Bs. 1. Beleeve 2. Beware 3. Bewaile First carry the honey of this instruction and exhortation First the word bids us Beleeve thus S. Paul said to the Jaylor who put him and his fellow in the inner prison when he Acts 16. had a commission to put them in prison that Jaylor after his putting them in the inward prison was himselfe put in the inmost prison his very soul was set in the stocks he was afraid of the flames of hell and cryed out in the anguish thereof even to those whom he had misused Sirs what must I doe to bee saved O how how shall I doe I fear the terrible torments of hell what course must I take to escape them To this Paul answers as I doe to those of you if there are any here among you in the like case Beleeve in the Lord Iesus and then shall be saved from that lake of fire and brimstone which otherwise will destroy and devoure thee sinke thee swallow thee in for ever And I from this very ground call upon you to cleave the clouds to work wonders to reach the right hand of that Majesty on high passing by all the Apostles and Angels and there to single out him who is all in all with God to become all in all to us to apprehend him for your owne Saviour to apply him to your owne souls to take downe his person his passion his promises to make him your owne by the lively saith of Gods Elect. And I beseech you O ye who have soules and have a Saviour who shed his blood to redeeme those precious souls doe not despair for any of your sinnes be they never so many millions be they never such mighty mountains I cannot stand to shew you the order which God useth in working faith in you How first he tells you that it is possible and then probable that God will pardon you after fears falling in in the middest and after a while will say to you sweedy your faith hath saved you your sins are forgiven you But this I say to you that there is such infinite mercy in God and such infinite merits in Christ that if you can but beleeve in him and the Lord looke upon you to make you able to say hold on him you shall surely be saved from hell you shall not be over whelmed with those extreme everlasting torments shall not be cast to the fiery flames which the breath of the Lord like a river of brimstone kindles Secondly for there is no time to tell you how you must attaine to that Beleeving namely by hearing the word of God which is able to save your souls I say secondly if you would Rom. 10. James 1. escape the everlasting terrible torments you must Beware that you walk in the way which the Saints and the Saviour trod in So saith Iohn when he saw the Pharisees seek to avoid the wrath to come Bring forth fruits saith he unto them when their Consciences cryed against them and set the torments of hell Matth 3. before them Bring forth fruits fit for amendment saith he and begin not to say in your selves we have Abraham to our father And doe not you I beseech you dream that you can stop the cry of hell in your Consciences by any foolish frivolous fig-leaves or if you could so curb and crush them that yet you are able to avoid that brimstone by pleading Pedegrees pretending prerogatives No there is no way but one with you if ye walk not the way of fruitfulnesse be not carefull conscionable circumspect in all Conversation in all acts of Christianity Though it be Christ even Christ alone who hath freed us from hell and fitted us for heaven and for his sake shall all that be chosen be kept from those ever-burning flames yet it is they they alone none but they who are fruitfull as well as faithfull shall escape the lake of brimstone all the rest all that walk not warily worthily must be extremely and eternally hell-tormented That is the way and the means to escape those are the persons who must be preserved from that most terrible place of torments In that and after that men must fly from the wrath to come And therefore you must be such must be so fruitfull must bring forth fruits fit for a Christian calling if you would not be thrown to Tophet to that extremely tormenting fire of hell which the breath of the Lord like a river of brimstone kindles Thirdly whosoever of you would not be damned for ever and ever must look back with godly sorrow like those foure beasts in that fourth Chapter of Iohns Revelation who had Eyes behind as well as before on his former foolish false behaviour So saith Peter to those three thousand who when they had been pricked in their hearts frighted with feare of those fiery flames of hell feeling a kind of foretast of it in their very inwards cryed out what shall we doe with sighing soule and Acts 2. 37. 38. sorrowfull spirits Repent saith he be ye truely touched sincerely sweetly terrified troubled that ye were so proud and presumptuous that you duest provoke the mighty Jehovah who is able to tumble you down to hell to the place of torments Make your hearts bleed that your sinnes made him bleed who shed it to keep you from hells eternall flames And surely forgivenesse of sinnes and faith in Christ to conceive it and receive it without which to escaping of hell nothing at all but being extreamly eternally damned 〈◊〉 must be attained with any fruitfull force and feeling till a Converts soul become such an one as will suck it in and that it cannot be capable of till it be soked in brinish tears or bitterer terrours till is bee afraid of Tophet that so fearing it it might not feele that unquenchable fire of hell which the breath of the Lord as a river of brimstone kindles And these be the three Bs which have the honey These be the things which the sacred Scripture commends to such as have in their hearts wormwood and gall for feare of hells extreme eternalls when it counselleth them by comforting and comforteth them by counselling Now what the World would doe and that both lawfully and laudably if a noyse of fire should fright them we all know by much experience Suppose which the Lord keepe from you that there should be a noise of fire in your Towne what course would ye take for the quenching of it I know generally and negatively what you would doe that is to say what you would not doe for you world certainly hear mee no longer but would leave mee alone as they did Christ and his chosen vessel Paul and yet you should not for I would goe along with you remembring what is written I will have mercie and not sacrifice Hosea 6. 6. But what would you doe when you came to it and sought to quench it I suppose you would get three things 1. Company 2.
A Ladder 3. Water For the first you would get Company you would call upon one the other crying Fire fire fire fire save us from it help to quench it And O that you would do so directly for the saving of your soules for the preserving of you from those torments which are extreme and endure for ever O that you would get together that you would goe one to another that you aske one the other the question How doth your soule and How doth your soule O would you say to each other thus What say you neighbour to that which we heard to day Is it true that there is an hell and that there are such torments in it that they are so terrible so everlasting that they never shall end but abide for evermore O what what shall we doe what will you doe what shall I do I feare I shall even be damned in hell even in hell and that in such extremity and that for all eternity But me thinkes I heare some of you say to me I can finde in my heart to goe to his house but not to this house he is a Puritan but I tell you if there were a fire such a fire in your towne or houses there would no word at all of Puritan but all the noise would bee Neighbour neighbour fire fire helpe neighbour help And O that the thought of this fire which the breath of the Lord for ever kindleth would take away all hostilitle all carnall crooked conceit of enmity and make you joyn hearts heads and hands for the quenching of it so farre as concernes your escaping for the preserving of you from it as Saul was forced to depart from David when he was neare him at the mouth of the Cave to the end he might save his kingdome which the Philistines then had invaded O that you would walke and talk together like yet living creatures and now loving neighbours how you might escape hell the everlasting lake of fire and brimstone I assure you it would much availe you towards your freedome from the fiery flames which The breath of the Lord like a streame of brimstone doth kindle it Secondly if there were fire in your Towne and houses which the Lord evermore keep same from you you would immediately seeke a Ladder And O that if any among you be stuck to the heart and stung with this Sermon at the hearing of these unspeakable unquenchable flames of hell O that you would goe to your Minister Ministers are Ladders Iacobs Ladders reaching from earth to the height of heaven and say to him when your soules are sinking Sir be good to us helpe us beale us heave us up from the sinks of sorrow we see death ready to seize on us hell ready to swallow us utterly Thus did that Jaylor those Pharisies those Converts before mentioned they roated and ranne to their Preachers crying Acts 16. Mat. 3. Acts 2. What shall we doe to be saved But O alas we the Ministers of the Gospel grow greedy of filthy lucre waxer wanton in spending our time upon trifling novelties niceties because we want worke or purer employment are not at all enquired after concerning the sores of your soules the bellowings and breathings of them the blemishes and breathes in them where is there almost a man among millions who makes the mone for a man of God one of a thousand to whom he may cry for counsell when his Conscience is almost confounded But you O people who have pretious soules in you and which soules must surely be turned to Tophet if you be not turned topsie-turvie from blindnesse and badnesse to true Religion and holy Righteousnesse doe you that which the fewest number doe they are many and often mighty ones which walke in the way which drawes to destruction get you Ladders and get upon them make your Ministers minde their studies when they heare you pouring out your hearts and posing them and putting them often times to their prayers for more wisedome to resolve your doubtaind difficulties But chiefly ah doe it as you doe not desire to be damned goe speedily to those Ministers by whose work men must be saved when you heare of hels extremitie and are afraid that you shall fall in it They will not with the Watchmen smite you they will reare you restore you recover you they have more leasure and more learning then I have more time to doe the thing which will stop your soules from sinking and stirre them from despaire as well as securitie when Satan sets before you your due desert of eternall damnation Above all I desire and require you that if any thing hath been spoken in my two Sermons which puts any of you to your plunges and puzzles your soules by saying you must be damned that you enquire of some Embassadour of Jesus Christ whether it were true as well as terrible holy Doctrine as well as threatned deepe damnation And I for my part if any of my Brethren being a word for it will be ready to recall and recant it and shew you a softer way if there be any such in the blessed Bible to escape this flaming fire of Tophet which The breath of the Lord like a streame of brimstone doth kindle it The third thing that you would doe would be to cry Water water should the noise of Fire fire be heard among you which the Lord to his good pleasure keep far from you And O that this cry of Fire Fire this extremely tormenting fire this everlastingly tormenting fire would cause you to cry for a double Water and double your cry for it with single hearts and earnest spirits O that you would cry for the water of pardon for forgivenesse of sinnes for the washing of your soules through his bloud who came by Water and bloud not by water only but by water and bloud out of whose more then precious side came Water and bloud for the soules 1 Joh. 5. 6. even of Publicans most prophane ones of vicious villanous men or miscreants O that the feare of this quenchlesse fire would make you cry Lord have mercy upon us not as many try it without any sence of miserie and so without capability of mercy tossing and tumbling the Name of the Lord as I would be loath to have my name tossed crying Lord have mercy upon us Christ have mercy upon us Lord have mercy upon us in such haste and show of heat as if they meant to sell their Lords have mercy upon us for money and would get as many of them into their hands as they could to sell them hereafter Whereas if they thought of hell of its extreme and eternall torments it would make them with deliberation yea with the utmost of their devotion to cry Lord have mercy upon us we are else undone for ever O I say that the feare of this fire would make you cry Christ have mercy upon us and to continue so crying till your hearts he sprinkled
doe it Then say ye Thou art the man some flatter you for feare of loosing your face and favour but I will not suffer you to sleep in your sinnes I will affright every veine in your soule and body before I le suffer you through my default to be cast to the fiery flames of hell which The breath of the Lord like a river of brimstone kindles And thus of the acts of Pollicie Now pitty must also be used in speaking do others to helpe them from hell And because the time is past that I cannot come to the comfort which come to the Saints from this holy doctrine for out of this strong comes swâ—â—â— and Gods children from hells extremity and eternitie may gather the excellencie and eternity of heaven may be sure they shall not be thrown into it may with more patience endure any misery on earth may be the more joyfull in their escaping such terrible torments as well as more certain of them escaping them c. I say because I want time to deliver those and such like holy comforts from the serious thought of the doctrine of hells extremitie and eternity I will end it as I began it in pressing the using Pitty when we warne men and women to take heed of it As I told you at the beginning that I should speake hereof with compassion so in the end I call upon all to use the like commiseration as our Lord and his Apostle did when they told of destruction and damnation Many walke saith blessed Paul whose end will be Phil. 3. 18. damnation and I tell you of it weeping The enemy shall cast a bank about thee saith Christ but he said it with weeping eyes for when he drew now to Ierusalem be beheld the Citie and Luk. 19. 41. wept over it As it is related of Bias the Judge that he never sentenced any man with dry eyes Shew to them whom you doe admonish that you speake to them of hell and of their going to it if they turn not with griefe of heart with groning in spirit knowing that the wrath of man doth not accomplish the will of God as the sonne of thunder hath taught us not James at all that part of his will wherein he binds us to doe our utmost in keeping poore souls from the wrath to come from the place of torments the fire of hell of which it is said in the Text that the breath of the Lord like a river of brimstone kindles it FINIS WHen this last Sermon thus was brought to end Our Vincent from the Pulpit did descend Into the Pew and blessed be our Lord Who so much grac'd this Preacher of his Word That though his foes exceedingly desir'd To interrupt him in it and conspir'd To that same purpose yea besides although They had both power and pollicie enough To doe it yet they could not for their heart Touch him or cause one person to depart Till he had finisht But when that was done His foes by heaps did at the Church doore run John 18. 1. Rev. 11. 7. To doe him mischiefe And a wonder 't is But that we certainly may learn by this That God had other work for him to doe And better souls for him to preach unto That knife or Halberds or that presse of men Had not destroy'd his smoaking body then But blest be God at length he got away And preacht at Mary Magdalens that day i th Evening And since that by Gods great power Full many a Sermon he hath preacht in our Great London Citie But no thanks to you Ye preaching-hating bloud-desiring crew Of sottish slauderers yea sure you should Be sharply punished for what you would But could not compasse that you so might be A warning unto others and to mee Idem A. F. qui scripsit This was the Sermon c. Qui punit ponit MR. Packington before the Iustices required me to produce the testimonie of some Ministers of my own Countrey I therefore am compelled to produce this written by them and subscribed every one with his owne hand VVE whose names are underwritten doe certifie that Mr. Humfrey Vincent whom we have known for a good space of time is of a very honest life and conversation he hath at our desires at sundry times preached in our severall Cures The Lord hath endued him with singular gifts which he hath denied to his Brethren although faithfull in their places Indeed he is one of a thousand either to break or to bind up by Gods help a broken heart He is a Iohn Baptist to humble and to lay low a proud exalted spirit He hath beene sent for to preach in many places about us where we have heard his Doctrine hath been sound and his carriage as a Minister of the Gospel and we hope he hath done much good in our Countrey In witnesse whereof we Ministers of the Gospel have put to our hands John Needham Preacher of Stafford Seth VVood of Armitage Sampson Newton of Canck Thomas Thomas of Beckbury William Fletcher of Albrington Simon King of Codsall VVilliam Brue ton of Nosehall George Baxter of VVenlock VVilliam Peake of Shemton Robert Ashton of Bednall Deliverance Fenny house of Shassal John Chapman of Dunnâ—ngton VVilliam Madestart of Bridgnorth Thomas Mocket of Newport Roger Linsh of Norton juxta Canck All these Preachers of the VVord
from an evill conscience and your bodies washed with pure water And I Heb. 10. 22 beseech you as you would not suffer these unspeakeable unquenchable flames doe as our Saviour bids and binds you that is to say Aske Seeke and Knock for that holy water Mat. 7. 7. and the Spirit without which he telleth and teacheth us that there is no comming to the glorious Kingdome and so by consequence no escaping of hell Aske earnestly and if no answer seeme to come Seeke more earnestly and if you heare no answer yet Knock most earnestly for the water of the Spirit to regenerate renew and restore you from the death of sinne and the danger of death eternall death and dreadfull damnation Yea I would Knock downe the gates of heaven why should not I doe a thing impossible to escape the lake of fire and brimstone at well as the Lord bids us doe a thing impossible to be free from eternall damnation saying Make Eze. 18. 31. you a new heart and a new spirit for why will ye die though he knoweth that we cannot move an hand towards making new hearts therfore promiseth by the same Prophet yea and that Eze. 11. 19 and 36. 26. once and again that he will give us new hearts and new spirits rather then feele the fury of God in the fiercenesse and fulnesse of it in that Tophet that place of torments that hell of hels which hath such fire in it that The breath of the Lord like a streame of brimstone doth kindle it And thus much be spoken to such as have hitherto abode in darkenesse by not thinking on the place of torments too much considering the time not halfe enough in regard of the thing you may now depart at your pleasure I having shewed you the case you are in and the course you must take to come out of it I have onely two words to speak now to you who have such knowledge and such obedience wrought with in you either before this day it some good and Christian perfection or on this day in the beginnings of it in the seeds or desires of it or sound preparations to it Now to you who are soundly wrought on and so are freed from those extreme everlasting torments I am to perswade with you 1. To praise the Lord for your owne mercy 2. To pitty others in their misery For the first of these as oft as you thinke on the extremitie and eternitie of the torments of hell it must make you one by one cry with the sweet Singer of Israel Psal 86. 12. 13. I will praise thee O Lord my God with all my heart and I will glorifie thy Name for evermore For great is thy mercy towards me and thou hast delivered my soule from the lowest hell And to provoke you to this duty of praise which when we come to heaven and shall see that we cannot to hell we shall continually be employed in and which we are so more backward to bring our hearts to whiles we are in earth let us briefly think on these things 1. First if our Graces be well grounded strongthned and stablished we shall be sure without peradventures that wee shall not be thrown to the lake of brimstone Revel 21. 7. 8. 2. If we had been dead only and revived recovered to life again yea if we had been but deadly sick and had been restored to health again we should say with good Hezekiah The living Isai 38. 19. the living they shall praise thee How much more are we bound to doe it at the freeing our souls from the place of torments 3. Consider how many millions nobler richer learneder then we are are left to themselves and their soules to Satan to be extremely eternally damned And God hath made choise of us filly simple wormes who were first Elected and then Selected and after Neglected of all meere morall men and often in our owne soules Dejected in our owne apprehensions 1 Cor. 1. 26. 27. 4. Consider how many times how many thousand times the God of heaven did call and cry to us and yet we refused and often resisted He sent not only his Son and after his Son his Word to reveale his Sonne but also his Spirit from Sabbath to Sabbath from Sermon to Sermon and still we withstood our owne escape our owne deliverance our own freedome from those flames which have none end or ease at all in them 5. He fetched us from it called culled converted our soules from it when we were loath to come out of hell loathest of all to come out of the way to it loather it may be some of us then ever in all our lives before O the Lord dealt with us as he did in fetching Lot from Sodome whiles we lingred hee laid hands on us the Lord being exceedingly mercifull to us saying Fly for your lives Escape towards the mountaine lest ye be consumed in the lake of fire and brimstone And the cause why we so contemned our owne mercy in that our misery was our ignorance our not knowing what case we were in our thinking our selves safe and in the way to the Kingdome of Heaven when alas we were almost in hell in the very path the very porch of it 6. And lastly that as he sent when we never sought pardon so he hath not only knockt off the bolts and bonds not onely freed us from hels most fierce and fiery flames but also fitted us in some measure for the wearing of Royall Crownes of Glory So that now we can think on hell without horrour without astonishment because we can say with Paul to his Thessalonians God hath not appointed us to wrath but to abâ—â—inâ— Salvation by Iesus Christ 1 Thess 5. 9. The thought of these things should fill us full of joy and comfort and make us breathe out holy praises and breake forth into blessing the blessed Majesty crying with Paul Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Iesus Christ who hath blessed us with all spirituall blessings in heavenly places in Ephes 1. 3. Christ According as he hath chosen us before the foundation of the world when he rejected millions of millions to be extremely eternally damned And with Peter Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Iesus Christ which according to his abundant mercy in freeing us from those torments which know neither end nor ease hath begotten us again to a lively hope of an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away reserved in heaven for us 1 Pet. 1. 3. 4. And wherein we shall shine as the Sunne in the Kingdome of our Father when all the wicked of the world shall be cast into Matth. 13. 42. 43. that furnace of fire which The breath of the Lord like a streame of brimstone doth kindle it And thus much be spoken to you concerning your owne mercie Now a word of Information concerning others misery The Prophet Ieremie in one verse Ier.