade their thoughts unto it or to press them to set their delight in it O if men did truly know that God is their own Father and Christ their own Redeemer and Head and that those are their own Everlasting habitations and that there it is that they must abide and be happy for ever how could they chuse but be ravished with the forethoughts thereof If a Christian could but look upon Sun and Moon and Stars and reckon all his own in Christ and say These are the portion that my Husband doth bestow These are the blessings that my Lord hath procured me and things incomparably greater then these what holy raptures would his spirit feel The more do they sin against their own comforts as well as against the Grace of the Gospel who are wilful maintainers of their own doubtings and plead for their unbelief and cherish distrustful thoughts of God and scandalous injurious thoughts of their Redeemer who represent the Covenant as if it were of works and not of grace and represent Christ as an enemy rather then as a Savior as if he were glad of advantages against them and were willing that they should keep off from him and dye in their unbelief when he hath called them so oft and invited them so kindly and born the hell that they should bear Ah wretches that we are that be keeping up Jealousies of the Love of our Lord when we should be rejoycing and bathing our souls in his love That can question that love which hath been so fully evidenced and doubt still whether he that hath stooped so low and suffered so much and taken up a nature and office of purpose be yet willing to be theirs who are willing to be his As if any man could chose Christ before Christ hath chosen him or any man could desire to have Christ more then Christ desires to have him or any man were more willing to be happy then Christ is to make him happy Fie upon these injurious if not blasphemous thoughts If ever thou have harboured such thoughts in thy brest or if ever thou have uttered such words with thy tongue spit out that venome vomit out that rancor cast them from thee and take heed how thou ever entertainest them more God hath written the names of his people in heaven as you use to write your names in your own books or upon your own Goods or set your Marks on your own sheep And shall we be attempting to rase them out and to write our names on the doors of hell But blessed be our God whose foundation is sure and who keepeth us by his mighty power through Faith unto salvation 1 Pet. 1.5 Well then this is my second advice to thee that thou follow on the work of self-examination till thou hast got assurance that this rest is thy own and this will draw thy heart unto it and feed thy spirits with fresh delights which else will be but tormented so much the more to think that there is such Rest for others but none for thee SECT III. 3. ANother help to sweeten thy soul with the foretasts of Rest is this Labor to apprehend how neer it is Think seriously of its speedy approach That which we think is neer at hand we are more sensible of then that which we behold at a distance When we hear of war or famin in another country it troubleth not so much or if we hear it prophesied of a long time hence so if we hear of plenty a great way off or of a golden age that shall fall out who knows when this never rejoyceth us But if Judgments or Mercies begin to draw neer then they affect us If we were sure we should see the golden Age then it would take with us When the plague is in a Town but twenty miles off we do not fear it nor much prehaps if it be but in another street but if once it come to the next door or if it seaze on one in our own family then we begin to think on it more feelingly It is so with mercies as well as Judgments VVhen they are far off we talk of them as marvells but when they draw close to us we rejoyce in them as Truths This makes men think on Heaven so insensibly because they conceit it at too great a distance They look on it as twenty or thirty or fourty yeers off and this is it that duls their sense As wicked men are fearless and senseless of judgment because the sentence is not speedily executed Eccles. 8.11 So are the godly deceived of their comforts by supposing them further off then they are This is the danger of putting the day of death far from us VVhen men will promise themselves longer time in the world then God hath promised them and judg of the length of their lives by the probabilities they gather from their Age their health their constitution and temperature this makes them look at heaven as a great way off If 〈◊〉 the rich fool in the Gospel had not expected to have lived many yeers he would sure have thought more of providing for Eternity and less of his present store and possessions And if we did not think of staying many yeers from Heaven we should think on it with far more piercing thoughts This expectation of long life doth both the wicked and the godly a great deal of wrong How much better were it to receive the sentence of death in our selves and to look on Eternity as neer at hand Surely Reader thou standest at the door and hundreds of diseases are ready waiting to open the door and let thee in Is not the thirty or fourty years of thy life that is past quickly gone Is it not a very little time when thou lookest back on it And will not all the rest be shortly so too Do not dayes and nights come very thick Dost thou not feel that building of flesh to shake and perceive thy house of
we shall be raised from many yeers rottenness and dust and that dust exalted to a Sun-like glory and that glory perpetuated to all eternity VVhat sayest thou Christian Is not this the greatest of miracles or wonders Surely if we observe but common providences the Motions of the Sun the Tides of the Sea the standing of the Earth the warming it the watering it with Rain as a Garden the keeping in order a wicked confused world with multitudes the like they are all very admirable But then to think of the Sion of God of the Vision of the Divine Majesty of the comely Order of the Heavenly Host what an admirable sight must that needs be O what rare and mighty works have we seen in Britain in four or five yeers what changes what subduing of enemies what clear discoveries of an Almighty Arm what magnifying of weakness what casting down of strength what wonders wrought by most improbable means what bringing to Hell and bringing back what turning of tears and fears into safety and joy such hearing of earnest prayers as if God could have denyed us nothing that we asked All these were wonderful heart-raising works But O what are these to our full deliverance to our final conquest to our eternal triumph and to that great day of great things SECT IX 7. COmpare also the Mercies which thou shalt have above with those particular Providences which thou hast enjoyed thy self and those observable Mercies which thou hast recorded through thy life If thou be a Christian indeed I know thou hast if not in thy Book yet certainly in thy Heart a great many precious favors upon record The very remembrance and rehearsal of them is sweet How much more sweet was the actual enjoyment But all these are nothing to the Mercies which are above Look over the excellent Mercies of thy Youth and Education the mercies of thy riper yeers or age the mercies of thy prosperity and of thy adversity the mercies of thy several places and relations are they not excellent and innumerable Canst not thou think on the several places thou hast lived in and remember that they have each had their several mercies the mercies of such a place and such a place and all of them very rich and engaging Mercies O how sweet was it to thee when God resolved thy last doubts when he overcame and silenced thy fears and unbelief when he prevented the inconveniences of thy life which thy own counsel would have cast thee into when he eased thy pains when he healed thy sickness and raised thee up as from the very grave and death when thou prayedst and wepst as Hezekiah and saidst My days are cut off I shall go to the gates of the grave I am deprived of the residue of my yeers I said I shall not see the Lord even the Lord in the Land of the Living I shall behold man no more with the Inhabitants of the World Mine age is departed and removed from me as a Shepherds Tent I have cut off like a Weaver my life he will cut me off with pining sickness from day to day wilt thou make an end of me c. Yet did he in love to thy soul deliver it from the pit of corruption and cast thy sins behinde his back and set thee among the living to praise him as thou dost this day That the fathers to the children might make known his Truth The Lord was ready to save thee that thou mightest sing the songs of praise to him in his house all the days of thy life Isai. 38.10 to the 20. I say were not all these most precious mercies Alas these are but small things for thee in the eyes of God he intendeth thee far greater things then these even such as these are scarce a taste of It was a choice mercy that God hath so notably answered thy prayers and that thou hast been so oft and so evidently a prevailer with him But O think then Are all these so sweet and precious that my life would have been a perpetual misery without them Hath his providence lifted me so high on Earth and his merciful kindness made me great How sweet then will the Glory of his presence be And how high will his eternal love exalt me And how great shall I be made in Communion with his greatness If my pilgrimage and warfare have such mercies what shall I finde in my home and in my Triumph If God will communicate so much to me while I remain a sinner what will he bestow when I am a perfect Saint If I have had so much in this strange Country at such a distance from him what shall I have in Heaven in his immediate presence where I shall ever stand about his Throne SECT X. 8. COmpare the comforts which thou shalt have above with those which thou hast here received in the Ordinances Hath not the written Word been to thee as an open fountain flowing with comforts day and night when thou hast been in trouble there thou hast met with refreshing when thy faith hath staggered it hath there been confirmed what suitable Scriptures hath the Spirit set before thee VVhat seasonable promises have come into thy minde so that thou maist say with David If thy Word had not been my delight I had perished in my trouble Think then If the VVord be so full of consolations what overflowing springs shall we finde in God if his letters are so comfortable what are the words that flow from his blessed lips and the beams that stream from his Glorious Face If Luther would not take all the world for one leaf of the Bible what would he take for the Joyes which it revealeth If the promise be so sweet what is the performance If the Testament of our Lord and our charter for the Kingdom be so comfortable what will be our possession of the Kingdom it self Think further what delights have I found also in this Word preached when I have sit under a heavenly heart-searching Teacher how hath my heart been warmed within me how hath he melted me and turned my bowels me thinks I have felt my self almost in Heaven me thinks I could have been content to have sate and heard from morning to night I could even have lived and dyed there How oft have I gone to the congregation troubled in spirit and returned home with quietness and delight How oft have I gone doubting concluding damnation against my own soul and God hath sent me home with my doubts resolved and satisfied me and perswaded me of his love in Christ How oft have I gone with darkness and doubtings in my Judgment and God hath opened to me such pretious truths and opened also my understanding to see them that his light hath been exceeding comfortable to my soul what Cordials have I met with in my saddest afflictions what preparatives to fortifie me for the next encounter Well then if Moses face do shine so gloriously what Glory
be If I could see the Congregations provided with able Teachers and the people receiving and obeying the Gospel and longing for Reformation and for the Government of Christ O what a blessed place were England If I could see our Ignorance turned into Knowledg and Error turned into soundness of Understanding and shallow Professors into solid Believers and Brethren living in Amity and in the life of the Spirit O what a fortunate Iland were this Alas alas what 's all this to the Reformation in Heaven and to the blessed condition which we must live in there There 's another kinde of change and glory then this What great joy had the people and David himself to see them so willingly offer to the Service of the Lord And what an excellent Psalme of Praise doth David thereupon compose 1 Chro. 29.9 10 c. When Solomon was anointed King in Jerusalem the people rejoyced with so great joy that the earth rent at the sound of them 1 Kings 1.40 what a joyful shout will there be then at the appearing of the King of the Church If when the foundations of the earth were fastned and the corner stone thereof was laid the morning stars did sing together and all the sons of God did shout for joy Job 38 6 7. why then when our glorious world is both founded and finished and the corner stone appeareth to be the top stone also and the Holy City is adorned as the Bride of the Lamb O Sirs what a joyful shout will then be heard SECT XI 9 COmpare the joy which thou shalt have in heaven with that which the Saints of God have found in the way to it and in the foretastes of it when thou seest a heavenly man rejoyce think what it is that so affects him it is the property of fools to rejoyce in toyes and to laugh at nothing but the people of God are wiser then so they know what it is that makes them glad When did God ever reveal the least of himself to any of his Saints but the joy of their hearts were answerable to the Revelation Paul was so lifted up with what he saw that he was in danger of being exalted above measure and must have a prick in the flesh to keep him down when Peter had seen but Christ in his Transfiguration which was but a small glimpse of his glory and had seen Moses and Elias talking with him what a rapture and extasie is he cast into Master saith he it is good for us to be here let us here build three Tabernacles one for Thee and one for Moses and one for Elias as if he should say O let us not go down again to yonder persecuting rabble let us not go down again to yonder drossy dirty world let us not return to our mean and suffering state is it not better that we stay here now we are here is not here better company and sweeter pleasures but the Text saith He knew not what he said Matth. 17.4 When Moses had been talking with God in the Mount it made his Visage so shineing and glorious that the people could not endure to behold it but he was fain to put a vail upon it No wonder then if the face of God must be vailed till we are come to that state where we shall be more capable of beholding him when the vail shall be taken away and we all beholding him with open face shall be turned into the same Image from glory to glory Alas what is the backparts which Moses saw from the clefts of the Rock to that open face which we shall behold hereafter what is the Revelation to John in Patmos to this Revelation which we shall have in heaven How short doth Pauls Vision come of the Saints Vision above with God How small a part of the glory which we must see was that which so transported Peter in the Mount I confess these were all extraordinary foretastes but little to the full Beatifical Vision when David foresaw the Resurrection of Christ and of himself and the pleasures which he should have for ever at Gods right hand how doth it make him break forth and say Therefore my heart was glad and my glory rejoyceth my flesh also shall rest in hope Psal. 16.9 Why think then If the foresight can raise such ravishing joy what will the actual possession do How oft have we read and heard of the dying Saints who when they had scarce strength and life enough to express them have been as full of joy as their hearts could hold And when their bodies have been under the extremities of their sickness yea ready to feel the pangs of death have yet had so much of heaven in their spirits that their joy hath far surpassed their sorrows and if a spark of this fire be so glorious and that in the midst of the sea of adversity what then is that Sun of Glory it self O the joy that the Martyrs of Christ have felt in the midst of the scorching flames sure they had life and sense as we and were flesh and blood as well as we therefore it must needs be some excellent thing that must so rejoyce their souls while their bodies were burning VVhen Bilney can burn his finger in the Candle and Cranmer can burn off his unworthy right Hand when Bainham can call the Papists to see a Miracle and tel them that he feels no more pain then in a bed of Down and that the fire was to him as a bed of Roses when Farrer can say If Istir believe not my Doctrine Think then Reader with thy self in thy Meditations sure it must be some wonderful foretasted glory that can do all this that can make the flames of fire easie and that can make the King of Fears so welcome O what then must this glory it self needs be when the very thoughts of it can bring Paul into such a streight that he desired to depart and to be with Christ as best of all when it can make men never think themselves well till they are dead O what a blessed Rest is this Shall Sanders so delightfully embrace the Stake and cry out Welcome Cross and shall not I more delightfully imbrace my blessedness and cry Welcome Crown Shall blessed Bradford kiss the Faggot and shall not I then kiss the Son himself Shall the poor Martyr rejoyce that she might have her foot in the same hole of the Stocks that Mr. Philpots foot had been in before her and shall not I rejoyce that my soul shall live in the same place of glory where Christ and his Apostles are gone before me Shall Fire and Faggot shall Prisons and Banishment shall Scorns and cruel Torments be more welcome to others then Christ and Glory shall be to me God forbid What thanks did Lucius the Martyr give them that they would send him to Christ from his ill masters on earth How desirously did Basil wish when his persecuters threatned his
the duty When thou hast perhaps but an hours time for thy Meditation the time will be spent before thy heart will be serious This doing of duty as if we did it not doth undo as many as the flat omission of it To rub out the hour in a bare lazie thinking of Heaven is but to lose that hour and delude thy self Well what is to be done in this case why do here also as you do by a loitering servant keep thine eye always upon thy heart look not so much to the time it spendeth in the duty as to the quantity and quality of the work that is done You can tell by his work whether your servant hath been painful ask what affections have yet been acted how much am I yet got neerer Heaven Verily many a mans heart must be followed as close in this duty of Meditation as a Horse in a Mill or an Ox at the Plow that will go no longer then you are calling or scourging If you cease driving but a moment the heart will stand still and perhaps the best hearts have much of this temper I would not have thee of the judgment of those who think that while they are so backward it is better let it alone and that if meer love will not bring them to the duty but there must be all this violence used to compel it that then the service is worse then the omission These men understand not first That this Argument would certainly cashiere all Spiritual obedience because the hearts of the best being but partly sanctified will still be resisting so far as they are carnal Secondly Nor do they understand well the corruptness of their own natures Thirdly Nor that their sinful undisposedness will not baffle or suspend the commands of God Fourthly Nor one sin excuse another Fifthly Especially they little know the way of God to excite their Affections and that the love which should compel them must it self be first compelled in the same sense as it is said to compel Love I know is a most precious grace and should have the chief interest in all our duties But there be means appointed by God to procure this love and shall I not use those means till I can use them from love that were to neglect the means till I have the end Must I not seek to procure love till I have it already There are means also for the increasing of love where it is begun and means for the exciting of it where it lieth dull And must I not use these means till it is increased and excited Why this reasoning considering-duty that we are in hand with is the most singular means both to stir up thy love and to increase it and therefore stay not from the duty till thou feel thy love constrain thee that were to stay from the fire till thou feel thy self warm but fall upon the work till thou art constrained to love and then love will constrain thee to further duty My jealously least thou shouldst miscarry by these sotish opinions hath made me more tedious in the opening of its error Let nothing therefore hinder thee while thou art upon the work from plying thy heart with constant watchfulness and constraint seeing thou hast such experience of its dulness and backwardness let the spur be never out of its side and when ever it slacks pace be sure to give it a remembrance SECT III. 3. AS thy heart will be loitering so will it be diverting It will be turning aside like a carless servant to talk with every one that passeth by When there should be nothing in thy minde but the work in hand it will be thinking of thy calling or thinking of thy afflictions or of every bird or tree or place thou seest or of any impertinency rather then of Heaven Thy heart in this also will be like the Husbandmans Ox or Horse if he drive not he will not go and if he guide not he will not keep the furrow and it is as good stand still as go out of the way Experience will tell thee thou wilt have much ado with thy heart in this point to keep it one hour to the work without many extravagancies and idle cogitations The cure here is the same with that before to use watchfulness and violence with your own imaginations and as soon as they step out to chide them in Say to thy heart What did I come hither to think of my business in the world to think of places and persons of news or vanity yea or of any thing but Heaven be it never so good what canst thou not watch one hour wouldst thou leave this world and dwell in Heaven with Christ for ever and canst thou not leave it one hour out of thy thoughts nor dwell with Christ in one hours close Meditation Ask thy heart as Absalom did Hushai Is this thy love to thy friend Dost thou love Christ and the place of thy Eternal Blessed abode no more then so When Pharaohs Butler dreamed That he pressed the ripe Grapes into Pharaohs Cup and delivered the Cup into the Kings hand it was a happy dream and signified his speedy access to the Kings presence But the dream of the Baker That the Birds did eat out of the Basket on his head the baked meats prepared for Pharaoh had an ill omen and signified his hanging and their eating of his flesh So when the ripened Grapes of Heavenly Meditation are pressed by thee into the Cup of Affection and this put into the hands of Christ by delightful praises if thou take me for skilful this is the interpretation That thou shalt shortly be taken from this prison where thou liest and be set before Christ in the Court of Heaven and there serve up to him that Cup of praise but much fuller and much sweeter for ever and for ever But if the ravenous fowls of wandring thoughts do devour the Meditations intended for Heaven I will not say flatly it signifieth thy death but this I will say That so far as these intrude they will be the death of that service and if thou ordinarily admit them That they devour the life and the joy of thy thoughts and if thou continue in such a way of duty to the end It signifies the death of thy soul as well as of thy service Drive away these birds of prey then from thy sacrifice and strictly keep thy heart to the work thou art upon SECT IV. 4. LAstly Be sure also to look to thy heart in this That it cut not off the work before the time and run not away through weariness before it have leave Thou shalt finde it will be exceeding prone to this like the Ox that would unyoke or the Horse that would be unburdened and perhaps cast off his burden and run away Thou maist easily perceive this in other duties If in secret thou set thy self to pray is not thy heart urging thee still to cut it short dost thou not
dare to contend in love with thee or set my borrowed languid spark against the Element and Sun of Love Can I love as high as deep as broad as long as Love it self as much as he that made me and that made me love that gave me all that little which I have both the heart the hearth where it is kindled the bellows the fire the fuel and all were his As I cannot match thee in the works of thy Power nor make nor preserve nor guide the worlds so why should I think any moreof matching thee in Love No Lord I yield I am unable I am overcome O blessed conquest Go on victoriously and still prevail and triumph in thy love The Captive of Love shall proclaim thy victory when thou leadest me in triumph from Earth to Heaven from Death to Life from the Tribunal to the Throne my self and all that see it shall acknowledg that thou hast prevailed and all shall say Behold how he loved him Yet let me love thee in subjection to thy Love as thy redeemed Captive though not thy Peer shall I not love at all because I cannot reach thy measure or at least let me heartily wish to love thee O that I were able O that I could feelingly say I love thee even as I feel I love my friend and my self Lord that I could do it but alas I cannot fain I would but alas I cannot Would I not love thee if I were but able Though I cannot say as thy Apostle Thou knowest that I Love thee yet can I say Lord thou knowest that I would love thee but I speak not this to excuse my fault it is a crime that admits of no excuse and it is my own it dwelleth as neer me as my very heart if my heart be my own this sin is my own yea and more my own then my heart is Lord what shall this sinner do the fault is my own and yet I cannot help it I am angry with my heart that it doth not love thee and yet I feel it love thee never the more I frown up on it and yet it cares not I threaten it but it doth not feel I chide it and yet it doth not mend I reason with it and would fain perswade it and yet I do not perceive it stir I rear it up as a carkass upon its legs but it neither goes nor stands I rub and chafe it in the use of thine Ordinances and yet I feel it not warm within me O miserable man that I am unworthy soul is not thine eye now upon the onely lovely object and art thou not beholding the ravishing glory of the Saints and yet dost thou not love and yet dost thou not feel the fire break forth why art thou not a soul a living spirit and is not thy love the choicest piece of thy life Art thou not a rational soul and shouldst not thou love according to Reasons conduct and doth it not tell thee that all is dirt and dung to Christ that earth is a dungeon to the celestial glory Art thou not a spirit thy self and shoulst thou not love spiritually even God who is a Spirit and the Father of Spirits Doth not every creature love their like why my soul art thou like to fleshâ— or gold or stately buildings art thou like to meat and drink or cloathes wilt thou love no higher then thy horse or swine hast thou nothing better to love then they what is the beauty that thou hast so admired canst thou not even wink or think it all into darkness or deformity when the night comes it is nothing to thee while thou hast gazed on it it hath withered away a Botch or Scab the wrinkles of consuming sickness or of age do make it as loathsom as it was before delightful suppose but that thou sawest that beautiful carcass lying on the Bier or rotting in the grave the skull dig'd up and the bones scattered where is now thy lovely object couldst thou sweetly embrace it when the soul is gone or take any pleasure in it when there is nothing left thats like thy self Ah why then dost thou love a skinful of dirt and canst love no more the heavenly Glory What thinkest thou shalt thou love when thou comest there when thou seest when thou dost enjoy when the Lord shall take thy carcass from the grave and make thee shine as the Sun in glory and when thou shalt everlastingly dwell in the blessed presence shalt thou then love or shalt thou not is not the place a meeting of lovers is not the life a state of love is it not the great marriage day of the Lamb when he will embrace and entertain his Spouse with love is not the imployment there the work of love where the souls with Christ do take their fill O then my soul begin it here be sick of love now that thou maist be well with love there keep thy self now in the love of God Jude 21. and let neither life nor death nor any thing separate thee from it and thou shalt be kept in the fulness of love for ever and nothing shalt imbitter or abate thy pleasure for the Lord hath prepared a city of love a place for the communicating of love to his chosen and those that love his Name shall dwell there Psal. 69.36 Awake then O my drowsie soul who but an Owl or Mole would love this worlds uncomfortable darkness when they are called forth to live in light to sleep under the light of Grace is unreasonable much more in the approach of the light of Glory The night of thy ignorance and misery is past the day of glorious Light is at hand this is the day-break betwixt them both Though thou see not yet the Sun it self appear methinks the twilight of a promise should revive thee Come forth then O my dull congealed spirits and leave these earthly Cels of dumpish sadness and hear thy Lord that bids thee Rejoyce and again Rejoyce thou hast lain here long enough in thy prison of flesh where Satan hath been thy Jaylor and the things of this world have been the Stocks for the feet of thy Affections where cares have been thy Trons and fears thy Scourge and the bread and water of Affliction thy food where sorrows have been thy lodging and thy sins and foes have made the bed and a carnal hard unbelieving heart have been the iron gates bars that have kept thee in that thou couldst scarce have leave to look through the Lattices and see one glimpse of the immortal light The Angel of the Covenant now calls thee and strikes thee and bids thee Arise and follow him up O my soul and cheerfully obey and thy bolts and bars shall all fly open do thou obey and all will obey follow the Lamb which way ever he leads thee Art thou afraid because thou knowst not whither Can the place be worse then where thou art Shouldst thou fear to follow
and height of my spirit discover my title to this promised land shall I be the adopted Son of God and coheir with Christ of that blessed inheritance and daily look when I am put into possession and shall not this be seen in my joyful countenance What if God had made me commander of the earth What if the mountains would remove at my command What if I could heal all diseases with a word or a touch What if the infernal spirits were all at my command Should I not rejoyce in such priviledges and honors as these yet is it my Saviours command not to rejoyce that the divels are subject to us but in this to rejoyce that our names are written in heaven I cannot here enjoy my parents or my neer and beloved friends without some delight especially when I did too freely let out my affections to my friend how sweet was that very exercise of my love O what will it then be to live in the perpetual love of God! For brethren here to live together in Unity how good and pleasant a thing is it To see a family live in love husband wife parents children servants doing all in love to one another To see a Town live together in love without any envyings brawlings heart-burnings or contentions scornes law-suits factions or divisions but every man loving his neighbor as himself and thinking they can never do too much for one another but striving to go beyond each other in love O how happy and delectable a sight is this O sweetest bands saith Seneca which binde so happily that those that are so bound do love their binders and desire still to be bound more closely and even reduced into one O then what a blessed society will be the Family of Heaven and those peaceable Inhabitants of the New Jerusalem where is no division nor dissimilitude nor differing Judgments nor disaffection nor strangeness nor deceitful friendship never an angry thought or look never a cutting unkinde expression but all are one in Christ who is one with the Father and live in the love of Love himself Cato could say That the soul of a Lover dwelleth in the person whom he loveth and therefore we say The soul is not more where it liveth and enlighteneth then where it loveth How neer then will my soul be closed to God and how sweet must that conjunction be when I shall so heartily strongly and uncessantly love him As the Bee lies sucking and satiating her self with the sweetness of the Flower or rather as the childe lies sucking the Mothers brest inclosed in her arms and sitting in her lap even so shall my loving soul be still feeding on the sweetness of the God of Love Ah wretched fleshly unbelieving heart that can think of such a day and work and life as this with so low and dull and feeble joyes But my enjoying Joyes will be more lively How delectable is it to me to behold and study these inferior works of God to read those Anatomical Lectures of Du Bartas upon this great dissected body what a beautiful fabrick is this great house which here we dwell in The floor so drest with various Herbs and Flowrs and Trees and watered with Springs and Rivers and Seas the roof so wide expanded so admirably adorned Such astonishing workmanship in every part The studies of an hundred Ages more if the world should last so long would not discover the mysteries of divine skill which are to be found in the narrow compass of our bodies What Anatomist is not amazed in his Search and Observations What wonders then do Sun and Moon and Stars and Orbs and Seas and VVindes and Fire and Aire and Earth c. afford us And hath God prepared such a house for our silly sinful corruptible flesh and for a soul imprisoned and doth he bestow so many millions of wonderful rarities even upon his enemies O then what a dwelling must that needs be which he prepareth for pure refined spiritual glorified ones and which he will bestow onely upon his dearly beloved children whom he hath chosen out to make his mercy on them glorified and admired As far as our perfected glorified bodies will excel this frail and corruptible flesh so far wil the glory of the New Jerusalem exceed all the present glory of the creatures The change upon our Mansion will be proportionable to the change upon our selves Arise then O my soul by these steps in thy Contemplation and let thy thoughts of that glory were it possible as far in sweetness exceed thy thoughts of the excellencies below Fear not to go out of this body and this world when thou must make so happy a change as this but say as Zuingerus when he was dying I am glad and even leap for joy that at last the time is come wherein that even that mighty Jehovah whose Majesty in my search of Nature I have admired whose Goodness I have adored whom in faith I have desired whom I have sighed for will now shew himself to me face to face And let that be the unfained sense of thy heart which Camerarius left in his VVill should be written on his Monument Vita mihi mors est mors mihi vita nova est Life is to me a Death Death is to me a new Life Moreover how wonderful and excellent are the works of Providence even in this life to see the great God to engage himself and set a work his Attributes for the safety and advancement of a few humble despicable praying persons O what a joyful time will it then be when so much Love and Mercy and VVisdom and Power and Truth shall be manifested and glorified in the Saints glorification How delightful is it to my soul to review the workings of Providence for my self and to read over the Records and Catalogues of those special mercies wherewith my life hath been adorned and sweetned How oft have my prayers been heard and my tears regarded and my groaning troubled soul relieved and my Lord hath bid me Be of good cheer He hath healed me when in respect of means I was uncurable He hath helped me when I was helpless In the midst of my supplications hath he eased and revived me He hath taken me up from my knees and from the dust where I have lain in sorrow and despair even the cries which have been occasioned by distrust hath he regarded what a support are these experiences to my fearful unbelieving heart These clear Testimonies of my Fathers Love do put life into my afflicted drooping spirit O then what a blessed day will that be when I shall have all mercy perfection of mercy nothing but mercy and fully injoy the Lord of Mercy himself When I shall stand on the shore and look back upon the raging Seas which I have safely passed when I shall in safe and full possession of glory look back upon all my pains and troubles and feares and tears and upon all the
mercies which I here received then shall behold the glory enjoyed there which was the End of all this O what a blessed view will that be O glorious prospect which I shall have on the celestial mount Zion Is it possible that there should be any defect of joy or my heart not raised when I am so raised If one drop of lively faith were mixed with these considerations O what work they would make in my brest and what a Heaven-ravished heart should I carry within me Faine would I believe Lord help my unbelief Yet further consider O my soul How sweet have the very ordinances been unto thee What raptures hast thou had in prayer and under heavenly Sermons What gladness in dayes of thanksgiving after eminent deliverances to the Church or to thy self What delight do I finde in the sweet society of the Saints To be among my humble faithful neighbors and friends To joyne with them in the frequent worship of God To see their growth and stability and soundness of understanding To see those daily added to the Church which shall be saved O then what delight shall I have to see the perfected Church in Heaven and to joyne with these and all the Saints in another kinde of worship then we can here conceive of How sweet is it to joyne in the high praises of God in the solemn assemblies How glad have I been to go up to the house of God Especially after long restraint by sickness when I have been as Hezekiah released and readmitted to joyne with the people of God and to set forth the praises of my great deliverer How sweet is my work in Preaching the Gospel and inviting sinners to the marriage feast of the Lamb and opening to them the treasures of free Grace Especially when God blesseth my endeavors with plenteous success and giveth me to see the fruit of my labors even this alone hath been a greater joy to my heart that if I had been made the Lord of all the riches on earth O how can my heart then conceive that joy which I shall have in my admittance into the Celestial Temple and into the Heavenly Host that shall do nothing but praise the Lord for ever When we shall say to Christ Here am I and the children thou hast given me and when Christ shall present us all to his Father and all are gathered and the Body compleated If the very Word of God were sweeter to Job then his necessary food and to Jeremy was the very joy and rejoycing of his heart and to David was sweeter then the Hony and Honicomb so that he cryeth out O how I love thy Law it is my meditation continually and if thy Law had not been my delight I had perished in my troubles O then how blessed a day will that be when we fully enjoy the Lord of this Word and shall need these written precepts and promises no more but shall in stead of these love-letters enjoy our beloved and in stead of these promises have the happiness in possession and read no book but the face of the glorious God! How far would I go to see one of those blessed Angels which appeared to Abraham to Lot to John c. Or to speak with Henoch or Elias or any Saint who had lived with God especially if he would resolve all my doubts and describe to me the celestial habitacions How much more desirable must it needs be to live with those blessed Saints and Angels and to see and possesse as well as they It is written of Erastus that he was so desirous to learn that it would be sweet to him even to dye so he might but be resolved of those doubtful questions wherein he could not satisfie himself How sweet then should it be to me to dye that I may not only be resolved of all my doubts but also know what I never before did think of and enjoy what before I never knew It was a happy dwelling that the twelve Apostles had with Christ to be always in his company and see his face and hear him open to them the mysteries of the Kingdom But it will be another kinde of happiness to dwell with him in Glory It was a rare priviledg of Thomas to put his fingers into his wounds to confirme his faith and of John to be called the Disciple whom Jesus loved on whose brest at supper he was wont to lean But it will be another kinde of priviledg which I shall enjoy when I shall see him in his glory and not in his wounds and shall enjoy a fuller sense of his Love then John then did and shall have the most hearty entertainment that Heaven affordeth â—f they that heard Christ speak on earth were astonished at his Wisdome and answers and wondered at the gratious Words which proceeded from his mouth How shall I be affected then to behold him in his Majesty Rowse up thy self yet O my soul and consider Can the foresight of this glory make others embrace the stake and kiss the fagot and welcome the cross and refuse deliverance And can it not make thee cheerful under lesser sufferings Can it sweeten the flames to them and can it not sweeten thy life or thy sickness or naturall death If a glympse could make Moses his face to shine and Peter on the mount so transported and Paul so exalted and John so rapt up in the spirit Why should it not somewhat revive me with delight Doubtless it would if my thoughts were more believing Is it not the same Heaven which they and I must live in Is not their God their Christ their Crown and mine the same Nay how many a weak woman or poor despised Christian have I seen mean in parts but rich in faith who could rejoyce and triumph in hope of this inheritance And shall I look upon it with so dim an eye So dull a heart So dejected a countenance some small foretastes also I have had my self though indeed small and seldome thorow mine own belief and how much more delightful have they been then ever was any of these earthly things The full enjoyment then will sure be sweet Remember then this bunch of Grapes which thou hast tasted of and by them conjecture the fruitfulness of the Land of Promise A Grape in a wilderness cannot be like the plentiful Vintage Consider also O my soul What a beauty is there in the imperfect Graces of the spirit here so great that they are called the Image of God and can any created exceellencie have a more honorable title Alas how small a part are these of what we shall enjoy in our perfect state O how pretious a mercy should I esteem it if God would but take off my bodily infirmities and restore me to any comfortable measure of health and strength that I might be able with cheerfulness to go through his work How pretious a mercy then will it be to have all
and Groans How then should I long for my finall full recovery There is no sickness nor pain nor weeping nor complaints O when shall I arrive at that safe and quiet Harbor where is none of these storms and waves and dangers when I shall never more have a weary restless night or day Then shall not my life be such a medley or mixture of hope and fear of joy and sorrow as now it is nor shall Flesh and Spirit be combating within me nor my soul be still as a pitched Field or a Stage of contention where Faith and Unbelief Affiance and Distrust Humility and Pride do maintain a continual distracting conflict then shall I not live a dying life for fear of dying nor my life be made uncomfortable with the fears of losing it O when shall I be past these soul-tormenting fears and cares and griefs and passions When shall I be out of this frail this corruptible ruinous body This soul contradicting ensnaring deceiving flesh When shall I be out of this vain vexatious World Whose pleasures are meer deluding dreams and shadows whose miseries are real numerous and uncessant How long shall I see the Church of Christ lie trodden under the feet of persecutors or else as a ship in the hands of foolish guides though the supream Master doth moderate all for the best Alas that I must stand by and see the Church and Cause of Christ like a Footbal in the midst of a crowd of Boyes tost about in contention from one to another every one running and sweating with foolish violence and laboring the downfal of all that are in his way and all to get it into his own power that he may have the managing of the work himself and may drive it before him which way he pleaseth and when all is done the best usage it may expect from them is But to be spurned about in the dirt till they have driven it on to the Goal of their private interests or deluded fancies There is none of this disorder in the Heavenly Jerusalem there shall I finde a Government without imperfection and obedience without the least unwillingness or rebellion even a harmonious concent of perfected Spirits in obeying and praising their Everlasting King O how much better is it to be a Door-keeper there and the least in that Kingdom then to be the Conqueror or Commander of this tumultuous World there will our Lord govern all immediatly by himself and not put the Reins in the hands of such ignorant Riders nor govern by such foolish and sinful deputies as the best of the sons of men now are Dost thou so mourn for these inferior disorders O my soul and yet wouldst thou not be out of it How long hast thou desired to be a Member of a more perfect reformed Church and to joyn with more holy humble sincere souls in the purest and most Heavenly worship Why dost thou not see that on Earth thy desires flie from thee Art thou not as a childe that thinketh to travel to the Sun when he seeth it rising or setting as it were close to the Earth but as he travelleth toward it it seems to go from him and when he hath long wearied himself it is as far off as ever for the thing he seeketh is in another world Even such hath been thy labor in seeking for so holy so pure so peaceable a Society as might afford thee a contented settlement here Those that have gone as far as America for satisfaction have confessed themselves unsatisfied still When wars and the calamities attending them have been over I have said Return now my soul unto thy Rest But how restless a condition hath next succeeded When God had given me the enjoyment of Peace and Friends and Liberty of the Gospel and had settled me even as my own heart desired I have been ready to say Soul take thy ease and rest But how quickly hath Providence called me Fool and taught me to call my state by another name When did I ever begin to congratulate my flesh its felicity but God did quickly turn my tune and made almost the same breath to end in groaning which did begin in laughter I have thoughts oft-times in the folly of my prosperity Now I will have one sweet draught of Solace and Content but God hath dropped in the Gall while the Cup was at my mouth We are still weary of the present condition and desire a change and when we have it it doth not answer our expectation but our discontent and restlesness is still unchanged In time of peace we thought that war would deliver us from our disquietments and when we saw the Iron red hot we catched it inconsiderately thinking that it was Gold till it burned us to the very bone and so stuck to our fingers that we scarce know yet whether we are rid of it or not In this our misery we long for peace and so long were we strangers to it that we had forgot its name and begun to call it REST or HEAVEN But as soon as we are again grown acquainted with it we shall better bethink us and perceive our mistake O why am I then no more weary of this weariness and why do I so forget my resting place Up then O my soul in thy most raised and fervent desires Stay not till this Flesh can desire with thee its Appetite hath a lower and baser object Thy Appetite is not sensitive but rational distinct from its and therefore look not that Sense should apprehend thy blessed object and tell thee what and when to desire Believing Reason in the Glass of Scripture may discern enough to raise the flame And though Sense apprehend not that which must draw thy desires yet that which may drive them it doth easily apprehend It can tell thee that thy present life is filled with distress and sorrows though it cannot tell thee what is in the world to come Thou needest not Scripture to tell thee nor Faith to discern that thy head aketh and thy stomack is sick thy bowels griped and thy heart grieved and some of these or such like are thy daily case Thy friends about thee are grieved to see thy griefs and to hear thy dolorous groans and lamentations and yet art thou loth to leave this woful life is this a state to be preferred before the Celestial glory or is it better to be thus miserable from Christ then to be happy with him or canst thou possibly be so unbelieving as to doubt whether that life be any better then this O my soul do not the dulness of thy desires after Rest accuse thee of most detestable ingratitude and folly Must thy Lord procure thee a Rest at so dear a rate and dost thou no more value it Must he purchase thy Rest by a life of labor and sorrow and by the pangs of a bitter cursed death and when all is done hadst thou rather be here without it Must he
Lightning without the Thunder which maketh it seem more dreadful then delightful And shouldst thou be loth then O my soul to leave this for the Eternal perfect Light and to change thy Candle for the glorious Sun and to change thy Studies and Preaching and Praying for the Harmonious Praises and fruition of the Blessed God Nor will thy loss be greater in the change of thy company then of thine imployment Thy friends here have been indeed thy delight And have they not been also thy vexation and thy grief They are gracious and are they not also sinful they are kinde and loving and are they not also peevish froward and soon displeased they are humble but withal alas how proud they will scarce endure to hear plainly of their disgraceful faults they cannot bear undervaluing or disrespect they itch after the good thoughts and applause of others they love those best that highliest esteem them The missing of a curtesie a supposed sleighting or disrepect the contradicting of their words or humors a difference in opinion yea the turning of a straw will quickly shew thee the pride and the uncertainty of thy friend Their graces are sweet to thee and their gifts are helpful but are not their corruptions bitter and their imperfections hurtful Though at a distance they seem to thee most Holy and Innocent yet when they come neerer thee and thou hast throughly tryed them alas what silly frail and froward pieces are the best of men Then the knowledg which thou didst admire appeareth clouded with ignorance and the vertues that so shined as a Glow-worm in the night are scarcely to be found when thou seekest them by day-light VVhen temptations are strong how quickly do they yield what wounds have they given to Religion by their shameful falls Those that have been famous for their Holiness have been as infamous for their notorious hainous wickedness those that have been thy dearest bosome friends that have prayed and conferred with thee and helped thee toward Heaven and by their fervor forwardness and heavenly lives have shamed thy coldness and earthliness and dulness whom thou hast singled out as the choicest from a world of professors whom thou madest the daily companions and delights of thy life are not some of them faln to Drunkenness and some to Whordome some to Pride Perfidiousness and Rebellion and some to the most damnable Heresies and Divisions And hath thy very heart received such wounds from thy friends and yet art thou so loth to go from them to thy God Thy friends that are weak are little useful or comfortable to thee and those that are strong are the abler to hurt thee and the best if not heedfully used will prove the worst The better and keener thy knife is the sooner and deeper will it cut thy fingers if thou take not heed Yea the very number of thy friends is a burden and trouble to thee every one supposeth he hath some interest in thee yea the interest of a friend which is not a little and how insufficient art thou to satisfie all their expectations When it is much if thou canst answer the expectations of one If thou were divided among so many as each could have but little of thee so thy self and God who should have most will have none And almost every one that hath not more of thee then thou canst spare for all is ready to censure thee as unfriendly and a neglecter of the duty or respects which thou owest them And shouldst thou please them all the gain will not be great nor art thou sure that they will again please thee Awake then O my drowsie soul and look above this world of sorrows Hast thou born the yoke of afflictions from thy youth and so long felt the smarting rod and yet canst no better understand its meaning Is not every stroke to drive thee hence and is not the voice of the rod like that to Elijah What dost thou here Up and away Dost thou forget that sure prediction of thy Lord In the world ye shall have trouble but in me ye shall have peace The first thou hast found true by long experience and of the later thou hast had a small foretaste but the perfect peace is yet before which till it be enjoyed cannot be clearly understood Ah my dear Lord I feel thy meaning it s written in my flesh it s engraven in my bones My heart thou aymest at thy rod doth drive thy silken cord of love doth draw and all to bring it to thy self And is that all Lord is that the worst Can such a heart be worth thy having Make it so Lord and then it is thine Take it to thy self and then take me I can but reach it toward thee and not unto thee I am too low and it is too dull This clod hath life to stir but not to rise Legs it hath but wings it wanteth As the feeble childe to the tender mother it looketh up to thee and stretcheth out the hands and faine would have thee take it up Though I cannot so freely say My heart is with thee my soul longeth after thee yet can I say I long for such a longing heart The twins are yet a striving in my bowels The spirit is willing the flesh is weak the spirit longs the flesh is loth The flesh is unwilling to lye rotting in the earth The soul desires to be with thee My spirit cryeth Let thy Kingdom come or else let me come unto thy Kingdom but the flesh is afraid least thou shouldest hear my prayer and take me at my word VVhat frequent contradictions dost thou finde in my requests because there is such contradiction in my self My prayers plead against my prayers and one part begs a denial to the other No wonder if thou give me such a dying life when I know not whether to ask for life or death With the same breath do I beg for a reprival and removal And the same groan doth utter my desires and my feares My soul would go my flesh would stay My soul would faine be out my flesh would have thee hold the door O blessed be thy Grace that makes advantage of my corruptions even to contradict and kill themselves For I fear my fears and sorrow for my sorrows and groan under my fleshly groans I loath my lothness and I long for greater longings And while my soul is thus tormented with fears and cares and with the tedious means for attaining my desires it addeth so much to the burden of my troubles that my wearyness thereby is much increased which makes me groan to be at Rest. Indeed Lord my soul it self also is in a straight and what to chuse I know not well but yet thou knowest what to give To depart and be with thee is Best but yet to be in the flesh seems needfull Thou knowest I am not weary of thy work but of sorrow and sin I must needs be weary I am willing to stay while
thou wilt here imploy me and to dispatch the work which thou hast put into my hands till these strange thoughts of thee be somewhat more familiar and thou hast raised me into some degree of acquaintance with thy self But I beseech thee stay no longer when this is done Stay not till sin shall get advantage and my soul grow earthly by dwelling on this earth and my desires and delights in thee grow dead But while I must be here let me be still amending and ascending make me still better and take me at the best I dare not be so impatient of living as to importune thee to cut off my time and urge thee to snatch me hence unready because I know my everlasting state doth so much depend on the improvement of this life Nor yet would I stay when my work is done and remaine here sinning when my brethren are triumphing I am drowning in teares while they swim in joyes I am weeping while they are singing I am under thy feet while they are in thy bosome Thy footsteps bruise and break this worm while those Stars do shine in the Firmament of glory Thy frowns do kill me while they are quickened by thy smiles They are ever living and I am daily dying Their joyes are raised by the knowledg of their endlesness my griefs are enlarged by still expecting more while they possess but one continued pleasure I bear the successive assaults of fresh calamities One billow fals in the neck of another and when I am rising up from under one another comes and strikes we down Yet I am thy childe as well as they Christ is my head as well as theirs why is there then so great a distance How differently dost thou use us when thou art Father to us all They sit at thy table whilst I must stand without the doors But I acknowledg the equity of thy ways Though we all are children yet I am the Prodigal and therefore meeter in this remote country to feed on husks while they are always with thee and possess thy glory Though we all are members yet not the same they are the tongue and fitter to praise thee They are the hands and fitter for thy service I am the feet and therefore meeter to tread on earth and move in dirt but unfit to stand so neer the head as they They were once themselves in my condition and I shall shortly be in theirs They were of the lowest forme before they came to the highest They suffered before they reigned They came out of great tribulation who now are standing before thy throne And shall not I be content to come to the crown as they did and to drink of their cup before I sit with them in the Kingdom The blessed souls of David Paul Austin Calvin Perkins Bayne Parker Ames Bradshaw Dod Preston Stoughton Sibbes with all the spirits of the just made perfect were once on earth as I am now as far from the sight of thy face and glory as deep in sorrows as weak and sick and full of pains as I Their souls were longer imprisoned in corruptible flesh I shall go but the way that they all did go before me Their house of clay did fall to dust and so must mine The world they are now in was as strange to them before they were there as it is to me And am I better then all these pretious souls I am contented therefore O my Lord to stay thy time and go thy way so thou wilt exalt me also in thy season and take me into thy barn when thou seest me ripe In the mean time I may desire though I may not repine I may look over the hedge though I may not break over I may believe and Wish though not make any sinful hast I am content to wait but not to lose thee And when thou seest me too contented with thine absence and satisfying and pleasing my self here below O quicken up then my dull desires and blow up the dying spark of love And leave me not till I am able unfeignedly to cry out As the heart panteth after the brooks and the dry land thirsteth for the water streams so thirsteth my soul after thee O God when shall I come and appear before the living God Till my daily conversation be with thee in Heaven and from thence I may longingly expect my Saviour Till my affections are set on things above where Christ is reigning and my life is hid Till I can walk by Faith and not by sight willing rather to be absent from the body and present with the Lord. What interest hath this empty world in me and what is there in it that may seeme so lovely as to entice my desires and delight from thee or make me loth to come away when I look about me with a deliberate undeceived eye me thinks this world 's a howling wilderness and most of the inhabitants are untamed hideous monsters All its beauty I can wink into blackness and all its mirth I can think into sadness I can drown al its pleasures in a few penitent tears and the winde of a sigh will scatter them away When I look on thâ—m without the spectacles of flesh I call them nothing as being vainty or worse then nothing as vexation O let not this flesh so seduce my soul as to make it prefer this weary life before the Joyes that are about thy Throne And though Death of it self be unwelcome to Nature yet let thy Grace make thy Glory appear to me so desirable that the King of Terrors may be the Messenger of my Joy O let not my soul be ejected by violence and dispossessed of its Habitation against its will but draw it forth to thy Self by the secret power of thy Love as the Sun-shine in the Spring draws forth the creatures from their Winter Cells meet it half way and entice it to thee as the Loadstone doth the Iron and as the greater flame doth attract the less Dispel therefore the Clouds that hide from me thy Love or remove the Scales that hinder mine Eyes from beholding Thee for onely the beames that stream from thy Face and the foresight or taste of thy great Salvation can make a soul unfainedly to say Now Let thy Servant depart in peace Reading and Hearing will not serve my meat is not sweet to my Ear or to my Eye it must be a taste or feeling that must entice away my soul Though arguing is the means to bend my will yet if thou bring not the matter to my hand and by the influence of thy Spirit make it not effectual I shall never reason my soul to be willing to depart In the Winter when its cold and dirty without I am loth to leave my Chamber and fire but in the Summer when all is warm and green I am loth to be so confined shew me but the Summer fruits and pleasures of thy Paradise and I shall freely quit my earthly Cell Some pleasure
I have in my Books my friends and in thine Ordinances till thou hast given me a taste of something more sweet my soul will be loth to part with these The Traveller will hold his Cloak the faster when the windes do bluster and the storms assault him but when the Sun shines hot he will cast it off as a burthen so will my soul when thou frownest or art strange be lother to leave this garment of flesh but thy smiles would make me leave it as my prison but it is not thy ordinary discoveries that will here suffice as the work is greater so must be thy help O turn these fears into strong desires and this lothness to dye into longings after thee while I must be absent from thee let my soul as heartily groan under thine absence as my pained body doth under its want of health And let not those groans be counterfeit or constrained but let them come from a longing loving heart unfeignedly judging it best to depart and be with Christ And if I have any more time to spend on earth let me live as without the world in thee as I have sometime lived as without thee in the world O suffer me not to spend in strangeness to thee another day of this my Pilgrimage while I have a thought to think let me not forget thee while I have a tongue to move let me mention thee with delight while I have a breath to breathe let it be after thee and for thee while I have a knee to bend let it bow daily at thy Footstool and when by sickness thou confinest me to my Couch do thou make my bed and number my pains and put all my tears into thy Bottle And as when my spirit groaned for my sins the flesh would not second it but desired that which my spirit did abhor so now when my flesh doth groan under its pains let not my spirit second it but suffer the flesh to groan alone and let me desire that day which my flesh abhorreth that my friends may not with so much sorrow wait for the departure of my soul as my soul with joy shall wait for its own departure and then let me dye the death of the Righteous and let my last end be as his even a removall to that Glory that shall never end Send forth thy Convoy of Angels for my departing soul and let them bring it among the perfected spirits of the Just and let me follow my dear friends that have died in Christ before me und when my friends are weeping over my Grave let my spirit be reposed with thee in Rest and when my Corps shall lye there rotting in the dark let my soul be in the Inheritance of the Saints in Light And O thou that numberest the very hairs of my head do thou number all the dayes that my body lyes in the dust and thou that writest all my members in thy Book do thou keep an account of all my scattered bones and hasten O my Saviour the time of thy return send forth thine Angels and let that dreadful joyful Trumpet sound delay not lest the living give up their hopes delay not lest earth should grow like hell and lest thy Church by division be crumbled all to dust and dissolved by being resolved into individual unites Delay not lest thine enemies get advantage of thy Flock and lest Pride and Hypocrisie and Sensuality and Unbelief should prevail against thy little Remnant and share among them thy whole Inheritance and when thou comest thou finde not Faith on the earth Delay not lest the Grave should boast of Victory and having learned Rebellion of its guest should plead prescription and refuse to deliver thee up thy due O hasten that great Resurrection Day when thy command shall go forth and none shall disobey when the Sea and Earth shall yield up their Hostages and all that slept in the Graves shall awake and the dead in Christ shall first arise when the seed that thou sowedst corruptible shall come forth incorruptible and Graves that received but rottenness and retained but dust shall return thee glorious Stars and Suns therefore dare I lay down my carcass in the dust entrusting it not to a Grave but to Thee and therefore my flesh shall rest in Hope till thou raise it to the possession of the Everlasting REST. Return O Lord how long O let thy Kingdom come Thy desolate Bride saith Come for thy Spirit within her saith Come who teacheth her thus to pray with groanings after thee which cannot be expressed The whole Creation saith Come waiting to be delivered from the bondage of Corruption into the glorious liberty of the Sons of God Thy Self hast said Surely I come quickly Amen Even so come LORD IESVS The Conclusion THus Reader I have given thee my best advice for the attaining and maintaining a Heavenly Conversation The maner is imperfect and too much mine own but for the main matter I dare say I received it from God From him I deliver it thee and his charge I lay upon thee That thou entertain and practise it If thou canst not do it methodically and fully yet do it as thou canst onely be sure thou do it seriously and frequently If thou wilt believe a man that hath made some small tryal of it thou shalt finde it will make thee another man and elevate thy soul and clear thine understanding and polish thy conversation and leave a pleasant savor upon thy heart so that thy own experience will make thee confess That one hour thus spent will more effectually revive thee then many in bare external duties and a day in these contemplations will afford thee truer content then all the glory and riches of the Earth Be acquainted with this work and thou wilt be in some remote sort acquainted with God Thy joyes will be spiritual and prevalent and lasting according to the nature of their Blessed Object thou wilt have comfort in life and comfort in death VVhen thou hast neither wealth nor health nor the pleasure of this world yet wilt thou have comfort Comfort without the presence or help of any Friend without a Minister without a Book when all means are denied thee or taken from thee yet maist thou have vigorous real comfort Thy graces will be mighty and active and victorious and the daily joy which is thus fetcht from Heaven will be thy strength Thou wilt be as one that standeth on the top of an exceeding high Mountain he looks down on the world as if it were quite below him How small do the Fields and VVoods and Countreys seem to him Cities and Towns seem but little spots Thus despicably wilt thou look on all things here below The greatest Princes will seem below thee but as Grashoppers and the busie contentious coveteous world but as a heap of Ants. Mens threatnings will be no terror to thee nor the honors of this world any strong enticement Temptations will be more harmless as
delight in God and heavenly Things it would rectifie their judgments better then all the arguments in the world Lose this delight once and you will begin to quarrel with the Ordinances and Ways of God and to be more offended at the Preachers imperfections then profited by the Doctrine Sixthly And it is the want of these Heavenly Delights in God that makes men so entertain the delights of the flesh This is the cause of most mens voluptuousness and flesh-pleasing The Soul will not rest without some kinde of delights If it had nothing to delight in either in hand or in hope it would be in a kinde of Hell on Earth vexing it self with continual sorrow and despair If a Dog have lost his Master he will follow somebody else Men must have their sweet Cups or delicious Fare or gay Apparel or Cards or Dice or Fleshly Lasts to make up their want of delight in God How well these will serve in stead of God our fleshly youths will be better able to tell me when we meet at Judgment If men were acquainted with this Heavenly Life there would need no Laws against Sabbath breaking and riotousness nor would men need to go for mirth to an Alehouse or a Tavern They would have a far sweeter pastime and recreation neerer hand Seventhly also This want of Heavenly Delights will leave men under the power of every Affliction they will have nothing to comfort them and ease them in their sufferings but the empty uneffectual pleasures of the flesh and when that is gone where then is their delight Eighthly Also it will make men fearful and unwilling to die For who would go to a God or a place that he hath no delight in or who would leave his pleasure here except it were to go to better O if the people of God would learn once this Heavenly Life and take up their delights in God whilest they live they would not tremble and be disconsolate at the tidings of death Ninthly Yea this want of Heavenly Delight doth lay men open to the power of every Temptation A little thing will tice a man from that which he hath no pleasure in Tenthly Yea it is a dangerous preparative to total Apostacy A man will hardly long hold on in a way that he hath no delight in nor use the means if he have no delight in the end But as a Beast if you drive him a way that he would not go will be turning out at every gap If you be Religious in your actions and become over to God in your outward Conversaâ—ion and not in your delight you will shortly be gone if your trial be strong How many young people have we known who by good education or the perswasion of friends or for fear of Hell have been a while kept up among Prayers and Sermons and good company as a Bird in a Cage when if they durst they had rather have been in an Alehouse or at their sports and at last they have broke loose when their restraint was taken off and have forsaken the way that they never took pleasure in You see then that it is not a matter of indifferency whether you entertain these Heavenly Delights or not nor is the loss of your present comfort all the inconvenience that follows the neglect And now Christian Friends I have here lined you out a Heavenly precious Work would you but do it it would make you men indeed To delight in God is the work of Angels and the contrary is the work of devils If God would perswade you now to make conscience of this duty and help you in it by the blessed influence of his Spirit you would not change your lives with the greatest Prince on the Earth But I am afraid if I may judg of your hearts by the backwardness of my own that it will prove a hard thing to perswade you to the work and that much of this my labor will be lost Pardon my jealousie it is raised upon too many and sad experiments What say you Do you resolve on this Heavenly course or no Will you let go all your sinful fleshly pleasures and daily seek after these higher delights I pray thee hear shut the Book and consider of it and resolve on the duty before thou go further Let thy Family perceive let thy Neighbors perceive let thy Conscience perceive yea let God perceive it that thou art a man that hast thy daily Conversation in Heaven God hath now offered to be thy daily delight Thy neglect is thy refusal What Refuse delight and such a Delight If I had propounded you onely a course of Melancholy and Fear and Sorrow you might better have demur'd on it Take heed what thou dost Refuse this and refuse all Thou must have Heavenly Delights or none that are lasting God is willing that thou shouldst daily walk with him and fetch in consolations from the Everlasting Fountain if thou be unwilling even bear thy loss And one of these days when thou liest dying then seek for comfort where thou canst get it and make what shift for contentment thou canst Then see whether thy fleshly delights will stick to thee or give thee the slip and then Conscience in despight of thee shall make thee remember That thou wast once perswaded to a way for more excellent pleasures that would have followed thee through death and have lasted thee to Everlasting What man will go in rags that may be clothed with the best or feed on pulse that may feed of the best or accompany with the vilest that may be a companion to the best and admitted into the presence and favor of the greatest And shall we delight so much in our clothing of flesh and feed so much on the vain pleasures of Earth and accompany so much with sin and sinners When Heaven is set open as it were to our daily view and God doth offer us daily admittance into his presence O how is the unseen God neglected and the unseen Glory forgotten and made light of and all because they are unseen and for want of that Faith which is the Substance of things hoped for and the Evidence of things that are not seen But for you sincere Beleevers whose hearts God hath weaned from all things here below I hope you will value this Heavenly Life and fetch one walk daily in the New Jerusalem I know God is your Love and your desire and I know you would fain be more acquainted with your Saviour and I know it is your grief that your hearts are not more neer him and that they do no more feelingly and passionately love him and delight in him As ever you would have all this mended and enjoy your desires O try this Life of Meditation on your Everlasting Rest Here is the Mount Ararat where the fluctuated Ark of your Souls must Rest. O let the World see by your Heavenly Lives That Religion lieth in something more then Opinions and Disputes and a
with sharp Sight are winged as those Saraphims that waited on Christ when ten Calamities and utter destruction was told for the low Jerusalem They of this City are not as Israel after the flesh which would not see for all the Wonders that our Lord did but these Redeemed with his pretious blood are full of Eyes lightned by Lamps the glory of Jehovah and behold Christ through all the Prophets a performer of our Faith sealed of God Sealer of all Vision opener of Seals for the Stories of the Church Here is the true Light where the saved walk hither Kingdoms bring their glory hither the blessed Nations carry their Jewels This is a Kingdom uncorrupted which shall not be given to a strange and unclean people they must be written in the Book of the Lamb and chosen of eternity sanctified of God which here are Citizens Through this there gusheth a stream better then the four in Eden a stream of lively waters by belief in Christ as those waters flowing from Lebanon Here is that Tree of Life in the midst of the Paradise of God with leaves to heal the Nations that will be cured while it is said to day with twelve fruits to give food continually to such as feed also upon the hidden Manna who after death receive the Crown of Justice and Life the morning star white Cloathing and the white Stone wherein a name is written equal to all the Law Deut. 27 2. The first seat of the first Adam in the first Paradise was glorious this is better and as Moses began with the Terrestrial so the holy Word endeth in the Celestial that to Wheels full of eyes may the Writ of Truth be compared The full concent and melody of Prophets and Apostles how their Harps are tuned on Mount Sion it will sully appear in the full sight of Peace when our bodies are made conformable to Christ his glorious body in the world to come and our eyes shall see the Lord in that Sicâ— For that Coming O thou whom my soul loveth be like to the Roe upon the mountains Amen Even so come Lord Jesus Then we shall in perfect holiness worship thee to whom the Angels alway give holy Worship saying Praise and Glory and Wisdom and Thanks and Honor and Power and Might be unto our God for evermore Amen A Poem of Master I. Herberts in his Temple HOME COme Lord my head doth burn my heart is sick While thou dost ever ever stay Thy long deferrings wound me to the quick My spirit gaspeth night and day O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee How canst thou stay considering the pace The blood did make which thou didst waste When I behold it trickling down thy face I never saw thing make such hast O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee When man was lost thy pity look't about To see what help in th' earth or skie But there was none at least no help without The help did in thy bosome lye O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee There lay thy Son and must he leave that nest That hive of sweetness to remove Thraldome from those who would not at a feast Leave one poor apple for thy love O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee He did he came O my Redeemer dear After all this canst thou be strange So many yeers baptiz'd and not appear As if thy Love could fail or change O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee Yet if thou stayest still why must I stay My God what is this world to me This world of wo Hence all ye clouds away Away I must get up and see O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee What is this weary world This meat and drink That chain 's us by the teeth so fast What is this woman-kinde which I can wink Into a blackness and distaste O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee With one small sigh thou gav'st me th' other day I blasted all the joyes about me And scouling on them as they pin'd away Now come again said I and flout me O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee Nothing but drought and dearth but bush and brake Which way so ere I look I see Some may dream merrily but when they wake They dress themselves and come to thee O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee We talk of Harvests there are no such things But when we leave our Corn and Hay There is no fruitful yeer but that which bring 's The last and lov'd though dreadful day O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee O loose this frame this knot of man unty That my free soul may use her wing Which now is pinion'd with mortality As an entangled hamper'd thing O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee What have I left that I should stay and grone The most of me to Heav'n is fled My thoughts and joyes are all pack't up and gone And for their old acquaintance plead O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee Come dearest Lord pass not this holy season My flesh and bones and joints do pray And even my verse when by the rhyme and reason The word is Stay say's ever Come O shew thy self to me Or take me up to thee FINIS If you will reade nothing but What Was intended by the Author amend these misprintings The rest are but small PAge 8. line 14. blot out Sect 7. p. 9. for your reade their p. 81. l. 3. for prop r. proper p. 85. l. 15. r. Colluvione p. 87. l. 21. after be add so p. 95. l. 5. for when r. whom p. 96. l. 37. for in r. to p. 97. l. 8. blot out to p. 99. l. ult after Rest add is p. 145. l. 10. blot out with p. 161. l. 22. before thee put making p. 200. l. 21. for former r. formall and in the Margin l. 19. for sed r. suae p. 240. l. 37. for which r. what p. 242. l. 26. for Monensis r. Aponensis and in the Margin for Grainerius r. Guainerius p. 269. l. 14. for mortall r. morall p. 389. l. 23. for Promises r. Premises p. 394. l. 21 for distinguished r. extinguished p. 517. l. 23. for Pebugius â— Pâ—stugius p. 530. l. 7. before think write that p. 543. l. 18. for your r. our p. 648. l. 15. for Heavenly blessing r. Heavenly believer p. 669. l. 20. for things r. this p. 674. l. 18. for waiting r. writing p. 720. l. 9. for they r. the p. 763. l. 15. for which r. with p. 776. l. 16. for whose r. whole p. 728. l. 2. for promise r. premise §. 1. §. 2. * Heb. 10.30 Micah 2.8 2 Pet. 2.20 Joh 2.23 Heb 6.4 5 6. Heb. 10.29 30 Joh. 15.2 6. Mat 13.41 Joh. 17.12 §. 3. §. 4. 1 Theirs by Purpose before
conferri solitum certo certius est Danaeus contr Bellar. de Baptismo pag. 443. * Fâ—erunt miracula ut 〈◊〉 atque praecones quibâ—s Evangelium commandabâ—tâ—â— Vâ—â—nim Lâ—x Mosis compâ—uribus miraculis in monte Sina per desertum authoritatem sibi conciliavit quae posâ—ea destiterunt cum ad terram promissionis ventum est eâdem ratione miracula nunc quoque sublata sunt cum Evaâ—gelium per universum orbem diffusum est Promissio igitur quam Christus in Marco 16 17. scribi voluit non ad omnia tempora pertinebat Pet. Mart. Loc. Commun Class 1. cap. 8. §. 20. § 2. 1. Position 2. Position * Fides humana non habâ—t suâ natura certitudinem inâ—allâ—bâ—â—â—m quamvis sit fides humâ—â—â— quae moralitâ—r loquendo evidâ—ns infallibâ—lâ— censâ—tuâ— ut quod Roma sit quod Indi sint c. Amâ—s in disput de fidei divlâ— veritate Thes 3. * Justin Martyr telleth Tryphon in his Dialogue of the wickedness of the Jewes that they sent out into all parts of the world their choicest man to perswade the people against the Christians they were Atheists and would abolish the Deity and that they were convict of gross impiâ—ty And yet this mischievous industry of the Jews did not prevail §. 3. Maxima est differentia inter 1. testificationem primitiva Ecclesiae quae fuit tempore Apostolorum 2. Inter testificationem Ecclesiae quae proximè post Apostolorum temporae secuta est quaequa primae Ecclaesiae testificationem aâ—â—eperat 3. Et inter testificationem praesentis Ecclesiae de Scripturâ Quae enim nunc est antea fuit Ecclesia si potest ostendere testimonia eorum qui acceperant noverant testificationem primae Ecclesiae de Germanis scriptis credimus ei ut testi probanti sua dicta Non autem habet potestatemstatuendi aut decernendi aliquid de libris sacris cujus non possit certa documenta ex testificatione primitivae Ecclesiae proferre Chemnitius Exam. Con. Tridentin part 1. in initio pag. 86. Quisquis adhuc prodigia ut credat inquirit magnum est ipse prodigium qui mundo credente non credit Dr. Humfredus in Jesuitism part 1. pag. 166. * Of the Heaten ancient Writers attestation to the several Histories of the Bible I shall particularly say little it being done so fully by Grotius de Verit. Christian. Reliligio l. 1. p. 40. c. Tertullianus de praescriptione affirmat ipsas authenticas Apostolorum literas hoc est ipsa 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Apostolorum suo adhuc temtempore in Ecclesis Aposiolicis conservata extitisse a The occasion of writing the several Books of the new Testament you may see in Chemnit Exa Concilii Trident in the beginning b Dico Evangelium Lucae quod tuemur apud Ecclesias Apostolicas jam universas ab initio editionis sed stare Tertul. adv Marc. Vide Sibrandum JubbertuÌ„ de principiis Christianorum dogmatum lib. 2. c. c Even among the Papists the more learned and modest maintain the perfection of the Hebrew Text of the old Testament as Arias Pagninus Vatablus Cajetan Quid est gens Judaeorum nisi quaedam seriniaria chriâ—â—ianorum bajulans legem prophetas in testimonium assertionis Ecclesiae August cont Faust. Manichaeum lib. 12. cap. 23. * Antiochus did what he could but left the Jews their Scripture entire in despight of him Nam cum tot secula intercesserint nemo tamen quicquam addere vel auferre vel permutare ausus fuit omnibus enim nostrae gentis hominibus insita quodammodo atque ingenita fides est credere haec Dei essâ— consulta his acquiescere ac pro ipsis si ita res posceret libenter animam ponere Josep cont Appion lib. 1. Sic Euseb. Eccles. Hist. lib. 3. cap. 10. Ita Philo referente Eusebio Preparat Evang. lib. 8 cap. 2. Mirabile mihi videtur duobus annorum millibus imo majore tempore jam sere transacto nec verbum unum in lege illius esse immutatum sed centies unusquisque Judaeorum morietur quam legis Mosaicae derogabit * They think the Scripture Miracles incredible and yet every age still hath such wonders as the next ages will not believe Why is not the raining of Manna or Quailes from heaven as credible as the raining of that grain about ten years ago in England It fell in many parts of the Kingdom It was like a withered Wheate corn but not so long with a skin of a dark colour which being pulled of the grain had a taste somewhat shaâ—p and hot I tasted it and kept some of it long which fell on the Leads of the Church and of the Ministers House in Bridgenorth where I preached the Gospel Tiberius upon a Letter from Pilate of the Miracles Death and Resurrection of Christ did move in the Senate to proclaime him to be God but they refused because the motion was not first from themselves but the Emperor did abide in his opinion still Egesip Anacephaleos Wherefore Tertullian bids them Go look in your Registers and the Acts of your Senate in Apolog Vid. Usher Brit. Eccl. prim p. 3.4 * Julian when he scorneth Christ doth acknowledg his Miracles What saith he hath this Jesus done worthy of memory or of any account in all his life Save that he cured a few blinde and lame and delivered some from Devils that possessed them c. The Star that appeared at Christs birth is mentioned by Pliny lib 2. cap. 25. So do divers others as Origen reports Cont. Celsum Herods killing the children is mentioned in Augustus taunt I had rather saith he be Herods Swine then his Son because he killed a son of his own among the rest Macrob. Saturnal d Josephus relates the life of John the Baptist as the Evangelists do The Darkness and Earthquake at Christs death is acknowledged by Phlegon in lib. Chron. 13. Lucian bid his Tormentors search their own Chronicles and they should finde that in Pilates time the light failed in the midst of the day and the Sun was darkned while Christ was suffering Tertullian also appealeth to their ewn Chronicles Apol. And that it was no Natural Eclipse is known to Astronomers See Marsilius Ficinus of the Star The death of Herod is set out by Josephus Antiq. lib. 19 cap. 7. as by Luke Ireneus affirmeth that in his time the working of Miracles the raising of the Dead the casting out of Devils healing the sick by meer laying on of hands and Prâ—phesying were still in force And that some that were so raised from death remained alive among them long after See Nicepho Eccles. Histor. Tom. 1. lib. 4 c. 13 And Justin Martyr saith That the gift of Prophesying was famous in the Church in his time Dialog ad Tryphon § 4. Objection against this Argument Answered Answ. e Nos fidem quae verbis Dei habetur etsi non prorsus nasci ex miraculis