to your selves And that both in time of Health and Sickness § 31. 1. In Health you must be careful to provide for each other not so much pleasing as wholsome food and to keep each other from that which is hurtful to your health disswading each other from Gluttony and Idleness the two great Murderers of mankind If the bodies of the poor in hunger and cold and nakedness must be relieved much more of those that are become as your own flesh § 32. 2. Also in Sickness you are to be tenderly regardful of each other and not to be sparing of any cost or pains by which the health of each other may be restored or your souls confirmed and Gen. 27. 14. your comforts cherished You must not lothe the Bodies of each other in the most lothsom sickness Eph 5 29 31. Job 19. 17. Job 2. 9. nor shun them through loathing no more than you would do your own Prov. 17. 17. A friend loveth at all times and a brother is born for adversity Much more those that are so nearly bound for sickness and health till death shall separate them It is an odious sin to be aweary of a sick or suffering friend and desirous that God would take them meerly that you may be eased of the trouble And usually such persons do meet with such measure as they measured to others and those that they look for help and comfort from will perhaps be as weary of them and as glad to be rid of them § 33. Direct 8. Another duty of Husbands and Wives is to be helpful to each other in their worldly Direct 8. business and estates Not for worldly ends nor with a worldly mind but in obedience to God See Prov. 31. Gen. 31. 40. Tit. 2. 5. 1 Tâ—m 5. 14. 5. 8. who will have them Labour as well as pray for their daily bread and hath determined that in the sweat of their brows they shall eat their bread and that six dayes they shall labour and do all that they have to do and that he that will not work must not eat The care of their affairs doth lye upon them both and neither of them must cast it off and live in idleness unless one of them be an Ideot or so witless as to be unfit for care or so sick or lame as to be unfit for labour § 34. Direct 9. Also you must be careful of the lawful honour and good names of one another Direct 9. You must not divulge but conceal the dishonourable failings of each other as Abigail except 1 Sam. 25. 25. Matth. 18 16. Matth. 1. 19. 2 Sam. 11. 7. Prov. 31. 28. Eccles 7 3. Prov. 22. 1. 2 Sam. 6. 20. Gen 9 22 25. in any case compassion or justice require you to open them to any one for a cure or to clear the truth The reputation of each other must be as dear to you as your own It is a sinful and unfaithful practice of many both Husbands and Wives who among their companions are opening the faults and infirmities of each other which they are bound in tenderness to cover As if they perceived not that by dishonouring one another they dishonour themselves Love will cover a multitude of faults 1 Pet. 4. 8. Nay many disaffected pievish persons will aggravate all the faults of one another behind their backs to strangers and sometimes slander them and speak more than is truth Many a man hath been put to clear his good name from the slanders of a jealous or a passionate Wife And an open enemy is not capable of doing one so much wrong as she that is in his bosome because she will be easily be believed as being supposed to know him better than any other § 35. Direct 10. It is also a great part of the duty of Husbands and Wives to be helpful to one Direct 10. another in the education of their Children and in the government of the inferiors of the family Some 〈…〉 m 3. 4 12. Gen. 18. 19. â—â— 35. 2 c. 〈…〉 24 14. 〈…〉 101. men cast all the care of the Children while they are young upon their Wives And many women by their passion and indiscretion do make themselves unfit to help their Husbands in the Government either of their Children or Servants But this is one of the greatest parts of their employment As to the Mans part to govern his house well it is a duty unquestionable And it is not to be denyed of the Wife 1 Tim. 5. 14. I will that the younger Women marry bear Children guide the house Bathshâ—ba taught Solomon Prov. 31. 1. Abigail took better care of Nabal's house than he did himself They that have a joint interest and are one flesh must have a joint part in government although their power be not equal and one may better oversee some business and the other other business yet in their places they must divide the care and help each other And not as it is with many wicked persons who are the most unruly part of the family themselves and the chiefest cause that it is ungoverned and ungodly or one party hindreth the other from keeping order or doing any good § 36. Direct 11. Another part of their Duty is to help each other in works of charity and hospitality Direct 11. While they have opportunity to do good to all but especially to them of the houshold of faith Heb. 13. 2. Gen. 18. 6 c. Rom. 12. 13. 2 Cor. 9. 6. â—uke 1â— 9. 1 Tim 3. 2. 5. 10. Prov. 11. 20 28 Neh. 8. 10. Prov. 19. 17 Job 29. 13. 31. 20. Acts 20. 35. and to sow to the Spirit that of the Spirit they may reap everlasting life yea to sow plentifully that they may reap plentifully Gal. 6. that if they are able their houses may afford relief and entertainment for the needy especially for Christs servants for their Masters sake who hath promised that He that receiveth a Prophet in the name of a Prophet shall receive a Prophets reward and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous mans reward and whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water in the name of a Disciple verily I say unto you he shall in no wise lose his reward Matth. 10. 41 42. The woman of Sâ—â—â—â—em lost nothing by the entertainment of Elisha when she said to her Husband Behold now I perceive that this is an holy man of God which passeth by us continually Let us make him a little Chamber I pray thee on the wall and let us set for him there a Bed and a Table and a Stool and a Candlestick and it shall be when he cometh to us that he shall turn in thither 2 Kings 4. 10. But now how common is it for the people to think all too little for themselves and if one of them be addicted to
experiences thou wilt be very hardly kept from desperation Thou wilt read such passages as Heb. 6 4 5 6. and Heb. 10. 26 27 28 29. with so much horrour that thou wilt hardly be perswaded that there is any hope Thou wilt be ready to think that thou hast sinned against the Holy Ghost and that thou hast trampled underfoot the blood of the Covenant and done despite to the spirit of grace And thou wilt think that there is no being twice born again Or if thou be restored to Life thou wilt hardly ever be restored to thy comforts here if thy backsliding should be very great But indeed the danger is exceeding great lest thou never be recovered at all if once thou be twice dead and pluckt up by the roots Jud. 6. and lest God do finally forsake thee And then how desperate will be thy case § 35. 16. Is it not the example of Backsliders very terrible which God hath set up for the warning of his servants as monuments of his wrath Luk. 17. 32. Remember Lot's Wife saith Christ to them that are about to lose their estates or goods or lives by saving them How frightful is the remembrance of a Cain a Iudas a Saul a Ioas 2 Chron. 24. 2. a Iulian How sad is it to hear but such a one as Spira especially at his death crying out of his backsliding in the horrour of his soul and to see such ready to make away themselves § 36. 17. Consider that there is none that so much dishonoureth God as a Backslider Others are supposed to sin in ignorance But you do by your lives as bad as speak such blaspheamy as this against the Lord As if you should say I thought once that God had been the best Master and his servants the wisest and happiest men and Godliness the best and safest life but now I have tryed both and I find by experience that the Devil is a better master and his servants are the happiest men and the world and the flesh do give the truest contentment to the mind This is the plain blaspheamy of your lives And bethink thee how God should bear with this § 37. 18. There is none that so much hardeneth the wicked in his sin and furthereth the damnation of souls as the Backslider If you would but drive your Sheep or Cattle into a house those that go in first do draw the rest after them but those that run out again make all the rest afraid and run away One apostate that hath been noted for Religion and afterwards turneth off again doth discourage many that would come in For he doth as it were say to them by his practice Keep off and meddle not with a Religious life for I have tryed it and found that a life of worldliness and fleshliness is better And people will think with themselves Such a man hath tryed a Religious life and he hath forsaken it again and therefore he had some reason for it and knew what he did Woe to the world because of offences and woe to him by whom the offence shall come â—â—k 17. 1. Mat. 18. 7. How dreadful a thing is it think that mens souls should lie in Hell and you be the cause of it It were good for that man that a milstone were hanged about his neck and be were drowned in the depth of the Sea Matth. 18. 6 7. Luk. 17. 2. § 38. 19. There is none that are so great a terrour to weak Christians as these Backsliders For they are thinking how far such went before they fell away And those that think that true grace may be lâ—st are saying Alas how shall I stand when such that were better and stronger than I have faln away And those that think true grace cannot be lost are as much perplexed and say How far may an Hypocrite go that after falleth away How piously did this man live how sorrowfully did he repâ—nt how blamelesly did he walk how fervently and constantly did he pray how savourily did he speak how charitably and usefully did he live And I that come far short of him as far as I can discern can have no assurance that I am sincere till I am sure that I go further than ever he did Woe to thee that thus perplexest the consciences of the weak and hinderest the comforts of believers § 39. 20. Thou art the greatest grief to the faithful Ministers of Christ Thou canst not conceive what a wound it giveth to the heart and comforts of a Minister when he hath taken a great deal of pains for thy Conversion and after that rejoyced when he saw thee come to the flock of Christ and after that laboured many a year to build thee up and suffered many a frown from the ungodly for thy sake to see all his labour at last come to nought and all his glorying of thee turned to his shame and all his hopes of thee disappointed I tell thee this is more doleful to his heart than any outward loss or cross that could have befaln him It is not persecution that is his greatest grief as long as it hindereth not the good of souls It is such as thou that are his â—orest persecutors that frustrate his labours and rob him of his joyes And his sorrows shall one day cost thee dear The life and comforts of your faithful Pastors is much in your hands 2 Cor. 7. 3. 1 Thes. 3. 8. Now we Live if ye stand fast in the Lord. § 40. 21. Thou art more treacherous to Christ than thou wouldst be to a common friend Wouldst thou forsake thy friend without a cause especially an old and tryed friend And especially when in forsaking him thou dost forsake thy self Prov. 27. 10. Thy own friend and thy fathers friend forsake not Prâ—v 17. 17. A friend loveth at all times and a brother is born for adversity If thy friend were in distress wouldst thou forsake him And wilt thou forsake thy God that needs thee not but supplyeth thy needs Ruth was more faithful to Naomi Ruth 1. 16 17. that resolved Whither thou goest I will go and where thou lodgest I will lodge where thou dyest I will dye And hath God deserved worse of thee § 41. 22. Nay thou dealest worse with God than the Devils servants do with him Alas they are too constant to him Reason will not change them nor the Commands of God nor the offers of everlasting life nor the fears of Hell nothing will change them till the spirit of God do it And wilt thou be less constant to thy God § 42. 23. Consider also that thy end is so near that thou hadst but a little while longer to have held out And thou mightest have known that thou couldst keep thy worldly pleasures but a little while And it is a pitiful thing to see a man that hath born the forest brunt of the battle and run till he is almost at the end of the race to lose all for want of a
John 3. 18. 3. 5. Thou sleepest in Irons in the captivity of the Devil among the walking judgements of God in a life that is still expecting an end in a Boat that is swiftly carried to eternity just at the entrance of another world and that world will be Hell if Grace awake thee not Thou art going to see the face of God to see the world of Angels or Devils and to be a companion with one of them for ever And is this a place or case to sleep in Is thy Bed so soft thy dwelling so safe God standeth over thee man and dost thou sleep Christ is coming and death is coming and judgement coming and dost thou sleep Didst thou never read of the foolish Virgins that slept out their time and knockt and cryed in vain when it was too late Matth. 25. 5. Thou mightest wiselyer sleep on the Pinnacle of a Steeple in a Storm than have a soul asleep in so dangerous a case as thou art in The Devil is awake and is rocking thy Cradle How busie is he to keep off Ministers or Conscience or any that would awake thee None of thy enemies are asleep and yet wilt thou sleep in the thickest of thy foes Is the battle a sleeping time or thy race a sleeping time when Heaven or Hell must be the End While he can keep thee asleep the Devil can do almost what he liâ—t with thee He knows that thou hast now no use of thy eyes or understanding or power to resist him The Learnedst Doctor in his sleep is as unlearned actually as an Ideot and will dispute no better than an unlearned man This makes many learned men to be ungodly they are asleep in sin The Devil could never have made such a drudge of thee to do his work against Christ and thy soul if thou hadst been awake Thou wouldst never have followed his whistle to the Ale-house the Play-house the Gaming-house and to other sins if thou hadst been in thy wits and well awake Read Prov. 7. 23. 24. I cannot believe that thou longest to be damned or so hatest thy self as to have done as thou hast done to have a lived Godless a Graceless a Prayerless and yet a merry careless life if thy eyes had been opened and thou hadst known and feelingly known that this was the way to Hell Nature it self will hardly go to Hell awake But it 's easie to abuse a man that is asleep Thou hast Reason but didst thou ever awake it to one hours serious Consideration of thy endless state and present case O dreadful judgement to be given over to the Spirit of slumber Rom. 11. 8. Is it not high time now to awake out of sleep Rom. 13. 11. When the light is arisen and shines about thee When others that care for their souls are busily at work When thou hast slept out so much precious time already Many a mercy and perhaps some Ministers have been as Candles burnt out to light thee while thou hast slept How oâ—t hast thou been called already How long wilt thou sleep O sluggard Prov. 6. 9. 10. Yet thou hast thundering calls and allarums to awake thee God calls and Ministers call Mercies call and judgements call and yet wilt thou not awake The voice of the Lord is powerful full of Majesty breaketh the Cedars shaketh the Wilderness and yet cannot it awake thee Thou wilt not sleep about far smaller matters at meat or drink or in common talk or Market But O how much greater business hast thou to keep thee awake Thou hast yet an unholy soul to be renewed an ungodly life to be reformed an offended God to be reconciled to and many thousand sins to be forgiven Thou hast death and judgement to prepare for thou hast Heaven to win and Hell to scape Thou hast many a needful Truth to learn and many a holy duty to perform and yet dost thou think it time to sleep Paul that had less need than thou did watch and pray and labour day and night Acts 20. 31. 1 Thess. 3. 10. O that thou knewest how much better it is to be awake While thou sleepest thou losest the benefit of the Light and all the mercies that attend thee The Sun is but as a clod to a man asleep The world is as no world to him The beauty of Heaven and Earth are nothing to him Princes friends and all things are forgotten by him So doth thy sleep in sin make nothing of health and patience time and help Ministers Books and daily warnings O what a day hast thou for everlasting if thou hadst but a heart to use it What a price hast thou in thine hand Prov. 10. 5. Sleep not out thy day thy harvest time thy tide time They that sleep sleep in the night 1 Thess. 5. 7. Awake and Christ will give thee light Rom. 13. 12. Ephes. 5. 14. Awake to righteousness and sin not 1 Cor. 15. 34. O when thou seest the Light of Christ what a wonder will it possess thee with at the things which thou now forgettest What joy will it fill thee with and with what pity to the sleepy world But if thou wilt needs sleep on be it known to thee sinner it shall not be long If thou wilt wake no sooner death and vengeance will awake thee Thou wilt wake when thou seest the other world and seest the things which thou wouldst not believe and comest before thy dreadful Judge Thy damnation slumbereth not 2 Pet. 2. 3. There are no sleepy souls in Heaven or Hell all are awake there and the day that hath awakened so many shall waken thee Watch then if thou love thy soul lest thy Lord come suddenly and find thee sleeping Mark 13. 34 35 36 37. What I say to one I say to all Watch. § 4. Tempt 2. If Satan cannot keep the soul in a sleepy careless inconsiderate forgetfulness he would Tempt 2. make the unregenerate soul believe that there is no such thing as Regenerating Grace but that it is a fancied thing which no man hath experience of and he saith as Nicodemus How can these things be John 3. 4. He thinks that natural conscience is enough § 5. Direct 2. But this may be easily refuted by observing that Holiness is but the very Health and Direct 2. rectitude of the soul and is no otherwise supernatural than as Health to him that is born a Leper See 2 Cor. 5. 17. Gal. 6. 15. Gal. 4. 19. Joh. 3. 3. 5. 6. Matth. 18. 3. 1 Pet. 1. 23. It is the rectitude of Nature or its disposition to the use and end that it was made for Though Grace be called supernatural 1. Because it is not born with us and 2. Corrupted Nature is against it 3. And the End of it is the God of Nature who is above Nature 4. And the Revelation and other means are supernatural as Christs incarnation resurrection c. Yet both Nature and Scripture and experience tell you
keeping a good house and a good table tipling is called drinking a cup with a friend Lust and filthiness is called Love worldliness is called thriftiness and good husbandry Idleness and loss of Time is called the leasure of a Gentleman slothfulness is called a nâ—t being too worldly Time wasting sports are called Recreations Pride is called Decency and Handsomness Proud revenge is called Honour and Gallantry Romish cruelty and persecution and 〈…〉 ing the Church is called keeping up order obedience and unity Disobedience to superiors is câ—llâ—d not â—â—aâ—ing mâ—n Church-divisions are called strictness and zeal 2. Specially if a sâ—n be not iâ— dis 〈…〉 among the stricter sort it greatly prepareth men to commit it As breaking the Lords day beyond sâ—â— in many râ—fâ—rmâ—d Churches And at home spiritual pride cens riousâ—â—ss baâ—kâ—iting disobedience â—â—d Church-divisions are not in half that disgrace among many professors of strictness as they deserve and as swearing c. is § 100. Direct 38. Remember that what ever be the Name or Cloak God judgeth righteously 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the truth Names may deceive us but not our Iudge And sin is still in disgrace with God however it be with men Remember the comlier the paint and cover is the greater is the danger and the more watchful and cauâ—â—lous we should be It is not imperfect man but the perfect Law of God which must be our Rule The great succâ—ss of this Temptation should deterr uâ— from entertaining it What abundance of mischief hath it done in the world § 101. Tempt 39. Sometime the Devil tempteth men to some â—â—ynous sin that if he prevail not at Tempt â—9 lâ—â—st he may draw them into a less As cheating chafferers will ask twice the price of their commodity that by abating much they may make you willing to give too much He that would get a little must ask a great deal He will tempt you to drunkenness and if he draw you but to tipling or time-wasting he hath got something If he tempt you to fornication and he get you but to some filthy thoughts or immodest lascivious talk or actions he hath done much of that which he intended If he tempt you to sâ—me horrid cruelâ—y and you yield but to sâ—me less degree or to some unjust or uncharitable censures you think you have conquered when it 's he that conquereth § 102. Direct 39. Remember that the least degree of sin is sin and death the wages of it Direct 39. Romans 6. 23. Think not that you have scapt well if your heart have taken any of the infection â—r if you have been wounded any where though it might have been worse If the Tempter had tempted you no further but to a lustful malicious or proud thought or word you would perceive that if he prevail he conquereth so may you whâ—n he getteth this much by a shameless asking more § 103. Tempt 40. He tempteth us sometime to be so fearful and carefull against one sin or Tempt 40. about sâ—me â—ne danger as to be mindless of some other and lie open to his temptation Like a Fâ—â—â—â—r that will seem to aime all at one place that he may strike you in another while you are guarding that Or like an enemy that giveth all the allarm at one end of the City that he may draw the people thither while he stormeth in another place So Satan makes some so afraid of worldliness that they watch not against Idleness or so fearful of hard-heartedness and deadness and hypocrisie that they watch not against Passion neglect of their callings or dejectedness or so fearful of sinning or being deceived about their salvation that they fear not the want of Love and Joy and Thankfulness for all the mercy they have received nor the neglect of holy Praise to God § 104. Direct 40. Remember that as obedience must be entire and universal so is Satans Direct 41. temptation against all parts of our obedience and our care must extend to all if we will escape It would cure your inordinate fear in some one point if you extended it to all the â—â—â—â—t § 105. Tempt 41. Sometime by the suddenness of a temptation he surprizeth men before they are Tempt 41. aware § 106. Direct 41. Be never unarmed nor from your watch especially as to Thoughts Direct 41. or sudden Passions or rash words which are used to be committed for want of deliberation § 107. Tempt 42. Sometime he useth a violent earnestness especially when he getteth Passion on Tempt 42. his side So that Reason is born down and the sinner saith I could not forbear § 108. Direct 42. But remember that the very eager unruliness of your passion is a sin it self Direct 42. and that none can compel you to sin and that Reason must deliberate and rule or else any murder or wickedness may have the excuse of urgent passions § 109. Tempt 43. Sometime he useth the violence of men They threaten men to frighten them Tempt 43. into sin § 110. Direct 43. But is not God and his threatnings more to be feared Do men Direct 43. threaten imprisonment or death or ruine And doth not God threaten everlasting misery And can he not defend you from all that man shall threaten if it be best for you See the portion of the fearful Rev. 21. 8. § 111. Tempt 44. Sometime variety of temptations distracteth men that they do not look to all at Tempt 44. once § 112. Direct 44. Remember that one part of the City unguarded may lose the whole in a general Direct 44. assault § 113. Tempt 45. Sometime he ceaseth to make us secure and lay by our armes and then Tempt 45. surpriseth us § 114. Direct 45. Take heed of security and Satans ambushments Distinguish between cessation Direct 45. and conquest You conquer not every time that you have rest and quietness from temptation Till the sin be hated and the contrary grace or duty in practice you have not at all overcome And when that 's done yet trust not the Devil or the flesh nor think the warr will be shorter than your lives For one assault will begin where the former ended Make use of every cessation but to prepare for the next encounter § 115. Tempt 46. He will tempt you to take striving for overcoming and to think because Tempt 46. you pray and make some resistance that sin is conquered And because your Desires are good all is well § 116. Direct 46. But all that fight do not overcome If a man strive for Masteries yet is he Direct 46. not crowned except he strive lawfully 1 Tim. 2. 5. Many will seek to enter and shall not be able Luke 13 24. § 117. Tempt 47. He followeth the sinner with frequency and importunity till he weary him and Tempt 47. make him yield § 118. Direct 47. Remember that Christ is as importunate with thee to
basest of the people whose poverty might tempt them to discontent nor set thee upon the pinnacle of worldly honour where giddiness might have been thy ruine and where temptations to pride and lust and luxury and enmity to a holy life are so violent that few escape them He hath not set thee out upon a Sea of cares and vexations worldly businesses and encumberances but fed thee with food convenient for thee and given thee leisure to walk with God He hath not chained thee to an unprofitable profession nor used thee as those that live like their beasts to eat and drink and sleep and play or live to live But he hath called thee to the noblest and sweetest work when that hath been thy business which others were glad to taste of as a recreation and repast He hath allowed thee to converse with Books and with the best and wisest men and to spend thy dayes in sucking in delightful knowledge And this not only for thy pleasure but thy use and not only for thy self but many others O how many sweet and precious truths hath he allowed thee to feed on all the day when others are diverted and commonly look at them sometimes a far off O how many precious hours hath he granted me in his holy Assemblies and in his honourable and most pleasant work How oft hath his Day and his holy uncorrupted Ordinances and the communion of his Saints and the mentioning of his Name and Kingdom and the pleading of his cause with sinners and the celebrating of his praise been my delight O how many hundreds that he hath sent have wanted the abundant encouragement which I have had When he hath seen the disease of my despondent mind he hath not tryed me by denying me success nor suffered me with Ionas according to my inclination to overrun his work but hath ticed me on by continued encouragements and strowed all the way with mercies But his mercies to me in the souls of others have been so great that I shall secretly acknowledge them rather than here record them where I must have respect to those usual mercies of believers which lye in the common road to Heaven And how endless would it be to mention all All the good that friends and enemies have done me All the wise and gracious disposals of his providence in every condition and change of life and change of times and in every place whereever he brought me His every dayes renewed merciâ—s His support under all my languishings and weakness his plentiful supplies his gracious helps his daily pardons and the Glorious Hopes of a blessed Immortality which his Son hath purchased and his Covenant and Spirit sealed to me O the mercies that are in One Christ one Holy Spirit one Holy Scripture and in the Blessed God himself These I have mentioned unthankful heart to shame thee for thy want of Love to God And these I will leave upon record to be a witness for God against thy ingratitude and to confound thee with shame if thou deny thy Love to such a God Every one of all these mercies and multitudes more will rise up against thee and shame thee before God and all the world as a monster of unkindness if thou Love not him that hath used thee thus Here also consider what God is for your future good as well as what he hath been hitherto How all sufficient how powerful merciful and good But of this more anon § 24. Direct 7. Improve the vanity and vexation of the Creature and all thy disappointments and Direct 7. injuries and afflictions to the promoting of thy Love to God And this by a double advantage First By observing that there is nothing meet to divert thy Love or rob God of it unless thou wilt Love thy trouble and distress Secondly That thy Love to God is the comfort by which thou must be supported under the injuries and troubles which thou meetest with in the world And therefore to neglect it is but to give up thy self to misery Is it for nothing O my soul that God hath turned loose the world against thee That Devils rage against thee and wicked men do reproach and slander thee and seek thy ruine and friends prove insufficient and as broken Reeds It had been as easie to God to have prospered thee in the world and suited all things to thy own desires and have strawed thy way with the flowers of worldly comforts and delights But he knew thy proneness to undo thy self by carnal loves and how easily thy heart is enticed from thy God And therefore he hath wisely and mercifully ordered it that thy temptations shall not be too strong and no creature shall appear to thee in an over-amiable tempting dress Therefore he hath suffered them to become thy enemies And wilt thou love an enemy better than thy God What! an envious and malicious world A world of cares and grief and pains a weary restless empty world How deep and piercing are its injuries How superficial and deceitful is its friendship How serious are its sorrows What toyish shews and dreams are its delights How constant are its cares and labours How seldome and short are its flattering smiles Its comforts are disgraced by the certain expectation of succeeding sorrows Its sorrows are heightned by the expectations of more In the midst of its flatteries I hear something within me saying Thou must dye This is but the way to rottenness and dust I see a Winding-sheet and a Grave still before me I foresee how I must lye in pains and groans and then become a lothesome corpse And is this a world to be more delighted in than God What have I left me for my support and solace in the midst of all this Vanity and Vexation but to look to him that is the All-sufficient sure never failing good I must love him or I have nothing to love but enmity or deceit And is this the worst of Gods design in permitting and causing my pains and disappointments here Is it but to drive my foolish heart unto himself that I may have the solid delights and happiness of his Love O then let his blessed will be done Come home my soul my wandering tired grieved soul Love where thy love shall not be lost Love him that will not reject thee nor deceive thee nor requite thee as the world doth with injuries and abuse Despair not of entertainment though the world deny it thee The peaceable region is above In the world thou must have trouble that in Christ thou maist have peace Retire to the harbour if thou wouldst be free from storms God will receive thee when the world doth cast thee off if thou heartily cast off the world for him O what a solace is it to the soul to be driven clearly from the world to God and there to be exercised in that sacred Love which will accompany us to the world of Love § 25. Direct 8. Labour for the truest
of all the mercies of God Gen. 32. 10. The humble soul is the thankful soul and therefore so greatly valued by the Lord. § 6. Direct 4. Understand what Misery you were delivered from and estimate the greatness of the Direct 4. mercy by the greatness of the punishment which you had deserved Misery as well as sin must tell us the greatness of our mercies This is before opened Chap. 1. Dir. 9. pag. 21. § 7. Direct 5. Suppose you saw the damned souls or suppose you had been one day in Hell your selves Direct 5. bethink you then how thankful you would have been for Christ and Mercy And you were condemned to it by the Law of God and if death had brought you to execution you had been there and then Mercy would have been more esteemed If a Preacher were sent to those miserable souls to offer them a pardon and eternal life on the terms as they are offered to us do you think they would make as light of it as we do § 8. Direct 6. Neglect not to keep clear the Evidences of thy title to those special Mercies for Direct 6. which thou shouldst be most thankful And hearken not to Satan when he would tempt thee to think that they are none of thine that so he might make thee deny God the Thanks for them which he expecteth Of this I have spoken in the Directions for Love § 9. Direct 7. Think much of those personal mercies which God hath shewed thee from thy youth up Direct 7. untill now by which he hath manifested his care of thee and particular kindness to thee Though the common mercies of Gods servants be the greatest which all other Christians share in with each one yet personal favours peculiar to our selves are apt much to affect us as being near our apprehension and expressing a peculiar care and love of us Therefore Christians should mark Gods dealings with them and write down the great and notable mercies of their lives which are not unfit for others to know if they should see it § 10. Direct 8. Compare thy proportion of Mercies with the rest of the peoples in the world And Direct 8. thou wilt find that it is not one of many thousands that hath thy proportion It is so small a part of the world that are Christians and of those so few that are Orthodox Reformed Christians and of those so few that are seriously godly as devoted to God and of those so few that fall not into some perplexities errors scandals or great afflictions and distress that those few that are in none of these ranks have cause of wonderous thankfulness to God Yea the most afflicted Christians in the world Suppose God had divided his mercies equally to all men in the world as health and wealth and honour and grace and the Gospel c. How little of them would have come to thy share in comparison of what thou now possessest How many have less wealth or honour than thou How many thousands have less of the Gospel and of Grace In reason therefore thy thankfulness should be proportionable and extraordinary § 11. Direct 9. Compare the Mercies which thou wantest with those which thou possessest and observe how Direct 9. much thy receivings are greater than thy sufferings Thou hast many meals plenty for one day of scarcity or pinching hunger Thou hast many dayes Health for one dayes sickness and if one part be ill there are more that are not If one Cross befall thee thou escapest many more that might befall thee and which thou deservest § 12. Direct 10. Bethink thee how thou wouldst value thy mercies if thou wert deprived of them Direct 10. The want of them usually teacheth us most effectually to esteem them Think how thou shouldst value Christ and hope if thou wert in Despair And how thou wouldst value the mercies of Earth if thou wert in Hell And the Mercies of England if thou were among bloody Inquisitors and persecutors and wicked cruell Heathens or Mahometans or bruitish savage Americans Think how good sleep would seem to thee if thou couldst not sleep for pains Or how good thy meat or drink or cloaths or house or maintenance or friends would all seem to thee if they were taken from thee And how great a mercy health would seem if thou were under some tormenting sickness and what a mercy Time would seem if Death were at hand and Time were ending And what a mercy thy least sincere desires or measure of grace is in comparison of their case that are the haters despisers and persecutors of holiness These thoughts if followed home may shame thee into thankfulness § 13. Direct 11. Let Heaven be ever in thine eye and still think of the endless joy which thou Direct 11. shalt have with Christ. For that is the mercy of all mercies and he that hath not that in hope to be thankful for will never be thankful aright for any thing and he that hath Heaven in prâ—â—isâ— to be thankful for hath still reason for the highest joyful Thanks whatever worldly thing he want or though he were sure never more to have comfort in any creature upon earth He is unthankful indeed that will not be thankful for Heaven But that is a mercy which will constrain to Thankfulness so far as our title is discerned The more believing and heavenly the mind is the more thankful § 14. Direct 12. Look on earthly and present Mercies in connexion with Heaven which is their End and Direct 12. as sweetned by our interest in God that giveth them You leave out all the life and sweetness which must cause your thankfulness if you leave out God and overlook him A dead carkâ—ss hath not the Loveliness or Usefulness as a living man You mortifie your mercies when you separate them from God and Heaven and then their beauty and sweetness and excellercy is gone And how can you be thankful for the husks and shells when you foolishly neglect the kernel Take every bit as from thy Fathers hands Remember that he feedeth and clotheth and protecteth thee as his Child It is to Our Father which is in Heaven that we must go every day for our daily bread Taste his Love in it and thou wilt say that It is sweet Remember whither all his Mercies tend and where they will leave thee even in the bosome of Eternal Love Think with thy self How good is this with the Love of God This and Heaven are full enough for me Course fare and course clothing and course usage in the world and hard labour and a poor habitation with Heaven after all is Mercy beyond all humane estimation or conceiving Nothing can be little which is a token of the love of God and leadeth to Eternal Glory The Relation to Heaven is the life and glory of every mercy § 15. Direct 13. Think oft how great a mercy it is that Thankfulness for mercy is made so
§ 21. I beseech thee now that readest these Lines be so true to God be so ingenuous be so much a friend to the comfort of thy soul and so much love a life of pleasure as to set thy self for the time to come to a more conscionable performance of this noble work and steep thy thoughts in the abundant mercies of thy God and express them more in all thy speech to God and man Say as David Psal. 116. 16 17. O Lord truly I am thy servant thou hast loosed my bonds I will offer to thee the Sacrifice of Thanksgiving and will call upon the name of the Lord. Psal. 30. 1 2 3 4 11 12. I will extoll thee O Lord for thou hast lifted me up and hast not made my foes to rejoyce over me O Lord my God I cryed unto thee and thou hast healed me O Lord thou hast brought up my soul from the grave thou hast kept me alive that I should not go down to the pit Sing unto the Lord O ye Saints of his and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness Thou hast put off my sackcloth and girded me with gladness to the end that my glory may sing praise to thee and not be silent O Lord my God I will give thanks to thee for ever Psal. 69. 30. I will praise the name of God with a Song and magnifie him with thanksgiving This also shall please the Lord better than an Oxe Psal. 92. 1 2. It is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord and to sing unto thy Name O Most High To shew forth thy loving kindness in the morning and thy faithfulness every night Psal. 119. 62. At midnight will I rise to give thanks unto thee because of thy righteous judgements Psal. 140. 13. Surely the righteous shall give thanks unto thy Name the upright shall dwell in thy presence Remember that you are commanded in every thing to give thanks 1 Thess. 5. 18. When God is scant in mercy to thee then be thou scant in thankfulness to him and not when the Devil and a forgetful or unbelieving or discontented heart would hide his greatest mercies from thee It is just with God to give up that person to sadness of heart and to uncomfortable self-tormenting melancholly that will not be perswaded by the greatness and multitude of mercies to be frequent in the sweet returns of Thanks DIRECT XV. Let thy very heart be set to GLORIFIE GOD thy Creator Redeemer Gr. Dir. 15. and Sanctifier both with the Estimation of thy Mind the Praises of thy Mouth To Glorifie God and the Holiness of thy Life § 1. THe GLORIFYING of GOD being the End of man and the whole Creation must be the highest duty of our lives and therefore deserveth our distinct consideration 1 Cor. 10. 31. Whether ye eat or drink or whatever ye do do all to the glory of God 1 Pet. 4. 11. That God in all things may be glorified through Iesus Christ to whom be praise and dominion for ever and ever Amen I shall therefore first shew you what it is to glorifie God and then give Directions how to do it § 2. To glorifie God is not to add to his essential perfections or felicity or real glory The Heb. â— 3. Act. 7. â—â— Rom. 3 â—â— Rev. 21 11 23. Jude 24. 1 Peâ— 4. 13. 2 Cor. 3. 18. glory of God is a word that is taken in these various senses 1. Sometime it signifieth the essential transcendent Excellencies of God in himself considered So Rom. 6. 4. Psal. 19. 2. 2. Sometime it signifieth that glory which the Angels and Saints behold in Heaven What this is a soul in flesh cannot formally conceive or comprehend It seemeth not to be the Essence of God because that is every where and so is not that glory Or if any think that his Essence is that glory and is every where alike and that the creatures capacity is all the difference betwixt Heaven and Earth he seems confuted in that the glory of Heaven will be seen by the glorified Body it self which its thought cannot see the Essence of God Whether then that Glory be the Essence of God or any immediate Emanation from his Excellency as the beams and light that are sent forth by the Sun or a created glory for the felicity of his Servants we shall know when with the blessed we enjoy it 3. Sometime it is taken for the appearance of Gods perfections in his creatures either natural or free agents as discerned by man and for his Honour in the esteem of man Iohn 11. 4. 40. 1 Cor. 11. 7. 2 Cor. 4. 15. Phil. 1. 11. 2. 11. Isa. 35. 2. 40. 5 c. And so to glorifie God is 1. Objectively to represent his Excellencies or Glory 2. Mentally to conceive of them 3. And Verbally to declare them I shall therefore distinctly Direct you 1. How to glorifie God in your Minds 2. By your Tongues 3. By your Lives Directions for Glorifying God with the Heart § 3. Direct 1. Abhor all Blasphemous representations and thoughts of God and think not of him Direct 1. lamely unequally or diminutively nor as under any corporeal shape nor think not to comprehend I egâ— Gassâ—â—ci Oration iâ— augâ—â—aâ— in Institut Asâ—â—oâ—om him but reverently admire him Conceive of him as Incomprehensible and Infinite And if Satan would tempt thee to think meanly of any thing in God or to think highly of one of his Perfections and meanly of another abhor such temptations And think of his Power Knowledge and Goodness equally as the Infinite perfections of God § 4. Direct 2. Behold his glory in the glory of his works of Nature and of Grace and see him in Direct 2. all as the soul the Glory the All of the whole Creation What a Power is that which made and preserveth all the world What a Wisdom is that which set in joynt the Universal frame of Heaven and Earth and keepeth all things in their Order How good is he that made all good and gave the creatures all their goodness both natural and spiritual by Creation and Renewing grace Thus The Heavens declare the glory of God and the Firmament sheweth his handy work Psal. 19. 1. His glory covereth the Heavens and the earth is full of his praise Hab. 3. 3. The voice of the Lord is upon the waters the God of glory thundereth Psal. 29. 3. Psal. 145. § 5. Direct 3. Behold him in the Person Miracles Resurrection Dominion and Glory of his blessed Direct 3. Son Who is the brightness of his glory and the express image of his person upholding all things by the word of his power and having by himself purged our sins sate down at the right hand of the Majesty on high being made better than the Angels c. Heb. 1. 3 4. By him it is that glory is given to God in the Church Eph. 3. 21. God hath highly exalted him and given him
their bodies or minds to serve God you may so far go beyond them and use with thankfulness the mercies given you But you must no more be flesh-pleasers than they 5. And some deceive themselves by interposing sometimes a formal fast as the fleshly Pharisee that fasted twice a week Luke 18. 12. and then they think that they are no sensualists I speak not of the Popish fasting with Fish and Delicates this is not so much as a shew of mortification But what if you really fast as oft as the Pharisees did and quarrel with Christs Disciples for not fasting Matth. 9. 14 15. Will not a sensualist do as much as this if his Physicion require it for his health If the scope of your lives be fleshly it is not the interruption of a formal fast that will acquit you which perhaps doth but quicken your appetite to the next meal § 21. VII Yet many are wrongfully taken by others if not by themselves to be sensual by False appearances of sensuality such mistakes as these 1. Because they live not as meanly and scantly as the poor who want things necessary or helpful to their duty But by that rule I must not be well because other men are sick or I must not go apace because the lame can go but slowly If poor men have bad Horses I may ride on the best I can get to dispatch my business and redeem my time so I prefer not costly useless ostentation before true serviceableness 2. Others are accused as sensual because the weakness of their bodies requireth a more tender usage and dyet than healthful mens some bodies are unfitter for duty if they fast And some are useless through sickness and infirmities if they be not used with very great care And it is as truly a duty to cherish a weak body to enable it for God service as to tame an unruly lustful body and keep it from offending him 3. Some Melancholy conscientious persons are still accusing themselves through meer scrupulosity questioning almost all they eat or drink or wear or do whether it be not too much or too pleasing But it is a cheerful sobriety that God requireth which neither pampereth the body nor yet disableth or hindereth it from its duty and not an unprofitable wrangling scrupulosity § 22. Direct 1. The first and Grand Direction against Flesh-pleasing is that you be sure by a serious Direct 1. living faith to see the Better things with God and to be heartily taken up in minding loving seeking and securing them All the other directions are but subservient to this For certainly mans soul will not be idle being a living active principle And it s as certain that it will not act but upon some End or for some End And there are no other Ends to take us up but either the things temporal or eternal And therefore there is no true cure for a sensual Love of temporal things but to turn the heart to things eternal Believingly think first of the certainty greatness and eternity of the Ioyes above and then think that these may more certainly be yours than any worldly Riches or delights if you do not contemptuously reject them And then think that this is the time in which you must make sure of them and win them if ever you will possess them and that you are sent into the world of purpose on this business And then think with your selves how fleshly pleasures are the only competitors with the everlasting pleasures and that if ever you lose them it will be by over-loving these transitory things and that one half of your work for your salvation lyeth in killing your affections to all below that they may be alive to God alone And lastly think how much higher and sweeter pleasures even in this life the godly do enjoy than you and you are losing them while you prefer these fordid pleasures Do you think that a true Believer hath not a more excellent delight in his fore-thoughts of his immortal blessedness with Christ and in the assurance of the Love of God and communion with him in his holy service than you or any sensualist hath in flâ—shly pleasures Sober and serious Meditation on these things will turn the mind to the true delights § 23. Direct 2. Be acquainted with the range of sensual desires and follow them and watch them Direct 2. in all thâ—ir extravagancies Otherwise while you are stopping one gap they will be running out at many more I have given you many instances in my Treatise of Self-denyal I will here briefly set some before your eyes 1. Wâ—â—ch your Appetites as to meat and drink both quantity and quality Gluttony is a common unâ—bsâ—rvâ—â— sin The flesh no way enslaves men more than by the appetite As we see in Drunkards and Gluttons that can no more forbear than one that thirsteth in a burning Feavor 2. Take heed of the Lust of uncleanness and all degrees of it and approaches to it especially immodest embraces and behaviour 3. Take heed of ribald filthy talk and Love Songs and of such incensing snares 4. Take heed of too much sleep and Idleness 5. Take heed of taking too much delight in your Riches and lands your buildings and delectable convâ—niences 6. Take heed lest Honours or worldly Greatness or mens applause become your too great pleasure 7. And lest you grow to make it your delight to think on such things when you are alone or talk â—â—â—â—y of them in company with others 8. And take heed lest the success and proâ—perity of your affairs do too much please you as him Luke 12. 20 9. Take not up any inordinate pleasure in your children relations or nearest friends 10. Take heed of a delight in vain â—â—profitable sinful company 11. Or in fineness of apparel to set you out to the eyes of others 12. Take heed of a delight in Romances Play-books feigned stories useless news which corrupt the mind and waste your time 13. Take heed of a delight in any recreations which are excessive needless devouring time discomposing the mind entising to further sin hindering any duty especially our delight in God They are miserable souls that can delight themselves in no more safe or profitable things than Cards and Dice and Stage-playes and immodest dancings § 24. Direct 3. Next to the universal Remedy mentioned in the first Direction see that you have the Direct 3. particular remedies still at hand which your own particular way of flesh-pleasing doth most require And let not the love of your vanity prejudice you against a just information but impartially consider of the diseasâ— and the remedy Of the pâ—â—ticulâ—rs anon § 25. Direct 4. Remember still that Goâ— would â—ive yâ—u more pleasure and not less and that he Direct 4. will give you as much of the â—elights of sense as is truly good for you so you will take them in their place in subordination to your heavenly delights And is not
or private as when we dwell in godly families among the most exemplary helpful company under the most lively excellent means the faithfullest Pastors the profitablest Teachers the best Masters or Parents and with faithful friends 7. Some Time is made fit by particular acts of Providence as a Funeral Sermon at the death of any near us as the presence of some able Minister or private Christian whose company we cannot ordinarily have or a special leisure as the Eunuch had to read the Scripture in his Chariot Acts 8. 8. And some Time is made specially fit by the special workings of Gods Spirit upon the heart when he more than ordinarily illuminateth teacheth quickneth softneth humbleth comforteth exciteth or confirmeth As Time in general so specially these seasons must be particularly improved for their several works we must take the Wind and Tide while we may have it and be sure to strike while the Iron is hot 9. And some Time is made fit by others necessities and the call of God As it is the Time to relieve the poor when they ask or when they are most in want or to help our neighbour when it will do him most good to visit the sick the imprisoned and afflicted in the needful season Matth. 25. Thus are the godly like Trees planted by the River side which bring forth fruit in their season Psal. 1. 3. So to speak in season to the ignorant or ungodly for their conversion or to the sorrowful for their consolation Isa. 50. 4. 10. Our own Necessity also maketh our seasons So the Time of age and sickness is made by necessity the season of our special repentance and preparation for death and judgement 11. The present Time is commonly made our season through the uncertainty of a fitter or of any more Prov. 3. 27. Withhold not Good from him to whom it is due when it is in the power of thy hand to do it Say not unto thy neighbour Go and come again to morrow I will give when thou hast it by thee Eccles. 11. 2. Give a portion to seven and also to eight for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the earth Prov. 27. 1. Boast not thy self of to morrow for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth Gal. 6. 10. As we have therefore opportunity let us do good to all men especially to them who are of the houshold of faith These are our special seasons § 4. To Redeem Time supposeth 1. That we know what we have to do with Time and on what What Redeeming Time supposeth we ought to lay it out and of how great worth the things are for which we must redeem it 2. That we highly value Time in order to this necessary work 3. That we are sensible of the greatness of our sin and loss in our negligent or wilful losing so much as we have done already 4. That we know the particular season of each duty 5. And that we set less by all that which we must part with in our Redeeming time than we do by Time it self and its due ends Or else we will not make the bargain § 5. And as these five things are presupposed so these following are contained in our Redeeming What it containeth Time 1. To Redeem Time is to see that we cast none of it away in vain but use every minute of it as a most precious thing and spend it wholly in the way of duty 2. That we be not only doing good but doing the Best and Greatest Good which we are able and have a call to do 3. That we do not only the Best things but do them in the best manner and in the greatest measure and do as much good as possibly we can 4. That we watch for special opportunities 5. That we presently take them when they fall and improve them when we take them 6. That we part with all that is to be parted with to save our time 7. And that we forecast the preventing of impediments and the removal of our clogs and the obtaining of all the Helps to expedition and success in duty This is the true Redeeming of our Time § 6. The Ends and Uses which Time must be Redeemed for are these 1. In general and ultimately it To what Uses Time must be Redeemed must be all for God Though not all imployed directly upon God in meditating of him or praying to him yet all must be laid out for him immediately or mediately that is either in serving him or in preparing for his service in mowing or in whetting in travelling or in baiting to fit us for travail And so our time of sleep and feeding and needful recreation is laid out for God 2. Time must be Redeemed especially for works of Publick benefit For the Church and State for the souls of many especially by Magistrates and Ministers who have special charge and opportunity who must spend and be spent for the peoples sakes though rewarded with ingratitude and contempt 2 Cor. 12. 14 15. 3. For your own souls and your everlasting life For speedy conversion without delay if you be yet unconverted For the killing of every soul-endangering sin without delay For the exercise and increase of young and unconfirmed Grace and the growth of knowledge For the making sure our Calling and Election And for the storing up provisions of Faith and hope and love and comfort against the hour of suffering and of death 4. We must Redeem Time for the souls of every particular person that we have opportunity to do good to especially for children and servants and others whom God hath committed to our trust 5. For the wellfare of our own Bodies that they may be serviceable to our souls 6. And lastly for the Bodily wellfare of others And this is the order in which those works lye for which and in which our Time must be Redeemed The Price that Time must be Redeemed with is 1. Above all by our utmost Diligence That we be From what and at what price it must be Redeemed still doing and put forth all our strength and run as for our lives and whatever our hand shall find to do that we do it with our might remembring that there is no work nor device nor knowledge nor wisdom in the grave whither we go Eccl. 9. 10 Our sluggish ease is an easie price to be parted with for precious Time To Redeem it is not to call back Time past nor to stop Time in its hasty passage nor to procure a long life on earth but to save it as it passeth from being devoured and lost by sluggishness and sin 2. Time must be Redeemed from the hands and by the loss of sinful pleasures sports and revellings and all that is of it self or by accident unlawful from wantonness and licentiousness and vanity Rom. 13. 11 12 13 14. Both these are set together And that knowing the Time that now it is high time to awake out of sleep
the men on earth with all their power and all their wit are not able to recall one minute that is gone All the riches in this world cannot redeem it by reversing one of those hours or moments which you so prodigally cast away for nothing If you would cry and call after it till you tear your hearts it will not return Many a thousand have tryed this by sad experience and have cryed out too late O that we had now that Time again which we made so light of But none of them did ever attain their wish No more will you Take it therefore while you have it It is now as liberal to the poorest beggar as to the greatest Prince Time is as much yours as his Though in your youth and folly you spend as out of the full heap as if Time would never have an end you shall find it is not like the widdows oyl or the loaves and fishes multiplyed by a Miracle But the hour is at hand when you will wish you had gathered the fragments and the smallest crums that nothing of so precious a commodity had been lost even the little minutes which you thought you might neglect and be no losers Try whether you can stop the present moment or recall that which is gone by already before you vilifie or loiter away any more lest you repent too late § 17. Direct 10. Think also how exceeding little Time thou hast and how near thou allway standest Direct 10. to eternity Job 7. 1. Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth Are not his days also like the Ex ipsà vitâ discedimus tanquam ex hospitio non tanquam ex domo Commorandi enim nobis natura diversorium non habitandi domum dedit Cic. i◠Cat. Maj. days of an hireling Job 14. 1 2. Man that is born of a woman is of few days and full of trouble He cometh forth like a flower and is cut down He fleeth also as a shadow and continueth not Job 9. 25 26. Now my days are swifter than a post they flee away they see no good they are passed away as the swift ships as the Eagle that hasteth to the prey O what is this inch of hasty Time How quickly will it all be gone Look back on all the Time that 's past If thou have lived threescore or fourscore years what is it now Doth it not seem as yesterday since thou wast a child Do not days and nights wheel on apase O man how short is thy abode on earth How small a Time will leave thee in eternity What a small and hasty moment will bring thee to the state in which thou must remain for ever Every night is as the death or end of one of the few that are here allotted thee How little a while is it till thy mortal sickness Till thou must lie under languishing decays and pain Till thy vital powers shall give up their office and thy pulse shall cease and thy soul shall take its silent undiscerned flight and leave thy body to be hid in darkness and carried by thy friends to the common earth How short a Time is it betwixt this and the digging of thy grave Betwixt thy pleasures in the flesh and thy sad farewel when thou must say of all thy pleasures They are gone Betwixt thy cares and businesses for this world and thy entrance into another world where all these vanities are of no esteem How short is the Time between thy sin and thy account in judgement Between the pleasure and the pain And between the patient holiness of the Godly and their full reward of endless joys And can you spare any part of so short a life Hath God allotted you so little Time and can you spare the Devil any of that little Is it not all little enough for so great a work as is necessary to your safe and comfortable death O remember when sloth or pleasure would have any how little you have in all And out of how small a stock you spend How little you have for the one thing necessary The providing for eternal life And how unseasonable it is to be playing away time so neer the entrance into the endless world § 18. Direct 11. Remember also how uncertain that little Time is which you must have As you Direct 11. know it will be short so you know not how short You never yet saw the day or hour in which you were sure to see another And is it a thing becoming the Reason of a man to slug or cast away that day or hour which for ought he knows may be his last You think that though you are not certain yet you are likely to have more But nothing that is hazardous should be admitted in a business of such moment Yea when the longest life is short and when so frail a body liable to so many hundred maladies and casualties and so sinful a soul do make it probable as well as possible that the thred thy of life should be cut off ere long even much before thy natural period When so many score at younger years do come to the grave for one that arriveth at the ripeness of old age is not then the uncertainty of thy Time a great aggravation of the sinfullness of thy not-redeeming it If you were sure you had but one year to live it would perhaps make you so wise as to see that you had no Time to spare And yet do you wast it when you know not that you shall live another day Many a one is this week trifling away their Time who will be dead the next week who yet would have spent it better if they had thought but to have dyed the next year O man what if death come before thou hast made thy necessary preparation Where art thou then When Time is uncertain as well as short hast thou not work enough of weight to spend it on If Christ had set thee to attend and follow him in greatest holiness a thousand years shouldst thou not have gladly done it And yet canst thou not hold out for so short a life Canst thou not watch with him one hour He himself was provoked by the nearness of his death to a speedy dispatch of the works of his life And should not we Matth. 26. 18. He sendeth to prepare his last communion feast with his Disciples thus My time is at hand I will keep the passover at thy house with my Disciples And Luke 22. 15. With desire have I desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer So should you rather say My time is short my death is at hand and therefore it concerneth me to live in the knowledge and communion of God before I go hence into his presence especially when as Eccles. 9. 12. Man knoweth not his time Many thousands would have don◠better in their preparations if they had known the period of their time Matth. 24. 43. But know this
do all the good we do through much opposition and meet with great disadvantages and difficulties which may quickly stop such dull and backward hearts as ours If you will prefer your profit before your souls in the choice of your condition and will plunge your selves into distracting busyness and company your Time will run in a wrong unprofitable chanel § 44. Direct 6. Contrive before hand with the best of your skill for the preventing of impediments Direct 6. and for the most succesful performance of your work If you leave all to the very time of doing you will have many hinderances rise before you and make you lose your Time which prudent forecast might have prevented As for the improving of the Lords Day if you do not beforehand so order your business that all things may give place to holy duties you will meet with so many disturbances and temptations as will lose you much of your Time and benefit so for family duties and secret duties and meditation and studies and the works of your callings If you do not forecast what hindrance is like to meet you that you may prevent it before the time you must lose much Time and suffer much disappointment § 45. Direct 7. Endure patiently some smaller inconvenience and loss for the avoiding of greater and Direct 7. for the redeeming of Time for greater duties and let little things be resolutely cast out of your way when they would draw out your Time by insensible degrees The Devil would cunningly steal that from you by drops which he cannot get you to cast away profusely at once He that will not spend prodigally by the pounds may run out by not regarding pence You shall have the pretenses of decencie and seemliness and civility and good manners and avoiding offence and censure and of some necessity too to draw out your precious Time from you by little and little And if you are so easie as to yield it will almost all be wasted by this temptation As if you be Ministers of Christ whose Time must be spent in your studies and pulpits and in conference with your people and visiting them and watching over them and it is your daily groans that Time is short and work is long and that you are forced to omit so many needful studies and pass by so many needy souls for want of Time Yet if you look not well about you and will not bear some censure and offence you shall lose even the rest of the Time which now you do improve Your friends about you will be tempting and telling you O this friend must needs be visited and the other friend must be civilly treated you must not shake them off so quickly They look for more of your time and company you are much obliged to them they will say you are uncivil and morose such a scholar comes to be acquainted with you and he will take it ill and misrepresent you to others if you allow him not Time for some familiar discourse It s one that never was with you before and never took up any of your Time And so saith the next and the next as well as he Such a one visited you and you must needs visit him again There is this journey or that which must needs be gone and this business and that which must needs be done Yea ones very family-occasions will steal away all his Time if he watch not narrowly we shall have this servant to talk to and the other to hear and our Relations to respect and abundance of little things to mind so little as not to be named by themselves about meat and drink and cloaths and dressing and house and goods and servants and work and tradesmen and messengers and marketting and payments and cattle and a hundred things not to be reckoned up that will every one take up a little of your Time and those littles set together will be all As the covetous usurer that to purchase a place of Honour agreed for a month to give a penny to every one that asked him which being quickly noised abroad in the City there came so many for their pence as took all that he had and made him quit his place of Honour because he had nothing left to maintain it So perhaps you are an eminent much valued Minister and this draweth upon you such a multitude of acquaintance every one expecting a little of your Time that among them all they leave you allmost none for your studies whereby not only your Conscience is wounded but your parts are quenched and your work is starved and poorly done and so your admirers themselves begin to set as light by you as by others for that which is the effect of their own importunity And as in our yearly expences of our money there goeth near as much in little matters not to be named by themselves and incidental unexpected charges of which no account can be given beforehand as doth in food and rayment and the ordinary charges which we foreknow and reckon upon just so it will be with your precious Time if you be not very thrifty and resolute and look not well to it you will have such abundance of little matters scarce fit to be named which will every one require a little and one begin where the other endeth that you will find in the review when Time is gone that Satan was too cunning for you and cheated you by drawing you into seeming necessities This is the grand Reason why Marriage and House-keeping are so greatly inconvenient to a Pastor of the Church that can avoid them because they bring upon him such abundance of these little diversions which cannot be foreseen In this case a conscionable man in what calling soever must be Resolute And when he hath endeavoured with Reason to satisfie expectants and put by diversions if that will not serve he must neglect them and cast them off and break away though he lose by it in his estate or his repute or his peace it self and though he be censured for it to be imprudent uncivil morose or neglective of his friends God must be pleased who ever be displeased we must satisfie our minds with his alone approbation instead of all Time must be spared whatever be lost or wasted and the Great things must be done whatever become of the less Though where both may be done and the lesser hinder not the greater and rob us not of Time from necessary things there we must have a care of both § 46. Direct 8. Labour to go allwaies furnished and well provided for the performance of every duty Direct 8. which may occur As he that will not lose his Time in Preaching must be well provided so he that will not lose his Time in solitariness must be allwaies furnished with matter for profitable meditation And he that would Redeem his Time in company must be allwaies furnished with matter for profitable discourse He that is full will
strength are in their vigour and do not yet fail you And who should go fastest or work hardest but he that hath the greatest strength You may now get more by diligence in a day than hereafter you can get in many How few prove good Scholars or wise men that begin not to learn till they are old Fly youthful lusts therefore 2 Tim. 2. 22. Remember your Creator in the days of your youth Eccl. 12. 1. If you be now trained up in the way you should go you will not depart from it when you are old Prov 22. 6. O that you could but know what an unspeakable advantage and benefit and comfort it is to come to a ripe age with the provisions and furniture of that wisdom and holiness and acquaintance with God which should be attained in your youth and what a misery it is to be then to learn that which you should have been many years before in practising and to be then to begin to live when you must make an end much more to be cast to Hell if death should find you unready in your youth or to be forsaken of God to a hardened age Happy they that with Timothy and Obadiah do learn the Scripture and fear God in their Childhood and from their youth 1 King 18. 12. 2 Tim. 3. 15. § 63. Sort 2. Necessity maketh it incumbent on the weak and sick and aged in a special manner Sort 2. to Redeem their Time If they will not make much of it that are sure to have but a little and if they will trifle and loyter it away that know they are near their journeys end and ready to give up their accounts they are unexcusable above all others A Thief or Murderer will pray and speak good words when he is going out of the World Well may it be said to you as Paul doth Rom. 13. 11 12. Now it is high time to awake out of sleep when your salvation or damnation is so near It is high time for that man to look about him and prepare his soul and lose no time that is so speedily to appear before the most Holy God and be used for ever as he hath lived here § 64. Sort 3. It is specially incumbent on them to Redeem the Time who have loytered and Sort 3. mispent much time already If Conscience tell you that you have lost your youth in ignorance and vanity and much of your age in negligence and worldliness it is a double crime in you if you Redeem not diligently the Time that is left The just care of your salvation requireth it unless you 1 Pet. 4. 3. are willing to be damned Ingenuity and duty to God requireth it unless you will defie him and resolve to abuse and despise him to the utmost and spend all the time against him which he shall give you The nature of true Repentance requireth it unless you will know none but the Repentance of the damned and begin to Repent the mispending of your Time when it s gone and all is too late § 65. Sort 4. It is specially their duty to Redeem the Time who are scanted of time through poverty Sort 4. service or restraint If poor people that must labour all the day will not Redeem the Lords day and those few hours which they have they will then have no time at all for things spiritual servants that be not Masters of their time and are held close to their work had need to be very diligent in Redeeming those few hours which are allowed them for higher things Sort 5. § 66. Sort 5. Thâ—se that enjoy any special helps either publick or private must be specially carefull to improve them and Redeem the Time Do you live under a convincing powerful Ministry O improve it and Redeem the Time for you know not how soon they may be taken from you or you from them Do you live with Godly Relations Parents Husband Wife Masters in a Godly Family or with godly fellow-servants friends or Neighbours Redeem the time get somewhat by them every day you know not how short this season will be Do you live where you have Books and leisure Redeem the time This also may not be long Had not Ioshua been horribly unexcusable if he would have loitered when God made the Sun stand still while he pursued his enemies O loiter not you while the Sun of mercy patience means and helps do all attend you § 67. Sort 6. Those must especially Redeem the Time who are ignorant or graceless or weak in Sort 6. grace and have strong corruptions and little or no assurance of salvation and are unready to dye and have yet all or the most of their work to do If these loiter they are doubly to blame sure the Ephes. 2. 2. Time past of your lives may suffice to have loitered and done evil 1 Pet. 4. 3. Hath not the Devil had too much already Will ye stand all the day idle Mat. 20. 6. Look home and see what you have yet to do How much you want to a safe and comfortable death Hos. 10. 12. Sow to your selves in righteousness reap in mercy break up your fallow ground for it is time to seek the Lord till he come and rain righteousness upon you § 68. Sort 7. It much concerneth them to Redeem the Time who are in any office or have any Sort 7. opportunity of doing any special or publick good especially Magistrates and Ministers of Christ. Your life will not be long your office will not be long O bestir you against sin and Satan and for Christ and holiness while you may God will try you but a time Let Obadiah hide and feed the Prophets when he is called to it and while he may that God may hide him and not think to shift off duty and save himself to a better time saith Mordechai to Esther Esth. 9. 13 14. Think not with thy self that thou shalt escape in the Kings house more than all the Iews For if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise from another place but thou and thy Fathers house shall be destroyed and who knoweth whether thou art come to the Kingdom for such a time as this Are you Ministers O preach the Gospel while you may Redeem the time All times are your season so great a work and the worth of souls commandeth you to do it in season and out of season 2 Tim. 4. 2. A man that is to save many others from drowning or to quench a fire in the City is unexcusable above all men if he Redeem not time by his greatest diligence and speed § 69. Sort 8. Lastly it is specially incumbent on them to Redeem the time who being recovered Sort 8. from sickness or saved from any danger are under the obligation both of special mercy and special promises of their own who have promised God in the time of sickness or
understand the true nature and use of Recreations Labour to be acquainted Direct 2. just how much and what sort of Recreation is needful to your selves in particular In which you must have respect 1. To your bodily strength 2. To your minds 3. To your labours And when you have resolved on 't what and how much is needful and fit to help you in your duty allow it its proper time and place as you do your meals and see that you suffer it not to encroach upon your duty § 51. Direct 3. Ordinarily joyn profit and pleasure together that you lose no time I know not one Direct 3. person of an hundred or of many hundred that needeth any Game at all there are such variety of better exercises at hand to recreate them And it is a sin to idle away any time which we can better improve I confess my own nature was as much addicted to playfullness as most and my judgement alloweth me so much recreation as is needful to my Health and Labour and no more But for all that I find no need of any game to recreate me When my mind needeth recreation I have variety of recreating Books and Friends and business to do that And when my body needeth it the hardest Labour that I can bear is my best recreation walking is instead of games and sports as profitable to my body and more to my mind If I am alone I may improve that time in meditation If with others I may improve it in profitable cheerful conference I condemn not all sports or games in others but I find none of them all to be best for my self And when I observe how far the temper and life of Christ and his best servants was from such recreations I avoid them with the more suspition And I see but few but distaste it in Ministers even Shooting Bowling and such more healthful games to say nothing of Chess and such other as fit not the end of a recreation Therefore there is somewhat in it that nature it self hath some suspition of That student that needeth Chess or Cards to please his Mind I doubt hath a carnal empty mind If God and all his books and all his friends c. cannot suffice for this there is some disease in it that should rather be cured than pleased And for the Body it is another kind of exercise that profits it § 52. Direct 4. Watch against inordinate sensual Delight even in the Lawfullest sport Excess Direct 4. of pleasure in any such vanity doth very much corrupt and befool the mind It puts it out of relish with spiritual things and turneth it from God and Heaven and duty § 53. Direct 5. To this end keep a watch upon your thoughts and fantasies that they run not after Direct 5. sports and pleasures Else you will be like children that are thinking of their sport and longing to be at it when they should be at their Books or business § 54. Direct 6. Avoid the company of revellers gamesters and such time-wasters Come not Direct 6. among them lest you be ensnared Accompany your selves with those that delight themselves in God 2 Tim. 2. 22. § 55. Direct 7. Remember death and judgement and the necessities of your souls Usually these Direct 7. Eccles. 2. 2. sports seem but foolishness to serious men And they say of this mirth as Solomon it is madness And it is great and serious subjects which maketh serious men Death and the world to come when they are soberly thought on do put the mind quite out of rellish with foolish pleasures § 56. Direct 8. Be painful in your honest Callings Laziness breedeth a love of sports when Direct 8. you must please your slothful flesh with ease then it must be further pleased with vanities § 57. Direct 9. Delight in your relations and family duties and mercies If you love the company Direct 9. and converse of your Parents or Children or Wives or Kindred as you ought you will find more pleasure in discoursing with them about holy things or honest business than in foolish sports But Adulterers that love not their Wives and unnatural Parents and Children that love not one another and ungodly Masters of Families that love not their duty are put to seek their sport abroad § 58. Direct 10. See to the sanctifying of all your Recreations when you have chosen such as are Direct 10. truly suited to your need and go not to them before you need nor use them not beyond your need See also that you lift up your hearts secretly to God for his blessing on them and mix them all along as far as you can with holy things as with holy Thoughts or holy Speeches As for Musick which is a lawful pleasure I have known some think it prophaness to use it privately or publickly with a Psalm that scrupled not using it in common mirth When as all our mirth should be as much sanctified as is possible All should be done to the Glory of God And we have much more in Scripture for the Holy Use of Musick publick and private than for any other use of it whatever And it is the excellency of Melody and Musick that they are recreations which may be more aptly and profitably sanctified by application to holy uses than any other And I should think them little worth at all if I might not use them for the holy exhilerating or elevating of my soul or affecting it towards God or exciting it to duty Direct 11. § 59. Direct 11. The sickly and the Melancholy who are usually least inclined to sport have much more need of Recreation than others and therefore may allow it a much larger time than those that are in health and strength Because they take it but as Physick to recover them to health being to abate again when they are recovered § 60. Direct 12. Be much more severe in regulating your selves in your recreations than in censuring Direct 12. others for using some sports which you mislike For you know not perhaps their case and reasons and temptations But an idle Time-wasting sensual sporter every one should look on with pity as a miserable wretch PART III. Directions about Apparel and against the Sin therein committed § 1. Direct 1. FItness is the first thing to be respected in your Apparel to make it a means to Direct 1. the end to which it is appointed The Ends of Apparel are 1. To keep the body warm 2. To keep it from being hurt 3. To adorn it soberly so far as beseemeth the common dignity of humane nature and the special dignity of your places 4. To hide those parts which nature hath made your shame and modesty commandeth you to cover § 2. The Fitness of Apparel consisteth in these things 1. That it be fitted to your Bodies as your Shoo to your foot your Hat to your head c. 2. That it be suited to your
he shall serve me He that worketh Deceit shall not dwell within my House He that telleth lyes shall not tarry in my sight Prov. 3. 33. The Curse of the Lord is in the House of the wicked but he blesseth the Habitation of the Iust. LONDON Printed by Robert White for Nevill Simmons at the Sign of the Princes-Arms in St. Pauls Church-yard 1673. To all that fear God in the Burrough and Parish of Kederminster in Worcestershire Dear Friends YOU are the Only People that ever I took a special Pastoral Charge of And Gods blessing and your Obedience to his Word do make the remembrance of my Labours and Converse with you to be sweet It was neither by Your Will or Mine that we have been this twelve years separated nor that we yet continue so I thank our most Gracious God who maugre all the Serpents Malice hath Inwardly and Outwardly so well provided for you above most others as that I hope you will be no losers by any thing which hath yet befallen you That I have hitherto survived so many of my departed Friends both with you and elsewhere after all that you have known is my own wonder as well as yours And what I have been doing in this time of our separation I have formerly told you in part by some other Writings and now tell you more by this which was written about five or six years ago though it found not passage into the world till now I live not yet Idle But whether this be the way of my chiefest service to the Church of God in my present case some distant Censurers have questioned If it be not my Ignorance of my duty and of what will be most useful to others is the cause and not my Love of Ease or my obeying Man rather than God I judge that my chief duty which I think is likest to do most good I am glad that once more before I dye I have opportunity to speak to you at this distance and to perswade you to and Direct you in that Family Holiness and Righteousness which hath been so much of your Comfort and Honour and will be so while you faithfully continue it O how happy a state is it to have God dwell in your Families by his Love and Blessing and Rule them by his Word and Spirit and Protect them by his Power and Delight in them and they in Him as his Churches preparing for the Coelestial Delights O how much of the Interest of true Religion must be kept up in the world by the Holiness and Diligence of Christian Families How happy a supply doth it afford where there are sad defects in the Teaching Holiness and Discipline of the Churches O that the Rulers of Families who are silenced by no others did not silence themselves from that Instructing and Prayer which is their work I should be sorry that this Directory is so Voluminous that few of you can buy it but that more Ends than One in such works must be intended If any of you which God forbid shall shew by an ungodly life that you have forgotten the Doctrine which was taught you or if more yet shall traduce the Doctrine of your once unworthy Teacher Posterity shall here see what it was in this Record which may remain and preach when I am yet more silenced in the dust The Lord whom we have served though with lamentable defects and in whom though alas too weakly we have trusted preserve us in the Life of Faith Hope and Love in Sincerity Zeal and patient Constancy to the Glorious Life where we hope to behold in Perfect Love without the fear of death or separation our most Blessed Head and God for ever Amen Totteridge near Barnet Feb. 10. 1671 2. Your Servant in Willingness Richard Baxter A Christian Directory TOM II. Christian Oeconomicks CHAP. I. Directions about Marriage for Choice and Contract AS the Persons of Christians in their privatest capacities are Holy as being Dedicated and separated unto God so also must their Families be HOLINESS TO THE LORD must be as it were written on their Doors and on their Relations their Possessions and Affairs To which it is requisite 1. That there be a Holy Constitution of their Families 2. And a holy Government of them and discharge of the several duties of the Members of the Family To the right constituting of a Family belongeth 1. The right contracting of Marriage and 2. The right choice and contract betwixt Masters and their Servants For the first § 2. Direct 1. Take heed that neither lust nor rashness do thrust you into a marryed condition before Direct 1. you see such Reasons to invite you to it as may assure you of the Call and approbation of God For 1. It is God that you must serve in your Marryed state and therefore it is meet that you take his counsel before you rush upon it For he knoweth best himself what belongeth to his service 2. And it is God that you must still depend upon for the blessing and comforts of your relation And therefore there is very great reason that you take his advice and consent as the chief things requisite to the match If the Consent of Parents be necessary much more is the Consent of God § 3. Quest. But how shall a man know whether God call him to Marriage or consent unto it Hath Quest. he not here left all men to their liberties as in a thing indifferent Answ. God hath not made any Universal Law commanding or forbidding Marriage but in this Answ. Whether Marriage be indifferent regard hath left it indifferent to mankind yet not allowing all to marry for undoubtedly to some it is unlawful But he hath by other General Laws or Rules directed men to know in what cases it is lawful and in what cases it is a sin As every man is bound to choose that condition in which he may serve God with the best advantages and which tendeth most to his spiritual welfare and increase in Holiness Now there is nothing in Marriage it self which maketh it commonly inconsistent with these benefits and the fulfilling of these Laws And therefore it is said that He that Marrieth doth well that is he doth that which of it self is not unlawful and which to some is the 1 Cor 7. 7 3◠most eligible state of life But there is something in a single life which maketh it especially to Preachers and persecuted Christians to be more usually the most advantagious state of life to these Ends of Christianity And therefore it is said that He that marrieth not doth better And yet to individual persons it is hard to imagine how it can choose but be either a duty or a sin at least except in some unusual cases For it is a thing of so great moment as to the ordering of our hearts and lives that it is hard to imagine that it should ever be indifferent as a means to our main end but
be proportionable to your possessions John 15. 5. Mar. 12. 41. Luke 12. 48. Do as much more good in the world than the poor as you are better furnished for it than they Let your servants have more time for the learning of Gods Word and let your families be the more religiously instructed and governed To whom God giveth much from them he doth expect much Direct 12. Direct 12. Do not only take occasions of doing good when they are thrust upon you but study how to do all the good you can as those that are zealous of good works Tit. 2. 14. Zeal of good Matth. 5. 16. Gal. 6. 7 8 9 10. 1 Pet. 2. 12. Heb. 10. 24. Tit. 3. 8 14. 2. 7. Ephes. 2. 10. 1 Tim. 2. 10. 5. 10. Acts 9. 36. works will make you 1. Plot and contrive for them 2. Consult and ask advice for them 3. It will make you glad when you meet with a hopeful opportunity 4. It will make you do it largely and not sparingly and by the halves 5. It will make you do it speedily without unwilling backwardness and delay 6. It will make you do it constantly to your lives end 7. It will make you pinch your own flesh and suffer somewhat your selves to do good to others 8. It will make you Labour in it as your Trade and not only consent that others do good at your charge 9. It will make you glad when good is done and not to grudge at what it cost you 10. In a word it will make your neighbours to be to you as your selves and the Pleasing of God to be above your selves and therefore to be as glad to do good as to receive it Direct 13. Do good both to mens souls and bodies but alwayes let bodily benefits be conferred in Direct 13. order to those of the soul and in due subordination and not for the body alone And observe the many other Rules of Good Works more largely laid down Tom. 1. Cap. 3. Direct 10. Direct 14. Ask your selves often How you shall wish at death and judgement your estates had been Direct 14. laid out and accordingly now use them Why should not a man of Reason do that which he knoweth before hand he shall vehemently wish that he had done Direct 15. As your care must be in a special manner for your children and families so take heed Direct 15. of the common error of worldlings who think their children must have so much as that God and their own souls have very little When selfish men can keep their wealth no longer to themselves they leave it to their children who are as their surviving selves And all is cast into this gulf except some inconsiderable parcels Direct 16. Direct 16. Keep daily account of your use and improvement of your Masters Talents Not that Mat. 25. 14 15 you should too much remember your own good works but remember to do them and therefore ask your selves What Good have I done with all that I have this Day or Week Direct 17. Look not for long life for then you will think that a long journey needeth great provisions Direct 17. But dye daily and live as those that are going to give up their account And then Conscience 1 Tim. 6. 18. 1 Cor. 4. 1 2. Luke 16. 10. will force you to ask whether you have been faithful Stewards and to lay up a treasure in Heaven and to make you friends of the Mammon that others use to unrighteousness and to lay up a good foundation for the time to come and to be glad that God hath given you that the improvement of 1 Tim. 5. 25. which may further the good of others and your salvation Living and Dying let it be your care and business to Do Good CHAP. XXIX Directions for the Aged and weak HAving before opened the Duties of Children to God and to their Parents I shall give no other particular Directions to the Young but shall next open the special Duties of the Aged § 1. Direct 1. The old and weak have a lowder call from God than others to be accurate Direct 1. in examining the state of their souls and making their calling and election sure Whether they Iâ— Augustines speech to the people of Hippo for Fradius his succession he saith In Infantiâ spâ—raâ—ur pueritia in pueritia speratur adolescentia in adolescentià spâ—râ—â—ur juventuâ— in juventure speratur gravitas in gravitate speratur senectus Utrum contingat incertum est est tamen quod sperâ—tur Senâ—ctus autem alâ—am â—â—atem quam speret non habet Vid. Papâ—r Massoâ— in vita Coelâ—sti fol. 58. are yet Regenerate and Sanctified or not is a most important question for every man to get resolved but especially for them that are nearest to their end Ask counsel therefore of some able faithful Minister or friend and set your selves diligently to try your Title to eternal life and to cast up your accounts and see how all things stand between God and you And if you should find your selves in an unrenewed state as you love your souls delay no longer but presently be humbled for your so long and sotâ—ish neglect of so necessary and great a work Go open your case to some able minister and lament your sin and fly to Christ and set your hearts on God as your felicity and change your company and course and rest not any longer in so dangerous and miserable a case The more full Directions for your Conversion I have given before in the beginning of the Book and in divers others and therefore shall say no more to such it being others that I am here especially to Direct § 2. Direct 2. Cast back your eyes upon the sins of all your life that you may perceive how humble Direct 2. those souls should be that have sinned so long as you have done and may feel what need you have of Christ to pardon so long a life of sin Though you have repented and been justified long ago yet you have daily sinned since you were Justified And though all be forgiven that is repented of yet must it be still before your eyes both to keep you humble and continue the exercise of that Repentance and drive you to Christ and make you thankful Yea your forgiveness and Iustification are yet short of perfection whatever some may tell you to the contrary as well as your sanctification For 1. Your Justification is yet given you but conditionally as to its continuance even upon condition of your perseverance 2. And the temporal chastisement and the pains of death and the long absence of the body from Heaven and the present wants of grace and comfort and communion with God are punishments which are not yet forgiven executively 3. And the final sentence of Justification at the day of Judgement which is the perfectest sort is yet to come And therefore you have
XXX Directions for the Sick THough the chief part of our preparation for Death be in the time of Health and it is a work for which the longest life is not too long yet because the folly of unconverted sinners is so great as to forget what they were born for till they see Death at hand and because there is a special preparation necessary for the best I shall here lay down some Directions for the sick And I shall reduce them to these four heads 1. What must be done to make Death safe to us that it may be our passage to Heaven and not to Hell 2. What must be done to make sickness profitable to us 3. What must be done to make Death comfortable to us that we may Dye in Peace and Ioy 4. What must be done to make our Sickness Profitable to others about us Tit. 1. Directions for a safe Death to secure our Salvation THe Directions of this sort are especially necessary to the unconverted impenitent sinner yet needful also to the Godly themselves and therefore I shall distinctly speak to both 1. Directions for an uncoverted sinner in his sickness It is a very dreadful case to be found by sickness in an unconverted state There is so Great a work to be done and so little time to do it in and soul and body so unfit and undisposed for it and the misery so great even everlasting torment that will follow so certainly and so quickly if it be undone that one would think it should overwhelm the understanding and heart of any man with astonishment and horrour to foresee such a condition in the time of his health much more to find himself in it in his sickness And though one would think that the near approach of Death and the nearness of another world should be unresistibly powerful to convert a sinner so that few or none shold Die unconverted however they lived yet Scripture and sad experience declare the contrary that most men Die as well as live in an unsanctified and miserable state For 1. A life of sin doth usually settle a man in Ignorance or Unbelief or both so that sickness findeth him in such a dungeon of Darkness that he is but lost and confounded in his fears and knoweth not whither he is going nor what he hath to do 2. And also sin wofully Hardeneth the Heart and the long resisted spirit of God forsaketh them and giveth them over to themselves in sickness who would not be ruled and sanctified by him in their health And such remain like blocks or beasts even to the last 3. And the Nature of sickness and approaching death doth tend more to affright than to renew the soul and rather to breed fear and trouble than Love And though Grief and fear be good preparatives and helps yet it is the Love of God and Holiness in which the souls Regeneration and Renovation doth consist and there is no more Holiness than there is Love and Willingness And many a one that is affrighted into strong Repentings and cryes and prayers and promises and seem to themselves and others to be Converted do yet either Die in their sins and misery or return to their unholy lives when they recover being utter strangers to that true Repentance which reneweth the heart as sad experience doth too often testifie 4. And many poor sinners finding that they have so short a time do end it in meer amazement and terrour not knowing how to compose their thoughts to examine their hearts and lives nor to exercise faith in Christ nor to follow any Directions that are given them but lye in trembling and astonishment wholly taken up with the fears of Death much worse than a beast that is going to be butchered 5. And the very pains of the body do so divert or hinder the thoughts of many that they can scarce mind any spiritual things with such a composedness as is necessary to so great a work 6. And the greatest number being partly confounded in ignorance and partly withheld by backwardness and undisposedness and partly disheartned by thinking it impossible to become new-creatures and get a regenerate heavenly heart on such a sudden do force themselves to hope that they shall be saved without it and that though they are sinners yet that kind of Repentance which they have will serve the turn and be accepted and God will be more merciful than to damn them And this false Hope they think they are necessitated to take up For there is but two other wayes to be taken The one is utterly to Despair and both Scripture and Reason and Nature it self are against that The other way is to be truly converted and won to the Love of God and Heaven by a lively faith in Iesus Christ And they have no such faith and to this they are strange and undisposed and think it impossible to be done And if they must have no Hopes but upon such terms as these they think they shall have none at all Or else if they hear that there is no other Hope and that none but the holy can be saved they will force themselves to hope that they have all this and that they are truly converted and become new creatures and do Love God and holiness above all not because indeed it is so but because they would have it so for fear of being damned And instead of finding that they they are void of faith and Love and Holiness and labouring to get a renewed soul they think it a nearer way to make themselves believe that it is so already And thus in their presumption self-deceiving and false hopes they linger out that little time that is left them to be converted in till death open their eyes and hell do undeceive them 7. And the same Devil and wicked men his instruments that kept them in health from true Repentance will be as diligent to keep them from it in their sickness and will be loth to lose all at the last cast which they had been winning all the time before And if the Devil can but keep them in his power till sickness come and take them up with pain and fear he will hope to keep them a few dayes longer till he have finished that which he had begun and carryed on so far And if there be here and there one that will be held no longer by false hopes and presumption he will at last think to take them off by desperation and make them believe that there is no remedy § 4. And indeed it is a thing so difficult and unlikely to convert a sinner in all his pain and weakness at the last that even the Godly friends of such do many times even let them alone as thinking that there is little or no hope But this is a very sinful course As long as there is life there is some hope And as long as there is hope we must use the means A Physicion will try the best Remedies
grace and hopes which he hath given you through Christ I know that a pained languishing body is undisposed to express the comforts of the soul But yet as long as the soul is the Commander they may be expressed in some good measure though not with such vivacity and alacrity as in health Behave your selves before all as those that are going to dwell with Christ If you shew them that you take Heaven for a real felicity it will do much to draw them to do so too Shew them the difference between the death of the righteous and of the wicked and that may so draw them to desire to dye the death of the Righteous that it may draw them also to resolve to live their lives How many souls might it win to God if they saw in his dying servants such confidence and joy as beseemeth men that are entering into a world of joy and peace and blessedness If we went out of the body as from a Prison into liberty and from a tedious journey to our desired home it would invite sinners to seek after the same felicity and be a powerful Sermon to convert the inconsiderate § 4. Direct 3. Now tell poor sinners of the vanity of the world and of all its glory wealth and pleasure Direct 3. and of the mischief and deceitfulness of sin Say to them O Sirs you may see in me what the world is worth If you had all the wealth and pleasure that you desire thus it would turn you off and forsake you in the end It will ease no pain It will bring no peace to a troubled soul It will not lengthen your lives an hour It will not save you from the wrath of God It maketh your death the sadder because you must be taken from it Your account will be the more dreadfull O Love not such a vain deceitful world Sell not your souls for so poor a price Forsake it before you are forsaken by it O make not light of any sin Though the wanton flesh would have you take it for a harmless thing you cannot imagine when the pleasure is gone how sharp a sting is left behind Sin will be then no jeasting matter when your souls are going hence into the dreadful presence of the Most Holy God § 5. Direct 4. Now tell those about you of the Excellency and Necessity of the Love of God of Heaven Direct 4. of Christ and of a holy life Though these may be made light of at a distance yet a soul that is drawing near them will be more awakened to understand their worth say to them O friends I find now more than ever I did before that it is only God that is the end and happiness of souls Nothing but his favour through Iesus Christ can comfort and content a dying man And none but Christ can reconcile us to God and answer for our sins and make us acceptable And no way but that of faith and holiness will end in happiness Opinions and customary forms in Religion will not serve the turn To be of this or that Party or Church or Communion will not save you It is only the soul that is justified by Christ and sanctified by his Spirit and brought up to the Love of God and holiness that shall be saved What ever Opinion or Church you are of without Holiness you shall never see God to your comfort as without faith it is impossible to please him Heb. 12. 14. 11. 6. Rom. 8. 6 7 8 9. O now what a miserable case were I in if I had all the wealth and honour in the world and had not the favour of God and a Christ to purchase it and his Spirit to witness it and prepare me for a better life Now I see the difference between spending time in Holiness and in sin between a godly and a worldly fleshly careless life Now I would not for a thousand worlds that I had spent my life in sensuality and ungodliness and continued a stranger to the life of faith Now if I had a world I would give it to be more holy O Sirs believe it when you come to dye sin will be then sin indeed and Christ and Grace will be better than riches and to dye in an unregenerate unsanctified state will be a greater misery than any heart can now conceive § 6. Direct 5. Endeavour also to make men know the difference between the godly and the wicked Direct 5. Tell them I nâ—w see who maketh the wisest choice O happy men that choose the joyes which have no end and lay up their treasure in Heaven where rust and moths do not corrupt and thieves do not break through and steal and labour for the food that never perisheth Matth. 6. 19 20. John 6. 27. O foolish sinners that for an inch of fleshly filthy pleasure do lose everlasting Rest and joy What shall it profit them that win all the world and lose their souls § 7. Direct 6. Labour also to convince men of the pretiousness of Time and the folly of putting off Direct 6. Repentance and a holy life till the last Say to them O friends it is hard for you in the time of health and prosperity to judge of Time according to its worth But when Time is gone or near an end how pretious doth it then appear Now if I had all the Time again which ever I spent in unnecessary sleep or sports or curiosities or idleness or any needless thing how highly should I value it and spend it in another manner than I have done Of all my life that is past and gone I have no comfort now in the remembrance of one hour but what was spent in obedience to God O take Time to make sure of your salvation before it s gone and you are left under the tormenting feeling of your loss § 8. Direct 7. Labour also to make them understand the sinfulness of sloth and of loytering in the Direct 7. matters of God and their salvation and stir them up to do it with all their might Say to them I have often heard ungodly people deride or blame the diligence and zeal and strictness of the godly But if they saw and felt what I see and feel they could not do it Can a man that is going into another world imagine that any thing is so worthy of his greatest zeal and labour as his God and his salvation Or blame men for being loth to burn in Hell Or for taking more pains for their souls than for their bodies O friends let fools talk what they will in their sleep and frenzy as you love your souls do not think any care or cost or pains too great for your salvation If they think not their labour too good for this world do not you think yours too good for a better world Let them now say what they will when they come to dye there is none of them all that is not quite forsaken of
sense and reason but will wish that they had Loved God and sought and served him not formally in hypocritical complement but with all their heart and soul and might § 9. Direct 8. Labour also to fortifie the minds of your friends against all fears of suffering for Direct 8. Christ and all impatience in any of their afflictions Say to them The sufferings as well as the pleasures of this life are s◠short that they are not worthy once to be compared with the durable things of the life to come If I have past through a life of want and toil if my body hath endured painful sickness if I have suffered never so much from men and been used cruelly for the sake of Christ what the worse am I now when all is past Would an easie honourable plentiful life have made my death either the safer or the sweeter O no! It is the things eternal that are indeed significant and regardable Neither pleasure nor pain that is short is of any great regard Make sure of the Everlasting pleasures and you have done your work O live by faith and not by sense Look not at the temporal things which are seen It is not your concernment whether you are rich or poor in honour or dishonour in health or sickness but whether you be justified and sanctified and shall live with God in Heaven for ever Such serious counsels of dying men may make their sickness more fruitful than their health CHAP. XXXI Directions to the Friends of the Sick that are about them § 1. Direct 1. WHen you see the sickness or death of your friends take it as Gods warning Direct 1. to you to prepare for the same your selves Remember that thus it must be with you Thus are you like to lye in pain and thus will all the world forsake you and nothing of all your honour or wealth will afford you any comfort This will be the end of all your pleasures of your greatness and your houses and lands and attendance and of all your delicious meats and drinks and of all your mirth and play and recreations Thus must your carkasses be forsaken of your souls and laid in a grave and there lie rotting in the dark and your souls appear before your Judge to be sentenced to their endless state This certainly will be your case and O how quickly will it come Then what will Christ and Grace be worth Then nothing but the favour of God can comfort you Then whether will it be better to you to look back on a holy well-spent life or upon a life of fleshly ease and pleasure Then had you rather be a Saint or a Sensualist Lay this to heart and let the house of mourning make you better and live as one that looks to dye § 2. Direct 2. Use the best means for the recovery of the sick which the ablest Physicions shall advise Direct 2. you to as far as you are able Take heed of being guilty of the Pride and folly of many self-conceited ignorant persons who are ready to thrust every Medicine of their own upon their friends in sickness when they neither know the nature of the sickness or the cure Many thousands are brought to their death untimely by the folly of their nearest friends who will needs be medicining them and ruling them and despising the Physicion as if they were themselves much wiser than he when they are meerly ignorant of what they do As ignorant Sectaries despise Divines and set up themselves as better Preachers so many silly Women despise Physicions and when they have got a few Medicines which they know not the nature of nor how to use they take themselves for the better Physicions and the lives of their poor friends must pay for their pride and folly No means must be trusted to instead of God but the best must be used in subservience unto God And one would think that a small measure of wit and humility might serve to make silly women understand that they that never bestowed one year in the study of Physick are not so likely to understand it as those that have studied and practised it a great part of their lives It is sad to see people kill their dearest friends in kindness even by that ignorance and proud selfconceitedness which also maketh them the destroyers of their own souls § 3. Quest. But seeing God hath appointed all mens time what good can Physick do If God hath Quest. appointed them to live they shall live and if he have appointed them to dye it is not Physick that can save them Answ. This is the foolish reasoning of wicked people about their salvation If God have appointed Answ. me to salvation I shall be saved if he have not all my diligence will do no good But such people know not what they talk of God hath made your duty more open and known to you than his own decrees And you separate those things which he hath joyned together As God hath appointed no man to salvation simply without respect to the means of salvation so God hath appointed no man to live but by the means of life His Decree is not Such a man shall be saved or Such a man shall live so long only But this is his Decree Such a man shall be saved in the way of faith and holiness and in the diligent use of means and Such a man shall live so long by the use of those means which I have fitted for the preservation of his life So that as he that liveth a holy life may be sure he is chosen to salvation if he persevere and he that is ungodly may be sure that he is in the way to Hell so he that neglecteth the means of his health and life doth shew that it is unlike that God hath appointed him to live and he that useth the best means is liker to recover though the best will not cure uncurable Diseases nor make a man immortal The reasoning is the same as if you should say If God have appointed me to live so long I shall live though I neither eat nor drink But if he have not eating and drinking will not prolong my life But you must know that God doth not only appoint you to live that is but half his Decree but he decreeth that you shall live by eating and drinking § 4. Direct 3. Mind your friends betimes to make their Wills and prudently by good advice to settle Direct 3. their estates that they may leave no occasion of contending about it when they are dead This should be done in health because of the uncertainty of life But if it be undone till sickness it should then be done betimes The neglect of it oft causeth much sinful contending about worldly things even among those near relations who should live in the greatest amity and peace § 5. Direct 4. Keep away vain company from them as far as you can conveniently
been tempted to But you are sure that Heaven is better than Earth and that it is far better for them to be with Christ. 6. You allwayes knew that your friends must die To grieve that they were mortal is but to grieve that they were but men 7. If their mortality or death be grievous to you you should rejoice that they are arrived at the state of Immortality where they must Live indeed and die no more 8. Remember how quickly you must be with them again The expectation of living long your selves is the cause of your excessive grief for the death of friends If you lookt your selves to die to morrow or within a few weeks you would lâ—ss grieve that your friends are gone before you 9. Remember that the world is not for one Generation only Others must have our places when we are gone God will be served by successive Generations and not only by one 10. If you are Christians indeed it is the highest of all your Desires and Hopes to be in Heaven And will you so grieve that your friends are gone thither where you most Desire and Hope to be § 19. Obj. All this is reason if my friend were gone to Heaven But he dyed impenitently and Object how should I be comforted for a soul that I have cause to think is damned Answ. Their misery must be your grief But not such a grief as shall deprive you of your greater Answ. Joyes or disable you for your greater duties 1. God is fitter than you to judge of the measures Helps to moderate our sorrow for the dâ—mned of his mercy and his judgements and you must neither pretend to be more merciful than he nor to reprehend his Justice 2. All the works of God are Good and all that is Good is amiable Though the misery of the creature be Bad to it yet the works of Justice declare the Wisdom and Holiness of God and the perfecter we are the more they will be amiable to us For 3 God himself and Christ who is the merciful Saviour of the World approve of the damnation of the finally ungodly 4. And the Saints and Angels in Heaven do know more of the misery of the souls in Hell than we do And yet it abateth not their Joyes And the perfecter any is the more he is like-minded unto God 5. How glad and thankful should you be to think that God hath delivered your selves from those eternal flâ—mes The misery of others should excite your Thankfulness 6. And should not the Joyes of all the Saints and Angels be your Ioy as well as the sufferings of the wicked be your sorrows But above all the thoughts of the Blessedness and Glory of God himself should over-top all the concernments of the creature with you If you will mourn more for the Thieves and Murderers that are hanged than you will rejoice in the Justice prosperity and honour of the King and the wellfare of all his faithful subjects you behave not your selves as faithful subjects 7. Shortly you hope to come to Heaven Mourn now for the damned as you shall do then or at least let not the difference be too great when that and not this is your perfect state A Form of Exhortation to the Ungodly in their Sickness or those that we fear are such DEar Friend The God that must dispose of us and all things doth threaten by this sickness to call away your soul and put an end to the time of your pilgrimage and therefore your friends that Love and pity you must not now be silent if they can speak any thing for your preparation and salvation because it must be Now or Never When a few days are past they must never have any such opportunity more If now we prevail not with you you are likely to be quickly out of hearing and past our advice and help for ever And because I know your weakness bids me be but short and your memory is not to be burdened with too much and yet your Necessity must not be neglected I shall reduce all that I have to say to you to these four heads 1. Of the change which you seem near to and the world which you are going to 2. Of the Preparation that must be made by all that will be saved and who they be that the Gospel doth Iustifie or Condemn 3. I would fain help you to understand which of these conditions you are in and what will become of your soul if it thus goeth hence And 4. If your case be bad I would direct you how you may come out of it and what is yet to be done while there remaineth any time and hope And I pray you set your heart to what I say for I will speak nothing but the certain truth of God revealed to the world by his son and spirit expressed in the Scripture and believed by all the Church of Christ. I. God knoweth the change is great which you are near You are leaving this world where you have spent the dayes of your preparation for eternity and leaving this flesh to corrupt and turn to common earth and must here converse with man no more You are going now to see that world which the Gospel told you of and you have often heard of but neither you nor we did ever see Before your friends have laid your body in the grave your soul must enter into its endless state and at the Resurrection your Body be joyned with it Either Heaven or Hell must be your lot for ever If it be Heaven you will there find a world of Light and Love and Peace A world of Angels and glorified souls who are all made perfect in Knowledge and Holiness living in the perfect flames of Love to their Glorious Creator Redeemer and Regenerater And with them you will be thus perfected your self your soul will see the Glory of God and be rapt up in his Love and filled with his Joyes and employed triumphantly in his Maâ— 13. 2 Thes 1. 6 7 8 9 10 11. praises and this for ever If Hell should be your portion you will there be thrust away as a hated thing from the face of God and there you will find a world of Devils and unholy damned miserable souls among whom you must dwell in the flames of the wrath of God and the horrours of your own Conscience remembring with anguish the mercy which you once rejected and the warnings and time which once you lost and at the Resurrection your Soul and Body must be reunited and live there in torment and despair for ever I know these things are but half believed by the â—ngodly world while they profess to believe them And therefore they must feel that which they refuseâ— to believe But God hath revealed it to us and we will believe our Maker You are now going to see the great difference between the end of Holiness and of sin between the Godly and the ungodly and to
united your Heart unto himself and turned it from sin to Holiness from the world to God and from Earth to Heaven and made you a new creature to live for Heaven as you did for earth Surely this is not so small and indiscernable a work or change but he that hath felt it on himself may know it It is a great work to bring a sinner to feel his unrighteousness and misery and to apply himself to Christ for Righteousness and life It is a great work to take off the heart from all the felicity of this world and to set it unfeignedly upon God and to cause him to place and seek his happiness in another world what ever become of all the prosperity or pleasure of the flesh It is thus with every true Believer for all the remnant of his sins and weaknesses And may you not know whether it be thus or not with you One of these is your case And it 's now time to know which of them it is when God is ready to tell you by his judgement If indeed you are in Christ and his Spirit be in you and hath renewed you and sanctified you and turned your heart and life to God I have then nothing more than Peace and Comfort to speak to you as in the following Exhortation But if it be otherwise and you are yet in a carnal state and were never renewed by the spirit of Christ Will you give me leave to deal faithfully with you as is necessary with one in your condition and to set before you at once your sin and your Remedy and to tell you what yet you must do if you will be saved IV. And first will you here lay to heart your folly and unfeignedly lament your sinful life before the Lord Not only this or that particular sin but principally your fleshly heart and life that in the main you have lived to this corruptible flesh and loved and sought and served the world before your God and the happiness of your soul. Alas friend did you not know that you had an immortal soul that must live in joy or misery for ever Did you not know that you were made to Love and serve and honour your maker and that you had the little time of this life given you to try and prepare you for your endless life and that as you lived here it must go with you in heaven or hell for ever If you did not believe these things why did you not come and give your Reasons against them to some judicious Divine that was able to have shewed you the Evidence of their truth If you did believe them alas how was it possible that you could forget them Could you believe a Heaven and a Hell and not regard them or suffer any transitory worldly vanity to be more regarded by you Did you know what you had to do in the world and yet is it all undone till now Were you never warned of this day Did never Preacher nor Scripture nor book nor friend nor conscience tell you of your end and tell you what would be the fruit of sin and of your contempt and slighting of Christ and of his grace Did you know that you must Love God above the world if ever you would be saved and that you must to that end be partaker of Christ and renewed by his spirit and yet would you let out your heart upon the world and follow the bruitish pleasures of the flesh and never earnestly seek after that Christ and spirit that should thus renew and sanctifie you Do you not think now that it had been wiser to have sought Christ and grace and set your affections first on the things above and to have made sure work for your soul against such a day as this than to have hardened your heart against Gods grace and despised Christ and Heaven and your salvation for a thing of nought You see now what it was that you preferred before Heaven what have you now got by all your sinful Love of the world where now is all your fleshly pleasure Will it all now serve turn to save you from death or the wrath of God and everlasting misery will it now go with you to another world Or do you think it will comfort a soul in Hell to remember the wealth which he gathered and left behind him upon earth would it not now have been much more comfortable to you if you could say My dayes were spent in Holiness in the Love of my dear Redeemer and in the hearty service of my God in praising him and praying to him in learning and obeying his holy word and will My business in the world was to please God and seek a better world and while I followed my lawful trade or calling my eye was chiefly on eternal life Instead of pleasing the flesh I delighted my soul in the Love and praise and service of my Redeemer and in the hopes of my eternal blessedness and now I am going to enjoy that God and happiness which I believ'd and sought Would not this be more comfortable to you now than to look back on your time as spent in a worldly fleshly life which you preferred before your God and your salvation Christ would not have forsaken you in the time of your extremity as the world doth if you had cleaved faithfully to him You little know what peace and comfort you might have found even on earth in a holy life How sweet would the word of God have been to you How sweet would prayer and meditation and holy conference have been Do you think it is not more pleasant to a true Believer to read the promises of eternal life and to think and talk of that blessed state when they shall dwell with God in Ioy for ever than it was to you to think and talk of worldly trash and vanity If you had used the world as a traveller doth the necessaries of his journey the thought of heaven would have offorded you solid rational comfort all the way O little do you know the sweetness of the Love of God in Christ and how good a Christian findeth it when he can but exercise and increase his knowledge and faith and Love to God and thankfulness for mercy and hopes of Heaven and walk with God in a heavenly conversation Do you not wish now that this had been your course But that which is done cannot be undone and time that is past can never be called back But yet there is a sure Remedy for your soul if you have but a heart to entertain and use it God so loved the world Joh. 3. 16 18. that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever Believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life Iesus Christ being God and Man is the Mediator between God and man His death is a sufficient Sacrifice for our sins It is his Office to save all those that come to God by him Do but unfeignedly
incumbrances and snares 5. And it is a great part of the commodity of a faithful friend to be assisted in the true knowledge of our selves To have one that will watch over us and faithfully tell us of the sin and danger and duty which we cannot easily see without help and which other men will not faithfully acquaint us with II. But yet it is rare to choose and use this friendship rightly And there are many evils here to be carefully avoided The instances shall be mentioned anon in the directions and therefore now passed by Quest. 3. Is it meet to have more such bosome friends than one Quest. 3. Answ. Usually One only is meetest 1. Because Love diffused is oft weak and contracted is more strong 2. Because secrets are seldome safe in the hands of many 3. Because suitable persons are rare 4. And though two or three may be suitable to you yet perhaps they may be unsuitable among themselves And the calamity of their own disparities will redound to you And their fallings out may turn to the bewraying of your secrets or to some other greater wrong 2. But yet sometimes two or three such friends may be better than one alone 1. In case they be all neer and of an approved suitableness and fidelity 2. In case they be all suitable and endeared to one another 3. If a man live per vices in several places and his friends cannot remove with him he may have one friend in one place and another in another and so many will be but as one that is constant 4. And in case that many may add to our help our counsel and comfort more than to our danger hurt or trouble In all these cases many are better than one Quest. 4. Is it fit for him to take another bosome friend who hath a pious Wife and is any other so Quest. 4. fit to be a friend as he and she that are as one flesh Answ. When a Wife hath the understanding and vertue and fidelity fit for this sort of friendship then no one else is so â—it because of neerness and united interests The same I say of a Husband to a Wife But because that it seldome falls out that there is such a fitness for this office especially in the Wife in that case it is lawful and meet to choose a friend that is fit indeed and to commit those secrets to him which we commit not to a Wife For secrets are not to be committed to the untrusty nor wise counsel to be expected from the unwise how neer soever And the great writers about this special Friendship do think that no woman is fit for it but men only But that conclusion is too injurious to that Sex Quest. 5. Is it agreeable to the nature of true friendship to Love our friend not only for himself but Quest. 5. for our own commodity and whether must he or I be the chief end of my love and friendship Answ. 1. Indeed in our Love to God he that is the object is also our chief and ultimate end and we must Love him more for Himself than for our selves And yet here it is lawful subordinately to intend our selves 2. And our love to the Common-wealth should be greater than our Love to our selves and therefore we may not Love it chiefly for our selves 3. And if our bosome friend be notoriously Better than we are and more serviceable to God and to the common good we should Love him also above our selves and therefore not chiefly for our selves 4. But in case of an equality of goodness and usefulness we are not bound to Love our most intimate friend more than our selves and therefore may at least equally Love him for our selves as for himself And if we are really and notoriously better and more useful we may love him chiefly for our selves and our selves above him But still we must love God and the publick Good above both our selves and him and must Love both our selves and him in order to God who is the beginning and end of all Quest. 6. Is it contrary to the nature of true friendship to keep any secret from such a bosome friend Quest. 6. or to retain any suspicion of him or to suppose that he may possibly prove unfaithful to us and forsake us Answ. Cicero and the old Doctors of Friendship say that all this is inconsistent with true friendship And it is true that it is contrary to perfect friendship But it is as true that perfect friendship cannot be nor must not be among imperfect men And that the nature of mankind is so much depraved that the best are unmeet for perfect friendship And certainly few men if any in the world are fit for every secret of our hearts Besides that we are so bad that if all our secret thoughts were known to one another it might do much to abate our friendship and love to each other And it is certain that man is so corrupt a creature and good men so imperfectly cured of their corruption that there is selfishness uncertainty and mutability in the best And therefore it is not a duty to judge falsly of men but contrarily to judge of them as they are And therefore to suppose that it is possible the closest friend may reveal our secrets one time or other and that the steadfastest friend may possibly become our enemy To think that possible which is possible and more is injurious to none Quest. 7. Is it lawful to change a bosome friend and to prefer a new one whom we perceive to be Quest. 7. more worthy before an old one Answ. An old friend caeteris paribus is to be preferred before a new one and is not to be cast off without desert and necessity But for all that 1. If an old friend prove false or notably unfit 2. Or if we meet with another that is far more able fit and worthy no doubt but we may prefer the later and may value Love and use men as they are for goodness worth and usefulness Quest. 8. What Love is due to a Minister that hath been the means of our Conversion And can such a Quest. 8. one â—e loved too much Answ. 1. There is a special Love due to such a one as the hand by which God did reach out to us his unvaluable mercies And ingratitude and sectarian proud contempt of such as have been our fathers in Christ is no small sin 2. But yet another that never did us good who is much wiser and better and more serviceable to the Church must be better Loved than he by whom we were converted Because we are to love men more for the sake of God and his Image and service than for our selves 3. And it is a very common thing for passionate Women and young people when they are newly converted to think that they can never too much value and honour and Love those that converted them and to think that all such
Love is holy and from God whereas the same Love may be of God as to the principle motives and ends in the main and yet may have great mixtures of passionate weakness and sinful excess which may tend to their great affliction in the end Some that have been converted by the writings of a Minister a hundred or a thousand miles off must needs go see the Author some must needs remove from their lawful dwellings and callings to live under the Ministry of such a one yea if it may be in the house with him some have affections so violent as proveth a torment to them when they cannot live with those whom they so affect some by that affection are ready to follow those that they so value into any errour And all this is a sinful Love by this mixture of passionate weakness though pious in the main Quest. 9. Why should we restrain our Love to a bosome friend contrary to Cicero's doctrine and what Quest. 9. sin or danger is in loving him too much Answ. All these following 1. It is an errour of judgement and of will to suppose any one Better than he is yea perhaps than any creature on earth is and so to Love him 2. It is an irrational act and therefore not fit for a Rational creature to Love any one farther than reason will allow us and beyond the true causes of regular Love 3. It is usually a fruit of sinful selfishness For this excess of Love doth come from a selfish cause either some strong conceit that the person greatly Loveth us or for some great kindness which he hath shewed us or for some need we have of him and fitness appearing in him to be useful to us c. Otherwise it would be purely for Amiable worth and then it would be proportioned to the nature and measure of that worth 4. It very often taketh up mens minds so as to hinder their Love to God and their desires and delights in holy things While Satan perhaps upon Religious pretences turneth our affections too violently to some person it diverteth them from higher and better things For the weak mind of man can hardly think earnestly of one thing without being alienated in his thoughts from others nor can hardly love two things or persons fervently at once that stand not in pure subordination one to the other And we seldom Love any fervently in a pure subordination to God For then we should Love God still more fervently 5. It oft maketh men ill members of the Church and Commonwealth For it contracteth that Love to one over-valued person which should be diffused abroad among many and the common good which should be loved above any single person is by this means neglected as God himself which maketh Wives and Children and bosome friends become those gulfs that swallow up the estates of most rich men so that they do little good with them to the publick state which should be preferred 6. Overmuch friendship engageth us in more duty than we are well able to perform without neglecting our duty to God the Commonwealth and our own souls There is some special duty followeth all special acquaintance but a bosome friend will expect a great deal You must allow him much of your Time in conference upon all occasions and he looketh that you should be many wayes friendly and useful to him as he is or would be to you When alas frail man can do but little our Time is short our strength is small our estates and faculties are narrow and low And that Time which you must spend with your bosome friend where friendship is not moderated and wisely managed is perhaps taken from God and the publick good to which you first owed it Especially if you are Magistrates Ministers Physicions Schoolmasters or such other as are of publick usefulness Indeed if you have a sober prudent friend that will look but for your vacant hours and rather help you in your publick service you are happy in such a friend But that is not the excess of Love that I am reprehending 7. This inordinate friendship prepareth for disappointments yea and for excess of sorrows Usually experience will tell you that your best friends are but uncertain and imperfect men and will not answer your expectation And perhaps some of them may so grosly fail you you as to set light by you or prove your Adversaries I have seen the bonds of extraordinary dearness many ways dissolved One hath been overcome by the flesh and turned drunkard and sensual and so proved unfit for intimate friendship who yet sometime seemed of extraordinary uprightness and zeal Another hath taken up some singular conceits in Religion and joyned to some sect where his bosome friend could not follow him And so it hath seemed his duty to look with strangeness contempt or pity on his ancient friend as one that is dark and low if not supposed an adversary to the truth because he espouseth not all his mis-conceits Another is suddenly lifted up with some preferment dignity and success and so is taken with higher things and higher converse and thinks it is very fair to give an embrace to his ancient friend for what he once was to him instead of continuing such endearedness Another hath changed his place and company and so by degrees grown very indifferent to his ancient friend when he is out of sight and converse ceaseth Another hath himself chosen his friend amiss in his unexperienced youth or in a penury of wise and good men supposing him much better than he was and afterward hath had experience of many persons of far greater wisdom piety and fidelity whom therefore reason commanded him to preser All these are ordinary dissolvers of these bonds of intimate and special friendship And if your Love continue as hot as ever its excess is like to be your excessive sorrow For 1. You will be the more grieved at every suffering of your friend as sickness losses crosses c. whereof so many attend mankind as is like to make your burden great 2. Upon every removal his absence will be the more troublesome to you 3. All incongruities and fallings out will be the more painful to you especially his jealousies discontents and passions which you cannot command 4. His death if he die before you will be the more grievous and your own the more unwellcome because you must part with him These and abundance of sore afflictions are the ordinary fruits of too strong affections And it is no rare thing for the best of Gods servants to profess that their sufferings from their friends who have over-loved them have been ten times greater than from all the enemies that ever they had in the world And to those that are wavering about this case Whether only a common friendship with all men according to their various worth or a bosome intimacy with some one man be more desirable I shall premise a free confession of my
own case whatever censures for it I incur When I was first awakened to the regard of things spiritual and eternal I was exceedingly inclined to a vehement Love to those that I thought the most serious Saints and especially to that intimacy with some one which is called Friendship By which I found extrordinary benefit and it became a special mercy to my soul. But it was by more than one or two of the fore-mentioned wayes that the strict bond of extraordinary Friendship hath been relaxed and my own excessive esteem of my most intimate friends confuted And since then I have learned to love all men according to their real worth and to let out my love more extensively and without respect of persons acknowledging all that is good in all But with a double Love and honour to the excellently wiâ—e and good and to value men more for their publick usefulness than for their private suitableness to me and yet to value the ordinary converse of one or a few suitable friends before a more publick and tumultuary life except when God is publickly Worshipped or when publick service inviteth me to deny the quiet of a private life And though I more difference between man and man than ever I do it not upon so slight and insufficient grounds as in the time of my unexperienced credulity nor do I expect to find any without the defects and blots and failings of infirm imperfect mutable man Quest. 10. What qualifications should Direct us in the choice of a special bosome friend Quest. 10. Answ. 1. He must be one that is sincere and single hearted and not given to affectation or any thing that is much forced in his deportment plain and open hearted to you and not addicted to a hiding fraudulent or reserved carriage 2. He must be one that is of a suitable temper and disposition I mean not guilty of all your own infirmities but not guilty of a crosness or contrariety of disposition As if one be in love with plainness of Apparel and frugality in dyet and course of life and the other be guilty of curiosity and ostentation and prodigality If one be for few words and the other for many If one be for Labour and the other for Idleness and frequent interruptions If one be for serving the humours of men and the other for a contempt of humane censure in the way of certain duty these disparities make them unfit for this sort of bosome friendship 3. He must not be a slave to any vice For that which maketh him false to God and to betray his own soul may make him false to man and to betray his friend 4. He must not be a selfish person that is corruptly and partially for himself and for his own Carnal ends and interest For such a one hath no true love to others but when you seem cross to his Own interest his pleasure wealth or honour he will forsake you For so he doth by God himself 5. He must be Humble and not notably proud For Pride will make him quarrelsome disdainful impatient and quite unsuitable to a humble person 6. He must be one that 's throughly and resolvedly Godly For you will hardly well center any where but in God nor will he be useful to all the ends of friendship if he be not one that Loveth God and holy things and is of a pious conversation Nor can you expect that he that is false to God and will sell his part in him for the pleasure or gain of sin should long prove truly faithful unto you 7. He must be one that is judicious in Religion that is not of an erroneous heretical wit nor ignorant of those great and excellent Truths which you should ost confer about But rather one that excelleth you in solid understanding and true judgement and a discerning head that can teach you somewhat which you know not and is not addicted to corrupt you with false opinions of his own 8. He must be one that is not Schismatical and embodied in any dividing Sect For else he will be no longer true to you than the interest of his party will allow him And if you will not follow him in his conceits and singularities he will withdraw his love and despise you And if he do not yet he may endanger your stedfastness by the temptation of his love 9. He must be one that hath no other very intimate friend unless his friend be also as intimate with you as with him Because else he will be no further secret and trusty to you than the interest or will of his other friend will allow him 10. He must be one that is Prudent in the management of business and especially those which your converse is concerned in else his indiscretion in words or practice will not suffer your friendship to be long entire 11. He must be one that is not addicted to loquacity but can keep your secrets Otherwise he will be so untrustly as to be uncapable of doing the true office of a friend 12. He must have a zeal and activity in Religion and in all well-doing Otherwise he will be unfit to warm your affections and to provoke you to love and good works and to do the principal works of friendship but will rather cool and hinder you in your way 13. He must be one that is not addicted to levity unconstancy and change or else you can expect no stability in his friendship 14. He must not much differ from you in Riches or in poverty or in quality in the world For if he be much Richer he will be carryed away with higher company and converse than yours and will think you fitter to be his servant than his friend And if he be much poorer than you he will be apt to value your friendship for his own commodity and you will be still in doubt whether he be sincere 15. He must be one that is like to live with you or near you that you may have the frequent benefit of his converse counsel example and other acts of friendship 16. He must be one that is not very covetous or a Lover of Riches or preferment For such a one will no longer be true to you than his Mammon will allow him 17. He must be one that is not pievish passionate and impatient but that can both bear with your infirmities and also bear much from others for your sake in the exercise of his friendship 18. He must be one that hath so good an esteem of your person and so true and strong a Love to you as will suffice to move him and hold him to all this 19. He must be yet of a publick Spirit and a lover of good works that he may put you on to well doing and not countenance you in an idle self-pleasing and unprofitable life And he ought to be one that is skilful in the business of your Calling that may be fit to censure your work and amend it and
and Idleness and Gluttony and Sportfulness of Wife and Children and Family also to maintain as well as their own many thousand pounds a year perhaps may be too little Many a conquering Army hath been maintained at as cheap a rate as such an Army of Lusts or Garrison at least as keep possession of some such families when all their Luxury goeth for the honour of their family and they glory in wearing the livery of the Devil the World and the Flesh which they once renounced and pretended to Glory in nothing but the Cross of Christ and when they take care in the education of their Children that this entailed honour be not cut off from their Families no wonder if God's part be little from these men when the Flesh must have so much and when God must stand to the courtesie of his enemies and have but their leavings I hope the Nobility and Gentry of England that are innocent herein will not be offended with me if I tell them that are guilty that when I foresee their reckoning I think them to be the miserablest persons upon earth that rob God and rob the King of that which should defray the charges of Government and rob the Church and rob the poor and rob their souls of all the benefits of good works and all to please the devouring flesh It 's a dreadful thing to foresee with what horrour they will give up their accounts when instead of so much in feeding and cloathing the poor and promoting the Gospel and the saving of mens souls there will be found upon their reckoning so much in vain curiosities and pride and so much in costly sports and pleasures and so much in flesh-pleasing Luxury and Excess The trick that they have got of late to free themselves from the fears of this account by believing that there will be no such day will prove a short and lamentable remedy and when that day shall come upon them unawares their unbelief and pleasures will dye together and deliver them up to never-dying horrour and despair I have heard it oft mentioned as the dishonour of France that the third part of the revenews of so rich a Kingdom should be devoted and paid to the maintaining of Superstition But if there be not many and most Kingdoms in the world where one half of their wealth is devoted to the Flesh and so to the Devil I should be glad to find my self herein mistaken And judge you which is more disgraceful to have half your estates given in sensuality to the Devil or a third part too ignorantly devoted to God! If men laid out no more than needs upon the flesh they might have the more for the service of God and of their souls You cannot live under so much a year as would maintain above twice as many frugal temperate industrious persons because your flesh must needs be pleased and you are strangers to Christian mortification and self-denial Laertius tell us that Crates Thebanus put all his money into the Bankers or Usurers hands with this direction that If his sons proved Ideots it should all be paid to them but if they proved Philosophers it should be given to the poor because Philosophers can live upon a little and therefore need little So if we could make men Mortified Christians they would need so little for themselves that they would have the more to give to others and to do good with 2. Men do not seriously believe Gods promises that he will recompence them in this life with better things an hundred fold and in the world to come with life eternal Matth. 19. 29. And that by receiving a Prophet or righteous man they may have a Prophets or righteous mans reward Matth. 10. 41. And that a cup of cold water when you have no better given to one of Christs little ones in the name of a Disciple shall not be unrewarded Matth. 10. 42. They believe not that Heaven will pay for all and that there is a life to come in which God will see that they be no losers They think there is nothing certain but what they have in hand and therefore they lay up a treasure upon earth and rather trust to their estates than God whereas if they verily believed that there is another life and that judgement will pass on them on the terms described Matth. 25. they would more industriously lay up a treasure in Heaven Matth. 6. 20. and make themselves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness and study how to be rich in good works and send their wealth to Heaven before them and lay up a good foundation against the time to come that they may lay hold upon eternal life and then they would be ready to distribute and willing to communicate 1 Tim. 6. 17 18 19. Luk. 16. 9. They would then know how much they are beholden to God that will not only honour them to be his Stewards but reward them for distributing his maintenance to his Children as if they had given so much of their own They would then see that it is they that are the receivers and that giving is the surest way to be rich when for transitory things sincerely given they may receive the Everlasting riches Then they would see that he that saveth his Riches loseth them and he that loseth them for Christ doth save them and lay them up in Heaven and that it is more blessed to give than to receive and that we should our selves be laborious that we may have wherewith to support the weak and to give unto the needy Read Act. 20. 35. Ephes. 4. 28. Prov. 31. 20 c. Then they would not be weary of well-doing if they believed that in due season they shall reap if they faint not but as they have opportunity would do good to all men but especially to them that are of the houshold of faith Gal. 6. 9 10. They would not forget to do good and communicate as knowing that with such sacrifice God is well-pleased Heb. 13. 16. A true belief of the Reward would make men strive who should do most 3. Another great hinderance is the want of Love to God and our neighbours to Christ and his Disciples If men loved Christ they would not deal so niggardly with his disciples when he has told them that he taketh all that they do to the least of them whom he calleth his brethren as done to himself Matth. 25. 10. 39 40. If men loved their neighbours as themselves I leave you to judge in what proportion and manner they would relieve them whether they would find money to lay out on Dice and Cards and gluttonous feastings on playes and games and pomp and pride while so many round about them are in pinching want The destruction of Charity or Christian Love is the cause that works of Charity are destroyed Who can look that the seed of the Serpent that hath an enmity against the holy seed should liberally relieve them or