and absolute Belief both in his words and in his works both in his Counsels and his Commands both in his Promises and his Threats For He who Thus is believing is ipso facto and eo ipso at once an Obedient and Loving Christian. A Christian so loving that the longer he lives the more he lives the Life of Faith the more he is weaned and sequestred from the things here below the more he is wedded and betrothed unto those things that are above His Affections are taken off from the beggarly Elements of the World and fix't entirely upon God as his soveraign Good I mean they are set upon God in Christ reconciling the World unto Himself And overcome The world he does as St. Iohn must needs mean by overcoming its Temptations its Pomps and Vanities its Smiles and Flatteries nor only the Pleasures but Terrors of it He overcometh That world which St. Iohn has comprized under three general Heads to wit the lust of the Flesh the lust of the Eye and the pride of Life For a sincere Faith in Christ in his Death and Resurrection and in the Consequences of Both gives us a much greater Byass a stronger Bent and Inclination to all good Things than the whole World can to the contrary by all its flatteries or its frights It possesseth us immediately with Inward Ioy in the Holy Ghost and praepossesseth us with an Antepast of The Glory to be reveal'd It praesentiates unto us such Joys to come as do exceedingly over-weigh the frowns and favours of the world It is expressed by St. Iohn in the place before-cited not only as the means whereby we grow Victors But as the Victory it self This saith he is The Victory which overcometh the world even our Faith As if it were not only the Instrument but Essence of it § 10. It follows then that we must distinguish with exceeding great Care and every minute of our Lives between two things which do extremely much differ like Heaven and Hell and yet are commonly confounded to admiration I say we must carefully distinguish not only between an Idle and an Operative Faith a Faith which works and a Faith which works not But withal between a working and working Faith between a Faith which only works by the Love of a man's self and a Faith which duly works by the Love of others For when the Son of Man shall come with his holy Angels in flaming Fire taking Vengeance of them that know not God and obey not the Gospel of Iesus Christ He will find enough idle unactive Faith which either works not at all or not at all by Love or else by none but Self-love which is the worst and greatest Evil that can possibly come to pass in the last and worst Times St. Paul sets it down in his long Catalogue of Impieties which shall be in the last Days as The Ring-leader and Head of All the Villanies which ensue as the first and greatest Link of that Chain of Darkness which draws the other Links after it and reacheth as far as from Hence to Hell In the last days says he to Timothy perilous Times shall come For men shall be Lovers of their own selves and in consequence of That All the Devilish Things that follow from the First Verse unto the Ninth of that Third Chapter of the Second Epistle to Timothy A Chain of Darkness almost as long as That the Devils themselves are held in and reserved saith St. Iude until the Iudgment of the Great Day Nor is it my opinion only But that of Estius Simplicius and Strigelius that the Sin of Self-love is set down First in The Black List as The Head-spring and Fountain of all the Rest. For I think I may challenge any man living without immodesty to Name any one Actual and Damning Sin which has not the Sin of Self-love for its most execrable Original It was meerly Self-love which turned Luciser into a Devil and made the Son of the Morning The Prince of Darkness It was the Sin of Self-love which turned those Protoplasts Adam and Eve out of their Innocence and by consequence out of their Paradise which they held and possessed by That one Tenure It was at first the Love of Self and of Self-preservation which moved Peter to renounce and abjure his Master And it was first a Self-love which produced in Iudas a love of Mony wherewith he was tempted to betray and to slay his Master Thence it was that Self-denial or Self-abnegation was the very first Lesson our Saviour taught his first Disciples And 't is the first we are to learn in the School of our Master Iesus Christ. It being the Causa-sine-qua-non of all other Duties in a Christian. For whosoever has once attain'd a good Degree of Self-denial or of Self-hatred for Sins committed can fast from eating when he is hungry and even from drinking when he is dry from stealing when he is Poor and from coveting when he is Rich from repining when he is low and from oppressing when he is lofty and so from every thing else which either is sinful in it self or so much as a Temptation inducing to it How did St. Peter when he repented revenge himself upon himself for his having so basely out of Self-love not only disown'd but forsworn his Lord He did not only deny Himself in opposition to his Denial of Jesus Christ But abhorr'd himself too in opposition to his Self-love which betray'd him to it How triumphant was his Faith and his Self-denial how triumphant over Himself and his former Cowardize how did he preach up Christ Crucified for which he was Crucified with his Head downwards and in All he did or suffer'd how did he bear down all before him not only all the World but the Flesh and the Devil too as mighty Cataracts and Torrents do sticks and straws So did Peter as well as Paul courageously sight the good sight of Faith Such in Him was That Faith which overcometh the World And when the Son of Man cometh to be the Judge of Quick and Dead Lord how much or rather how little shall he find of such fighting and conquering Faith upon the Earth § 11. This is infinitely far from That Carnal Faith which only works by Self-love All the Degrees of Disobedience to Christ's Commands No The Faith which He shall find in comparatively None that is to say in very few at his second Coming is such a Faith as strongly works by a Love of others which is said with great reason to be The fulfilling of the Law in Both the Tables of The Decalogue which our Blessed Lord came to fulfil and perfect not to abrogate or to destroy because 't is hard if not impossible for us to name any one Duty incumbent on us as Men or Christians which is not the Necessary Production of such a Love as Faith works by For as immoderate Self-love which consists with an human and worthless Faith is the Root
World and the Glory of them And thereupon made him this glorious Offer All these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me Or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If falling down Thou wilt worship me § 4. Which words do present us with Satan's Masterpiece And the Motto on his Ensign is Now or Never For as the Roman Triarij when their two first Squadrons had fought in vain were depended upon at last as their only Refuge So when the Devil had been improsperous in his two first Onsets upon our Saviour He comes at last to make use of All the Kingdoms of the Earth and the Glory of them clearly looking upon This as his most formidable Reserve And even against the Fortifications not only of the Innocence but the Divinity of our Lord who was no less the Lord of Armies than Prince of Peace his most ingenious most powerful most hopeful Stratagem The Text at first view affords no more than two Generals To wit the Devil 's vast Offer And the unreasonable Condition with which 't is clogg'd But out of these Generals put together we may by the help of a little Logick draw four Particulars Each of which will be a Doctrin whereof it will be easy to make good Use. 1. The First particular Doctrin is That the Kingdoms of the Earth and the Glory of them being all met together as here they are do amount to nothing more than so many glittering Temptations 2. The Second is That all the Goods of this World however lovely they may appear to Carnal Reason or Common Sense are yet by God's Patience and wise Permission in the Devil's Proffer and Disposal I say They are so by God's Permission because the Devil can give nothing till God gives leave which for wise and just Ends it often pleaseth him to afford 3. The Third Doctrin is That the utmost Scope and Drift of all the Donatives of the Tempter is to steal our Hearts from God and to turn them wholly upon Himself He never Proffers but with a dangerous Proviso He does it liberally indeed All these things will I give thee But with a covetous Supposition if falling down thou wilt worship me 4. From whence it follows in the fourth Place That how incessantly soever some men do labour whereby to purchase these Gifts of Satan yet there is nothing in the World with greater easiness to be compass'd if the Devil may be try'd by his own Confession Who though the things here spoken of are great and goodly even the Kingdoms of the Earth and the Glory of them is yet most ready to part with All in exchange for an Act of our Adoration To attain the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The All that our Tempter can give or offer nothing more needs be done than to fall down to him and worship him § 1. To prove the First of these Four That the Kingdoms of the Earth when they are All put together make but a glittering Temptation or handsom Snare we need not argue or dispute from a fitter Topick than the very signal Method the Devil here useth Who when he could not corrupt our Saviour by all the Miseries of Want did now at last attempt to do it by the bountiful Overtures of Plenty Nor can we think he was so silly as not to rise in his Temptations from the less unto the greater It being for nothing but his Subtilty in conjunction with his Malice that He is call'd The Old Serpent And is said by St. Iohn to have deceiv'd the whole World And if the Children of this World are wiser in their kind as our Saviour says they are than the Children of Light How much more is their Father who for the Power of his working and Success of his Policy is called sometimes The Prince and once The God of this World Nor is it certainly for Nothing that The Devil has in Scripture such glorious Titles For if we consider the world of men who are divided in their Affections 'twixt Christ and Satan we shall find by their Actions the best Interpreters of their Hearts that the Territories of Satan are much the greater Our Saviour tells us of a Broad way which leadeth to Destruction and many there be that go in thereat whereas in comparison the way to Life is but Narrow and They that go thither he saith are few And therefore Those unclean Spirits which are expressed by St. Paul to be the Spirits now working in the Children of Disobedience are but little after call'd by the same Apostle The Principalities and the Powers and which is more 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Rulers of this World § 2. That thus it is the Scripture tells us But some may wonder that thus it should be What may therefore be the reason why so few should fight manfully under the Banner of our Saviour who therefore said truly His Kingdom is not of this World And so many under Satan's who thence is said to be the Ruler and the God of this world It cannot be because God is more unwilling to be obey'd and belov'd by his People than Satan is Nor can it be because God did make it necessary for Satan to have a greater success in the World than Christ. Nor can it be because God is more delighted in the Damnation than the Salvation of his Creatures He would not fo gratifie the Prince of Darkness nor could his Mercy have been then over all his Works Nor can it be because Satan is of more strength than the Almighty or more powerful to corrupt than God to purifie For could it consist with God's oeconomy to work on our Wills by That Omnipotence by which the Wind and the Fire and the Sea obey him we should not be in a capacity to break his Praecepts we should act only as natural spontaneous Agents and do our Duties as the Stones do in tending downwards Whereas having made us an other Thing to wit a rational sort of Creatures and that in viâ not yet arriv'd at our Journeys end but in a Tendency from Earth either to Heaven or to Hell not indefectibly good like the Spirits in Heaven nor consummately evil like those in Hell but as it were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Skirts or the Confines betwixt them Both to wit inclinable to evil and also capable of good does therefore work upon our Wills in a congruous manner in such a manner as is agreeable with the nature we are of and with the condition we are in Does not press us by any force to list our selves in his Army But freely leaves us our option either to be Royalists or Rebels to him Nor can it derogate from his Goodness that he leaves it in our power to be rebellious because he gives us sufficient Grace whereby he enables us to obey It is not therefore by a Fatality that Satan has got so many Soldiers but by the voluntary Defection
Godliness of the fear for thus lyes the order and the coherence of the words Let us serve him with Reverence and Godly fear For our God is a Consuming Fire Last of all we may infer from the Pronoun our That God is no such Accepter of Persons as to connive at Sin in us whilst he does punish it in others No the times of their ignorance God winked at saith the Apostle But now commandeth all men every where to repent To us indeed if we repent he is a God ready to pardon swift to shew mercy and slow to wrath But to us being Impenitent he is a Terrible a jealous and an avenging God From whence 't is inferr'd by the holy Writer That we as well as the People Israel are bound to serve God with Fear and Reverence Because Our God as well as Theirs is a consuming Fire That is the same God is such as well to Us as to Them For here 't is worthy to be observ'd That as Moses exhorting his people Israel to take heed unto themselves that they forget not the Covenant of the Lord their God gave his reason in these words For the Lord Thy God is a Consuming Fire So our Apostle in this Chapter having first of all compared the Law with the Gospel Moses with Christ and a Contemner of the one with a Despiser of the other and having exhorted us to the Duty incumbent on us as we are Christians gives the very same reason in the very same words with no more than the change of a Monosyllable for OUR God is a consuming Fire Such he is as the God of All but above all as he is OURS because we sin when we sin against greater light and against greater obligations to cease from sinning Having now done with the explication and with the division of the Text 't will be most useful as well as natural to begin with the first of the five Illations Because the greatest numbers of men do stand in need of a conviction That Christianity is a Service requiring our Industry and Care A Service consisting of Obedience as well as Faith in as much as the Promises of the Gospel are clog'd with Precepts Thô the Yoke of Christ is easy yet 't is a Yoke and thô his Burden is light yet 't is a Burden To stand fast in that Liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free is to hold fast the Gospel or Law of Christ and to hold it as an Instrument whereby to serve him and to serve him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so as our Persons and our Service may be accepted A Doctrin the rather to be Imprinted in all our memories and our minds as either a method for prevention or means of cure because throughout the whole catalogue of damning Haeresies whether as that Catalogue was begun by Irenaeus or as continued by Epiphanius or as perfected by St. Austin and other Writers of the Church none hath shed a more killing Influence upon the minds and manners of Christian People so far at least as I am able to conjecture than the mistaken but pleasant notions of Iustification and Faith the imputed Righteousness of Christ and Christian Liberty Hardly any four things are more needful to be believ'd or more subject to be mistaken Never was Poyson more pernicious or more to be antidoted than that to which I oppose the main drift of the well intended project I have in hand There were Gnosticks and Nicolaitans Carpocratians and Valentinians whilst yet the day of the Gospel began to dawn whom the Tempter had betrayed into such a Lust That Lust had blinded with such an Ignorance That Ignorance was the Mother of so many and great Errors and those Errors brake forth into such execrable Sins that 't were perhaps another Sin to make men acquainted with their nature or but to tell them their very names For there are Sins saith St. Paul which 't is a shame even to speak of So as Tertullian passed them by with a profession of his Bashfulness he wanted the confidence and the courage to name those things which were done in secret To such as these we can award no fitter punishment than that to which the Ephesians condemn'd Herostratus when having burnt Diana's Temple just as Pausanias kill'd King Philip for no other end than to be talk't of He was decreed by that Senate to be forgotten And forgotten he had been if one single Theopompus had not put him into his Story And therefore there was need of Epiphanius his Apology for having given us a Narrative of those Tacenda although he did it in detestation Now as often as I consider within my self how the oldest and the worst of all those Haeresies do walk about in new names through our English Streets that though the Scenes are somewhat different yet still the Actors do all agree That the Gnosticks and Nicolaitans and Carpocratians of the First times are repeated as 't were by a Metempsychosis in the Antinomians and Solifidians and sanguin Fiduciaries of Ours that we have had if not as false Christs as Barchâ—â—hebas yet as false Prophets as Barjesus who have so preached up the Gospel and so cry'd down the Law I only mean the Evangelical or Christian Law And made obedience so cheap a thing by enhauncing the price of Faith as to have turn'd Christian Liberty into Libertinism and the Grace of God into wantonness I am tempted to wish the Gospel were sometimes preach'd as the Law of God was first publish'd in thundring and lightning That God were sometimes represented as well by us unto the English as by St Paul to the Hebrew Christians not only as in his nature a quickning light but as he is also in his Effects a consuming Fire If not in hope to raise some who seem to be dead in their Security yet at least to awaken others who it is to be hoped are yet but drowzy For as 't is the custom and the craft of some cunning Pleaders by citing the Authority of Laws and Statutes to patronize the Breach of them or as Ausonius could compile the most loathsom Fescenine out of Virgil Himself the Parthenian Poet or as a Spider sucks poyson from the very same flower from which a Bee doth extract the most soveraign hony so I know not which hath drawn the more deadly Venom from the wholsom Letter of the Gospel the Gnosticks heretofore or the Libertines now whether the former were worse corrupters of the Third Chapter of St. Iohn or the later of the Fourth of St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians For as the Gnosticks in those times so the Libertines in These are wont to cocker up themselves with the she Tempter in Epiphanius that they are all the chosen Vessels not vessels of a Respective but of an absolute election They think it much below Them to look upon God as a consuming Fire It is for men of their Perfection not to