the Lord Jesus Christ. SECT III. Of speaking good of our neighbours IF it be not in our hands to do well it must be in our hearts and the contrary must never be upon our tongues we are sure we can speak well or we can abstain from speaking ill If it be otherwise with us we can not be welcome here we shall not worthily communicate God opens his mouth and his heart and his bowels his bosome and his treasures to us in this holy Sacrament and calls to us to draw water as from a river and can we come to drink of the pleasant streams that we may have only moisture enough to talk much and long against the honour of our brother or our sister Can it be imagined that Christ who never spake an ill word should take thee into his arms and feast thee at his table and dwell in thy heart and lodge thee in his bosome who makest thy self all one with the Devil whose office and work it is to be an accuser of the Brethren No Christ never will feast serpents at his Table * persons who have stings instead of tongues and venom in all the moisture of their mouth and reproach is their language We should easily consent that he â—hat kiâ—â—â—d a man yesterday and is likely to kill another to morrow were not this day worthy to Communicate now some persons had rather lose their lives than lose their honour what then think we of their preparation to the holy communion that make nothing of murdering their brothers or their sisters same that either invent evil stories falsely and maliciously or believing them easily report them quickly and aggravate them spitefully and scatter them diligently He that delights to report evil things of me that will not endure so much as to have me well spoken of hath certainly but little kindness to me he would very hardly die for me or lay out great sums of mony for me that will not afford me the cheapest charity of a good word The Jewes have a saying that it were better that a man were put into a flame of fire than he should publickly disgrace his Neighbour But in this there are two great considerations that declare the unworthiness of it 1. They who readily speak reproachfully of others destroy all the love and combinations of charity in the world they ruine the excellency and peculiar priviledge of mankind whose nature it is to delight in society and whose needs and nature make it necessary Now slander and reproach and speaking evil one of another poysons love and brings in hatred and corrupts friendship and tempts the biggest vertue by anger to passe unto revenge For an evil tongue is a perpetual storm it is a daily temptation and no vertue can without a miracle withstand its temptation If you strike a lamprey but once with a rod saith the Greek proverb you make him gentle but if often you provoke him A single injury is entertained by Christian patience like a stone into a pocket of wooll it rests soft in the embraces of a meek spirit which delights to see it self overcome a wrong by a worthy sufferance but he that loves to do injury by talk does it in all companies and takes all occasions and brings it in by violence and urges it rudely till patience being weary goes away and is waited upon by Charity which never forsakes or goes away from patience A wound with the tongue is like a bruise it cannot be cured in four and twenty hours 2. No man sins singly in such instances as these Some men commit one murder and never do another some men are surprized and fall into uncleanness or drunkenness but repent of it speedily and never again return to folly but an evil and an uncharitable tongue is an accursed principle it is in its very nature and original equal to an evil habit and it enters without temptation and dwells in every part of our conversation and injures every man and every woman and is like the evil spirit that was in love with Tobias his wife if you drive him from Nineve he will run to the utmost parts of Egypt there also unlesse an Angel binde him he will do all the mischief in the world for there is not in the world a worse Devil than a devilish tongue But I am not now to speak of it as it is injurious to our neighbour but as it is an hinderance to our worthy communicating The mouth that speaketh lies or stings his neighbour or boasteth proud things is not fit to drink the blood of the sacrificed Lamb. Christ enters not into those lips from whence slander and evil talkings do proceed and the tongue that loves to dispraise his brother can not worthily celebrate the praises and talk of the glorious things of God and let no man deceive himself an injurious talker is an habitual sinner and he that does not learn the discipline of the tongue can never have the charity of Christ or the blessings of the peaceful Sacrament Persons that slander or disgrace their brother are bound to make restitution It is as if they had stoln a jewel they must give it back again or not come hither But they that will neither do nor speakwell of others are very far from charity and they that are so ought to be as far from the Sacrament or they will not be very far from condemnation But a good man will be as careful of the reputation as of the life of his brother and to be apt to speak well of all men is a sign of a charitable and a good man and that goes a great way in our preparation to a worthy Communion SECT IV. Forgiveness of injuries a necessary part of preparation to the holy Sacrament THis duty is expressed not only as obligatory to us but as relative to the Holy Sacrament in the words of our blessed Saviour When thou bringest thy gift to the Altar and there remembrest that thy Brother hath ought against thee leave there thy gâ—ft and go be first reconciled to thy brother and then come and offer This Precept was indeed instanced in the Levitical Sacrifices and Jewish Altars but because as St. Irenaeus observes the Precepts of Christ however expressed relate to Moses Law but less principally and chiefly designe an Evangeli al duty therefore he referrs these words to the celebration of the Christian Eucharistical Sacrifice and Oblation concerning which he hath these excellent words From the beginning God respected Abels offering because he offered in righteousness and singleness of heart But God regarded not the Sacrifice of Cain because he had a heart divided from his Brother full of zeal and malice and therefore God who knoweth all secrets thus reproves him If thou doest rightly offer but not rightly divide be quiet God will not be appeased with thy sacrifice For if any one in outward appearance offers a clean
reason for what they pretend and yet the words of Scripture from whence they pretend are not so many as are the several pretensions My purpose is not to dispute but to persuade not to confute any one but to instruct those that need not to make a noise but to excite devotion not to enter into curious but material inquiries and to gather together into an union all those several portions of truth and differing apprehensions of mysteriousness and various methods and rules of preparation and seemingly opposed Doctrines by which even good men stand at distance and are afraid of each other For since all societies of Christians pretend to the greatest esteem of this above all the Rites or external parts and ministries of Religion it cannot be otherwise but that they will all speak honourable things of it and suppose holy things to be in it and great blessings one way or other to come by it and it is contemptible only among the prophane and the Atheistical all the innumerable differences which are in the discourses and consequent practices relating to it proceed from some common truths and universal notions and mysterious or inexplicable words and tend all to reverential thoughts and pious treatment of these Rites and holy Offices and therefore it will not be impossible to find honey or wholsome dews upon all this variety of plants and the differing opinions and several understandings of this mystery which it may be no humane understanding can comprehend will serve to excellent purposes of the Spirit if like men of differing interest they can be reconciled in one Communion at least the ends and designs of them all can be conjoyned in the design and ligatures of the same reverence and piety and devotion My purpose therefore is to discourse of the nature excellencies uses and intention of the holy Sacrament of the Lords Supper the blessings and fruits of the Sacrament all the advantages of a worthy Communion the publick and the private the personal and the Ecclesiastical that we may understand what it is what we go about and how it is to be treated I shall account also concerning all the duties of preparation ordinary and extraordinary more and less solemn of the rules and manners of deportment in the receiving the gesture and the offering the measures and instances of our duty our comport and conversation in and after it together with the cases of conscience that shall occur under these titles respectively relating to the particular matters It matters not where we begin for if I describe the excellencies of this Sacrament I find it engages us upon matters of duty and inquiries practical If I describe our duty it plainly signifies the greatness and excellency of the Mystery the very notion is practical and the practice is information we cannot discourse of the secret but by describing our duty and we cannot draw all the lines of duty but so much duty must needs open a Cabinet of Mysteries If we understand what we are about we cannot chuse but be invested with fear and reverence and if we look in with fear and reverence it cannot be but we shall understand many secrets But because the natural order of Theology is by Faith to build up good life by a rectified Understanding to regulate the Will and the Affections I shall use no other method but first discourse of the excellent Mystery and then of the duty of the Communicant direct and collateral CHAP. I. Of the Nature Excellencies Vses and Intention of the Holy Sacrament of the Lords Supper SECT I. Of the several apprehensions of men concerning it WHen our Blessed Lord was to nail the hand writing of Ordinances to his Cross he was pleased to retain two Ceremonies Baptism and the Holy Supper that Christians may first wash add then eat first be made clean and then eat of the Supper of the Lamb and it cannot be imagined but that this so signal and peculiar retention of two Ceremonies is of great purpose and remarkable vertues The matter is evident in the instance of Baptism and as the Mystery is of the foundation of Religion so the vertue of it is inserted into our Creed and we all believe one Baptism for the remission of our sins and yet the action is external the very Mystery is by a Ceremony the allusion is bodily the Element is water the minister a sinful man and the effect is produced out of the Sacrament in many persons and in many instances as well as in it and yet that it is effected also by it and with it in the conjunction with due dispositions of him that is to be baptized we are plainly taught by Christs Apostles and the symbols of the Church But concerning the other Sacrament there are more divisions and thoughts of heart for it is never expressly joyned with a word of promise and where mention is made of it in the Gospels it is named only as a duty and a Commandment and not as a grace or treasure of holy blessings we are bidden to do it but promised nothing for a reward it is commanded to us but we are not invited to obedience by consideration of any consequent blessing and when we do it so many holy things are required of us which as they are fit to be done even when we do not receive the Blessed Sacrament so they effect salvation to us by vertue of their proper and proportioned promises in the vertue of Christs death however apprehended and understood Upon this account some say that we receive nothing in the B. Eucharist but we commemorate many blessed things which we have received that it is affirmed in no Scripture that in this mystery we are to call to minde the death of Christ but because we already have it in our minde we must also have it in our hearts and publish it in our confessions and Sacramental representment and therefore it is not the memory but the commemoration of Christs death that as the anniversary sacrifices in the law were a commemoration of sins every year not a calling them to minde but a confession of their guilt and of our deserved punishment so this Sacrament is a representation of Christs death by such symbolical actions as himself graciously hath appointed but then excepting that to do so is an act of obedience it exercises no other vertue it is an act of no other grace it is the instrument of no other good it is neither vertue nor gain grace nor profit And whereas it is said to confirm our faith this also is said to be unreasonable for this being our own work cannot be the means of a Divine grace not naturally because it is not of the same kind and faith is no more the natural effect of this obedience than chastity can be the product of Christian fortitude not by Divine appointment because we find no such order no promise no intimation of any such event and although the thing
same Ministry of salvation and but one and the same Oeconomy of God Thus St. Peter affirms That by the precious blood of Christ we are redeemed from our vain conversation and it is every where affirmed that we are purified and cleansed by the blood of Christ and yet these are the express effects of his Spirit for by the spirit we mortifie the deeds of the body and we are justified and sanctified in the name of our Lord Jesus by the spirit of our God By which expressions we are taught to distinguish the natural blood of Christ from the spiritual the blood that he gave for us from the blood which he gives to us that was indeed by the spirit but was not the same thing but this is the spirit of grace and the spirit of wisdom And therefore as our Fathers were made to drink into one spirit when they drank of the water of the rock so we also partake of the spirit when we drink of Christs blood which came from the spiritual rock when it was smitten for thus according to the Doctrine of St. John the water aâ—d the blood and the spirit are one and the same glorious purposes As it was with our Fathers in the beginning so it is now with us and so it ever shall be world without end for they fed upon Christ that is they believed in Christ they expected his day they lived upon his promises they lived by faith in him and the same meat and drink is set upon our Tables and more than all this as Christ is the Lamb slain from the beginning of the world so he shall be the food of souls in heaven where they who are accounted worthy shall sit down and be feasted in the eternal Supper of the Lamb concerning which blessedness our B. Saviour saith Blessed is he that eateth bread in the Kingdom of God for he hath appointed to his chosen ones to eat and drink at his table in his Kingdom plainly teaching us that by eating and drinking Christ is meant in this world to live the life of the spirit and in the other world it is to live the life of glory here we feed upon duty and there we feed upon reward our wine is here mingled with water and with myrrhe there it is mere and unmixt but still it is called meat and drink and still is meant grace and glory the fruits of the spirit and the joy of the spirit that is by Christ we here live a spiritual life and hereafter shall live a life eternal Thus are sensible things the Sacrament and representation of the spiritual and eternal and spiritual things are the fulfillings of the sensible But the consequent of these things is this that since Christ always was is and shall be the food of the faithful and is that bread which came down from heaven since we eat him here and shall eat him there our eating both here and there is spiritual only the word of teaching shall be changed into the word of glorification and our faith into Charity and all the way our souls live a new life by Christ of which eating and drinking is the Symbol and the Sacrament And this is not done to make this mystery obscure but intelligible and easie For so the pains of hell are expressed by fire which to our flesh is most painful and the joyes of God by that which brings us greatest pleasure by meat and drink and the growth in grace by the natural instruments of nutrition and the work of the Soul by the ministeries of the body and the graces of God by the blessings of nature for these we know and we know nothing else and but by phantasmes and ideas of what we see and feel we understand nothing at all Now this is so far from being a diminution of the glorious mystery of our Communion that the changing all into spirituality is the greatest increase of blessing in the world And when he gives us his body and his blood he does not fill our stomachs with good things for of whatsoever goes in thither it is affirmed by the Apostle that God will destroy both it and them but our hearts are to be replenished and by receiving his spirit we receive the best thing that God gives not his liveless body but his flesh with life in it that is his doctrine and his spirit to imprint it so to beget a living faith and a lively hope that we may live and live for ever 4. St. John having thus explicated this mystery in general of our eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Christ added nothing in particular concerning any Sacraments these being in particular instances of the general mystery and communion with Christ. But what is the advantage we receive by the Sacraments besides that which we get by the other and distinct ministeries of faith I thus account in general The word and the spirit are the flesh and the blood of Christ that is the ground of all Now because there are two great Sermons of the Gospel which are the summe total and abbreviature of the whole word of God the great messages of the word incarnate Christ was pleased to invest these two words with two Sacraments and assist those two Sacraments as he did the whole word of God with the presence of his Spirit that in them we might do more signally and solemnly what was in the ordinary ministrations done plainly and without extraordinary regards Believe and repent is the word in Baptisme and and there solemnly consigned and here it is that by faith we feed on Christ for faith as it is opposed to works that is the new Covenant of faith as it is opposed to the old Covenant of works is the covenant of repentance repentance is expressly included in the new covenant but was not in the old but by faith in Christ we are admitted to pardon of our sins if we repent and forsake them utterly Now this is the word of faith and this is that which is called the flesh or body of Christ for this is that which the soul feeds on this is that by which the just do live and when by the operation of the holy spirit the waters are reformed to a Divine Nature or efficacy the baptized are made clean theâ— are sanctified and presented pure and spotless unto God This mystery St. Austin rightly understood when he affirmed that we are made partakers of the body and blood of Christ when we are in baptisme incorporated into his body we are baptized in the passion of our Lord so Tertullian to the same sense with that of St. Paul we are buried with him in baptisme into his death that is by baptisme are conveyed to us all the effects of Christ's death the flesh and blood of Christ crucified are in baptisme reached to us by the hand of God by his holy spirit and received by the hand of man the Ministery of
and God is appeas'd and God is reconciled and God gives us blessings and the fruits of Christs passion in the vertue of the sacrificed Lamb that is we believing and praying are blessed and sanctified and saved through Jesus Christ. So that as we pray so we communicate if we pray well we may communicate well else at no hand Now in this besides that we are to take account of our Prayers by all those measures of the Spirit which we have learned in the holy Scriptures there are two great lines of duty by which we can well examine our selves in this particular 1. That our Prayers must be the work of our hearts not of our lips that is that we heartily desire what we so carefully pray for and God knows this is not very ordinary For besides that we are not in love with the things of God and have no worthy value for Religion there are many things in our Prayer which we ask for and do not know what to do with if we had them and we do not feel any want of them and we care not whether we have them or no. We ask for the Spirit of God for Wisdom and for a right Judgment in all things and yet there are not many in our Christian Assemblies who use to trouble themselves at all with judging concerning the Mysteries of Godlinesse Men pray for humility and yet at the same time think that all that which is indeed humility is a pitiful poornesse of spirit pusilanimity and want of good breeding We pray for contrition and a broken heart and yet if we chance to be melancholy we long to be comforted and think that the Lectures of the Crosse bring Death and therefore are not the way of Eternal Life We pray sometimes that God may be first and last in all our thoughts and yet we conceive it no great matter whether he be or no but we are sure that he is not but the things of the world do take up the place of God and yet we hope to be saved for all that and consequently are very indifferent concerning the return of that Prayer We frequently call upon God for his grace that we may never fall into sin now in this besides that we have no hopes to be heard and think it impossible to arrive to a state of life in which we shall not commit sins yet if we do sin we know there is a remedy so ready that we believe we are not much the worse if we do Here are prayers enough but where are the desires all this while We pray against covetousnesse and pride and gluttony but nothing that we do but is either covetousnesse or pride so that our Prayers are terminated upon a word not upon a thing We do covetous actions and speak proud words and have high thoughts and do not passionately desire to have affections contrary to them but only to such notions of the sin as we have entertained which are such as will do no real prejudice or mortification to the sin and whatever our Prayers are yet it is certain our desires are so little and so content with any thing of this nature that for very many spiritual petitions we are indifferent whether they be granted or not But if we are poor or persecuted if we be in fear or danger if we be heart-sick or afflicted with an uncertain soul then we are true desirers of relief and mercy we long for health and desire earnestly to be safe our hearts are pinch'd with the desire and the sharpnesse of the appetite is a pain then we pray and mind what we do * He that is in fear of death does not when he prays for life think upon his money and his sheep the entring of a fair woman into the room does not bend his neck and make him look off from the Princes face of whom he sues for pardon And if we had desires as strong as our needs and apprehensions answerable to our duty it were not possible that a man should say his prayers and never think of what he speaks but as our attention is so is our desire trifling and impertinent it is frighted away like a bird which fears as much when you come to give it meat as if you came with a design of death When therefore you are to give sentence concerning your Prayers your â—rayer-book is the least thing that is to be examined your Desires are the principal for they are fountains both of action and passion Desire what you pray for for certain it is you will pray passionately if you desire fervenâ—ly Prayers are but the body of the bird Desires are its Angels wings 2. If you will know how it is with you in the matter of your Prayers examine whether or no the form of your Prayer be the rule of your life Every Petition to God is a Precept to man and when in your Litanies you pray to be delivered from malice and hypocrisie from pride and envy from fornication and every deadly sin all this is but a line of duty and tells us that we must never consent to an act of pride or a thought of envy to a temptation of uncleannesse or the besmearings and evil paintings of hypocrisie * But we when we pray against a sin think we have done enough and if we ask for a grace suppose there is no more required Now Prayer is an instrument of help a procuring auxilliaries of God that we may do our duty and why should we ask for help if we be not our selves bound to do the thing Look not therefore upon your prayers as a short method of ease and salvation but as a perpetual monition of duty and by what we require of God we see what he requires of us and if you want a system or collective body of holy precepts you need no more but your prayer book and if you look upon them first as duties then as prayers that is things fit to be desired and fit to be laboured for your prayers will be much more usefull not so often vain nor so subject to illusion not so destitute of effect or so failing of the promises The prayers of a Christian must be like the devotions of the husbandman God speed the plough that is labour and prayer together a prayer to bless our labour Thus then we must examine Is desire the measure of our prayer and is labour the fruit of our desire if so then what we ask we shall receive as the gift of God and the reward of our labour but unless this be the state of oâ—r prayer we shall finde that the receiving of the Sacrament will be as ineffective because it will be as imperfect as our prayer For prayer and Communion differ but as great and little in the same kinde of duty Communion is but a great publick and solemn addresse and prayer to God through Jesus Christ and if we be not faithful in a little we shall not be
thy paths that my footsteps slip not As for God his way is perfect the word of the Lord is tryed he is a buckler to all those that trust in him For who is God save the Lord and who is our rock save our God Judge me O Lord for I have walked in mine integrity but I trust in the Lord therefore I shall not slide Examine me O Lord and prove me try my reins and my heart for thy loving-kindnesse is before mine eyâ—s and I will walk in thy truth I will not sit with vain persons neither will I go in with dissemblers I hate the Congregation of evil doers and will not sit with the wicked I will wash mine hands in innocency so will I compasse thine Altar O â—ord That I may publish with the voice of thanksgiving and tell of all thy wondrous works But as for me I will walk in my integrity redeem me and be merciful unto me So shall my foot stand in an even place and in the congregations will I blesse the Lord. Glory be to the Father c. As it was in the beginning c. The Prayers O Eternal and most Glorious God who sittest in heaven ruling over all things from the beginning thou dwellest on high and yet humblest thy self to behold the things that are in heaven and earth thou hast searched me O Lord and known me thou understandest my thoughts afar off and art acquainted with all my ways for there is not a word in my tongue but thou O Lord knowest it altogether Be pleased to impart unto thy servant a ray of thy heavenly light a beam of the Sun of righteousnesse open mine eyes that I may see the wondrous things of thy Law that I may walk in them all my days Set all my sins before my face that I may speedily and earnestly and perfectly repent and forsake them all Give me a sight of my infirmities that I may watch against them discover to me all my evil and weak principles that I may reform them and whatsoever is wanting in me towards the understanding of any thing whereby I may please thee and perfect my duty I beg of thee to reveal that also unto me that my duty may not be undiscerned and my faith may not be reproved and my affections may not be perverse and hardned in their foolish pursuance and a secret sin may not lye undiscovered and corrupting my soul. II. GIve me an ingenuous and a severe spirit that whatever judgment of charity I make concerning others I may give a right judgment concerning my own state and actions condemning the criminal censuring the suspicious suspecting what seems allowable and watchful even over the best that I may in the spirit of repentance and mortification correct all my irregularities and reform my errours and improve the good things which thou hast given me that endeavouring to approve my actions to my conscience and my conscience to thy law I may not be a reprobate but approved by thee in the great day of examination of all the world and be reckoned amongst thy Elect thy secret ones through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen A short form of Humiliation after our Examination I. THY Judgments O Lord God are declared in thunder and with fear and dread thou shakest all my bones and my soul trembles when I consider that great day in which thou shalt judge all the world and that infinite justice which will not spare the mighty for his greatnesse nor the poor for his poverty and thy unlimited power which can mightily destroy all them that will not have thee to reign over them II. O most dreadful Judge I stand in amazement when I consider that the heavens are not pure in thine eyes and if thou foundest perversnesse in thy Angels and didst not spare them what shall become of me The stars fell from heaven and what can I presume who am but dust and ashes They whose life that seemed holy are fallen into an evil portion and after they have eaten the bread of Angels they have been delighted with Carobe-nuts with husks and draffe of Swine III. There is no holinesse O God if thou withdrawest thy hand no wisdom profits if thy government does cease No courage can abide no chastity can remain pure no watchfulnesse keep us safe unlesse thou doest continue to strengthen us to purifie us to make us stand When thou leavest us we drown and perish when thy grace and mercy visits us we are lifted up and stand upright We are unstable and unsecure unlesse we be confirmed by thee but we seek to thee for thy help and yet depart from the wayes of thy commandements IV. O how meanly and contemptibly do I deserve to be thought of how little and inconsiderable is the good which I do and how vast how innumerable how intolerable are the evils which I have done I submit O God I submit to the abysses of thy righteous and unsearchable judgements for I have been searching for a little some little good in me but I finde nothing Much indeed of good I have received but I have abused it thou hast given me thy grace but I have turned it into wantonnesse thou hast enabled me to serve thee but I have served my self but never but when I was thy enemy so that in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing V. I am a deep abysse O God of folly and calamity I have been searching my heart and can find no good thing I have been searching and I cannot find out all the evil Thou didst create in me a hope of glory but I have lost my confidence and men have sometimes spoken good things of me but I know not where they are and who shall raise me up when I fall down before thy face in thy eternal judgment VI. I will no more desire I will no more suffer I will no more seek I will no more be moved by the praises of men for behold they speak but they know nothing Thou art silent but thou knowest all things and I increase the number of my sins What shall I do O thou preserver of men I will lay my face in the dust and confess my self to be nothing VII Pity my shame O God bind up my wounds lift me from the dust raise me up from this nothing and make me something what thou wilt what thou wilt delight in Take away the partition wall the hindrance the sin that so easily besets me and bring me unto Jesus to my sweetest Saviour Jesus unite me unto him and then although in my self I am nothing yet in him I shall be what I ought to be and what thou canst not chuse but love Amen Amen A Prayer for holy and fervent desires of Religion and particularly of the Blessed Sacrament O Most Blessed most glorious Lord and Saviour Jesus thou that waterest the furrows of the earth and refreshest her wearinesse and makest it very plenteous behold O God my desart
sins frequently and repents frequently gives great reason to believe that his repentances are but pretended and that such repentances before God signifie nothing yet that is nothing to us it may be they are rendred ineffâ—ctual by the relapse and that they were good for the present as Ahabs was but whether they be or be not yet if he be not ashamed to repent so often we must think it no shame and no imprudence to forgive him and to forgive him so that he be restored intirely to his former state of good things that is there must be no let in thy charity if there be in prudence that 's another consideration But his second repentance must be accepted as well as his first and his tenth as well as his fifth And if any man think it hard so often to be tied to accept his repentance let him understand that it is because himself hath not yet been called to judgment he hath not heard the voice of the exactor he hath not yet been delivered to the tormentors nor summed up his own accounts nor beheld with amazement the vast number of his sins He that hath in deepest apprehension placed himself before the dreadful Tribunal of God or felt the smart of conscience or hath been affrighted with the fears of hell or remembers how often he hath been spared from an horrible damnation will not be ready to strangle his Brother and afflict him for a trifle because he considers his own dangers of perishing for a sum which can never be paid if it never be forgiven Question III. What indications and signs of repentance are we to require and to accept as sufficient I answer that for this circumstance there is as proper an use and exercise of our charity as in the direct forgiveness We are not to exact securities and demonstrations Mathematical nor to demand the extremity of things If thy enemy be willing to make an amends accept of his very willingnesse for some part and his amends for the other Let every good act be forwardly entertained and persuade you heartily that all is well within If you can reasonably think so you are bound to think so for after all the signs of repentance in the world he may deceive you and whether his heart be right or not you can never know but by the judgment of charity and that you may better use betimes For when ever your returning enemy saies he does repent that is gives humane and probable indications of his repentance you cannot tell but that he saies true and therefore you must forgive The words of Christ are plain if he returns saying I do repent then it is a duty and we can stay no longer for he that confesses his sin and praies for pardon hath done great violence and mortification to himself he hath punished his fault and then there is nothing left to be done by the offended party but to return to mercy and charity But in this affair it is remarkable what we are commanded by our blessed Lord Agree with thine adversary quickly c. lâ—ft thou be constrained to pay the utmost farthing Plainly intimating that in reconcilements and returns of friendship there is supposed alwaies something to be abated something clearly forgiven for if he pay thee to the utmost farthing thou hast forgiven nothing It is merchandise and not forgivenesse to restore him that does as much as you can require Be not over righteous saith Solomon that is let charity do something of thy work allow to her place and powers and opportunity It was an excellent saying of St. Bernard God is never called the God of revenges but the Father of mercies because the original of his revenges he takes from us and our sins but the original and the causes of his forgivenesse he takes from himself and so should we that we restore him that did us wrong to our love again let it not be wholly because he hath done all that can be required but something upon our own account let our mercy have a share in it that is let us accept him readily receive him quickly believe him easiy expound all things to the better sense take his word and receive his repentance and forgive him at the beginning of it not to interrupt his repentance but to incourage it and that 's the proper work of charity in the present Article Question IV. Whether after every relapse must the conditions of his pardon be harder than before I answer that I find no difference in the expression of our blessed Saviour It is all one after seven times and after seventy times and after seventy times seven times If he shall return saying I repent that 's all is here required But then because by saying I repent is not meant only the speaking it but also doing it must at least be probable that he does so as well as say so therefore although as soon as he does so so soon you must forgive him yet 1. After the first forgivenesse and at the second and third offence we are not obliged so readily to believe his saying as after the first offence at which time although he did violence to justice and charity yet he had not broken his faith as now he hath and therefore the oftner he hath relapsed the more significations he ought to give of the truth of his repentance He that is pardoned and sins again cannot expect so easily to be acquitted the third time as at the first saith S Basil. At the first fault we must believe his saying because we know nothing to the contrary but when he hath often said so and it is seen so often that he did not say true he that is forgiven and then relapses is obliged to do more the next time he pretends repentance 2. Altâ—ough we â—re bound to forgive him intirely even after a thousand injuries if he does truly repent yet this person cannot expect to be imployed or to be returned to all his former capacities of good because it is plain he hath not cured the evil principle the malicious heart or the evil eye the slanderous tongue or the unjust hand his covetous desire and his peevish anger and then though we must be ready in heart to receive him to all the degrees of his former condition when he shall be capable and is the same man that ought to be imployed yet till he be so or appears so in prudent and reasonable indications he must be pardoned heartily and prayed for charitably but he must be handled cautiously It must not be harder for thee to pardon him after ten thousand relapses and returns but after so much variety of folly and weak instances it will be much harder for him to say and prove he does repent But in this our charity must neither be credulous nor morose too easie nor too difficult but it is secure if it pardons him and prayes for him whether he repents or no. 3.
hast thou to do to declare my Statutes or that thou shouldst take my Covenant in thy mouth seeing thou hatest instruction and castest my words behind thee Thou sittest and speakest against thy Brother thou slanderest thine own mothers Son These things thou hast done and I kept silence but I will reprove thee and set them in order before thine eyes Now consider this ye that forget God lest I tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver Deliver me from bloud-guiltiness O God thou God of my salvation and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness Blessed is he that considereth the poor the Lord will deliver him in the time of trouble The Lord will deliver him and keep him alive and he shall be blessed upon the earth and thou wilt not deliver him into the will of his enemies The Lord will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing thou wilt make all his bed in his sickness But I said Lord be merciful to me heal my soul for I have sinned against thee Yet the Lord will command his loving kindness in the day time and in the night his song shall be with me and my prayer unto the God of my life O send out thy light and thy truth let them lead me let them bring me to thy holy Hill and to thy Tabernacles Then will I go unto the Altar of God my exceeding joy yea upon the harp will I praise thee O God my God The righteous shall be glad in the Lord and shall trust in him and all the upright in heart shall glory Do good O Lord to them that are true of heart and evermore mightily defend them Do good in thy good pleasure unto Sion build thou the walls of Jerusalem In God will I praise his word in the Lord will I praise his word Thy vows are upon me O God I will render praises unto thee For thou hast delivered our souls from death wilt not thou deliver our feet from falling that we may walk before God in the light of the living I will love thee O God and praise thee for ever because thou hast done it and I will wait on thy name for it is good before thy Saints Glory be to the Father c. A Prayer for the grace of Charity c. O Most gentle most merciful and gracious Saviour Jesu thou didst take upon thee our nature to redeem us from sin and misery thou wert for us led as a Lamb to the slaughter and as a Sheep before the shearer is dumb so thou openedst not thy mouth thou turnedst thy back to the smiters and thy cheeks to the nippers thou wert mock'd and whip'd crucified and torn but thou didst nothing but good to thy enemies and prayedst with loud cries for thy persecutors and didst heal the wound of one that come to lay violent hands upon thee O plant in my heart gentleness and patience a meek and a long suffering spirit that I may never be transported with violent angers never be disordered by peevishness never think thoughts of revenge but may with meekness receive all injuries that shall be done to me and patiently bear every cross accident and with charity may return blessing for cursing good for evil kind words for foul reproaches loving admonitions for scornful upbraidings gentle treatments for all derisions and affronts that living all my daies with meekness and charity keeping peace with all men and loving my neighbour as my self and thee more than my self and more than all the world I may at last come into the regions of peace and eternal charity where thou livest who lovest all men and wouldst have none to perish but all men to be saved through thee O most merciful Saviour and Redeemer Jesu Amen An act of Forgiveness to be said with all earnestness and sincerity before every Communion O God my God I have sinned grievously against thee I am thy debtor in a vast and an Eternal debt and if thou shouldest take the forfeiture I shall be for ever bound in eternal prisons even till I pay the utmost farthing But I hope in thy mercies that thou wilt forgive me my ten thousand Talents and I also do in thy presence forgive every one that hath offended me whoever hath taken my goods privately and injuriously or hurt my person or contrived any evil against me whether known or unknown who ever hath lessened my reputation detracted from my best endeavours or hath slandered me or reproached reviled or in any word or way done me injury I do from the bottom of my soul forgive him praying thee also that thou wilt never impute to him any word or thought or action done against me but forgive him as I desire thou wouldst also forgive me all that I have sinned against thee or any man in the world Give him thy grace and a holy repentance for whatever he hath done amiss grant he may do so no more keep me from the evil tongues and injurious actions of all men and keep all my enemies from all the expresses of thy wrath and let thy grace prevail finally upon thy servant that I may never remember any injury to the prejudice of any man buâ— that I may walk towards my enemies as Christ did who received much evil but went about seeking to do goâ—d to every man and if ever it shall be in my power and my opportunity to return evill O then grant that the spirit of love and forgiveness may triumph over all anger and malice and revenge that I may be the Son of God and maâ— love God and prove my love to thee by my love to my Brother and by obedience to all thy Laws through the Son of thy love by whom thou art reconciled to mankind our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Amen Vers. Remember not Lord our offences nor the offences of our forefathers neither take thou vengeance of our sins Resp. Spare us good Lord spare thy people whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood and be not angry with us for ever Amen CHAP. V. Of Repentance preparatory to the Blessed Sacrament SECT I. WHen Isaac and Abimelech had made a covenant of peace and mutual agreement they would not confirm it by a Sacramental Oath till the next morning that they might swear fasting for the reverence and religious regard of the solemn Oath saith Lyra. But Philo says they did it Symbolically to represent that purity and cleanness of soul which he that swears to God or comes to pay his vows ought to preserve with great Religion He that in a religious and solemn addresse comes to God ought to consider whether his body be free from uncleannesse and his soul from vile affections He that is righteous let him be righteous still and he that is justified let him be justified yet more saith the Spirit of God and then it follows He that thirsts let him come and drink of the living waters freely and without money meaning
that when our affections to sin are gone when our hearts are clean then we may freely partake of the feast of the supper of the Lamb. For as in natural forms the more noble they are the more noble dispositions are required to their production so it is in the spiritual for when Christ is to be efformed in us when we are to become the Sons of God flesh of his flesh and bone of his bone we must be washed in water and purified by faith and sanctified by the spirit and cleansed by an excellent repentance we must be confirmed by a holy hope and softned by charity So God hath ordered in the excellent fabrick of humane bodies First our meat is prepared by fire then macerated by the teeth then digested in the stomach where the first separation is made of the good from the bad the wholesom juyces from the more earthy parts these being sent down to earth the other are conveyed to the Liver where the matter is separated again and the good is turned into blood and the better into spirits and thence the body is supplied with blood and the spirits repair unto the heart and head that thence they may be sent on Embassies for the ministeries of the body and for the work of understanding So it is in the dispensation of the affairs of the soul The ear which is the mouth of the soul receives all meat and the senses entertain the fuel for all passions and all interests of vertue and vice But the understanding makes the first separation dividing the clean from the unclean But when the spirit of God comes and purifies even the separate matter making that which is morally good to be spiritual and holy first cleansing us from the sensualities of flesh and blood and then from spiritual iniquities that usually debauch the soul then the holy nourishment which we receive passes into diviâ—e excellencies But if sensuality be in the palate and intemperance in the stomach if lust be in the liver and anger in the heart it corrupts the holy food and makes that to be a savour of death which was intended for health and holy blessiâ—gs But therefore when we have lived in the corrupted air of evil company and have sucked in the vile juices of coloquintida and the deadly henbane when that is within the heart which defiles the man the soul must be purged by repentance it must be washed by tears and purified by penitential sorrow For he that comes to this holy Feast with an unrepenting heart is like the flies in the Temple upon the day of Sacrifice the little insect is very busie about the flesh of the slain beasts she flies to every corner of the Temple and she tastes the flesh before the portion is laid before the God but when the nidour and the delicacy hath called such an unwelcome guest she corrupts the Sacrifice and therefore dies at the Altar or is driven away by the officious Priest So is an unworthy Communicant he comes it may be with pâ—ssion and an earnest zeal he hopes to be fed and he hopes to be made immortal he thinks he does a holy action and shall receive a holy blessing but what is his portion It is a glorious thing to be feasted at the Table of God glorious to him that is invited and prepared but not to him that is unprepared hateful and impenitent But it is an easie thing to say that a man must repent before he communicates so he must before he prayes before he dies before he goes a journey the whole life of a man is to be a continual repentance but if so then what particular is that which is required before we receive the holy Communion For if it be an universal duty of infinit extent of unlimited comprehension then every Christian must alwayes be doing some of the offices of repentance but then which are the peculiar parts and offices of this grace which have any special and immediate relation to this solemnity for if there be none the Sermons of repentâ—nce are nothing but the general doctrine of good life but of no special efficacy in our preparation The answer to this will explicate the intricacy and establish the measures of our duty in this proper relation in order to this ministery SECT II. The necessity of repentance in order to the holy Sacrament 1. THe holy Sacrament of the Lords Supper does not produce it's intended effect upon an unprepared subject He that gives his body to that which is against the spirit his spirit to the affections of the body cannot receive the body of Christ in a spiritual maner He that receives Christ must in great truth be a servant of Christ. It is not lawful saith Justin Martyr for any one to receive the holy Eucharistical bread and to drink of the sacred Calice but to him that believes and to him that lives according to Christs Commandment For as St. Paul argues of the infinite undecency of fornication because it is a making the members of Christ to become the members of an harlot upon the same account it is infinitely impossible that any such polluted persons should become the members of Christ to the intents of blessing and the spirit How can Christs body be communicated to them who are one flesh with an harlot and so it is in all other sins we cannot partake of the Lords table and the table of Devils A wicked person and a Communicant are of contrary interests of differing relations designed to divers ends fitted with other dispositions they work not by the same principles are not weighed in the same ballance nor meted by like measures and therefore they that come must be innocent or return to innocence that is they must repent or be such persons as need no repentance and St. Ambrose gives this account of the practise of the Church in this affair This is the order of this mystery which is every where observed that first by the pardon of our sins our souls be healed and the wounds cured with the medicine of repentance and then that our souls be plentifully nourished by this holy Sacrament and to this purpose he expounds the parable of the prodigal son saying that no man ought to come to this Sacrament unless he have the wedding ring and the wedding garment unless he have receiv'd the seal of the spirit and is cloathed with white garments the righteousness and justification of the Saints And to the same purpose it is that St. Cyprian complains of some in his Church who not having repented not being put under discipline by the Bishop and the Clergy yet had the Sacrament ministred to them against whom he presses the severe words of St. Paul He that eats and drinks unworthily eats and drinks damnation to himself that is he that repents not of his sins before he comes to the Holy Sacrament comes before he is prepared and therefore
lamp he must stand readily prepared by a state of repentance and against the solemn time he must make that state more actual and his graces operative Now in order to this it is to be considered that preparation to death hath great latitude and not only he is fit to die who hath attained to the fulness of the stature of Christ to a perfect man in Christ Jesus but every one who hath renounced his sin with heartinesse and sincerity and hath begun to mortifie it But in these cases of beginning or of Infancy in Christ though it be certain that every one who is a new Creature though but newly become so is born of God and hath life abiding in him and therefore shall not passe into condemnation yet concerning such persons the Rulers of Souls and Ministers of Sacraments have nothing but a judgment of charity and the sentences of hope relating to the persons the state is so little and so allayed and so near to the late state of death from which they are recovering that God only knows how things are with them yet because we know that there is a beginning in which new converts are truly reconciled there is a first period of life and as we cannot say in many cases that this is it so in many we cannot say this is not therefore the Church hopes well of persons that die in their early progressions of piety and consequently refuses not to give to them these divine Mysteries Whoever are reconciled to God may be reconciled to the Church whose office it is only to declare the Divine Sentence and to administer it and to help towards the verification of it But because the Church cannot be surer of any person that his sins are pardoned that he is reconciled to God that he is in the state of Grace that if he then dies he shall be saved than a man himself can be of himself and in his own case which certainly he knows better than any man else and that our degrees of hope and confidence of being saved when it is not presumption but is prudent and reasonable does increase in proportion to our having well used and improved Gods grace and inlarges it self by our proportions of mortification and spiritual life and every man that is wise and prudent abides in fears and uncertain thoughts till he hath gotten a certain victory over all his sins and though he dies in hope yet not without trembling till he finds that he is more than conquerour therefore in proportion to this address to death must also be our address to the holy Sacrament For no man is fit to die but he that can be united unto Christ and â—he only that can be so must be admitted to a participation of his body and his bloud It is the same case in both we dwell with Christ and the two states differ but in degrees it is but a passing from altar to altar from that where the Minister of the Church officiates to that where the head of the Church does intercede There is this only difference there may be some proportions of haste to the Sacrament more than unto death upon this account because the reception of the Sacrament in worthy dispositions does increase those excellencies in which death ought to find us and therefore we may desire to communicate because we perceive a want of gâ—ace and yet for the same reason we may at the same time be afraid to die because after that we can receive no more but as that finds us we shall abide for ever But he that fears justly may yet in many cases die safely and he shall find that his fears when he was alive were useful to the caution and zeal and hastiness of repentance but were no certain indication that God was not reconciled unto him The best and severest persons do in the greatest parts of their spiritual life complain of their imperfect state and feel the load of their sins and apprehend with trembling the sad consequents of their sins and every day contend against them and forget all that is past of good actions done and press forwards still to more grace and are as hungry as if they had none at all and those men if they die go to Christ and shall reign with him for ever and yet many of them go with a trembling heart and though considering the infinite obliquity of them they cannot over-value their sins yet considering the infinite goodness of God and his readiness to accept it they undervalue their repentance and are safe in their humility and in Gods goodness when in many other regards they think themselves very unsafe Now such men as these must not be as much afraid to communicate as they are afraid to die but these and all men else must not communicate till they be in that condition that if they did die it would go well with them and the reason is plain because every friend of God dying so is certainly saved and he that is no friend of God is unworthy to partake of the Table of the Lord. But for the reducing the Answer of this Question to practice and to particular considerations I am to advise these things 1. Because no man of an ordinary life and a newly begun repentance ought hastily to pronounce himself acquitted and in the state of grace and in the state of salvation in this rule of proportion we are only to take the judgment of charity not of certainty and what is usually by wise and good men supâ—osed to be the certain though the least measure of hopeful expectations in order to death that we must suppose also to be our least measure of repentance preparatory to the blessed Sacrament 2. This measure must not be taken in the daies of health and carelesness but when we are either actually in apprehension or at least in deep meditation of death when it is dressed with all such terrors and material considerations that it looks like the King of terrors and at least makes our spirits full of fear and of sobriety 3. This measure must be carefully taken without the allay of foolish principles or a careless spirit or extravagant confidences of personal predestination or of being in any sect but with the common measures which Christians take when they weigh sadly their sins and their fears of the Divine displeasure let them take such proportions which considering men relie upon when they indeed come to die for few sober men die upon such wild accounts as they rely upon in talk and interest when they are alive He that prepares himself to death considers how deeply God hath been displeased and what hath been done towards a reconciliation and he that can probably hope by the usual measures of the Gospel that he is in probability of pardon hath by that learnt by what measures he must prepare himself to the holy Sacrament 4. Some persons are of a timorous conscience and apt to irregular and
unreasonable fears and nothing but a single ray from heaven can give them any portions of comfort and these men never trust to any thing they do or to any thing that is done for them and fear by no other measures but by consideration of the intolerable misery which they should suffer if they did miscarry and because these men can speak nothing and think nothing comfortable of themselves in that agony or in that meditation therefore they can make use of this rule by the proportions of that judgment of charity which themselves make of others and in what cases and in what dispositions they conclude others to die in the Lord if they take those or the like measures for themselves and accordingly in those dispositions address themselves to the holy Sacrament they will make that use of this rule which is intended and which may do them benefit 5. As there are great varieties and degrees of fitness to death so also to the holy Sacrament he that hath lived best hath enough to deplore when he dies and causes enough to beg for pardon of what is past and for aids in the present need and when he does communicate he hath in some proportion the same too he hath causes enough to come humbly to come as did the Publican and to say as did the Centurion Lord I am not worthy but he that may die with most confidence because he is in the best dispositions he also may communicate with most comfort because he does it with most holiness 6. But the least measures of repentance less than which cannot dispose us to the worthy reception of the holy Mysteries are these 1. As soon as we are smitten with the terrors of an afflicted conscience and apprehend the evil of sin or fear the Divine Judgments and upon that account resolve to leave our sin we are not instantly worthy and fit to communicate Attrition is not a competent disposition to the blessed Sacrament because although it may be the gate and entrance of a spiritual life yet it can be no more unless there be love in it unless it be contrition it is not a state of favour and grace but a disposition to it He that does not yet love God cannot communicate with Christ and he that resolves against sin out of fear only or temporal regards hath given too great testimony that he loves the sin still and will return to it when that which hinders him shall be removed Faith working by charity is the wedding garment and he that comes hither not vested with this shall be cast into outer darkness But the words of St. Paul are express as to this particular In Christ Jesus nothing can avail but faith working by love and therefore without this the Sacrament it self will do no good and if it does no good it cannot be but it will do harm Our repentance disposing us to this Divine feast must at least be contrition or a sorrow for sins and purposes to leave them by reason of the love of God working in our hearts 2. But because no man can tell whether he hath the love of God in him but by the proper effects of love which is keeping the Commandments no man must approach to the holy Sacrament upon the account of his mere resolution to leave sin untill he hath broken the habit untill he hath cast away his fetters untill he be at liberty from sin and hath shaken off its laws and dominion so that he can see his love to God entring upon the ruines of sin and perceives that Gods Spirit hath advanced his Scepter by the declension of the sin that dwelt within till then he may do well to stand in the outward Courts lest by a too hasty entrance into the Sanctuary he carry along with him the abominable thing and bring away from thence the intolerable sentence of condemnation A man cannot rightly judge of his love to God by his acts and transports of fancy or the emanations of a warm passion but by real events and changes of the heart The reason is plain because every man hath first loved sin and obeyed it and untill that obedience be changed that first love remains and that is absolutely inconsistent with the love of God an act of love that is a loving ejaculation a short prayer affirming and professing love is a very unsure warrant for any man to conclude that his repentance is indeed contrition for wicked persons may in their good intervals have such sudden fires and all men that are taught to understand contrition to be a sorrow for sins proceeding from the love of God and that love of God to be sufficiently signified by single acts of loving prayer can easily by such forms and ready exercises fancy and conclude themselves in a very good condition at an easie rate But contrition is therefore necessary because attrition can be but the one half of repentance it can turn us away from sin but it cannot convert us unto God that must be done by love and that love especially in this case is manifestly nothing else but obedience and untill that obedience be evident and discernable we cannot pronounce any comfort concerning our state of love without which no man can see God and no man can taste him or feel him without it 3. A single act of obedience in the instance of any kind where the scene of repentance lies is not a sufficient preparation to the holy Sacrament nor demonstration of our contrition unless it be in the case of repentance only for single acts of sin In this case to oppose a good to an evil an act of proportionable abstinence to a single act of intemperance for which we are really sorrowful and as we suppose heartily troubled and confess it and pray for pardon may be admitted as a competent testimonial that this sorrow is real and this repentance is contrition because it does as much for vertue as in the instance it did for vice alwaies provided that whatsoever aggravations or accidental grandeurs were in the sin as scandal deliberation malice mischief hardness delight or obstinacy be also proportionably accounted for in the reckonings of the repentance But if the penitent return from a habit or state of sin he will find it a harder work to quit all his old affection to sin and to place it upon God intirely and therefore he must stay for more arguments than one or a few single acts of grace not only because a few may proceed from many causes accidentally and not from the love of God but also because his love and habitual desires of sin must be naturally extinguished by many contrary acts of virtue and till these do enter the old love does naturally abide It is true that sin is extinguished not only by the natural force of the contrary actions of vertue but by the Spirit of God by aids from heaven and powers supernatural and Gods love hastens ouâ— pardon and acceptation
who did not communicate should be driven from the Churches And Palladius tells that when St. Macarius had by his prayers cured a poor miserable woman that was bewitched and fancied her self to be a horse he advised her Never to depart from the Church of God or to abstain from the Communion of the Sacraments of Christ. For this misfortune hath prâ—vailed upon you because for these five weeks you have not communicated Now this was but a relative crime and because their custome was such which is alwaies to be understood according to their acknowledged measures viz. that only pious persons were to be meant and required in that expectation this will not conclude that of it self and abstracting from the scandal it was in all cases unlawful to recede from the mysteries at sometimes â—or sometimes a man may be called off by the necessities of his calling or the duties of charity or piety A General of an Army a Prince a Privy Counsellor a Judge a Merchant may be very fit to communicate even then when they cannot or it may be ought not to stay But if he can stay and be a good man and rightly disposed by the habits of a good life he ought to stay and communicate and so much the rather if it be in any degree scandalous to go away The reason is because if he be a good man he can no more be surprised by an unexpected Communion than by a sudden death which although it may find him in better circumstances yet can never find him Unprovided But in this case St. Austins moderate determination of the case is very useful Let every one do as he is perswaded in his mind for a man may with a laudable fear and reverence abstain if he shall be perswaded that he ought not to communicate unless besides his habitual grace he hath kindled the fires of an actual devotion and preparation special and so much the rather because he may communicate very frequently and to great purposes and degrees of a spiritual life though he omit that single opportunity in which he is surpris'd and though it be very useful for a good man to communicate often yet it is not necessary that he communicate alwaies only let every pious soul consider that it is argument of the Divine love to us that these fountains are alwaies open that the Angel frequently moves these waters and that Christ saies to every prepared heart as to the multitudes that followed him into the wilderness I will not send them away fasting lest they faint in the way And if â—hrist be ever ready offering his holy body and bloud it were very fit we should entertain him for he never comes but he brings a blessing Question III. But how often is it advisable that a good man should Communicate Once in a year or thrice or every month or every fortnigbt every sunday or every day This question hath troubled very many but to little purpose For it is all one as if it were asked How often should a healthful man eat or he that hath infirmities take Physick And if any man should say that a good man should do well to pray three times a day he said true and yet it were better to pray five times and better yet to pray seven times but if he does yet he must leave spaces for other duties But his best measures for publick and solemn prayer is the custom of the Church in which he lives and for private he can take no measures but his own needs and his own leisure and his own desires and the examples of the best and devoutest persons in the same circumstances And so it is in the frequenting the holy Communion The laws of the Church must be his least measure The custome of the Church may be his usual measure But if he be a devout person the spirit of devotion will be his certain measure and although that will consult with prudence and reasonable opportunities yet it consults with nothing else but communicates by its own heights and degrees of excellency St. Hierom advises Eustochium a noble Virgin and other religious persons to communicate twice every month some did every Sunday and this was so general a custome in the Ancient Church that the Sunday was called The day of bread as we find in St. Chrysostome and in consonancy to this the Church of England commands that the Priests resident in Collegiate or Cathedral Churches should do so and they whose work and daily imployment is to Minister to religion cannot in such circumstances pretend a reasonable excuse to the contrary But I desire these things may be observed 1. That when the Fathers make a question concerning a frequent Communion they do not dispute whether it be adviseable that good people should communicate every month or every fortnight or whether the more devout and less imploy'd may communicate every week for of this they make no question but whether every days Communion be fit to be advised that they question and I find that as they are not earnest in that so they indefinitely give answer that a frequent Communion is not to be neglected at any hand if persons be worthily prepared 2. The frequency of Communion is to be estimated by the measures of devout people in every Church respectively And although in the Apostolical Ages they who Communicated but once a fortnight were not esteemed to do it frequently yet now they who communicate every month and upon the great Festivals of the year besides and upon other solemn or contingent occasions and at marriages and at visitations of the sick may be said to communicate frequently in such Churches where the Laws enjoyn but three or four times every year as in the Church of England and the Lutheran Churches But this way of estimating the frequency of Communion is only when the causes of inquiry are for the avoiding of scandal or the preventing of scruples but else the inward hunger and thirst and the spirit of devotion married to opportunity can give the truest measures 3. They that communicate frequently if they do it worthily are charitable and spiritual persons and therefore cannot judge or undervalue others that do not For no man knows concerning others by what secret principles and imperfect propositions they are guided For although these measures we meet with in Antiquity are very reasonable yet few do know them and all of them do not rely upon them and their own customs or the private word of their own guides or their fears or the usages of the Church in which they live or some leading example or some secret impediment which ought not but is thought sufficient any of these or many other things may retard even good persons from such a frequency as may please others and that which one calls opportunity others do not but however no man ought to be prejudiced in the opinion of others For besides all this now reckoned The
they had zeal for the good of souls Let no man say I repent in private I repent before God in secret God who alone does pardon does know that I am contrite in heart For was it in vain was it said to no purpose whatsoever ye shall loose in earth shall be loosed in heaven we evacuate the Gospel of God we frustrate the words of Christ so S. Austin And therefore when a man hath spoken the sentence of the most severe medicine let him come to the Presidents of the Church who are to minister in the power of the Keyes to him and beginning now to be a good son keeping the order of his Mother let him receive the measure and manner of his repentances from the Presidents of the Sacraments Concerning this thing I shall never think it fit to dispute for there is nothing to inforce it but enough to perswade it but he that tries will find the benefit of it himself and will be best able to tell it to all the world SECT VII Penitential Soliloquies Ejaculations Exercises and preparatory Prayers to be us'd in all the days of preparation to the Holy Sacrament I. ALmighty and eternal God the fountain of all vertue the support of all holy hope the Author of pardon of life and of salvation thou art the comforter of all that call upon thee thou hast concluded all under sin that thou mightest have mercy upon all Look upon me O God and have pity on me lying in my blood and misery in my shame and in my sins in the fear and guilt of thy wrath in the shadow of death and in the gates of hell I confesse to thee O God what thou knowest already but I confesse it to manifest thy justice and to glorifie thy mercy who hast spared me so long â—hat I am guilty of the vilest and basest follies which usually dishonour the fools and the worst of the sons of men II. I have been proud and covetous envious and lustful angry and greedy indevout and irreligious restless in my passions sensual and secular but hating wise counsels and soon weary of the Offices of a holy Religion I cannot give an account of my time and I cannot reckon the sins of my tongue My crimes are intolerable and my imperfections shameful and my omissions innumerable and what shall I do O thou preserver of men I am so vile that I cannot express it so sinful that I am hateful to my self and much more abominable must I needs be in thy eyes I have sinn'd against thee without necessity sometimes without temptation only because I would sin and would not delight in the ways of peace I have been so ingrateful so foolish so unreasonable that I have put my own eyes out that I might with confidence and without fear sin against so good a God so gracious a Father so infinite a Power so glorious a Majesty so bountiful a Patron and so mighty a Redeemer that my sin is grown shameful and aggravated even to amazement I can say no more I am asham'd O God I am amaz'd I am confounded in thy presence III. But yet O God thou art the healer of our breaches and the lifter up of our head and I must not despair and I am sure thy goodness is infinite and thou dost not delight in the death of a sinner and my sins though very great are infinitely less than thy mercies which thou hast revealed to all penitent and returning sinners in Jesus Christ. I am not worthy to look up to heaven but be thou pleased to look down into the dust and lift up a sinner from the dunghil let me not perish in my folly or be consumed in thy heavy displeasure Give me time and space to repent and give me powers of Grace and aids of thy spirit that as by thy gift and mercy I intend to amend whatsoever is amiss so I may indeed have grace and power faithfully to fulfil the same Inspire me with the spirit of repentance and mortification that I may always fight against my sins till I be more than conquerour Support me with a holy hope confirm me with an excellent operative and unreprovable faith and enkindle a bright and a burning charity in my soul Give me patience in suffering severity in judging and condemning my sin and in punishing the sinner that judging my self I may not be condemned by thee that mourning for my sins may rejoyce in thy pardon that killing my sin I may live in righteousness that denying my own will I may always perform thine and by the methods of thy Spirit I may overcome all carnal and spiritual wickednesses and walk in thy light and delight in thy service and perfect my obedience and be wholly delivered from my sin and for ever preserved from thy wrath and at last passe on from a certain expectation to an actual fruition of the glories of thy Kingdom through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen Amen Amen 1. I am in thy sight O Lord a polluted person sin like a crust of leprosie hath overspread me I am a scandal to others a shame to my self a reproach to my relations a burden to the earth a spot in the Church and deserve to be rejected and scorn'd by thee 2. But this O God I cannot bear It is just in thee to destroy me but thou delightest not in that I am guilty of death but thou lovest rather that I should live 3. O let the cry of thy Sons blood who offers an eternal Sacrifice to thee speak on my behalf and speak better things than the blood of Abel 4. My conscience does accuse me the Devils rejoyce in my fall and aggravate my crimes already too great and thy holy Spirit is grieved by me But my Saviour Jesus died for me and thou pittiest me and thy holy Spirit still calls upon me and I am willing to come but I cannot come unlesse thou drawest me with the cords of love 5. O draw me unto thee by the Arguments of charity by the endearments of thy mercies by the order of thy providence by the hope of thy promises by the sense of thy comforts by the conviction of my understanding by the zeal and passion of holy affections by an unreprovable faith and an humble hope by a religious fear and an increasing love by the obedience of precepts and efficacy of holy example by thy power and thy wisdom by the love of thy Son and the grace of thy Spirit Draw me O God and I will run after thee and the sweetnesses of thy precious ointments 6. I am not worthy O Lord I am not worthy to come into thy presence much less to eat the flesh of the Sacrificed Lamb For my sins O Blessed Saviour Jesus went along in confederation with the High Priests in treachery with Judas in injustice with Pilate in malice with the people 7. My sins and the Jews crucified thee my hypocrisie was the kiss that betrai'd thee my covetous