them When Midas was ready to dy for hunger his God was kinder to him in a little bread then in making all that he toucht turn into gold great things engage but little where there is but little use of them and all these Thirdly Are endeered by the Affection they are given with Good turns done with design what need soever I have of them are hire and not friendship it is the kindness onely that obligeth the gift without the love does but upbraid and scorn my want Now to measure the friend here in the Text by these were an impossible undertaking taking whose friendship did exceed all bounds and measures I shall do no more towards it but read the words before my text which were the occasion of it Greater love bath no man then this that a man lay down his life for his friends and then it follows yee are my friends The token therefore of his friendship the guift he gave them was his life rather that was the least he gave He gave his glory first that so he might be qualified to give his life for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Phil. ii 7. He lessened himself from the condition of being Lord of all into that of a servant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. ii 9. being diminished made lower meaner then his creatures for the suffering of death Now with the price of such divine essential glory to buy onely a life rather onely a possibility of death that after he might give that life for us and with his death purchase us an immortal life is such a gift as no Romance of friendship ever fancied or did aim at we may have heard of two companions that would dy for one another that never quarell'd in their lives but for this who should suffer first to save the other and strave onely for Execution But for a person of the Trinity to leave his heaven to come down to us to dwell with agonies that he might be at one with us and be tyed to the cross that he might be united to us this is a friendship fitt for Ecstasies of apprehension Of all the things that court thy kindness here below that spread snares and lay baits for thy friendship if any bid so fair so temptingly if any will give such a price in God's name let it have thy love I shall not blame him that engageth his affection there But sure Heaven cannot give a greater gift then this for what can God give greater then himself Yea I may say God could not give so much for he must be man too to give his life and this saith he he gave for his friends even in our stead who must have perish'd else eternally which intimates the second thing the need we had of this A need great as the gift necessity invincible that could break into heaven rifle the Trinity to serve its self throw death into those regions of immortality and which would not be satisfied but with the bloud of God And now is not the kindness and the condescension of friendship in his expressions too when he saith greater love then this hath no man which was the third endearement There never were such wounds of loves as those that tore this heart never such meltings of affection as dissolved this lover into sweates of bloud There was no motive to all this but his meere love for all this he designed to us before we were and therefore sure before we were deserving and O our God! thou that from all eternity didst lay contrivances to give thy life for us so to redeem and then to glorifie us what were we then that thou shouldst do his for us what were we then when we were not and yet that thou from the abyss of everlastingness shouldst think thoughts of such kindness to us and such blessedness for us who then were not and deserved nothing and who since we were have deserved nothing but damnation And as there was no other motive to all this design but love so neither was there any thing but love in the fulfilling Look on your Saviour in the garden and upon Mount Calvary and you shall find him there in as great agonies of affection as torment and hanging down his head upon the Cross with languishments of kindness more then weakness His arms stretched out and Rack't as if on purpose to the posture of receiving you to his embraces and his side opened not onely to shed Blood for you but to make you a passage to his very Heart Look on him offering up his Tears his Prayers and his Soul for Sin and in the midst of all projecting happyness to you as it were praying O my Father here I charge my self with all the guilt of those my friends I thy onely Son God one with thee am content to suffer Torments that they all may be acquitted Here I lay down my Life that they may have eternal Life let me be Crucified so they be Glorified Which was the purchase and the gift of this his Passion to all his friends even to those that do what he commands which is the first condition that entitles to his friendship and my next part Ye are my friends if ye do what I command you I shall not urge that Great men upon earth will not take any to their Friendship but upon these termes nor will I plead the reasonableness of this in Christ there being no cause why he should be a friend to any that will daily disoblige him and dishonour him nor will I press the whole Oeconomy of Scripture which says all the advantages Christ ever gave or meant us and all the Acts of friendship that he ever did for us were with this design He gave his grace that brings salvation to save us into an estate of sober virtue Tit. ii v. 11.12 he gave himself also to Ransom us from our own evil doings and to redeem us into his obedience Tit. ii v. 14. without which no dependance on him will availe Mat. vii 21. He will own no acquaintance with nor services from them who have friendship with sin though they have cast out Devils in his name if they retain their vices though they do miracles if they do wickedly he wil bid them depart profess he never knew them v. 22.23 He will not let such have a bare relation to his Name nor have the friendship of a title 2 Tim. ii 19. All his rewards also that he will give are promised to none other but them that do what he commands Apocal. xxii 14. that is do Evangelically heartily and faithfully endeavour it and do this with all diligence exprest by words that import all strife imaginable as running wrestling fighting warring And persevere also by patient continuance in well doing Rom. ii 7. and he hath nothing else but vengeance for all others 2 Thes. 1.8 and we have neither Christ nor Gospel nor Religion but with these terms But I shall wave all this and bound my self within the
Imprimatur Geo. Stradling Rever in Christo Pat. Gill. Epis. Lond. a Sac. Domest Ex Aed Sab. 7. November 1662. A SERMON PREACHED before the KING AT VVHITE-HALL October the 12th 1662. BY RICHARD ALLESTREY D. D. Chaplain then in Attendance Published by his MAJESTIES Command LONDON Printed by Tho. Roycroft for John Martin and James Allestrey at the Bell in S. Paul's Church-yard M DC LXIII JOHN XV. 14. Ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you THE words are a conditional assertion of Christ's concerning his Apostles and in them all Christians and they do easily divide themselves into two parts The First is a positive part wherein there is a state of great and Blessed advantage which they are declared to be in present possession of in these words Ye are my friends In which there are two things that make up that advantage 1. a relation 2. the person related to Friends and My friends The Second is a Conditional part wherein there are the terms upon which that possession is made over and which preserve the Right and Title to them in these words If ye do whatsoever I command you in which there are two things required as Conditions I. Obedience If ye do what I command you II. That Obedience Universal If ye do whatsoever I command you The first thing that offers it self to our consideration is the Relation Friends It is a known common-place truth that a Friend is the most useful thing that is in whatsoever state we are it is the Soul of life and of content If I be in prosperity We know abundance not injoy'd is but like Jewells in the Cabinet useless while they are there it is indeed nothing but the opinion of prosperity But t is not possible to enjoy abundance otherwise then by Communicating it a man possesseth plenty onely in his friends and hath fruition of it meerly by bestowing it If I be in adversity to have a person whom I may intrust a trouble to whose bosom is as open and as faithful to me as t is to his own thoughts to which I may commit a swelling secret this is in a good measure to unlade and to poure out my sorrow from me thus I divide my greivances which would be insupportable if I did not disburthen my self of some part of them now there is no bosom so safe as that where friendship lodges take Gods opinion in the case Deut. xiii 6. If thy brother the son of thy mother or thy son or thy daughter or the wife of thy bosome or thy friend that is as thine own soul. This is the highest step in the Gradation And there is all the reason in the world for though Parent and Childe are as neer one to other as any thing can be to part of it self Husband and Wife are but two different names of the same one yet these may become bitter and unkind a Parent may grow cross or a Childe refractory a Mother may be like the Ostrich in the Wilderness throw off her bowels with her burthen and an ungracious Son is constant pangs and travail to his Mother his whole life gives her after-throws which are most deadly Dislikes also may rest within the Marriage bed and lay their heads upon two wedded Pillow 's but none of these unkindnesses can untie the relation that ends not where the bitterness begins he is a Parent still though froward and a Childe though stubborn but a true friend can be nothing but kind it does include a deerness in its essence which is so inseparable from it that they begin and end together a man may be an Husband without loving but cannot be a lover that is a friend without loving And sure to have no one friend in this life no one that is concerned in any of my interests or me my self none that hath any cares or so much as good wishes for me is a state of a most uncomfortable prospect The Plague that keeps friends at a distance from me while I live out of the sphere of my infection and after gives me death hath yet less of Malignity then this that leaves me the compassions the Prayers all the solitary comforts all indeed but the outward entertainments of my friends that though it shut the Door against all company yet puts a Lord have Mercy on the Doore But this I now described hath none of that hath no good wishes nothing else but hate is worse then a perpetual Pistelence Yet neither is this State so comfortless in respect of this life as not to have a friend in the concernments of the Life to come none that hath so much kindness for my Soul as every man hath for his Enemies beast which if he see faln in a Ditch he will at least give notice that it may be helpt out thence No one that when a Sin like to that Falling Sickness in the Gospel and it is such indeed without a Parable is casting me into the Water quenching my parts my reason and the Immortal sparke within me or throwing me into the Fire raising Lascivious heats within which after will break out into Hell Fires none yet that will stretch out his hand to catch me or to pull me out None that does care to see me Perish to eternity or that values my Soul which yet did cost the blood of GOD at a words speaking This is to be like Dives in the Flames to whom they would not lend the help of the tip of a finger or give the kindness of a drop of Water I am as it were on the other side the Gulfe already Here is the use of friendship the onely noble one that 's worthy of that blessed quality when I have one that will be an assistant Conscience to me who when that within me sleeps or is benummed will watch over my actions will testifie them to my Face will be as faithful to me as the Conscience should be hold a Glass to my Soul shew me the staines and the proud tumours the foule Ulcers that are there and then will fret and rub or prick lance and corrode to cure those tumours and do oft those spots such an one is a familiar Angel-Guardian is truely of that blessed heavenly ranke and onely lesse then the friend in the Text the person related to and my next part My Friends There are three things from which men use to take the measures of a friend First From the good things he bestows on them He that thinks to keep friendship alive onely with air that gives good words but parts with nothing that entertains onely with garbs and civilities is but the pageant of a friend They that own having but one soul and seem to clasp as if they would have but one body too cannot keep such distinct and separate proprieties in other little things as not to have communication one from the other And Secondly The friendship of these benefits is rated by the measures of our need of
present words Greater love hath no man then this that a man lay down his life for his friend Ye are my friends if ye do what I command you When Christ is boasting of his love making comparisons and vying friendships with mankind nay more contriving heights and depths of mercy such as man hath no comprehension nor Fathom for when he was preparing to do an act of compassion on almost equal to his Divinity when he had resolutions of so much kindness as to give his life that he might shew kindness Yet could he not then find in his heart to offer or declare one jot of kindness to the men that will not do what he commands but in the midst of such agonies of compassion he thought of nothing but infinite indignation and eternal vengeance to the disobedient I have but now given my body and my blood even to the Traitour Judas to one who is a Devil I am going to give my life even for my enemies for the world but I will give no love to any have no friendship with any but the virtuous no though they be my own Disciples ye are my friends ye my companions and Apostles are my friends onely on this condition if ye do what I command you And then is it not matter of Astonishment to see men fancy they have a right in all Christ's actions and sufferings presume upon his favour and their own happy condition though they do nothing or but very little towards this and the maine of their life be disobedience as if all Christs commands appointed them to do no commands and Christianity were but a liberty from virtue To pass by those that do nothing but evil that which the Devil does suggest or their flesh dictate and to consider the demurer sort of Christians that pretend a respect to Christ and to Religion and see what they will doe Why sometimes you may find them troubled at their Vices and themselves and those troubles breath out in Sighs and in warme-wishes that they could do that which Christ prescribes to will is sometimes strongly present with them but to performe they know not how Alas Christ does not tell you that you are his friends if you wish well to him and his commands but he requires that you shall do them These are but vapours of a troubled soul which howsoever they may chance rise warm cath a strong suddain heat breath up in flashing thoughts They are but meteors little shooting flames that onely do catch fire and fall and dy shew fair but they warme nothing and so these thoughts do never heat the heart into devotions and holy resolutions the fire is not strong nor does it live enough to melt and worke away the filthynesses of the soul No though they grow to aversations for you may find such men when wearied with the pursuite of their sins hating their customes and the engagements to the practice of them complayning thus I know 't is ill and 't is against my heart that I obey the motions of my passions or lusts The incitations of my appetite the usance of the world the obligations of civility or mistaken honour do indeed prevaile upon me but 't is with great reluctancy of minde that I yeild to them but I cannot avoid it There are not few that satisfie themselves with this condition Now sure Christ does not say Ye cannot be my friends except you sin against me and against your Knowledge and your Conscience too 'T is strange that men should think the Heathen instance of a Witch that cryed Video meliora proboque Deteriora sequor I know and do approve of better things but cannot choose but follow these that are the worser strange that this fury that had the Devil for familiar should make Christ a friend that this should be the state of Gospel Saints and of God's favourites 'T is possible some therefore go yet further to good purposes towards Obedience and have holy intentions but this is not sufficient neither if to do his commands be necessary for to purpose and intend to do them is not certainly to do them Yet where are any that do aim at doing any more and there is none of these but does presume upon his interest in Christ and satisfies himself and is secure Yet is it hard to find a ground of this their confidence unless it rise from the unhappy use they make of God's preserving mercies and his kindness to them in the concernments of this life They see without their cares and upon very weak entreaties indeed against all provocations both of God and danger yet his protections secure them all though they neither minde the asking them nor minde the walking worthy of them The man whose sins not pâ—ayers prepare him for his bed he sleeps well perhaps more soundly then he who at his bed-side throws himself on his face into God's arms and there bequeaths himselfe to the securities of the Almighty And he whose Sleeps onely refresh him for returns to sin does often live as long as safely and as merrily as he that dayly most religiously does begg protections from above And others that affoord the Lord some little homages themselves some prayers when their pleasures or occasions permit God hath a care of them and their desires flow into them all does succeed well with them Now they take confidence hence to conclude these are the tokens of Gods friendship and all his mercies will come in at the like easie rates that such a short petition as committed them to the refreshments of the night and after which they wak't into renewed strengths and pleasures such another shall lay them down in safety to the sleeps of that long night that afterwards will break in happy resurrection for why God will not sure fail his own mercies but be as friendly to their souls as he is to their bodies And thus God's preservations here in meer defiance of our provocations which are the arts of his long suffering his strivings of Compassion meerly to give us opportunities of being reconciled to him and to invite us to be so while we make them occasions of carelesness and security they are so far from being pledges of his friendship that they have all the aggravations of affronted goodness become temptations and degrees of ruin 'T were fine indeed if Christ's eternal preparations for his friends would come in to us without care or doing any thing as an accession to our pleasures if when we had lived many years in a Garden our days all Flower'd with delight we might expire into Paradise and in soft aires of Musick breath into Hallelujah's But alas the smooth easy way leads down the Hill and he must strive and pant that will get up into the Mansions and the Bosom of his Saviour and whosoever will be his friend must do what he commands But is there nothing less indeed will qualify The Scripture saith that Abraham believed God
and it was imputed to him for righteousness and he was called the friend of God James ii 23. and then is Christ more inaccessible and harder to be made a friend Why truly God and Christ both are so much friends to all true believers that the life of Christ was given for them for God so loved the world that he gave his onely begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life John iii. 16. nor are there any qualities more signally peculiar to friendship more engaging then confidence and trust dependance and relying embosoming my self in him now these are but the exercise of Faith and t is most certain if we heartily endeavour to do what he commands there is employment then for all this work of Faith place for its applications and assurances My Text does make this good But when his friendship is made over on conditions as t is not onely in these words but every where in Scriptures there being not one promise absolute that does concern Gods favour justification and eternal life he does not once offer remission of sins but to those that amend their lives nay does express as if he could not give it otherwise peradventure they will repent that I may forgive them Jeremy xxxvi 3 The promises therefore being conditional Faith must be answerable to the promises that it does rest on and apply and at the most can be but an assurance that you shall be partaker of what 's promised that is to say partaker of the favour and the life of Christ if ye do his commands But then if I perform not this condition to trust upon his friendship which I am not qualified for to think by faith to receive a pardon which in that case I am was never offered me to apply to my self promises which were never made me for none were ever made to them that do not do and to assure my self Christ will transgress his everlasting Covenant for my Vices sake meerly to give me leave to enjoy my sins will do that which God may not do forgive one that will not repent If I believe thus against promise and against decree am confident whether Christ will or no and will rely upon him in despite of him if such a faith will make us friends affronts do reconcile This is indeed to lay violent hands on his favour and to invade his friendship and without metaphor take Heaven by force But sure I am that this is not the faith made Abraham be called the friend of God in that place of Saint James but a faith that was perfected by doing v. 22. of that Chapter a faith that made him offer up his onely Son upon the Altar v. 21. 'T is true he did in hope believe against all hope Rom iv 18. So that his faith was stronger then a contradiction but yet his resolutions of obedience seem stronger then his faith for he did that even to the cutting off the grounds of all his Faith and hope He trusted God would make his promise good to him make all the Nations of the Earth be blessed in the seed of Isaac though Isaac had no seed nor could have if he should be slain And he resolved at Gods command himself to slay that Isaac so to make him have no seed His Faith indeed did no dispute the great impossibility but his obedience caused it He did not question how can God perform with me when I have offered up my son I cannot look that a large Progeny should rise out of the Ashes on the Altar nor will those Flames that devour all my seed at once may my seed numerous lasting and glorious as the Stars in Heaven which he promised me but much less did he question why should I obey in this He that does his commands can but expect what he hath promis'd but if I should do this command and slay my Son I make his promise void and detroy my own expectations and if I disobey I can but suffer what he bids me do my own obedience will execute all that his indignation would threaten to my Disobedience Though Abraham had three daies time and journy to the Altar that Nature might have leisure the mean while to reason with the precept thus and his affection might struggle with his duty yet he goes on resolves to tear out his own bowels and cut of his hopes will Sacrifice his onely Son and Sacrifice God's promise to his commands And then He that will trust to Abraham's example of believing yet will not follow him at all in doing will obey no commands that is so far from offering up an onely Son he will not slay an onely evil custome nor part with one out of the herd of all his vicious habits will not give up the satisfaction to any of his carnal worldly or ambitious appetites not Sacrifice a passion or a lust to all the Obligations that God and Christ can urge him with he hath nor faith nor friendship no nor fore-head 'T is true indeed he that hath Abraham's faith may well assure himself he is Christ's friend but t is onely on this account because he that believes as Abraham believed he will not stick to do whatever Christ commands which is that universality of obedience that is the next condition that entitles to Christ's friendship and my last part Ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you There is no quality so necessary to a friend or so appropriate to friendship as sincerity They that have but one soul they can have no reserves from one another But disobedience to one precept is inconsistent with sincerity that hath respect unto all the commandments and he that will not do whatever Christ prescribes hath reserves of affection for some darling sin and is false to his Saviour He is an enemy indeed so that there is no friendship on either side Saint Paul says so of any of one kind the minding of the flesh saith he whether it be providing for the belly or any other of the organs of carnality is desperate incurable rebellion Now such a rebel is we know the worst of enemies Saint James does say as much of any of those vicious affections that are set on the world Whosoever will be a friend of the world is an enemy of God James iv 4. and he calls them adultereses and adulterers who think to joyn great strict Religion to some little by-love of an honour or a profit of this world Such men are like a wife that not contented with the partner of her takes in another now and then she must not count her self her husbands friend though she give him the greatest share in her affections no she is but a bosom enemy and so any one vice allow'd is a paramour sin is whoredome against Christ and our pretended friendship to him in all other obediences is but the kindness and the caresses of an adulteress the meer hypocrisie and
treachery of love If it be necessary to the gaining of Christs friendship that thou do his commands 't is necessary that thou do them all that thou divorce thy self from thy beloved sin as well as any other because his friendship does no more require other obedience then it does that but is as inconsistent with thy own peculiar vice as with the rest Indeed it is impossible that it should bear with any they being all his murderers If thou canst find one sin that had no hand in putting Christ to death one vice that did not come into the garden nor upon mount Calvary that did not helpe to assassin thy Saviour even take thy fill of that but if each had a stab at him if no one of thy vices could have been forgiven had not thy Jesus died for it canst thou expect he should have kindness for his agony or friendship for the man that entertaines his Crucifiers in his heart if worldly cares which he calls thorns fill thy head with contrivances of Wealth and Greatness of filling Coffers and of platting Coronets for thee as the Thorns did make him a Crown too would'st thou have him receive thee and these in his bosom to gore his Heart as they did pierce his Head If thou delight in that intemperance which filled his deadly Cup which Vomited Gall into it can he delight in thee That Cup which made him fall upon his Face to deprecate will he partake in as the pledg of mutual Love He that sunk under could not bear this load of thine when it was in his Cross upon his shoulders will he bear it and thee on his armes when thou fall'st under it When thou wilt cast a shameful spewing on his glory too if he own such a friend Thou that art so familiar with his name as thou wer't more his friend then any in the world whose Oaths and imprecations Moses sayes strike through that name which they so often call upon thou mayst as well think his heart did attract the Spear that pierc'd it and the wound close upon its head with unions of Love as that he hath kindness for thee If Christ may make friendship with him that does allow himself a Sin he may have fellowship with Belial for him to dwell in any heart that cherisheth a vice were to descend to Hell again But as far as those Regions of darkness are from his habitation of Glory and the black spirits of that place from being any of his guard of holy myriads so far is He from dwelling with or being friend to him that is a friend to any wickedness to him that will not do whatever he commands And now if these conditions seem hard if any do not care to be his friend upon these terms they may betake themselves to others Let such make themselves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness A friend indeed that hath not so much of the insincerities as many great ones have for this will furnish them with all that heart or lust can wish for all that necessities or wantonness proposeth to it self to dress out pomp or vice But yet when with enjoyment the affections grow and become so unquiet work them so as not to let their thoughts or actions rest make them quicken themselves and like the motions of all things that go downwards tending to the Earth increase by the continuance grow stronger and more violent towards the end then when they are most passionate it failes them and having fill'd their life with most unsatisfied tormenting cares it leaves them nothing but the guilt of all when their great wealth shall shrink into a single sheet no more of it be left but a thin shroud and all their vast inheritances but six foot of earth be gone yet the iniquity of all will stick close to them and this false friend that does it self forsake them will neither go along nor will let its pomp follow them raises a cry on them as high as God's tribunal the cry of all the bloud all the oppressed rights that bribery till then had stifled the groans of all those poor that greatness covetousness or extortion had grown'd and crush't the yellings of those souls that were starved for want of the bread of life which yet they payed for and the price of it made those heaps which will that day appear against their friends and masters and prove their adversaries to eternal death Let others joy in friends that wine does get them such as have no qualification to endear them but this that they will not refuse to sin and to be sick with their companions men that do onely drink in their affections as full of friendship as of liquor and probably they do unload themselves of both at once part with their dearness and their drink together and alike I know not whether it be heats of mutual kindness that inflame these draughts and the desires of them so as if they did drink thirst but sure I am that these hot draughts begin the lake of fire Let others please themselves in an affection that carnality cements These are warme friendships I confess but Solomon will tell us whence they have their heat Her house saith he does open into Hell and Brimstone kindles those libidinous flames There are straite bands fetters in those affections indeed for the same wise man sayes The closets of that sinner are the chambers of death that none that go unto her return again or take hold of the paths of life it seems she is a friend that takes most irreversible dead hold she is not onely as insatiate but as inexorable as the grave and the eternal chains of fate are in those her embraces But God keep us from making such strict Covenants with death from being at friendship with Hell or in a word that I say all at once with any that are good companions onely in sinning Such men having no virtue in themselves must needs hate it in others as being a reproach to them and therefore they are still besieging it using all arts and Stratagems to undermine it and having nothing else to recommend them into mens affections but their managery of vice no way to merit but by serving iniquity they not onely comply with our own evill inclinations that so they may be grateful and insinuate into us but they provoke too and inflame those tendencies that they may be more useful to us having no other means to work their ends And then such friends by the same reason must be false and trecherous and all that we declaime at and abhorre in enemies when that shall be the way to serve their ends because they have no virtue to engage them to be otherwise and to be such is to be constant to their own designs their dispositions and usances These are the pests of all Societies they speak and live infection and friendship with them is to couple with the Plague These do
compleat and perfect what the Devil but began in Eden Nurse up Original sin chafe inclination into appetite and habit suggest and raise desires and then feed them into constitution and nature in a word are a brood of those serpents one of which was enough to destroy paradise and innocence T is true a man would think these were our friends indeed that venture to Gehenna for us Alas they are but more familiar devils work under Sathan to bring us to torments and differ nothing from him but that they draw us into them and he inflicts them And when sinful contents come home in ruine and pleasures dy into damnation then men will understand these treacherous loves and find such friends are but projectours for the Devil then they will hate them as they do their own damnation discerning these are but the kindnesses of Hell Nay it is possible I may slander that place in speaking so ill of it Dives will let us see there are affections of a kinder and more blessed strain in Hell Luke xvi from the twenty-seventh verse you find he did make truce with torments that he might contrive and begg onely a message of repentance for his brethren he did not mind at all his own dire Agonies he minded so the reformation of his friends Good God! when I reflect upon these pieties of the damn'd together with the practices of those who have given their names in to Religion when I see fiends in Hell do study how to make men virtuous and Christians upon earth with all their art debauch them into vice and ruine I cannot choose but pray Grant me such friends as are in Hell Rather grant us all the friendship in the Text. But then we must have none with any vice Friendship with that engageth into enmity with God and Christ I shew'd you And to passe over all those after-retributions of vengeance Christ hath studied for his enemies when he that now courts us to be our friend and we will make our adversary must be our Judge For were there none of this and should we look no further then this life yet sure we of this Nation know what it is to have God our enemy who for so many years lay under such inflictions as had much of the character of his last executions they had the blasphemies and the confusion the dire guilts and the black calamities and almost the despair and irrecoverableness of those in Hell And though He be at peace with us at present at least there is a truce yet I beseech you in the presence and the fear of God to think in earnest whether the present provocations of this Nation do not equall those that twenty years agoe engaged him into Arms against us and made him dash us so in pieces whether those Actions of the Clergy be reformed that made the people to abhorre their function and their service the Offerings and Ministers of the Lord and made God himself spew them out 'T were endless to go on to the prophaneness to the loose impieties and the bold Atheismes of the Laity especially of the better-sort in short what one degree or state or Sex is better Sure I am if we are not better we are worse beyond expression or recovery who have resisted every method and conquerd all God's arts of doing good upon us been too hard for his judgments and his mercies both 'T is true when we lay gasping under his severe revenges we then pretended to be humbled begg'd to be reconciled and be at peace with him and vow'd to his conditions promising obedience and aliened our selves from our old sins his foes But then when Christ came to confirme this amity came drest with all his courtships brought all the invitations of Love along Our Prince and our Religion our Church and State Righteousness and Peace and the Beauty of Holyness every thing that might make us be an happy and a pious nation thus he did tempt and labour to engage that friendship which we offered him and vowed to him And we no sooner seiz'd all this but we break resolutions as well as duty to get loose from him and laden with the spoyls of our defeated Saviour's goodness we joyne hands with his enemies resume our old acquaintance-sins enrich and serve them with his bounties make appear that we onely drew him in to work such miracles but to assist our Worldlyness Ambitions and Lusts to be our opportunities of vice and provocation of him And being thus affronted and refused his enemy preferr'd not this God but Barabbas any the vilest thing for friend rather then Christ must he not needs be more our enemy then heretofore And if he be that question will concerns us Are we stronger then God It should behove us not to fall out with him till we are See how he does prepare himself for the encounter Wisedome v. Taking his jealousy for armour putting on Justice severe and vindicative Justice as a breast plate and his wrath sharpening as a sword and arming all the creatures for auxiliaries Alass when omnipotence does express it self as scarcely strong enough for execution but Almightyness will be armed also for vengeance will assume Weapons call in aides for fury who shall stand it Will our friends think you keep it off us and secure us did we consider how uneasy God accounts himself till he begin the storme while he keeps off his plagues from overrunning such a land we would expect them every moment and they must come Ah says he I will ease me of mine adversaries and avenge me of mine enemies and then in what condition are we if God can have no ease but in our ruine if he does hunger and thirst after it go to his vengeance as to a feast And if you reade the xxv Chapter of Isaiah you will find there a rich bill of fare which his revenge upon his enemies does make view the sixth verse He that enjoys his morsels that lays out his contrivances and studies on his dishes so as if he meant to cramm his Soul let him know what delight soe're he findes when he hath spoil'd the elements of their inhabitants to furnish his own belly and not content with natures delicacies neither hath given them forc'd fatnesses changing the very flesh into a marrow suppling the bones almost into that oyle that they were made to keep all this delight the Lord by his expressions does seem to take in his dread executions on his enemies a sinful people And if the vicious friendships of the world have so much more attractive then Christ's love and favour and the happy consequences of it as to counterpoise all the danger of such enmity you may joyn hands with them but if his be the safer and more advantageous then hearken to his propositions and beseechings for He does begg it of you as he treated this reconciliation in his blood so he does in Petitious too For saith Saint Paul We are Ambassadours for Christ as if God did beseech you by us we pray you in Christ's stead Be you reconciled and then be Generous towards your GOD and Saviour and having brought him as it were upon his knees reduc'd him to entreaties be friends and condescend to him and your own happiness If He be for you take no care then who can be against you His friendship will secure you not onely from your enemies but from Hostility it self for when a man's ways please the Lord he will make even his enemies to be at peace with him Prov. xvi 7. He will reconcile all but Vices And afterwards see what a blessed throng of friends we shall be all initiated into Heb. xii 23. To an innumerable company of Angels to the general assembly and Church of the first-born that are written in Heaven to God the Judge of all and to the spirits of Just men made perfect and to Jesus the Mediatour of the new Covenant c. And of this blest Corona we our selves shall be a noble and a glorious part inflamed all with that mutual Love that kindles Seraphims and that streams out into an heavenly glory filling that Region of immortal love and blessedness and being friends that is made one with Father Son and Holy Ghost that Trinity of Love we shall enjoy what we do now desire to ascribe to them All Honour Glory Power Majesty and Dominion for evermore Amen FINIS ERRATA Page 5. l. 5. r. pestilence p. 10. l. 8. r. love p. 13. l. 19. r. friends p. 17. l. ult r. them although p. 19. l. 20. r. as in a garden p. 26. l. 6. r. paramour-sin p. 27. l. 21. r. in his armes p. 29. l. 2. r. necessity p. 30. l. 2. r. groun'd (a) Luke xvi 24 25. a Luc. xxii 19.20.21 b John vi 70. c Rom. v. 10 d John iii. 16 17. vi 51. 2 Cor. v. 19. a Gen. xv 5. b Gen. xxii 4. a Rom. viii 7. a Mat. xiii 22. b Matt. xxvii 29. c Matt. xxvi 38 39. d Levit. xxiiii 16. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Psal. xlix 17. a Prov. vii 27. b Prov. ii 19. a 1 Cor. x. 22. Verse 17 19.20 a Isay i. 29 a 2 Cor. v. 20.