spring and beginner of all motion towards it Lord what Rhetorick what Commanding eloquence is there in that which is but probable nay many times in that which is most improbable if it carry any shew of probability with it Nay if it do not our ardent affections supply all deficiencies in the object and hurry us along to do that which when the heat is over we could easily see could not be done How doth Love carry us as it were on the wing to lay hold on that which we must needs know is out of our reach It is but probable that Industry will make us rich How do we toyl and sweat It is but probable that Flattery will lift us up on high and making our selves little will make us great Lord how do we strive to mishape and disguise and contract our selves What dwarfs what minims will we appear How do we call contumelies favours and feed on injuries onely because we are told that Potentates will make them Lords that make themselves their slaves Probability is the hand that turneth every wheel the Intelligence which moveth every sphere and every man in it Hearken to the busie noise of all the world behold the hollow look the pale and careful countenance the speaking and negotiating eye and the active hand see men digging sweating travelling shouldring and treading one another under foot and if you would know what worketh all this behold it is nothing but that which hangeth in Futurition that which is but probable and uncertain And if Probability have such Power and force in other things why should it not in this especially the evidence being so fair and clear that it is impossible to find out or set up any better against it which might raise any doubting in us and make us disbelieve it To a true believer DOMINVS VENIET The Lord will come is enough Nor need he seek any further A further inquiry to be assured of the time is but inquieta inertia a troublesome sloth and busie negligence like Ixion's wheel to turn us about where we shall never fasten and rest but be circled about in a giddy and uneffective motion Thirdly the knowledge of the very hour can be of no use at all to forward and carry on that which we are now to do Non prodest scire sed metuere futura saith Tully To know that which is to come is of no use but to fear it If I know it and not fear it I do but look upon it as to come And that doth but leave us setled in our lees This leaveth the Covetous in the mine the Revenger in his wrath the Wanton in the strumpets arms If we confess he will come and are not startled what a poor squib would that be if we should be told he would come at such an hour what a long hour should we make it how should we extend and thrust it back to all eternity Prov. 6.10 Yet a little sleep a little slumber For Poverty is in arms and coming but not yet come Yet let me grind the poor saith the Oppressour Yet let me crown my self with roses saith the Luxurious Yet a little more dalliance saith the Wanton Yet let me boast in mischief saith the Man of power Whilest we consider things in the future fit ut illud futurum semper sit futurum imò fortassis nunquam futurum saith the Father that which is to come will be alwaies to come nay peradventure we shall think at last that it will never come All futures are contingents with us and at last are nothing Time flieth away and will stay its course neither for the delaier nor the uncautelous and therefore our Lord who knoweth what is sufficient and best for us would not let us know any more Quod à Christo dicitur totum est That which he hath taught us is all that we can learn If the knowledge of the precise hour of his coming would add but one cubit to our stature and growth in grace Christ would have left it behind written in the fairest character but it is hid from our eyes for our advantage that by the doubtful and pendulous expectation of the hour our Faith might be put to the trial whether it be a languishing and dead faith or fides armata Tert. de Anima c. 33. a faith in arms and upon its watch ut semper diem observemus dum semper ignoramus that whilst we know not when it will be it may present it self unto us every moment to affront and aw us in every motion and be as our task-master to over-see us and bind us to our duty that we may fulfill our work Phil. 2.12 and work out our salvation with fear and trembling that our whole life may be as the Vigils and Eve and the hour of Christs coming the first hour of an everlasting Holy-day Lastly there is no reason why it should be known neither in respect of the good nor of the evil For the good Satìs est illis credere It is enough for them that they believe 2 Cor. 5.7 They walk by faith saith the Apostle and in their way behold the promises and comminations of the Lord and in them as in a glass behold heaven and hell the horrour of the one and the glory of the other And this sight of the object which they have by the eye of faith is as powerful to work in them obedience as if Heaven it self should fly open and discover all to them To the true believer Christ to come and Christ now coming in the clouds are in effect but one object for Faith seeth plainly the one in the other the last hour in the first the world at an end in the prediction But to evil and wicked men to men who harden themselves in sin no evidence is clear enough and Light it self is Darkness What they naturally know Jude 10. and what they can preach unto themselves in that they corrupt themselves and give their Senses leave to lead them to all uncleanness whilst Reason which should command is put behind and never hearkned to These are as brute Beasts in spite of all they have of Man within them And if they believe Christ's coming and will not turn back and bow and obey their Reason they would remain the same beasts or worse though they knew the very hour of his coming After all those judgements Pharaoh was still the same After the Rivers turned into blood after Frogs and Lice after the Plague on man and beast after every plague which came thick as line upon line precept upon precept after all these the effect and conclusion was Pharaoh hardned his heart was Pharaoh still the same Tyrant Exod. 10.27 Num 22. 2 Pet. 2.15 till he was drowned in the Red sea Balaam though the Ass forbad his folly and the Angel forbad it though the sword was drawn against him and brandisht in his very face that he bowed on the
Pharaonis Dominum obdurasse c. As often as it is read in the Church that God did harden Pharaoh's heart some scruple presently ariseth not onely in the minds of the ignorant Laity but also of the learned Clergy And for these very words the Manichees most sacrilegiously condemned the Old Testament And Marcion rather then he would yield that Good and Evil proceeded fâ—om the same God did run upon a grosser impiety and made another two Principles one of Good another of Evil. But we may lay this saith he as a sure ground an infallible axiome Deus non deserit nisi priùs deserentem God never forsaketh any man till he first forsake God When we continue in sin when the multitude of our sins beget Despair Despair Obduration when we add sin to sin to make up the weight that sinketh us when we are the worse for Gods mercy the worse for his judgments when his mercy hardeneth us and his light blindeth us God then may be said to harden our hearts as a father by way of upbraiding may tell his prodigal and thriftless son Ego talem te feci It is my love and goodness hath occasioned this I have made thee so by sparing thee when I might have struck thee dead I have nourished this thy pertinacy although all the father's love and indulgency was grounded upon a just hope and expectation of some change and alteration in his son Look upon every circumstance in the story of Pharaoh and we cannot find one which was not as a hammer to malleate and soften his stony hearts nor do we read of any upon whom God did bestow so much pains His ten plagues were as ten commandments to let the people go And had he relented at the first saith Chrysostome he had never felt a second So that it will plainly appear that the induration and hardning of Pharaoh's heart was not the cause but the effect of his malice and rebellion Magnam mansuetudinem contemtae gratiae major sequi solet ira vindictae The contempt of Gods mercy and there is mercy even in his judgements doth alwaies make way for that induration which calleth down the wrath of God to revenge it We do not read that God decreed to harden Pharaoh's heart but when Pharaoh was unwilling to bow when he was deaf to Gods thunder and despised his judgments and scorned his miracles God determined to leave him to himself to set him up as an ensample of his wrath to work his Glory out of him to give him up to his own lusts which he foresaw would lead him to ruine and destruction But if we will tie our selves to the letter we may find these several expressions in several texts 1. Pharaoh hardned his heart 2. Pharaoh's heart was hardned 3. God hardned Pharaoh's heart and now let us judge whether it be safer to interpret God's induration by Pharaohs or Pharaoh's by God's If God did actually and immediately harden Pharaoh's heart then Pharaoh was a meer patient nor was it in his power to let the people go and so God sent Moses to bid him do that which he could not and which he could not because God had hardned him But if Pharaoh did actually harden his own heart as it is plain enough he did then God's induration can be no more then a just permission and suffering him to be hardned which in his wisdom and the course he ordinarily taketh he would not and therefore could not hinder Sufficit unus Huic operi One is enough for this work of induration and we need not take in God To keep to the letter in the former shaketh a main principle of truth That God is in no degree Authour of sin but to keep to the letter in the latter cleareth all doubts preventeth all objections and openeth a wide and effectual door to let us in to a clear sight of the meaning of the former For that Man doth harden his own heart is undeniably true but that God doth harden the heart is denied by most is spoken darkly and doubtfully by some nor is it possible that any Christian should speak it plainly or present it in its hideous and monstrous shape but must be forced to stick and dress it up with some far-fetcht and impertinent limitation or distinction For lastly I cannot see how God can positively be said to do that which is done already to his hand Induration is the proper and natural effect of Sin And to bring in God alone is to leave nothing for the Devil or Man to do but to make Satan of a Serpent a very Flie indeed and the Soul of man nothing else but a forge and shop to work those sins in which may burn and consume it everlastingly God and Nature speak the same thing many times though the phrase be different That which the Philosopher calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arâ—stot l. 7. Eth c. 1. ferity and brutishness of nature and in Scripture is called hardness of heart Every man is shaped formed configured saith Basil to the actions of his life whether they be good or evil One sin draweth on another and a second a third and at last we are carried 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of our own accord and as it were by the force of a natural inclination till we are brought to that extremity of sin which the Philosopher calleth Ferity a shaking off all that is Man about us and the holy Ghost Rom. 1.28 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a reprobate mind And such a mind had Pharaoh who was more and more enraged by every sin he had committed as the Wolf is most fierce and cruel when he hath drawn and tasted blood For it is impossible that any should accustome themselves to sin and not fall into hardness of heart and indisposition to all goodness Therefore we cannot conceive that God hath any hand in our death if we die and that Dereliction Incrassation Excaecation Hardness of heart are not from God further then that he hath placed things in that order that when we accustome our selves to sin and contemn his grace blindness and hardness of heart will necessarily follow but have no relation to any will of his but that of Permission And then this Expostulation is reall and serious QVARE MORIEMINI Why will ye die Now to conclude I have not been so particular as the point in hand may seem to require nor could I be in this measure of time but onely in general stood up in defense of the Goodness and Justice of God For shall not the Judge of all the earth do right Gen. 18.25 Shall he necessitate men to be evil and then bind them by a law to be good Shall he exhort and beseech them to live when they are dead already Shall his absolute Dominion be set up so high from thence to ruine his Justice This indeed some have made their Helena but it is an ugly and ill favoured
To be willing to permit sin and To be willing that sin should be committed are as different in sense as in sound unless we will say that he who permitteth me to be wounded when I would not look to my self and hold up my buckler did cast that dart at me which sticketh in my sides We have been told indeed Qui volens permittit peccata certè vult voluntate permissivâ ab aliis fieri That he that is willing to permit sin by that permissive will is willing also to have that sin committed But it is so unsavoury so thin and empty a speach that the least cast of the eye pierceth through it It is a rotten stick whitled by unskilful hands to make a pillar to uphold that fabrick of the phansie the absolute decree of Reprobation Take away this supporter That God will have that to be done which he permitteth that is That he will have that to be done which he forbiddeth and down falleth th◠Babel of Confusion to the ground And now what is God's Will This is his will even your sanctification 1 Thess 4.3 Luke 7.30 Acts 20.27 S. Luke calleth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the counsel of God and so doth S. Paul His counsel is his wish his desire his will his natural sincere and constant will And it savoureth of much vanity and weakness to talk and dispute of Gods decree which in respect of particulars must needs be to us most uncertain when we certainly know his will when he crieth To day if you will hear his voice when his precepts and his laws are promulged HODIE To day to enquire what he did before all eternity We may rest on the Goodness of God who would not have created us if he had not loved us I have made thee I have formed thee Isa 43.7 I have created thee saith God for my glory On the Mercy of God with which it could not consist to precondemn so many to misery before they were On the Justice of God which cannot punish without desert and that could not be in the Creature before he was Psal 89.47 On the Wisdome of God which doth nothing much less doth make Man for nought doth not stamp his image upon him to deface it nor useth to make and unmake to build and pull down to plant and dig up On the Grace of God which hath appeared unto all men Tit. 2.11 John 17.3 that they may know him to be the onely true God and him whom he hath sent Christ Jesus But now we are told that some places of Scripture there are which seem to give God a greater hand in sin then a bare and feeble and uneffective permission For God biddeth the Prophet Go tell the people Isa 6.9 10. Make the heart of this people fat and make their ears heavy and shut their eyes lest they see with their eyes and hear with their ears and be converted Now to make their heart fat and their ears heavy and to shut up their eyes is more then a bare permission it is in a manner to destine appoint them to death Most true if it can be proved out of this place that God did either But it is one thing to prophesy a thing shall be done another to do it Hector in Homer foretelleth Achilles death Orodes the fall of Mezentius in Virgil and our Saviour the destruction of Hierusalem but neither was Hector's prophesy the cause of Achilles death nor Orodes's of Mezentius nor our Saviour's of the destruction of Hierusalem Go and tell them maketh it a plain prediction what manner of men they would be to whom Christ was to speak stubborn and refractory and such as would harden their faces against the truth If you will not take this interpretation our Saviour is an Interpreter one of a thousand Job 33.23 Matth. 13.14 15. nay one for all the world He telleth his disciples that in the multitude was fulfilled the prophesy of Esay which saith By hearing you shall hear and not understand c. For this peoples heart is waxen fat and their eyes have they closed that they might not see And here if there eyes were shut it were fit one would think they should be opened True saith Chrysostom if they had been born blind or if this had been the immediate act of God but because they wilfully shut their eyes he doth not say simply They do not see but Seeing they do not see to shew what was the cause of their blindness even a perverse and froward heart Matth. 12.24 They saw the miracles they said he did them by Beelzebub He telleth them that he is come to shew them the will of God they are peremptory and resolute that he is not of God and being corrupt Judges against their own sight and understanding they were justly punisht with the loss of both For it is just that he should be blind that putteth out his own eyes Yet was not this incrassation or blinding through any malevolent influence from God but this action is therefore attributed to God because whatsoever light he had afforded them whatsoever means he had offered them whatsoever he did for them was through their own fault and stubbornness of no more use to them then colours to a blind man or as the Wise-man speaketh then a mess of pottage on a dead mans grave Eccl. 30.18 We might here sylvam ingentem commovere meet with many other places of Scripture like to this but we will touch but one more and it is that which is so common in mens mouthes and at the first hearing conveyeth to our understanding a shew and appearance of some positive act in God which is more then a bare permission Exod. ◠3 God telleth Moses in plain terms I will harden Pharaoh's heart And here I will not say with Gerson Aliud est littera aliud est literalis sensus That the letter is one thing and the litteral sense another but rather with Hilary De Trin. l. 8. Optimus est lector qui dictorum intelligentiam ex dictis potiùs exspectet quà m imponat retulerit magìs quà m attulerit He is the best reader of Scripture who doth rather wait and expect what sense the words will bear then on the sudden rashly fasten what sense he please and carry away the meaning not bring one nor cry This must be the sense of the Scripture which his presumption formerly had set down Sure I am none of the Fathers which I have seen make this induration and hardning of Pharaoh's heart a positive act of God Nor S. Augustine himself who was more likely to look this way then any of the rest although he interpreteth this place of Scripture in divers places Feria 4. post 3. Dominic in Quadrages Pharaoh non potentiâ sed patientiâ Dei indurabatur Idem Ser. 88. I will but mention one and it is in one of his Lent-Sermons Quoties auditur cor
the land desolate untill the consummation and that determined shall be poured out upon it For the judgments of God are like to those waters which came out of the Temple at first they are shallow and come but to the ankles Ezek. 47. anon they are deeper and come up unto the loins but at length they are so deep that they give no passage over And therefore let us beware of God's judgments betimes whilst they are yet foordable when they are come but to the ankles when they are but corrections but if we stay till they come to the loins let us haste and pass them through for if we tempt his patience longer and wade yet a little further we shall find no passage at all by which to fly and escape from the wrath to come but it will swallow us up everlastingly And here to make some Use of this we may cry out with the Prophet Jeremiah Be astonished O you Heavens at this Jer. 2.12 and be ye horribly afraid be ye very desolate For Men who have understanding are become more unreasonable then the beasts more senseless then the Heavens then stocks or stones then Idols who have eyes yet see not the judgments of the Lord eares and yet hear not his voice when he is angry hands and yet feel not the scorpions of a Deity Prov. 23.35 God hath stricken us yet we are not sick he hath beaten us and we felt it not Our wickedness hath not corrected us and our backslidings have not reproved us God hath been jealous of us and we still provoke him to jealousie and would be stronger then he we strive and try it out with him as if he had no arme to strike or we had skill and activity to avoid the blow Nay the sword is latched in our sides and we walk delicately with all his judgments about us feel it not though he hath sent a fire into our bones He hath clothed himself with vengeance and we strut in purple he is angry and we are wanton he frowneth and we smile he hath hewn down thousands of us with the sword and we walk about drest up like coffins with herbs and flowers carrying our own funerals about with us He hath threatned to remove our candlestick and we so little fear it that it is our study to prevent him and do it our selves to send us false Prophets and we are ready to receive them as angels of light to destroy our Sanctuary and it is our religion to beat it down What can God do to us to make us believe he is angry what worm can gnaw us what fire scorch us but that of Hell Should he appear visibly before us with all his artillery in his hand unless he struck us dead we should attempt to besiege and invade him For what can he almost do in this kind which he hath not done What hailstones and coals of fire hath he which he hath not rained down upon us He may seem even to have emptied his quiver and drawn at several times all his judgments out of the treasury of his wrath yet we are still the same As it was in the dayes of Noah we eat and drink and be merry and the same profane sacrilegious covetous malicious proud unmerciful men the same giant-like sinners till the general floud till judgment sweep us away Like Caligula that monster of men in Seneca we threaten and challenge Jupiter himself to battel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If thou trouble me I will trouble thee So mad saith Seneca that he thought Jupiter could not hurt him or if he did that he could revenge it and return it back again upon Jupiter We do not indeed speak it for what Atheist will profess he is so but in effect we do it even fight against Heaven and bid defiance to God himself thinking it humility enough to hearken after him and honour enough to mention his name though it be with the tongue of a Pharisee When were there more symptomes and indications of an angry God when were there more demonstrations of a gainsaying people When was there more misery when was there more vanity When was there more cause of humility when was there more pride It was no great wonder that this horrid monster Pride should find an entrance and room amongst those spiritual substances the Angels because in heaven there could no calamity approch near unto them or seize upon them to allay and abate that tumour SED QUID SUPERBIS PULVIS ET CINIS Why art thou proud dust and ashes which could not be said to Lucifer And therefore as we began so we must end Be astonished O Heavens at this be horribly afraid be ye desolate For Desolation it self cannot humble mortal Man whose breath is in his nostrils For when God's judgments are near us when they are about us when they are entred into out very bowels we put them far from us place them over our heads out of our sight Yet run over all the flying book of curses look back and contemplate all the fearful judgments of God with which he used to redeem his glory and avenge him upon a proud and stubborn people Famine Plague Sword the Burning of Sodome the Drowning of the old world and you shall not find so great a judgement as this Not to be sensible of God's judgments What is it then not to be bettered what is it to be hardned by them Let us pray then to God with the Prophet David Psal 51. Create in us new hearts and renew a right spirit within us or as it is Ezek. 11.19 Take away these hearts of stone and give us hearts of flesh or rather with Bonaventure that God would take from us these hearts of flesh such as they are and give us hearts of stone for were they stone they would be more sensible then ours and God by these his judgments as he did once by the hand and rod of Moses may strike our hearts more stony and obdurate then the rock and the waters of true contrition may flow out in such a stream which may first carry away our sins and then his judgments We will conclude with the speech of our Saviour to the women of Jerusalem when he was going to his cross with some little change Luke 23.28 Daughters of Jerusalem saith he weep not for me but weep for your selves and for your children If we will not seek God for his own sake who is the fountain of goodness and onely to be sought yet let us seek him for our selves and if not for our selves yet for our wives and children for our City for our Country for our Church For Sin is as the Dragon's tail in the Revelation which sweepeth down many stars along with it involveth millions of those who committed it Let God's mercy allure let his judgments terrifie us If we seek him he will be found though it be through his rayes or through the storm by his
as under heaven the Throne of God which shall stand fast for ever When we walk with men we walk as with them whom we can sometimes delude sometimes muzzle and bind But when we walk with God we walk with him who is every where and seeth every event whose eye is ever open whose hand is ever stretched out Psal 29.5 and whose voice breaketh the cedars of Libanus But now secondly as the Laws of men do not so aw and regulate us but that we break out too oft beyond those bounds which Reason and Religion hath set up no more doth the Law within us the Law of our Vnderstanding as Damascene calleth the Conscience command or confine us in our walk Sometimes we gloss it sometimes we slight it sometimes we silence it and some there be that seal it up and sear it as S. Paul speaketh as with a hot iron If it speak to us we are deaf 1 Tim. 4.2 if it renew its clamours we are more averse and if it check us we do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Paul beat and wound it more and more Multi famam 1 Cor. 8.12 pauci conscientiam verentur saith Pliny The loudest noise our Conscience can make is not heard but the Censure of men which is not most times worth our thought is a thunder-clap we hear it and we tremble We are led like fools with melody to the stocks What others say is our motion and turneth us about to any point but when we speak to our selves we hear it but believe it not fling it by and forget it The voice of Conscience is Defraud not your brother nay 1 Thes 4.6 but we will over-reach him The voice of Conscience is Love thy neighbour as thy self Lev. 19.18 nay but we will oppress him The voice of Conscience is Love Mercy nay Matth. 19.19 but we will love our selves What we speak to our selves our selves soon make heretical How ambitious are we to be accounted just and how unwilling to be so How loud are we against Sin in the presence of others and then make our selves as invisible as we can that we may commit it What a sin is Uncleanness in the Temple and what a blessing is it in the closet With what gravity and severity will a corrupt Judge threaten iniquity What a pilferer Let him be whipt What a murderer He shall dye the death He whippeth the Thief and hangeth the Murderer and indeed whippeth and hangeth himself by a proxie So that we see neither the power of the Laws nor the respect and obedience we ow to our selves are of any great force to prevail with us to order our steps aright Walk with men or as before men That may have some force but it reacheth no further then the outward man Walk with our selves give ear to our selves This might do much more but we see the practice of it is very rare and unusual that there is little hope that it will complete and perfect our walk and make us Just and Merciful men which is here required It will be easie then to infer that our safest conduct will be to walk with God And to secure both the Laws of men and that Law within us that they may have their full power and effect in us we must first raise and build up in our selves this firm perswasion That whatsoever we do or think is open to the eye of that God who is above us and yet with us That that discovery which he maketh is infinitely and incomparably more clear and certain then that which we make by our senses That we do not see our friend so plain as he seeth our hearts That thou seest not the birds fly in the ayr so distinctly as he seeth thy thoughts fly about the world to those several objects which we have set up for our delight That he seeth and observeth that irregularity and deformity in our actions which is hid from our eyes when our intention is serious and our search most accurate Though we are in the flesh and so led by Sense were this belief rooted and confirmed in us That God doth but see us as Man seeth us or were this as evident to our Faith as that is to our Sense we should be more watchful over our selves and more wary of the Devils snares and baits then we commâ—â—ly are Magna necessitas indicta pietatis c. saith Hilary There is a necessity laid upon us of fear and reverence and circumspection when we know and believe that he now standeth by as a Witness who will come again and be our Judge What a Paradise would the world be and what a heaven would there be upon earth if this were generally and stedfastly believed Glorious things are spoken of Faith We call it a full assent we call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hebr. 11.1 a full and certain perswasion It is the evidence of things not seen I ask Is ours so Would to God it were Nay would for many of us we did but believe that God is present with us and seeth what we do or think as firmly as we do a story out of our own Chronicles nay as many times we do believe a lye Matth. 17.20 Would our faith were but as a grain of mustard seed Even such a faith if it did not remove mountains yet would chide down many a swelling thought would silence many a proud word would restrain us from those actions which now we glory in but should run from as from Serpents as from the Devil himself if we could fully perswade our selves that a God of wisdome and power were so near Now in the last place let us cast a look upon those who for want of this perswasion do walk on in the haughtiness of their hearts bow neither to the Laws of God nor men nor hearken to the Law within them which notwithstanding could not be in them were not this bright Eye and powerful Hand over them And this may serve for Use and Application Phil. 3.18 Many walk saith S. Paul to the Philippians of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping that they are enemies to God And first the Presumptuous sinner walketh not with God who hath first hardned his heart Zech. 7.12 Isa 3.9 and then his face as an adamant whose very countenance doth witness against him who declareth his sins as Sodome and hideth them not These first contemn themselves and then scornfully reject what common Reason and Nature suggest to them and then at last trusting either to their wit or wealth conceive a proud disdain of all that are about them and not a negative but a positive contempt of God himself First they lose their Reason in their lusts and then their Modesty which is the onely good thing that can find a place in evil They do that upon the open stage which they did at first but behind the curtain They first make
It will concern us to take heed how he findeth us when be cometh Oh let him not find us digging of pits and spreading of nets to catch our brethren spinning the spiders web wearying and wasting our selves in vanity Let him not find us in strange apparel in spotted garments in garments stained with blood Let not this Lord find thee in rebellion against him this Saviour find thee a destroyer this Christ who should anoint thee find thee bespotted of the world Let not an humble Lord find thee swelling a meek Lord find thee raging a merciful Lord find the cruel an innocent Lord find thee boasting in mischief the Son of man find thee a beast But to day if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts This is your Day and this day you may work out Eternity Psal 95.7 8. This is your hour to look into your selves to be jealous of your selves Hebr. 3.7 8. vereri omnia opera to be afraid of every word work and thought every enterprise you take in hand For whatsoever you are saying whatsoever you are doing whatsoever you are imagining whilst you act whilst you speak before you speak whilst you think and that thought is a promise or prophecy of riches and delights and honours which are in the approch and ready to meet you or a seal and confirmation of those glories which are already with you whilst you think as the Prophet David speaketh that your houses shall continue for ever Psal 49.11 even then he may come upon you and then this inward thought all your thoughts perish or return again upon you like Furies to lash and torment you for ever And therefore to conclude since the Premisses are plain the Evidence fair Since he is a Lord and will come to judge us Since he will certainly come Since the time of his coming is uncertain and since it is sudden he is no Christian he is no Man but hath prostituted that which maketh him so his Reason to his Sense and Brutish part who cannot draw this Conclusion to himself That he must therefore watch Which is in the next place to be considered The Twelfth SERMON PART III. MATTH XXIV 42. Watch therefore c. WE have seen Christ our Lord at the right hand of God considered him 1. as our Lord 2. as coming 3. as keeping from our eye and knowledge the time of his coming And now what inference can we make He is a Lord and shall we not fear him To come and shall we not expect him To come at an hour we know not and shall we not watch This every one of them naturally and necessarily affordeth and no other conclusion can be drawn from them But when we consult with Flesh and Blood we force false conclusions even from the Truth it self and to please and flatter our sensual part conclude against Nature to destroy our selves Sensuality is the greatest Sophister that is worketh Darkness out of Light Poyson out of Physick Sin out of Truth See what paralogismes she maketh God is merciful Therefore presume He is patient Therefore provoke him He delayeth his coming We may now beat our fellow-servants and eat and drink with the drunken It is uncertain when he will come Therefore he will never come This is the reasoning of Flesh and Blood this is the Devils Logick And therefore that we be not deceived nor deceive our selves with these Fallacies behold here Wisdome it self hath shewn us a more excellent way and drawn the Conclusion to our hands VIGILATE ERGO He is a Lord and to come and at an hour ye know not of Watch therefore And this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vigilate is verbum vigilans as Augustine speaketh a waking busy stirring word and implieth as the Scholiast telleth us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all manner of care and circumspection And what are all the Exhortations in Scripture but a commentary and exposition of this Duty There we find it rendred by Awaking Working Running Striving Fasting Praying We shall find it to be Repentance Faith spiritual Wisdome that golden chain wherein all Virtues and Graces that Vniversitas donorum as Tertullian speaketh that Academy that World of spiritual Gifts meet and are united When we awake we watch to look about and see what danger is near When we work we watch till our work be brought to perfection that no trumpet scatter our Alms no hypocrisie corrupt our Fast no unrepented sin deny our Prayers no wandring thought defile our Chastity no false fire kindle our Zeal no lukewarmness dead our Devotion When we strive we watch that lust which is must predominant And Faith if it be not dead hath a restless eye an eye that never sleepeth which maketh us even here on earth like unto the Angels For so Anastasius defining an Angel calleth him a reasonable creature but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such a one as never sleepeth Corde vigila fide vigila spe vigila charitate vigila saith S. Augustine An active Faith a waking Heart a lively Hope a spreading Charity Assiduity and perseverance in the work of this Lord these make up the VIGILATE the Watching here These are the seals Faith Hope and Charity set them on and the Watch is sure But this is too general To give you yet a more particular account we must consider first That God hath made man a Judge and Lord of all his actions and given him that freedom and power which is libripens emancipati à Deo boni Tert. l. 2. cont Marcion doth hold as it were the ballance and weigh and poyse both good and evil and may touch or strike which scale it please that either Good shall out weigh Evil or Evil Good For Man is not evil by necessity or chance but by his will alone See Dent. 30.15.19 I have set before thee this day Life and Good Death and Evil Therefore chuse Life Secondly God hath placed an apparancy of some good on that which is evil by which Man may be wooed and enticed to it and an apparency of smart and evil on that which is good Difficulty Calamity Persecution by which he may be frighted from it But then thirdly he hath given him an Understanding by which he may discover the horrour of Evil though coloured over and drest with the best advantage to deceive and behold the beauty and glory of that which is good though it be discouloured and defaced with the blackness and darkness of this world He hath given him a Spirt Prov. 20.27 which the Wiseman calleth the Candle of the Lord searching the inward parts of the belly his Reason that should sway and govern all the parts of the body and faculties of the soul by which he may see to eschew evil and chuse that which is good adhere to the good though it distaste the sense and fly from evil though it flatter it By this we discover the enemy and by this we conquer him By this we
remedio laboramus By our own folly and the Devils craft our disease doth not hurt us so much as our remedy Repentance which was ordained as the best Physick to purge the soul is turned into that poyson that corrupteth and killeth it What wandring thought what idle word what profane action is there which is not laid upon this fair foundation Hope of pardon which yet will not bear up such hay and stubble We call Sin a disease and so it is a mortal one But Presumption is the greatest the very corruption of the blood and spirits of the best parts of the soul We are sick of Sin it is true but that we feel not But we are sick very sick of Mercy sick of the Gospel sick of Repentance sick of Christ himself and of this we make our boast And our bold relyance on this doth so infatuate us that we take little care to purge out the plague of our heart which we nourish and look upon as upon Health it self We are sick of the Gospel for we receive it and take it down and it doth not purge out but enrage those evil humours which discompose the soul John 13.27 We receive it as Judas did the sop we receive it and with it a devil For this bold and groundless Presumption of pardon maketh us like unto him hardeneth our heart first and then our face and carrieth us with the swelling sails of impudence and remorselessness to an extremity of daring to that height of impiety from which we cannot so easily descend but must fall and break and bruise our selves to pieces Praesumptio invericundiae portio saith Tertullian Presumption is a part and portion and the upholder of Immodesty It falleth and careth not whither it ruineth us and we know not how it abuseth and dishonoureth that Mercy which it maketh a wing to shadow it It hath been the best purveiour for Sin and the kingdome of Darkness We read but of one in the Gospel that despaired Matth. 27.5 Acts 1.25 and hanged himself and so went to his place but how many thousands have gone a contrary way with less anguish and reluctancy with fair but false hopes with strong but feigned assurances and met him there Oh it is one of the Devils subtilest stratagemes to make Sin and Hope of heaven to dwell under the same roof to teach him who is his vassal to walk delicately in his evil wayes to rejoyce alwaies in the Lord even then when he fights against him to assure himself of life in the chambers of death And thus every man is sure The Schismatick is sure and the Libertine is sure the Adulterer is sure and the Murderer is sure the Traitour is sure they are sure who have no savour no relish of salvation The Schismatick hath made his peace though he have no charity The Libertine looketh for his reward though he do not onely deny good works but contemn them The Adulterer absolveth himself without Penance The Murderer knoweth David is entred heaven and hopeth to follow him The prosperous Traitour is in heaven already His present success is a fair earnest of another inheritance That God that favoureth him here will crown him hereafter Every man can do what he list and be what he list do what good men tremble to think of and yet fear not at all but expect the salvation of the Lord first damne and then canonize himself For the greatest part of the Saints of this world have been of their own Creation made up in the midst of the land of darkness with noise with thunder and earthquakes We may be bold to say If Despair hath killed her thousands Presumption hath slain her ten thousands Foolish men that we are who hath bewitched us that we lay hold on Christ when we thrust him from us make him our own and appropriate him when we crucifie and persecute him every day that we had rather phansie and imagine then make our election sure that we will have health and yet care not how we feed or what poison we let down that we make salvation an arbitrary thing to be met with when we please and can as easily be Saints as we can eat and drink as we can kill and slay Good God! what mist and darkness is this which maketh men possessed with Sin that is an enemy ready to devour them to be thus quiet and secure Could we or would we but a little awake and consult with the light of our Faith and Reason we should soon let go our confidence and plainly see the danger we are in whilst we are in our evil wayes and find Fear tied fast unto them So saith S. Paul But if you sin Rom. 13.4 fear Christian Security and Hope of life is the proper and alone issue of a good Conscience through faith in Christ purged from dead and evil works If we will leave our Fear Hebr. 9.14 we must leave our Evil works behind us Assurance is too choice a piece to be beat out by the phansie and to be made up when we please at a higher price then to be purchased with a thought It is a work that will take up an age to finish it the engagement of our whole life to be wrought out with fear and trembling Phil. 2.12 not to be taken as a thing granted as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so set up as a pillar of hope when there is no better basis and foundation for it then a forced and fading thought which is next to air and will perish sooner The young man in the Gospel had yet no knowledge of any such Assurance-office and therefore he putteth up his question to our Saviour thus Good Master Matth. 19.16 Mark 10.17 what good thing shall I do that I may inherit eternal life He saw no hope of entring in at that narrow gate with such prodigious sins And our Saviour's answer is Keep the commandments that is Turn from thy evil wayes Be not Envious Malitious Covetous Cruel False Deceitful Despair is the daughter of Sin and Darkness but Confidence is the emanation of a good Conscience What Flesh and Blood maketh up is but a phantasme which appeareth and disappeareth is seen and vanisheth so soon gone that we scarce know whether we saw it or no. There can be no firm hope raised but upon that which is as mount Sion Psal 125.1 and standeth fast for ever which is our best guard in our way nay which is our way in this life and when we are dead will follow us Eras Adag Nothing can bear and afford it but this Vnum arbustum non alit duos erithacos Sin and Assurance are birds too quarrelsome to dwell in the same bush Therefore if you sin fear or rather turn from your evil wayes 1 John 3 21. and then you shall have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 boldness and confidence towards God We must therefore sink and fall low and mitigate our voice
conquereth Kingdoms It is the best Physician and doth more then Art can do without it Art can do nothing It is the best Politician and without it Wisdome can do nothing It is the best Souldier for without it Power can do nothing It is all in all in every thing But in our spiritual politie and warfare it hath not strength enough to turn us about it is not able to bow our knee or move our tongue much less to rend our heart Yea such is our extremity of folly such is the hardness of our hearts Ipsa opportunitas fit impietatis patrocinium One opportunity raises in us a hope of another and maketh us waste our time in the wayes of evil which should be spent in our Return extendeth our hopes from day to day from year to year from one hour to another even till our last minute till Time flieth from us and Opportunity with it till our last sand and when that is run out there is no more time for us and so no more opportunity The voice of Opportunity is Psal 95.7 8. Hebr. 3.7 8. To day Now if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts This is his voice Now It is true but there may be more Nows then this and it is but There may be to morrow may yield an opportunity Thus we corrupt her language In my youth it is true but I may recover it in my riper age My feeble age will have strength enough to turn me or I may turn in my bed when I am not able to turn my self Now there be more Nows then Now What need such haste My last prayer my last breath my last gasp may be a Turn Psal 49.13 Now this our way uttereth our foolishness For what greater folly can there be then when Grace and Mercy and Heaven is offered now to refuse it Plutarch Vitâ Pelopidae 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let Sin devour the opportuniy and to morrow we will turn is a speech that ill becometh a mortal's mouth whose breath is in his nostrils Psal 39.5 for it may be his last His age is but a span long but a hand-breadth as nothing in respect of God The Septuagint render it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tertullian Nullificamina others Nihilitudines or Nihilietates which is Nothings And in such a Nothing shall I let slip that opportunity which may make me Something even eternal Shall I make so many removes so many delayes within the compass of a span Whatsoever my span my nothing may be my opportunity is not extended beyond this span is no larger then this nothing And here is the danger Whether this Span be now at an end and measured out I cannot tell My Span may be but a fingers breadth my age but a minute that which I fill up with so many Nows so many opportunities Nothing And then if I turn not now I am turned into hell where I can never turn Care not then for the morrow Matth. 6.34 let the morrow care for it self There is no time to turn from thy evil wayes but now Secondly it is the greatest folly in the world thus to play with danger to seek death first in the errours of our life Wisd 1.12 and then when we have run out our course when death is ready to devour us to look faintly back upon light For the endeavours of a man that hath wearied himself in sin can be but weak and faint like the appetite of a dying man who can but think of meat and loath it The later we turn the less able we be to turn The further we stray the less willing shall we be to look back For Sin gathereth strength by delay devoteth us unto it self gaineth dominion over us holdeth us as it were in chains and will not soon suffer us to slip out of its power When the Will hath captivated it self under Sin a wish a sigh a thought is but a vain thing nor hath strength enough to deliver us One act begetteth another and that a third Many acts make up a habit and evil habits hold us back with some violence What mind what motion what inclination can a man that is drowned in sensuality have to God who is a Spirit a man that is buried in the earth so every covetous man is to God who sitteth in the highest heavens he that delighteth in the breath of fools to the honour of a Saint Here the further we go the more we are in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1. Rhet. c. 11. That which is done oft hath some affinity to that which is done alwayes saith Aristotle When an arm or other limb is broke it may have any motion but that which was natural to it And if we do not speedily proceed to the cure it will be the more difficult 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to set it in its right place again that it may perform its natural functions Now in Sin there is a deordination of the Will a luxation of that faculty Hence weakness seiseth upon the Will and if we neglect the first opportunity and do not rectifie it betimes and turn it back again and bend it to the rule it will be more and more infeebled every day move more irregularly and like a disordered clock point to any figure but that which should shew the hour and make known the time of the day We may read this truth in aged men saith S. Basil Orat ad Ditescentes When their body is even worn out with age and there is a general declination of strength and vigour the mind hath a malignant influence on the body as the dody in their blood and youth had upon the mind and being made wanton and bold with the custome of sin it heighteneth and enflameth their frozen and decayed parts to the pursuits of pleasures past though they can never overtake them nor see them but in effigie in that image or picture which they draw themselves They now call to mind the sins of their youth with delight and act them over again when they cannot act them as youthful as when they first committed them They have milk they think in their breasts and marrow in their bones They periwigg their Age with wanton behaviour Their age is threeseore and ten when their speech and will is but twenty They boast of what they cannot act and would be more sinful if they could and are so because they would It is a sad contemplation how we startled at sin in our youth and how we ventured by degrees and engaged our selves how fearful we were at first how indifferent afterwards how familiar within a while and then how we were setled and hardened in it at the last What a Devil Sin was and what a Saint it is become what a serpent it was and how now we play with it We usually say Custome is a second Nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist Ibid. and indeed it followeth and
flattereth the Flesh rebelleth we may set up this thought against them That this may be our last moment and if we yield now we shall be slaves for ever 2 Pet. 3.15 For as the long-suffering of God is salvation so is every day every hour of our life such a day and such an hour as carrieth along with it eternity either of pain or bliss That thou mayest therefore turn now think that a time may come when thou shalt not be able to turn Sen De Benef. 2.5 Tardè velle nolentis est Not to be willing to turn to thy God now is to deny him Delay is no better then defiance And why shouldest thou hope to be willing hereafter who art not willing now and art not willing now upon this false and deceitful hope that thou shalt be willing hereafter Wilful and present folly is no good presage of after-wisdome It is more probable that a froward Will will be more froward and perverse then that after it hath joyned with the vanities of this world and cleaved fast unto them it should bow and bend it self to that Law which maketh it death to touch them He that leapeth into the pit upon hope that he shall get out hath leapt into his grave at least deserveth to be covered over with darkness and buried there for ever Fear then least the measure of thy iniquity be almost full and perswade thy self thy next sin may fill it Think this is thy Day thy hour thy moment And though peradventure it may not be yet think it may be thy last It is no errour though it be an errour For if it be not thy last yet in justice God might make it so for why should heaven be offered more then once And if it be an errour it is an happy errour for it will redeem us from all those errours which Delay bringeth in and multiplieth even those errours which make us worse then the Beasts that perish A happy errour I may say an Angel that layeth hold on us and snatcheth us out of the fire out of the common ruine and hasteneth us to our God A happy errour which freeth us from all other errours of our life And yet though it may be an errour for it is no more then it may be it is a truth For onely one Now is true There may be many more Nows it is true a now to morrow and a now hereafter and a now on our death-bed but these are but May-bees and these potential truths concern us not for that which may be may not be That which concerneth us is an everlasting truth To day if you will hear his voice harden not your hearts If you harden them to day and stand upon May-bees then they may be hard for ever Therefore if you expect I should point out to a certain time the time is now Turn ye turn ye even now Now the Prophet speaketh now the words sound in your ears Now if you will hear his voice harden not your hearts For why was it spoken but that we should hear it It is an earnest call after us and if we obey not it is an argument against us that we deserve to hear it no more We are willing that what we speak should stand not a word not a syllable not one tittle must fall to the ground If we speak to our servant and say Go he must go and if we say Do this he must do it nunc now dicto citiùs as soon as it is spoke A deliberative pausing obedience obedience in the future tense to say he will do it when he pleaseth strippeth him of his livery and thrusteth him out of doors And shall Man who is dust and ashes seek a convenient time to turn from his evil wayes Shall our now be when we please Shall one morrow thrust on another and that a third Shall we demur and delay till we are ready to be thrust into our graves or which will follow into hell If the Lord saith Turn ye turn ye there can be no other time no other Now but Now. All other Nows and opportunities as our dayes are in his hands and he may close and shut them up if he please and not open them to give thee another Domini non servi negotium agitur The business is the Lord's and not the servant's and yet the business is ours too but the time is in his hands and not in ours Now then turn ye now the word soundeth and echoeth in your ears Again Now now hast thou any good thought Deus ad homines imò quod propius est in homines venit Sen. Ep. 73. any thought that hath any relish of salvation For that thought if it be not the voice is the whisper of the Lord but it speaketh as plain as his thunder If it be a good thought it is from him who is the Fountain of all good and he speaketh to thee by it as he did to the Prophets by visions and dreams In a dream Job 33.15 16. in a vision of the night I may say In a thought he openeth the ears of men and sealeth their instruction And why should he speak once and twice and we perceive it not Why should the Devil who seeketh to devour us prevail with us more then our God that would save us Why should an evil thought arise in our hearts and swell and grow and be powerful to roll the eye to lift up the head to stretch out the hand to make our feet like hinds feet in the wayes of death and a holy thought a good intention which is as it were the breath of the Lord be stopped and checked and slighted and at last chased away into the land of oblivion Why should a good thought arise and vanish and leave no impression behind it and an evil thought increase and multiply shake the powers of the soul command the Will and every faculty of the mind and every part of the body and at last bring forth a Cain an Esau a Herode a Pharisee a profane person an adulterer a murderer Why should we so soon devest our selves of the one and morari stay and dwell and fool it in the other sporting our selves as in a place of pleasure a Seraglio a paradise Let us but give the same friendly entertainment to the good as we do to the bad let us but as joyfully imbrace the one as we do the other let us be as speculative men in the wayes of God as we are in our own and then we shall make haste and not delay to turn unto him We talk much of the Grace of God and we do but talk of it It is in all mouthes in some but a sound in others scarse sense in most a loud but faint acknowledgment of its power when it hath no power at all to move us an acknowledgement of what God can do when we are resolved he shall work nothing in us We commend it Tit.
as it is void of reason of no use at all but to make us favour our selves and ingage and adventure further in those vvayes vvhich lead unto death I deny not but as there is great difference in sins so there may be a difference also in committing them that the righteous person doth not drink dovvn sin vvith that delight and greediness vvhich the vvicked do that they do not sport themselves in the vvayes of death nor fall into them vvith that easiness and precipitancy that they do not count it as a purchase to satisfie their lusts and that most times the event is different for the one falleth dovvn at the feet of God for mercy the other hardneth his heart and face and vvill not bovv But yet I cannot number it amongst the marks and characters of a righteous man or as some love to speak and may so speak if they well understood what they said of one of the elect when he falleth into any mortal grievous sin as Adultery Murder and the like that he doth not fall plenâ voluntate with full consent and will but more faintly and remissly as it were with more gravity then other men that he did actually fall but was not willing to fall that is that he did will indeed the sin which he did commit but yet did commit it against his will Nor can I think our consent is not full when we chide and rebuke the tentation and yet suffer it to win ground and gain more and more advantage against us when we have some grudgings some petty murmurs in our selves and in our hearts defame those sins which wâ— shew openly in our actions For when we have done that which is evil we cannot say we would not have done it when we have made room for Sin to enter we cannot say that we would have excluded it For first I cannot see how these two should meet so friendly a double Will nay a contrary Will in respect of one and the same act especially when Sin is not in fieri but in facto esse when the temptation hath prevailed and the Will determined its act Indeed whilst the act was suspended and our mind wavering and in doubt where to fasten which part to embrace whether to take the wedge of gold or to withdraw whether to smite my brother or to sheath up my Sword and Anger together whether to taste or not to taste the forbidden fruit when it was in labour as it were and did strive and struggle between these two the Delightfulness and Unlawfulness of the object between the Temptation and the Law Gal. 5.17 whilest the flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh there may be such an indifferency a kind of willing and nilling a profer and distast an approch and a pawse an inclination to the object and a fear to come near But when the Sense hath prevailed with the Will to determin for it against the Reason James 1.15 when Lust hath conceived and brought forth then there is no room for this indifferency because the Will hath determined its act and concluded for the Sense against the Reason for the Flesh against the Spirit For we must not mistake the fluctuations and pawses and contentions of the mind and look upon them as the acts of the Will which hath but one simple and indivisible act which it cannot divide between two contraries so as to look stedfastly on the one and yet reflect also with a look of liking upon the other Matth. 6.24 Our Saviour hath fitted us with an instance Ye cannot serve God and Mammon If we know then what the Will is we shall know also that it is impossible to divide it and shall be ashamed of that apologie to say we sin semi-plenâ voluntate with an imperfect with an half Will we know not how There may be indeed a kind of velleity and inclination to that which is good when the Will hath embraced that which is evil there may be a probo meliora a liking of the better when I have chosen the worser part But this is not a willing but an approbation and an allowing of that which is just which ariseth from the light of our Mind and the law of our Understanding from that natural Judgment by which we discern that which is evil from that which is good and it is an act of our Reason not of our Will And thus I may will a thing and yet dislike it I may embrace and condemn it I may commend Chastity and be a Wanton Hospitality and be a Nabal Clemency and be a Nero Christianity and be worse then a Jew I may subscribe to the Law that it is just and break it I may take the cup of Fornication and drink deep of it for some pleasant taste it hath when I know it will be my poyson And therefore in the second place this renitency and resistency of Conscience is so far from apologizing for us as for such as sin not with a full consent that most times it doth add weight to our sin and much aggravate it and plainly demonstrate a most violent and eager consent of the will which would not be restrained but passed as it were the rampier and bulwark which was raised against it to the forbiddâ—n object Neither the Law nor the voice and check of Conscience which is to us in the place of God could stop or restrain us but we play the wantons and dally with Sin as the wanton doth with his strumpet we do opponere ostium non claudere put the door gently to Senec. N. Q. l. 4. 2. but not shut and lock it out but it is welcome to us when it knocketh but more welcome when it breaketh in upon us We frown and admit it chide and embrace it bid it farewell vvhen vve are ready and long to joyn vvith it make a shew of running from it when we open our selves to receive and lodge it in our heart Again if the pravity and obliquity of an act is to be measured and judged by the vehement and earnest consent of the will then the sin which is committed with so much reluctancy will prove yet more sinful and of a higher nature then those we fell into when we heard no voice behind us to call us back For here the will of the sinner is stubborn and perverse and maketh hast to the forbidden object against all opposition whatsoever against the voice of the Lâ—â— which is now loud against him against the motions of the Spirit which he striveth to repell against the clamours of Conscience which he heareth and will not hear even against all the artillery of Heaven It doth not yield to the tentation when no voice is heard but the Tempter's nothing discovered but the beauty and allurement of the object nor upon strategeme or surprisals but it yieldeth against the thunder of the Law and dictate of Conscience it admitteth Sin not in its
a sigh or a feigned and formal confession so far we are content to humble our selves And this we may deplore with tears of bloud but cannot hope to remove though we should speak with the tongue of men and Angels since it hath taken such deep root in the hearts of men that they who cry down this Expecting of grace and Fighting against grace and who had rather see a fair shew of it in their lives then in their Panegyricks and would think it a more delightful sight to see them grow in grace then commend it and resist it are themselves cryed down and counted bringers in of new doctrine and enemies to the Grace of God because they would establish it And so the Drunkard may swill his bowls and chear up his heart in the dayes of his youth and expect that happy hour when Sobriety and Temperance shall possess him unawares The Oppressour may grind the face of the poor more and more since God's Grace is sufficient to melt his heart He may hope he may be honest one day who as yet resolveth to be a knave He that is turbulent in all his wayes who like a Haggard checketh at every feather and is troubled with every gust of wind nay with every breath may imagin that Grace will soon settle and compose his mind that Content and Peaceableness will one time or other suddenly fall upon him as a sweet and pleasant sleep He that hath a high look and a proud heart may be brought down and humbled in the twinckling of an eye And what is this but to cast away the Grace of God as S. Paul speaketh to turn it into wantonness as S. Jude to make it nothing else but a pretense and excuse to prolong our time in the tents of Kedar to encourage us to sport it on in our evil wayes like the wild asse or the wanton heifer Oh 't is a dangerous thing to attribute so much to Grace as to make it void and of no effect to cry up its power and be unwilling to feel it to say it can do that which we will not suffer it to do It is the constant voice of Scripture to commend God's Grace but withal to awake our industry to encourage us with the sight of so sure a guide and then bid us Vp and be doing God beseecheth us to be reconciled and commandeth us to reconcile our selves His will is that we should be saved and his will is that we should work out our salvation He persuadeth us to be patient and he persuadeth us to possess our souls with patience Where we are told that he worketh in us both to Will and to Do Phil. 2.13 it is given as a reason why we should 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 MAGIS OPERARI work more strenuously and intentively AUGESCERE IN OPERE as some increase and abound in our work Grace is a good wind to drive us on but must not be made a pillow to sleep on Humbled God would see us and he enjoyneth us to humble our selves S. Ambrose speaketh it plainly Non vult invitos cogere he will not save us against our wills And if we stand out and will not he cannot save us Non vult importunus irruere he breaketh not in by violence but when he entereth he calleth thee to open And this maketh our Humility voluntary that thy Will may lead thee and not Necessity draw thee A forced Humility is but Pride in a chain and a stubborn heart with a weight of led upon it Pharaoh's Humility Zech. 5. driven on with an East-wind and compassed with Locusts Ahab's Humility at the sound of the Prophet's thunder For here is the difference The righteous fall to the ground the wicked are tumbled down Their Humiliation is like Haman's going before Mordecai not like David's dancing before the Ark like the submission of a condemned man to the block which upon refusal he had been dragged to There is saith the devout Schoolman Humilitas poenalis and Humilitas medicinalis Humility which is not a virtue but a punishment and Humility which is not a punishment but a medicine Humility which is gall and wormwood and Humility which is an antidote When the vial is broken upon my head it poisoneth me but when I temper it my self and take it down it is a cordial The Gospel our Saviour calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a yoke and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a burthen a yoke which if we yield not our necks will break them and a burthen which if we bow not under will sink us but when Humility beareth it it is easie and when it weareth it light To be humbled then is not enough we must humble our selves and take some pains to do it Not enough to be on the ground unless our hand hath thrown us down Not enough to be in sackcloth unless we have put it on Not enough to be crucified unless we crucifie our selves Take them both together Be humbled and Take pains to humble your selves and you have crowned S. Peter's Exhortation We come now to our second Consideration and must shew you Wherein this Humbling of our selves consisteth The Oratour will tell us Virtutis laus in actione consistit Every virtue is commended by its proper act and operation and is then actually when it worketh And thus S. Paul exhorteth Timothy 1 Tim. 4.7 to exercise himself unto godliness which is learned by doing it and Plato 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to exercise the soul Every virtue is seen in its proper act Thus Temperance doth bind the appetite Liberality open the hand Modesty compose the countenance Valour guard the heart and Humility work its contrary out of the mind every thing that riseth up every swelling and tumour of the soul 2 Cor. 12.20 The Apostle calleth them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 puffings up for Riches or Learning or Eloquence or Virtue or something which we admire our selves for the elation and lifting up of our mind above it self 2 Cor. 10.14 the stretching of it beyond its measure setting it up against the Law against our brethren against God himself making us complain of the Law start at the shadow of an injury commit sin and excuse it making our tongues our own our hands our own our understandings our own our wills our own leaving us Independents under no Law but our own Psal 131.1 Prov. 16.18 The Prophet David calleth it the highness or haughtiness of the heart and Solomon the haughtiness of the spirit which is visible in our sin and visible in our apologies for sin lifting up the eyes Psal 10.4 and lifting up the nose as the phrase signifieth lifting up the head making our neck brass as if we had devoured a spit as Epictetus said I AM AND I ALONE is soon written in any man's heart and no hand but that of Humility can wipe it out For the mind of man is much subject to these fits of swelling Humility our
agents Nor can he who maketh not use of his Reason on earth be a Saint in heaven We are rewarded because we chose that which right Reason told us was best And we are punished because we would not discover that evil which we had light enough to see but did yield to our lusts and affections and called it Reason The whole power of Man is in Reason and the vigour and power of Reason is in Judgment Man is so built saith S. Augustine ut per id quod in eo praecellit attingat illud quod cuncta praecellit that by that which most excelleth in him Reason he may attain to that which is the best of all eternal happiness Ratio omnis honesti comes est saith Seneca Reason alwaies goeth along with Virtue But when we do evil we leave Reason behind us nor is it in any of our waies Who hath known the mind of the Lord at any time Rom. 11.34 or who hath been his counseller It is true here Reason is blind Though it be decked with excellency and array it self with glory and beauty Job 40.9 10. it hath not an eye like God nor can it make a law as he or foresee his mind But when God is pleased to open his treasury and display his Truth before us then Reason can behold apprehend and discern it and by discourse which is the inquisition of Reason judge of it how it is to be understood and embraced For God teacheth not the beasts of the field or stocks or stones but Men made after his own image Man indeed hath many other things common to him with other creatures but Reason is his peculiar Therefore God is pleased to hold a controversie with his people to argue and dispute it out with them and to appeal to their Reason 1 Cor. 11.13 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Judge within your selves To judge what is said is a privilege granted to all the children of men to all who will venture for the Truth It is time for us now to proceed to the other hindrance of Truth Therefore II. We must cast away all Malice to the Truth all distasting of it all averseness from it Certainly this is a stone of offense a bulwork a mountain in our way which if we remove not we shall never enter our Canaan that floweth with milk and hony we shall never take possession of and dwell in the tabernacles of Truth Now Malice is either direct and downright or indirect and interpretative onely And both must be laid aside The former is an affected lothing of the Truth when the Will affecteth the ignorance of that which is right and will erre because it will erre when it shunneth yea hateth the Understanding when it presenteth it with such Truths as might regulate it and divert it from errour and this to the end that it may beat back all remorse silence the checks and chidings of Conscience and slumber those storms which she is wont to raise and then take its fill of sin lie down in it as in a bed of roses and solace it self and rejoyce and triumph therein Then we are embittered with hony hardened with mercy enraged by entreaties then we are angry at God's precepts despise his thunder-bolts slight his promises scoff at his miracles Then that which is wont to mollifie hardeneth us the more till at length our heart be like the heart of the Leviathan as firm as a stone Job 41.24 yea as hard as a piece of the nether mill stone Then satis nobis ad peccandum causa peccare it is a sufficient cause to do evil that we will do it And what impression can Truth make in such hearts What good can be wrought upon them to whom the Scripture attributeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 1.28 a reprobate mind who have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a reverberating mind an heart of marble to beat back all the strength and power of Truth unto whom God hath sent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Thes 2.11 Rom. 1.18 strong delusion that they should believe a lie who hold the Truth in unrighteousness and suppress and captivate it that it cannot work its work who oppose their Wrath to that Truth which perswadeth patience and their Lust against that which would keep them chast who set up Baal against God and the world against Christ Eph. 4.19 These are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 past feeling and have given themselves over to lasciviousness to work all uncleanness with greediness They are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Eph. 4.18 they have their understanding darkned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For wickedness by degrees doth destroy even the principles of goodness in us Hos 4.11 blindeth our eyes and taketh away our heart as the Prophet speaketh and maketh us as if we had no heart at all Either 1. by working out of the understanding the right apprehension of things For when the Will chuseth that which is opposite to the Truth non permittit Intellectum diu stare in dictamine recto it swayeth the Understanding taketh it off from its right dictates maketh it deny its own receptions so that it doth not consider that which it doth consider it averteth and turneth it to apply it self to something that is impertinent and maketh it find out reasons probable or apparent against that Truth which had its former assent that so that actual displacency which we found in the entertainment of the contrary may be cast out with the Truth it self We are willing to leave off to believe the Truth that we may leave off to condemn our selves When this light is dim the Conscience slumbreth but when it spreadeth it self then the sting is felt In our ruff and jollity we forget we have sinned but when the hand of vengeance removeth the veil and we see the Truth which we had hid from our eyes then we call our sins to remembrance and they are set in order before us Where there is knowledge of the Truth there will be conscience of sin but there will be none if we put that from us Or else 2. positively when the Will joyneth with Errour and embraceth that which is evil and then setteth the Understanding on work to find out the most probable means and the fairest and smoothest wayes to that which it hath set up for its end For the Understanding is both the best and the worst counseller When it commandeth the Will it speaketh the words of wisdome giveth counsel as an oracle of God and leadeth on in a certain way unto the Truth But when a perverse Will hath got the upper hand and brought it into a subserviency unto it then like the hand of a disordered dial it pointeth to any figure but that it should Then it attendeth upon our Revenge to undermine our enemy it teacheth our Lust to wait for the twilight it lackeyeth after our Ambition and helpeth us into the uppermost seat it is as active
afraid of any neglect any as if it concerned us not Why should we take any Truth down by halves To instance in the sum of Religion Matth. 5.48 Our Saviour commandeth Be ye perfect even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect but how easily do we perswade our selves that we have nothing to do with this precept how perfunctorily do we look upon it what tricks and devices do we seek to shift it off withall It may be but a Counsel we think Or if it be a Precept it is in Perfection as in Baptism Votum sufficit A wish a desire is enough God will favour our weak endeavours nay approve our negligence Hence we make no progress in the waies of piety dwell and delight in errour and neglect that Truth which might save us Quis haec instituit Tropica Christ I am sure never set up these Tropicks Do we preach to you Christian Liberty Ye kiss our lips and are ready to cast it over you as a cloak of maliciousness 1 Pet. 2.16 But do we then go about to take it from you when ye make so bad use of it and to put your wedding garment about you even Charity which should bound and confine your Liberty Then we are looked upon with an eye of contempt as bringers-in of new doctrine Do we build up to the Saints of God assurance of salvation Ye are in heaven already For when this news is brought every man almost is a Saint But do we tell you that this Assurance is no arbitrary thing to be taken up at pleasure but the offspring and fruit of something else do we beseech you not to deceive your selves do we tell you what ye call Assurance may be a groundless phansie carnal security or stupefaction Behold then your countenance is changed and we are not the same men nor our feet so beautiful as before And the reason hereof is Because we love no more Truth then is for our turn Perfection we will learn but not learn to be perfect Freedome we like but not to be restrained Assurance we will build upon but not build up an assurance Thus far we will go but proceed no further take the Truth as the Devil urged Scripture by halves take that part of it which complieth with and flattereth our distempers and neglect and never seek into the rest veritatem summâ terrâ quaerere seek for the Truth in its top and surface but never dig deep for it for fear of raising up against our selves noysome damps and poisonous fogs from this rich mine of Truth And thus we may be enemies to the Truth when we think we love it and though we do not bid open defiance to it yet be at as sad a distance from it as they that do For to defie the Truth and not to care for it differ not so much but that they both end in the same fatal ignorance and both leave us in the dark To conclude Let us offer violence to our selves and redeem our selves from these Let us moderate and regulate our Affections and take from them all the strength they have to hinder us in our purchase Let us remove all Prejudice that we may be fit to judge aright of all things And let us not harden our hearts when Truth is ready to make its impression in them nor yet have little heart to it which is in effect to harden our hearts For Truth will neither dwell with him who shutteth it out nor yet with him who maketh no preparation to receive it neither apply it self to our Pride nor to our Sloth neither enter a man of Belial nor a lukewarm Laodicean Till the mind be clear of these no light can enter till the heart be disburdened of these it is an hard and an heavy heart not fit to be lifted up unto the Truth Thus much of the Impediments to be removed It behoveth us in the next place to consider what Helps the God of Truth affordeth us for the obtaining of the Truth and to make use of them There be indeed many but I shall name but three 1. Meditation or a fixing of our thoughts upon the Truth a continual survey of the beauty of it a recollecting our selves a renewing the heat and fervour that is in us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Philosopher Meditation is a kind of augmentation or growth This will make the Truth more visible and clear and more appliable then before The Word written is but a dead letter the Word spoken is but a sound but Meditation maketh it of energy and force to quicken and enliven us It is like those Prospectives which this later age hath found out whereby we discover Stars which were never seen before and in the brightest stars find spots otherwise not to be discerned By Meditation we see Christ at the right hand of God and the glory and riches of the Gospel By it we behold the World lothsome which before we doted on God's Statutes most delightful which before we abhorred Afflictions profitable which before we trembled at By it we find out the plague of our hearts and the leprosie of our souls which before appeared to us as spots as nothing This help we have by Meditation 2. Prayer Oratio viam ostendit nos deducit saith Bernard Prayer sheweth us the way and leadeth us along in it It draweth down grace to supply the defect of nature it calleth for strength and wisdome to resist and overcome temptations it procureth the assistance of the Spirit to relieve and uphold the infirmity of the mind it carrieth us on chearfully to this Mart so that neither hopes nor fears can turn us out of the way Certainly Prayer for the Truth can never return empty seeing it asketh that which God is most ready to give which he putteth to sale continually Cic Orat. de arusp resp The heathen Oratour could discover so much Faciles sunt preces apud Deos qui ultra nobis viam salutis ostendunt When God calleth us to him and we desire to come near him we pray for that which he would have Prayers may be heard and rewarded and yet not granted Non tribuit Deus quod volumus ut tribuat quod malumus saith Hierome God doth not give us what we will that he may give us that which is better Our prayers for temporal blessings may seem to be but spiritual flatteries wherein we speak God fair for our own ends Like Quadrigarius his darts Gell. l. 9. c. 1. our prayers if shot upwards fly more sure to the marke but if downwards at our own ends seldome hit Exauditur Diabolus Matth. 8.31 32. 2 Cor. 12.8 9. non exauditur Apostolus The Devils had their request granted yet we read that the Apostle was denied But he that prayeth for the Truth prayeth in the name of Christ he that desireth that which appertaineth to salvation Joh. 16.23 orat in nomine Salvatoris prayeth in the name
and time Care not for the morrow let the morrow care for it self There is no time to seek him but Now. For 1. It is the greatest folly in the world thus to play with danger to seek death first in the errours of our life and then when we have run our course and death is ready to devour us to look faintly back upon life For the endeavours of a man that hath wearied himself in sin can be but weak and faint like the appetite of a dying man who can but think of meat and loath it The later we seek the less able we shall be to seek the further we stray the less willing to return For Sin gathereth strength by delay devoteth us unto it self gaineth a dominion over us holdeth us as it were in chains and will not soon suffer us to slip out of its power When our Will hath captivated it self under sin a wish a sigh a thought are but vain things nor have they strength enough to deliver us One act begetteth another and that a third many make up a habit and evil habits hold us back with some violence from God What mind what motion what inclination can a man that is drowned in sensuality have to God who is a spirit a man buried in earth for so every covetous man is to God who is in Heaven he that delighteth in the breath of fools to the honour of a Saint Here the further we go â—he more we are in That which is once done hath some affinity to that which is done often and that which is done often is next to that which is done alwayes We say Custome is a second nature and indeed it imitateth natural motion It is weak in the beginning stronger in the progress but strongest towards the end Our first engagement our first onset in sin is with fear and reluctation we then venture further and proceed with less regret we move forward with delight delight continueth the motion and maketh it customary and costome at last driveth and bindeth us to sin as to our centre For though God in Scripture be said to Harden our hearts and some be very forward to urge those Texts as if Induration were not our fault but God's and would be comfort even in hell if we could say his hand threw us in yet Induration and hardening of the heart is the natural and proper effect of continuance in sin For every man is shaped and configured to the actions of his life whether they be good or evil An evil tree cannot bring forth good fruit nor can a good tree bring forth evil Virtue constraineth us and Vice constraineth us One sin draweth on another and a second a third and at last we are carried 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of our own accord and as it were by natural inclination and brought to that extremity of sin which the Philosopher calleth ferity or brutishness and the Apostle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a reprobate mind to delight in sin to triumph in sin to consecrate sin and call it virtue and religion to that difficulty of seeking God which the Lawyers call Impossibility in things which may but yet seldome come to pass For though God may be found even of these yet we have just cause to fear that few thus disposed ever seek him 2. It is dangerous in respect of God himself whose call we regard not whose counsels we reject whose patience we dally with whose judgements we slight to whom we wantonly turn our backs and run from him when he calleth after us to seek his face and so tread that mercy under our feet which should save us and will not seek him yet because we presume that though we grieve his Spirit though we resist his Spirit though we blaspheme his Spirit yet after all these scorns and contempts after all these injuries and contumelies he will yet sue unto us and offer himself and be found at any time in which we shall think convenient to seek him It is true God hath declared himself by his servant Moses and as it were become his own Herald to proclaim his own titles The Lord the Lord God Exod. 34.6 7. merciful and gracious long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth keeping mercy for thousands forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin Manasseth was the most notorious offender of all the Kings of Judah and wrought much wickedness saith the Text even above all the Amorites and this he did not for a little space but even till he was grown old and yet we see that patience attended his return and accepted his person when he prayed and humbled himself So loth is God to withdraw himself whilest there is any hope that we will seek him For he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 most lovingly affected to man the chief and prince of his creatures he wooeth him he longeth after him he waiteth on him he wisheth he were so wise as to seek him His glory and Man's salvation meet and kiss each other for it is his glory to crown him Nor doth he at any time leave us himself till we dote on the world and sensuality and divorce him from us till we have made our Heaven below chosen other Gods and think him not worth the looking after In a word he is alwayes a God at hand never goeth from us till we force him by violence When he went to lead his own people through the wilderness how many murmurings and rebellions did he endure ere he left them Till they committed that intolerable sin in Horeb in which it seemeth they were resolved to try the strength of his patience he did himself in person conduct them in the way Exod. 32. And after he telleth them he would not himself go before them left he should destroy them but he sendeth his Angel his vicegerent to supply his room so that even when he left them he left also room for mercy and he forsook them that he might not forsake them forsook them in some degree that he might not be constrained to forsake them for ever Since therefore God is so loth to hide himself from us or cast us off till we have cast off all care and thought of seeking him I would be very loth to wrong that property of his in which he seemeth so much to rejoyce or set bounds to his mercies which are infinite Yet as Tertullian speaketh non potest non irasci contumeliis misericordiae suae we cannot imagine but God must needs wax angry at the contumelies and reproches which by our dalliance and delay we fling upon his mercy vvhich is so ready to cover our sins For how can he suffer the Queen of his attributes to be thus prostituted to our lusts What hope of that souldier that kicketh away his buckler or of that condemned man that flingeth his pardon into the fire or of that sick man who loveth his disease and counteth his physick poison The Prophet here when he calleth upon
black lines of reprobation drawn out by the hand of Justice Oh that thou hadst known now whilest I speak whilest the word is in my mouth yet it is time hitherto is thy day NUNC AUTEM But now the word is spoken that time is past and cannot be recalled Hitherto was DIES TUA thy day but now the night is come Hitherto the light did shine and thou mightest have seen it but now omnium dierum soles occiderunt thy Sun is for ever set and darkness is come upon thee and that which might procure thy peace is hid from thy eyes for ever Beloved compare Jerusalem's state with the age of a man and you shall find as in that so in this there is a HAEC DIES TUA a This thy day in which thou mayest seek God and work thy peace and a NUNC AUTEM a Now when they shall be hidden from thine eyes Every man hath his day his allotted time in which he may seek and find God Hic meus est dixere dies And this day may be a feast-day or a day of trouble it may beget an eternal day or it may end in the shadow of death and everlasting darkness Oh that we men were wise but so wise as the creatures which have no reason so wise as to know our seasons to discover saltem hanc diem nostram this our day wherein we may yet see the things of our peace Oh that we could but behold that decretory moment in which mercy shall forsake us and justice cut off our hopes for ever But though there be such a day such a moment yet this day this moment like the day of Judgment is not known to any and God hath on purpose hid it from our eyes that we might have a godly jealousie of every moment of our life to come lest peradventure it may be the NUNC the Now wherein those things which concern our peace may be hidden from our eyes 2 Pet. 3.15 For as the long-sufferance of the Lord is our salvation so is every day every hour of our life On this hour on this moment Eternity may depend And who would perfunctorily let pass such an hour such a day which carrieth along with it eternity either of pain or bliss Flatter not thy self that thy day may be a long day or that thy last day may be that day Think not in thy heart that the NUNC AUTEM the decretory Now is yet afar off that whensoever thou seekest the Lord he will be found that when every action of thy life hath its proper season thy seeking of God hath none but what thou thy self appointest that thy failing in an hour may forfeit thy estate on earth but thy prodigally mis-spending of many years can no whit endanger thy title to Heaven Repentance indeed hath a blessing whensoever it cometh Pharaoh Judas Julian the Apostate could they have repented might have been saved But God who hath promised to Repentance a blessing at all times hath not promised repentance or power to repent when we list He that hath promised to be found at any time that we seek him hath not promised that we shall seek him when we please If thou pass thy NUNC thy Now thy allotted time he may give thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a heart that cannot repent nor seek him And it is justice with God to punish continuance in sin with final impenitency and to leave that heart which will not be softned unto it self till it be harder then the neither milstone Ephraim is joyned to idols Hos 4.17 let him alone And if the heart be alone it will soon turn stone and harden of it self The examples of Manasseh of him that was called at the eleventh hour of the thief on the cross are solatia poenitentium non subsidia rebellium saith Augustine These are left as comforts to the truly penitent not to chear and strenthen the heart of a rebellious sinner These becken to us and call upon us If you will enquire enquire return come Isa 21.12 but put no dispensation into our hands to seek when we please It will be good then for us if we will not believe this doctrine to be at least jealous of it as if it were most true to make every Now the last now to cast away our sins for fear that they may cleave as fast unto us as the leprosie did on Gehazi and his seed even for ever Pietas etiam tuta pertimescit It is the part of a pious mind sometimes to fear where no fear is and in the most plain and even ground to suspect a stone of offense Nor can we possibly be too scrupulous of our own salvation That thou mayst therefore meet with the Lord IN INVENIRI SUO whilest he may be found think that a time may come when thou mayst not be able to seek him Such a thought if it improve it self into a resolution will enlarge thy feet to seek and run after him Fear lest the measure of thy iniquity be almost full and perswade thy self thy next sin may fill it such a fear will make thee as bold as a lion in the wayes of God Such a perswasion that thou mayst fail and fall is far more safe then a groundless phantastical faith that thou shalt stand fast for ever Think that there is a Rubicon a river Kidron set thee which if thou pass thou shalt dye the death Think this is thy day and time of seeking and though it be not yet think it the last If it be an errour it is a happy errour that hasteneth thee to thy God If it be not the last if thy day have yet more hours more Nows in it yet the night will come when thou canst not seek him a night on thy understanding that thou shalt not have light to seek him a night of spiritual dulness when thou shalt have no mind to seek him and thy last night Death it self when thou canst seek no more And therefore let us seek him in this our day whilest he calleth upon us before our measure be full for then he will speak no more before we are past our bounds for there Death waiteth upon us ready to arrest us before our glass is run our day spent for then time shall be no more Let us seek him IN INVENIRI SUO whilest he may be found And here if you expect I should point out to a certain time the time is Now. Now the Prophet speaketh now the word soundeth in your ears To day now if you will hear his voice harden not your hearts For why is it spoken but that we should hear it Seek him now is an exhortation and if we obey not it is an argument against us that we deserve to hear it no more We are willing that what we speak should stand not a word we utter must fall to the ground If we speak to a friend and he turn away the ear it is a quarrel If
matter that is combustible into it self a man begetteth a man a sheep a sheep and a lion a lion So the natural and proper effect of God's Mercy to us should be Mercy in us and of it self it can produce nothing else The goodness of God cannot make us evil nor his Mercy harden our hearts nor can any poison be drawn from the Fountain of life When we walk in the midst of God's mercies compassed about with rayes and yet breathe nothing but fire and ruine to our brethren when we are compassed about on every side with mercy and yet carry with us no smell or savour of that mercy when God sheweth himself a Father and we are no more like him then a Tiger is to a Man the defect is not in the Agent or Example but in the Matter it worketh upon not in God's Mercy but our Will which is various and mutable and like the Chamaeleon taketh any colour which the next object presenteth and is sooner drawn to fashion and apply it self to the world then to God and so resisteth the force of his example and by that means many times draweth gall and wormwood out of the very bowels of Mercy For when vve say that God's Forgiveness of our sins hath povver to vvork in us the like compassion to others vve do not give it that causality vvhich doth necessarily and irresistibly produce such an effect For though it be povverful in it self yet it doth not so vvork as the Sacraments by some are said to do ex opere operato His infinite Mercies may leave our hearts as stone The promise of Remission of sins doth not as naturally beget love in us as Fire doth heat but it is powerful tanquam ordinatum ad hoc as the Schools speak as ordained to this end It hath the power of an object or exemplary cause I confess objects have a moving and attractive force but no invincible operation The heavens are a fair sight but they do not make a blind man see I may read of Julius Caesar and not be valiant of Solomon and not be vvise of Aristides and not be just But yet they have the power of an object vvhich is to present themselves to our very eye to dart light even in our faces to pierce the very inwards of our hearts to besiege and beleaguer us to beseech and persuade us and prevaile they will if vve stand not out vvilfully and fight against them What power vvhat commanding eloquence is there in them Hovv are vve able to stand out against those everlasting burnings Why should not God's mercy be more prevalent then any injury Why should not his example have more force then a temptation Why should not Reason be a better oratour then Sense Why should not Christ's Mercy bring forth my Love and his Death my Mortification For as S. Peter telleth us that the long-suffering of God is repentance because indeed it should produce no other effect so might I as properly say God's readiness to forgive is our mercy and charity to our brother because it is profered for this end Nor is it of less power and energy because through our default it vvorketh no such effect If the earth be as brass shall vve say the devv of heaven hath no virtue If we put out our eyes shall we say the Sun doth not shine Because we make God's Mercy but as a shadow to cover us shall we also count it no more then a Type which signifieth much but worketh nothing at all That it may therefore have its proper effect in us we must consider what it is that hindereth its operation and what is required of us that it may work kindly in us and so bring forth that effect which is natural what is the reason why it doth not alwayes prevail and what we must perform on our parts that it may And we may plainly see that we our selves harden our faces and our hearts against it that we are busie in the works of darkness when God's Mercy shineth round about us that we have decked our selves for harlots and wooe and draw them to us whilest God's Mercy standeth at the door and knocketh and can find no admittance that we have firted our minds for those guests alone which will defile them how one piece of silver can force our hand to our brother's throat when all the commands of God cannot take us off how the glory the vanishing glory of the world is the lamp we walk by and not the everlasting word of God how our hearts are stone and can Mercy make an impression and set the image of God upon a stone Besides one great hindrance and impediment is begot within us and derived from our selves For at the very name of Mercy as at the sound of musick we lie down and rest in peace and sleep as if Mercy had no other work to do but to save us And thus we make our selves the worse for the mercies of God shut up our bowels because he openeth his make no conscience of sin because he is ready to forgive will not be rich in good works because he is bountiful of his merits as if we onely were the adequate objâ—ct of mercy even then when we return with the spoil with our feet died in the bloud of our brethren It fareth with us as with the children of rich parents we are prodigal upon presumption of supply revel licentiously upon hope of sanctuary and patronage and like Nero spend all upon the false hope of treasure Non tam malè nobiscum ageretur si non tam bene It would not have been so ill with us if it had not been so well That which should make us happy maketh us miserable We read of a Gaoler and Torment but we soon forget that and when we bear about with us malice enough to constitute a Devil we relie still on a merciful Lord. Again we are like to those Sophisters in Aristotle who to that which was first proposed would soon yield assent That God is merciful and will forgive is most plain even written with the Sun-beams but when we should apply our wills to this rule and consider this position not onely as a principle in Divinity but also as a didactical example we presently fall off hunt out tricks and evasions and are very wise to deceive our selves Whatsoever the premisses are though drawn out of the very bowels of Mercy yet flesh and bloud are very apt and ready to deny the conclusion Christ loved us Therefore we must love one another Ephes 5. it is S. Pauls Enthymeme or argument And this Petition may be resolved into the very same God forgiveth us Therefore we must forgive one another But such is our blindness and perversness that though we are willing to subscribe to the Antecedent for we would sin still and be forgiven yet we are ready in our practice to deny the Consequence We have faith enough to see the riches of the Gospel to
tell their auditors that they were impoverisht with plenty streitned with abundance dull'd and cloy'd with too much matter and cry out with them Where should I begin or how should I end For we may behold the World as a theatre or stage and most men walking and treading their paces as in a shadow all in shew and visor nothing in substance maskt and hidden from others and masked and hidden from themselves fond of themselves and yet enemies to themselves loving and yet hating flattering and yet wounding raising and yet destroying themselves in their forehead Holiness to the Lord in their heart a legion of Devils breathing forth Hosanna's when they are a nayling their Saviour to the cross canonizing themselves saints when the Devil hath them in his snare hugging their errour proud of their errour glorying in their shame wiser then the Law wiser then the Gospel above command nauseating and loathing all advice and counsel whatsoever Reason or Revelation breaths against them as the smoke of the bottomless pit We may behold the Covetous grasping of wealth smiling at them that love not the world and counting them fools because they will not be so but this man is sick and dyeth this man perisheth and where is he We may behold the Ambitious in his ascent and mount and in his height looking down with scorn upon those dull and heavy spirits who will not follow after and yet every step he rises is a foul descent and he is never nearer to the lowest pit then when he is at his height This man falls and is dasht to pieces and where is he Behold the Seditious who moves and walks and beats up his march in the name of the Lord of hosts and thinks God beholding to him when he breaks his Law this man dyeth and perisheth and where is he Where is the Saint when the Covetous the Ambitious the Seditious man are in hell Oh beloved would we could see this and beware of it betimes before the Son of man comes who will pluck off our masks and disguises and make us a wofull spectacle to the world to men and to Angels Oh what a grief is it that we should never hear nor know our selves till we hear that voice Depart from me I know you not that we should deceive our selves so long till Mercy it self cannot redeem us from our errour That we should never see our selves but in Hell never feel our pain till it be eternal Oh what a sad thing is it that we should seal up our eyes in our own bloud and filth that we should delight in darkness and call it light that we should adore our errours and worship our own vain imaginations and in this state and pomp and triumph strut on to our destruction To day if you will hear his voyce harden not your hearts Hic meus est dixere dies This is our day to look into our selves to examine our selves to mistrust our selves to be jealous of our selves vereri omnia opera as Job speaks to be afraid of every work we do of every enterprise we take in hand to hearken to God when he speaks to us by our selves for Reason is his voice as well as Scripture By the one he speaks in us by the other to us to consult with our Reason and the rule to hear them speak in their own dialect not glossed and corrupted by our sensual affections to strive with our selves to fight against our selves to deny our selves and in this blessed agony and holy contention to lift up our hearts to the God of light to take up that of the Prophet David and make it our prayer Lord deliver us from the deceitful man that is from our selves I need not stand any longer upon this For even they that deceive themselves will willingly subscribe to all that I have said and commonly none defie Errour louder then they who call it unto them both with hands and words We will therefore rather as we proposed discover the Danger which men incurre by joyning with it that we may learn by degrees to shake it off to detest and avoid it In the first place this wilfull deceiving of our selves this deciding for our selves against our selves for our Sense against our Reason this easie falling upon any opinion or persuasion which may bring along with it pleasure or profit or honour all things but the truth is that which layes us open to every dart of Satan which wounds us the deeper because we receive it as an arrow out of Gods quiver as a message from Heaven For we see a false persuasion will build up in us as strong resolutions as a true one Saul was as zealous for the Law as Paul was for the Gospel hereticks are as ready for the fiery tryal as the orthodox the Turk as loud for his Mahomet as the Christian for his Christ In a word Errour produceth as strange effects as Truth Habet Diabolus suos martyres for the Devil hath his martyrs as well as Christ That which is a sin now and so appears a crying mortal sin and we stand at distance and will not come near it anon Profit or Pleasure those two parasites which bewitch the soul plead for it commend it and at last change the shape of it and it hath no voice to speak against us but bids us Go on and prosper It was a monster but now it is clothed and dressed up with the beauty of Holiness and we grow familiar with it It was as menstruous raggs but now we put it on and cloth our selves with it as with the robes of righteousness A false persuasion hath the same power which the Canonists give the Pope to make Evil good and Vice vertue It is a sin but if I do it not I shall loose all that I have and then I do it and then it is no sin It was Oppression it is now Law It was Covetousness it is now Thrift It was Sacrilege it is now Zeal It was Perjury it is now Wisdom Persuasion is a wheel on which the greatest part of the world are turned and circled about till they fall several wayes into several evils and do but touch at the Truth by the way Persuasion builds a Church and Persuasion pulls it down Persuasion formeth a Discipline and Persuasion cancels it Persuasion maketh Saints and Persuasion thrusts them out the Calendar Persuasion makes laws and Persuasion abollisheth them The Stoicks call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a kind of preoccupation of the minds the sourse and original of all the actions of our life as powerful when we erre as when the Truth is on our side and commonly carrying us with a greater swinge to that which is forbidden then to that to which we are bound to by a law This is the first mover in all those irregular motions of a wanton and untamed will This is the first wheel in the Devils 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in his devises and enterprises From this
down before Him 642 643. But his Mercy is of most force to humble us 643. ¶ God is uncapable of defilement 166. That which cometh from God is to be received with all reverence 285. 847 c. what God once saith shall infallibly be done 288. His Decrees cause not our wickedness 290. His Promises are conditional and oblige us to duty 290. Godly A Godly man will be a godly man in any place whether alone or in company 1089. v. Religion How meek under sufferings 176. The Godly not onely submit to but favour and applaud whatsoever God doth 307. They are not exempted from poverty and common casualties 901. But in general calamities God taketh extraordinary care of them 901. The different condition of the Godly and ungodly here and hereafter 561. Good is ex causa integra but any one point amiss is enough to make a thing evil 444. That which is good in it self is good alwayes and every where 73. and cannot be used to an evil end 85. Worldly things how good 85 86. v. World Nothing Good without God every thing Good with him 784. ¶ Good men may be full of doubts and suffer fits of despair 344 c. Comforts for such 347. Good partake with the bad in common calamities and why 291 c. ¶ A Good name carefully to be preserved 1054. ¶ Good works how far esteemed by God and how far advantageous to us 812. They cannot justifie the worker 812 813. Doing Good and Eschewing Evil must be inseparably joyned 281 282. Many do Good works by halves 160. Goodness is God's chief property 404 405. If it were essential to Man there would have been neither Law nor Gospel 410. 586. It is not necessary but voluntary 587. 628 629. It forceth approbation even from bad-men 500 551. 518. 1125. v. Necessity Piety Gospel far more excellent then either Philosophy or the Law 201 202. Though all its rules are not juris naturalis yet some are 224. The G. is much talked of much mistook and abused 1062. 1105 1106. The G. is a Law 1063 c. yea the strictest Law 1065. How we are to look upon it 1072. Of the Perfection of the Gospel 1073 c. 1094. It is perfect in respect of the End and of the Means 1073. It alone can fill and fit a man in any condition 1074. It ordereth every part faculty act motion inclination 1076. It reacheth all cases that be necessary 1077. It forbiddeth all sins great and small 1094. It is not onely perfect it self but far more perfect then the Law of Moses 1078 1079. It requireth more of us then the Law did 1078. The Papists and Libertines censured for arguing the G. of imperfection 1079 c. The G. carrieth us much higher then the Moral Heathen could sore or ken 1084. There is neither defect nor obscurity in it 1084. Since the G. is perfect we must square out our actions by it 1085. 1098. Though it be plain and easie yet we must carefully read and hear and pray that we may understand it 1094 1095. The G. not onely restraineth gross offenses but idle words wanton looks and thoughts 1095 1096. Why called by St. James a perfect law of liberty 648. Before we were captives under Sin and Satan 1097. but by it we are freed from the Guilt of Sin 1097. from the Power of Sin 1098. from the Rigour of the Moral and the Servitude of the Ceremonial Law 1098. VVhat it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to look into the Gospel 1105 c. The singular use of looking into it aright 1108. How few do so 1108. We must not onely look upon the G. consider it but continue it 1110 c. VVe must not forget but remember it 1116. VVe must turn the words into works 1117 c. God hath fitted the G. to us and us unto it 1124. Being looked into and persevered in it filleth the soul with light and joy 1125 c. Goths VVhen they sacked Rome they spared those who fled into Churches 501. Grace much talked of little understood 433. VVhat it is 433. God will not leave us destitute of it 433 434. Though infused into us it is not infused without us 667 c. It is an errour to think every man hath a certain measure of saving Grace 1024. 1096. Saving Gr. hath its degrees 458. 1086. It encreaseth by exercise 1117 Grace onely bringeth to God and to Glory 106. Many lay all the stress upon the power of God's Grace and do nothing themselves 434 435. 588. 628 629. 667. 722. 1001. Gr. doth not force a man to be good 435 436. 584. 1022. 1115. Our duty is to use Gr. aright and by no means to abuse it 435. 629. 1022. Some pretending to magnifie the Gr. of God turn it into wantonness 1001. 1022. Gr. worketh in us by means 1022. Graces must be tried 38. Gr. never appeareth so bright as in time of trial 698 699. Riches but trash if compared with Gr. 619. Many phansie they have Graces which they have not 668 669. Some hold that Grace can neither be resisted at first nor lost afterwards 683. Of total and final falling from Grace 1112 1113. Grief v. Joy Mourning Repentance Sorrow Grief a heavy burden 936. One cannot properly be bid to grieve 331. Grief at the death of friends is lawful but it must be moderate 543. Grief wholesome for the soul 563 c. What Grief is godly and what not 331 332. Grow in grace 578. 606. H HAbits of virtue how acquired 205. 667. Habits of grace though infused into us are not infused without us 667. Hannibal 1066. Happiness to be attained neither by the light of Reason nor by the Law but by Christ alone 716 717. v. Heathen Harden How God is said to harden hearts 412. Hast is not good in a wrong way 855. Hatred transformeth men yea and the Truth it self 670 671. We must not hate any man much less the Truth for the man's sake 672 673. Health how excellent a blessing 591. It is the fittest time to serve God in 592. If it be not employed in the service of God it will be of the devil 594. Hearing of Sermons without doing far from Religion 221. 277. 303. 304. 522. 790 701. 990. 1060. It is a sin and flat mockery of God 877. What God meaneth when he biddeth us hear 876. How th◠Word is to be heard 512. v. Prayer Heart As the H. is affected so the Tongue speaketh 976 977. Heathen How far they went in the doctrine of Repentance 324. and in moral Righteousness 868. Many of them have outgone most Christians in the way of righteousness 128. 663. What was the happiness they could teach and reach unto 324 325. 716 717. They reteined some seeds of Truth 371. By the light of Nature they hated hypocrisie 372. Whether their virtuous actions were sins 375. Their moral virtues advantaged them but little because they were destitute of saving truth 663 868. Heaven