Unworthiness by reason of this sin But self is not easily so far abased as to be heavy-laden and sick of sin nor is it easily drawn to value Grace or feel how much you are unworthy of it or need it nor easily driven to renounce all sufficiency and conceits of a Righteousness of your own and wholly to go out of your selves to Christ for life Self cannot spare sin for it is its darling and play-fellow its food its recreation and its life You must daily pray to be saved from temptation and delivered from Evil even the Evil of sin as well as of punishment But self doth Love the sin and therefore cannot long to be delivered from it and therefore Loveth the temptation that leadeth to it indeed is a continual tempter to it self Would the Covetous worldling be delivered from his worldliness Would the Ambitious Proud person be delivered from his Pride or Honours or the sensual person from his sensual delights No they do not Love the Preacher or people that are against them in these ways nor the holy self-denial that is contrary to them nor the Scripture that condemneth them nor indeed the Lord himself that forbids them and is the author of all these Laws and holy ways which they abhor So that you see how self is an enemy to every Petition in the Lords Prayer 3. And it is a violation of all the ten Commandments The first and second it is most directly against and is the very thing forbidden in them and all the rest it is against consequentially and is the virtual breach of them as disposing and drawing the soul thereunto The two Tables have two Great Commands which are the sum of the whole Law and all the other Commandments are consequents or particulars from these The sum of the first Table is Thou shalt Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart or above all This is the first Commandment Thou shalt have none other Gods before me which is put first as being the Fundamental Law commanding subjection it self to the soveraign Power of God which necessarily goes before all actual obedience to particular precepts But self is directly against this and sets up man as a God to himself And all the unsanctified Love themselves better than God and therefore cannot Love him above all And therefore neither second third or fourth command can be sincerely kept by such For when self is set up and God denied in stead of the right worshipping of God they are worshipping themselves or suiting God worship to the conceit and will of self Instead of the Reverent use of his name they are setting up their own names and will venture on the grossest abuse of Gods name rather than self shall suffer or be crossed And instead of hallowing the Lords day they devote both that and every day to themselves The sum of the second Table is Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self and this is the meaning of the tenth Commandment which forbiddeth us to covet any thing from him to our selves that is that we set not up self and its interest against our neighbour and his good and be not like a bruised or inflamed part of the body that draweth the blood or humors to it self or like a Wen or other Tumor that is sucking from the body for its own nutrition so that it is but plainly this Be not selfish or drawing or desiring any thing to thy self which is not thy due but belongeth to another but let Love run by even proportions between thy neighbour and thy self in order to God and the publick good And this Commandment brings up the rear that it may summarily comprehend and gather up all other particulars that be not instanced in in the foregoing Commandments Now selfishness being the very sin that is here forbidden I need to say no more to tell you that self is the breaker of this Law Next to this summary concluding Precept the greatest in the second Table if not one of the first is the fifth Commandment which requireth the preservation of Relations and Societies and the duties of those Relations especially of inferiors to superiors for the Honour of God and the Common good And this is set before the rest because the publick good is preferred to the personal good of any and Magistrates and Superiors being Gods Officers and for the Publick good are to be prefered before the subjects But what an enemy selfishness is to this Commandment I intend anon to shew you distinctly and therefore now pass it by And for the following Commandments who ever murdered another but out of some inordinate respect to himself either to remove that other 〈…〉 of his selfish Ends or to be revenged on â—…riving self of profit or honour or somâ—… it would have had or in some way or other â—…in your Own Ends by anothers blood And what is it but the satisfaction of your Own â—â—â—thy lusts that causeth Adultery and all uncleanness And what is it but the furnishing and providing for self that provoketh any man to Rob another And what is it but some selfish End that causeth any man to pervert Justice or slander or bear false witness against his neighbour so that nothing is more plain than that selfishness is all sin and villany against God and man comprized in one word And therefore you need not ask me which Commandment it is that doth forbid it For it is forbidden in every one of the ten Commandments The first condemneth self as it is the Idol set up and Loved trusted and served before God the second condemneth it as the Enemy of his worship and the third condemneth it as the Prophaner of his Name and the fourth as the Prophaner of his Hallowed time The second Table in the tenth Commandment condemneth self as it is the Tumor and gulf that is contrary to the Love of our neighbour and would draw all to it self The fifth Commandment condemneth it as the Enemy of Authority and Society the sixth as the Enemy to our Neighbours life the seventh eighth and ninth condemn it as the enemy to our neighbours chastity Estates and Cause or Name So that if you see any mischief done in Persons Families Towns Countrys Courts Armies or any where in the world you need not send out Hue and Cry to find out and apprehend the actor It is selfishness that is the Author of all If the poor be oppressed by the rich and their lives made almost like the life of a labouring Ox or Horse till the Cry of the oppressed reach to heaven who is it that doth all this but self The Landlords and rich men must Rule and be served by them I warrant you they would not do thus by themselves If the poor be discontented and murmur at their condition and steal from others who is it that is the cause of this but self If another were in poverty they would not murmur nor steal for him It is selfishness
They had rather live a sinful life if they durst and they had rather be excused from Religious duties except that little outward part which custom and their credit engage them to perform They are but like the caged birds that though they may sing in a Sun-shine day had rather be at liberty in the woâ—ds They love not a life of perfect holiness though they are forced to submit to some kind oâ— Religiousness for fear of being damned If they had their freest choice they had rather live in the Love of the creature than in the love of God and in the pleasures of the fleâ—h than in the holy course that pleaseth God The third state is the state of Love and none but this is a state of true Self-denial and of Justification and Salvation When we reach to this we are sincere we have then the Spirit of Adoption disposing us to go to God as to a Father But this Love is not in the same degree in all the sanctified Three degrees of it we may distinctly observe 1. Oft-times in the beginning of a true Conversion though the seed of Love is cast into the soul and the Convert had rather enjoy God than the world and had rather live in perfect holiness than in any sin yet Fear is so active that he scarce observeth the workings of the Love of God within him He is so taken up with the sense of sin and misery that he hath little sense of love to God and perhaps may doubt whether he hath any or none 2. When these Fears begin a little to abate and the soul hath attained somewhat of the sense of Gods Love to it self it Loveth him more observably and hath some leisure to think of the riches of his grace and of his Infinite excellencies and attractive goodness and not only to Love him because he Loveth us and hath been Merciful to us but also because he is Goodness it self and we were made to Love him But yet in this middle degree of Love the soul is much more frequently and sensibly exercised in minding it self than God and in studying its own preservation than the honour an interest of the Lord. In this state it is that Christians are almost all upon the inquiry after marks of Grace in themselves and asking How shall I know that I have this or that grace and that I perform this or that duty in sincerity and that I am reconciled to God and shall be saved Which are needful questions but should not be more insisted on than questions about our duty and the Interest of Christ In this state though a Christian hath the Love of God yet having much of his ancient Fears and Self-love and the Love of God being yet too weak he is much more in studying his Safety than his Duty and asketh oftner How may I be sure that I am a true believer than What is the duty of a true believer There is yet too much of Self in his Religion 3. In the third degree of Love to God the soul is ordinarily and observably carryed quite above it self to God and mindeth more the Will and Interest of God than its own Consolation or Salvation Not that we must at any time lay by the care of our Salvation as if it were a thing that did not belong to us or that we should separate the ordinate Love of our selves from the Love of God or set his Glory and our Salvation in an opposition But the Love of God in this Degree is sensibly predominant and we refer even our own Salvation to his Interest and Will In this Degree a Christian is grown more deeply sensible he is not his own but his that made him and redeemed him and that his principal study must not be for himself but for God and that his own interest is in it self an inconsiderable thing in comparison of the interest of the Lord and that Rewarding us with Consolation is Gods part and loving and serving him is ours assisted by his grace and that the diligent study and practice of our duty and the lively exercise of Love to God is the surest way to our Consolation In our first corrupt estate we are careless of our souls and are taken up with earthly cares In our estate of Preparation we are careful for our souls but meerly from the principle of Self-love In our first Degree of the state of saving grace we have the Love of God in us but it 's little observed by reason of the passionate fears and cares of our own salvation that most take us up In our second degree of holy Love we look more sensibly after God for himself but so that we are yet most sensibly minding the Interest of our own souls and enquiring after assurance of salvation In our third Degree of saving grace we still continue the care of our salvation and an ordinate self-love but we are sensible that the Happiness of Many even of Church and Common-wealth and the Glory of God and the accomplishment of his Will is incomparably more excellent and desirable than our own felicity And therefore we set our selves to please the Lord and study what is acceptable to him and how we may do him all the service that possibly we can being confident that he will look to our felicity while we look to our duty and that we cannot be miserable while we are wholly his and devoted to his service We are now more in the exercise of Grace when before we were more in trying whether we have it Before we were wont to say O that I were sure that I love God in sincerity Now we are more in these desires O that I could know and love him more and serve him better that I knew more of his holy will and could more fully accomplish it and O that I were more serviceable to him and O that I could see the full prosperity of his Church and the glory of his Kingdom This high degree of the Love of God doth cause us to take our selves as Nothing and God as All and as before conversion we were careless of our souls through ignorance presumption or security and after conversion were careful of our souls through the power of convincing awakening grace so now we have somewhat above our souls much more our bodies to mind and care for so that though still we must examine and observe our selves and that for our selves yet more for God than for our selves When we are mindful of God he will not be unmindful of us When it is our care to please him the rest of our care we may cast on him who hath promised to care for us Even when we suffer according to his will we may commit the keeping of our souls to him in well doing as to a faithful Creator 1 Pet. 4. 19 And it is not possible in this more excellent way 1 Cor. 12. 31 to be guilty of a careless neglect of our
to God by sanctification doth with himself devote all that he hath and virtually all that ever he shall have And if he understand himself he will do it actually And hence it is that the Seed of Believers yea of one Believer are said to be Holy Not only or chiefly because they are yours born of your bodies nor meerly from a promise of God that hath no presupposed reason from the subject But because they are the children of one that hath devoted himself and all that he hath to God and if he understand himself doth actually offer devote and dedicate his child to God in the solemn Baptism Ordinance and Covenant And God will sure accept all that upon his own invitation is consecrated and offered to him 5. See that you submit them heartily to the dispose of God So that whatever he do with them for sickness or health for poverty or riches for honour or dishonour for life or death you can patiently bear it and say as Eli It is the Lord let him do as seemeth him good 1 Sam. 3. 18. Murmur not if God afflict and take them away even at once as he did the sons of Job or if he should afflict you in them as he did David in Amnon and Absalom Remember that as the Resignation of Life it self is the point by which Christ under the Gospel doth try mens faith so it was the resignation of an only son which was next to life by which he would try Abraham the Father of the faithful before the Incarnation of Christ If therefore you will be children of Abraham you must walk in the steps of faithful Abraham and remember that your children are not your own and be content that God do with his own as he pleases 6. Make God their portion as much as in you lieth and seek more for a spiritual than temporal felicity for them and acquaint them with their Creator in the days of their youth as believing that those of them that are the Holiest are the Happiest 7. Devote your children to such callings and imployments in which they are likeliest to be most serviceable to God Consider their dispositions and parts and then never ask what kind of life is the most honourable or gainful for them but in what way and course of life they may most serve God and be most useful to his Church And to that let them be devoted 8. Favour them not in sin and suffer them not to dishonour God that they are devoted to Remember Eli's example Gentle reproofs instead of necessary severe correction is called by God A despising him and preferring his sons before him 1 Sam. 2. 29 30. even because his sons made themselves vile and he restrained them not 1 Sam. 3. 13. Take heed as you love your selves or them of taking their parts against God or against correction and excusing the sins by which they do dishonour him 9. Give them not for their carnal advancement in the world that part of your estate which is due to God You owe it all to him and in the disposing of it he hath limited you to begin at home provide so for your children that they may have their daily bread and so much more as they are in likelyhood the fittest stewards to improve for God But if you see the publick state of the Church or Commonweal to stand in need of your assistance and you shall then give almost all to your children to make them rich and great in the world and put off the works of greater moment with some poor inconsiderable alms or Legacy this is to prefer self before the Lord even as it is imagined to survive in your progeny even when natural self can no longer enjoy it It 's a wonder how so many men seeming holy and devoted to God can quiet their consciences in such a palpable sin as this If one of them have two hundred or three hundred pound a year it 's a wonder if he leave an hundred a year of it to any pious or charitable use but if he leave forty or fifty pound to the poor or build some small Almes-house he thinks he hath done well all the rest must go to leave his son in equal dignity and riches in the world as himself But of this I spoke before 10. Lastly be sure that you be very suspicious of self when the case of your children or any dear Relation is before you For self is near you and will stick close and will not easily be thrust out of your Counsels nor â—â—aken off And therefore in your own case and your Childrens case or the case of your near friends you will have much ado to overcome the cunning and strong temptations to Partiality if you were the holiest Saint on earth though overcome them you will in the main if you have true grace But if you are dead professors it 's twenty to one but they will overcome you and you will shew the world that you are selfish hypocrites and more for your Children and Friends than God Let me here give a few instances in this warning 1. How oft have we seen it here and elsewhere that people that make some shew of Religion and are forward to have vice punished and discipline exercised yet when it falls on any children or near relations of their own they are as much against it as they are for it on others yea rise up with passion and bitter reproaches of Officers Ministers or others that are the causes of it As one Hypocrite is tried when he denieth to suffer for Christ himself so others shew themselves Hypocrites sooner by preferring their children yea their sinful children yea the present ease or profit or credit of their children before their duty and the honour of God And they will rather have God provoked sin unpunished and their childrens own salvation hazarded than they will have them justly and regularly chastised yea some of them rise up as malignant enemies against them that do it 2. Again When God hath convinced you of duty if a carnal friend a husband or a parent do but contradict it and perswade you from a known duty or a holy life how commonly do men obey because forsooth they are their friends that do perswade them 3. Moreover When the case falls out that a man cannot follow God and his duty and be true to his soul but he is like to lose his friends how commonly is God denied that friends may not be denied and conscience wounded and duty bawk'd that the favour of friends may not be lost O saith one they are the friends that I live by my livelihood is in their hands I am undone if they cast me off Well! take them and make thy best of them and keep them as long as thou canst if thou canst live better without God than them or canst spare Gods favour better than theirs and they are better friends to thee than Christ is and would be take
state of the world and of the Church through the world doth scarce know how to order his affections or compose his prayers even in those greatest petitions about the honour Kingdom will of God They cannot grieve with the Church in grief nor mourn with it when it mourns so that it is a great duty of a Christian to labour to understand by History the former and present state of the Church And it is a great mark of a gracious soul that longs to hear of the prosperity of the Saints and free progress of the Gospel and a mark of a graceless person that careth not for these things But when History is not used to acquaint us with the matters of God or to surnish us with useful knowledge but to please a ranging carnal mind then it is but sinful sensuality or vanity Many persons have no such delight to read the useful History of Church-affairs as they have to read the curiously penned though less useful History of other matters Though I know that the History of the whole world is very serviceable to the knowledge of Divine things yet they that use it to holy ends will make choice accordingly and be no more in it than may suit with those ends It is the most humane with the most light ridiculous passages that are most pleasing to vain unsanctified wits but the godly delight in it so far as it shews them something of God and leadeth them to him In the very reading of Scripture a carnal reader may be much pleased with the History that hath no savour in the Doctrine but is weary to read it and yet I must add this caution by the way If we find a carnal kind of delight in Scripture-history or any other that is profitable we must not therefore cast off the History but seek after the cure of our disease that we may spiritually take pleasure in all for God and he may be the beginning end the life the All of our studies and delights And though our carnal delight in News and History be a sin in us yet God doth sometime make it an occasion of Good by leading us to that holy truth which after may be the means of our sanctification though at first we received it but as a Novelty And so the carnal pleasure that many have in hearing News and sitting with folks that will talk of other mens matters or things that concern them not is nothing but a sinful pleasing of the fancy and loss of time and neglect of greater matters which call for all our time and care It was the voice of the Athenians Act. 17. 21. for all the Athenians and strangers that were there spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing yea novelty of Doctrine and Religion and Teachers is a snare and bait to carnal fancies which many are taken by that are forsaken of God having first forsaken him and proved false to the truth received CHAP. XXXII Unnecessary Knowledge and Deligh therein 15. ANother part of Carnal Pleasure which self must be denied in is A desire after unnecessary Knowledge and Delight therein This is the common sin of man but not of all alike Even they that can live without the Knowledge of the saving Principles of Religion do yet itch to know unprofitable things and many a foolish question they will be asking about matters unrevealed or that concern them not when they overlook that which their salvation lieth on but the learneder sort and especially more prying wits and those that are bred up among disputes are the pronest to this sin and though it be an odious vice yet it so befooleth many that they reckon it confidently among their vertues God cannot be known too much nor can any man be too much in love with the true knowledge of God in Jesus Christ without this knowledge the mind is not good nor can the heart be sanctified or the man be saved Nor can any man know too much of the will and word of God nor yet of his works in which he revealeth himself to the world But the Carnal knowledge which is to be denied is of another nature than the sanctified knowledge of believers I shall shew you the difference in certain particular respects 1. This desire to know which is in the unsanctified is partly from meer nature and partly from a distempered fantasie which is like a crorupt enraged appetite that chooseth that which is unwholsom and yet is over-greedy after it But the desire after knowledge in the sanctified is kindled by the love of God and the love of those holy and heavenly things which they are inquiring after It is not the Love of God that sets ungodly men upon their studies but a common and carnal desire to know and this appears in the end which is next 2. This carnal knowledge is but to feed and furnish and please a carnal fancy because it is some adding to our understandings and because it is naturally pleasant to know and because it brings in some novelty and variety and because it makes us seem wiser than other men and furnisheth us with matter of discourse and ostentation and rids the mind of some troublesom doubts therefore even the worst have a mind to know But this is the knowledge that must be denied that which must be valued and sought after is To know God that we may love and reverence and trust and admire and honour him and enjoy him To know Christ that we may have more Communion with him To know the word and works of God that in them we may know his nature and his will and knowing his will may serve him and please him These must be the ends of Christian knowledge There is nothing in the world that God hath revealed but in its place we may be willing to know so that we stick not in the creature or sense of the words or common verities but use every thing as a book or looking-glass we love not a book so much for the letters as for the matter which they contain we love not a Glass for it self so much as for its use to shew us the face which we would see in it so if we go to the creatures but as a book in which we may read the mind of God and see his nature and as a glass in which his glory doth shine forth our study and knowledge will be sanctified and divine And thus as Paul would know nothing but Christ Crucified so every Christian should be able to say that he would know nothing but God in Christ for though we know a thousand matters and that of the lowest nature in themselves yet as long as we study them not for themselves but for God it is not them that we know so much as God in them and so all is but the knowing of God even as in our duty though the works may be many and
and have you sought first to get in a fitter man what can they for shame say to it If they say No they proclaim themselves notorious self-seekers For it 's very seldom that an humble man is allowed to judge himself the fittest 4. And he that seeketh Dignities for God and not for himself will use them for God and not for himself For the Intention will command the use He will deny himself in his superiority as well as if he were in the lowest place and will contrive how he may most serve and honour God and this will be easily seen in his endeavours whether it be God or self that he serves and liveth to And now I advise all that love their souls to take heed of this aspiring act of selfishness If you will needs seek your selves and be your own Exalters you must trust to your selves and be your own defenders And then you will find that the lowest condition in the hand of God is more safe and comfortable than the highest in your own hand If God should lift you up to the top of the highest mountains you may expect either a calm or his protection in the storm and to be as safe as those below but if you lift up your selves and Satan carry you to the pinacle of the Temple take heed lest you thence cast down your selves by his temptations that did lift you up Dignities and Honours are not indeed the things that they seem to be to carnal eyes that see not the inside but judge by the outward glittering shew There is most holy Duty and work to be done where is the greatest dignity And certainly the life of greatest work labour is not the life of greatest ease or carnal pleasure especially when it is the work of God that you must do a work which all the world is against and which Satan and all his power will resist and which must meet with enmity and abundance of enmity when ever you set about it Though you are Commanders yet you are Souldiers and you that are Leaders have the hottest standing and must expect the sharpest conflicts Do you think of your Dignities and Offices as places of meer superiority and honour and accommodation to your carnal selves then are you Carnal men and enter upon you know not what and make your selves Traitors and Enemies to God whom he is engaged to bring down and be avenged on at last you debase the sacred coin which bears the stamp and name of God Magistracy is holy and the Image of God and you basely turn it into the Image of the flesh and blot out Gods name from it and stamp upon it the name of self and traiterously make it your own which was eminently his Believe it whoever you are if you seek for places of Rule and Dignity with carnal selfish expectations you must either use them accordingly when you have them which is the readiest way to damnation in the world or else you must find your expectations crost and mifs of all your carnal Ends and find that the greatest toil and burden which you expected should have been your chief content God hath annexed the Honour and outward greatness partly to encourage you to so hard a work lest the burden should be too heavy and partly to enable you to perform it and give you some advantages against opposition But though the cloathing of Authority and Rule be splendid the substance thus covered is extraordinary Labour and duty and suffering It is Honourable but it 's an honourable burden and an honourable painful difficult work So that if men understood what Office and Authority is in Church or Common-wealth and look'd after the substance as well as the ornaments the work as well as the Honour and Greatness it would be an eminent piece of self-denial for a man to submit to the call of God to be a Prince a Judge a Justice or but a Constable and men would as hardly be drawn to take the Office as they are now to do the work of the Office in faithfulness and with courage and zeal for God and that is almost as hard as an offendor is drawn to the stocks Offices and high places are not intended to accommodate the flesh nor are they things to be ambitiously desired and sought for by such as understand the Ends and use of them but they are such laborious hazardous ways of serving God which a wise man knows must cost him more than the honour will repay and which a Good man will not run away from when God calleth him thereto but will so far Deny himself as to submit to them but not thrust himself into them as the Proud and selfish do It is a work of Patience to a Godly man to be thus exalted but it is a work of Pride and self-seeking in others Deny your selves so far as to submit to Government dignity bear it patiently if it be cast upon you as being an excellent opportunity of serving God But wiâ—â— not for it because of the Honour and advantages to the flesh much less contend for it or set your hearts on it He that seeketh an Office or Honour for himself must have another heart before he will use it for God It 's better with Saul to hide our selves from honour than with Absalom to contrive and seek it but best of all with David to stay till God call us and then obey CHAP. XLII The Love and good Word of others denied 2. ANother part of selfish Interest to be Denied is the Love and good Will and Word of others This is a thing that may and must be desired to good ends but not for carnal self When Paul look'd at Gods honour and the good of souls he became all things to all men that he might by all means save some and this he did not for self but for the Gospels sake and yet for himself in subordination to God that he might be partaker of it with them He would give no offence to Jew or Gentile or the Church of God but pleased all men in all things that tended to their good not seeking his own profit but the profit of many that they may be saved 1 Cor. 10. 32 33. And he hath left it as the duty of the strongest Christians not to please themselves but every one to please his neighbour for his good to edification But when Paul look'd at himself and his esteem among men then he saith With me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you or of mans judgment 1 Cor. 4. 3. And Gal. 1. 10. Do I seek to please men For if I yet pleased men I should not be the Servant of Christ Good natures are loth to provoke others to displeasure and Grace moveth us to Please men for the saving of their souls But it 's Pride and Self-seeking to desire to set up our selves in mens esteem and to endear our selves for our selves into their
turn them into mortal sins If Princes rule fight for themselves I have told you already what they do but if this were done for God it would have another form and another reward as it had another End What a doleful case is it that such excellent works as alms-deeds and acts of bounty to Church or poor or Commonwealth in buildings lands or any the like works should be all turned into sin and death by such a selfish vain-glorious intent And that their souls should be suffering for those works that others receive much good by What a sad case is it that Historians Lawyers Physicians Philosophers Linguists and the Professors of all the Sciences should undo themselves for ever by those excellent works that edifie the world Nay what can be more lamentable to think of than that able and learned Divines themselves should lose their own souls in the studying and preaching those precious truths that are saving unto others and that such excellent writings as remain a standing blessing to the Church should be the Authors of mortal sin And yet so it is if the renown and immortality of a name on Earth be the End that all this work is done for 12. Lastly Consider that if Honour be good for you it is better attained by minding your duty for the Honour of God and denying your own Honour than by seeking it For Honour is the shadow that will follow you if you fly from it and fly from you if you follow it What Christ here saith of Life is true of Honor He that seeketh and saveth it shall lose it and he that loseth it for Christ shall find it The greatest Honour is to deny our selves and our own honour and to do most for the Honour of God and to be contented to be nothing that God may be all For you have his promise that them that honour him he will honour but they that despise him shall be lightly esteemed THough I have endeavoured by a right limitation and exposition of the foregoing parts of self-denial to prevent mistakes and give you those grounds by which objections may be answered yet the stir that is made in the world about this point by Papists and many other mistaking Sects doth perswade me to give a more distinct Resolution of some of the principal doubts that are before us and therein to shew you that self-denial consisteth not in all things that by some are pretended to be parts of it but that there is a great deal of sin that goes under the name of self-denial among many of these sorts of mistaken persons CHAP. LI. Q. Whether Self-denial lie in renouncing Propriety Quest 1. WHether doth self-denial require us to renounce Propriety and to know nothing as our own as the Monks among the Papists swear to do as part of their state of perfection a book called The way to the Sabbath of Rest dothteach us Answ 1. That there should be no Propriety in goods or estate among men is contrary to the will of God who hath made men his Stewards and trusted several persons with several talents and forbidden stealing and commanded men to labour that they may have to give to him that needeth and he that hath this worlds goods and seeth his brother have need must not shut up the bowels of his compassion It is a standing duty to give to the poor and we shall therefore have the poor always with us for this exercise of our Charity And he that hath nothing can give nothing nor use it for God Why did Paul require them to give to the distressed Saints and maintain the Ministry and gather for such uses every first day of the week if he would have men have nothing to give This therefore is a conceit that needs nothing but Reason and the reading and belief of Scripture to confute it 2. But as no man is a Proprietary or hath any thing of his Own in the strict and Absolute sense because all is Gods and we are but Stewards so no man may retain his humane analogical propriety when God calleth him to give it up No man may retain any thing from Gods Use and service which he hath a propriety in We have so much Propriety as that no man must rob us and so much as our works of charity are rewardable though it be but giving a cup of cold water which could not be without propriety for who will reward him that gives that which is none of his own yea it is made the matter of the last judgement I was hungry and ye fed me I was naked and ye cloathed me c. Which they could not have done if they had not had food and cloathing to bestow So that the denial of propriety would destroy all exercise of charity in such kinds and destroy all Societies and orderly converse and industry in the world But yet when God calls for any thing from us we must presently obey and quit all title to it and resign it freely and gladly to his will And 3. There must be so much vigour of charity and sense of our neighbours wants as that no man must shut up the bowels of compassion but as we must love our neighbours as our selves so must we relieve them as a second self yea and before our selves if Gods service or honour should require it If we must lay down our lives for the brethren much more our estates So that Levelling Community is abominable but Charitable Community is a Christian duty and the great Character of sincere Love to Christ in his members And therefore in the Primitive Church there was no forbidding of Propriety but there was 1. A resignation of all to God to signifie that they were contented to forsake all for him and did prefer Christ and the Kingdom of God before all and 2. There was so great vigor of true Charity as that all men voluntarily supplied the wants of the Church and poor and voluntarily made all things as common that is Common by voluntary Communication for use though not common in primary title And so no man took any thing as his Own when God and his Churches and his Brethrens wants did call for it O that we had more of that Christian Love that should cause a Charitable Community which is the true Mean between the Monkish Community and the selfish tenacious Propriety Levelling hath not destroyed one soul for ten thousand that an inordinate love of Propriety hath destroyed CHAP. LII Q. Whether it lie in renouncing Marriage Quest 2. WHether Self-denial consists in the forswearing or renouncing of Marriage or the natural use of it by those that are marryed Answ. To forbid Marriage simply is called by the holy Ghost a Doctrine of Devils 1 Tim. 4. 1 3 and was one of the Heresies that the Apostles were called out to encounter in their own days But yet a Married state doth ordinarily not always call men off from that free attendance on the
in his Leviathan But they do not reverence that beam of Divinity which God hath communicated to them in their Authority nor love their Governors as the Fathers of the Church and Common-wealth for the common good and the honour of God which they are appointed to promote 5. And this selfishness is the deadly enemy of all right Administrations of Justice and the due exercise of Authority in Church or Commonwealth If a Minister be selfish he will be shifting off the troublesome part of his duty and will over-rule his understanding to believe that it is no duty because dis-believing is easier than obeying He will be forward in those duties that are necessary to his maintenance and applause and are imposed on him by the Laws of men but out of the Pulpit it 's little that he will do As if it were the Pulpit only that were Gods Vineyard where he is set to labour Flesh and blood shall be consulted and men shall be pleased and all that the interest of self may be maintained And if the People be selfish they will rebel against their faithfullest Guides and kick against their Doctrine and reproofs and fly from Discipline which seems to their distempered minds to be against them Let but one most notorious lamentable instance suffice The greater part of our Parishioners in most places of the Land are lamentably ignorant and careless in the matters of their Salvation and all that we can do is too little to bring them to understand the matters of absolute Necessity and yet almost all of them are so much wiser in their own conceits than the ablest of their Teachers that if we do not humor them and be not Ruled by them in our Doctrine and Administrations about Sacraments Prayers Burial and the rest yea if we obey them not in gestures and forms they turn their backs upon Officers and Ordinances and the Church it self and pour out their reproach upon their Teachers as if we were ignorant in comparison of them even of them that know not so much as children of seven or eight year old should know See here the wonderful bewitched power of a selfish disposition And in matters of the Commonwealth what is it more than this nay what is it besides this that maketh Princes become Tyrants and Rulers keep under the Ordinances and interest of Christ or fearfully neglect them and look after the Church in the last place when they have no business of their own to call them off and to begin to build Gods House when they have first built their own not imitating Nehemiah's labourers that had the sword in one hand and the Trewel in the other and builded in their arms what else makes them give God but their leavings who giveth them all And what else could make them such enemies to Truth as to side with those parties what ever they be that side most with them and promote their interest And alas what work doth selfishness make with inferior Magistrates It is this only that opens the hand to a Reward and the ear to the solicitations of their friends and it s this that perverteth the judgement and this that oppresseth the poor and innocent and this that â—yeth the tongues and hands of Justices so that abundance of them do little more than possess the room and stand like an armed statue or a sign-post which hurteth none Alehouses do what their list for them and drunkards and swearers are bold at their noses and they are no terror to evil doers nor revengers to execute wrath upon them nor Ministers that use their power for much good but bear the Sword almost in vain contrary to the very nature of their Office Rom. 13. 1 2 3 4. And it is selfishness in the people that causeth the trouble of faithful Magistrates Every man would do what his list The worst offendor abhors him that would punish him And those that will commend Justice and cry down vice in the general yet when they fall under Justice themselves they take all that they suffer to be injury and will do all that they can against Justice and the Officers of it when it is to defend themselves or theirs from the execution of it so rare a thing is it to meet with a man that is a friend to Laws and Justice when themselves must suffer by it 6. Selfishness also makes men withdraw from all those necessary burdens and duties that are for the preservation of Church or Commonwealth Such wretches had rather the Gospel were thrust out of doors than it should cost them much and had rather have the unworthiest man that would be their Teacher for a little than allow the best that maintenance that the Gospel doth command or give them what the Law hath made their Own They would venture the ruine of Church and State and let all fall into the hands of the common enemies rather than hazard their persons or lay out their estates for the common preservation So that if the hand of violence did not sometimes squeeze those Spunges and force these leeches to disgorge themselves they would but impoverish the Common-wealth by their Riches and weaken the body like wens or impostumes by drawing to themselves 7. And then the selfish are such causes of Division that if they did no other harm they would break both Church and State into pieces if their humor were predominant and not restrained or purged out And in this regard selfishness is the direct enemy of Societies and is always at work to dissolve them into Independant individuals A Society is a Political Body which must have but one Head and one Interest and one End But when selfishness prevaileth there are as many Heads and Ends and Interests as Persons If they be in a Church every one is the Teacher and Ruler and every one must have his opinion countenanced and his humor satisfied Every one must have his way and will And how is this possible when their minds are so various and contrary to one another and their Interests so inconsistent and there are as many Rulers as persons when every man is drawing to himself and there is no center in which they can unite what work is there like to be in the Church What progress could be made in the building of Babel when no man was ruled by another but every man ran confusedly after his single imagination what an Army will it be and how are they like to speed in fight where every Souldier is instead of a Captain and General to himself and one runs this way and another that way and one will have one course taken and another another course and every one fighteth on his own head such work doth selfishness make in the Church It is this that hath broken it into so many parcels and would crumble it all to dust if it should prevail And it is this also that causeth the Divisions of the Commonwealth Faction rising up against Faction
kept safe and sound and man had not been lost nor his estate thus shattered and overthrown And therefore the returning self-denying convert is brought to an utter distrust of himself and resolved hereafter to trust himself upon nothing below All-sufficiency and Infinite Love He is so offended with himself for his former self-destruction and for undoing himself so foolishly that he calls himself to account and into judgement for it and condemneth himself as a Traytor to God and a Murderer of himself and will no more be in the hands of so treacherous a delinquent But as the eyes of a servant are on the hand of his Master so are his eyes on God for all supplies And this is the part of the work of the spirit of Adoption who teacheth us to cry Abba Father and as Children not to be very careful for our selves but to run to our Father in all our wants and tell him what we stand in need of and beg relief and to be careful for nothing but in every thing by prayer with supplication and thanksgiving to make knownour requests to God Phil. 4. 6. And this acquiescence of the soul in the love of God is it that keepeth our hearts and minds in that Peace of God which passeth understanding vers 7. so that the more self-denyal the less is a man dependant on himself or troubled with the cares of his own preservation and the more doth he cast himself on God and is careful to please him that is his true Preserver and then quietech and resteth his mind in his All-sufficiency and infinite wisdom and love and so is a meer dependant upon God 7. Moreover It is the Prerogative of God as absolute Owner of us to be the sole Disposer of man and of all the other Creatures and to choose them their condition and give them their several Talents and determine of the events of all their affairs as pleaseth himself And innocent man was contented with this order and well pleased that God should be the absolute Disposer of him and all But when man turned from God to self he presently desired to be the Disposer of himself and not of himself only but of all the Creatures within his reach How fain would selfish corrupted man be the chooser of his own condition His will is against the will of God and he usually disliketh Gods disposal If he had the matter in his own hands almost nothing should be as it is but so cross would they be to God that all thing would be turned upside down If it were at their will there 's scarce a poor man but would be Rich and scarce a Rich man but would be richer The Servant would be master The Tenant would be a Landlord The Husbandman and Tradesman would be a Gentleman the Labourer would live an easier life His house should be better his cloathing should be better his fare should be better his Provision should be greater his credit or honour with men should be more the Gentleman would be a Knight and the Knight a Lord and the Lord would be a King and the King would be more Absolute and have a larger Dominion Nay every man would be a King and learn the doctrine of the Jews and many of this age among us to expect that the world should be ruled by them and they should reign as Lords and Princes in the earth If it were with selfish men as they would have it there 's scarce a man that would be what he is nor dwell where he doth nor live at the rates that now he liveth at The weak would be always strong and the sick would be well and always well and the old would be young again and never taste the infirmities of age and if they might live as long as they would I think there 's few of the unsanctified that would ever die nor look after Heaven as long as they could live on earth O what a brave life should I have thinks the selfish unsanctified wretch if I were but wholly at my own Disposal and might be what I would be and have what I would have What would men give for such a life as this Had they but their own wills they would think themselves the happiest men on earth that is if they could be delivered from the will of God and be from under his disposal and get the reins into their own hands Nay this is not all but the selfish person would be the disposer of all the world within his reach as well as of himself He would have Kingdoms at his dispose and all things carried according to his Will He would have all his neighbours have a dependance upon him Very bountiful he would be if he were the Lord of all For he would be the great Benefactor of the world and have all men beholden to him and depend upon him If he see things that little concern him he hath a will of his own that would fain have the Disposal of them If he hear of the affairs of other Nations some will he hath of his own which he would have fulfilled in them at least so far as any of his own interest may be involved in the business But when Sanctification hath brought men to self-denyal then they discern and lament this folly They see what silly giddy worms they are to be Disposers of themselves or of the world They see that they have neither wisdom nor goodness nor power sufficient for so great a work They then perceive that it were better make an Ideot the Pilot of a Ship or an Infant to be their Physitian when they are sick or the Disposer of their estates than to commit themselves and the world to their dispose They see how foolishly they have endeavoured or desired to rob God of his prerogative And therefore they return from themselves to him and give up all by free consent to his sole Disposal that so he may do with his own as he list He finds that he hath work enough to do of his own and is become too unfit for that and therefore he dare no more undertake the work of God for which he is infinitely unfit He finds that the more he hath his own will the worse it goes with him and therefore he will give up himself to God and stand to his will If he feels that Providence doth cross his flesh and that he hath Poverty when the flesh would have riches and slame when that carnal self would have honour and labour when the flesh would have ease and sickness when the flesh would have health he would not for all that have the work taken out of the hand of God but truly saith Not my will but thine be done and believeth that Gods disposal is the best and that his Father knows well enough what he doth And if it were put to his choice whether God or he should be the Disposer of his estate and honour and Life he had rather it
were in Gods hands than his own and would not undertake the charge if it were offered him Alas thinks he I am almost below a man and am I fit to make a God of I come off so lamely in the duty of a Creature as deserves damnation and am I fit to arrogate the work of the Creator 8. Moreover it is the high Prerogative of God to be the Soveraign Ruler of the world to make Laws for them which must be obeyed and to reward the obedient and punish the disobedient God is King of all the earth even King of Kings and Lord of Lords and all shall obey him or be judged by him for their disobedience But sin turned man into a Rebel against Heaven and a Traitor to his Maker so that now the selfish unsanctified man disliketh Gods Government at least in the particulars and would Govern himself The Law of God contained in his Word and Works he murmurs at as too obscure or too precise and strict for him He finds that it crosseth his Carnal interest and speaks not good of him but evil and therefore he is against it as supposing it to be against him and his pleasure profit and honour in the world If men had but the Government of themselves what a difference would there be between their way and Gods If corrupt unsanctified selfish man might make a Law for himself in stead of the Word of God what a Law would it be and how much of the Law of God should be repealed If sinners might make a Scripture you should find in it no such passages as these Except a man be Converted or born again he cannot enter into the Kingdom of heaven without Holiness none shall see God If self might make Laws you should not read in them If ye live after the flesh ye shall die but if by the Spirit ye mortifie the deeds of the body ye shall live Nor should you there find that the Gate is strait and the way is narrow that leads to life and few there be that find it or that the righteous are scarcely saved As all the Scripture is now for Holiness and against Prophaneness Ungodliness and Sensuality if self had the framing of it it should all be changed and it should at least speak peace to fleshly-minded men All those true and dreadful passages that speak fire and brimstone against the unsanctified and threatned everlasting torments should be razed out and you shall find no talk of damnation in the Scripture for such as they no talk of the worm that never dyeth or the fire that is never quenched or of Depart from me all ye workers of iniquity I know you not or that the way of the ungodly shall perish or that God doth laugh at them because he seeth that their day is coming Abundance of the Bible would be wiped out if Carnal self had but the altering of it Nay it would be quite made new and made a contrary thing the Articles of our Creed would be changed the Petitions of our Rule for Prayer would be most altered every one of the ten Commandments would be altered as I shall after shew Idolatry should be no sin but the principal Law for self would be set up as the Idol of the world will-worship would be no sin men would he held guiltless that take the name of God in vain The Lords day should be a day of mirth and carnal pleasure every Subject would be the Soveraign and every Inferiour the Superior Revenge would be made lawful for themselves though not for others Fornication and Adultery would be no mortal sin Stealing would be made tolerable to themselves it should be lawful to them to do any wrong to the name and reputation of another in a word every man would do what he list and his will should be his Law and himself should be his own Judge a gentle tender Judge no doubt Thus would self Rule But sanctification brings men to Deny this self and to lay down the Arms of Rebellion against God and to see how unfit we are to Rule our selves that we are too foolish and sinful and partial to make Laws and too partial also and tender to execute them and that as we were made to obey so obey we must and come again into our ranks and willingly subject our selves to the Soveraign of the world Self denyal teacheth a man to have his own Carnal wisdom and reasonings that rise up against the Laws of God and to Love them the worse because they are thus his own and to love the Laws of God the better because they are God's and because they are against his Carnal self The stamps of God on them doth make them currant with him when if they had but the private stamps of self he would disown them as counterfeit or treasonable He hath indeed a flesh that is restrained by Gods Laws and striveth against them but he thinks never the worse of the Law for that but approveth and liketh it in the inner man and if he might have his choice he would not blot out one Commandment nor one Direction nor one Article of Faith nor a tittle of the Law because that self is not the Chooser in him but he hath learned to submit to the will and wisdom of the Lord. And though he love himself and have a nature that is unwilling of suffering and feareth the displeasure of God and the threatnings of his holy Law yet doth he unfeignedly justifie the Law and acknowledge it to be holy and just and good and would not have the very threatnings of it to be repealed and blotted out if he had his choice for he knows that the Determinations of God are the best and that none but he is fit to govern and therefore he desires that he himself may be taught better to obey and not that he may rule and wisheth that he were more conformed to the Law and not that the Law were conformed to him and fain he would have his own will brought up to Gods but wisheth not Gods will to be crookened and brought down to his As far as men have self-denyal this is so 9. Moreover as it is Gods Prerogative to be the Soveraign Ruler of our selves so also of all others as well as us But when sin had set up self man would not only Rule himself but would rule all others An eager desire there is in the unsanctified selfish heart that he might be Ruler of Town and Country and all might be brought to do his will And hence it is that there is such resisting and grudging at good Governors and that men are so ambitious and fain would be highest because they would have their own wills fulfilled by all and therefore would have power to force men to it Hence it is that there is such a stir in the world for Crowns and Kingdoms and few men have ever been heard of that have refused a Scepter when it was offered