Sect. 1. Of sins of Infirmity p. 449 Sect. 2 455 Sect. 3 463 Sect. 4 468 Sect. 5 How far an Unregenerate man may goe in the ways of piety and Religion 474 Sect. 6 The Character of the Regenerate estate or person 495 Sect. 7 What are properly and truly sins of Infirmity and how far they can consist with the regenerate estate 499 Sect. 8 Practical advices to be added to the foregoing considerations 515 CHAP. VIII Sect. 1. Of the effect of Repentance viz. Remission of sins p. 527 Sect. 2 Of pardon of sins committed after Baptism 532 Sect. 3 Of the difficulty of obtaining pardon The doctrine and practice of the Primitive Church in this article p. 536 Sect. 4 Of the sin against the Holy Ghost and in what sense it is or may be Unpardonable 550 Sect. 5 555 Sect. 6 The former Doctrines reduc'd to Practice 568 CHAP. IX Sect. 1. Of Ecclesiastical Penance or The fruits of Repentance p. 579 Sect. 2 Of Contrition or godly Sorrow 582 Sect. 3 Of the natures and difference of Attrition and Contrition 599 Sect. 4 Of Confession 605 Sect. 5 Attrition or the imperfect repentance though with absolution is not sufficient 638 Sect. 6 Of Penances or Satisfactions 644 Sect. 7 The former doctrine reduc'd to practise 658 Sect. 8 669 Sect. 9. 680 place this before page 1. Cor contritum et humiliatum Deus non despiciet CHAP. I. The foundation and necessity of Repentance §. 1. Of the indispensable necessity of Repentance in remedy to the unavoidable transgressing the Covenant of Works IN the first entercourse with Man God made such a Covenant as he might justly make out of his absolute dominion and such as was agreeable with those powers which he gave us and the instances in which obedience was demanded For 1. Man was made perfect in his kinde and God demanded of him perfect obedience 2. The first Covenant was the Covenant of Works that is there was nothing in it but Man was to obey or die but God laid but one command upon him that we finde the Covenant was instanced but in one precept In that he fail'd and therefore he was lost There was here no remedy no second thoughts no amends to be made But because much was not required of him and the Commandement was very easie and he had strengths more then enough to keep it therefore he had no cause to complain God might and did exact at first the Covenant of Works because it was at first infinitely tolerable But From this time forward this Covenant began to be hard and by degrees became impossible not onely because mans fortune was broken and his spirit troubled and his passions disordered and vext by his calamity and his sin but because man upon the birth of children and the increase of the world contracted new relations and consequently had new duties and obligations and men hindred one another and their faculties by many means became disorder'd and lessen'd in their abilities and their will becoming perverse they first were unwilling and then unable by superinducing dispositions and habits contrary to their duty However because there was a necessity that man should be tied to more duty God did in the several periods of the world multiply Commandements first to Noah then to Abraham and then to his posterity and by this time they were very many And still God held over mans head the Covenant of Works Upon the pressure of this Covenant all the world did complain Tanta mandata sunt ut impossbile sit servari ea In cap. 3. Gal. said S. Ambrose the Commandements were so many and great that it was impossible they should be kept For at first there were no promises at all of any good nothing but a threatning of evil to the transgressors and after a long time they were entertain'd but with the promise of temporal good things which to some men were perform'd by the pleasures and rewards of sin and then there being a great imperfection in the nature of man it could not be that man should remain innocent and for repentance in this Covenant there was no regard or provisions made But I said The Covenant of Works was still kept on foot How justly will appear in the sequel but the reasonableness of it was in this that men living in a state of awfulness might be under a pedagogy or severe institution restraining their loosenesses recollecting their inadvertencies uniting their distractions For the world was not then prepar'd by spirituall usages and dispositions to be governed by love and an easie yoke but by threatnings and severities And this is the account S. Paul gives of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Law was a Schoolmaster Gal. 3.24 that is had a temporary authority serving to other ends with no finall concluding power It could chastise and threaten but it could not condemn it had not power of eternall life and death that was given by other measures But because the world was wilde and barbarous good men were few the bad potent and innumerable and sin was conducted and help'd forward by pleasure and impunity it was necessary that God should superinduce a law and shew them the rod and affright and check their confidences lest the world it self should perish by dissolution The law of Moses was still a part of the Covenant of Works Some little it had of repentance Sacrifice and expiations were appointed for small sins but nothing at all for greater Every great sin brought death infallibly And as it had a little image of Repentance so it had something of Promises to be as a grace and auxiliary to set forward obedience But this would not do it The promises were temporall and that could not secure obedience in great instances and there being for them no remedy appointed by repentance the law could not justifie it did not promise life Eternall nor give sufficient security against the Temporall onely it was brought in as a pedagogy for the present necessity But this pedagogy or institution was also a manuduction to the Gospel For they were used to severe laws that they might the more readily entertain the holy precepts of the Gospel to which eternally they would have shut their ears unless they had had some preparatory institution of severity and fear And therefore S. Paul also calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a pedagogy or institution leading unto Christ For it was this which made the world of the Godly long for Christ as having commission to open the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the hidden mystery of Justification by Faith and Repentance For the law called for exact obedience but ministred no grace but that of fear which was not enough to the performance or the engagement of exact obedience All therefore were here convinced of sin but by this Covenant they had no hopes and therefore were to expect relief from another and a better Gal. 3.22 according to that saying of S. Paul The
Scripture concludes all under sin that is declares all the world to be sinners that the promise by the faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that beleeve This S. Bernard expresses in these words Deus nobis hoc fecit ut nostram imperfectionem ostenderet Christi avidiores nos faceret Our imperfection was sufficiently manifest by the severity of the first Covenant that the world might long for salvation by Jesus Christ For since mankinde could not be saved by the Covenant of works that is of exact obedience they must perish for ever or else hope to be sav'd by a Covenant of ease and remission that is such a Covenant as may secure Mans duty to God and Gods mercy to Man and this is the Covenant which God made with mankinde in Christ Jesus the Covenant of Repentance This Covenant began immediately after Adams fall For as soon as the first Covenant the Covenant of works was broken God promised to make it up by an instrument of mercy which himself would finde out The Seed of the woman should make up the breaches of the man But this should be acted and published in its own time not presently In the mean time man was by virtue of that new Covenant or promise admitted to Repentance Adam confessed his sin and repented Three hundred years together did he mourn upon the mountains of India and God promised him a Saviour by whose obedience his repentance should be accepted And when God did threaten the old world with a floud of waters he called upon them to repent but because they did not God brought upon them the floud of waters For 120. years together he called upon them to return before he would strike his final blow Ten times God tried Pharaoh before he destroyed him And in all ages in all periods and with all men God did deal by this measure and excepting that God in some great cases or in the beginning of a Sanction to establish it with the terror of a great example he scarce ever destroyed a single man with temporal death for any nicety of the law but for long and great prevarications of it and when he did otherwise he did it after the man had been highly warned of the particular and could have obeyed easily which was the case of the man that gathered sticks upon the Sabbath and was like the case of Adam who was upon the same account judged by the Covenant of works This then was an emanation both of Gods justice and his mercy Until man had sinned he was not the subject of mercy and if he had not then receiv'd mercy the infliction had been too severe and unjust since the Covenant was beyond the measures of man after it began to multiply into particular laws and man by accident was lessen'd in his strengths From hence the corollaries are plain 1. God was not unjust for beginning his entercourse with mankind by the Covenant of works for these reasons 1. Because Man had strengths enough to doe it until he lessen'd his own abilities 2. The Covenant of works was at first instanc'd but in a small Commandement in abstaining from the fruit of one tree when he had by him very many others for his use and pleasure 3. It was necessary that the Covenant of works should begin for the Covenant of faith and repentance could not be at first there was no need of it no opportunity for it it must suppose a defailance or an infirmity as physick supposes sickness and mortality 4. God never exacted the obedience of Man by strict measures by the severity of the first Covenant after Adams fall but men were sav'd then as now they were admitted to repentance and justified by faith and the works of faith And therefore the Jews say that three things were before the world The Law the name of the Messias and Repentance 1 Cor. 2.7 that is as S. Paul better expresses it This Repentance through faith in the Messias is the hidden wisdome of God ordained before the world unto our glory So that at first it was not impossible and when it was it was not exacted in the impossible measure but it was kept in pretence and overture for ends of piety wisdome and mercy of which I have given account it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a wise dispensation but it was hidden For since it is essentiall to a law that it be in a matter that is possible Plato lib 5. de leg Demosth contra Timocratem Plutar. in Solon Curius Fortunatianus Rhet. Nemo obligatur ad impossibile it cannot be suppos'd that God would judge man by an impossible Commandement A good man would not doe it much lesse the righteous and mercifull Judge of Men and Angels But God by holding over the world the Covenant of works non fecit praevaricatores sed humiles did not make us sinners by not observing the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the minutes and tittles of the law but made us humble needing mercy begging grace longing for a Saviour relying upon a better Covenant waiting for better promises praying for the Spirit of grace repenting of our sins deploring our infirmities and justified by faith in the promises of God 2. This then is the great introduction and necessity of repentance We neither could have liv'd without it nor have understood the way of the Divine Justice nor have felt any thing of his most glorious attribute But the admission of us to repentance is the great verification of his justice and the most excellent expression of his mercy This is the mercy of God in Jesus Christ springing from the fountains of grace purchas'd by the bloud of the Holy Lamb the Eternal sacrifice promised from the beginning always ministred to mans need in the secret Oeconomy of God but proclaim'd to all the world at the revelation of God incarnate the first day of our Lord Jesus But what are we eased now under the Gospel which is a Law of greater holiness and more Commandements and a sublimer purity in which we are tied to more severity then ever man was bound to under any institution and Covenant If the Law was an impossible Commandement who can say he hath strictly and punctually perform'd the injunctions of the Gospel Is not the little finger of the Son heavier then the Fathers loyns Here therefore it is to be inquired Whether the Commandements of Jesus Christ be as impossible to be kept as the Law of Moses If we by Christ be tied to more holiness then the sons of Israel were by Moses Law then because that could not be kept then neither can this But if we be not tied to more then they how is the law of Christ a more perfect institution and how can we now be justified by a law no better then that by which we could not be justified But then if this should be as impossible as ever why is it anew imposed why is it held over us when the
commission displease God and provoke him to anger To abide in any one sin or to doe it often or to love it is against the Covenant of the Gospel and the essence and nature of repentance which is a conversion from sin to righteousness but every single act is against the cautions and watchfulness of repentance It is an act of death but not a state it is the way of death but is not in the possession of it It is true that every single act of fornication merits an eternal hell yet when we name it to be a single act we suppose it to be no more that is to be rescinded and immediately cut off by a vigorous and proportionable repentance if it be not it is more then a single act for it is a habit as I shall remonstrate in the Chapter of Habits But then upon this account a single act of any sin may be incident to the state of a good man and yet not destroy his interests or his hopes but it is upon no other ground but this It is a single act and it does not abide there but passes immediately into repentance and then though it did interrupt or discompose the state of grace or the Divine favour yet it did not destroy it quite The man may pray Davids prayer I have gone astray like a sheep that is lost Psal 119. ult O seek thy servant for I doe not forget thy Commandements So that if a man asks whether a good man falling into one act of these great sins still remains a good man the answer is to be made upon this consideration He is a good man that is so sorry for his sin and so hates it that he will not abide in it and this is the best indication that in the act there was something very pityable because the mans affections abide not there the good man was smitten in a weak part or in an ill hour and then repents for such is our goodness to need repentance daily for smaller things and too often for greater things But be they great or little they must be speedily repented of and he that does so is a good man still Not but that the single act is highly damnable and exclusive of Heaven if it self were not excluded from his affections but it does not the mischief because he does not suffer it to proceed in finishing that death which it would have effected if the poison had not been speedily expelled before it had seis'd upon a vital part But 2ly I answer that being in the state of grace is a phrase of the Schools and is of a large and almost infinite comprehension Every Christian is in some degree in the state of grace so long as he is invited to Repentance and so long as he is capable of the Prayers of the Church This we learn from those words of S. John All unrighteousness is sin 1 Joh 5.17 and there is a sin not unto death that is some sorts of sins are so incident to the condition of men and their state of imperfection that the man who hath committed them is still within the methods of pardon and hath not forfeited his title to the Promises and Covenant of Repentance But there is a sin unto death that is some men proceed beyond the measures and Oeconomy of the Gospel and the usuall methods and probabilities of Repentance by obstinacy and persevering in sin by a wilful spiteful resisting or despising the offers of grace and the means of pardon for such a man S. John does not encourage us to pray If he be such a person as S. John described our prayers will do him no good but because no man can tell the last minute or period of pardon nor just when a man is gone beyond the limit and because the limit it self can be enlarged and Gods mercies stay for some longer then for others therefore S. John left us under this indefinite restraint and caution which was decretory enough to represent that sad state of things in which the refractary and impenitent have immerged themselves and yet so indefinite and cautious that we may not be too forward in applying it to particulars nor in prescribing measures to the Divine Mercy nor passing final sentences upon our brother before we have heard our Judge himself speak Sinning a sin not unto death is an expression fully signifying that there are some sins which though they be committed and displease God and must be repented of and need many and mighty prayers for their pardon yet the man is in the state of grace and pardon that is he is within the Covenant of mercy he may be admitted to repentance if he will return to his duty So that being in the state of grace is having a title to Gods loving kindness a not being rejected of God but a being beloved by him to certain purposes of mercy and that hath these measures and degrees 1. A wicked Christian that lives vilely and yet is called to Repentance by the vigorous and fervent Sermons of the Gospel is in a state of grace of this grace God would fain save him willing he is and desirous he should live but his mercy to him goes but thus farre that he still continues the means of his salvation he is angry with him but not finally The Jews were in some portions of this state until the final day came in which God would not be merciful any more Even in this thy day O Jerusalem said our blessed Saviour so long as their day lasted their state of grace lasted God had mercy for them if they had had gracious hearts to receive it 2. But he that begins to leave his sins and is in a continual contestation against them and yet falls often even most commonly at the return of the temptation and sin does in some measure prevail he is in the state of a further grace neerer to pardon as he is nearer to holiness his hopes are greater and nearer to performance He is not farre from the Kingdome of Heaven so our blessed Lord expressed the like condition he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ordered dispos'd towards life eternal and this is a further approach towards the state of life 3. He that loves no sin but hath overcome his affections to all and hates all but yet with so imperfect a choice or aversation that his faith is weak and his repentance like an infant this man is in a better state then both the former God will not quench the smoaking flax nor break the bruised reed God hath in some measure prevail'd upon him and as God is ready to receive the first unto the means and the second unto the grace of Repentance so this third he is ready to receive unto pardon if he shall grow and persevere in grace And these are the several stages and periods of being in the state of grace 1. With the first of these not onely an act but a habit of sin
officium in Ministerium alienae idololatriae aliquas artes adhibuit curiositatis in verbum ancipitis negotiationis impegit ob tale quid extra gregem datus est vel ipse fortè irâ tumore aemulatione quod denique saepe fit dedignatione castigationis abrupit debet requiri atque revocari The Christian is in some sort perished who sins by beholding bloody or unchaste spectacles who ministers to the sins of others who offends by anger emulation rage and swelling too severe animadversions this man must be sought for and called back but this man is not quite lost Quod potest recuperari non perit nisi foris perseveravit Benè interpretaberis parabolam viventem adhuc revocans peccatorem That which may be recovered is but as it were lost unless it remains abroad and returns not to the place from whence it wandred To the same purpose S. Cyprian and S. Ambrose discourse of the Parable of him that fell among the thieves and was wounded and half dead Such are they who in times of persecution fell away into dissimulation De lapsis ad Anton. 52. Nec putemus mortuos esse sed magis semianimes jacere eos quos persecutione funestâ sauciatos videmus qui si in totum mortui essent nunquam de eisdem postmodùm Confessores Martyres fierent For if these were quite dead you should not finde of them to return to life and to become Martyrs and Confessors for that faith which through weakness they did seemingly abjure These men therefore were but wounded and half dead for they still keep the faith they preserve their title to the Covenant and the Promises of the Gospel and the grace of Repentance Quam fidem qui habet Lib. 1. de Poenit. c. 10. vitam habet saith S. Ambrose He that hath this faith hath life that is he is not excluded from pardon whom therefore peradventure the good Samaritan does not pass by because he findes there is life in him some principle by which he may live again Now as it was in the matter of Faith so it is of Charity and the other graces Every act of sin takes away something from the contrary grace but if the root abides in the ground the plant is still alive and may bring forth fruit again But he onely is dead who hath thrown God off for ever or intirely with his very heart Eph. 4.1 So S. Ambrose To be dead in trespasses and sins which is the phrase of S. Paul is the same with that expression of S. John of sinning a sin unto death that is habitual refractary pertinacious and incorrigible sinners in whom there is scarce any hopes or sign of life These are they upon whom as S. 1 Thess 2.16 Pauls expression is the wrath of God is come upon them to the uttermost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unto death so was their sin it was a sin unto death so is their punishment The result of these considerations is this He that commits one act of a wilful sin hath provoked God to anger which whether it will be final or no we cannot know but by the event by his forbearing us and calling us and accepting us to repentance One act does not destroy the life of grace utterly but wounds it more or less according to the vileness and quantity or abode in the sin §. 3. What repentance is necessary for single acts of sin 1. UPon consideration of the premisses it appears to be dangerous practically to inquire how far single acts of sin can stand with the state of grace or the being of a good man For they ought not to be at all and if they be once we must repent and the sin must be pardoned or we die And when it can be ask'd how far any sin can be consistent with the state of Gods favour it cannot be meant that God indulges it to a good man with impunity or that his grace and favour consists in this that he may safely sin once or twice in what instance or in any instance he shall choose but in this it does a single act of sin does not so destroy the hopes of a good man but that if he returns speedily he shall be pardoned speedily for this God will doe for him not by permitting him to sin again but by taking his sin away and healing his soul but how soon or how much or how long God will pardon or forbear he hath no way told us * For in the several states and periods of the soul in order to vertue or vice respectively there is no specifical difference but of degrees onely not of state As the sins are more or longer God is more angry and the man further off but the man is not wholly altered from his state of grace till he be arriv'd at the unpardonable condition He is a good or an evil man more or less according as he sins or repents For neither of the appellatives are absolute and irrespective and though in philosophy we use to account them such by the prevailing ingredient yet the measures of the spirit are otherwise The whole affair is arbitrary and gradual various by its own measures and the good pleasure of God so that we cannot in these things which are in perpetual flux come to any certain measures But although in judging of events we are uncertain yet in the measures of repentance we can be better guided Therefore first in general 2. S. Cyprians rule is a prudent measure Quà m magna deliquimus tam granditèr defleamus ut poenitentia crimine minor non sit According to the greatness of the sin so must be the greatness of the sorrow and therefore we are in our beginnings and progressions of repentance to consider all the 1 circumstances of aggravation 2 the complication of the crime 3 the scandal and 4 evil effect and in proportion to every one of these the sorrow is to be enlarged and continued For if it be necessary to be afflicted because we have done evil it is also necessary that our affliction and grief be answerable to all the parts of evil because a sin grows greater by being more in matter or choice in the instances or in the adhesion and as two sins must be deplored more then one so must two degrees that is the greater portions of malice and wilfulness be mourned for with a bigger sorrow then the less 3. Every single act of sin must be cut off by a moral revocation or à contrary act by which I mean an express hatred and detestation of it For an act of sin being in its proportion an aversion or turning from God and repentance being in its whole nature a conversion to him that act must be destroyed as it can be Now because that which is done cannot naturally be made undone it must morally that is it must be revok'd by an act of nolition and hatred of it and a wishing it had never been done for
it may be usefull to every man and so inoffensively that it may hurt no man I know but one Objection which I am likely to meet withall excepting those of my infirmity and disability which I cannot answer but by protesting the piety of my purposes but this onely that in the Chapter of Original sin I speak otherwise then is spoken commonly in the Church of England whos 's ninth Article affirms that the natural propensity to evil and the perpetual lusting of the flesh against the spirit deserves the anger of God and damnation against which I so earnestly seem to dispute in the sixth Chapter of my Book To this I answer that it is one thing to say a thing in its own nature deserves damnation and another to say it is damnable to all those persons in whom it is subjected The thing it self that is our corrupted nature or our nature of corruption does leave us in the state of separation from God by being unable to bear us to heaven imperfection of nature can never carry us to the perfections of glory and this I conceive to be all that our Church intends for that in the state of nature we can onely fall short of heaven and be condemn'd to a poena damni is the severest thing that any sober person owns and this I say that Nature alone cannot bring us to God without the regeneration of the Spirit and the grace of God we can never go to heaven but because this Nature was not spoil'd by Infants but by persons of reason and we are all admitted to a new Covenant of Mercy and Grace made with Adam presently after his fall that is even before we were born as much as we were to a participation of sin before we were born no man can perish actually for that because he is reconcil'd by this He that sayes every sin is damnable and deserves the anger of God sayes true but yet some persons that sin of meer infirmity are accounted by God in the rank of innocent persons So it is in this Article Concupiscence remains in the regenerate and yet concupiscence hath the nature of sin but it brings not condemnation These words explain the former Original imperfection is such a thing as is even in the regenerate and it is of the nature of sin that is it is the effect of one sin and the cause of many but yet it is not damning because as it is subjected in unconsenting persons it loses its own natural venome and relation to guiltiness that is it may of it self in its abstracted nature be a sin and deserve Gods anger viz. in some persons in all them that consent to it but that which will always be in persons that shall never be damned that is in infants and regenerate shall never damn them And this is the main of what I affirm And since the Church of England intended that Article against the Doctrine of the Pelagians I suppose I shall not be thought to recede from the spirit and sense of the Article though I use differing manners of expression because my way of explicating this question does most of all destroy the Pelagian Heresie since although I am desirous to acquit the dispensation of God and his Justice from any imputation or suspicion of wrong and am loath to put our sins upon the account of another yet I impute all our evils to the imperfections of our nature and the malice of our choice which does most of all demonstrate not onely the necessity of Grace but also of Infant Baptism and then to accuse this Doctrine of Pelagianism or any newer name of Heresie will seem like impotency and weakness of spirit but there will be nothing of truth or learning in it And although this Article was penn'd according to the style of the Schools as they then did love to speak yet the hardest word in it is capable of such a sense as complies with the intendment of that whole sixth Chapter For though the Church of England professes her self fallible and consequently that all her truths may be peaceably improved yet I do think that she is not actually deceiv'd and also that divers eminently learned do consent in my sense of that Article However I am so truly zealous for her honour and peace that I wholly submit all that I say there or any where else to her most prudent judgement And though I may most easily be deceived yet I have given my reasons for what I say and desire to be tried by them not by prejudice and numbers and zeal and if any man resolves to understand the Article in any other sense then what I have now explicated all that I shal say is that it may be I cannot reconcile my Doctrine to his explication it is enough that it is consistent with the Article it self in its best understanding and compliance with the truth it self and the justification of God However he that explicates the Article and thinks it means as he says does all the honour he can to the Authority whose words if he does not understand yet the sanction he reverers And this liberty I now take is no other then hath been used by the severest Votaries in that Church where to dissent is death I mean in the Church of Rome I call to witness those disputations and contradictory assertions in the matter of some articles which are to be observed in Andreas Vega Dominicus à Soto Andradius the Lawyers about the Question of divorces and clandestine contracts the Divines about predetermination and about this very article of Original sin as relating to the Virgin Mary But blessed be God we are under the Discipline of a prudent charitable and indulgent Mother and if I may be allowed to suppose that the article means no more in short then the office of Baptism explicates at large I will abide by the trial there is not a word in the Rubricks or Prayers but may very perfectly consist with the Doctrine I deliver But though the Church of England is my Mother and I hope I shall ever live and at last die in her Communion and if God shall call me to it and enable me I will not refuse to die for her yet I conceive there is something most highly considerable in that saying Call no man Master upon earth that is no mans explication of her articles shall prejudice my affirmative if it agrees with Scripture and right reason and the doctrine of the Primitive Church for the first 300 years and if in any of this I am mistaken I will most thankfully be reproved and most readily make honourable amends But my proposition I hope is not built upon the sand and I am most sure it is so zealous for Gods honour and the reputation of his justice and wisdome and goodness that I hope all that are pious unless they labour under some prejudice and prepossession will upon that account be zealous for it or at least confess that
our duty I do not say all that we can naturally or possibly but all that we can morally and probably according to the measures of a man and the rate of our hindrances and infirmities 5. But the last sort and sense of perfection is that which our blessed Saviour intended particularly in the instance and subject matter of this Precept and that is a perfection in the kinde of action that is a choice and prosecution of the most noble and excellent things in the whole Religion Three are especially instanc'd in the holy Gospel 1. The first is a being ready or a making our selves ready to suffer persecution prescrib'd by our blessed Saviour to the rich young man If thou wilt be perfect Mat. 19.21 sell all and give to the poor that is if thou wilt be my disciple make thy self ready and come and follow me For it was at that time necessary to all that would follow Christs person and fortune to quit all they had above their needs For they that followed him were sure of a Cross and therefore to invite them to be disciples was to engage them to the suffering persecution and this was that which our blessed Saviour calls perfection Dulce periculum est O Lenaee sequi Deum Cingentem viridi tempora pampino It is an easie thing to follow God in festivals and dayes of Eucharist but to serve him in hard battels to die for him is the perfection of love of faith and obedience Obedient unto death was the Character of his own perfection for Greater love then this hath no man then to lay down his life Scis quem dicam bonum perfectum absolutum Seneca Quem malum fucere nulla vis nulla necessitas potest He is good absolute and perfect whom no force no necessity can make evil 2. The second instance is being merciful for S. Luke recording this Precept expounds it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Be ye perfect that is Luk. 6.36 Be ye merciful as your heavenly Father is merciful for by mercy onely we can be like him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Scriptor act Diognetum He that bears his neighbours burthen and is willing to do benefit to his inferiors and to minister to the needy of the good things which God hath given him he is as God to them that receive he is an imitator of God himself And Justin Martyr reciting this Precept of our blessed Saviour in stead of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 uses the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Be ye good and bountiful as your heavenly Father is And to this purpose the story of Jesus and the young man before mentioned is interpolated in the Gospel according to the Hebrews or the Nazarens The Lord said unto him How sayest thou I have kept the Law and the Prophets when it is written in the Law Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self and behold many of thy brethren the sons of Abraham are covered in filth and die with hunger and thy house is full of good things and nothing goes forth to them from thence If therefore thou wilt be perfect sell all and give to the poor Charity which is the fulfilling the Commandement is also the perfection of a Christian and that a giving of alms should be perfection is not disagreeing with the design of the word it self 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 say the Grammarians it signifies to spend and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a great spender or a bountiful person 3. The third is the very particular to which our blessed Master did especially relate to in the words of the sanction or institution and we are taught it by the particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or therefore For when the holy Jesus had describ'd that glory of Christianity that we should love our enemies bless them that curse us do good to them that hate us and pray for them which despitefully use us and persecute us he propounds the example of our heavenly Father for he maketh his Sun to rise on the evil and on the good But the Publicans love their friends and salute their brethren but more is expected of us Be ye therefore perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect that is do more then the Publicans do as your Father does be perfect as he is that is love your enemies 6. Now concerning this sense of the Precept of perfection which is the choice and pursuance of the noblest actions of Religion we must observe that they are therefore perfection because they suppose a man to have pass'd through the first and beginning graces to have arrived at these excellencies of piety and duty For as no man can on a sudden become the worst man in the world his soul must by degrees be unstript of holiness and then of modesty and then of all care of reputation and then of disuse and by these measures he will proceed to the consummation of the method of Hell and darkness So can no man on a sudden come to the right use of these graces Not every man that dies in a good Cause shall have the reward of Martyrdome but he that having liv'd well seals that doctrine with dying which before he adorn'd with living And therefore it does infinitely concern all them that suffer in a good Cause to take care that they be not prodigal of their sufferings and throw them away upon vice Peevishness or pride lust or intemperance can never be consecrated by dying or by alms But he that after a patient continuance in well doing addes Charity or Martyrdome to the collective body of his other graces he hath made them perfect with this kinde of perfection Martyrdome can supply the place of actual baptisms but not of repentance Because without our fault it may so happen that the first cannot be had but without our fault the second is never left undone Thus perfection and repentance may stand together Perfection does not suppose the highest intention of degrees in every one but in all according to their measures of grace and time Evangelicall perfection is such as supposes a beginning an infant grace progression and variety watchfulness and fear trembling fear And there are many graces required of us whose materiall and formal part is Repentance Such as are Mortification Penitential sorrow Spiritual mourning Patience some parts of Humility all the parts and actions of Humiliation and since in these also perfection is as great a duty as in any thing else it is certain that the perfection of a Christian is not the supreme degree of action or intention But yet perfection cannot be less then an intire piety a holiness perfect in its parts wanting nothing material allowing no vicious habit permitting no vile action but contending towards the greatest excellency a charitable heart a ready hand a confident Religion willing to die when we are called to die patient constant and persevering endevouring 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the measures of a man to
or thrust through with a sword This we are taught by that excellent Author of the Divine Epistle to the Hebrews Heb. 10.28 29. He that despised Moses law died without mercy under two or three witnesses Of how much sorer punishment suppose ye shall he be thought worthy who hath troden under foot the Son of God and hath counted the blood of the Covenant wherewith he was saenctified an unholy thing and hath done despite to the Spirit of Grace So that under the Gospel he that sins and repents is in a farre better condition then he that sinn'd under the Law and repented For repentance was not then allowed of the man was to die without mercy But he that sins and repents not is under the Gospel in a farre worse condition then under the Law for under the Gospel he shall have a farre sorer punishment then under the Law was threatned Therefore let no man mistake the mercies of the New Covenant or turn the grace of God into wantonness The mercies of the Gospel neither allow us to sin nor inflict an easier punishment but they oblige us to more holiness under a greater penalty In pursuance of which I adde 3. The Covenant by which mankinde must now be judged is a Covenant of more Mercy but also of more holiness and therefore let no man think that now he is disobliged from doing good works by being admitted to the Covenant of Faith For though the Covenants are oppos'd as Old and New as a worse and a better yet Faith and Works are not oppos'd We are in the Gospel tied to more and to more excellent works then ever the subjects of any Law were but if after a hearty endevour we fall into infirmity and still strive against it we are pitied here but there we were not Under the first Covenant the Covenant of Works no endevour was sufficient because there was no allowance made for infirmities no abatements for ignorance no deductions of exact measures no consideration of surprises passions folly and inadvertency but under the New Covenant our hearty endevour is accepted but we are tied to endevour higher and more excellent things then they But he that thinks this mercy gives him liberty to do what he please loses the mercy and mistakes the whole design and Oeconomy of Gods loving kindness 4. To every Christian it is enjoyned that they be perfect that is according to the measure of every one Which perfection consists in doing our endevour He that does not do that must never hope to be accepted because he refuses to serve God by something that is in his power But he that does that is sure that God will not refuse it because we cannot be dealt withall upon any other account but by the measures of what is in our power and for what is not we cannot take care 5. To do our endevour or our best is not to be understood equally in all the periods of our life according to the work or effect it self nor according to our natural powers but it is accounted for by the general measures and great periods of our life A man cannot pray alwayes with equal intention nor give the same alms nor equally mourn with sharpness for his sins But God having appointed for every duty proper seasons and solennities hath declared that He does his best who heartily endevours to do the duty in its proper season But it were well we would remember that he that did a good act to day can do the same to morrow in the same circumstances and he that yesterday fought a noble battel and resisted valiantly can upon the same terms contend as manfully every day if he will consider and watch And though it will never be that men will alwayes do as well as at some times yet when at any time they commit a sin it is not because they could not but because they would not help it 6. He that would be approved in doing his best must omit no opportunity of doing a good action because when it is plac'd in its proper circumstances God layes his hand upon it and calls to have it done and there can be no excuse for the omission He does not do his best that does not do that Because such a person does voluntarily omit the doing of a good without just cause and that cannot proceed from an innocent principle 7. He that leaves any thing undone which he is commanded to do or does what he is commanded to forbear and considers or chooses so to do does not do his best cannot plead his privilege in the Gospel but is fallen under the portion of sinners and will die if he does not repent and make it up some way or other by sorrow and a future diligence 8. To sin against our Conscience can at no hand consist with the duty of Christian perfection Because he loves not God with all his heart nor serves him with all his strength who gives some of his strength and some of his affection to that which God forbids 9. No man must account that he does his duty that is his best or according to the perfection requir'd of Christians but he that does better and better and grows toward the measures of the fulness of Christ For perfection is an infinite word and it could not be communicated to several persons of different capacities and degrees but that there is something common to them all which hath analogy and equivalent proportions Now nothing can be perfect but that to which nothing is wanting and therefore a man is not any way perfect but by doing all all that he can for then nothing is wanting to him when he hath put forth all his strength For perfection is not to be accounted by comparing the subjects which are perfect for in that sense nothing is perfect but God but perfection is to be reckoned by every mans own proportions For a body may be a perfect body though it have not the perfection of a soul and a man is perfect when he is heartily and intirely Gods servant though he have not the perfection of S. Paul as a man is a meek man though he be not so meek as Moses or Christ But he is not meek if he keeps any fierceness or violence within * But then because to be more perfect is incident with humane nature he that does not endevour to get as much as he can and more then he hath he hath not the perfection of holy desires Therefore 10. Every person that is in the state of grace and designs to do his duty must think of what is before him not what is past of the stages that are not yet run not of those little portions of his course he hath already finish'd Vt cum carceribus missos rapit ungula currus Horat. Serm. l. 1 Satyr 1. Inflat equis auriga suos vincentibus illum Praeteritum temnens extremos inter euntem For so did the Contenders in the Olympick
which they can obey And indeed no man could be a sinner but he that breaks that law which he could have kept We were all sinners by the Covenant of Works but that was in those instances where it might have been otherwise For the Covenant of Works was not impossible because it consisted of impossible Commandements for every Commandement was kept by some or other and all at some times but therefore it was impossible to be kept because at some time or other men would be impotent or ignorant or surpris'd and for this no abatement was made in that Covenant But then since in what every man could help he is found to be a sinner he ought to account it a mighty grace that his other services are accepted In pursuance of this 15. Let no man boast himself in the most glorious services and performances of Religion Qui in Ecclesiâ semper gloriosè granditer operati sunt Epist ad lapsos opus suum Domino nunquam imputaverunt as S. Cyprian's expression is They who have greatly served God in the Church and have not been forward to exact and challenge their reward of God they are such whom God will most certainly reward For humility without other external works is more pleasing to God then pride though standing upon heaps of excellent actions It is the saying of S. Chrysostome * For if it be as natural to us to live according to the measures of reason as for beasts to live by their nature and instinct what thanks is due to us for that more then to them for this And therefore one said well Ne te jactes si benè servisti Obsequitur Sol obtemperat Lunae Boast not if thou hast well obeyed The Sun and the Moon do so and shall never be rewarded * But when our selves and all our faculties are from God he hath power to demand all our services without reward therefore if he will reward us it must wholly be a gift to us Concil Aâ—ausic 2. c. 18. Dâ—betur merocs bonis operibus sed gratia quae non debetur praecedit ut fiant that he will so crown our services * But he does not onely give us all our being and all our faculties but makes them also irriguous with the dew of his Divine Grace sending his holy Son to call us to repentance and to die to obtain for us pardon and resurrection and eternal life sending his holy Spirit by rare arguments and aids external and internal to help us in our spiritual contentions and difficulties So that we have nothing of our own and therefore can challenge nothing to our selves * But besides these considerations many sins are forgiven to us and the service of a whole life cannot make recompence for the infinite favour of receiving pardon * Especially since after our amendment and repentance there are remaining such weaknesses and footsteps of our old impieties that we who have daily need of the Divine Mercy and Pity cannot challenge a reward for that which in many degrees needs a pardon for if every act we do should not need some degrees of pardon yet our persons do in the periods of our imperfect workings * But after all this all that we can do is no advantage to God he is not profited or obliged by our services no moments do thence accrew to his felicities and to challenge a reward of God or to think out best services can merit heaven is as if Galileo when he had found out a Star which he had never observed before Job 35.7 and pleased himself in his own fancy should demand of the Grand Signior to make him King of Tunis for what is he the better that the studious man hath pleased himself in his own Art and the Turkish Empire gets no advantages by his new Argument * And this is so much the more material if we consider that the littleness of our services if other things were away could not countervail the least moment of Eternity Rom. 8.18 and the poor Countryman might as well have demanded of Cyrus to give him a Province for his handful of river water as we can expect of God to give us Heaven as a reward of our good works 16. But although this rule relying upon such great and convincing grounds can abolish all proud expectations of reward from God as a debtor for our good works yet they ought not to destroy our modest confidence and our rejoycings in God who by his gracious promises hath not onely obliged himself to help us if we pray to him but to reward us if we work For our God is merciful Psa 62.12 he rewardeth every man according to his work so said David according to the nature and graciousness of the work not according to their value and proper worthiness Mat. 5.12 1 Cor. 3.8 Matt. 16. 27. 2 Cor. 4.17 2 Thess 1.5 Apoc. 3.4 16.6 Rom. 8.18 not that they deserve it but because God for the communication of his goodness was pleased to promise it Promissum quidem ex misericordiâ sed ex justitiâ persolvendum said S. Bernard Mercy first made the promise but Justice payes the debt Which words were true if we did exactly do all that duty to which the reward was so graciously promised but where much is to be abated even of that little which was bound upon us by so glorious promises of reward there we can in no sense challenge Gods justice but so as it signifies equity In Matth. lib. 3. cap. 20. v. 8. and is mingled with the mercies of the chancery Gratis promisit gratis reddit So Ferus God promised freely and payes freely If therefore thou wilt obtain grace and favour make no mention of thy deservings And yet let not this slacken thy work but reinforce it and enlarge thy industry since thou hast so gracious a Lord who of his own meer goodness will so plentifully reward it 17. If we fail in the outward work let it be so ordered that it be as little imputable to us as we can that is let our default not be at all voluntary but wholly upon the accounts of a pityable infirmity For the Law was a Covenant of Works such as they were but the minde could not make amends within for the defect without But in the Gospel it is otherwise for here the will is accepted for the fact in all things where the fact is not in our power But where it is there to pretend a will is hypocrisie Nequam illud verbum est benè vult nisi qui benè facit said the Comedian This rule is our measure in the great lines of duty in all negative Precepts and in the periods of the law of Christ which cannot pass by us without being observed But in the material and external instances of duty we may without our fault be disabled and therefore can only be supplied with our endevours and desires But that is our advantage
we thus can perform all Gods will acceptably For if we endevour all that we can and desire more and pursue more it is accepted as if we had done all 2 Cor. 8.12 for we are accepted according to what a man hath and not according to what he hath not Unless we can neither endevour nor desire we ought not to complain of the burthen of the Divine Commandements For to endevour truly and passionately to desire and contend for more is obedience and charity and that is the fulfilling of the Commandments Matter for Meditation out of Scripture according to the former Doctrine The Old Covenant or the Covenant of Works IN that day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die Gen. 2.17 Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the law to do them Gal. 3 10. Deut. 27.26 Deut. 27.8 And thou shalt write upon stones all the words of this law very plainly Thou shalt not go aside from any of the words which I command thee this day to the right hand or to the left But it shall come to pass Deut. 28. if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God to observe to do all his commandements and his statutes then shall all these curses come upon thee and overtake thee And if you will not be reformed by these things Lev. 26.23 24 c. but will walk contrary unto me then will I also walk contrary unto you and will punish you yet seven times for your sins He that despised Moses law Heb. 10.28 died without mercy under two or three witnesses The New Covenant or the Covenant of Grace WEE are justified freely by his grace Rom. 3. ver 24 25 26 27 28. through the redemption that is in Jesus Christ * Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past through the forbearance of God * To declare I say at this time his righteousness that he might be just and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus * Where is boasting then it is excluded by what law of works Nay but by the law of faith * Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus Rom. 8.1 14 26 27 28. who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit * For as many as are led by the Spirit they are the sons of God * Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities because he maketh intercession for the Saints according to the will of God * And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God He that spared not his own Son Ver. 33 c. but delivered him up for us all how shall not he with him also freely give us all things * Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods elect It is God that justifieth This is the Covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those dayes Heb. 8.10 11 12. saith the Lord I will put my laws in their minde and write them in their hearts and I will be to them a God and they shall be to me a people all shall know me from the least to the greatest * For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more If any man be in Christ 2 Cor. 5.17 18 19 20 21. he is a new creature old things are past away all things are become new * And all things are of God who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ and hath given to us the ministery of reconciliation * Now then we are ambassadors for Christ as though God did beseech you by us we pray you in Christs stead be ye reconciled to God * For he hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins Acts 2.37 38. and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost for the promise is unto you and to your children and to all that are afar off and to as many as the Lord our God shall call And it shall come to pass Rom. 10.13 Acts 2.21 Rom. 10.5 6 8 9. that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved Moses describeth the righteousness which is of the law that the man which doth those things shall live by them But the righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise The word is nigh thee even in thy mouth and in thy heart that is the word of faith which we preach that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shalt believe in thy heart that God hath raised him from the dead thou shalt be saved Death is swallowed up in victory 1 Cor. 15.55 56. O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory The sting of death is sin and the strength of sin is the law But thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ My yoke is easie and my burthen is light For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh Rom. 8.3 4. God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh hath for sin condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit His Commandements are not grievous 1 Joh. 5.3 Rom. 5.10 If while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son much more being reconciled we shall be saved by his life * And not onely so but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ by whom we have now received the atonement I can do all things through Christ which strengthneth me Phil. 4.13 My grace is sufficient for thee 2 Cor. 12.9 for my strength is made perfect in weakness Ask and you shall have Mat. 7.7 seek and ye shall finde knock and it shall be opened unto you To him that hath shall be given and he shall have more abundantly Having therefore these promises 2 Cor. 7.1 let us cleanse our selves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit Vid. etiam Isa 49.6 53.12 Psal 22.23 24 25 26 27 28. Jer. 32.34 perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord. The PRAYER I. OEternal God Lord of Heaven and Earth Father of Men and Angels we do adore thy infinite Goodness we revere thy Justice and delight in thy Mercies by which thou hast dealt with us not with the utmost right and dominion of a Lord but with the gentleness of a Father treating us like friends who were indeed thy enemies
Thou O God didst see our follies and observe our weaknesses thou knowest the aversness of our nature to good and our proneness to commit vanity and because our imperfect obedience could not bring us to perfect felicity whither thou didst design us the great God of all the world was pleased to make a new Covenant with Man and to become a debtor to his servants Blessed be God and blessed be that Mercy which hath done so great things for us O be pleased to work that in us which thou expectest from us Let us not lose our title in the Covenant of Faith and Repentance by deferring the one or dishonouring the other but let us walk worthy of our vocation according to the law of Faith and the Mercies of God and the Covenant of our Lord Jesus II. O Blessed Jesus never suffer us to abuse thy Mercies or to turn thy Grace into wantonness Let the remembrance and sense of thy glorious favours endear our services and let thy goodness lead us to Repentance and our Repentance bring forth the fruits of godliness in our whole life Imprint deeply upon our hearts the fear and terror of thy Majesty and perpetually entertain our spirits with the highest apprehensions of thy loving kindeness that we may fear more and love more every day more and more hating sin crucifying all its affections and desires passionately loving holy things zealously following after them prudently conducting them and indefatigably persevering in them to the end of our lives III. O Blessed and Eternal God with thy Spirit inlighten our understandings in the rare mysterious Secrets of thy Law Make me to understand all the most advantageous wayes of duty and kindle a flame in my Soul that no difficulty or contradiction no temptation within or persecution without may ever extinguish Give me a mighty grace that I may design to please thee with my best and all my services to follow the best examples to do the noblest Charities to pursue all Perfection ever pressing forward to the mark of the high calling in Christ Jesus Let us rather choose to die then to sin against our Consciences Let us also watch that we may omit nothing of our duty nor pretermit any opportunity by which thou canst be glorified or any Christian instructed comforted or assisted not resting in the strictest measures of Command but passing forward to great and prudent significations of love doing heroick actions some things by which thou mayest be greatly pleased that thou mayest take delight to pardon to sanctifie and to preserve thy servants for ever Amen CHAP. II. Of the nature and definition of Repentance And what parts of duty are signified by it in holy Scriptures §. I. THe Greeks use two words to express this duty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Post factum angi cruciari to be afflicted in minde to be troubled for our former folly it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Phavorinus a being displeased for what we have done and it is generally used for all sorts of Repentance but more properly to signifie either the beginnings of a good or the whole state of an ineffective Repentance In the first sense we finde it in S. Matthew * 21.32 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and ye seeing did not repent that ye might believe him Of the second sense we have example in Judas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he repented too but the end of it was Mat. 27.3 he died with anguish and despair and of Esau it is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He found no place for an effective repentance but yet he repented too for he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. 12 17. he fain would have had it otherwise and he sought it with tears which two do fully express all the meaning of this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when it is distinguished from the better and effective Repentance There is in this Repentance a sorrow for what is done a disliking of the thing with its consequents and effect and so farre also it is a change of minde But it goes no further then so farre to change the minde that it brings trouble and sorrow and such things which are the natural events of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Suidas It is an affection incident to man not to God who cannot repent where although by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he means an Accident or property of Man that is a quality in the general sense yet that it is properly a passion in the special sense was the sense of all men Lib. de poenit as Tertullian observes saying that the Heathens know Repentance to be passionem animi quandam the same with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Suidas a passion quae veniat de offensâ sententiae prioris coming from our being offended or troubled at our former course But Tertullian uses the Latine word of which I shall give account in the following periods But when there was a difference made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was the better word which does not properly signifie the sorrow for having done amiss but something that is nobler then it but brought in at the gate of sorrow For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a godly sorrow that is fo or the first beginning of Rapentance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 worketh this better Repentance 2 Cor. 7.11 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a repentance not to be repented of not to be sorrowed for a repentance that is unto salvation Sorrow may go before this but dwells not with it according to that of S. Chrysostome Homil. 9. de Poenit. Medicinae hic locus non judicii non poenas sed peccatorum remissionem poenitentia tribuit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word Repentance brings not pains but pardon with it for this is the place of medicine and remedy not of judgement or condemnation meaning that this Repentance is wholly salutary as tending to reformation and amendment Lib. â—adv Marcion cap. 20. But Tertullian made the observation more express In Graeco sono Poenitentiae nomen non ex delicti confessione sed ex animi demutatione compositum est To repent among the Greeks signifies not a confession of our fault but the change of minde He speaks of the Grammatical sense of the word for in the whole use of it it is otherwise For however the Grammarians may distinguish them yet the words are used promiscuously for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is sometimes used in the bad sense and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies the better repentance not often but sometimes it does The son that told his Father he would not work in his Vineyard afterwards was sorry for refusing and he went to work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in the same Chapter Matth. 21.29 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ye seeing were not troubled and sorrowful that ye might believe
both signifie the Gospel For the whole Gospel is nothing else but that glad tidings which Christ brought to all mankinde that the Govenant of Works or exact measures should not now be exacted but men should be saved by second thoughts that is by Repentance and amendment of life through faith in the Lord Jesus That is if we become his Disciples for that is the condition of the Covenant we shall finde mercy our sins shall be blotted out and we shall be saved if we obey heartily and diligently though not exactly This becoming his Disciples is called Faith that is coming to him believing him hoping in him obeying him and consequent to this is that we are admitted to Repentance that is to the pardon of our sins For him hath God exalted on his right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 5.31 to give repentance and remission of sins This is the summe Total of the Gospel That we have leave to repent supposes that God will pardon what is past But then that we have leave to repent supposes us also highly bound to it It is in meer pity to our infirmities our needs and our miseries that we have leave to do it and this is given to mankinde by faith in Jesus Christ that is by becoming his Disciples for he hath power to pardon sins and to take them away and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness viz. which we have committed This is that which all the world did need and long'd for it was the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the hidden mystery from all ages but revealed in Christ whose blood as S. Clement expresses it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 brought to all the world the grace of Repentance This is the Gospel For the Gospel is nothing else but Faith and Repentance The Gospel is called Faith by S. Paul Gal. 3.23 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before that faith came we were under the law shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed that is to the Gospel or the glad tidings of Repentance which is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ver. 2. the hearing of faith For Faith being here opposed to the Law that is the Covenant of Mercy to the Covenant of Works must mean the Covenant of Repentance And therefore although if we consider them as proper and particular graces and habits they have differing natures and definitions yet in the general and foederal sense of which I now speak Faith and Repentance are onely distinguished by relations and respects not by substance and reality Acts 20.21 Repentance towards God and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ that is Repentance for having sinned against God a Repentance I say through faith in Jesus Christ that is a Repentance procured and preach'd and enjoyn'd by Christ being the summe of his Discipline And that it may appear Faith and Repentance to be the same thing and differing onely in name and manner of expression S. Paul confounds the distinction which he formerly made and that which he called Repentance towards God and faith towards our Lord Jesus in his Sermons in Asia in his Epistles to the Hebrews he calls Repentance from dead works and faith in God And the words are used for each other promiscuously in S. Luke for that which the rich man in hell called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Abraham called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If one comes from the dead they will repent No said Abraham If they will not hear Moses and the Prophets then if one come from the dead they will not believe or be perswaded And S. 2 Pet. 3.9 15. Peter giving an account of the delaying of the coming of the Lord for the punishment of the obdurate Jews and enemies of Christ sayes it is because God of his infinite goodness expects even them also to be converted to the faith or becoming Christians as the whole design of the place infers this he calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a coming to Repentance that is to the faith of Christ And therefore the Gospel is nothing else but an universal publication of Repentance and pardon of sins in the Name of Christ that is procured for all them who are his Disciples and to this we are baptized that is adopted into the Religion into that Discipleship under which God requires holiness but not perfect measures sincerity without hypocrisie but not impeccability or perfect innocence And as the Gospel is called Faith and Faith is Repentance that is it is the same Covenant of Grace and Mercy with this onely difference that it is called Faith as it relates to Christ who procured this mercy for us Repentance as it signifies the mercy it self so procured So Baptism by the same analogy is called the Baptism unto Repentance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Baptism of Repentance so it is called in the Jerusalem Creed that is the admission to the grace of the Gospel which the Fathers of CP in their appendage to the Nicene Creed thus express I believe one Baptism for the remission of sins that is to remission of sins we are admitted by Baptism alone no other way shall we have this grace this title but by being once initiated into the Gospel to be Disciples of Jesus Not that it is to be supposed that our sins are onely pardon'd when we are baptized but that by Baptism we are admitted to the state and grace of Repentance and pardon of sins And this is demonstratively certain not onely upon those many instances of baptized penitents admitted to pardon and baptized Criminals called upon in Scripture to repent but upon the very nature of the Evangelical Covenant and the whole design of Christs coming For if we were not admitted to Repentance after Baptism then we were still to be judged by the Covenant of Works not by the Covenant of Faith and we should inherit by the Law or not at all and not be heirs according to promise and then Christ were dead in vain we are yet in our sins and all the world must perish because all men have sinned and so none should go to heaven but newly baptized Infants or newly baptized Catechumens and how then could the Gospel be a New Covenant it being exactly the same with the Law for so it must be if it promise no mercy or Repentance to them that sin after our admittance to it * But Baptism is a new birth and by it we are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 renewed unto Repentance unto that state of life which supposes holiness and imperfection and consequently needs mercy all the way according to that saying Justus ex fide vivet The just shall live by faith that is all our righteousness all our hopes all our spiritual life is conserved by and is relying upon this Covenant of Mercy the Covenant of Faith or Repentance all his life time the just shall still need pardon and finde it if he perseveres in it that is endevours
24 25 26 27 28 29. * Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water * Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering for he is faithful that promised * And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works * Not forsaking the assembling of our selves together as the manner of some is but exhorting one another and so much the more as ye see the day approaching For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins * but a certain fearful looking for of judgement and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries * He that despised Moses law died without mercy under two or three witnesses * Of how much sorer punishment suppose ye shall he be thought worthy who hath troden under foot the Son of God and hath counted the blood of the Covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing and hath done despite unto the Spirit of Grace For the time is come 1 Pet. 4.17 that judgement must begin at the house of God and if it first begin at us what shall the end be of them that obey not the Gospel of God And every man that hath this hope in him 1 Joh. 3.3 22. purifieth himself even as he is pure * And whatsoever we ask we receive of him because we keep his Commandements and do those things which are pleasing in his sight And he that overcometh Apoc. 2.26 and keepeth my works unto the end to him will I give power over the Nations A Penitentiall Psalm collected out of the Psalms and Prophets HAve mercy upon me O God according to thy loving kindeness according to the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions For our transgressions are multiplied before thee and our sins testifie against us our trangressions are with us and as for our iniquities we know them In transgressing and lying against the Lord and departing away from our God speaking oppression and revolt conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falshood Our feet have run to evil our thoughts are thoughts of iniquity The way of peace we have not known we have made us crooked paths whosoever goeth therein shall not know peace Therefore do we wait for light but behold obscurity for brightness but we walk in darkness Look down from heaven and behold from the habitation of thy Holiness and of thy Glory where is thy zeal and thy strength the sounding of thy bowels and of thy mercies towards me are they restrained We are indeed as an unclean thing and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags and we all do fade as a leaf and our iniquities like the wind have taken us away But now O Lord thou art our Father we are the clay and thou our potter and we all are the work of thy hand Be not wroth very sore O Lord neither remember iniquity for ever behold see we beseech thee we are thy people Thou O Lord art our Redemer thy Name is from everlasting O Lord Father and Governour of my whole life leave me not to the sinful counsels of my own heart and let me not any more fall by them Set scourges over my thoughts and the discipline of wisdome over my heart lest my ignorances encrease and my sins abound to my destruction O Lord Father and God of my life give me not a proud look but turn away from thy servant alwayes a haughty minde Turn away from me vain hopes and concupiscence and thou shalt hold him up that is alwayes desirous to serve thee Let not the greediness of the belly nor the lust of the flesh take hold of me and give not thy servant over to an impudent minde There is a word that is clothed about with death God grant it be not found in the portion of thy servant For all such things shall be farre from the godly and they shall not wallow in their sins Though my fins be as scarlet yet make them white as snow though they be red like crimson let them be as wooll For I am ashamed of the sins I have desired and am confounded for the pleasures that I have chosen Lord make me to know mine end and the measure of my dayes what it is that I may know how frail I am and that I may apply my heart unto wisdome Withhold not thou thy tender mercies from me O Lord let thy loving kindness and thy truth continually preserve me For innumerable evils have compassed me about mine iniquities have taken hold upon me so that I am not able to look up for they are more then the hairs of my head therefore my heart faileth me But thou O Lord though mine iniquities testifie against me save me for thy Name sake for our backslidings are many we have sinned grievously against thee But the Lord God will help me therefore shall I not be confounded therefore have I set my face like a flint and I know that I shall not be ashamed He is near that justifieth me who will contend with me The Lord God will help me who is he that shall condemn me I will trust in the Lord and stay upon my God O let me have this of thine hand that I may not lie down in sorrow S. Paul 's Prayers for a holy life I. I Bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Eph. 3.14 c. of whom the whole family in Heaven and Earth is named that he would grant unto me according to the riches of his glory to be strengthned with might by his Spirit in the inner man that Christ may dwell in my heart by faith that being rooted and grounded in love I may be able to comprehend with all Saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge and may be filled with all the fulness of God through the same our most blessed Saviour Jesus Amen The Doxology Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the power that worketh in us Vnto him be glory in the Church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages world without end Amen II. O Most gracious God Col. 1.9 c. grant to thy servant to be filled with the knowledge of thy Will in all wisdome and spirituall understanding to walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing to be fruitfull in every good work increasing in the knowledge of God Strengthen me O God with all might according to thy glorious power unto all patience and long-suffering and joyfulness So shall I give thanks unto the Father who hath made me meet to be partaker of the inheritance of the Saints in light through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen III. NOw God himself and our Father 1
was enough to signifie that there is difference in the degrees of sin yet because they were eodem sanguine eluenda and without shedding of blood there was no remission they were reckon'd in the same accounts of death and the Divine anger And it is manifest that by the severities and curse of the Law no sin could escape For cursed is he that continues not in every thing written in the law to do them The Law was a Covenant of Works and exact measures There were no venial sins by vertue of that Covenant for there was no remission and without the death of Christ we could not be eased of this state of danger Since therefore that any sin is venial or pardonable is onely owing to the grace of God to the death of Christ and this death pardons all upon the condition of Faith and Repentance and pardons none without it it follows that though sins differ in degree yet they differ not in their natural and essential order to death The man that commits any sin dies if he repents not and he that does repent timely and effectually dies for none The wages of sin is death of sin indefinitely and therefore of all sin and all death for there is no more distinction of sin then death onely when death is threatned indefinitely that death is to be understood which is properly and specifically threatned in that Covenant where the death is named as death temporal in the Law death eternal under the Gospel And thus it appears in a very material instance relating to this question for when our blessed Saviour had threatned the degrees of anger he did it by apportioning several pains hereafter of one sort to the several degrees of the same sin here which he expresses by the several inflictions passed upon Criminals by the Houses of Judgement among the Jews Mat. 5.22 Now it is observable that to the least of these sins Christ assigns a punishment just proportionable to that which the gloss of the Pharisees and the Law it self did to them that committed Murther which was capital He shall be guilty of judgement so we reade it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so it is in the Greek He shall be guilty in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is in the Court of Judgement the Assembly of the twenty three Elders and there his punishment was death but the gentlest manner of it the decapitation or smiting him through with the sword and therefore the least punishment hereafter answering to death here can mean no less then death hereafter †Ita interpretantur hunc locum Barradius Maldonatus Estius ad hunc locum apud vetustiores eadem sententia praevaluit Haec enim erat mens Strabi Fuldensis qui glossam ordinariam compilavit Hugonis Cardinalis * And so also was the second 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he that cals Racha shall be guilty that is shall be used as one that stands guilty in the Sanhedrim or Councel meaning that he is to die too but with a severer execution by stoning to death this was the greatest punishment by the houses of judgement for Crucifixion was the Roman manner These two already signify hell in a less degree but as certainly and evidently as the third For though we read Hell-fire in the third sentence onely yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 no otherwise signifies Hell then the other two by analogy and proportionable representment The cause of the mistake is this When Christ was pleased to adde yet a further degree of punishment in hell to a further degree of anger and reproach the Jews having no greater then that of stoning by the judgement of the Sanhedrim or Councel he would borrow his expression from that which they and their Fathers too well understood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a barbarous custome of the Phoenicians of burning children alive in the valley of Hinnom which in succession of time the Hellenists called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not much unlike the Hebrew word and because by our blessed Lord it was used to signify or represent the greatest pains of hell that were spoken of in that gradation the Christians took the word and made it to be its appellative and to signify the state or place of the damned just as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the garden of Eden is called Paradise But it was no more intended that this should signify Hell then that any of the other two should The word it self never did so before but that and the other two were taken as being the most fearful things amongst them here to represent the degrees of the most intolerable state hereafter just as damnation is called death the second death that because we fear the first as the worst of present evils we may be affrighted with the apprehensions of the latter From this authority it follows that as in the Law no sins were venial but by repentance and sacrifice so neither in the Gospel are they nor in their own nature not by the more holy Covenant of the Gospel but by repentance and mortification For the Gospel hath with greater severity laid restraint upon these minutes and little particles of action and passion and therefore if in the law every transgression was exacted we cannot reasonably think that the least parts of duty which the Gospel superadded with a new and severer caution as great and greater then that by which the law exacted the greatest Commandements can be broken with indemnity or without the highest danger The law exacted all its smallest minutes and therefore so does the Gospel as being a Covenant of greater holiness But as in the law for the smaller transgressions there was an assignment of expiatory rites so is there in the Gospel of a ready repentance and a prepared mercy 7. Lastly those sins which men in health are bound to avoid those sins for which Christ did shed his most precious bloud those sins which a dying man is bound to ask pardon for though he hopes not or desires not to escape temporal death certain it is that those sins are in their nature and in the Oeconomy or dispensation of the Divine threatnings damnable For what can the dying man fear but death eternal and if he be bound to repent and ask pardon even for the smallest sins which he can remember in order to what pardon can that repentance be but of the eternal pain to which every sin by its own demerit naturally descends If he must repent and ask pardon when he hopes not or desires not the temporal it is certain he must repent onely that he may obtain the eternal And they that will think otherwise will also finde themselves deceiv'd in this * For if the damned souls in hell are punish'd for all their sins then the unpardon'd venial sins are there also smarted for But so it is and so we are taught in the doctrine of our great Master If we
nequis existimet propter innumera delicta quorum fraudibus nullus immunis est me omne hominum genus indiscretâ poenitendi lege constringere The highest danger is not in every sin offences and crimes must be distinguished carefully for the same severe impositions are not indifferently to be laid upon Criminals and those whose guilt is in such instances from which no man is free Wherefore covetousness may be redeem'd with liberality slander with satisfaction morosity with cheerfulness sharpness with gentle usages lightness with gravity perversness or peevishness with honesty and fair carriage But what shall the despiser of God do what shall the Murtherer do what remedy shall the Adulterer * Fornicator promiscuè Saepius usurpantur fornicatio adulterium have Ista sunt capitalia Fratres ista mortalia These are the deadly sins these are capital crimes meaning that these were to be taken off by the severities of Ecclesiastical or publick Repentance of which I am afterwards to give account and would cost more to be cleansed To a good man and meliorum operum compensatione as Pacianus affirms by the compensation of good works that is of the actions of the contrary graces they are venial they are cured For by venial they mean such which with less difficulty and hazard may be pardon'd such as was S. Pauls blasphemy and persecuting the Church for that was venial that is apt for pardon because he did it ignorantly in unbelief and such are those sins saith Caesarius which are usual in the world though of their own nature very horrible as forswearing our selves slander reproach and the like yet because they are extremely common they are such to which if a continual pardon were not offered Gods numbers would be infinitely lessen'd In this sense every sin is venial excepting the three Capitals reckoned in Tertullian Idolatry Murther and Adultery every thing but the sin against the Holy Ghost and its branches reckoned in Pacianus every thing but the seven deadly sins in others Now according to the degree and malignity of the sin or its abatement by any lessening circumstance or intervening consideration so it puts on its degrees of veniality or being pardonoble Every sin hath some degree of being venial till it arriv'd at the unpardonable state and then none was But every sin that had many degrees of Venial had also some degrees of Damnable So that to enquire what venial sins can stand with the state of grace is to ask how long a man may sin before he shall be damn'd how long will God still forbear him how long he will continue to give him leave to repent For a sin is venial upon no other account but of Repentance If Venial be taken for pardonable it is true that many circumstances make it so more or less that is whatever makes the sin greater or less makes it more or less venial and of these I shall give account in the chapter of sins of Infirmity But if by Venial we mean actually pardon'd or not exacted Nothing makes a sin venial but Repentance and that makes every sin to be so Therefore 5. Some sins are admitted by holy persons and yet they still continue holy not that any of these sins is permitted to them nor that God cannot as justly exact them of his servants as of his enemies nor that in the Covenant of the Gospel they are not imputable nor that their being in Gods favour hides them for God is most impatient of any remaining evil in his children But the onely reasonable account of it is because the state of grace is a state of Repentance these sins are those which as Pacianus expresses it contrariis emendata proficiunt they can be helped by contrary actions and the good man does perpetually watch against them he opposes a good against every every evil that is in effect he uses them just as he uses the greatest that ever he committed Thus the good man when he reproves a sinning person over-acts his anger and is transported to undecency though it be for God Some are over zealous some are phantastick and too apt to opinion which in little degrees of inordination are not so soon discernible A good man may be over-joyed or too much pleas'd with his recreation or be too passionate at the death of a childe or in a sudden anger go beyond the evenness of a wise Christian and yet be a good man still and a friend of God his son and his servant but then these things happen in despite of all his care and observation and when he does espy any of these obliquities he is troubled at it and seeks to amend it and therefore these things are venial that is pitied and excused because they are unavoidable but avoided as much as they well can all things considered and God does not exact them of him because the good man exacts them of himself * These being the Rules of Doctrine we are to practise accordingly To which adde the following measures 6. This difference in sins of Mortal and Venial that is greater and less is not to be considered by us but by God alone and cannot have influence upon us to any good purposes For 1. We do not alwayes know by what particular measures they are lessened In general we know some proportions of them but when we come to particulars we may easily be deceived but can very hardly be exact S. Austin said the same thing Quae sint levia Enchirid cap. 78. quae gravia peccata non humano sed Divino sunt pensanda judicio God onely not man can tell which sins are great and which little For since we see them equally forbidden we must with equal care avoid them all Indeed if the case should be so put that we must either commit Sacrilege or tell a spiteful lie kill a man or speak unclean words then it might be of use to us to consider which is the greater which is less that of evils we might choose the less but this ease can never be for no man is ever brought to that necessity that he must choose one sin for he can choose to die before he shall do either and that 's the worst that he can be put to And therefore though right reason and experience and some general lines of Religion mark out some actions as criminal and leave others under a general and indefinite condemnation yet it is in order to repentance and amends when such things are done not to greater caution directly of avoiding them in the dayes of temptation for of two infinites in the same kinde one cannot be bigger then the other We are tied with the biggest care to avoid every sin and bigger then the biggest we finde not This onely For the avoiding of the greatest sins there are more arguments from without and sometimes more instruments and ministeries of caution and prevention are to be used then in lesser sins but it is because fewer will
it then this For every one that breaks a Commandement let the instance be what it will is a transgressor of the same bond by which he was bound to all Non quòd omnia legis praecepta violârit sed quòd legis Authorem contempserit eóque proemio meritò careat quod legis cultoribus propositum est saith venerable Bede He did not violate all the Commandements but he offended him who is the giver of all the Commandements It is like letting one Bead fall from a Rosary or Coronet of Bugles This or that or a third makes no difference the string is as much broken if he lets one to slide as if he dropp'd twenty It was not an ill conceit of Menedemus the Eretrian that there was but one vertue which had divers names Aristo Chius express'd the same conceit with a little difference affirming all vertues to be the same in reality and nature but to have a certain diversification or rational difference by relation to their objects As if one should call the sight when it looks upon a Crow 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if upon a Swan 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so is vertue When it moderates the affections it is Temperance when it ballances contracts it is Justice when it considers what is and what is not to be done it is Prudence That which they call Vertue if we call it the Grace of God or Obedience it is very true which they say For the same spirit the same grace of obedience is Chastity or Temperance or Justice according as is the subject matter The love of God if it be in us is productive of all worthiness and this is it which S. John said This is love that we keep his Commandements The love of God constraineth us It worketh all the works of God in us It is the fulfilling of the Commandements For this is a Catholicon an Universal Grace Charity gives being to all vertues it is the life and spirit of all holy actions Abstinence from feasts and inordination mingled with Charity is Temperance And Justice is Charity and Chastity is Charity and Humility is still but an instance of Charity This is that Transcendent that gives life and vertue to Alms to Preaching to Faith to Miracles it does all obedience to God all good offices to our Neighbours which in effect is nothing but the sentence of Menedemus and Aristo that there is an Universal Vertue that is there is one soul and essence of all vertue They call it Vertue S. Paul calls it Charity and this is that one thing which is necessary that one thing which every man that sins does violate He that is guilty of all is but guilty of that one and therefore he that is guilty of that one of the breach of Charity is guilty of all And upon this account it is that no one sin can stand with the state of grace because he that sins in one instance sins against all goodness not against all instances of duty but against that which is the life of all against Charity and Obedience A Prayer to be said in the dayes of Repentance for the commission of any great Crime O Most glorious God I tremble to come into thy presence so polluted and dishonoured as I am by my foul stain of sin which I have contracted but I must come or I perish O my God I cannot help it now Miserable man that I am to reduce my self to so sad a state of things that I neither am worthy to come unto thee nor dare I stay from thee Miserable man that I am who lost that portion of innocence which if I should pay my life in price I cannot now recover O dear God I have offended thee my gracious Father my Lord my Patron my Judge my Advocate and my Redeemer Shame and sorrow is upon me for so offending thee my gracious Saviour But glory be to thee O Lord who art such to me who have offended thee It aggravates my sin that I have sinned against thee who art so excellent in thy self who art so good to me But if thou wert not so good to me though my sin would be less yet my misery would be greater The greatness of my Crime brings me to my Remedy and now I humbly pray thee to be merciful to my sin for it is very great II. O My God pity me and relieve my sad condition which is so extremely evil that I have no comfort but from that which is indeed my misery My baseness is increased by my hopes for it is thy grace and thy goodness which I have so provoked Thou O God didst give me thy grace and assist me by thy holy Spirit and call by thy Word and instruct me by thy Wisdome and didst work in me to will and to do according to thy good pleasure I knew my sin and I saw my danger and I was not ignorant and I was not surpris'd but wilfully knowingly basely and sensually I gave thee away for the pleasure of a minute for the purchase of vanity nay I exchanged thee for shame and sorrow and having justly forfeited thy love am plac'd I know not where nor in what degree of thy anger nor in what neighbourhood of damnation III. O God my God what have I done whither am I fallen I was well and blessed circled with thy Graces conducted by thy Spirit sealed up to the day of Redemption in a hopefull way towards thee and now I have listned to the whispers of a tempting Spirit and for that which hath in it no good no reason no satisfaction for that which is not I have forfeited those excellencies for the recovery of which my life is too cheap a price I am ashamed O God I am ashamed I put my mouth in the dust and my face in darkness and hate my self for my sin which I am sure thou hatest But give thy servant leave to hope that I shall feel the gracious effluxes of thy love I know thou art angry with me I have deserved it But if thou hadst not lov'd me and pitied me thou mightest have stricken me in the act of my shame I know the design of thy mercy and loving kindness is to bring me to repentance and pardon to life and grace I obey thee O God I humbly obey thy gracious purposes Receive O Lord a returning sinner a poor wounded person smitten by my enemies broken by my sin weary and heavy laden ease me of my burthen and strengthen me by a mighty grace that hereafter I may watch more carefully resist more pertinaciously walk more circumspectly and serve thee without the interruptions of duty by the intervening of a sin O let me rather die then choose to sin against thee any more Onely try me this once and bear me in thy arms and fortifie my holy purposes and conduct me with thy grace that thou mayest delight to pardon me and to save me through Jesus Christ my Lord and dearest Saviour Amen I
a sin it follows that the habit is a particular state of sin distinct from the act because it is a state of vicious desires And as a body may be said to be lustful though it be asleep or eatting without the sense of actual urtications and violence by reason of its constitution so may the soul by the reason of its habit that is its vicious principle and base effect of sin be hated by God and condemn'd upon that account So that a habit is not onely distinct from its acts in the manner of being as Rhetorick from Logick in Zeno as a fist from a palm as a bird from the egge and the flower from the gemme but a habit differs from its acts as an effect from the cause as a distinct principle from another as a pregnant Daughter from a teeming Mother as a Conclusion from its Premises as a state of aversation from God from a single act of provocation 9. If the habit had not an irregularity in it distinct from the sin then it were not necessary to persevere in holiness by a constant regular course but we were to be judg'd by the number of single actions and he onely who did more bad then good actions should perish which was affirmed by the Pharisees of old and then we were to live or die by chance and opportunity by actions and not by the will by the outward and not by the inward man then there could be no such thing necessary as the Kingdome of Grace Christs Empire and Dominion in the soul then we can belong to God without belonging to his Kingdome and we might be in God though the Kingdome of God were not in us For without this we might do many single actions of vertue and it might happen that these might be more then the single actions of sin even though the habit and affection and state of sin remain Now if the case may be so as in the particular instance that the mans final condition shal not be determin'd by single actions it must be by habits and states and principles of actions and therefore these must have in them a proper good and bad respectively by which the man shall be judg'd distinct from the actions by which he shall not in the present case be judg'd All which considerations being put together do unanswerably put us upon this conclusion That a habit of sin is that state of evil by which we are enemies to God and slaves of Satan by which we are strangers from the Covenant of Grace and consign'd to the portion of Devils and therefore as a Corollary of all we are bound under pain of a new sin to rise up instantly after every fall to repent speedily for every sin not to let the Sun go down upon our wrath nor rise upon our lust nor run his course upon our covetousness or ambition For not onely every period of impenitence is a period of danger and eternal death may enter but it is an aggravation of our folly a continuing to provoke God a further aberration from the rule a departure from life it is a growing in sin a progression towards final impenitence to obduration and Apostasie it is a tempting God and a despising of his grace it is all the way presumption and a dwelling in sin by delight and obedience that is it is a conjugation of new evils and new degrees of evil As pertinacy makes error to be heresie and impenitence makes little sins unite and become deadly and perseverance causes good to be crowned and evil to be unpardonable So is the habit of viciousness the confirmation of our danger and solennities of death the investiture and security of our horrible inheritance The summe is this Every single sin is a high calamity it is a shame and it is a danger in one instant it makes us liable to Gods severe anger But a vicious habit is a conjugation of many actions every one of which is highly damnable and besides that union which is formally an aggravation of the evils there is superinduc'd upon the will and all its ministring faculties a viciousness and pravity which makes evil to be belov'd and chosen and God to be hated and despis'd A vicious habit hath in it all the Physical Metaphysical and Moral degrees of which it can be capable For there is not onely a not repenting a not rescinding of the past act by a contrary nolition but there is a continuance in it and a repetition of the same cause of death as if a man should marry death the same death so many times over it is an approving of our shame a taking it upon us an owning and a securing our destruction and before a man can arrive thither he must have broken all the instruments of his restitution in pieces and for his recovery nothing is left unless a Palladium fall from heaven the man cannot live again unless God shall do more for him then he did for Lazarus when he raised him from the dead §. 4. Sinful habits do require a distinct manner of Repentance and have no promise to be pardon'd but by the introduction of the contrary THis is the most material and practical difficulty of the Question for upon this depends the most mysterious article of Repentance and the interest of dying penitents For if a habit is not to be pardoned without the extirpation of that which is vicious and the superinducing its contrary this being a work of time requires a particular grace of God and much industry caution watchfulness frequent prayers many advices and consultations constancy severe application and is of so great difficulty and such slow progression that all men who have had experience of this imployment and have heartily gone about to cure a vicious habit know it is not a thing to be done upon our death-bed That therefore which I intend to prove I express in this Proposition A vicious habit is not to be pardon'd without the introduction of the contrary either in kinde or in perfect affection and in all those instances in which the man hath opportunities to work The Church of Rome whose Chairs and Pulpits are dangerous guides in the article of Repentance affirms that any sin or any habit of sin may be pardon'd by any single act of contrition the continued sin of fourty years may be wash'd off in less then fourty minutes nay by an act of attrition with the Priestly absolution which proposition if it be false does destroy the interest of souls and it cannot be true because it destroys the interest of piety and the necessities of a good life The reproof of this depends upon many propositions of which I shall give as plain accounts as the thing will bear 1. Every habit of vice may be expelled by a habit of vertue naturally as injustice by justice gluttony by temperance lust by chastity but by these it is not meritoriously remitted and forgiven because nothing in nature can remit sins or
and heart But if thou canst know thy self you need not enquire any further If thy duty be performed you may be secure of all that is on Gods part 5. When ever repentance begins know that from thence-forward the sinner begins to live but then never let that repentance die Doe not at any time say I have repented of such a sin and am at peace for that for a man ought never to be at peace with sin nor think that any thing we can doe is too much Our repentance for sin is never to be at an end till faith it self shall be no more for Faith and Repentance are but the same Covenant and so long as the just does live by faith in the Son of God so long he lives by repentance for by that faith in him our sins are pardoned that is by becoming his Disciples we enter into the Covenant of Repentance And he undervalues his sin and overvalues his sorrow who at any time fears he shall doe too much or make his pardon too secure and therefore sets him down and sayes Now I have repented 6. Let no man ever say he hath committed the sin against the Holy Ghost or the unpardonable sin for there are but few that doe that and he can best confute himself if he can but tell that he is sorrowful for it and begs for pardon and hopes for it and desires to make amends this man hath already obtained some degrees of pardon and S. Pauls argument in this case also is a demonstration If when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son Rom. 5.10 much more being reconciled we shall be saved by his life That is if God to enemies gives the first grace much more will he give the second if they make use of the first For from none to a little is an infinite distance but from a little to a great deal is not so much And therefore since God hath given us means of pardon and the grace of Repentance we may certainly expect the fruit of pardon for it is a greater thing to give repentance to a sinner then to give pardon to the penitent Whoever repents hath not committed the great sin the Unpardonable For it is long of the man not of the sin that any sin is unpardonable 7. Let every man be careful of entring into any great states of sin lest he be unawares guilty of the great offence Every resisting of a holy motion calling us from sin every act against a clear reason or revelation every confident progression in sin every resolution to commit a sin in despite of conscience is an access towards the great sin or state of evil Therefore concerning such a man let others fear since he will not and save him with fear plucking him out of the fire but when he begins to return that great fear is over in many degrees for even in Moses law there were expiations appointed not onely for errour but for presumptuous sins The PRAYER I. OEternal God gracious and merciful I adore the immensity and deepest abysse of thy Mercy and Wisdome that thou doest pity our infirmities instruct our ignorances pass by thousands of our follies invitest us to repentance and doest offer pardon because we are miserable and because we need it and because thou art good and delightest in shewing mercy Blessed be thy holy Name and blessed be that infinite Mercy which issues forth from the fountains of our Saviour to refresh our weariness and to water our stony hearts and to cleanse our polluted souls O cause that these thy mercies may not run in vain but may redeem my lost soul and recover thy own inheritance and sanctifie thy portion the heart of thy servant and all my faculties II. BLessed Jesus thou becamest a little lower then the Angels but thou didst make us greater doing that for us which thou didst not doe for them Thou didst not pay for them one drop of bloud nor endure one stripe to recover the fallen stars nor give one groan to snatch the accursed spirits from their fearful prisons but thou didst empty all thy veins for me and gavest thy heart to redeem me from innumerable sins and an intolerable calamity O my God let all this heap of excellencies and glorious mercies be effective upon thy servant and work in me a sorrow for my sins and a perfect hatred of them a watchfulness against temptations severe and holy resolutions active and effective of my duty O let me never fall from sin to sin nor persevere in any nor love any thing which thou hatest but give me thy holy Spirit to conduct and rule me for ever and make me obedient to thy good Spirit never to grieve him never to resist him never to quench him Keep me O Lord with thy mighty power from falling into presumptuous sins lest they get the dominion over me so shall I be innocent from the great offence Let me never despair of thy mercies by reason of my sins nor neglect my repentance by reason of thy insinite loving kindness but let thy goodness bring me and all sinners to repentance and thy mercies give us pardon and thy holy Spirit give us perseverance and thy infinite favour bring us to glory through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen CHAP. IX Of Ecclesiasticall Penance or The fruits of Repentance §. 1. THe fruits of Repentance are the actions of spiritual life and signifie properly all that piety and obedience which we pay to God in the dayes of our return after we have begun to follow sober counsels For since all the duty of a Christian is a state of Repentance that is of contention against sin and the parts and proper periods of victory and Repentance which includes the faith of a Christian is but another word to express the same grace or mercies of the Evangelical Covenant it follows that whatsoever is the duty of a Christian and a means to possess that grace is in some sense or other a Repentance or the fruits of Gods mercy and our endevours And in this sense S. John the Baptist means it saying Bring forth therefore fruits meet for Repentance that is since now the great expectation of the world is to be satisfied and the Lords Christ will open the gates of mercy and give Repentance to the world see that ye live accordingly in the faith and obedience of God through Jesus Christ That did in the event of things prove to be the effect of that Sermon But although all the parts of holy life are fruits of Repentance when it is taken for the state of favor published by the Gospel yet when Repentance is a particular duty or vertue the integral parts of holy life are also constituent parts of Repentance and then by the fruits of Repentance must be meant the less necessary but very useful effects and ministeries of Repentance which are significations and exercises of the main duty And these are sorrow for sins