Selected quad for the lemma: heart_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A56594
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Advice to a friend
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Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707.
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1673
(1673)
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Wing P738; ESTC R10347
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111,738
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356
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grace to improve and make the best use of this blessing to my further increase in Wisdom and Goodness which are the greatest treasures of all O that I may feel my heart disposed and enclined by a particular love to some to be kind and loveing to all other men and especially to love thee and our blessed Lord the more my best and my eternal Friend Bestow upon those to whom I am united in friendly affection all that I can desire for my self An healthful body a long life a clear understanding a ready apprehension an exact prudence a vertuous will an unwearied diligence a constant chearfulness a sweet and obliging behaviour an useful conversation and good success in all their undertakings Requite all their kindnesses to me in multitude of blessings and above all with a sense of thy Divine favour and with the perpetual joy and comfort of the Holy Ghost O blessed Lord hear all their own Prayers Hear them for themselves and for me also And stir us up all to pray with greater ardency with a more zealous affection to thy Honour and each others good and with a most inflamed desire to be as like thee as possibly we can That after a constant and hearty friendship here in this World we may have a comfortable departure out of it and rest in a joyful hope to meet together in the other life and embrace in the bosome of our blessed Lord Christ Jesus Amen Amen XI IN the next place I must exhort you to exercise a great faith in Gods good Providence which rules in all affairs This is of great force to banish all perplexing thoughts and consequently to make you of a chearful spirit and to be good company for your self when you are alone or about your necessary employments And it hath not only this oblique aspect upon our Souls to defend them from that heaviness sadness which is too apt to oppress them but is of a more direct and manifest influence to comfort and enliven them on all occasions By removing that is those impediments out of the way which are a clog and a burden to our spirits and by begetting likewise an higher faith in Gods goodness to our better part which takes such care of our lower concernments For what is it that makes our heart unwilling to go to God and to wait upon him as Mary sate at our Saviours Feet but the multitude of businesses wherewith like Martha we incumber and trouble our selves We imagine we can never take care enough about those things and when we have done our best still we remain solicitous about the success And so our Souls being already filled crowded with these thoughts there is no room left to admit of any other till they be thrust out And suppose now our own Conscience begin in this case to reprove us and bid us go to our God yet if it be that only which urges us and not a quiet faith in his good providence how do we hear those things calling us off again and inviting nay drawing our hearts to them as being indeed their own It is nothing else that distracts us but these cares which are not ejected by faith but only silenced and stilled a little by natural conscience which tells us we do amiss Or if they have lain quiet a while and given us leave to pray to God and think of better things how easily do they thrust out all our good Meditations and pious affections when they return again Nay how do they eat up and prey on the very Soul it self as well as on all the good notions which are within it If we be necessarily engaged then in more affairs than willingly we would it is as necessary we should be strongly perswaded of the Care which God takes of all things that they shall go well with those who trust in him That so we may use but a moderate diligence and not trouble our selves about issues and events and that we may save abundance of time for better thoughts and that these affairs may not take up our hearts both while we are in them and when we are out of them too That 's too much familiarity with them when they will never let us alone And we ought to endeavour that though they employ our minds for many Hours yet when we have done our work they may not then ingross our time also The care of Religion is great enough we need not take upon us the care of the World too With what reason do we complain that we find it difficult to govern our selves when it seems we think our selves meet to govern this World and all No wonder that we are weary of our work when we have not only our own to do but will needs undertake Gods work likewise We may well sigh and be discouraged when we carry such a vast burden upon our Shoulders There is no end of these Cares which intermix themselves not only with our particular businesses but trouble us continually with sad and fearful thoughts about the affairs of Nations and the state of the publique wherein our private wealth is embarqued And this is the mischief of it that when we are discouraged by this means it is a sin and not meerly our misery because we will meddle with more than belongs unto us We put our selves to an unnecessary pain to put our selves out of the favour and care of him who would ease us of this burden by casting it upon his merciful providence It is an uncomfortable and a sinful condition which is aggravated by this that it is a needless and a bold intrusion into his business who governs the World It is as if I should be very solicitous whether the Sun will shine to morrow or not when I have occasion to stay all Day about my affairs at home Let us do what concerns us and leave God to dispose of all the rest And let us believe that he will assist us in our dispatches and a great deal the more if we will not stretch our selves to meddle beyond our line He will help us to do what we ought when we do no more than we should When we are not oppressed I mean with fear that we shall not be able to go thorough our employments and when we are not too careful what will become of them after we have finished our work God will take care that we shall do them and that they shall have the best success when they are done Look upon your self as a part of the World and upon God as the Governour of the whole And then by faith in him make your self as it were a part of himself that so he may have a particular concernment in your affairs Look upon your self not only as one of his Family and therefore under his General Providence but also as one of his Children for whose good he will more than ordinarily provide And be always confident he will provide the better for you because
you In brief This is an holy Feast where our Lord not only makes you good chear for the present but renews your decayed strength and begets in you a greater liveliness for the future One great end of the institution of publique Feasts among all Nations in the World was for the maintaining of unity love and friendship among the People that lived under the same Laws and for the recreating of those who were tired with their constant labours And it is the design we likewise see of our private Feasts which are times of ease and refreshment for our neighbours and preserve also good will among them according to that of Ben Syra a famous Person among the Jews Spread the Table and contention ceases We are all good Friends at a Feast Upon which account Plato was of Opinion that their Gods themselves in much pitty to Man-kind whose life is full of labour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Lib. 2. de Leg. did appoint those Festival times for them that they might have a little relaxation and be incouraged by those publique joyes to proceed without any murmuring in their several imployments We are very sure that God hath instituted by his particular command this Holy Feast like to which none ever was and which we may celebrate as oft as we please upon the Body and Blood of his dear Son Whereby a great love sure will be begot in our hearts to him and his service whose guests we are and at whose cost the entertainment is made meerly out of his extraordinary grace and royal favour towards us This sure will be a singular refreshment and restorative to our spirits when we grow weary and almost spent in the work of our Lord. The sweetness of this will be like Wine to the Heart or like Marrow and Fatness to the Bones It will stir us up when we are listless and comfort us when we are sad and put life into us when we are dead and make us not only able but willing to be Religious being both our pleasure and our food Seneca speaking of times of relaxation and rest from labours saith he knew some great Men L. de tranq animi who once a Moneth would give themselves a Day of play and others that every Day would allow some Hours wherein they would not so much as write a Letter or meddle with any thing that had the show of business If we in like manner did though not every Day yet every Moneth take this sweet repast if out of love to Christ and consideration of our own necessities we did lay aside all other thoughts and give up our selves to those delightful Meditations which here present themselves unto us it would ease us of many cares and troubles and make us more chearfully do the will of God at other times and dispose us to attend the whole business of Religion as the pleasure rather than the labour of our life But if you be cast into a place where you have not the opportunity so frequently to celebrate the remembrance of Christ's death by receiving the outward and visible signs and pledges of his Divine Grace then you may the oftner communicate with him spiritually in your own heart and represent his dying love as lively as you can to it in your retired thoughts Beseeching him to accept of your unfeigned desires to make him your publick acknowledgments and to joyn with all those pious Souls which are then met together throughout the Christian World to show forth his praise and to offer up themselves in holy love to him and to our blessed Redeemer Christ Jesus For which purpose I would advise you to make use of all such Meditations Prayers and Thanksgivings as are wont to attend those Solemnities altering only those words which relate to your actual receiving at the Table of the Lord. The profit of such a frequent remembrance of our Lord one way or other will be exceeding great for the securing your duty and the making all those Counsels which I have given you the more effectual It will put you in mind of the worth and dignity of your Soul for which Christ hath done and suffered so much and on whom he bestows such precious tokens of his love It will quicken your love to him which is the life of Religion You shall taste how sweet it is beyond all comparison to be Religious whereby we have such hope in God There you shall be remembred how gainful it is to be good beyond all the purchases of this World for Christ imparts himself to you and all his benefits There you pray with the greatest devotion and offer up Spiritual Sacrifices and you represent also the Sacrifice of Christ to prevail for blessings for you And there you are most likely to have the most plentiful communications of God's Holy Spirit to you and to feel your Heart dilated in the largest affection unto Him There you confirm your promises to God and he seales his to you You cannot there be of another judgment if you would than this that since Christ dyed to give you life you ought not henceforth to live to your self but unto him which dyed for you and rose again This I make no doubt is one reason why those promises wherein Men stand engaged to God are no better performed because they do not frequently repeat this holy action in the exercise of which they find their hearts at present fully resolved for God and goodness This is the cause that they waver again and all their Promises and Vows wherein they bind themselves fall off like cords of vanity Whereas did they upon all occasions communicate with our Saviour they would find their resolutions grow so strong and stedfast that no temptation would be able to break them They would be like Bands of Iron or Chains rather of Gold that would hold them for ever to their duty You have heard I believe the story of Mithridates who by often use of the Antidote which he invented so fortified his Spirits that they resisted the force of all Poyson Insomuch that when to avoid the Roman slavery he would have dispatched himself by a strong venemous draught he was not able to effect it Such a soveraign vertue you will find in the frequent devout receiving of the Sacrament of Christs Body and Blood It will secure the life of your Soul confirm your strength arm you against the bitings of the old Serpent and make it in a manner impossible for you to be impoisoned by any naughty affections But I have writ so much on this Subject in other Books already that I need not say any more of it here You find I hope those Treatises useful to the stirring up Devotion and to the making a Soul more forward and unwearied in Gods service And there likewise you may meet with a particular Prayer for Love to the Holy Communion wherefore let me proceed without any stop to the next Advice XIII IF