of its unseen Element Thou sayst it is now dying now dead when it is emptying itself into the Ocean of Beauties retreating into the pure and incorruptible Element of Beauty the Blessed Person of Christ. Cleave to it in this view of it cast thy self with it into these secret and sacred depths of Life and Loveliness so shalt thou never lose it or thy self save by being both together swallowed up into the perfection of Beauty the Eternal Treasury of all Beauties Jesus Christ. I have now finished the Two first Reasons of the Fairness of Christ above all things the Original the Perfection of Beauty in his Person Before I pass to the other Two Reasons let us look down a little upon our selves and make some application of these Beauties which we have seen in the Person of our Lord to our own Persons to enlighten the Darknesses and redress the deformities there Use. 1. A Caution Let us take heed that we make no inference take no encouragement from the Loveliness of Christ to make our selves unlovely in his Eye to defile his Spouse in our selves to stain his Glory by Sensuality Lust or any presumptuous Sin Our Saviour now dying saith to his Father of his Disciples I sanctify my self that they also may be sanctified John 17. Jesus Christ put off in Death every thing of Earth and Flesh. He lifteth himself up by his Cross into Glory that he may present himself again to the Eye of our Spirits in the Spiritual and Heavenly Brightness of the Divine Form and Glory that he may baptize us into the same Sea of his Blood and into the same white Cloud of his own Spiritual Beauties that we also by him may die to the Flesh and live with him in the Spirit Hath Jesus Christ to this end made himself higher than the Heavens Heb. that our Hearts and Liveâ— should be low and vile as the Earth Is he ascended above all the Angels all the Principalities and Powers of Light that we should become like Beasts and yield up our Bodies and Spirits Instruments to the Principalities and Powers of the Darkness of this World and of Hell Is there any hope of renewing such a Person by words who thus turneth the rightest and pleasantest words of the Lord Jesus and his Beauties unto nourishment to vain and filthy Lusts to Corruption Is any more to be done but to leave him to that Dreadful and Delightful Maran Atha which is by interpretation The Lord cometh to the Person of Christ himself in his own immediate Appearances when those glorious and unexpressible Beauties of the Spirit and God-Head in which he shall appear shall be Flames of Fire burning upon and consuming every Earthly Fleshly Principle or Spirit in every Form Use. 2. A Conviction of the Evil of Sin which blindeth us to the sight of this Beautiful and Blessed Person of our Lord Jesus How should we all curse to the Pit of Hell from whence it arose that Charm or Enchantment if any had such force to change the Sun into Sack-cloath or hinder it from shining any more upon the Earth How much worse than a Grave would it make the whole world when we should have eyes open and no Light Far greater is that mischief which the Devil worketh by Sin By the charm of this world which he raiseth as an Apparition and Lying Image from Hell together with the Lusts which he awakeneth by it he taketh away from us the glorious Light of Christs Person ten thousand times brighter sweeter and of more consequence to us than the Sun in Heaven 2 Corin. 4. 4. By this means all our faculties are as so many Eyes continually awakened continually benighted with the blackness of Darkness deluded with empty Shadows and disappointed of the beloved Substance So are our Spirits wandring in an everlasting Darkness tormented night and day with the fire of their own restless eager and unsatisfied desires while Jesus Christ their only Light and Food is hid from them under the Cloud of their Corruptions Take heed especially of three Sins 3 of Covetousness Uncleanness Enmity 1. Take heed of Covetousness Mat. 6. 22. Our Saviour warneth his Disciples to take heed what they made their Treasure because where the Treasure sure is there the Heart will be v. 21. The beloved Object irresistibly draweth the Heart to itself and transformeth it into itself as Seed doth the ground in which it is sown The Eye saith Christ is the Light of the Body If thine Eye be single thy whole Body shall be full of Light But if thine Eye be evil thy whole Body shall be full of Darkness and if the Light which is in thee be darkness how great is that Darkness The whole Soul and every Spirit is an Eye The understanding is an Eye of Light the Will is an Eye of Love The same word for the substance of it in the Hebrew signifies an Eye and a Fountain The Object is the Light of this Eye which sheds abroad in it the Beams of its Light Sweetness and Influence These are the waters springing up in this Fountain The single Eye in the Language of the Scripture is the good the liberal large open Eye The Eye is single from its Object when it hath fixed unchangeably in it that single Object which is truly and eternally One when it looketh upon all things only as they are comprehended in this Unity This is such a singleness such a simplicity that the Eye and the Object are both One the Supream and Eternal Unity is both the Eye and the Object in this Spirit and so the Fountain which goeth forth from its own Eden maketh the Soul a Paradise and watereth the whole Body The Evil Eye is a contracted divided narrow covetous envious malicious Eye Beware O man that the things of this world that this world be not in thine Eye As Jesus Christ is the Image of the Invisible God so is this World the Image of its God the Devil the Prince of Darkness by which he becomes visible to thee enamouâ—eth thy Soul setteth himself in thine Eye and thine Heart with all his Hells and Fires hid within this Cloud And now a blackness of Darkness big with a dreadful Tempest of Wrath dwelleth within thee and covereth all things round about thee But if Jesus Christ be the Object of thy Love he will be as a Divine Sun in the Center and midst of thy Spirit powring forth a great plenty of rich and glorious Beams thorow all parts every point of thy Soul thy Body every thing round about thee Now all things shall be to thee one entire and beautiful Body of Divine Light Indeed the world compared with the great and glorious world of Light and Beauty in the Person of Christ is as a Mote in the Sun But if this Mote be in thine Eye it will deprive thee of the sight of this Sun 2. Take heed of Uncleanness St. Jude v. 23. teacheth us to hate the Garment spotted
a Body of Divine Loves above all Heavens Rom. 8. 28 29. St. Paul triumpheth after this manner I am perswaded thâ—â— neither Death nor Life neither Angels Principalities Powers nor things present noâ— things to come nor heighth nor Depth nor any other Creature shall be able to separate us from the Love of God which is in Jesus Christ our Lord. The Love of God in Jesus Christ lineth covereth all things transubstantiateth all things into the same Divine Love St. Paul mentioneth the nearest things to us the most intimate the most Potent the most Penetrating the most Universal the most comprehending the most Transforming Death Life Angels things Present to come Depth Heighâ—h What cometh nearer what toucheth every Point of our whole Substance and Being than Death Life Angels What more intimate to our hearts and Spirits If none of these can come between the Love of God in Jesus Christ and our Persons then all these by the Touch of this Love must be Tinctured and changed into new Forms into Essences of Love As Sugar is dissolved in a Glass of Wine so Death Life Angels things Presâ—nt things to come heighths Depths every other Creature in this Golden Cup of Divine Love the Glorified Person of Christ is dissolved into Love becometh a Rich Love-Cordial to a fainting Spirit making it to dance and sing for Joy when it was intended a deadly Poyson to it The holy Apostle had said upon this Ground a little before In all these things Sword Famine Persecution wee are more than Conquerours It is plain how we are Conquerours Captivity is carried Cuptive Those Forms and Powers of Darkness of Death which thought to captivate us are themselves Captives to Eternal Life and Love in the Lord Jesus As Saul among the Prophets so the Bitterest the Blackest things which assault the Spirit of a Saint encompassed with this Love of the Father poured forth in Christ uncloath themselves and put on Amiable Shapes of Love sing songs of Love breath forth from every part of them the most Delightful Sweetness of Divine Love Thus this Love maketh us Conquerours But what meaneth this to be more than Conquerours Is there a Joy or Glory above this of a Conquerour Grace coming into Glory Love Reigning after Suffering Is there any thing sweeter any thing greater than this Victory of Love Yes St. Paul saith when he was caught up into the Third heavens into the Paradise there he heard Words which it is impossible to utter This is The Paradise in the Third Heavens the Love of God in the Glorified Person of Christ. This Love transformeth every thing every Creature to this heavenly Paradise Those blessed Souls which by believing enter into this Paradise hear Words of Love Words of Joy Words of Pleasure of Glory from this Love which it is impossible to utter which are too sweet too high too ravishing to be exprest A holy Soul in This Paradise of Love feeleth a Joy far beyond that of Marriage of Conquest of Reigning of Children of any thing named in this World or in that which is to come Thus the Sweetness of Divine Love expresseth itself in its Sweet Efficacy Thus the Purity of Divine Love in Christ is manifest in its Sweetness 2. The Love of God in Christ is most Pure because it hath the greatest Virtue Our Divines express hell after this manner All Diseases Pains Griefs here are Evils by a Tincture onely of Divine Wrath a little Drop of Divine Wrath mingling itself with them Hâ—ll is Pure Wrath. Hell is the Abstract of Wrath the Evil of all Diseases Pains and Griefs abstracted from them and heightned to the utmost So Jesus Christ bare all our Infirmities and took our Griefs though he was never sick On the Contrary all the Good all the Joyes in the Creature are a Weak Tincture of Divine Love The Shadow of St. Peter as hâ— passed along healed the sick All the Sweetness and Pleasure in things here is the Shadow onely of Divine Love falling upon them All the Joy in any heart here is the Shadow onely of Divine Love cast over it The Love of God is poured forth Purely in the Person of Christ. There Love is a Substance no Accident There Love is Infinite being allayed or limited by no mixture Our Saviour in Glory is Divine Love in the Abstract It is a Weak Glance of Divine Love like the Sunshine here below cast upon the Water or a Looking-Glass which maketh the Beauty the Sweetness of all Colours Figures Motions in the Creature It is a remote Touch of Divine Love like the Ends of the Sun-beams reflected in a Burning-Glass which maketh the Pleasantness and Pleasant Properties of all Plants the Lustre Gracefulness Virtue of all Precious Stones and Pearls the Joy of all Relations The Beauty the Sweetness of all Colours Features Motions the Pleasantness the Pleasant Properties of all Plants the Lustre Gracefulness Virtue Life of all Precious Stones Pearls heavenly Bodies heavenly Spirits the Joyes of all Relations are contained Eminently with an Infinite Enlargement an Infinite heightning in this Divine Face This Tree Pearl this Union the Unity the Purity of Eternal Love in our Glorified Jesus O Sinner come cast thy self freely into the Bosom of thy Saviour Here thou fallest immediately into a Sea of Pure Love Open thy Mouth wide enlarge all thy Faculties to drink in the Sweetness of Pure Love pouring itself by Floods and Seas into thee Feel the Transcendent virtue of Pure Love transforming thee thy heart thy Person into a rich clear and heavenly Pearl in this Sea O Saints swim continually in this Sea of Pure Love the Bosom of your Glorified Saviour Feel the Transcendent Virtue of Pure Love dissolving you also into a Sea of pure Love a Sea of Glass and Fire a Sea of Pure Chrystal Divine Beauty without any Spot of Flesh or Earth Darkness or Death a Sea of Pure Chrystal shining and burning with a Pure Flame of heavenly Joyes without any Smoak of Lusts or Passions Obj. how is the Love of God Pure in Christ Is there not in the Lord Jesus a mixture of Love and Wrath He saith of himself in one place All Judgment is given to the Son of Man He adjudgeth to Hell and to Torments as well as to Heaven and to Joys Matt. 25. Jesus Christ is represented as a King upon the Throne in Glory in the Judgment of the last day v 31. He maketh Separation between the Sheep and Goats v. 32. He setteth the Sheep at his Right hand in the Place of Power Honour and Love He setteth the Goats at his Left hand on his Wrath-side v. 33. He passeth the Sentence of Love upon One inviting them as Blessed Ones to the Kingdom of Love prepared for them of the Father in Eternity v. 34. He passeth a Sentence of Wrath upon the other sending them away with a Curse into the Hell fire with the Devils v. 40. How is the Love of God poured forth Purely without
Darkness must be the Ground Division the Work upon it There are then two Powers as two Parts in this Image 1. Power of Darkness 2. Power of Division 1. Power of Darkness This is the Form and Division the Figure of this Black Spirit Darkness is made his Character The Power of Darkness his Princely Title Colos. 1. 13. Who hath delivered us out of the Power of Darkness into the Kingdom of his Dear Son It is read thus in Greek out of the Principality of Darkness into the Kingdom of the Son of his Love The Devil as the Prince of Darkness which implies Division is opposed to Iesus Christ the King of Love which is unity and lives only in Light Again Ephes. 6. 12. We fight against the Rulers of the Darkness of this World You may thus translate it more to the words against the World-comprehending Powers of the Darkness of this State As God is One and Many by a grateful Distinction in the Unity so is the Devil One and Many by a grating Division without Unity many Powers of Darkness in one Power The Devil in this Darkness lies as a Stain upon the Beauties of the whole Creation defacing the Image dimming the Glory of God in them He lies as a Cloud upon all the Contents of the Creature spreading a melancholy Shade over them infusing a Poyson of Fears Falshoods Deceits Mistakes Dangers Death into them He is a Prison and a Chain Shutting up holding down the Spirits of men when they would break forth and raise themselves into that Light of Divinity which faintly glimmers in this Darkness Such is the First Part of the Image the Power of Darkness 2. Power of Division The Name Devil comes from the Greek Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies most properly one that casts in Principles or Seeds of Division So he is described by our Saviour in the Parable The Envicus man the Enemy hath sown Tares Our Lord with a Divine depth defines this Spirit in those words A Kingdom divided against it self cannot stand Whatever stands must be founded upon a Unity The Devil is a divided Kingdom a Duality a Ruinous Thing This Power of Division divides itself into a Seven-fold Power which is known by these Names 1. Self-love 2. Lust. 3. Covetousness 4. Pride 5. Envy 6. Passion 7. Enmity or Despair 1. Power Self-love 1 John 4. 8. God is Love Love in the Abstract Love Absolute Unlimited Infinite a Universal Sweetness The Devil is Self-love a particular Being cutting off itself from the rest of things from Him who is the Great I am in whom all things have their Being These are the Circlings of the Serpent by which he folds and wraps up himself in himself This Serpent before he spake to the Woman tempted himself with this glittering language Es. 14. 14. I will be like the most High The first word in this aspiring speech is that which first made him a Devil of an Angel I The establishing of a Proper Interest divided from the general Interest of things in the God-head This Self-love is the Horned head into which he then sprouted forth the Cloven Foot in which he ended when he first with-drew himself from the all-comprehending Unity into a Circle and Center of his own 2. Power Lust. This is a praegnancy to multiply himself to bring forth himself in strange and diverse forms upon strange and diverse Images God is One Gal. 3. 20. God brings forth himself in One Image Jesus Christ is his Only-begotten Son Joh. 1. 14. God brings forth all things by this One Image and in it Coloss. 1. 16. In him were all things Created The Devil is contrary to God in all this He is that Son of God which broken and deform'd by his Fall from the First Unity goes full of monstrous Lust after the Daughters of Men dark divided fleshly Images of the Creature With these he mingles himself so he brings forth himself and them into Gyantly shapes and in a Brood of Gyants Gyants in Hebrew signifie Dead Distracted Prodigious Forms as appearing from the shades below or faln and sunk thither Our Saviour calls this Spirit of Lust Joh. 8. 45. The Father of Lyes because he begets himself upon all things in base spurious and various Shapes Solomon represents the Image of the Devil in Flesh and this World by a Whorish Woman because she lusts after and wanders thorow all the diversity of divided Forms in the Devil 3. Power Covetousness Pro. 30. 16. There are two things that never say enough the Grave and the Barren Womb. This Invisible Power is a Womb of Darkness which takes in all things but brings forth nothing So the Darkness is never enlightned but ever increas'd made deeper and more devouring This Spirit is the Invisible Grave which draws all things into it But then it crumbles them into Dust it divides them from themselves So the Principle of Division is sharpned not satisfied fretted to a greater wideness not fill'd This is the Serpent feeding upon Dust ever encompassing the Earth This is the Bottomless Pit 4. Power Pride The Devil under this property is call'd Is. 14. 12. Lucifer the Son of the Morning He saith v. 13. I will exalt my Throne above the Stars of God His ambition is to shine alone and as he riseth to put out all other Lights by the Malignity of his appearance He goes on v. 13. I will sit upon the Mount of the Congregation in the sides of the North. The appearance of our Lord Jesus in the double flame of Terror and Triumph Consuming and Crowning is from the North Ezek 1. 4. The Mount of the Congregation is Mount Sion where the General Assembly and Church or Congregagation of the First-born are Hebr 12. 22 23. This is the Mount lifted up above every Mountain The Spirit exalted above every Spirit The Devil would seat himself upon this Mount in the place of Jesus Christ to be as he is the Onely One. Yet he would have it with this difference to be the top of the Mount while the great Congregation sit as the Clouds under his Feet to be a consuming Fire to all others a Crowning Glory only to himself God is the Heavenly Hierusalem where all things are Fellow-citizens The Devil is that Babel which saith I sit alone as a Queen Revel 18. She thinks her self never Great till she have swallowed up all her Companions never Great enough till she be Great alone This is the difference between Pride and Plenty 5. Power Envy This Power is a Reflection of Darkness and Division upon it self from the Sense of Beauty and Unity else-where It is Mystically describ'd Revel 20. 1. An Angel came down from Heaven with a Chain in one hand a Key in the other v. 2. He took hold of the Dragon the old Serpent and bound him up in the Bottomless Pit Divine Wisdom is that Chain which reacheth from the Top of Heaven to the Center of the Earth where at
lovely morning breaketh upon thy Spirit from the midst of the shades of unbelief and thy natural State it maketh a day of Power a day of Armies Jesus Christ appeareth now in the Glory of his Father in his own Glory in the Glory of all his holy Angels He boweth down all these Heavens and with them descendeth from above into thy Spirit With these Armies of Glories he fighteth against all the Powers of Darkness in thee With the Power of these Glories he subdueth thee to himself winneth thy Love transformeth thy Spirit and Person shineth upon and draweth forth to maturity every Seed of Glory in thee The Person of thy Jesus shining out in thee is that Morning from which as from a Beautiful and Blessed Womb falleth the Dew of Christs Youth which is his Spirituality his Eternity ever-full ever-flourishing with all Divine Beauties upon his Person This Dew maketh all Graces to spring in thy Soul powerfully plentifully beautifully pleasantly with State and Majesty As that Vine which hath most of the Sun bringeth the most kindly Grapes the greatest Clusters the fairest and best coloured the sweetest the largest Grapes the most abounding with Spirit and Heat yielding the best Wine so doth that Soul which liveth most in the Eye of the Lord Jesus under the Beams of his Person unvailed bring forth the most kindly Fruits of the Spirit in all these respects 1. All Grace aboundeth most it is as the Dew 2. It is pleasantest Thy people are a willing people There is most of Love of Life and Delight 3. It is most Beautiful There are the Beauties of Holiness 4. Every Grace is greater spreadeth and enlargeth itself more hath more vertue and force in it The Appearance of Christ. maketh a Day of Power 5. It is more Princely hath enstamped upon it more of the Person of the Lord Jesus and so more of the Majesty of the Divine Nature 6. It yieldeth the most excellent wine of Heavenly Joys to make glad the heart both of God and Man It is the Dew of Christs Youth It hath in it a Confluence a Concurrence of all the Lovelinessâ—s Sweetnesses of the Person of our Lord in his Spâ—ritual his Immortal State which is his Youth flourishing in the height of all Divine Pleasantness and Glory never to fade or decline O! Let us all be found in the â—umber of the Watchmen that watch continually for this morning Let us go forth from under the vail from out of the Cave of the Flesh and of the world into the Light of this morning into the sweet breakings of the Eternal Day from the glorâ—ous Person of our Saviour Let us receive the Dew of his Youth falling upon us Let us see the Dew of his Youth falling upon all things round about us making the Deseâ—t to Blossom as the Rose our Hearts all things to us Spring Blossom and Flourish with the Spiritual and Immortal Beauties of our Beloved This Dew is his Sowing his watering them every where Use 2. A Direction to the Knowledge of the Person of our Saviour and his Beauties The Lord himself saith The words that I speak unto you they are Spirit and they are Life John 6. 63. Jesus had been speaking of Himself of eating his Flesh and drinking his Blood He meaneth by words the Things which those words signify The Person of Christ the excellencies and vertues of his Person concerning which he spake to them are not Flesh and Blood which are the Shadows only dying dead yea Death itself nor meerly Spiritual but Spirit Substantially and Essentially which is Life not by Participation but Primitively in the Essence in the Spring This is the ground which I lay for the direction which I am to give you in your study of the Beautiful Person of Christ Christ and his Beauties are Spiritual Now not I but St. Paul giveth you two Rules 1 Corin. 2. 7 8. The Holy Apostle speaketh of the Knowledge of the Wisdom of God in a Mystery Then he expresseth this Wisdom of God in a Mystery to be Jesus Christ the Lord of Glory the Lord whose Person is all Glory whose Principality and Kingdom is Glory in the Abstract Glory in its utmost extent He had said this was unknown to all the Princes of this world the Princes in Wisdom as well as Power the highest ranks and orders of Men or Angels To confirm this he citeth a Scripture in the next verse v. 9. Eye hath not seen nor Ear heard neither have entered into the heart of Man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him Observe by laying these three verses together how St. Paul meaneth one Thing by these three expressions The Wisdom of God in a Mystery the Lord of Glory Things prepared by God for those that love him The Person of Christ is that Image of Glory and of the God-Head in which lieth the entire Mystery Wisdom and design of God from the Beginning to the End with all its way He is a Collection of all those Beauties and Blessedness Loves and Joys prepared by the Father for his Beloved Ones to feast upon to Eternity Of these St. Paul determineth that the noblest highest largest senses understandings hearts of the most excellent Creatures are uncapable of the least Glympse or tast of them This he draweth down afterwards to a Rule which is my first Rule Rule 1. Spiritual Things are Spiritually discerned 1 Cor. 2. 14. This Rule divideth it self into Three Branches 1. Spiritual things are discerned by a Spiritual Eye St. Paul saith The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him neither can he for they are Spiritually discerned 1 Cor. 2. 14. Nature hath a Twofold Eye the Eye of Sense the Eye of Reason The Eye of Sense is common to Man with Beasts and is the Bestial Eye This discerneth the Beauties of Flesh and Blood We have histories of Beasts Birds and Fishes which have been in love with Beautiful Virgins and Youths But this Eye is blind to Spiritual Objects A Material and Corporeal Object if it excel and be transcendent in Sweetness Harmony or Beauty destroyeth the Sense as the Sun dazleth darkeneth and putteth out the Eye How much more unable are our Senses to take in or bear Immaterial and Spiritual Glories Nature 's other Eye is that of Reason of the Mind the Intellectual Eye which is common to Man with Angels This is the Angelical Eye in Man This can discover can take some measure of the Invisible things of the Creation and maintain some Commerce with Angels But the Darkness of this Eye to the Beauties of Christ is painted forth in a lively manner by that sweet and sublime Prophet Isaiah c. 6. v. 1. The Lord Jesus appeareth sitting upon the Throne of His Spiritual and Divine Form His Train of Glories filled the Temple v. 2. The Seraphims themselves which are â—eputed the Highest Order and Degree of Angels cover their faces
the Victory the Joy and Crown of the Feast I know you prevent me in your thoughts you who love the Lord Jesus by applying this to your Prince your Beloved and his Love his Bride your own Souls I shall bring down all to my purpose and to your practice in the exercise of those Principal and Triumphant Graces Faith Love Heavenly Joy by three Conclusions or Spiritual Maxims 1. Conclu All the Armies of God all the Powers of the God-Head the innumerable Companies of holy Angels and blessed Spirits all the Hosts of Heaven and Earth with their Captain the Lord Jesus at the head of them move and fight in their courses under the Banner of Love Thy Person in a glorious Image of all Divine Beauties is figured upon the Banner as this Eternal Princes Love Love to thee is wrought upon the Banner in Characters of Glory This is the Cause of all motions in Heaven and Earth To this Banner all Powers every where resort unto this they are united under this they march and fight 2. Conclu The Lord Jesus as Captain of the Lord's Hosts with all his Heavenly Armies his ten thousands of Angels his Chariots of fire and Horses of fire continually encompasseth thee marcheth encampeth round about tâ—ee as his chiefest Treasure his Love with Banners of Love spred and displaid over thee on every side of thee round about Every step thou takest in thy way to Heaven is in the midst of these Warriours All Divine Powers continually circle thee in The Invisible and Invincible Hosts of God under the conduct of thy Beloved Jesus are thy perpetual Guard and Convoy In the midst of these thou walkest â—ittest and lyest down thou wakest and sleepest Psal. 91. 11. The Angels have a charge of thee from their Prince and thy Bridegroom that they keep thee in all thy ways that they bear thee in their hands least at any time thou strike thy foot against a stone that thou never stumble The Angels of God are thy Chariots of War thy Chariots of State thy Chariots of Love thy Chariots for Travel in which thou journiest thorow this Wilderness to thy Kingdom the Kingdom of Love and Glory All this they are in one They make thy way thy Palace in the midst of thy Kingdom for Strength for Glory for Delights for Rest in thy Love They bear thee up above in the light of Life in the Life of Divine Love This is the way high and lifted up above all the Powers of Darkness and Death in which they carry thee along that thou mayst never strike thy foot against any stone of offence against any hard and hurtful Form of Darkness Enmity or Death Thy Jesus the Bosom of thy Beloved is this way 3. Conclu These Banners of Love which are spred over thee in thy marches here the same hang streaming over thy head to Eternity and over the Head of thy King as thou fittest at the Feast with him in Heaven The Fights about thee here are the Trophies and Triumphs at the Feast here The same Love is figured on all which maketh all precious Stones and Jewels in thy Marriage-Crown and Crown of Glory to shine there and adorn it for ever Use. The Use which we make of this is to see the difference between the two states of a Saint and a Sinner a Believer and him who believeth not 1. See the blessedness of â— Believer Heb. 1. 2. Jesus Christ is said to be the Brightness of the Glory of God that is of Love the express Image of the Substance or Person of God that is of Love For God is Love v. 6. 7. When God bringeth his Son again that is after his Resurrection in his Spiritual and Heavenly Appearance into the world he saith Let all the Angels of God worship him He hath made all his Ministers Spirits and his Angels a flame of Fire This concerneth thee O Believer and is spoken of thee O the blessedness of that Soul which indeed receiveth Jesus Christ and his Love by Faith if only thou didst know thine own happiness God hath brought his Son in his second Appearance in his Spirit into thine Heart He is in thee the brightness of the Glory of Love that is of the Divine Nature shining in the midst of thee This is that Eternal Sun from which all blessed Spirits continually drink in the Light Influences Joys of Life and Immortality He is in thee the express Image of Love which is the Substance and Person of God This setteth itself thorow him as a Seal upon thine Heart Now the Power of God is a Servant to his Love in thee Now God saith Let all the Angels of God worship how down to serve my Love in this Soul God himself maketh his Angels Flames of Love enfolding thee penetrating thy Body and Spirit shining within thee round about thee continually in the darkest night He maketh his Angels Ministring Spirits to thee Spirits of Glory Minister Love to thee after an Invisible manner in all visible Things Every moment of time every Circumstance or Accident in time are the Wings of Angels a Chariot of Angels carrying thee above the snares of Death below into Heaven This is thy Portion who believest in the Lord Jesus and his Love 2. See the misery of Unbelievers How wretched art thou who believest not who sayest to the Love of God and the Tydings of it from Heaven Depart from me I have no pleasure in you Those Powers of Darkness that are ever ready to raise up Leviathan from his Stormy deep below curse thee All evil Spirits are Flames of Wrath burning within thee burning from without upon thee alwaies in the midst of thy Jollities at thy Feasts on thy Beds of pleasure Evil Spirits are ever Ministring Wrath to thee after an Invisible manner thorow all Visible Things Devils are thy Chariots These wrap thee up in a thick Cloud in the blackness of Darkness and hurry thee to Hell O be not unbelievers but believe that you may inherit the Land of Love and dwell in it for ever Love inviteth wooeth you to believe that is to receive itself into your Hearts Love will bring its own entertainment and make the Feast for itself if you for your parts will but take it in as a guest 3. Instance The Righteousness of God serveth his Love Rom. 5. l. Grace reâ—gneth by Righteousness unto Eternal Life thorow Jesus Christ our Lord. Grace is Love in its Fountain Love upon the Throne Love is brought in here by the Apostle under the name of Grace as a King Eternal Life Heaven is the Kingdom of Love Jesus Christ is the chief Minister of State to this great King God is Love sitting upon the Throne The Lord Jesus is the same supream Love descending from the Throne to be the Universal Servant and General Officer throughout all this Kingdom of Love Righteousness is the Scepter of the King Thy Scepter is a Scepter of Righteousness Psal. 45. Love reigneth by
surrounding us far from our Father's house from the Bosom of our Jesus in the wide solitary naked field of this Fleshly Image We lie upon the Cold Ground of our own Natural Earthly Comfortless Spirits Under our head is the hard Stone of unbelief Distrust Care and Fear Where is now Finishing Love Finishing Love is now nearer to you than you are aware This is the Season for Finishing Love this is the Time in which the Work of Finishing 〈◊〉 is most Beautiful What it now doth will be for Ever for an Eternal Joy and Glory a Work of Eternity It will be now Pure Love Perfect Love It will now work with All Freedom with all Fulness in your Weaknesses Ere you are aware Finishing Love will open itself as the Heaven of Heavens round about you You shall see the Lord Jesus as a Mystical Ladder 〈◊〉 Divine Loves reaching from Heaven to Earth filling with the Fulness 〈◊〉 Divine Loves poured forth in his Glorified Person all the Space betweeâ— Heaven and Earth while One End of this Ladder toucheth the Heart of Goâ— in the Glories of Heaven and Eternity the other End toucheth thine 〈◊〉 thou liest covered with darkness below on the Desolate Earth Divine Love in all Angelical forms stand upon every Round of this Ladder every Degreâ— and State oâ— Things between heaven and Earth in great Troops These â— once descend and ascend bring down the Heart of the Father into thy Bosomâ— and carry up thy Heart into the Bosom of the Father Now thou saiest This Open Field was the House of God of Divine Loâ—â— This Darkness was the Gate of Heaven the Gate of Finishing Love and was not aware By this Gate Divine Love cometh forth from Its Spiritual Pâ—â—lace unto me By this Gate Divine Love bringeth me into its Palace Itâ— enough I have received the Spirit of Promise I am Sealed by it with 〈◊〉 Eternal Image of Divine Loves and Glories with the Heart of my Jesus mâ— God set upon my Heart O my Jesus it is true it is True This was the Sea son of thy Finishing Love and I was not aware Thy Finishing Love maketh Perfect its Strength Light Sweeetness in Weakness Darkness Enmity Thus comfort your selves against the Difficulties of Life in the Freedom the Fulness of the Finishing Love of God treasured up in the Glorified Person of Christ for you 2 Comfort Against the Darkness of Death Gladly therefore will I rejoyce in mine Infirmities For when I am weak the Power of Christ resteth upon me saith St Paul 2 Corin. 12. 10. in the place cited before It is the Power of Finishing Love in Christ which is here intended For that was the Subject of the former part of the verse My Grace is sufficient for Thee Behold Free Grace Pure Love For my Strength is made perfect in Weakness The Strength of Grace of Love is made Perfect in Weakness Behold Finishing Love This maketh the Infirmities not of old Age onely but of our dying hour Pleasant to us that when we are weakest the Power of Divine Love resteth upon us in its Finishing Sweetnesses and Glories When the Lord Jesus hung upon the Cross he cried out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me A Darkness covereth the face of the whole Earth round about Him The next words which we hear from him just as he giveth up the Ghost are these It is Finished A Declaration of Victory A Triumph The Mystery of my Sufferings of Divine Wrath are finished in my Person The Glory of the God Head of Heaven of Eternity All Beauty all Joyes The Mystery of Divine Love are finished and compleated in my Person Both these Mysteries are now finished Both Compleated in One Glory in this One Moment of my Death This is the Pattern of a Saint and of Finishing Love in the Pangs of Death You have a Saint sick on his Death-bed a sense of Sin of Wrath Doubt Despair spreading their black Wings over his Spirit pains faintings deadly pangs seizing upon his Body In a Moment in the midst of these Weaknesses the Lord Jesus in a Chariot of Angels and Invisible Glories with the full Power of all Finishing Loves resteth upon him from without raiseth himself and shineth from within Now in this Moment is the Whole Scenâ— changed The black and baleful Image of Things is changed into a Heaven The fainting dying Person into a Glorified Spirit triumphing in his Chariot of Angels and ascending with the Lord Jesus into the Heighths of Eternity He crieth one moment The Joys of Life the Light of the Sun the Delights of mine Eyes My Dearest Relations and sweetest Friends Life itself forsake me My hope my Faith my Spiritual Comforts my God my God why do ye why doest thou forsake me The Next moment with a Shout of Angels with the Sound of the Silver Trumpets in Heaven he crieth out It is finished The Sufferings of Christ are finished in me Divine Love hath finished upon me all its Mysteries and made the Joys of Eternity full in me A modest Person was sick and in want A Friend sensible of his want and modesty conveyed a Bag of money under his head and pillow while he slept He waketh findeth it smileth and saith This is the Stealth of my Friend Our Jesus frequently casteth a deep Darkness the Shadow of Death over us then when he purposeth under the covert of this Darkness to convey some finished Piece of Glory some Compleat Work of Finishing Love Heaven itself into our Bosom our Persons into a Heaven of Immortalities and Glories unsought unexpected unperceived by us until we are possessed of them until we are in the midst of Them These are the Stealths of our Beloved These are the Stealths of Finishing Love The Power of Christ with all the Fulness of Finishing Loves resting upon a Saint in his Death is excellently described 2 Corin. 5. v. 1 2 3 4. Observe there Four things 1. A Glorious Building 2. The Groans of Burthened Saints 3. The Workmanship of God 4. The Earnest of the Spirit 1. A Glorious Building This is A building of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of God The Materials as well as the Builder and the Form are all of a Divine Nature It is a Pallace hewn out of the Rock and standing in the Rock of Eternity Gold precious Stones Pearls the Body of the Sun Angelical Substances are as Dung to the Materials of which this Building consisteth It is Eternal above Time and so without Beginning or End above Succession and change It is in the Heavens in the Highest Heavens the Heavens of Eternity the Heavens of Heavens in the Eternal and Supream Spirit It is situate in the most Divine Heighths in the midst of the most Divine Lights Loves Purities Powers and Pleasures in the midst of the most Divine Lives and Immortalities 2. The Groans of burthened Saints We groan being burthened The Burthen is the Earthy Tabernacle This Life The Weight of vanity and
which thou cryest Abba Father Although thou understandest it no more than the Lamb understandeth how or why it is carryed to its Dam and drawn by its bleatings Go thy way then and be no more troubled give thy self up to the instinct and leadings of this holy Spirit within thee Thou shalt certainly see the time when the obscure smoak of the Spiritual Instinct in thee will break up into a clear Light and flame of a Joy unspeakable and Glorious both in the Testimony of the Spirit heard within thee and the Seal of the Spirit seen upon thee either in this Life or in Eternity We read in the 2 of Chron. That Solomons Throne had a Foot-stool of Gold and six steps up to the Throne On each side of these steps were two Lyons that supported every step Thou who hast the Throne of the Divine Nature in the midst of the Spiritual Paradise and Heaven set up within thee in its obscurest and lowest state rest in peace and joy on the Foot-stool itself and upon the lowest step of this Throne For the Foot-stool itself the lowest state is of Gold of an incorruptible and Divine Nature which will certainly in its proper time lift thee up to the full height and Glory of the Throne itself The lowest step here even at the highest hath for its support and guard two Lyons The Lord Jesus the true Lyon of the Tribe of Judah in all the Varieties and Riches of his Spiritual Glories multiplies his Presence and Appearance round about thee to sustain defend and cherish thee in these first beginnings of Grace in thee in the midst of thy darkness and weakness after the same manner in the same Heavenly Person of his in the same fulness of Love Power and Glory as he is with the highest Saints When we began to speak of this first step of the Resurrection or new Birth we propounded four Heads to treat upon 1. The Life which is risen 2. The Death out of which it riseth 3. The Resurrection itself 4. The way of this Resurrection We have finished our discourse upon three of these We are now to speak briefly of the last 4. The way of the Resurrection in the new birth is Jesus Christ. He saith of himself in the Gospel of St. John I am the Way Jesus Christ is the way of this Resurrection in six Steps 1. He is the Price 2. The Head 3. The Root 4. The Pattern 5. The Companion 6. The Life of this Resurrection 1. The Blood of Christ is the Price of this Resurrection Jesus Christ by his Blood hath doubly redeemed us from Death 1. By Purchase giving his Life a Ransom for us to the Divine Justice 2. By Conquest having by the effusion of his Blood and loss of his Life gained a perfect Victory over all the Powers of Darkness 2. The Lord Jesus above in Heaven is the Head of the Resurrection from the Dead In the latter part of the first of Eph. we have Jesus Christ gloriously presented unto us in his Resurrection from the nethermost part of the Earth and in his Ascent above all Heavens Then the Apostle concludes that discourse and Chapter with this Blessed Consolation that God had given him in this Glory of the Resurrection from the Dead to be the Head over all things to his Church Thou who mouâ—nest over thy sins as the worst of Deaths who doubtest who despairest of Life raise thy self to a lively Hope Look up and see thy self already risen in his Resurrection already set down in Heavenly Places together with Christ as a Glorious Spirit in that first Spirit the Head and Fountain of them all from which they are as Inseparable as the Beams in their upper ends are from the Sun Thus St. Paul speaks in the former part of the 2d Chap. of the Eph. upon that Divine Ground which he had laid in the end of the first Chapter That Christ in his Resurrection from the Dead is the Head over all to his Church 3. The Lord Jesus as he is risen from the Dead by his Spiritual Presence in our Hearts is the root of the Resurrection or new Birth in us 1 Corin. 15. Jesus Christ as he is the second Adam is said to be a quickning Spirit and the living corner Stone precious and tryed in his Death and precious in his Resurrection out of which we grow up to be a Temple to God that is both a Spiritual Heaven and a Spiritual Paradise Eph. 3. He is said to dwell in our Hearts by Faith The Lord Jesus is that Spirit which is the Root of all Spirits natural or supernatural the Root of all Life Natural and Spiritual Earthly or Heavenly Humane Angelical or Divine Dost thou feel the weight of Death heavy upon thee hast thou no sense of any spark of true Life in thee to sweeten either Death or Life to thee Look up to thy Root at the bottom of thy Spirit thy Jesus Abide in this Root wait for this Root Here are all the Treasures of Spiritual Life laid up At the set time in the proper season this Root shall spring and bud and blossom and bring forth it 's heavenly Fruits replenished with the Light and sweetness of the Divine Life and spreading themselves thorow thy whole Soul Thus shall that Life of God which thou hast lost which in thy death retired itself hither into its Root rise again in thee and thou be new-born into this Life Thus shall Jesus Christ as an Heavenly Root in thy Heart bring forth himself unto the Life of Faith which is his own Heavenly Image in thee within the Vail the Cloud of Flesh. Thus doth he make thine heart from this Root of Eternity to be an Heavenly Habitation and dwelling place for himself raised up new and Eternal out of the Ruines of Death 4. Our blessed Saviour is the Pattern of the Resurrection to us In the 8th of the Rom. we are said to be predestinated to be conformed to his Image Eph. 1. God is spoken of as working Faith and so bringing forth the Spiritual Life in us according to that exceeding greatness of his Power by which he raised Christ from the Dead We read in the Gospel that a mighty Angel came down from Heaven and rolled away the Stone from the mouth of the Grave while the Watchmen about the Grave were cast into a deep sleep to make way for the rising of Christ. How frequently doth the Soul which feels the horrour of the Spiritual Death think its Resurrection to a Divine Life to the Heavenly Graces and sweet Peaces of that Life impossible Alass the Flesh is as a Grave in which it is shut up Its Lusts and Temptations are as a mighty Stone rolled upon the mouth of this Grave Tempters visible and invisible are as Watchmen round about the Grave to keep thee there But be not discouraged at any of these things O thou disconsolate Soul Look to thy Pattern the Lord Jesus as it was
with him so shall it be with thee A supernatural Power a mighty Angel from Heaven shall bind up thy Tempters thy Spiritual Enemies in chains of Darkness as in a deep sleep shall remove the great Stone the most powerful Lusts and Temptations from the mouth of thy Grave God himself in his Power in the greatness of his Power as it excelleth and transcendeth all Powers all things all thoughts of men or Angels God himself in his Almightiness in the infiniteness of his Power and God-head God himself in the immediate naked most potent most high most Glorious Appearances and Operations of his God-head shall come down upon thee shall arise and shine in thee and as he riseth raise thee together with himself into the Light of Life Whil'st thou lyest in Sin thy true Person or Life lie together dead in thee as to thee But beneath thy Soul at the bottom of it they lie hid in God who is the ground of every natural being and the Treasury of all Spiritual Beings At the season of the new birth God discocovers himself in thy Soul as a glorious ground out of which thy Life and thy Jesus spring up together by degrees like Twin-lillies Roses from the same stalk or root which is Christ. Thus shalt thou rise from the Dead with a shout of Heavenly Joys 5. Christ is the Companion in the Resurrection St. Paul tells the Galatians he travels in birth again with them till Christ be formed in them We read 1 Corin. 6. He that is joyned to the Lord is one Spirit A saint and Christ are one Spirit by a Spiritual Marriage which makes two Spirits perfectly one yet so that they remain perfectly and distinctly two in one When thou risest from the dead in Regeneration thy Jesus riseth together with thee out of that Grave in thy Heart into which thou hast cast him by thy Sin at the Fall when thou in thy true Life and Paradise in thee fell into the same Grave together with him Jesus Christ and the Soul spring up together in the first Creation as Twins For St. John saith in his first Chapter of his Gospel that without him that is in a single state disjoyned from Christ was nothing made that was made Christ and the Soul like two Twin-lillies flourished together in Paradise Together they died by the Fall Many times since thy birth into this world have Jesus Christ and with him that Beautiful and Blessed Life which thou enjoyed'st in Paradise been rising again into thy Heart into a more excelling Paradise that in the Spirit and in Heaven which is Eternal But alass thou hast still thrown them back again into the same Grave in thy flesh by the new wounds which thy renewed Lusts and Unbelief have given them Notwithstanding all this when the set time is come nothing can withstand the rising in thee Jesus Christ and thy Soul are together born anew in thee from the womb of Eternal Love where they lay hid and wrapt up together in the Grave itself They now come up together in one Spirit into one Spiritual Life and Heavenly Image in which Paradise also comes up new and fresh together with them By the same immediate and glorious operation of the God-head they break irresistibly forth thorow the darknesses of the night and scatters them and breaks them up as it shines thorow them How blessed is this Union and Fellowship Christ and the Soul ever undivided grow up now together in the mutual sight in the mutual embraces of each other thorow every state and degree of the Regeneration or Resurrection Light or Darkness Solaces or Sufferings Life or Death In all by the Heavenly Union they are mutually a Crown of rejoycing one to another 6. Christ is the Life of this Resurrection So himself testiâ—ieth in the 11 of St. John I am the Resurrection and the Life How sure how sweet is thy Life O Believer who art risen from the Death of Sin and born again to thine Heavenly Father Thy Life is sure It is Christ himself the Power God eternal Life itself who is thy Life the Life of thy Graceâ— here the Living Hope of Glory in Heaven the Life of God in thee which never dies in the midst of Death Thy Life is sweet O Believer How unexpressible is this pleasure to feel Jesus Christ himself the only delight of the Father in Eternity the only Delight of all the Holy Angels and Glorified Saints in Heaven springing up in thy Heart flowing thorow thy whole Soul and Person working in all acting all as Life in thee Thus I have finished this fourth Head the way of the Resurrection in its first step the Regeneration or New-birth and the discourse itself upon this subject FINIS ERRATA'S PAge 15. line 22. for word r. world p. 19. l. 25. for and thou r. O thou p. 55. l. 1. for spirit r. letter p. 66. l. 15. for three r. four p. 115. l. 38. dele by p. 126. l. 2. dele the first have p. 139. l. 2. for ni r. in l. 14. for an r. any p. 151. l. 1. for no r. not l. 7. for diviness r. divineness p. 158. l 22. for thee r. the p. 175. l. uâ—â— for their r. there p. 189. l. 16. for because r. and 3dly because p. 194. l. 14. for word r. words p. 205. l. 11. dele the first 1 p. 206. l. 32. for beautiful r. beauty p. 208. l. 39. dele at the word below p. 210. l. 17. for of spirit r. of the spirit p. 211. l. 20. for creature r. creatures p. 228. l. 35. for forms r. form p. 236. l. 24. for each in r. each creature in p. 249. l. 20. for form r. forms p. 252. l. 33. for though be it r. though it be p. 279. l. 9. for Vse 3 d r. Vse 4 th p. 294. l. 35. for pants r. plants p. 297. l. 5. for the glory r. with glory p. 299. l. 27. for 4 r. 1. p. 300. l. 32. for so God is light r. so God is life p. 301. l. 31. for the Divine Sea r. the Divine Saint p. 311. l. 3. for 3 steps r. 4 steps p. 314. l. 11. for is vizor r. is a vizor p. 315. l. 28. for thine nature r. thy nature l. 39. for fields r. field p. 319. l. 39 for is it r. it is p. 321. l. 16. for thy will r. thy God p. 325. l. 22. for four r. two p. 329. l. 17. for nature of this thing r. nature of things p. 332. l. 33. for which the will r. which is the will p. 335. l. 35. for are r. have p. 341. l. 4. for flesh r. fleshly p. 342. l. 19. for beware r. 2 dly beware p. 349 l. 41. for it conquest r. its conquest p. 350. l. 39. dele the Light p. 352. l. 14. for to the end r. to the end are removed p. 380 l. 25. for thus r. thou l. 41. for o passionate r. of passionate p. 392. l. 36. for poureâ—h r. poured p. 423. l. 9. for are r. ere p. 433. l. 7. for tof r. of p. 448. l. 27. for it it r. it p. 450. l. 17. for so r. see p. 451. l. 21. for same r. next for 1 Cor. r. 2 Cor. p. 472. l. 32. for resteth r. rested p. 480 l. 7. r. form p. 512. l. 3. r. Look to thy Root
that which is Natural then that which is Spiritual so it is true in this First is the Servile State in Religion then the Son-like So we read Gal. 4. 7. Now are ye no more Servants but Sons Thus the Son-like State is the second step or Remove in Religion But it will be necessary for me to open the Servile State first that the Son-like may be the better understood 1. State Servile This State hath Four Signs 1. Sign Fear 2. Sign Dependencies 3. Sign Forms 4. Sign Solicitude 1. Sign Fear A Saint in a Servile State serves God chiefly from a Principle of Fear Rom. 8. 15. Ye have not received the Spirit of Bondage again to fear St. Paul doth not speak here of a Sinful State in Nature but of a Servile State in Grace This will appear clearly if you compare this place with the fourth Chapter of the Epistle to the Galatians You shall see in both Places the Twofold State of a Servant and a Son in Religion described alike almost in the same terms Rom. 8. 15. Ye have not received the Spirit of Bondage again Galat. 4. 1. The Heir while a Child differeth nothing from a Servant v. 3. Ye were in bondage to worldly Elements V. 7. Now are ye no longer Servants Rom. 8. 15 17. But the Spirit of Adoption whereby ye cry Abba Father Now are ye Sons if Sons then Heirs Galat. 4. 6. He hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our Hearts whereby we cry Abba Father 7. Sons and Heirs c. Thus the Spirit of Bondage is a Spirit sent forth from God in the ministry of the Law Therefore the Apostle saith Ye have not received the Spirit of Bondage This Spirit begets men to God but it is in a Servile-State by and to Fear Fear is the Seed and Fruit of this Spirit So a man by it becomes a Son to God but by the Bond-woman So he is partly a Son partly a Servant or rather a Son in the State of a Servant But I must further explain this Fear by 1. The Distinction of Fear 2. The Object 1. The Distinction of Fear There is a Twofold Fear 1. Fear Slavish 2. Fear Filial 1. Fear Slavish This Fear comes before Love and is cast out when Love comes 1 John 4. 18. Perfect Love casteth out Fear But what Fear is this That which is Slavish So it is added Fear hath Torment A Slavish Fear is to the Heart as Fire is to Gold Gold is wrought by the Fire to a softness and fitness to receive the King's Image then it is taken out of the Fire So this Fear subdues the Heart to a yielding temper to receive the Impressions and Image of God in Love Then it is cast ouâ— 2. Fear Filial This follows after Love flows from it is as sweet and desirable as Love itself The Scripture saith in one Place Who would not fear thee This Fear is a Plyantness of the Soul to God yielding to him form a near sense of his Greatness and Goodness both in one It is like the Bowing of some Flowers towards the Sun being toucht with his Influences and Beams Revel 14. 6. An Angel in the midst of Heaven preacheth the Everlasting Gospel What is the Everlasting Gospel The glad Tidings of Eternal Love in God to the Creature This Angel at the seventh v. cries aloud Fear God This Fear answers Love and Ecchos to it in the Heart Love saith God is thine Fear saith I will no more be mine own Love saith God will come down into thee and fill thee Fear saith I will sink down out of my self and give way to God The Filial Fear is proper to the Son-like State It is the Slavish Fear which is the Sign of that Servile State of which we now speak A Son-like State hath Love for its Eldest Child Fear for its Youngest A Servile State hath Fear for its First-born Love here is a Younger Brother In the Son Fear is the Motion of Love In the Servant it is the Motive to Love The Servant is the Son of the Bond-woman The Son is born of the Free-woman The Soul in a Servile State of Religion ascends out of Flesh towards God So Fear is First and Love riseth out of Fear as Fire out of Smoak The Soul in a Son-like state descends comes down from God as a Bride ready trim'd So Lâ—ve is First and brings forth Fear as a pure Flame breaths from it a fine Air. This is the Distinction of Fear This the Sign of a Servile State a Slavish Fear 2. The Object of Fear This is exprest by the Holy Ghost Heb. 2. 15 Those that were held in bondage by the Fear of Death The Jews were under the Law in a Servile State under a Slavish Fear This Fear had Death in its Eye for its Object Death hath two things in it Loss and Pain Loss of Life with all the Sweets and Comforts of Life Pain in the Labours and Pangs at the parting of Soul and Body Thus a Slavish Fear hath a Twofold Object 1 Object Loss 2. Object Pain 1. Object Loss A Christian in a Servile State fears the Loss of God more than God The Fear of God makes a man sink out of himself into God Fear of Loss of him makes a man apt to sink into himself in Despair A Servile Christian fears the loss of Gods Favour more than the loss of God the loss of the Fruits of his Favour which are Peace within Prosperity without more than the loss of his Favour 2. Object Pain A Spiritual Son-like Saint fears the Departures of God the loss of Divine Enjoyments more then all Pains or Tortures But the Servant in Religion is not any thing so much sensible of the loss of all the joys in Heaven as he is struck with trembles at the pains of Hell Iohn the Baptist was a Figure of the Servile State He presseth his Exhortation with such Reasons as these The Axe is laid to the Root of the Tree Save your selves from that wrath which is to come Iesus Christ was the Head and Figure of the Son-like State He moveth by other Arguments The Kingdom of God is at hand Light is come into the World Come to me and have life in abundance I have done with the First and most apparent Sign of a Servile State Fear 2. Sign Dependencies A Servile Christian seeks God chiefly by outward Assistances Gal. 3. 24. The Law was a School-master to bring us to Christ. A School-master ties Children to their set Times Rules Exercises till they can speak a Language judge of Truth converse with wisdom naturally from inward and free Principles So the Law which is the Mistris under whom we are in bondage teacheth us to seek Communion with God at peculiar Times The Forming of our Spirits according to God by particular Rules The Deriving of Truths Strengths Comforts from God by several Performances This is our way of Life till the Seed of Life be come up
can make Darkness in thy Soul His Secret place out of which he shoots his invenomed arrows into thy heart He can make thick Clouds upon thy Soul his Pavilion from whence he will make war upon thee Thus we must distinguish upon the Appearances of God 2. Distinct. Secondly we must distinguish upon the Person of God as He is in Himself and as He is in Jesus Christ. 1. First God as He is in Himself is One One rest and blessedness in every State Thus God is All in All all that sweetness peace joy in every Appearance which he is in any Appearance It is said in Job of the Earth as it was in its first State No stranger passed thorow it So it is true of the God-Head in its first State in its simplicity that there is no Strange Appearance there This Throne of God wherever it is set up is a Circle and every hand is the Right Hand there every Shape in which God puts forth Himself is Love 2. Secondly God as He is in Iesus Christ hath his Right and his Left Hand his Sweet and Strange Appearances Light and Darkness Love and Wrath Revel 6. 16. They cry to the Rocks and the Mountains to fall upon them to hide them from the wrath of the Lamb. Jesus Christ witnesseth John 5. 22. The Father judgeth no man but hath committed all judgment to the Son This distinguishing and dividing Judgment by which God puts forth Himself in Love upon some in Wrath upon others is not exercised by the Father that is by God as He is in Himself but by the Son that is by God as He is in Jesus Christ. This is the Kingdom of God the shining forth of the God-Head from the right hand of the Lord Jesus in its own proper Glory calming and clearing up all in the Soul scattering like Clouds those strange Appearances of Darkness and Terrour into which God had before put himself This is Christ shewing us the Father discovering God in his First Light as He is the Fountain of Love where there is neither Fear nor Torment Use. 1. For Tryal By this we may try our selves whether we be in the Kingdom of God or no. The Kingdom of God is Peace If you be truly in Peace you are of a truth in the Kingdom of God I will enlarge this Tryal by Three Instances which are the Glory the Grace the Blessing of God 1. Glory First the Glory of God and the Peace of God ever go together Luk. 2. 14. In the Angels Song these two are united Glory to God on high Peace on Earth Jesus Christ when he came down from Heaven and was incarnate Angels in their Praises and Prayers at the Incarnation joyn these two Spiritual Glory and Spiritual Peace as undivided in their Life and Death in their absence and presence The Soul that is without Peace is indeed without in that Darkness which is without whither nothing of the Glory of God comes whence no Glory is given to God If thou canst live without Peace thou livest in a true Hell where there is nothing of the Light of the Glory of God nor any desire of it If thou hadst any taste or glympse of the Glory of God in thy Soul thou wouldst feel a sweet peace within thee with thy God with thy self and with all things The Glory of God is a Healing a Uniting a Perfecting thing it makes all perfect in One Mal. 4. 2. A Sun of Righteousness shall arise with healing in his Wings The Sun-shine of Glory falling from the Face of God upon the Soul in any degree sweetly and soundly closeth up wounds maketh up breaches and divisions in the Spirit The Wings of the Sun are his Beams Each touch of any one Beam of the Glory of God upon the Soul carries a healing lenifying appeasing vertue 2. Grace Secondly the Grace and the Peace of God ever go together St. Paul when he prays for the Saints at the beginning of all his Epistles joyns these Two Grace and peace from God our Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ. So much of the Grace of God as goes forth into the Soul so much of Peace goes along with it Where there is no Peace there is no Grace There is a Two-fold Grace of God the Love of God towards the Soul the Loveliness or Image of God in the Soul 1. Where there is nothing of Peace there is nothing of the Grace of God that is of the Love of God yet appearing to that Soul Where the Love of God is poured forth it is an overflowing Sweetness 1 Corin. 13. 5. Charity thinketh no ill This Charity which is said in the same Chapter to be perfect to remain for ever can be no other than the Love of God let down from Heaven into the Soul and revealed there gathering the Soul up into itself to dwell in this Love The Soul that dwells in this Love thinks no evil of God of itself of any thing but is at peace with all hath sweet thoughts of all For the Love of God is its Eye by which it sees and its Heart by which it thinks It sees God itself and all things by the Light of this Love it thinks of all things by the Strength of this Love 2. Where there is nothing of Peace there is nothing of the Grace of God that is of the loveliness of God of the Beauty of Holiness in that Soul So much of Peace so much of Holiness and Spirituality So much of Distraction and Disquiet so much of Corruption and Carnality Where things begin to descend there begins Flesh and Division As things descend and go lower so these things increase Where things begin to ascend there begins Spirit Spirituality Unity and Peace The more we ascend and go upward the more we increase in these 3. Blessing Thirdly the Blessing and the Peace of God ever go together Prov. 15. 17. Better is a Dinner of Herbs with Love than a stalled Ox with hatred Love is the Womb of Peace and Hatred is the Mother of Unquietness as appears by that place Prov. 10. 12. Hatred stirreth up strife but Love covereth a multitude of Sins Didst thou live at the highest rate of all content in thine outward man and hadst no peace in thy Soul thou couldst have nothing blest to thee All thy delicacies would have a bitterness on thy palate and a venom in thy bowels that will never suffer thee to have a true joy in any thing which thou enjoyest Hadst thou but a Dinner of Herbs the lowest fare such as the Cattel may have together with thee and hadst Spiritual peace with it these Herbs would have such a blessing in them that they would be as the food of Paradise was to man when he had Herbs and all Green things given him for meat If thine inward man had a stalled Ox those Oxen which Wisdom slays Prov. 9. 2. prepared for it the strongest notions the highest Mysteries set before thine understanding
her upon itself as upon a Bed of Rest. By this time we see what the Holy Ghost means by the Heart and the Bed Let us now return to that place of that Psalmist for the opening of which we have brought in all these Scriptures Psal. 4. 4. Commune with your own Heart upon your Bed and be still that is discourse not with your Spirit as it lives in this Body upon these Outward Appearances For so it is one with the Strange Woman it is a Strange Heart it is a Fountain that makes itself common and defiles itself it is not your own Fountain alone your own Heart but a wandring false lying Heart Retire your self into your Chamber in which the Candle of the Lord shines that is into your Spirit as it hath the Spirit of God for the Spring of Natural Light and Life in it Here wait quietly and silently for the openings of the Spirit of God in the secret Voice of Nature within you But stay not here Silence this Spirit too draw your self yet more inward into the Spirit of the Lord Jesus as He is the Inward Man within the more inward than the secretest Retirements of the Natural Spirit Here cast thy self upon thy Bed in thy Heart and commune with thy Heart upon thy Bed This is thy Bed and thy Heart both in one Here lay thy self at Rest upon this Spirit which is the Comforter advise with this Spirit which is the only Counsellor the Spirit of Truth So be thou still let thine own Spirit the Spirit of this World and Nature in thee be silent He that thus hearkens in Silence what the Lord will say shall certainly hear him speak Peace to his Saints The Spirit of God in thy Natural Man may speak of Wrath to thee and God will confirm that voice of Wrath in the Spirit of thy Natural Man And so here thou canst find no Bed to comfort thee But go a little beyond thy Natural Man and thou shalt meet with the Spirit of God as it is in its own Freedom and Fulness in the Lord Jesus Here is a Bed ready prepared for thee Now silence thine own Spirit for ever and hear no more what the Spirit in thine own Spirit speaks but what this Spirit speaks as it is here in Jesus Christ and this Spirit will certainly make thee to hear the voice of Joy and Gladness Thus the Lord giveth his Beloved Rest not in themselves but in Himself I have now finished the First Part of Spiritual Peace which is Silence the Silencing of a Three-fold Spirit the Spirit of Wrath from God the Spirit of the Devil the Spirit of Man 2. Part Satisfaction The Second Part of Spiritual Peace is Satisfaction This consists in Two Things 1. A Sweet League with all things 2. A Satisfactory Rest in this League 1. A Sweet League with all things There can be no Satisfaction where there is any thing wanting and not made up or any thing Crooked and not made straight as Solomon speaks Eccl. 1. 15. There is no Satisfaction where there is Division or Contention Jobs Friends promiseth this Satisfaction to Job Job 5. 23. Thou shalt be in League with the Stones of the Field and the Beasts of the Field shall be at Peace with thee v. 24. And thou shalt know that thy Tabernacle shall be in Peace Behold a League wiâ—h all things below thee Beasts and Stones Principles and Appearances of Life descending are the Beasts The Stones are the Principles and Appearances of Darkness descended to the lowest the Dead Images of things Behold a League here with all things above thee thy Tabernacle shall be in Peace The Powers above thee are thy Tabernacle The Angels are thy Tabernacle God is thy Tabernacle Thou shalt dwell peaceably in these These shall be in Peace not in stormy or fiery Appearances upon thee Behold a League with all Times with Eternity Thou shalt know that thy Tabernacle shall be in Peace Thou shalt not fear what is to come because all Times to come shall be in Covenant with thee Whatever Times come to others still thy Tabernacle thy Angel thy God shall be peace upon thee and this thou shalt know before hand This is that League with all things which Jobs Friend promiseth to him without which there can be no Satisfaction or Peace Quest. But you will perhaps ask me how this League is made Ans. I answer that it is made by living in the Spirit of Jesus Christ. This Spirit in you is this League or Covenant For the Spirit is the Unity and hath the Band of Peace in itself Ephes. 4. 3. The Lord who is the Spirit is call'd the God of the Spirits of all Flesh Num. 16. 12. and 27. 16. This place agrees with that Luk. 20. 38. God is the God of the Living not of the Dead for all things live to Him As our Saviour said that Little Children had their Angels which beheld the Face of God in Heaven So it is most true that each Fleshly Appearance hath its Spirit in which it lives with and to God Every Beast or Stone hath its Angel in which it is comprehended after a living manner and by which it is governed Every Angel hath its Spirit in Jesus Christ in which itself is again comprehended after a Divine manner and by which it is entirely managed Thus the Spirits of all things are in the Spirit of Jesus Christ. The Spirit of every Creature which is the Scepter that sways it the Lawâ—giver to it is in the haâ—d of the Spirit of Christ and goes forth from between his Feet If then thou wouldst be in League with all things and at Peace with them be thou One Spirit with Jesus Christ so all Things and Times shall be One Spirit with thee and this Unity of Spirit is the Bond of Peace To be Spiritually-minded is Life and Peace Rom. 8. 6. If thou wouldst live comfortably take hâ—â—d of dwâ—lling in the Fleshly Tabernacle in the Fleshly Savour and rellish of things Let thy understanding and Soul abide in the Spirit of God So thou shalt converse always every where with lively and lovely Objects All things round about thee within thee without thee shall have Life and a Harmony a Tuneableness with themselves and with thy Spirit a Peace-fulness in their Life All things shall have an Angelical Life and Sweetness to thee as they have to the Elect Angels All things shall have a Divine Life and Sweetness to thee as they have to God This is the First thing in which Satisfaction consists a Sweet League with all things 2. A Satisfactory Rest in this League This is the Second Thing in which the Satisfaction of Spiritual Peace confists Es. 14. 3. And it shall come to pass in that day the Lord shall give thee Rest from thy Sorrow and from thy Fear and from thy hard Bondage wherein thou wast made to serve Poor Soul while thou livest in the Darkness of Fleshly things
The Spiritual Man at first lies hid under the Natural Man as Seed under the Ground So St. Paul speaks of it Gal. 3. 19. Wherefore then served the Law it was added because of Transgressions till the Seed should come to whom the Promise was made and it was ordained by Angels in the hand of a Mediator While a Man lives under the Law the Seed of Promise is not yet come that is the Spiritual Man which is One with Christ and so the Promised Seed is not come up or put forth in the Soul But it lies hid under the Ministry of Angels which restrain Sin by inward Impressions and outward Dispensations of the Good or Evil Things of this World and it lies hid under a Mediator which is the Earthly Image of God according to this Creation in which God stands as a Mediator between Man and Himself in the Spiritual Image which is the Heavenly Person of Jesus Christ. God in this Earthly Image Heightens and Suppresseth Sin by his Divided Appearances of Mercy and Wrath by his Divided Administrations of Allurement and Terror Reward and Punishment Thus God as a Mediator stands between Man and the Person of Christ hiding that Person together with the Spiritual Man which is in Christ from Man And so God converseth with Man at this Distance after this manner till the Seed come in which God and Man are no more Two but One Spirit in Jesus Christ. This is the First State of the Spiritual Man 2 Secondly the Spiritual Man breaks forth thorow the Natural Man appears in it and together with it Gal. 2. 20. I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me and the life which I live is by the Faith of the Son of God c. Christ and the Spiritual Man are joyned together by an inseparable Union When these break forth in a Man yet clothed with Flesh they draw the Person of a Man to have his Life in themselves as in his proper Principle They shew forth themselves to him as that Appearance and Image of Things in which he is to dwell The Principles of Nature are now as a Death to a Man so far as he abides in them The Fleshly Image of Things is a Prison or an Inchantment or a Whorish Woman to him He loaths the Embraces of it though he cannot quite shake it off A Saint now labours to crucify and casts off both these Yet while he is shut up in them he comforts himself in he casts himself upon the Spiritual Man and the Life of Christ which dwell in These together with him and look forth thorow these as thorow the Lattices upon him 3. The Third State of the Spiritual Man is that in which he is Absolute free from the Bonds of the Flesh no more Comprehended by but Comprehending the Natural Man in himself St. Paul speaks of this State 2 Corin. 5. 2. In this we groan earnestly desiring to be cloathed upon with our House which is from Heaven As Jesus Christ is at the same time Blessed and Glorious in Heaven yet withal living in thy Flesh who art a Member of Him and suffering with thee So thy Spiritual Man even while it is streightned here below in thy Natural Life is at Liberty above in Heaven in Jesus Christ. This Man at once comes down from Above in its full Glory upon thee and breaks forth from Below from out of thy Fleshly Life to a full Liberty And this is the House which comes down from Heaven to cloath thee that thou mayst not be naked But this House from Heaven doth not cloath thee till thy Earthly Tabernacle be dissolved in Death as appears by the first verse of that Chapter cited next before 2 Corin. 5. 1. When our Earthly Tabernacle is dissolved we have a House not made with Hands Eternal in the Heavens These are the Three States of the Spiritual Man The First of these is the Legal State of a Christian. The Second is the Evangelical State before Death The Third is the Angelical State that State to which we cannot come but by Death or a Change instead of Death when as Jesus Christ speaketh We shall be as the Angels in Heaven Thus much we have spoken of the First Distinction 2. Distinct. The Second Distinction is upon the Spiritual Man in the Evangelical State or upon an Evangelical Christian in this Life He also hath Three Distinct Growths St. Iohn speaks of all Three in One Place 1 John 2. 12. I write to you Little Children because your Sins are forgiven for his Names sake v. 13. I write unto you Fathers because you have known Him who is from the Beginning I write unto you Young Men because ye have overcome the Wicked One. I write unto you little Children because ye have known the Father v. 14. I have written unto you Fathers because ye have known Him that is from the Beginning I have written unto you Young Men because ye are strong and the Word of God abideth in you and ye have overcome the Wicked One The Apostle doubles his mention of all Three Growths for Certainty and Efficacy that we may take the more Clear and Distinct notice of it He placeth the Two Extreams the Children and Fathers First Then he puts the Middle-State in the Last Place because that is the more Remarkable and Active in the World The Children are not yet grown up to the Conflict The Fathers are past the Brunt and violence of it For the same Reason in his Repetition he adds something when he speaks of the Young Men to encourage them Now let us speak a word or two particularly of Each of these Growths 1. The First Growth of an Evangelical Christian is his Child-hood The spiritual Man when it first begins to put forth itself in us suits itself much to our Natural Capacities puts itself into Fleshly Forms and Appearances as into Swathing Bands Yet it submits and subordinates all these Appearances to the Spiritual Appearance itself in the highest and most grown State It Owns That It Depends upon That It Directs its Growth to That Thus it is a Little Child and Knows the Father 2. Secondly an Evangelical Christian comes to be a Young Man This is then when thou comest to distinguish between the Fleshly and the Spiritual Appearances of the Spiritual Man or of Jesus Christ in thee When a Saint grows strong in Spiritual Appearances when he begins to abide firm in them then he sets himself against the Fleshly Appearances because the Devil hath his Chiefest Strength and Seat in them And now thou hast overcome the Wicked One when once thou hast discovered and discerned the Fleshly Appearances from the Spiritual Life itself When thou labourest to crucify the One as fast as it Grows up that thou mayst live more abundantly in the Other thou hast now taken from the Devil his most Principal Power and Engine He is now falling apace like Lightning from Heaven in thy Soul This is
have strong Temptations mighty Lusts and no Power to withstand them I cannot Trust in God or Believe in Jesus Christ I find no Profit in the Ordinances I take no Pleasure at all in Spiritual Things Obj. But you will say may I not rejoyce when I discover the Workings of Grace in my Heart Is it not a just Cause of Grief when I feel my Heart hardned from the Love and Fear of God Ans. There is a Right and a Wrong Way of Rejoycing and Grieving in these Things The Mistake lies here in not Distinguishing between these Ways Psal. 3. 7. David rejoyc'd that the Lord by his Favour had made his Mountain so strong But this Mirth was quickly turn'd into Mourning It would not have been so if David instead of Rejoycing in the Mountain made strong by the Favour of the Lord had Rejoyc'd in the Lord and his Favour which made that Mountain strong Or rather if instead of that Favour of the Lord he had made the Lord of that Favour his Joy Psal. 77. Asaph abandoned all Joy and gave himself over to Grief for Gods With-drawings from him in the Sensible Conveyances of His Grace to his Soul v. 2. 3. c. But he repents himself of Measuring his Ioy or Grief by this Standard and finds a Cause of Joy above these Troubles v. 10. I said This is mine Infirmity but I will remember the Years of the Right Hand of the most High I shall speak of Spiritual Mourning when I come to the next Mistake In the mean time I will give you Two Rules for the Removing of the Mistake in this Point of Grounding our Joys The Two Rules are These 1. Rule Make God as He is in Himself the Object of your Ioy without any Consideration of your selves at all 2. Rule Take the Rise of your Ioy from Iesus Christ not as He Communicates Himself to you but as He Comprehends you in Himself I will begin with the First Rule 1. Rule Make God as He is in Himself the Object of your Ioy without any Consideration of your selves at all When St. Paul commands Joy he confines us to the Person of God for the Matter of our Joy Philip. 3. 1. Finally Brethren Rejoyce in the Lord. The Person of the Lord hath Space and Room and Entertainment enough for thy Joys in their largest Extent Thou needst not wander besiâ—es the Tents of any Creature within thee or without thee Do but still Pitch thy Thoughts upon this Mark and thou shalt have Plenty of Joy He that makes God as He is Alone the Matter of his Rejoycing will find Abundant matter of Joy in every Season You have David's Example in this kind Psal. 118. 14. The Lord is my Strength and Song He is become my Salvation The Lord is then Strong in you and for you when you receive Him in the Simplicity of His Nature unmixt with anything of the Creature God is weakned and straitned when He is Compounded with any other thing You bring Him out of Himself and below Himself when you joyn Him with any thing besides Himself It is said of Jesus Christ in the Gospel that in One Place He could do no Great Work because of Their Unbelief Faith is the Emptying and Filling Grace It Empties the Soul of itself and the Creature It Fills the Soul with God While we abide in Unbelief that is in any Thing of our Own or the Creatures we weaken God in us we bind Him and make Him un-able He can do no Great Work in us We have God in Power when we have Him in Purity we have Him in Purity when we have Him in the Simplicity and Nakedness of his own Person Thus the Lord is thy Strength And thus must He be thy Song the Subject of thy Joy When thou singest of God alone then art thou strong and hast strong Joys The Lord is thy Salvation So far as thou goest out of thy self and the World so far as thou entrest into God thou entrest into Salvation Joy and Heaven itself I will back this Rule with some Particular Motives 1. Motive Look to God in the Nakedness of His own Person and you shall see Light without any Darkness John 8. 12. Jesus Christ saith of Himself I am the Light of the World He that followeth me shall not walk in Darkness but shall have the Light of Life Our Saviour is the Light that points and chalks out our way to us He is the Star that goes before us and stands over the God-Head as the House in which He and We must find our Rest and dwell for Ever Follow Christ. Which way goes Christ He goes by the Cross and thorow Death He descends to the Lowermost Darkness Then He ascends thorow all things till He comes above All. He goes up above the Highest Heavens into God Go you after the Lord Jesus Tread in the Steps of this Shepherd of the Flock Go by the Cross the Death and the lowest Darkness Carry every thing of the Creature with thee this Way into These Then rise up out of All pass thorow All till thou come beyond All unto the High and Holy Habitation of the God-Head If thy Heart be in this Treasure of the Divine Nature if thine Eye be upon it and thy Way be towards it thy Way itself shall be a Light of Truth and Joy without any Darknâ—ss Psal. 104. 2. Who coverest thy self with Light as with a Garment and stretchest out the Heavens like a Curtain Every Thing of the Creature is a Covering upon God even the Brightest the most Beautiful Piece of the Creature the Light itself The Highest and most Glorious Things the Heavens themselves are Curtains drawn before the Lord Hiding and Darkning Him to us You must break thorow the Light of Angels the Highest Heavens the Divinest Excellencies of this Creation into the Open Face of the Godâ—Head if you will have the true Light of Peace and Joy in your Spirits While you sit under any Thâ—ng Created you sit under a Cloud in the Dark you can never be free from Fears Doubts Uncertainties and Unsatisfactions This is the First Motive 2. Motive Set your Heart and Thoughts on God in the Simplicity of His own Nature and you shall sit down under Love without any Mixture of Wrath. Esa. 27. 4. The Lord saith of Himself Fury is not in me who would set the Bryars and Thorns against me in Battel I would go through them I would burn them together God as He is in the Singleness of His own Person and Nature hath nothing of Wrath in Him but all Sweetness Love and Blessedness God in Himself is Light and Love He is a Fire a Principle of Wrath only as He is in the Fleshly Creature Straitned Imprisoned and Resisted by the Darkness of the Flesh. If you hold up any Created Strength or Excellency before God you set Bryars and Thorns against Him upon which God Kindles in his Wrath as a Consuming Fire 1 Corin.
2 Corin. 12. 2. He tells us of a Man in Christ caught up to the Third Heaven v. 3. Such a Man Paul knew v. 4. This Man heard Un-utterable Words in Paradise v. 5 Of such a One saith St. Paul I will glory Three Distinct Persons are mentioned in this Discourse Yet all these Three prove One. 1. First here is the Person of Christ as it is in the Third Heaven The First Heaven is the Starry Heaven For so we read He called the Firmament Heaven Gen. 1. 8. The nature of Angels makes the Second Heaven So we read Gen. 21. 17. The Angel of God called to Hagar out of Heaven and they are called The Angels of Heaven The Third Heaven seems to be the Natural Image and Presence of God as he is the head of Angels This is called The face of God Psal. 42. 2. Mat. 18. 10. In this Heavenly appearance was Paradise the flourishing State of all the Creatures in the Divine Image This Image was withdrawn at the fall and not brought forth again in its own naked Appearance till Jesus Christ brought it forth to Light after a Spiritual manner in His own Person by His Resurrection from the Dead 2. Secondly here is the Person of St. Paul as it is wholly Spiritual in Union with the Person of Christ Comprehended in One Spirit Ascending and Caught up into One Glory with him 3. Thirdly Here is the Person of St. Paul as it is a Mixt Person partly Spiritual partly Natural This Man as he was spiritual had a fellowship with the Man in Glory knew him did bear that Image and Impression of those Words which were spoken and those Glories which were seen in Paradise But as he was Natural so he could not Utter those Heavenly Words nor Understand that State whether it were the Last Resurrection to the Glory of the Body or the first Entrance and Abod of the Soul naked in Glory at Death Of such an one I will Glory saith St. Paul v. 5. that is of the Heavenly Man the Man of Paradise that is of the Natural Man as it is caught up into the Spiritual Man of the Spiritual Man as it is Comprehended in Christ and together with Him caught up into Paradise Thou mayest Joy and Glory in that Man that Self only which is above a Man above thy self which is compleat in Christ as Christ is compleat in the Glory of God Of Such a One I will Glory saith St. Paul that is of that Man whose Resemblance and Likeness I saw and was taken up and transfigured into it when I had that Revelation fourteen years ago But of my self saith he I will not boast He calls himself the Man in that Mixt State in which he now was on Earth having the Power of Christ made manifest in his Weakness This Rule hath two Parts in it One is Negative the Other is Affirmative 1. Part The First is the Negative Part of this Rule which is This Take not the Rise of your Ioy from Iesus Christ as he communicates Himself to you on Earth The Communications of Christ to us in the Natural Man are 1. Uncertain 2. Imperfect 3. Unsatisfactory 4. Un-safe for an Object of Joy 1. First The Communications of Christ in our Natural Man are Uncertain They are like the Shining of the Sun upon the Earth which is ever and anon cut off by a Cloud comiâ—g between the Earth and the Sun So Sins Temptations Desertions make the Breakin gs forth of Christ upon Us Fleeting and Changeable Jesus Christ complains of his Father forsaking Him Neither is there any Member of Christ that lives in the Body which doth not often find cause to grieve for the Withdrawings of Jesus Christ. The Psalms are the Discovery and History of a Holy Soul in her whole Câ—urse and in all her Tempers How often have ye there Sad mention made of Gods hiding his Face If thou take thy Joy no higher than from the Puttings forth of Christ in thee thou wilt be very Wavering and Unconstant in all thy Comforts Thou canst have no Sure or Setled Joy this way Thou wilt be able to bear no Tryal when thou shalt be carried thorow the Waters of Darkness and Desolation thorow the Fires of Terrour and burning Tribulation The Strength of thy Joy will be Small and thou wilt faint in the Day of Adversity 2. Secondly The Communications of Christ in our Flesh are Imperfect They are Imperfect Two ways 1. In Degree 2. By Mixture 1. In Degree All our Graces are thus Imperfect while we are in This World I count not my Self to have apprehended saith St. Paul Phil 3. 13. I press towards the Mark v. 14. While you look upon your Graces for Comfort you can never have a Full Joy because you have no Grace which doth not in Many Degrees fall short of the Mark in Jesus Christ the Glory of God to which ye are called He that takes his Joy from the Manifestations of Christ in his Flesh is like him that feeds upon Uâ—ripe Fruit which hath a Sowrness in the Taste and a Watâ—rishness in the Nourishment So will this Man have a Bitterness and Weakness in his Dearest Comforts 2. By Mixture This is a Second Way in which the Graces of Christ are Imperfect in us Rom. 7. 21. St. Paul complains I find a Law that when I would do Good Evil is present with me How many sad Throws have we how near are we brought to Despair full many a Time when we go to derive our Joys from what we can discover of Jesus Christ in us If we pitch our Thoughts upon Faith Love Obedience Humility Heavenly-Mindedness we find these only as Weaâ— Inclinations in us We would do good But then Evil is present with us At the same time like Satan in the midst of the Sons of God Unbelief Lust Hatred Pride Worldliness appear together with our Graces and so mingled with them that it becomes very difficult to determine which is the Son that is to abide in the heart and which the Servant that is to be cast out which is the True Predominant Principle in the Soul and which is a Temporary Appearance only Who can tell which are from the proper Will of the Soul as the Children of the Husband which are from Violence as begotten by a Ravisher This Mixture in thee will make that Joy which depends upon any Thing in thy self a Mixt Thing of Hope and Fear of Pain and Pleasure Thy Life will be like an April day which hath far more Showers than Sun-shines in it Thou wilt far oftner with Paul cry O wretched Man than say with him I bless God Rom. 7. 24. As the Hand that gathers a Rose in the midst of Thorns so will thy Heart be while it gathers its Joys from the Beauty of Christ growing up in itself If it do reach any Sweetness it will have with it many a sharp and Bloody Scratch from its Corruptions as from Thorns 3. Thirdly
devouring them again Here God is various sometimes blazing forth brightly sometimes wrapping up himself in a thick Smoak sometimes Burning Dreadfully sometimes shining out Sweetly This is the Appearance of God as he comes forth in a Created Image to the Creature of the First Creation This is called by Moses the Back-parts of God in which he hath many Names proclaimed before him which have Change and Contrariety in them Exod. 34. 6 7. Gracious and Jealous Long-suffering and visiting c. This is the First Distinction 2. Distinction of the State of Things This is Two-fold 1. The State of Things in the Spirit or God 2. The State of Things in the Flesh or the Creature You have this Distinction taught you Heb. 2. 14. For as much as the Children are made Partakers of Flesh and Blood Here you have the Children before their Clothing of Flesh and Blood again you have the Children in that Clothing There is such another place as this which expounds it and is expounded by it Rom. 8. 20 21. The Creature was made subject to Vanity not willingly but in Hope c. It shall be delivered into the glorious Liberty of the Sons of God Here is the Creature before above after the Vanity of this Creation in the Liberty of the Sons of God Here is the Creature under vanity and in the Corruptible Creation 1. State The State of Things in the Spirit or in God This is a State of Immortal Beauty and Joys All things live to God Luk. 20. 38. To God that is in God All Things live to God that is as they are seen by God for all things are seen by God in God God never looks off or looks out from Himself Rom. 8. 6. To be spiritually-minded is life and peace All things live and flourish to the spiritual mind which is born of God which is both the Eye and Image of God in the Soul as they do to God He that hath the Eternal Spirit for the Eye of his Mind hath it also for the Object of his Mind He that seeth things by the Spirit seeth them in the Spirit All things in the Spirit are One Spirit with that Spirit Spiritual Appearances of the Spirit So they are living and pleasant Images of that Life and Peace which is the Activity and Harmony of the Divine Nature Rom. 11. 36 St. Paul saith of God Of him and through him and to him are all things to whom be glory for ever Amen God is blessed for ever the Spring and Seat of Blessedness All things cannot but be Branches of Blessedness as they have their beginning their way their ends in him who is the Eternal Spirit of Blessedness and Glory 2. State The State of things in the flesh or in the creature or in themselves This is a Flourishing Fading and Flaming State of Things We have it described by St. Peter 1 Pet. 1. 24. All Flesh is as Grass and all the Glory of the Flesh as the Flower of the Field the Grass withereth and the Flower thereof falleth away All Things in the Flesh are at best Vanity and change in their Principles Their Path is Corruption their Conclusion is Consumption as by Fire This is the Second Distinction 3. Distinction of the Life of Man Man hath a Two-fold Principlâ— 1. A Heavenly 2. An Earthly Principle This Distinction is laid down 1 Cor. 15. 45. The First Man Adam was made a living Soul the New Adam is a quickning Spirit Adam is a Universal Name which includes all Mankind as in its Root or Principle The Two Adams are the Two Principles or distinct Roots of Man One is a Living Soul the Soul of all Mankind in its Natural State The other is a Quickning Spirit the Spirit or Principle of men as they are converted from Nature to Grace or Glory These Principles are called by the Apostle in this place one Heavenly the other Earthly v. 47. The First Man is from the Earth the Second Man is the Lord from Heaven v. 48. As is the Earthy such are they that are Earthy as is the Heavenly such are they that are Heavenly These Two Principles are likewise called Two Images the Image of the Heavenly and of the Earthly Man v. 49. As we have born the Image of the Earthly we shall also bear the Image of the Heavenly Man They are likewise stiled in Scripture the Inward and the Outward Man Corin. 2. 4 14. Though our Outward Man perish our Inward is renewed day by day The Heavenly Principle is as the Center the Earthly as a Point in the Circumference shooting forth its Beams from thence only The Heavenly and Earthly Principle lie mutually infolded in one another The Earthly Principle is in the Heavenly as the Seed in the full-blown Flower The Heavenly Principle is in the Earthly as the Flower lies hid in the Seed The Earthly is in the Heavenly as the Flowers of all Colours are in the Light The Heavenly is in the Earthly as Light is in every Colour These Two are also expressed by the Spiritual and Natural Man 1 Cor. 2. 14 15. So also by the New and Old Man Coloss. 3. 9 10. Man according to the Diversity of these Two Principles is capable of a Five-fold life at once 1. The Life of the Heavenly Principle in itself 2. The Life of the Earthly Principle as it is Comprehended in the Heavenly 3. The Life of the Heavenly as it is in the Earthly 4. The Life of the Earthly as it is Subordinate to the Heavenly 5. The Life of the Earthly Principle in itself 1. Life The Life of the Heavenly Principle in itself Man as he lives this Life is uncapable of any blot of Sin or spot of Sorrow The Apostle speaks with reference to this Life Ephes. 5. 8. Now are ye Light in the Lord Walk as Children of the Light As we live in the Heavenly Principle and that lives in itself we are Children of Light clear Beams of the God-Head like Christ Brightnesses of the Fathers Glory which can neither be Defiled nor Darkned That which is born of God sins not nor cannot sin I may add it grieves not nor cannot grieve according to its Heavenly Birth In this Principle we are Light in the Lord. Our Saviour tells us that we shall be in the Resurrection as the Angels He tells us again that the Angels of Little Children behold the Face of God in Heaven This Life in the Heavenly Principle is the Resurrection In this we are alwaies as Angels While we are like little Ones on Earth we are as the most Glorious Angels beholding the Face of our Father in Heaven while we are inclosed in the Darkness of Flesh we are at the same time Light in the Lord. It is the Opinion of some very learned men that the Supream part of the Soul which is above sensible Things ever living in the midst of Invisible Things the Head and Spirit of the Soul that this is each Mans Angel
always in pangs of Love to bring it forth and form it in us But to conclude this Reason This Holy Spirit this Spirit of Unity and Unity of the Spirit is the Spiritual heart of which we speak St. Paul Ephes. 3. expresseth it by being rooted in Love This is that Root which we have in the eternal Love of God in that Love which is God in God as he is Love This is the new Heart which is bred and cherished in the bosom of the Father These Heavens above us comprehend in their Circuits all things here below which as learned men teach us are figures images of their vertues sent forth from them But they have fixed in themselves innumerable Bodies of Light and Glory far exceeding all things here They say that these Heavens are Circular because that round Figure is most caâ—acious and beautiful as being an Image of the Unity of Angelical 〈◊〉 How great and glorious a Circle then vastly transcending the Heaven of Heavens is this Divine Unity this Spirit which is the new heart of a Saint All the Heavens and this earth lie within the compass of it as Light shadows which it casteth from it self But as for those Treasures which are proper to it which are fixt in it how infinitely more innumerable how infinitely richer are they The mind of Christ with all the Beauties and Brightnesses there the deep things of God with all those Lights and Joys unfathomable to every natural Eye and Heart lie within the Circuit of this Spiritual Principle A great Philosopher call'd the Angelical Spirit in man which is his Natural Heart the Flower of the Soul It is so indeed as the Blossoms upon Fruit-Trees but the Divine Spirit the Spiritual heart is the Fruit 1. Use. Seek this good heart which hath so good a Treasure in it That you may seek it with all affection and diligence take these Three directions Believe the Truth of this Principle Consider the Preciousness of it Understand your Propriety in it 1. Believe the Truth of this Principle When the Apostles asked the Christians in Samaria whether they had received the Holy Ghost they answered that they had not so much as heard whether there were a Holy Ghost or no. Is not this the temper of many amongst us of most of the sensitive and natural Spirit in us all We do not so much as believe that there is a Holy Ghost much less that this Holy Ghost is poured out upon any Soul as a Heavenly Anointing from above or dwells in any heart as the Principle of a supernatural and eternal Life He that comes to God must believe that God is and that he is a Rewarder of those that diligently seek him Heb. 11. 6. Fix in thine heart with an unshaken faith these two Radical Truths from which all the fatness and sweetness of the Tree of Life is derived into our Spirits 1. That God is 2. That there is a Union between God and Man in One Spirit Say frequently to thy self It is true It is the first Truth upon which all other Truths are built that there is a supream incomprehensible Being which shines through all and fills all the Fountain and Measure the End Perfection and Blessedness of all Beings It is as true that this ever-glorious God descends in Jesus Christ to sow himself by his own good Spirit as a Divine Seed in the heart of man below that by the unvailing of his original Excellencies he shines as a spiritual Sun from above into the Soul to quicken awake and call forth this Seed in the vertue of which the Soul springs into a new and heavenly Being comes to God by the fresh Participations of his life grows up into his Likeness pleaseth him is possess'd and enjoy'd by him possesseth and enjoyeth him with an unexpressible fulness of all mutual and Divine Pleasures When the Merchant in the Gospel found a Pearl in the Field he went and sold all to purchase this Field If you have discovered this rich Pearl of the Divine Nature as a Root at the bottom of yoâ—â— Spirits go exchange every Principle Power and excellency to give 〈◊〉 self up to the conduct activity fruitfulness enjoyment of this alone 2. Consider the preciousness of this Heavenly Principle Es. 6. 13. God compares his people in the greatest desolations to an Oak whose Substance is in it when it hath cast its leaves so saith he the Holy Seed shall be the Substance thereof Consider here three Precious Things in this good Heart which is the Seed and Principle of Grace in us 1. This Spiritual Principle is a Substance Solomon complains of all things under the Sun the Eye is not satisfied with seeing nor the Ear filled with hearing He brings this as an Argument and effect of their vanity All things here are Shadows only and so empty unsatisfactory endlesly raising expectations and desire but never answering them When this Spirit which is far above the Sun is received by thee when this becomes the Principle of all thy faculties which sees in thine Eye hears in thine Ear understands and wills in thine heart when this is the Treasury from which all Objects come forth to act those faculties then thine Eye will be satisfied with seeing substantial Beauties thine Ear will be filled with substantial Melodies thine Understanding will sit down to a Heavenly Feast of substantial Lights and Truths thy Will shall lie down to a Sweet and Eternal rest in a bed of substantial Embraces and Joys in the midst of the Substance and Essence of Goodness itself 2. This is the Holy Seed The Heavens over our Heads are pure They are free from that gross and dark Matter with which all Forms of things are mixt here on Earth This Purity of theirs is their Transparency Light Lustre Harmony Vertue Incorruptibility Yet they are Corporeal and Bodily their bright Beauties shall be turned into Darkness and Blood The Angels are purer far than these Heavens They have no Cloud Clog or Dross of Bodies Yet are they mixtures of Light and Shade Their Glories are vails upon the true Glory They wax old as a Garment and are changed Their Nature is subject to stains and falls But this Principle which is the Seed and Heart of a Believer is purer than the Heavens or the Angels It is the Spirit of God the true Light in which there is no Darkness Simple incorruptible Unchangeable 3. This Principle is durable It is a Fountain springing up in the Soul to Eternal Life John 4. O precious Treasure Eternity is defined to be the full and unbounded Possession of all Good at once in One. Pearls have their price because they have their lustre in a lasting Substance This Holy Seed is the onely Pearl of price both for its Lustre and for its lastingness The Will of Man naturally moves to good The greater the good is and the more clearly it appears to us so much the more natural and powerful are the motions
others Beauties Jesus Christ in the Canticles often calls the Holy Soul his Sister-Spouse He calls her Can. 1. 9. My Love The word in Hebrew according to its Root is the same with that which signifies a Friend who is described to be Alter Idem the same in another Person It properly imports One made into Two by a Division as Adam and Eve the other half on Ones self 3. By a Union of Substances Bodies can never meet in One No one Body can ever be in two places at once nor two bodies ever in one place They unite only by Touches by their outsides by Accidents and Shadows A Holy Heart and Heavenly Things unite as Spirits as the purest Spirits where the Unity is most perfect These intimately totally essentially formally penetrate possess fill and actuate each other You have a shadow of it in the mixture of Lights or in two clear and bright Eyes when they look full and stedfastly one upon another So Christ prays John 17. 21. That they all may be one as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they may be one in us Again v. 23 I in them and thou in me that they may be made perfect in One. The Radical and Original Unity is that of the Blessed Persons in the Trinity the most immediate Branches and liveliest Copies of it are those Two of the Divine and Humane Nature in Christ's Person of the Head and Members in his Mystical Body But this shall suffice for our present Doctrine that a good Heart is a Treasury of good things PSAL. XLV VER II. Thou art fairer than the Children of Men Grace is poured into thy lips therefore God hath blessed thee for ever THis Psalm is a Song of Loves It containeth the whole mystery of the Gospel and of the life of a Saint with his Saviour both in the Figure and Substance which is all an Heavenly Song of Spiritual and eternal Loves An Holy Soul in love with Jesus Christ is altogether taken up with this Threefold exercise 1. The Description and Contemplation of the Person of her Beloved 2. The Desire and continual longings by day and by night to be possess'd of to enjoy this Person 3. The care and labour to be like him to partake of his Beauties and Graces to derive them by the channels and streamings of the Spirit into itself to transform itself into his Likeness St. Paul spends the first part of his discourses in drawing aside the Curtain and setting the Person of Christ in its entire form naked glories and native sweetnesses in the Eyes of Believers Then he leadeth and presseth them to the enjoyment first next to the Imitation of this Jesus upon the ground of his own Loveliness Love and Life The first part of this Psalm is spent in like manner upon the Person and Praises of the Lord Jesus This Verse hath Three Parts 1. The Beauty of Christ Thou art fairer than the Children of Men 2. The Love and Sweetness of Christ Grace is poured into thy lips 3. The Seal of the God-Head of the Father of his Blessedness and Eternity upon the Person of Christ therefore God hath blessed thee for ever 1. The first part in the Text is the Beauty of Christ Thou art fairer than the Children of Men. Jesus Christ is the fairest of all men He is fairer than the whole generation of Mankind He is fairer than any person born of Man The Lord Jesus excells all Mankind in Beauty in Three respects 1. The Humane Nature of Christ taken by itself was born of a Virgin-Mother and God immediately supplying the place of a Father So it was as a Morning-beam begotten between a pure Sun and a clear sweet Air. Then it was born without Sin the proper and only deformity of Spirits Thus his Soul and Body were like a Silver stream flowing quietly in a clean channel where the Image of the Skie and all the Heavenly Bodies figures itself constantly and clearly So did the Mind Will and Workings of the God-Head figure themselves and shine in the Manhood of Christ. Lastly it is the common sense of Divines that the Complexion of Christ was very delicate and pure arising from the most accurate proportion of the Elements the most exact Harmony and purity of the Humours and Spirits in his Body We never read that he was at all Sick As this made all his Sufferings the greater thorough the quickness of his sence so it made him in his outward Form extreamly sweet and lovely above the rest of men But besides all this the Holy Ghost seems to fix its eye upon the Humane Nature of Christ in two other States different from that of his Incarnation by the Virgin Mary as he is the First-born of the whole Creation or of every Creature and as he is the First-born of those that rise from the Dead Coloss. 1. 15 18. The Jews say that the Messias was the first Creature that all the rest were made by Him in Him and for Him as Pictures to the Life and Copies to the Original A German Divine teacheth that he who receives the Body of Christ receives at once all that is good or fair in the whole world from the Beginning to the End of it But the Humanity of the Lord Jesus as he is the First-born of those that are risen from the Dead excels Adam in all his Innocency and primitive Perfections yea and Himself also as he was the First-born of every Creature the Natural Head of Angels as much as Heaven exceeds the Earth or a Paradise in the third Heavens an Earthly One 1 Corin. 15. 49. The former was an Earthly Beauty fading designed for a Sacrifice to be exposed to all sorts of shame and Sufferings to be made a Prey to the devouring jaws of Death This latter Beauty is Heavenly Incorruptible seated upon a throne which indureth for ever and ever 2. The Second Respect in which Christ is fairer than the Children of men is the Union between the Divine and Humane Nature All the Beauties of our Saviours Manhood are heightned by this Union to that Lustre and Loveliness which cannot be express'd in any meer Creature as a fine Cloud a Garden of Flowers a Statue of Gold are quite other things when the naked Sun sheds his Beams immediately upon them than when they are seen in a common or reflected Light By vertue of this Union the Humane Nature of Christ is One Person with the Divine As precious stones are a common water congealed but inclosing particles of the Heavenly Aetherial Light and Spirit So the Manhood of the Lord Jesus in its lowest state of Flesh in its Blood in the Grave excel'd in vertue outshined in Lustre Rubies Diamonds all the precious things of the Creature in Heaven and Earth by vertue of this Union For in all these States God was the Person there all subsisted in him as Branches in the Tree of Eternity As Thomas did to the Wounds of Christ
persecuteth him that is born after the Spirit In the First of these verses Jerusalem above is said to be the Mother of us all In the Second these All us are expounded to be the Children of Promise In the Third verse the same persons are described by being born after the Spirit This Phrase of being born after the Spirit is fully explained by that of Jesus Christ from whence it seemeth to be taken John 3. That which is born of the Flesh is Flesh That which is born of the Spirit is Spirit To be born after the Spirit and of the Spirit signifie both the same thing Is it not then evident that the Jerusalem above which is free which is the mother of all the Spiritual Seed is the Eternal Spirit after which a Saint is born that is of this Spirit and in the Image of this Spirit where there is Liberty 2 Corin. 4. Now lay the Third Scripture by these two Heb. 12. 22. We are come to Mount Sion the Heavenly Hierusalem the City of the living God to the Millions of Angels the general Assembly to the Church of the First-born written in Heaven to the Spirits of just men made perfect to God to Jesus Christ. Before we Saw Hierusalem above and the Spirit now we see Mount Sion and the Heavenly Hierusalem to be the same Is it not then an infallible demonstration that Sion and the Holy Spirit are One as the Type and the Truth Can any other be the living City of the living God where all the Holy Angels the First-born of the Father the Spirits of all Saints as well on Earth as in Heaven Jesus Christ in his Mediatory Kingdom the Father upon the Throne of Judicature meet and appear together in the full liberty of Eternal Light Love and Joy besides the Unity of the Spirit which is the Sweet and Sacred band between the two Glorious Persons in the Trinity between all pure Spiritual Divine Beings above and below This is the Spring and Immortal Seat of them all 2. We have in this place another Person set forth by this bright and lovely Character the Perfection of Beauty We may discover our own Beloved and Bridegroom the Lord Jesus under this Title if we bring to it the Lights of two other Scriptures shining like this by his Appearance in them In Heb. 1. 3. He is stiled the Brightness of Glory Is not this the same as to say The Perfection of Beauty 2 Corin. 4. 6. God hath shined in our hearts unto the Light of the Knowledge of the Glory of God in the Face or Person of Jesus Christ Can Face answer Face in a Glass more exactly than these Two Scriptures answer one another In both you have God God shining in one you have God shining from the Perfection of Beauty in the other God shining with a Light of Glory in the Face or Person of Christ. God in all the Creatures whether they be Visible or Invisible casts forth Shadows only of Himself Then he appeareth in the Perfection of Beauty when he appeareth in the Person of Christ as Light in the Body of the Sun 3. But why are these two so joyned as if they were the same Thing from Sion the perfection of Beauty I will not examine whether we may not disjoyn them in reading by putting in between them and or in Particles frequently understood from Sion and or in the Perfection of Beauty God shineth This needeth not There is plainly a difference between the English and the Hebrew The Hebrew runneth word for word thus From Sion from the Perfection of Beauty God hath shined So you have the Three Persons of the ever-blessed Trinity clearly distinguished and united in this shining of the God-Head The Father shineth from the Spirit his holy hill of Sion from the Person of Christ the Perfection of Beauty These Two Persons are placed here as One in Another a Globe of Light in a Globe of Light and the Father shining from them both to awaken in us this great and glorious Truth that the Persons of the Sacred Trinity have their Perfection in each other and are ever undivided when they appear nakedly in their proper Forms The whole Trinity is the Crown of Beauty upon every one of them In particular Jesus Christ never appears as the Perfection of Beauty but when he and the Spirit appear both in One 2 Cor. 3. from the 14th to the end you read of a vail upon the Face of Moses the Person of Christ in the Type then of a vail upon the Hearts of the Jews These are both the same vail For the vail is never upon the Person of Christ properly and simply but upon the Eye of our Spirits as the Cloud is never upon the Body of the Sun but upon our Corporeal Eyes For as that doth in the midst of its world so doth the Person of Christ in the midst of all things ever comprehend and contemplate himself and all things in the simple and pure Light of his own naked Beauties But then in the same place we read that the Vail is taken away in Christ and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is Liberty that is freedom from the Vail Christ is seen unvailed in his naked Glories It is added Now the Lord is that Spirit Then mention is made in the last verse of beholding the Glory of the Lord with open Face that is Eye to Eye the naked Eye of our Souls to the naked Eye of his Beauties every Spirit being all Eye The verse is closed thus as by the Spirit of the Lord or more agreeably to the Greek as of the Lord the Spirit I have alledged all this to make it plain to you and to seal it upon your understandings and memories that Jesus Christ is then only seen in his true Person and shape without a vail when he is seen in the Spirit when Christ and the Spirit are seen as two distinct Persons in One. Sion the Type of the Spirit signifieth Vision Hierusalem the Figure of the same Spirit the Heavenly Hierusalem is by interpretation the Heavenly Vision of Heavenly Perfection and Peace The Lord Jesus is the Perfection of Beauty the Heavenly Harmony of all things the Peace of all Hearts and Desires The Person of the Spirit is the Heavenly Vision of this Heavenly Perfection By the way observe that the Holy Ghost speaks in this 50 Psal. of the Day of Judgement the Second and last Coming and Appearance of our Lord and Saviour after which he shall go away and disappear no more See here what manner of Appearance this is in what State in what Form the King of Glory comes to the Marriage of his Bride and to reign upon the Earth He comes in a Spiritual and Divine Form in the Person of the Spirit The Eternal Spirit is an anointing of Beauty upon the whole Person of our Beloved He again is a Sun of Beauty looking forth in the Person of Spirit Nay the
with the Flesh. The Holy Spirit seemeth here to represent a Saint after this manner Jesus Christ in the inward and Spiritual Man as a Sun shining in Heaven The outward and natural Man as a Garment of Light sent forth from this Sun thorow which the Sun itself is seen in every point of it As often as any unclean thought or fleshly Imagination ariseth in us this becomes a spot upon our Garment Now the White is turned into Blackness of Darkness the Beauty into Burning the Face of Christ and of Heaven are clouded and appear no more Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God saith our Saviour Matt. 5. All vision dependeth upon the suitableness between the Eye and the Object All sense in every kind of things proceedeth from the suitableness between each Faculty and its proper Object Suitableness is the visible Image and effect of an hidden Unity and awakeneth that as the Sun doth its own Seminal vertues in the Earth which spring up into all manner of Plants Flowers and Fruits The pure Beauties of Christs Person are seen only by a pure Eye which Eye is the living Image of the same Person in the Unity of the same Spirit and awakened in us by the Appearances of that Glory There is a Three-fold Purity Moral Legal Evangelical If we would see the Image of God in the visible Frame of Nature which is the Person of Christ in its Shadow we must be baptized into the Blood that is into the Principle and Spirit of this Image we must be washed in this Laver from all the gross disorders and pollutions of the Flesh unto a Moral Purity If we would see the Divine Image shining in the midst of the Intellectual Angelical Invisible things of Nature which is the Person of Christ in its Picture let us baptize our selves into the Blood that is into the Spirit and Principle of this Image Let us in this Spring wash off by the Fire upon the Altar offer up all sensitive Forms which is the Sacrifice of Beasts that our Spirits may be like the vail of the Tabernacle having Cherubims the Forms of Invisible and Heavenly things only formed upon them This is our legal Purity But would we see that Image of the invisible God which is itself invisible to every Natural Eye of Men and Angels Would we see not the Shadow the Picture but the Brightness of Glory the Person of Christ in the Life unvailed We must then be baptized into the Blood the Spirit the Principle of this Eternal Essential Image of God This alone can purify the Heavenly Things themselves Heb. This alone can wash out the impression and similitude of every Creature in its Natural State that the uncreated Glory which alone is the true Heaven and lies hid under the other as a Diamond in a heap of rubbish may shine forth This is our Evangelical Purity and our Evangelical Vision of God in the Person of Christ. When thou art come never so little past the lusts of the Flesh thou shalt meet with him whom thy Soul loveth Jesus Christ in his Shadow This will be an Earthly Paradise to thee springing up thorow thy body thy senses all vsible things round about thee When thou art come never so little past the Flesh itself and all Appearances of things in that thou shalt meet with him whom thy Soul loveth in a lively lovely Picture thy Jesus in the Form of an Angel All that was dear to thee and present with thee in the dark shadow thou shalt now see again with gain and enjoy in the bright Picture Thy Earthly Paradise shall be grown up transformed and enlarged with thee into a Heaven of Angels When thou art come never so little past these Watchmen themselves the Angels without the walls of the City of this whole Creation thou shalt meet with him whom thy Soul loves the Lord Jesus in his naked living and eternal Beauties Here thou shalt see the Light of Life far above all Shadows and Pictures enlarging itself to take in and comprehend them also Not only the Persons and Things represented in those lower Scenes and Forms but the Scenes and Forms themselves appear again and appear eternally in this last and highest opening of the Mystery of God Not only that Rose which was the Treasure hid in the Seed the Stalk the Leaf the Thorn sheweth itself full blown in all its Beauties and Sweetnesses but that Seed Stalk each Leaf every thing of the Rose-Tree every dust of the Earth round about it is now a Distinct Rose This is the Rose of Sharon our Jesus seen as he is the vail taken off in the Gospel by the Holy Spirit Follow after Holiness in all degrees of it that you may see this Jesus as he ascends thorow all Degrees of things Fly from every degree of uncleanness which will be a spot upon your Garments that the Beauties of Christ cannot shine in them neither in your outward and Earthly or your Inward Angelical Garment 3. Beware of Enmity The Holy Ghost saith â— John He that hateth his Brother walketh in darkness until now Every Saint every Man every Creature each Providence is our Brother as it is the work of God the Birth of God by Jesus Christ and beareth the Image of him who is the Wisdom of God All Hatred is a Twin-birth with Darkness Both arise immediately out of the departure and separation from the Unity which is the womb from whence spring together that Blessed Pair Light and Love All Enmity and Hatred besides that which is the loving and lovely opposition of Love itself to Hatred and Enmity is the seed of the Serpent out of which himself ariseth and by which he propagateth his Serpentine brood The Jews say in their Proverbs The Spirit of God resteth not upon an Angry or a sad Man While thy Soul is wrapt up in a black Cloud of Malice or tossed with any Tempest of wrath the Sun of Love the Glorious Person of thy Saviour which is all an immortal Flame of Love appeareth not to thee neither can it be seen by thee all whose Lovelinesses are the Beauties and Beams of Love Rom. 3. 24. Jesus Christ is called the Propitiation This was in the Tabernacle and Temple the Golden Mercy-Seat on which God sat between the Cherubims and talked with Moses In allusion to this we read of the Throne of Grace Heb. 4. 16. The Person of Christ in his Heavenly Form is the Propitiation the Golden Mercy-Seat the Throne of Grace the Throne of Love of the freest sweetest purest Love If you streighten a Flame and bar it from its Liberty of extending and dilating itself you extinguish it and lose at once its Light and Heat If you contract the Love of Christ in you by Wrath or Enmity you make your self uncapable of the sweet Light of his Appearances and of the Heavenly Heat of his Graces and Consolations While there is among you strife anger malice
Creature is in Christ as in the Excellency of the Divine Strength in its Divine Root Power Life Vertue as in the Excellency of the Divine Dignity in its Divine Form Beauty and Fruit. As our Lord Jesus is the Image of the Invisible God so the whole Creation lieth in him as in a Glorious Fountain-Head in a Beautiful Womb in a Beautiful Pattern in one entire Form of Beauty As our Lord Jesus is the First-born of every Creature so each Creature is seen distinctly in Him and he appeareth distinctly in each Creature in its Primitive Pure Paradisical State In the next place you have this General drawn down into Particulars the Heaven and the Earth the Visible the Invisible things of the Creature Angels with all their Orders all comprehended in the Light of Christ's Beauties like the living Creatures in the White Sheet let down out of Heaven to St. Peter as he prayed on the top of the house All are For By In Him v. 17. Lastly For a close you have all the Forms of Nature like Flowers of Silk in a Garment of Needle-work shining together in the Person of Christ v. 19. We read in the latter part of that verse All things subsist by him It is in Greek word for word All things have subsisted together in him As Beams of Light stand in the Sun and out of the Sun such a Sun is Jesus Christ such a Visible Image of the Invisible God at the Head of the Creation in which and out of which all the Creatures stand like a Bright and mysterious knot of Millions of Distinct Beams As a great and fresh Picture taken from the Life made up of many less Pictures which stand in it of which several Copies are taken from itself and Copy from Copy So is our Beloved the first born of every Creature in which all the Creatures subsist together in their proper Distinctions and their Universal Harmony After this first Circuit of Nature St. Paul passeth to the second Circuit of Grace v. 18. Here also all things appear in Christ as their first Principle and their proper Habitation Jude The Garden of All the distinct Root and Flower of each Spiritual Plant. He is the Head of the Church the Beginning the Principle the first-born from the Dead Both these Circuits St. Paul bringeth into one Divine Circle of Christ's Glorious Person like two distinct and pleasant Apartments one excelling the other in Riches Greatness and Beauty within the same Palace in which all the pleasures of the God-Head and of the Father lie For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell v. 19. Thus we see how St. Paul bringeth all fulness through all Generals and Particulars of things every where into Jesus Christ like the Silver and Gold out of all the Mines of Nature and Grace refined and fashioned by the Hand of a curious Workman the Divine Spirit into one Jewel Behold All Fulness the Fulness of all kinds and Degrees All Fulness the Fulness of all Things Invisible and Visible Angels and Men Heaven and Earth Flesh and Spirit God and the Creature All Fulness the Fulness of all States Light and Darkness Honour and Dishonour Pain and Pleasure the Griefs of all Sufferings the Joy of all Glories the deepest Guilt of Sin the brightest Crown of Righteousness He was made Sin for us that we might be made the Righteousness of God in him Life Death the Resurrection from the Dead Immortality The Earth with its nethermost parts the Heavens with all the Heights above them in a word Love and Wrath with all their Changes and Dresses All Fullness dwelleth together in Jesus Christ. O the Greatness of the Majesty and Fulness of this Heavenly Person Job saith of Wisdom which is one of the names of Christ Job 11. v. 6. The Secrets of Wisdom it is double to that which is The Person of Christ in the Secrets of its Spiritual Treasures containeth all things which are and appear in the Light and Eye of the Creature and besides these which are Copies their Originals Thus is it double to that which is having in itself the Shadow and the Substance the Picture and the Life whereas all that is is Shadow and Picture only The Platonists call Secondary and created Beings 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Beings the Original they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Unity above all Being But Job going on to speak of Jesus-Christ addeth Canst thou find out the Almighty to Perfection v. 7. As high as Heaven deeper than Hell v. 8. The Measure thereof is longer than the Earth broader than the Sea That is observable The Divine Wisdom called also the Almighty is as high as Heaven but deeper than Hell His Heights are all Heavens and his Depths are Heaven below Hell itself What are the Dimensions what are the Comprehensions of this Spiritual Person It is the Heaven of Heavens for height of Glory It stretcheth the Compass of its everlasting Beauties and sweetnesses beneath Hell itself comprehending that in its Depths amidst the precious things of its sacred deep below It s Measure extendeth beyond both Earth and Sea in all their Literal and Mystical Images As the Earth hangeth in the midst of the Air as the Air moveth in the bosom of Heaven So Earth Hell Sea Air Heaven and all live move and have their Being in this most high Person and Spirit O the Greatness of the Majesty and Fulness of Christ I think not fit to pass over this Part of our Saviours Beauty the variety in him without Two Notes one of the happiness of Believers the other of the Unhappiness of Sinners 1. Note How happy are they who are persuaded in their hearts to trust in Jesus Christ and by faith to abide in him They dwell together with and in all Fulness When they travel through the valley of Baca of Weeping they go from Strength to Strength from one part of the Variety from one Beauty in the Person of their Beloved to another So they see the God of Gods in Sion the open face and full Beauties of their Bridegroom in the Unity of His eternal Person and Spirit in every form of things Every Pit the deepest and darkest is filled with Divine Beauties in him and his Fulness Psal. 139. v. 6. David cryeth out This Knowledge is too wonderful for me The Name that is the Person of Christ is Emmanuel that is God with us Mat. 1. v. 23. God inhabiting all Forms of things that all Fulness may dwell in him and so he may be with a Believer a Believer with him every where at all times David was in this Contemplation of Christ's Person and ravished with it Thou compassest my path v. 3. Thou hast beset me behind and before v. 6. I am encompassed and shut in with thy Person behind and before from Eternity to Eternity in every Form of Darkness or Light Earthly or Heavenly I am still with thee All
these are Varieties only in thee It is thy self thy Person besetteth compasseth comprehendeth me and my way in them all O Believers when you see Jesus Christ in the least glance of His Person with the same Eye of Light and Love as David saw him with do not you also meet with wonders of Delight and Glory which are too great for your Hearts Affections or Understandings to take in Do not the lowest and least things seen in him appear to you as Divine Wonders with such a height of Light in them as no created Eye can reach But David caught up into the view and Embraces of Jesus in his Heavenly Form proceedeth in his Rapture Whither shall I go from thy Spirit or whither shall I flee from thy Presence Face or Person v. 7. The Spirit and the Presence or Person of Christ are here both one to teach us that this Person and Presence of our Saviour in which he is the same yesterday to day and for ever in His Appearances to the Saints under the Law under Grace in Glory is entirely Spiritual a pure Spirit If I ascend up into Heaven thou art there if I make my Bed in Hell behold thou art there v. 8. Hell in Hebrew and Greek signifies no more 〈◊〉 the Grave or the State of the Dead It is added in Hebrew Behold Thou These words art there are put in by the Translatours as you may see by the Change of the Letter If I take the wings of the Morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the Sea v. 9. even there shall thy hand lead me and thy right Hand shall hold me v. 10. If I say the Darkness shall cover me even the Night shall be light round about me v. 11. Yea the Darkness hideth not from thee but the Night shineth as the Day the Darkness and Light are both alike to thee v. 12. These last words too are added to thee Go thy wayes O Believer O beloved Spouse of this Heavenly Lover say to him with the same tongue in the same language of Light and Love as David doth Wherever I fly or fall I am ever encompassed with ever wrapt up in thy Spiritual and Glorious Person as my Heaven as the Air of my Life O my Beloved If I fly it is in the face of these Brightnesses If I fall I lie in the Bosom of these Beauties When I ascend up into Heaven behold thou art there Heaven is as a great Room of State and Pleasure in the Divine Building of thy Person The Light of this is all the Glory the Love and Loveliness of this are all the Treasures and feasts of Joy there The several Appearances of those Distinct Varieties in thy Person shooting forth themselves like Beams with a Divine Lustre Warmth and Life make all the Angels in Heaven The Assembly of Glorified Saints is the Fruitfulness and Fulness of thy Person first thy Birth and then thy Bride like Eve to Adam in Paradise the Heavenly Eve to the Last Adam in the Heavenly Paradise thy self multiplying it self that it may have a meet Help for it self to be the Object of all its Loves the Subject of all its Joys the Mother of all Living What have I in Heaven besides thee Ps. 73. 25. Thy Person filleth all those shining and smiling Forms of things in Heaven They are all the Beauties in thy Face the smiles in thine Eye If I die behold thee Death itself is first an extasie of Love in which thou overshadowest me in a moment snatching me out of the Light of this world into the sweet and everlasting Light of a far greater and more Blessed world thy Person Then is it an extasie of Joy to find the same Jesus cloathed with the same white and shining Rayment in the Grave as I beheld him in Heaven The Grave becomes a Bed and that Bed thy Bosom Luke 16. 22. The Begger died and was carried by Angels into Abrahams Bosom the rich man also dieth and is buried That which the Grave is to the rich man that to the Begger to the poorest Saint is the Bosom of Jesus figured by Abraham in whom he lay hid as the Seed of Eternity Ere I was aware my Soul made me as the Chariots of Aminadab Cant. 7. Aminadab is my Princely People a Chariot of Angels of Glorious Spirits This is the manner of the Death of Christs Spouse Ere she is aware her Soul setteth her upon or rather itself becometh to her a Chariot of Angels where she sitteth upon a Golden Throne of Love encompassed with Curtains of Light and so is transported in the twinkling of an Eye into the Arms of her Beloved her whole way itself lying in the same embraces which are the end of her way and those Angels being the varieties and the movings of those Fulnesses of beauties in the Bridegrooms Person which is the same Spring and Rest of love in them all Go on then believing Soul with David and say to thy Saviour but the time may come when I shall neither rest on thy bosom as a Throne of Grace in Heaven nor as a Bed in the Grave in the Fellowship of thy Death I may be hurried to the uttermost parts of the Sea to that State where storms of malice and wrath rage most in the midst of the blackness of Darkness But when it is so even then thou risest upon me and sweetly breakest like a lovely morning in the Beauties of thy Person round about me Thou takest me upon thy Divine Beams as upon Silver Wings with Feathers of Gold in which the Glories of the Divine and Humane Nature are united As thou in thy course circlest thorow all the infiniteness of differing Beauties within thy self thou carriest me upon these Wings of thine to the extremities of this Sea of Darkness and Tempests Even here also as in Heaven itself thy hand which is thy self thy Spiritual Person thy Divine Life in Act the Activity and Appearance of thine inseparable Glories lead me as my Strength within my guide and way before me my light round about me Yea even here thy right Hand which is thy Person in the sweetest fullest Act and appearance of Love Beauty Majesty and Power holdeth me at once bearing me up in itself encompassing with itself Thus the Sea and Tempests are still thy Person in the same Lovely and Eternal Form opening new Wonders of Beauty and discovering greater Riches of vaster varieties within the bright Bound of its own Spiritual Fulness Yea if I sink so low that I begin to faint and say now the Darkness will cover and overwhelm me now the night will seal up my Eyes from the sight of my Beloved and hide him from me then the Night it self becomes a bright Sun round about me in the Heaven of thy Person where every spot of Darkness as well as Beam of Light is a shining Point or line of Beauty and all so many several Suns set thick one by another Can.
with two of their Wings as uncapable of the Brightness of this Blessed Appearance We generally profess to abhor the Principles of Sadducees and Socinians O that we did not most of us fall in too far with them in the real and practical part The Sadducees deny both Angel and Spirit They allow nothing besides that which their Senses can take hold of and assure to them Let us awaken our own Souls and examine our selves Are we not very apt to reject and condemn Jesus Christ Himself if He come in any Appearance of Beauty and Glory which beareth not the Figure of which hath not some proportion to the Forms of Flesh and Sense The Socinians acknowledge both Angels Created Spirits and the Eternal uncreated Spirit above them But they admit nothing more of these than their reason can give reception to They ascend no higher to these than the Wing of their Natural understanding can carry them They make reason the only Rule and Judge of Divine Things The men of Sodom went about groping for the door at which the Angels went in and could not find it because they were blind Is not this too frequently our case How many How often do we all go about in our searches groping for that Gate of Heaven by which the Angels all Divine Appearances go in and out at the Heavenly Person of our Saviour but find him not because we seek him with those natural Eyes of our own sense and understanding which are perfectly blind to his Beauties Divines teach us that one way of knowing God is by Negations when we run over each particular good in every Creature when we lay all the good of the whole Creation together in one heap and then say nothing of this is God all this is nothing of God as he is in himself his Nature and Person is infinitely beyond and above all that is here We were advanced to a good degree in the Knowledge of our Lord Jesus if we were arrived at this Negative way of knowing him if when we were gone as fâ—r risen as high as our outward senses our inward faculties could enlarge and lift up themselves we then said of all this is not Jesus Christ. No he is made higher than all the Heavens of sense than all the Heavens of Reason and of Angels When we are thus stopt and bounded let us turn to Prayer and wait for the opening of a New Eye in us David cryeth out Psal. 24. 7. Lift up your heads O ye gates and be ye lift up ye everlasting Doors and the King of Glory shall come in So do you cry Thou everlasting Door thou Eye of Eternity thou Spiritual and Divine Eye open thy self in me that by thee the King of Glory may come in to me and fill all my Soul and Senses themselves with His Train So shall I see my King in His Beauty 2. Spiritual things are discerned in a Spiritual Light 1 Job 1. 7. If we walk in the Light as He is in the Light we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin As He is in the Light He is God the Father as is manifest by that part of the last clause in the verse Jesus Christ His Son That term As is Emphatical and Distinguishing There is a Twofold Light One in which the Creature is Another in which God is One God maketh the Other God is The Creature is in a Derived and Changeable Light like the Earth God is like the Sun in His own Light inseparable from Himself St Paul distinguisheth between these two Lights God who commanded the Light to shine out of darkeness hath shined in our hearts the Light of the Knowledge of the glory of God in the face or Person of Jesus Christ 2 Cor. 4. 6. Behold here One Light which is commanded by the Creating Word of God out of Darkness which is called up out of the Possibility and Principles of the Creature Another Light which is the immediate Shine of the God-Head itself in the Face of Christ. As the Sunshine is called the Flower of Light because it springeth and â—lourisheth in the Body and Face of the Sun itself so is this called here a Light of Glory in the Face of Christ. God Himself is called the Father of Lights Jam. 1. 17 that is the Eternal Sun the Sun of Spirits the Supreme Sun of all Beings Spiritual and Corporeal He is the Fountain of Light the first and purest Light His Essence is a Light of Glory This Essential Light of his own unchangeable Glories is the Heaven in which he is St. Paul saith of him he only hath immortality dwelling in the Light which no man can approach unto whom no man hath seen nor can see 1 Tim. 6. 16. The Light of God is so pure that it is invisible to every Creature It shineth with such a Strength and Fulness of Glory that no mortal Eye the natural sight of no Man or Angel can approach it or pierce into it In this God himself dwelleth as in a Palace composed of the Beams and Brightnesses of his own God-Head spread round about him and encompassing him on every side In this Palace he resideth in the Center and midst of every Spirit every Being hid from the search of all In this high and strong Tower of Divine Light Jesus Christ dwelleth together with the Father and is hid there after the same manner Colos. 3. 3. Our Life is hid with Christ in God He is hid in God by the excess of Light in an Abyss of Glory But how then shall we see Jesus Christ in his own Light if that Light of his Person and Beauties by its unsearchable Riches and Incomprehensible unapproachable Glories hide him from us St. Peter answereth this objection 1 Pet. 2. 9. Ye are a chosen Generation a Royal Priesthood a peculiar people that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called us out of Darkness into his marvellous Light His Light in Greek is properly his own Light Every Light in the things of sense is from the Sun But that is the Suns own Light which is inherent in the Body of the Sun which floweth immediately from it in which the Sun himself is seen In like manner that is Gods own Light by way of eminency peculiarity and distinction from every other Light which is the very shine and sparkling of the God-Head in itself upon itself in which it seeth and rejoyceth in it self in which alone it is seen which is inseparable from the Divine essence and Persons as the Sun-shine is from the glorious body of the Sun This is a Marvellous Light This Light itself is a Divine Wonder It is above the reach of every Humane or Angelical understanding It is a Light which openeth a Divine World of Glorious Wonders every thing is then only seen right and in its true state when it is seen in this Light Every thing seen in
Life from the Ocean which hath its Fountain in itself which is therefore unconfined and infinite as much as a little Shadow from the Eternal Incomprehensible Truth and Substance such is the dissimilitude and disproportion between the beautiful Body of Adam in Paradise and the Blessed Body of our dear Lord in Heaven As the Earth in Essence and Appearance in Greatness and Glory in vertue and Comprehension differeth from Heaven not only this Heaven which we see not the Heaven of Angels above our sight but that Heaven out of which our Jesus cometh as Lord of all an Heaven higher than all created Heavens such is the difference between the New-created Body of Adam our first Father which shone about his spotless Soul as the Light about the Sun and the glorified Body of Jesus our first and last Lord and Love O all ye that hear and believe admire with me the insiniteness of the wisdom and love of our God who hath made the loss of Paradise by Sin so great a gain to us instead of that giving us our Jesus But we shall come yet more clearly to the mark at which we aim if we examine these words more exactly To that end I shall propound three Questions 1. Question What the general Nature of a Body is Answ. A Body is the compleat Image Instrument and Fulness of that Soul or Spirit to which it doth belong Col. 2. 17. A Body and a Shadow are set opposite one to another Which are a Shadow of things to come but the Body is of Christ or is Christs is the Body of Christ. A Body and a Shadow agree in being an Image But the Shadow is a confused useless emply Image the Body express Instrumental Substantial and full In the same Chapter a little before v. 9. we read of the Lord Iesus in him dwelleth all the Fulness of the GodHead bodily God is the Person in Christ the glorified Body of our blessed Saviour is the express Image of the God-Head God is seen there as a Man is at home in his house nakedly clearly familiarly constantly entirely in all Forms and Postures This glorious Body is the Universal and Immediate Instrument of the God-Head the Sphear of its Activity God judgeth all acteth all exerciseth all the operations of the Divine Nature and life here as the Sun runeth his race from the beginning to the end of it in his proper Orb and Heaven God dwelleth with all his fulness in this Body He delighteth to pour out into the Body of our Beloved and his Beloved all the precious Treasures of his God-Head Here he delighteth to possess and enjoy them in a Bodily Form in the Form of a Spiritual Heavenly and Divine Body As at the Incarnation the word was made Flesh. A Body of Flesh Iohn 1. 14. by emptying itself to nothing so now is the Eternal Word again in the Resurrection made a Spiritual Body by returning and rising up into all its Fulnesses in the same Body in which he had emptied himself The Lord Jesus speaketh of himself in Glory when he saith In my Fathers house are many Mansions John 14. 2. The Body of our Bridegroom is a Spiritual Palace in which all the excellencies and Off-springs all the operations and works of the Divine Nature have their several distinct Mansions and apartments We read of a Tree in the branches of which all the Birds of Heaven have their Nests The Spiritual Body of Christ is the Tree of Life and of Love which hath Branches enough and large enough for all the Birds of the highest Heaven the seven Spirits of God with all their Train all the variety of the God-Head to make their several Nests in them I may add also for all the Beasts of the Field all inferiour Forms of Things to lodge under its Shadow You who love the Lord Jesus and his Appearances doth not this move you doth not this make your hearts to spring and dance in your breasts to hear that your Saviour is cloathed with this Heavenly Body so full of Glory and of God Can we forbear now from saying to our own hearts and one to another these five short words 1. If we have formerly known any thing besides our Jesus let us now know it no more If we have hitherto known Christ after the Flesh let us know him so no more This is the only object worth all our knowledge and study Jesus in his Spiritual Body purer and brighter than the Body of Heaven in Paradise far beyond that in the height variety and compass of its Glories 2. How black doth every Sin appear in this Light of our Lords glorified Body When a Soldier was about to kill Cresus his dumb Son cryed out thou killest the King So cry to every Lust in thine heart thou crucifiest my Jesus in his Spiritual Body the Body of all Divine Beauties shining like a Divine Sun upon thee comprehending thee as the highest â—eaven In every Creature in which thou seest not the blessed Light of this Body in which thou doest not kiss it with the pure mouth of the Spirit in thee thou doest crucisy it 3. Is not this Bosom this Heavenly Body of our Beloved a Field of Lillies indeed the Field of all Spiritual Beauties and Divine Graces Shall we not like pleasant Roes be ever feeding here As Booz said to Ruth let us never go into any other Field to gather or to feed Is not this the Paradise itself in the third Heavens where all the Fulnesses of the God-Head are in a Body a Divine Body 4. How pure and Spiritual are we to be in Body and Spirit if we are to be Brides to this Lamb of God whose Body outshineth all the Angels and is raised to a degree of Spirituality far above them 5. Is this that Body of which the poorest believing Soul may say by the Law of its Spiritual Marriage my Jesus hath not power over his own Body but I have power over it to command its presence with me to delight my self in it as my Garden of Eden of pleasure to bring forth Fruit by it Is this that glorious Body of Christ to which these vile Bodies yours and mine are to be made like by that Power by which he is able to subdue all things to himself to the similitude of this Body of Divine Glories Is this the Body into which we are taken up and which we are at home with when in death we are withdrawn from these Bodies of our Pilgrimage here Qu. 2. What the force of this phrase is A Living Soul The first Adam was made a Living Soul Was he not made a Body as well as a Soul The Body seemeth to be so far from being concerned here that it is excluded Ans. This Word Soul hath Three Acceptions in the New Testament and so that which answereth it in the Old 1. It is taken for the Person composed of Soul and Body So Gen. 46. 26. All the Souls which came with
Job 1. 14. The Word was made Flesh. The true and Spiritual Body which is an Immortal Plant in the Heavenly Paradise according to the Almighty Power and Mysterâ—ous Will of the Eternal Word in which it standeth and Flourisheth maketh itself into a Body of Flesh. Again by the same Power in the sweet and glorious Mystery of the same Will it maketh this Flesh a Spirit If you ask now where it is it is Singing and Triumphing throughout all the Divâ—ne Powers throughout all the â—nnumerably various Forms of Eternal Life Beauty and Joy in the Heavenâ—y Body â—or that which was Flesh is now Spirit As the Tabernacle was removed into the Temple when the Temple was built up and set there as a part of the Sacred Mysteries in that Holy Place so the Spiritual Body when it is raised taketh up into itself and comprehendeth in itself the Vailing Form of Flesh as a Beautiful Form in that Divine Mystery which it finisheth in itself Qu. But you will say now perhaps How is this done by what Power and in what manner is the Body of our Lord in the Resurrection made a Quickning Spirit Ans. I answer that it is done by vertue of the Personal Union between the Divine and Humane Nature in Christ. The Person is the Word the Eternal Spirit This Word the Soul the Body of our beloved Jesus are all one Person so all one Eternal Spirit the Fountain of Life As the Soul is said to be all in the whole Body and All in every part of it so is the Person in Christ the Immmâ—rtal Word All in the whole Humane Nature and All in every part of it either Soul or Body The Union between the Divine Nature in our Bridegroom and his glorified Body is equally immediate and entire as between that and his Triumphant Soul The Humane Nature subsisteth and standeth in the Divine as a Tree in its Root But this Union in the days of his Flesh is as that between the Tree and its Root in Winter The Resurrection is our Saviours Spring-time and Summer Every living Root in Spring ceaseth not to send forth its Sap into the Tree until it have brought forth the Tree into that Form and laden it with those Fruits which are proper to the Root In the Resurrection the Divine Nature riseth up with all its Sweetness and Fatness all its Vertues and Powers into the Humane Nature till it have spread and fashioned it entirely into its own Form till it have laden it all over with the precious Fruits of its own excellencies Joys and Glories In every power part and point of Soul and Body though never so mean so small the Fountain of the God-Head openeth itself the Fulness of the God-Head poureth forth itself that as the Waters cover the Sea so every distinct Part or Point appeareth as a distinct Sea of the Divine Life Joys Loves and Glories without bottom or bound This O shadowy Man O faln lost Man is thy Jesus thy Life thy Saviour Look to this Jesus with an Eye of Faith with an Eye of Love live by Him live in Him live to Him Triumph thou because of this Jesus Look to Him as 1. Thy Principle 2. Thy Pattern 3. Thy Price 4. Thy Portion 1. Look to this Jesus who is All-Beautiful with the Beauty of the GodHead itself as thy Principle I am the vine ye are the branches He that abideth in me and I in him bringeth forth much fruit Without me ye can do nothing saith Jesus Christ Job 15. 5. The Tree first comprehendeth the Branch in itself then sendeth it forth supplying it continually with its own Life and Sap. By the vertue of this Life Sap the Branch taketh hold of the Tree sucketh in continually fresh and vital nourishment by which it flourisheth and bringeth forth much fruit What shall I say for thee who yet partakest not of the sweetness and fatness of this Spiritual Tree of Life and love Thou canst bring forth no Fruit thou canst do nothing towards thine own fruitfulness Without this Jesus thou canst do nothing O that thou didst understand thine own Emptiness and the Fulness of Sap in this Vine How truly All things Angels Men All the Creatures can do nothing are nothing without this Jesus that Spirit which is the onely Truth the onely Lfe in and thorow All I will pray over thee with inward bleedings of Divine Love from my heart O that Jesus thy Root who comprehendeth even thee also in the Fulness of His Heavenly sap and vertue would bring thee forth by a new birth as a Heavenly branch in Himself O that He would continually milk forth from His Breast the streams of His Life into thee Thus He abideth in thee Now do thou now wilt thou by Him abiding in thee abide in Him Shoot forth thy self into Him as roots do their Sprigs and Branches into the Earth beneath by the actings of thy Faith upon him Draw his Spirit and Grace into thy self Be green be fair and flourishing in the Eye of Heaven Bring forth much Fruit for thy self thy Saviour thy Heavenly Father all Angels and blessed Spirits to feed upon in Eternity 2. Look to this Jesus as thy Pattern What thou hast seen done in his Soul and Body by the Union between these and the God-Head the same Glory shall be brought forth in thy Soul and Body also by the Union between him and thee if thou in thy Soul and Body adhere and stick to his glorified Soul and Body as they are full of the Eternal Word dwelling in them and resting upon them The Angels reproved the Disciples when Christ was taken up into Glory because they looked to a visible Heaven to see their glorified Lord still with Eyes of Flesh Why stand you here gazing up into Heaven This same Jesus who is taken up from you into Heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into Heaven I say to you in another sense stand and look upon your Jesus as he ascends This is your Pattern As you have seen him in his Humane Nature go up out of all Fleshly and Visible Images into an Invisible Glory as you have seen him taken out of the sight of every created Eye in the white Cloud of the most excellent Majesty of the Father which is the Heaven of Heavens so shall the same Jesus in like manner come again in your Souls and Bodies descending into them upon those Spiritual Heavens and changing them by degrees from Glory to Glory till they also put off every thing of Flesh and disappearing to every natural Eye be made perfectiâ—n the same Spirit to be for ever together with him there where he is and like him 3. Look to Jesus as thy Price The Lord taketh notice of the low thoughts and disesteem which the Jews had of him by that which they gave for him thirty pieces of Silver This saith he by the Prophet is the Price at which they valued me
a Sight of that Heaven which is the Principle of the Lord Jesus in Glory This lyeth clear before us that the Heaven understood in this place cannot be any Visible or Common Heaven no not any of the Created Heavens This is an Heaven above All. For He who cometh forth from it is Lord of All. He is made Higher than All Heavens by ascending into this Heaven which is of another Make different from all things of the First Creation and hath a New Name above every Name that is named in this World or that which is to come the World of Sense or the World of Angels Heb. 7. 26. Eph. 4. v. 10. The Earth then of which we speak cannot be the Common Earth It must be as large as that mentioned Gen. 1. v. 2. out of which the Heavens themselves were made The Earth intended here by the Holy Ghost taketh in all things below the Heaven mentioned and meant by Him Angels with all the Invisible Glories of the First Creation are Gods arising up out of this Earth and comprehended within the Compass of it I will set up Three Lights before you by which I shall endeavour to give you a Prospect of this Earth and of the First Man arising out of it so as to be a Shadow and a Figure of the Heaven we aim at with our Bridegroom coming down out of it coming down in it as His Mother of Eternal Love His Garment and Crown of Divine Beauty His Chariot of Life and Light of Power and Pleasure 1. Light God as He is the Head of the First Creation cometh not forth Naked but in a Shadowy Image of Himself which He casteth as a Vail over the true and proper Beauties of His own Person which the Eye of no Creature ever saw or can see Psal. 104. The Psalmist singeth the praises and wonders of God in the Creation After the preface he beginneth thus Who coverest thy self with Light as with a Garment and stretchest out the Heavens as a Curtain v. 2. You have a manifest allusion here to the Works of the First and Second Day Gen 1. The Jews say from this Scripture in the books of their wise and learned men that God to make this World appeared not in His naked Beauties but cum Indumentis suis with a Garment for a Covering upon Him The Light in which God shineth forth at the Beginning to form a Mass of Darknes into a beautiful Creation was onely a Shadow of the Eternal Light of His own Nature and Substance and a Vail upon it The Glory itself the Divine Presence and Appearance at the Head of this Creation which was spread over the whole Compass of it as an Heaven was a Curtain drawn before the true Heaven the true Glory which stood behind this Curtain like the Oracle in the most Holy place while the First Tabernacle was not yet removed This is the First Light 2. Light God in this Shadowy Image of himself is that Earth the Divine Earth out of which the first Man is made with a Divinity resting upon him Gen. 1. 26. God said let us make man in our Image after our Likenâ—ss The word Image in Hebrew Tselem seemeth to be a contract of two words Tsd Maveth the Shadow of Death It is used Psal. 39. 6. Man walketh in a vain show they are disquieted in vain or in vanity That other word used Gen 1. 26. Our Likeness signisieth similitude silence an imagination a cutting off Both import thus much that the Divine Image the Mother of the first Adam in whose Womb he was formed out of whose Womb he sprung forth upon whose breasts he hung was a shadow a silent vanishing Shadow of the Eternal word in which that slept as in its Night or Death As Dreams are Imaginations in the Fancy which act their parts while the Man sleepeth such was this Image after which Man with the whole World was made This was the Mother-Earth which broughâ— him forth which beareth him which nurseth him in her Bosom and dandleth him on her Knees We read Gen. 2. 7. God formed Man of the dust of the ground The word Ground is the same with Adam It signifieth in its root a sparkling Lustre and Ruddiness like that of the best Rubies to express which it is also used A sweet and glorious Light shining thorow a dark shade like a rosie morning or the Sun setting red in a lovely evening because being low he shineth with his bright Beams thorow the rising mists and vapours of the Earth is properly intended by this word The Light of the God-Head sparkling in a Shadow of himself glowing under a Cloud like a living Ruby from the Rock of Eternity this was Adamah the Ground the Mother of Adam God formed Adam of the dust of this ground The learned Jews paraphrase after this manner upon the dust here As the skilful Apothecary beateth his Spices to a small and â—ine powder that by a more curious and exact mixture of them he may make them into a rich ointment or cordial so God in the smallest and least parts perfectly mingleth and uniteth all the Principles Powers Forms and Vertues of the several Creatures as they lay together in their first and fairest Image in their First-born state in himself Of these thus tempered he sormeth Man the Second Image of the whole Creation next to that in his own Person Thus Man is as a living Crystal in which the entire Form of all the world visible and invisible is seen transparently in the whole Glass and in every point of the Glass by a ravishing concurrence of all parts in each the mâ—nutest part with a most beautiful and divine Harmony arising from the accurate Mixture of that Precious Dust. Thus Man is an Universal musick where the well-measured Motions and sweet Sounds of all the Strings meet in every skilful Touch of every String as a New Circle of Heavenly Melody and Delights spread from a New Center of Life and Love Thus I pass from the Second to the Third Light 3. Light The First Adam was the Golden Head of the First Creation next to God in Jesus Christ. St. John in the 1. chapter of his Gospel describeth the order and manner in which the unfaln World came forth from God The Word which was Jesus Christ as He is God the Essential and Eternal Image of the God-Head was made by His own Almighty Power according to the Unsearchable Counsel of His own All-Gracious and All-Glorious Will a Shadowy Image of Himself As upon the Vail of the most Holy Place were wrought in pleasant Colours the Figures of those Cherubims which stood within the Vail shining in a rich Substance of Massy Gold So was it in the most Holy Person of our Saviour the true and living Temple of the Divine Nature The Glories of the Essential Image figured themselves upon this Mystical Vail of the Shadowy Image So the Beloved Apostle saith to us while he openeth the Mysteries
Apple-Tree among the Trees of the Wood so is my Beloved among the Sons I sat down under his Shadow with great delight and his Fruit was sweet to my taste There are three distinct parts in the Hebrew 1. I desired and sweetly delighted in his Shadow 2. Then I sate down 3. And his Fruit was sweet to my taste The Apple in Holy Scriptures and in the writings of Learned Authors is famous for a pleasant Cordial nourishment of Life and for an Emblem of Love You may see this in this Chapter v. 5. Stay me with Flagons comfort me with Apples for I am sick of Love Apples are Emblems of Love for their pleasant looks to the Eye their fragrant smell their delightful tast their cordial vertue their round form which is a Figure of Unity the Root and Sap and Fruit of all Love In the midst of the Wood of this Life where all Forms of things are like blasted and barren Trees good neither for Shade nor Fruit Jesus Christ standeth as an Apple-Tree a Tree of Life and a Tree of Love Fair Flourishing and Fruitful When the poor Spouse of Christ thorow all this Life is wearied with scorching Heats sounding Tempests raging Storms then her Beloved when He seeth His Fit Time springeth up as a Paradisical and Heavenly Tree As He springeth up He overshadoweth His Spouse not as a cloud overshadoweth the Sun or as Darkness in the absence of the Sun overshadoweth the earth but as the approaching and rising Sun overshadoweth the Stars So the Lord as a Tree of Glory spreadeth His Shadow over all those Lights of the Night the Principles Powers Activities Appearances oâ— the Natural Man drinking them up into One Light of Glory and Immortality with Himself while He drowneth them with a Sea of Love breaking in upon them and overflowing them How sweet is this Approaching Shadow of her Lord's Blessed Person to the Love-sick Soul a Shadow perfumed with the Ointments of His Love shining with the purple Lustre of His Beauties quickened with the Life of His Glories a Divine Shadow With what Desire with what Delight doth the Holy Soul go under this Shadow How precious in the Eye of God of all the Angels of a Saint Himself is This Death This Death is no Evening to a pleasant Day but a Lovely Morning and glorious Sun putting out the Lights of the Moon with all the Sars because the Time of the Night is past and the Day is come Never did the softest and sweetest Sleep 〈◊〉 with more pleasure upon the Senses of any Person than this Shadow of Death cometh upon the Heavenly Bride Here a Saint sitteth down As Hee entreth into this Shadow he entreth into Rest into the Unâ—ty of God where He resteth for ever from his own Work and Spirit to lye down in the Eternal Spirit Now he catâ—h of his own Apple upon this Apple-Tree He meeteth with Himself in Glory in the Glorified Person of his Beloved as the ripe Fruit of Life and Love hanging ready upon its own Tree in Eternity In the same moment he seeth it he taketh it in he rellisheth it with unexpressible sweetness and delight as being Great Glorious His own by the nearest dearest Suitableness and propriety Himself in the Entirest Unity in the same Moment he seedeth upon it is Transubstantiated into it and becometh that Lovely Apple that full-ripe Fruit of â—ove upon the Tree As he thus seedeth upon his own Apple and is changed into it at once he seedeth upon is changed into all the Apples of the Tree and the whole Tree itself For this is the Divine Mystery of Spiritual Pâ—anâ—s in the Heaveâ—ly Paradise each Fruit each part of the Plâ—nt comprehendeth the whole Pâ—ant all the Plants stand live and grow together in each Plant. Every Person aâ—d Spirit in Glory hath its own Name all Names written upon it It is itself an Entire Heaven in which all the Heavenly Inhabitants shine and sing and dance together with their various Beauties Musicks and Motions cast into the most Divine Harmony by a most perfect Unity 3. Script Iohn 14. v. 2. 3. In my Father's hâ—use are many Mansions If it 〈…〉 I would have tâ—ld you I go to prepare a place for 〈◊〉 And if I goe and prepare a place for you I will come again â—nd receive you unto my self that where I am there ye may be also Three Mysteries are opened to us in these words 1. The Place of Blessed Persons after this Life 2. The Preparation of this Place 3. Their Passage into this Place All are full of a Joy glorious and unspeakable 1. The Place of Blessed Spirits after this Life It is saith Christ my Father's House The House of the Father is the Glorified-Person of His Son This is the Temple of God in Heaven the Palace of the great King In Him the fulness of the God-Head dwelleth bodily All glorious Persons Angels Saints and Spirits as they are comprehended in the Person of Christ and make up His Body the Divine Body the Body of Glories and Eternity in Him as they are Beautiful Members in that Body so are they Mansions in that Temple Apartments in that Palace Every Apartement in this Divine Palace hath the whole Palace with all the Persons Prospects Furniture Entertainments of the whole within itself This is the Place 2. The Preparation of this Place I go to prepare a place for you While this Palace of Eternity with all its Apartments which are also its Inhabitants the Glorified and Immortal Persons of all Saints stood in the Father in the Divine Nature alone it was hid from the Eye of every Creature it was shut up that none could enter into it it was remote from every Creature at a very great distance The Lord Jesus by His Death and Resurrection entring with the Humane Nature into this Eternal Habitation hath set it up in the Nature of Man hath brought it near to us hath set it in our view hath set it open for us The Gates of this Temple of this Heavenly Hierusalem stand open day and night to all quarters of the Heaven and the Earth All the Apartements of it with our several Names written upon them our several Persons in Glory appearing in them stand ready The Lord Jesus Himself is the Beautiful Gate the Living Way the Ascent the rich Stair-case to this Temple The Angels are continually descending in Him as Chariots to bring down riding upon them our glorious Saviour and our glorious Selves into the Bosom of our Spirits here below The Bridegroom and the Bride ready trimm'd and already joyned in One come thus down out of Heaven come thus forth from the Temple The Angels are continually ascending by this Stair-case carrying up our Spirits beforehand on visits into this Palace into our own Apartments into the Bosom of our own Glorified and Immortal Substances there Every Grace every Providence every Motion of things to him whose Eyes are opened is such an Angel
such a chariot of Angels with these Persons riding in it 3. The Passage into this Place I will come unto you and take you unto my self that where I am there ye may be also There are three Steps of Christ's Coming to us in Glory 1. Into our whole Spirits by Regeneration 2. Into our whole Souls at death 3. Into our whole Persons Spirit Soul and Body at the Resurrection By every step he maketh a mutual Union so far as he goeth He cometh to us He taketh us to himself that we may be both together in one place in one Spirit He letteth himself down in his Heavenly Palace into us he taketh us up into the Heavenly Palace in himself he maketh our Persons a Heavenly Palace like his glorified Person and one with it This is our passage in Death into Glory Of old God descended upon the Tabernacle in a Cloud the Glory was in the Cloud Then Moses was summoned to enter into the Cloud and so into the Glory where God talked with him In latter times the most excellent Majesty in a 〈◊〉 Cloud overshadowed the Lord Jesus and in overshadowing him transfigured him then in the transfiguration talked to him of his Sonship to the Father and of Love In like manner at the set time the Lord Jesus as a living Temple of Heavenly Glory cometh down upon thee in a white Cloud of some Love-storm or Love-sickness I call it a Love-sickness because it ariseth at once from the Love of the Spirit of the Bride in thee and from the Love of thy Bridegroom to thee from the longings and burning desires of both after the immediate perpetual and full enjoyments of each other As thou entrest into this Cloud and art overshadowed by it thou art in a moment at the same time taken into that Palace of Glory and transfigured into the Glory of that Pallace There thou appearest to be the Son of God the Spouse of the Immortal King God speaketh to thee converseth with thee as a Son and Spouse in one He seeth the Figure of his own Beauties in thy Face and his Heart resteth in thy Bosom He seeth and enjoyeth thy Person as springing up eternally with incomprehensible Pleasures out of the Root of his own Divine Loveliness he feeleth and rellisheth thy Spirit as the flowing of his own sweetnesses from their own Fountain in himself he poureth forth himself in a flood of Beauties and Sweetnesses into thee All his Loves rest in thy Love and he in thee 4. Script I am now come to the last Scripture For we know that if our Earthly House of this Tabernacle be dissolved we have a Building of God an House not made with hands Eternal in the Heavens For in this we groan earnestly desiring to be cloathed upon with our House which is from Heaven If so he that being cloathed we shall not be found naked For we that are in this Tabernacle do groan being burthened not that we would be uncloathed but cloathed upon that Mortality might be swallowed up of Life Now he that hath wrought us for this self-same thing is God who hath also given us the Earnest of the Spirit 2 Cor. 5 1 2 3 4 5. This is a rich and deep Scripture What expressions of Death are those How full of Joy Not to be found naked Naked of any support or comfort Of any cloathing of Being or Beauty Essence or Substance Form or Fulness in Person or Relations Not to be uncloathed Of any Garment of Light or Life To be cloathed upon with an House from Heaven To have the Lord Jesus as a circling Glory coming down upon this Image in which we now dwell neither taking away the Nature nor Form of any thing that here we are or have but taking up all as sacred Mysteries into a Temple of Glory giving them a place for ever in this Temple penetrating filling and cloathing them the Glory To have Mortality swallowed up of Life To lose none of the things or entertainments which here we enjoy in this mortal state but the mortality of them only and that not by Death breaking them down with violence but by the sweet breakings in of Life and Immortality upon them not by a blackness of Darkness dreadfully over-spreading them but a brightness of Eternal Glory delightfully rising upon them like the Sun upon the beautiful Forms of Heaven and Earth after they have weakly appeared in the melancholy Beams of the Moon shining faintly in the shade of the Night And He that hath wrought us for the Self-same Thing is God It is a Divine Hand and Skill which hath framed and fashioned us to this capacity It is God who by his own operations in us not mediately as in tâ—e works of Nature but immediately as in all works of Grace and Glory hath wrought out this Spiritual and Divine Being this Spiritual and Divine Nature in us which never dyeth but is changed from Glory to Glory which in Death putteth off nothing but putteth on a greater and purer Light upon its weaker Lights and Shades piercing thorow and breaking up delusive Shapes formed out of the Darkness of remaining night by stronger Beams of Glory falling from above Who hath also given us the Earnest of his Spirit An Earnest is part of the Sum in present and an assurance of the rest God doth not only frame a Spiritual work like a new Heaven in us but giveth us the Person of his Spirit himself in which the Persons of the Father and the Son are seen together unvailed in their Union and Communion of Beauties and Loves in the unity of which all Angels and Blessed Spirits dwell together as their proper Center and Circle This Spirit God giveth to be in the Spiritual Nature framed by himself in us as a new Sun in the new Heaven This Spirit in us is the Earnest of our Death a foretast of its Sweetness and Delights a vision in part beforehand of the manner of our dying and an assurance of the compleating of its season after the same Beautiful and pleasant Image As at the first Effusion of the Spirit upon us or any new Effusion as at any Act of the Spirit when he shineth our freshly in us this Natural Image of Things is no more a Light of Glory Forms of Glory Immortal Spirits full of a Divine Beauty and Majesty appear every where They are alone and there is nothing besides in the whole space of Things above or below past present or to come As they are so are we All Things are one Vision of Divine Glory Neither do we perceive how one Image of Things goeth and another cometh Both are done one is come the other is gone in the same moment in the twinkling or cast of an Eye So is Death This is the Earnest of our Death This is a step of Death a foretast of it So shall Death he perfected us I have three Observations to make upon this Scripture besides that which I have
within and without in the glorified Person of the Lord Jesus There he taketh his first view of thee There his Eye and his Heart are fixt Eternally to thee Here he maketh choice of thee here he falleth in love with thee and his Soul resteth with perfect delight in thee For he beholdeth thee as a spectacle of all Divine loveliness lying in the Bosom of him who is the brightness of all Divine Glory As a Vessel in the Sea is filled with the Waters and overflown with the same Waters so art thou before the World was in the Person of thy Jesus as in a Sea of Spiritual Heavenly Beauties all full within all covered without with these Glories quite thorow transparent with the riches of their lustre entirely swallowed up into the Sea of these pure and bright Glories This is Electing Love of which St. Paul speaketh Ephes. 1. He hath made us acceptable in the beloved one It is a significant expression which no language can answer for the Sweetness and Fulness of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 made acceptable The phrase hath this force in it God embraceth thee with the Arms of the dearest and tenderest loves finding thee entirely cloathed and encircled with the height of all loveliness in the object of all loves and the first sâ—at the essence itself of all lovelinesses the Lord Jesus His Soul is well-pleased with thee to the utmost of all Content he hath his fill of Pleasures in thee enjoying thee in the Center of all Pleasantnesses his own Son 2. Part. Dâ—vine love in the second Part is a love of Benevolence While thou art a desolate Wilderness where nothing appeareth but Dearth and Drouth but Bush and Brake the love of Eternity descendeth and soweth itself as a Heavenly Seed in thee It cometh down in Heavenly Showers It breaketh forth in Heavenly Sun-shines upon thee The same love springeth up into all manner of Spiritual loveliness in thee Now the Grass groweth the Roes and the Hinds play where the Dragon lay The Bramble bringeth forth Roses The Stony Heart is now made the Garden of God The Soul which wallowed in the â—ilth of the Devil is washed by Eternal love in its own Blood redeemed by its own life made to bear the Fruit of its own loveliness and ready trimmed for a Bride to itself 3. Part. Divine love in the third Part is a love of Complacency and delight in thee in thine own Person Now Heaven is opened to thee God with all his holy Angels are continually descending and ascending between Heaven and thine Heart which is become as it were another Heaven on Earth God resteth in his Love to thee and rejoyceth with singing over thee The Marriage-feast of the Lamb and his Bride is kept in thee and thou art that Bride God with all his loves resteth in thy Bosom All his desires who is infinite are terminated in thee All his delights are consummated in thee All the Quires of Angels round about sing of his love to thee All his Excellencies and Glories all his works on every side sing for his Joy in thee Ah! Dear Souls When God shall thus bring back your Captivity how will your Mouths be filled with laughter How will you be as those that Dream But why should these glad Tydings seem to you too good too great to be true God is able to do all this for you and in you For his Power is Infinite God is as willing as he is able For his Power lyeth in his Will and his Will is Love Only wait thou for him and keep thine Eye upon the first Link in the Golden Chain of Divine love which is fastned to the Throne of God the Person of Christ in Heaven above all thy frailties folly and filths before thy Being in Flesh. This Link is that which draweth after it the other two inseparably and infallibly This is the Circle of Heavenly love First God loveth thee in Eternity with that love with which he loveth the Lord Jesus For he beholdeth thee in the light of the same loveliness in which he beholdeth Jesus Christ. Then he bringeth down the Treasure of this love and loveliness which is his beloved Son into thee soweth him as a Seed of the Divine Nature and Sonship He springeth up in thee transformeth thee into his own likeness groweth up in an inseparable Union and Fellowship with thee Now God hath another Son in which he seeth his Son in conjunction on Earth as he saw them before in conjunction in Heaven Lastly God embraceth this Son on Earth in whom he seeth his Son He giveth him the kiss of a Father with all the Joys of a Father He taketh him into his Arms carrieth him up into Heaven changing him still as he carrieth him up till this Union begun below be at last made perfect in and swallowed up into that Union which was at first in Eternity Then shall the Lord Jesus see himself in a Saint after the same manner in which a Saint is seen in the Lord Jesus both being made perfect in Each and all made perfect in one Follow on to know the Lord and his love and ye shall know this love of the Lord. 1. Use. See the Evil of sin upon two Accounts First Sin is an Aberration from the Will of God Secondly Sin is an Opposition to that Will 1. The first Evil of Sin is that is it an Aberration from the Will of God The Will of God is love In every Sinful path thou losest the Love-Presence of thy God What is this Love-Presence and what is thy loss in being deprived of it In the Love-Pâ—esence of God are these Things 1. A Light of Glory shining round about thee This Light of Glory cloatheth thy Person all over with its living lustre as with a Garment of pure Gold of Divine Loveliness This Light layeth all things open and naked to thee in their Heavenly Beauties in their Eternal Truths and Substances This light is a mutual Union and Fellowship between thee and all things in the light all the Children of light all Spirits and Forms of light This light is a Spiritual Paradise in which thou springest up and flourishest as a Plant and Flower of light This Divine Light is a new Wine which thou continually drinkest in and art filled with pure Spirits of all Life Excellency Loves and Joys Lastly This pleasant and triumphant Light chaseth away all the shadows all the darkness deceits melancholy and fears of the Night 2. In the Love-Presence is the Face of God unvailed naked and smiling God is as a King and a Bridegroom in his Ivory Palace Thou art as his Queen and Bride at his Right hand in Garments of Needle-work wrought by the Eternal Spirit with all manner of Beautiful and Delightful Flowers and Figures Here they make these two glad with all manner of Pleasures as on their Marriage-day 3. An innumerable company of Angels make up this Love-Presence These are thy guard They
to this end that you may not sin by departing from it but if any man do sin that he may presently return Saul was softned and melted when he heard the language of love from David who had watched over him to preserve him while he slept in the midst of that Army with which he made War upon him Is this thy voice my Son David said he then Open thine Eyes see the Divine Will with innumerable Eyes of love watching over thee in the midst of thy rebellions Open thine Ears hear the Divine Will wooing thee with the sweetest language of love in the midst of thy pollutions This will turn thee again to the Will of God to melt thy self into its Bosom when once this thought ariseth in thee that thou returnest to a Bosom of love ever open to thee Use. 3. Be in love with Holiness Holiness is a Conformity to the Will of God This Will is Love How easy is that Yoak How light is the Burthen How pleasant is the Law of Love Keep my Commandment and abide ye in my Love even as I abide in my Fathers Love saith Jesus Christ. To abide in the Divine Will to keep the Commandments of that is to abide in the Paradise of Divine love to dress it and keep it David saith of the Law of the Lord Psal. 19. It is more to be desired than thousands of Gold and Silver It is sweeter than the Honey and the Honey-comb In keeping it is exceeding great reward Hear O beloved Souls and be wise and be in love with Holiness In every command to Holiness God cometh to you in the Light and Purity of all his Divine Beauties in the Strength and Sweetness of all his Divine loves to make thee like himself to marry thee to himself In every act of obedience to this law of Holiness thy Person shineth with a Heavenly lustre by the shining forth of the unvailed Person of God upon thee thou receivest a kiss of Heavenly love immediately from the Mouth of God and returnest it again O tast and see Then you will say that this Heavenly Traffick is beyond that of all precious of all pleasant things No where such loveliness as this no where such love Holiness is a Conformity to the Will of God The Will of God is Love the Fountain and the Life of all Incorruptible Beauties of all pure and ever-flourishing Pleasures I have done with the second â—escription of Divine Love which defineth it to be the same with the Divine Will 3. Descrip. God is Love He who was the Disciple of Love who lay in the Bosom of Love and so best knew what Love is declareth Divine Love to be the Nature and Essence of God God saith he is Love He that dwelleth in Love dwelleth in God and God dwelleth in him 1 Joh. 3. 16. As the Sea is a heap of Waters The gathering together of the Waters God called the Sea Gen. 1. As the Body of the Sun is a pure and simple Light so is God a Collection of Loves a gathering together of all Loves into one Spirit This is the Divine Nature an Unity a Purity a Simplicity of Love I shall endeavour to shew you by four Arguments that there is no name which doth so properly so fitly express the nature of God as this of Love 1. Argum. The first the principal Thing the beginning of all Things in God is Love Psal. 136. I intend a short Paraphrase upon this whole Psalm because it maketh so clearly and fully for my purpose being taken altogether from the beginning to the end of it If you would hear the Musick of Angels of Heaven if you would hear the living Harmony of the Divine Nature as it is all Love listen with a Spiritual Ear to this Psalm which is a Song composed entirely of this Subject of Divine Love If the Spirit of God assist me to sound forth aright the Heavenly Musick of this Psalm I do not doubt to make your hearts in your Bosoms to leap and dance to it by that time I have done First Take two general Observations concerning this Psalm 1. Gener. Observ. This is a Psalm of Praises and Thanksgivings the Work of Heaven a Heavenly Work But all the Praises here are attributed to all the Thanksgivings are terminated in Love and the Eternity of Love This is the burthen of the Song repeated in every verse this is that into which all the Strength and Sweetness of the sense is still resolved this maketh one half of every verse quite thorow the whole Psalm For his Mercy endureth for ever The Word in Hebrew signifieth alike Mercy Kindness Love That word endureth is added by the Translatours You may read the words with as full an agreement with the Original as I humbly conceive For his Love is Eternal But however this be if we adhere to the Translation Mercy is one of the sweetest tenderest largest names of Divine love 1. Mercy is Love condescending and descending from the heights of all Heavens above to the nethermost parts of the Earth to the nethermost Hell 2. Mercy is Love uniting itself to the vilest and most miserable Creatures which lie below which stick in the Mire and Clay in the bottom of the Pit There love sympathizeth with them maketh itself entirely one with them in their low estate 3. Mercy is Love making a mutual and strange exchange with those loathsome and lost Souls Iâ— taketh to itself their guilt shame weakness and woes It giveth to them its own Righteousness Strength Beauties Joys and Glories Thus Mercy is the circle of Divine love as it cometh forth from Heaven and Eternity goeth down to the lowest depths of Time and the Creation then ascendeth again till like the Sun it return thither where it first arose Poor and broken Spirits who lie at the utmost ends of the Earth mourning as outcasts hope evermore in Eternal love wait for it The love of God will find you out it will meet with you and take you in its way For Divine love is Eternal It encompasseth Heaven and Earth Time and Eterty His Mercy endureth for ever 2. Gener. Observ. This Psalm comprehendeth all things in it Created or Uncreated the Nature of God the Persons of God and of Christ the Wonders of God the Works of God the Works of Nature Grace and Glory It comprehendeth all things Then it maketh the ground and Crown of all to be Love this is brought in to every particular in each verse as the Reason Rule Result of all For his Mercy endureth for ever for his love is Eternal It is a maxime in Nature that all motion is founded upon something unmoveable This is the Divine Maxime upon which Heaven and Earth standeth all motions in the heart of God and in the Creature of Grace and Nature are founded upon the unmoveableness the unchangeableness of eternal Love O blessed Love O blessed God who is this love O blessed Soul which with a spiritual Eye created
which Eternal Love bringeth forth to itself within itself as its own Essential Form and Image This Glory this Life-Image of Love is that which it is forming in every Aegypt Sea Wilderness and Canaan The Heathen represented the Nature of this thing by Venus the Mother of Love the Seeds and Life springing by a Cupid Love the Child of this Mother Gen. 1. 2. It is said that the Spirit of God moved upon the Waters The Paraphrase upon that Scripture maketh it to be an allusion to a Dove which is the Bird of love sitting upon her Eggs and hatching her young ones The Holy Spirit is often in Scriptures represented by a Dove Eternal Love is of a Truth that Almighty Spirit which at first sate upon the whole Creation to form it and moveth upon it thorow all times to cherish and govern it Love is the Mother of all above All things are the Off-spring of Love a Race of Seminal and Springing Loves Mercy Love runneth along with the whole with each particular of the whole thorow the length of Eternity itself This is still the Burthen of the Song For his Mercy endureth for ever 2. The Works of Grace These are the second sort of Divine Works and these also are the Works of Love These are divided into three Ranks 1. The constant abode of the Soul in the Heart of God Who remembred us in our low estate v. 23. Thou O broken Heart Art sinking by ignorance by unbelief by thy fall from God thou art sinking still deeper into the Darkness and Filth of this World and thy Lusts. Still thou sinkest into the Power and Horrours of the Devil Now thou sayest the Lord hath forgotten me he hath cast me off for ever Yet he remembreth thee in thy low estate Still thou art in his Thoughts thou art in his Heart as a Pillar in the Temple of the Divine Nature which is Love never to go forth Thy Person is ever before him with a Sweet and deep Impression upon his Spirit never to be rased out What hath done this It is Eternal Love This is the Light of the Divine Mind which continually presenteth thee to it in the dress of its own Beâ—uties This is the sweet force of the Divine Will which holdeth thee fast in itself which beareth thee in its Arms thorow all conditions and will not let thee go for ever This is the Reason why He remembreth thee in thy low estate For his Mercy endureth for ever 2. The bringing us back into the Bosom of God This is the second Rank in the Works of Grace And hath redeemed us from our Enemies For his Mercy endureth for ever v. 24. It is Eternal Love in the Bosom of the Father which hath sent Jesus Christ forth from thence for us and to us that he may be our Sacrifice our Ransom and our Redeemer It is Eternal Love in the Person of Christ which cometh down from Heaven to make itself a Sacrifice for us to the Justice and Wrath of God It is Eternal Love in the Person of our Iâ—sus which descendeth upon the Earth as a Field of Blood to undertake the Fight with the Powers of Darkness that he may reskue us and redeem us from all our Enemies on Earth and in Hell It is Eternal Love in the Person 〈◊〉 Iâ—â—us Christ that gâ—veth itself a Price for us that one Pearl in which Hâ—â—ven and Earth with all the treasures of the Creature and Creator lie to puâ—chase us to itself It is Eternal Love in the Person of our Heavenly Bridegroom that giveth itself to us to cloath us to form us to act us to be a Crown of Divine Glory upon us to be a Fountain of all Spiritual Loveliness Life Grace Purity and Joys in the midst of us Thus it redeemeth us from our Captivity and Shame Thus it maketh us a Bride fit for itself coming forth ready trim'd out of the Heaven of its own Embraces 3. The nourishing of us in the Bosom of God This Work of Grace cometh in the third Rank Who giveth food to all Flesh For His Mercy endureth for ever Mark how these answer one another Mercy Food All Flesh For ever Eternal Love is both the Feeder and the Food If God give Food If everlasting Mercy Eternal Love in the Divine Nature and Form give Food This is Food indeed not the Flood of a Shadow or a lie My Flesh is Meat indeed my Blood is Drink indeed saith our Lord Jesus The Lord speaketh not this of his Humane Nature For of this he saith in another place The Flesh profiteth not but the Spirit quickneth It is Eternal Love which is the Flesh of Christ the strength and substance of the Divine Nature It is Eternal Love which is the Blood of Christ the Life and Sweetness of the Divine Nature This is that Meat indeed and Drinâ— indeed which Love giveth for Food to all Flesh in its Bosom to nourish it to Eternal Life I have passed thorow the second Sort of 〈◊〉 Works the Works of Grace 3. Works of Glory O give thanks unto the God of Heaven For his Mercy endureth for ever v. 26. and last The Psalm begun with Goodness as its ground of Love v. 1. It closeth its Musick with Heaven as the Crown of Love The natural Heavens the Heavens of the first Creation are not intended here These were mentioned in the body of the Song and pass away These are the last and highest Heavens the Heavens of Glory the high and holy places of Eternity These Heavens are all made of Love All the precious and incorruptible Substance all the unexpressible and pure Sweetnesses All the Divine and unfading Beauties of these Heavens are Eternal Love All the Praises given to God as he appeareth in these Heavens with all his Saints and Angels all his Joys and Glories round about him are attributed to Eternal Love the Root the Flower the Fruit the only reason and rellish of all O give thanks to the God of Heaven For his Mercy endureth for ever For his Love is Eternal The midst of Solomons Chariot is pavâ—d or flameth with Love Cant. 3. The Center of Heaven is a Love-fire All the Spirits and Spiritual Glories of it are Immortal flames of Divine Love 2. Argum. Love is the end of all Things with God This is the second Argument to prove Love to be the proper Name of God and full expression of the Divine Nature Love appeareth to be the last end of all things three ways 1 All the Works of God end in Love 2. All the Attributes and Exâ—ellencies of God serve his Love 3. God resteth in his Love 1. All the Works of God end in Love Psal. 145. v. 9. His tender Mercies are over all his Works The word Mercies cometh from the Belly the inward parts the Womb. It signifieth the very heart of Love where it first liveth and never dieth where it lyeth warmest and hath the strongest pulse It signifieth Love in its Center and
before the Testament or Covenant is here expressed by Promises The Law is compounded of Precepts and Promises dependant upon those Precepts as condition of the Covenant to be performed mutually on both sides of prohibitions and threatnings annexed But as the Sun is a Body streaming forth freely by a knot of Beams So is the Gospel a knot of Promises which are all Love in so many clear unmixt Beams shooting themselves freely forth from the fulness and force of Love alone in its Head-spring the heart of God Obj. But you will say Are there not Precepts set down Conditions imposed Duties required high and hard things to be performed in an Evangelical State Ans. It is most true The Gospel hath its Precepts Conditions Duties and these all high hard raised to a pitch of Spirituality and Heavenliness beyond the reach and sight of any natural Spirit But these all depend upon the Promise and not the Promise on them All Evangelical Graces and Duties are Children of the Promise The Promise is as the Hierusalem above free the mother of all living Principles and Performances We read 2 Pet. 1. 4. That we have given to us great and precious promises by which we are made partakers of the Divine Nature You who believe not hear and believe You who believe but faintly and weakly hear that your Faith may be encreased You who are strong in Faith hear and believe yet more Hear how all the difficulties in believing in the whole life of Faith from the Beginning to the end the Promises are Pipes of pure Gold laid into your Hearts from the Heart of Christ in Glory By these from that flourishing Olive Tree the Divine Nature as the best Oil floweth in upon you freely and perpetually When a Gardiner would set choice Plants Flowers in a barren sandy Soil he first bringeth in fresh and fertile Soil to lay upon it Then he planteth in this good ground which he hath made his Flowers and Trees which now flourish and make that barren Earth a rich and pleasant Garden So God findeth thy Spirit O Man barren and sandy a Rock No Spiritual Plant no Truth or Grace of the Gospel can take root or live here But be not thou discouraged by all this by the hardness of thine Heart the barrenness and enmity of thy Spirit to the Heavenly Seed which it killeth as often as it is sown in it Look to the Promises God by these will bring in the Divine Nature With this as a good and Heavenly ground he will overlay and enrich thy Spirit Now God will plant every pleasant Truth every Evangelical Grace in thy Spirit Now they shall all prosper they shall unfold their several Beauties send forth their sweet smell and bring forth much fruit in thee For this new Earth of the Divine Nature shall send forth its Fatness and Sweetness into them and make them to grow When a Prince goeth his progress his Gests are set down before he leaveth his Court which way and how far he shall Travel every day where he shall lodge at night His Servants with Furniture and Provisions from his Court wait upon him all along A Promise is a Declaration and Obligation of Divine Love which it maketh of itself which it layeth upon itself free and immutable Whoever thou art that hearest this believe in the Promise Believe freely in a free Promise This Faith will make thee the Prince of which I speak Thou art now a Prince come forth from Heaven to take thy Progress thorow this world and so return home to Heaven again All thy Gests by day and Rests by night are set down Eternally in Heaven in the Book of Love there which is the Heart of God and from thence in a Promise which is Eternal Love or the Heart of God transcribed to be read by thee The day of a Saint is the Light shining from the Face of God The night is the drawing in and darkning of this Light All thy motions by day with every Circumstance O Believer O Heavenly Prince are described exactly in the draught of Divine Love the Promise Thou goest as it is written of thee there The Holy Angels thine own Servants from thy Court in Heaven attend thee in all thy way with Heavenly Provisions and Minister unto thee as is appointed there Thy resting-place every Night is ordered in the Promise The Blessed Angels go before thee They take up thy lodging for thee They make it ready with Heavenly Furniture They make thy Bed for thee They are a Guard round about thee for the fear of the night All things are done as was set down before in the Bosom of Eternal Love opened in the Promise Thus the Gospel is All a Promise The Promises are Love shining forth by its own Brightnesses and Beams Love is that name of God which is an Ointment poured forth Love is the Divine Nature freely flowing and diffusing itself like Live-Honey As a Bottom of Silk is unwound and wrought out into divers beautiful Figures in a Garment of Needle-work such is thy Life thy whole Story O Saint Divine Love spun forth from the glorious Heart of God as Silk from the curious Worm is wound up into a Bottom in the Promise This rich Bottom worketh out itself into all thy motions and rests into all thy Changes and Chances thorow thy whole course as into so many exact and shining Figures of Eternal Glories Thus Love maketh itself the entire History of thy Life of that History and Life it maketh for thee a Garment to wear in Heaven becoming the Bride of the great King You may see something by my description of this first Pillar on which the Gospel standeth how God is one in the Covenant of Grace and that high Heavenly Unity the sweet Spring of all the Grace and love of the Covenant You will see this breaking forth more like the day dawning by degrees upon you as I shall set before you the other two Pillars of Evangelical Truth 2. Pillar The Promise of the Gospel is to the Seed and to that Seed as to One. To Abraham and to his Seed were the Promises made He saith not to Seeds as to many but to his Seed as to One. v. 16. The Seal of the Promise upon the Seed is the Unity God will not give his Glory to another The Love and Grace of God in the Gospel is his chief Glory Therefore is Evangelical Love to the Evangelical Seed and that for the Unity sake The Seed every where in the Father in all the Off-spring is one with itself Love and Unity are ever inseparable The Strength and Sweetness of the Relation between the Father and the Child is the Unity Love is at its height in a Father because there is the Head of the Unity The Unity here is the Spring of Love From hence its streams run along into all relations with the sweeter and stronger force as they are nearer to this Spring God is Love God
are joyned and raised to the highest point of Unity in Love God assembled all the Powers and properties of the Creation all the Angels the Persons in the Trinity to form a shadow of the Divine Nature in the first Man saying Let us make Man O Man All the Beauties Blessedness and Treasures of the Divine Nature are gathered together into one Sun of Divine Love to make thee new no more a Shadow but a Sun in this Sun a Light in this Light of Eternal Love Open thine Eye and thine Heart to this Love by believing it 3. Argu. Power consisteth in Unity The Supreme Unity which is Love is then Almighty the Supreme and Soveraign Power Is any thing impossible to Almighty Love Is any thing too hard for it What change is there from Darkness to Light from pollution to Purity from profaneness to Piety from the hardness of a Stone to the softness and sweetness of a Dove from a Devil to a Blessed Angel from a Hell to a Heaven which Almighty Love cannot make in thine Heart in a moment with one cast of its Eye upon thee 4. Argu. A simple Unity is Infinite It is ever every where the same Nothing boundeth it because it is itself alone and there is no other thing besides itself together with it to give an allay to it or confine it This is the Infiniteness of the Divine Unity This Unity thus Infinite is Divine Love Come whoever thou art Believe and cast thy self thy Hopes thy Fears thy Griefs thy Joys thy Sins thy Graces into this Abyss this Sea of Love which hath no Bottom nor Shore This will receive them all This will swallow them all up into its sweet and shining Depths This will cover them all with its own rich and glorious Floods as Waters cover the Sea Come Believe and cast thy self all thy Relations the delights of thine Eyes the dear and pleasant things of thine Heart thy whole Spirit Soul and Body into this Infiniteness of Divine Love Thou shalt find them after many days to day immediately eternally sporting themselves in this great and wide Sea of Love Love in the Person of the Lord Jesus descended to the nethermost parts of the Earth and ascended above all Heavens that it might fill all Behold now a Deluge of Divine Love in the Resurrection of thy Jesus Love as a manifold Fountain of a great Deep from below breaketh up and breaketh open itself Love poureth down itself thorow all the Windows of Heaven opened upon thee Thus the Floods of Love increase rise higher and higher till they cover the tops of the highest Mountains of Guilt or Despair of Desire or hope in thy Spirit Only do not thou stop these Fountains of Love from below shut not these Windows of Heaven above to thy self by thy unbelief Love in the Person of the Holy Ghost by the mouth of the Psalmist cryeth unto thee Open thy Mouth wide and I will fill it Open all thine outward and â—nward senses open all the Powers and Faculties of thy whole Man to take â—n this Love Open them yet wider wider still Take in still more of this Love When thou art full of Love to thine utmost Capacity still that Love which remaineth is infinitely more infinitely sweeter than all that which thou hast taken in 5. Argu. That One Seed the Divine Unity is thy Seed in thee that is Love â—tself the first the highest Love Thou also art his Off-spring No Man ever hated his own Flesh. Can a Mother forget her Child saith the Holy Ghost Divine Love is the Seed out of which thou springest Divine Love is thy Father which hath begotten thee thy Mother which hath brought thee forth Can Love itself hate its own Birth and Branch Can Love itself forget its own Child the Child of Love The Prodigal returned first to himself then he thinketh of his Father and of Heaven then his Father meetâ—th him kisseth him bringeth him home entertaineth him with the best Garment with Feasts with Musick with an Universal Joy O Prodigal Thou hast wasted thy Beauty thy Strength thy Parts thy Comforts thy flourishing hopes among Harlots in lewd Company and Conversation Thou feedest among Swine upon Husks and thou starvest in the midst of the Swine for want of Husks O Prodigal The Divine Unity the Seed of God Eternal Love is still thy true self which lyeth below all these disguises of Darkness and Deformity as Jesus Christ lay sleeping at the bottom of the Ship which was ready to sink by the violence of the Storm Thou art the Seed of God For thou also art his Off-spring Thou art the Seed of Love For God is Love O Prodigal Open the Eye of thy Spirit Believe and see Divine Love awakening and appearing in thee as thy true self to thy self Feel it drawing thee by a sweet and irresistible force to itself that is to thy self from whence thou hast so long wandered in a strange Form by the Sorcery of Sin and the Devil Believe and see Divine Love in the true Forms of thy Father and of Heaven opening their Bosom again to thee sending forth a vertue of Heavenly Love from themselves with which they touch thy Heart soften iâ— melt it into kindly repentings a lovely shame and tears of Love kindling sweet desires lively hopes and ardent longings in thee after thy Father and Heaven thine own Country Believe and see Divine Love thy Father coming into the midst of the Swine to thee carrying thee in a rich Chariot made of his own Bosom and Embraces heaping kisses upon thee as he carryeth thee So Love bringeth thee home to its own House the Heavenly Palace of Love There Divinâ— Love cloatheth thee with the best Garment it s own Native and Divine Loveliness Love feasteth thee with its own Joys as they have sprung up thorow a Death for thee into a Resurrection for thee also Love sweetneth heightneth all thy entertainment with its own Musick resounding with a Divine Harmony from all Heavenly Hearts all Glorified Spirits round about thee yea from all things in Heaven and Earth tuned by the Eternal Spirit of Love itself and plaid upon in a most exact and charming Consort Return then to thy true self thy Father and to Heaven Heavenly Love is all these It is also thy way to these thy Light and thy Life in the way Believe Say not now O that I could believe and repent Heavenly Love will form itself into inward Divine Meltings Repentings Acts of Faith and of all Grace in thee Look to this Love and live Eternally in the Bosom of Love The Unity of God which is Love is thy Root which will rise up unto a Divine sap and form itself into all Divine Fruit in thee if thou wait for it For thou art the Off-spring of God Use. 3. The Unity of God is the Root and Reason of Holiness The Unity of God is the Fountain of Love of all Grace and Comfort in the Gospel The
than the Son without the Father Both are from Eternity both equally Eternal in this sacred Mystery and Trinity of the Divine Nature of Divine Love Prov. 8. This Son of Love is brought in speaking of himself and his Father Before the Mountains were formed ere yet the foundations of the Earth were laid I was before him as one brought up with him his delight day by day Before all the Creatures in Eternity the Lord Jesus alone was with the Father and none other besides him He was bred up together with him the Lamb the lovely the beloved Birth and Object of all his Loves the delight of his Eyes that fed at his Table and lay in his Bosom If you ask now what the Father did before he made the World the answer is full and sweet the Father in the infiniteness of Eternity brought forth Jesus Christ delighted himself in Jesus Christ the only Birth of all his Love and Desires the entirâ— Image of all his Loves and Joys Use. If you would be Holy Heavenly and Happy if you would be perfect in all Graces Joys and Glories as your Heavenly Father is perfect 〈◊〉 like him in this He is taken up with his Son Jesus alone before above a Creatures in Eternity Let this Jesus as he is the Birth and Image of all Dâ—â—vine Loves in the Father the Fountain of Love be your only one the 〈◊〉 Birth and beautiful Image of your Spirits continually before you bred 〈◊〉 with you into every Age Form and State your only delight day by da This is the first Birâ—â— of Love the Birth of Love in Eternity All those Birth of Love and lovely Images which are in the Creature Shadowy Finite Fâ—â—ding are here Substantial a Spiritual and Heavenly Substance Infinite Endlesâ— Ever-flourishing 3. Character The Lord Jesus as he is the second Person in the Trinity is the fairâ—â— Birth of Divine Love We read 1 Cor. 13. 5. Love behaveth not itself unseemâ— doth nothing uncomely The word uncomely signifieth a want of Proportion Haâ—â—mony Order Figure which make all Beauty and Musick every where Loâ—â— can conceive can form nothing within itself can bring forth nothing froâ— itself but its proper Object its proper effect which is suitable to it 〈◊〉 is Loveliness and Beauty As the Trees of Paradise had their Seed in them so every Birth of Love is in every part full of the Seeds of Love by which begetteth Love again full of the Beams of Love which kindle the sweâ— heat and fire of Love This is loveliness which soweth the Seeds of Loâ—â— and sendeth forth the Beams of Love into Spirits round about it As the 〈◊〉 the Supreme Eye of the visible World is to the Light so is Love the Eyâ—â— and heart of Eternity to loveliness Loveliness is the proper Emanation 〈◊〉 Image of Love by which it planteth itself in all Eyes and Hearts attractâ—â— all things into the Golden Circle and Center into the Glorious Palace of 〈◊〉 Blessed and Eternal Unity in itself which is itself Love then bringeth forth Loveliness and Beauty the Divine Love alâ— vine Loveliness and Beauty the Supreme Love the Supreme Loveliness and Beauty So the Lord Jesus is Beauty itself a Divineâ— Beauty the Supream Beauty the fairest Birth of Love being the first the only Birth of the Father the Fountain of Divine Love Love at the highest Love in its first Sweetness John 1. 14. We saith the Holy Apostle speaking of Jesus Christ saw his Glory the Glory as of the Only-begotten Son of God The Son of God is the only Birth of Love from the Father the Fountain of Love in two respects Comparatively Comprehensively First The Lord Jesus is the only Birth and Image of Divine Love Comparatively for his excelling loveliness We saw his Glory as the Glory of the Only-begotten of the Father So great a Glory shineth in his Person as darkneth all other Beauties all other Births and Images of Love maketh them quite to disappear and seem none at all Secondly Our Beloved Jesus is the only Birth and Image of Divine Love Comprehensively All his Saints are in thine hand All Holy Births and Images of the Father the Spring of Love in Eternity all Divine Lovelinesses the works of this curious Workman all the Jewels of Beauty framed by the skill of the first and Supreme Love in the heart of the Father all are comprehended in this Birth and Image all adorn the Person of Jesus Christ are there in their highest lustre and take their Beauty from him Thus is the Son of God the fairest Birth and Image of Divine Love Use. 1. O Sinners This is that Jesus who wooeth you the fairest of all things Beauty itself the Divine the Supreme Beauty Object no more against him and your union with him Obj. 1. Say not you are unworthy of him it cannot be that he should love Creatures so unlovely as you are Ans. He who would be your Bridegroom will be your Beauty What Bosom of the Highest and Divinest Love are you not fit for when he who is the Highest and Divinest Beauty is your Loveliness What stains can appear in you when the fairest Image from the Fountain of Love comprehending in itself innumerable Glories all Divine all Supreme descendeth upon you and wrappeth you up entirely in itself Obj 2. Say not you are unfit you cannot believe his Love you cannot love him again you shall never be pure and lovely like him to please him to honour him Ans. He who offereth himself to be your Beauty and Loveliness will be your Lover your Bridegroom This Glorious Spirit the Life of all Divine Loveliness will be the Husband of your Spirits All your Fruit shall be from him He who is the fairest Birth and Image from the Fountain of Love will be the Birth of all Spiritual and Heavenly Beauties in you of all Graces Comforts and Glories He will be the lovely Image springing up the root of Love the heart of the Father into your whole Spirit Soul and Body Object then no more Make plain his way Lay open your hearts to this Jesus who cometh to be a Divine Beauty to thy Person a Divine Bridegroom to thy Spirit the Divine Birth of Faith of Love of all Graces Glories Joys and Immortality in thee He will be better to thee than all thy Righteousness sweeter to thee than all thy Lusts Lovelier than all the Idolâ— of thine Eyes and Heart Fruitfuller than all thine hopes Use. 2. O Saints Behold another of your rich Jewels See here that Jewel which when you wear filleth Heaven and Earth with the brightness and sweetness of its light round about you dazleth blindeth and confoundeth the Devils that they cannot come near you to hurt you attracteth and draweth down the Angels from Heaven to gaze upon you to admire you to attend round about you to encompass you whithersoever you go yea allureth ravisheth the heart of the Father himself to come and inhabit in you
without any Reserve without any Division of the Heart Simplicity is Unity The Intentness of the Mind upon One Thing The heart of God All the Thoughts of his heart All the Powers of the Godhead All the Divine Attributes are united and intended upon This One Thing alone Love poured forth on the Person of the Lord Jesus Simplicity is without Alteration or Composition The heart of God is single in this Natural unchangeable This is the One Thing the Onely Thing of God's heart This is the Sâ—mplicity of the Divine Operations from Eâ—ernity to Eternity The Effusion of Love in the Person of Christ There may be many Shadows many Vails many Windings But this is the Simplicity the naked Face of the Divine Design of the Divine Work from the Beginning to the End as it lieth in the heart of God 2. Upbraiding none To upbraid is to object some Evil as an Argument of withholding some Act of Love or exercising some Act of Wrath. John 1. 2. 9. Jesus Christ is called the Lamb which taketh away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tollit taketh up beareth the Sins of the World When the Father was to pour forth his Love upon Christ he did not reproach him saying Thou hast the Sins of all the World upon thee Thou hast upon thee Millions of Whoredomes Adulteries Incests Treasons Witchcrafts Murthers Idolatries Rebellious Blaspemies Horrid Profanenesses Apostasies Spiritual wickednesses in Heavenly Angelical Divine Forms the proper Sins of Devils Thou hast many Davids Amnons Absaloms Manassehs Mary Magdalens many Peters many Judas's in thee and comest thou to me for Love How can I give thee my Love Instead of this when he is Baptized into that publick Ministry in which he professedly beareth the Sins of all the World before Men and Angels in which he beareth the Person of the greatest Sinners that ever were in the open Eye of Heaven Heaven openeth upon him the God-Head descendeth upon him visibly in a living Form of Love in the Form of a Dove a voice cometh to him from the Father This is my Beloved Son in whom I am well pleased St. Paul saith Love thinketh no Evil. Solomon saith Love covereth All Sin When the Father should express Love to Christ in the Person of a Sinner he doth not object thy Unloveliness thy Filth thy want of Love thy enmity neither to deny Love nor to make the manner of expressing love lâ—ss sweet less lovely No. As the Seâ— when it floweth covereth all the Sand on the Shore round about with Multitudes of deep Waters so God when he poureth forth his love in Jesus Christ drowneth Eternally the innumerable multitudes of thy Sins with mighty and unfathomable Seas of Love which never return to leave them naked or bare to any Eye any more for ever God poureth forth his Love in Jesus Christ freely that is 1. Naturally 2 Nakedly 3. Indifferently 1. God poureth forth his Love in Christ Naturally Mat. 3. 17. This is my Beloved Son in whom I am well pleased Every Faculty or Power is carried forth naturally to its proper object Jesus Christ is the proper object of the Fathers Love The most perfect work of Nature in every thing is to bring forth its like Then nothing so Naturally so Powerfully attracteth love so delighteth aâ— this similitude doth The most perfect and perpetual Act of the Divine Nature in the Father is to bring forth the most perfect Image of himself in the Person of Christ then to pour forth himself in all Divine Loves and Pleasures into his Bosom Pleasure accompanieth all natural operations Pleasure naturally drawetâ— every Spirit Jesus Christ draweth the Heart of the Father all his love entirely to himself because the Father is pleased in him He is the Rest and Joy of his Father Three Things follow upon This â—aturalness of the Father's Love in Christ 1. Sweetness 2. Force 3. Duration 1. Sweetness That is ever Sweetest which is most Natural Live Honey is most esteemed because it droppeth Naturally of its own accord from the Honey-Comb Thou who hungrest after the Love of God lye down in the arms of thy Jesus There Love will drop and fall from the Heart of the Father into the Mouth of thy Spirit as Freely as Naturally as Sweetly as 〈◊〉 Live Honey from the Hâ—ny-Comb 2. Force That which is Natural hath the Greatest Force in it Every Natural Agent worketh to the utmost of its Power Thou who wantest Love be found in Jesus Christ. As the Sun every moment poureth forth All hâ—â— Beams from every part of him because he shineth Naturally so will the Father pour forth himself in Millions of Loves from every Point of his Hearâ— of his Godhead he will pour forth himself in All his Loves he will poâ—â— forth himself All in Loves upon Thee in Jesus Christ. For the Father as Naturally loveth in Jesus Christ as the Sun-shineth 3. Duration Nothing violent unnatural continueth Psal. 30. 5. His angâ—â— endureth but a moment In his favour there is Life Clouds and Storms 〈◊〉 not long They are a violence upon the Air and Praeternatural to it Calmâ—â— Serenities and Clear Sunshines are its Natural State Clouds and Storms of wrath are a Force upon the Divine Nature Strange to it a Disguise upon it The Blessed Calms Serenities and Sun shines of Loves of Love are its proper State Comfort thy self then O afflicted Soul The rain will be over the storm will be pass't away The sweet and clear the Golden the Glorious smiles of Love will return after the Storm and Rain These will rest the Last in the Face of God and upon thy Spirit Wrath is but for a moment at longest the moment of this Life this Shadow this short Dream of Lifes The Truth of Life the Perpetuity of Life Eternity is for Love 2. God poureth forth his Love in Christ Nakedly John 3. 34 God giveth him his Spirit without Measure The Spirit is Love in a Living Person in its Eternal Substance in its Native Seat in its Unlimited Freedom as Light in the Sun God saith to the Lord Jesus I will not stand to measure out my Love to thee Take it All. I will not give thee a Jewel out of my Cabinet but my Cabinet of Jewels I will not give thee an Apple of Love off from the Tree but the Tree of Love with all ripe and pleasant Fruits of Love hanging upon it I will not give thee some Spice from the Island but the Island of Spices the Land of Loves where they grow and increase eternally I will give thee the Infinite Eternal Spirit of Love himself where all the Treasures of Love â—re without number measure or End The Face of Divine Love in Jesus Christ hath no Vail upon it though â—ever so thin no Cloud upon it though never so fine No. Its Love shineth â—orth in Jesus Christ with a naâ—ed face in its Strength with all its Beauties â—ll its Sweetnesses Thou who art weary who art heavy laden with any
forth as A Spirit as the Eternal Spirit having married the Humane Nature into One Heavenly Form and Spirit with itself Now all the Treasures of Righteousness Life Immortality Love Joy all the Treasures of the God-Head display themselves over the whole Person of Christ entirely nakedly richly to the Height of all their Beauties and Sweetnesses as Flowers full-blown in Spring as Fruit-trees laden with ripe fruit in Autumn Who now can express the Joys when a Naked Heart meeteth with its Naked Jesus when both have cast off their Vails One from his Face The other from his Heart It is the same Blessed hand of the Eternal Spirit which taketh off the Vails from Both dropping Myrrhe a heavenly Sweetness Purity and Immortality as It taketh them off The Reflection of the Face of God upon the Face of Moses on the Mount cast a Divine Lustre and Beauty which remained upon it He came down into the midst of the People bringing a Heaven in his Face along with him But they could not bear the Brightness of this Naked Beauty He therefore casteth a Vail upon his Face So they remain in Darkness their Minds are blinded until Wrath cometh upon them to the uttermost This is an Example unto us upon whom the Ends of all Fore-going Times and Actions are come Behold the Lord Jesus is gone up to the top of the Mount He is ascended He is Glorified with the Father with that Glory which he had with the Father before the World was As a Spirit he cometh down again to us in the Shining Form of this Spiritual Uncreated Eternal Glory Wo to you who cannot bear the Brightness of this Appearance who cannot look stedfastly upon the Naked Face the Naked Form of the Lord Jesus this Spirit To you he casteth a Vail over his Face and as he casteth a Vail over his own Face he casteth a Vail over your Hearts To you now he cometh as a Thief in the Night bringing Darkness and Doubt Trouble and Terrours Confusion Desolation and Despair spoiling you of all your Counterfeit Jewels false hopes false Joys false Graces false Christ. But you who love and wait for this Appearanâ—e of your Lord and Saviour like Lightning shining from Heaven into your Hearts you who with the single Eye of a Chast Spouse look to the Beloved Person of your Jesus in the simplicity of his Spiritual and Divine Form Blessed are you of the Lord Jesus To you he cometh as a Sun of Righteousness with healing in his Wings Overspreading you with his warm and Naked Beauties Covering your Deformities Curing your Maladies Infusing new Cordials of Immortal Life and Joy into your Hearts Hatching you to Spirituality raising you upon Silver Wings and Golden Feathers to Heavenly Flights with himself To you he cometh Enlightning enlivening Transforming Glorifying Gathering you up into One Spirit One Glory with himself Where this Spirit the Lord Jesus is there is Liberty of beholding of enjoying the Lord Jesus nakedly immediately entirely eternally without any chain clog cloud interposal or interruption There is Liberty of growing up into a Spirit out of All the Vails of Flesh into One Spirit with him O the Joys of a Naked Heart when it meeteth with its Naked Saviour But as it was with the Painter who called to remove the Vail that he might see the Picture when their was a Vail onely painted there The Vail was all the Picture so is it with the hypocrite with the Temporary Believer His Jesus his Heaven is a Vail onely a Vail like that of the Tabernacle finely wrought with Pictures of Angels of Heaven of Jesus but Keeping him for ever from the Face the Bosom of Jesus the society of Angels the Joys of Heaven in the Outermost Darkness His hope is a Spiders Web. The Poison of Death and Hell are bred there I hear a Voice frequently in my Spirit saying to me Cry What shall I cry 1. Cry There was an Ark in which Noah and his Family were safe from the Flood which drowned the World The onely Ark in which Noah the Believer the Child of Rest shall be safe from the Flames which are now ready to devour the World is the Naked Person of Christ in the Invisibility and Spirituality of his Divine Eternal Form 2. Cry The Sound and noise of the Hammers framing the Ark for Noah preached the Righteousness of God the Ruin of the World very near The Sound and noise of the Lord Jesus the Spirit of Life the Spirit of Love in his Naked Person in his Naked Loves and Lovelinesses growing up forming himself in the Spirits of his Saints preaches now a Deluge of Destruction Death and Hell at the Door ready to enter in The Rest and Righteousness of God in his Bosom alone the Rest of God in his Loves the Righteousness of God in his Loveliness 3. Cry As it was in the Days of Noah so it will be now The whole World will go on to eat and Drink to marry and give in Marriage to mock at this Preparation of an Ark at these Discourses of these Endeavours for the Spiritual Person of Christ in the Heavenly Image for the Revelation of him in our Spirits for the Retirement of our Persons into him The whole World will go on in Sensuality and Carnality mocking at the Lord this Spirit the Ark till the day that God open the Windows of Heaven from above and break up the great Deep of Hell from below to cover them with and swallow them up in Unquenchable Flames They say that Seth foreseeing Two Destructions of the World prepared Two Pillars upon which he engraved all Mysteries of Humane and Divine Knowledge One of Marble to endure the Flood the other of Brick to continue in the Flames St Peter speaking of the Flood and the Ark addeth The Like Figure whereunto now saveth us Baptism not the washing away of the filth of the Flesh but the Answer of a Good Conscience by the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the Dead The Lord Jesus counselleth the last Church Laodicea to buy of him Gold tried in the Fire Gold tried in the Fire no more loseth any thing or receiveth any harm in the Fire but shineth more gloriously The Lord Jesus risen from the Dead and become a Spirit the Fountain of Life is the Gold tried in the Fire of Death and the Divine Wrath. An Ark of Wood saved Noah from the Waters Behold an Ark of pure Gold a Spirit of Immortality and Glory which shineth with greatest Glory in the midst of the Everlasting Burnings This is our Jesus who saveth us from the Fire which is already Kindled and burneth upon the World which will immediately raise itself to a Mighty Irresistible Flame Blessed are you who enter into this Ark of Gold and shut your selves up into It. Here you shall lie upon beds of Love as in the Marriage-Chamber in the Bosom of your Bridegroom encompassed with Songs of Joy while the Fire dreadfully devoureth all without
to take thy Person into the Arms of his Preventing Loves to breath bis Preventing Loves into Thee as a New Life the Spring of a New Beauty excelling that which was lost by Thee in Paradise incorruptible that never fadeth not passeth away Ladies and Queens have sometimes hatched Eggs in their Bosoms Thy dead deformed Person will thy Saviour hatch in the warm and naked Bosom of his Preventing Loves unto a Divine Life that shall answer Love with Love and flourish in the Loveliness of every Grace every Glory through thy New-born Soul and body according to their proper seasons Having known the Love of the Lord my Spirit laboureth yet not my Spirit but the Love of the Lord Jesus in my Spirit laboureth by all means to bring forth itself in the fresh and full Sense of its First its Free its Preventing Sweetnesses in your hearts as a Spring of Living Waters in a dry and barren Wilderness But as a tender Mother taketh a beloved Child weak and peevish laieth it in her lap poureth a Cordial down into its stomack so will your Jesus do with you O Grieved Spirits who are weak without strength froward will not take in his Love He will take you lay you upon his knees and pour this precious Cordial of his Preventing Loves into your Mouths Then will it go right and sweet down to the bottom of your heart There it will become a Well springing up with pure sweet and plentiful Streams of every Spiritual Truth Grace Comfort or Joy unto Eternal Life This is The First State of Love in the Lord Jesus Preventing Love 2. There is in the Lord Jesus poured forth from the Father a Fulness of all Assisting Love 2. Cor. 14. v. 7. 8. 9. St. Paul had a thorn in his Flesh messengers of Satan sent to buffet him He prayed thrice that he might be delivered from them He had this answer from the Lord My Grace is sufficient for Thee Many tender-hearted Saints who feel their Lusts as Thorns in their Flesh who feel their Passions as the Messengers of Satan the Angels of the Dragon buffeâ—ing them cry out frequently in the Agonies of Fear and Grief O this Lust O this Thorn in my Flesh Sure at last it will wound me so deeply to the heart that it will let out the Life-blood of all faith hope grace and comfort O this Passion O this Messenger of Satan It will one day carry me back again into those Chains of Darkness and that Bottomless Pit out of which I seem to my self sometimes to have escaped But O Believer tossed with the Tempests be comforted Fear none of these things Look up continually to the Blessed Person of your dear Saviour lifted up into Glory in the midst of your Spirits See the Father pouring forth himself into the Fulness the Glorious Fulness of all Assisting Loves in his Bosom Pray continually and hear this Blessed voice from the Mouth of your Saviour continually sounding in your ears My Assisting Loves are sufficient for Thee Obj. But some Soul that wanteth Comfort will say When the Lord Jesus hath once by his Preventing Love planted a New Principle and Habits of Grace in me he now expecteth that I should improve this Principle and act these Graces If I do this and make use of that which I have I may comfortably look for his Assisting Love and that more Grace should be still given me But what New Loves can I promise my self to accompany me and carry me on in my way while I so ill requite the Lord Jesus for his First Loves that I suffer his Gifts to lye unimproved his Graces to lye unactive in me hid in the Earth by my Sloth or Sensuality Answ. I shall proceed in my answer to this Objection by Three Steps 1 Stâ—p This Objection wrappeth up together in it something True something False 1. This is False That the Assisting Love of the Lord Jesus dependeth upon our Emprovement of Grace already received from him This is not True No by no means Assisting Love is as free as full as absolute as much all as much alone in Carrying on the Work of Grace in us as Preventing Love is in Beginning it God hath poured forth in Christ the Fulness of all Assisting Love I am the Truth the way and the Life saith our Saviour Jesus Christ is the Truth and the Life of all Grace in the way as much as in the Beginning or End Without me ye can do Nothing Every Act of Grace every thing in every Act of Grace which distinguisheth it from a meer Non-Entity from an Absolute Nothing Every Degree of Spiritual Being in the whole Life of Grace with all the Exercises of it through the whole way from the Beginning to the End is all alike Immediately from Jesus Christ. That which is True in the Objection is this the Emprovement of Spiritual Principles the Exercise of our Graces are attended with Clearer Illuminations Sweeter Enlargements more Divine heighthnings of all heavenly Truths Graces and Consolations in us On the other siide when Faith is not acted when holiness is neglected Darkness Decay Distress and Death dwell upon us But these things are all entirely Consequences and Effects not Causes or Attractives of Assisting Love The Assisting Love of our Lord Jesus is as the Sun which by its Presence bringeth Light Warmth Fruitfulness Life Beauty Pleasurealong with it When it withdraweth itself leaveth the Cold hardness Storms Desolation of Winter behind it The Bridegroom chargeth the Virgins of Jerusalem by the Roes and Hinds of the Field that they stir not up nor awake his Love until She please Cant. 2. 7. The Angels of heaven which are the Invisible Ministers by whom all things move in the whole Order of Second Causes are here understood according to the sense of some learned Divines By the Virgins of Jerusalem The Roes and hinds of the Field are the Pleasant Loves and Lovelinesses of the Eternal Spirit in the heavenly Person of Christ. The Law of the Eternal Beauties and Loves of the Divine Nature lieth upon all things upon all the Ministers and Armies of God that the Spouse of Christ be never laid to sleep or awakened but according to its own good pleasure as it is One Spirit with the Lord Jesus by a knot of Everlasting Love as a Queen at the Right hand of her King set down in Heavenly Places with him in him upon the same Throne When the Divine Principle which is the Bride and the Spiritual Man in a Saint retireth itself and goeth to its rest in this Night the Wild Beasts Bruitish Lusts Raging Passions come forth to prey upon the Natural Man covering it with filth wounds But when the Day spring ariseth from on high when the season cometh for this Man this Heavenly Seed Bride to awake to stir up her self and come forth again in this New Morning the Beasts return to their Den Lusts and Passions sink down into their own
Principle the Bottomless Pit out of which they arose But the Musick to which the Spiritual Spouse moveth in these Retirements and Returns is the Love of the Spiritual Bridegroom like the Silver Trumpets of the Sanctuary in the Wilderness to the Children of Israel sounding a Retreat and a Rest or a March and a Progress Obj. But you will say If there be nothing to be done by us to what purpose are all Duties Prayers Attendances on the Word If nothing can be done by us in the Acting and Improvement of Spiritual Principles to what end are all Admonitions Exhortations Instructions Promises in the Holy Scriptures Ans. These are all Assisting Love descending from the Bosom of the Bridegroom above into the Lap of his Bride below in various forms like the Sun-shine Showers from Heaven falling upon the Bosom of the Earth They are the same Assisting Love ascending again by various degrees in various Shapes or Growths like the Flowers the Corn shooting up out of the Ground Hos. 2. 22. It is promised that God will hear the Heavens the Heavens shall hear the Earth the Earth shall hear the Corn and Wine and the Corn and Wine shall hear Jezreel Jezreel is the Seed of God All the Ordinances all Forms all Motions not of Grace alone but of Nature also are the Commerce and Traffick of the Divine Nature with itself as it is the head of Fine Gold above all and the Hidden Pearl the Precious Seed at the bottom of all In every Step of things in every Form in every Language of Heaven and Earth of Grace and Nature in every Ordinance God seeth the face heareth the Voice answereth the Cry of Jezreel his own Seed his own Son Jezreel seeth the Face heareth the Voice answereth the Call of God of its Father Jezreel is the Dove whose Face is Lovely whose Voice is Sweet to the Heavenly Bridegroom although it be from the Holes of the Rock and the Hollow places of the Stairs from the lowest the darkest Dispensations from the nethermost parts of the Earth from the meanest Ordinances from an Inward an Outward Prison or Grave The Heaven the Earth the Corn the Wine Duties performed Ordinances enjoyed Graces Acted the Word published All are the Green Flourishing Fruitful Bed of Preventing or Assisting Loves on which the Lord Jesus and his Spouse embrace each other In Ordinances the heavenly Bridegroom pipeth or mourneth to Jezreel the Divine Seed his Sister-Spouse In Duties or Graces Jezreel danceth or mourneth to him again Thorow all these Assisting Love sweetly shineth or soundeth from above sweetly again reflecteth and Ecchoeth back from the Spirit of a Saint below This is the Answer in its First Step. 2. Step. The Reason given by the Philosopher why the Heavens which we see over our heads move so regularly so harmoniously so constantly from the begining of the world hitherto is this They have Assisting Forms Intelligences Angels which move them which turn them round Many Souls sweetly touched with the Allurements of Divine Love in Christ fear to come to him to cast themselves into His Bosom by Believing They distrust their own strength and constancy for their continuance in a holy temper They doubt they shall fall back with greater guilt and shame to themselves with greater reproach to the name of the Lord Jesus Many weak Christians are day and night tormented with like fears and doubts that they shall fall away at last by the force of some Corruption or the Difficulties in the waies of Holiness Dear Souls be not discouraged from believing or in believing be not kept off from the Bosom of Christ be not disquieted in His Bosom by any fears or doubts You have a Good Angel for an Assisting Form you have an Assisting Form brighter and more glorious than the highest and brightest Angel more powerful than all the Angels in Heaven You have the Assisting Love of the Lord Jesus present with you in your Spirits by day and by night This doth move this will move and turn about your Hearts your lives regularly harmoniously constantly in all the Circles of Divine Graces Truths Joys Glories according to the Laws and Patterns in the Supreme Mind in the Heart of God thorow all times Eternally Preventing Love is the Golden Chain which draweth thee to the Embraces of Christ. O run when thou feelest thy self so drawn Assisting Love is the Golden Chain that tyeth thee fast and close immediately inseparably for ever in these embraces Rest with Confidence and full Assurance in these embraces feed with desire and delight among the Lillies here lye down to sleep in these embraces Thy sleep will be sweet to thee 3. Step. Learned men and Divines teach us that the Preservation of the world is continuata Creatio a continued Creation In every moment of Time from the Begiâ—ning of the world to the end the Divine Act of Preserving and Governing the world according to the Present form proper to it for that Season is entirely the same with the Act of Creation In every moment from the Begining of the world to the end the whole world with all things in it rise up into the form designed for that moment in the Eternal Law of the Divine Wisdom out of the nothingness of the Creature out of the Omnipotency of the Creator as freely as freshly as fully as Absolutely as in the first Moment of Its Being So is it and much more clearly sweetly gloriously so in this Creation of God the Creation of Grace Assisting Love is no other than Preventing Love Continued A continuation of Preventing Love They say A line is One Individual Point in motion This is most true All Assisting Love the whole Life of Grace and Glory in a Saint is One Individual Unchangeable Point of Preventing Love Eternal Love in Motion spreading itself within Itself to an Infinite Circle In every moment of a Saint's spiritual Being from his first Conversion to Eternity the Act of Assisting Love in Preserving in Governing thee is the same with that first Act of Preventing Love in Regenerating thee In every moment of thy Spiritual Being from thy first Conversion to thy Glorification in Eternity thy Spiritual Man the Divine Nature in thee riseth up into the form of that Moment answering Its Pattern in the Heavenly Image the Glorified Person of Christ out of thine own Nothingness out of the glorious fulness of the God-head in Christ as freely as â—reshly as sweetly as absolutely as entirely as in the first moment of the New-Birth in thee I will conclude this Second State of Divine Love in Christ Assisting Love with that of the Greek Epigram thus translated fer Fatum sin ferre recuses non minus te feret Fatum Bear thy Destiny If thou refuse to bear it thy Destiny will nevertheless bear thee and carry thee along Cast thy self O believer into the Bosom of the Assisting Love of thy God in Christ to be born up and carried along in it But
of that Sacrament pointing out the Truth figured in that Type The Lord Jesus is a Husband to Thee in his own Blood Thou must also be a Spouse to him in thine own Blood St Paul saith Ye are dead to your first Husband by the Dead Body of Christ that ye may be married to another to him who is risen from the Dead Rom. 7. 4. You must come thorow the Death of Christ into his Marriage-Bed You cannot lye down in the Embraces of his Love in Glory except ye be first married to his Crucified Body and united to that in the Embraces of Death Flesh and Blood saith St Paul cannot enter into the Kingdom of God into the Kingdom of Spiritual Love If a Fleshly a Natural Spirit striveth to enter into the Love of God in the Glorified Person of our Lord Jesus it â—alleth short of the Truth the Life it attaineth to a Similitude only The Love and Glory of the Father of Christ of Heaven to the most raised Spirit of this Creation is an Enchantment Delusion a Dream This Gâ—ace of God in the Figure this Divine Love in a Dream is for the most part turned into Wantonness Lust. So men become in the heighth of the Purest Notions of the Sweetest Images no more than Filthy Dreamers The Death of Christ in the New Birth in Purity and Power of the holy Ghost is the Angel with a Flaming Sword turning every way which keepeth the Entrance into the True Paradise the Way to the Tree of Divine Love as well as of Divine Life The Eternal Spirit is the Flaming Sword Death here in its outward form is an Angel ministring to this Spirit He that dieth by this Sword and Flame in the hand of this Angel cutteth off burneth up all Fleshly Forms and Lives is in the same moment new-born into a Divine Immortal Spirit In this Spirit he entereth into the Paradise of Love in the Third Heavens above the Heaven of Sense or all things Visible above the Heaven of Reason Angels all things Invisible Intellectual of the First Creation in the Glorified Person of Christ. Here nothing entereth which hurteth or defilâ—th But be not discouraged when ye hear of a Baptism in Death before the Heavens open and the Dove Divine Love descend to rest upon you to give you rest in itself It is Love itself which is the Baptiser which leadeth you and goeth down with you into Death It is a River of Love which is the Jordan the Death into which you go down and are baptised We are baptised St. Paul saith in the forementioned place into the Similitude of Christ's Death The Death of Christ was Death in Truth a Substantial Real Death The Death of Christ in a Saint is Eternal Love Eternal Life in the Likeness and Form of Death a Similitude onely of Death in a Substance of Immortal Love and Glory in the Person of our Jesus ascended Use. 4. Take heed of mingling the Lusts of the Flesh with Spiritual Loves Jealousy is the Rage of God as well as of Man It burneth to the Foundations of the Earth A Fly bred out of Dung so infested the Eagle that it forced him to lay his Eggs for safety in the Lap of Jupiter the Heathen-God The Fly mounteth up aloft carrieth up some Dung with it letteth it fall into Jupiter's lap He arising and shaking the Dung out of his Lap shaketh ouâ— the Eagle's Eggs with it which fall broken to pieces upon the ground This is a Fable The Moral is good Thou art a Saint Thou layest the Births of the Divine Spirit in Thee thy Graces Hopes Joyes with thy self in the Bosom of Divine Love O take heed that thy Flesh that Dung-Fly mingle nothing of its Filth with these Births of the Spirit in the Pure Bosom of Heavenly Love If it do assure thy self that Love will cast all the Filth all Flesh out of its Chast and Spiritual Embraces As that falleth to the Ground thou also wilt fall with it and have many a broken bone many a broken heart We read in the Revelation of the Dragon and his Angels in Heaven together with Michael and his Angels But they fought there till the Dragon and his Angels were cast out Thou O Believer art a Heaven in which God dwelleth as Love where all the Angels as Angels of Love where all Forms of things are as Heavenly Angels of Pure Love round about him ministring to him Shall there be now seen in this Heaven in thy Person O Believer silthy Lusts furious Passions the Dragon and his Angels together with the Lord Jesus Divine Love and its holy Angels How hateful how horrid a Wonder What a Prodigy is this If it be so let there be no rest in the Heaven of thy Spirit let there be a continual Fight until the Dragon with his Angels the Fleshly Spirit with its Lusts and Passions be cast out When the Unclean Dog and the fiery Dragon are no more Thy Lamb will feed and lye down to rest thy Turtle will make its Nest and enjoy its Mate its Beloved in quiet Nothing shall disturb or make them afraid in all the Paradise of Divine Love Use. 5. Comfort your selves O Believers You travel thorough the Valley of Baca Baca signifieth a Mulberry Tree and Weeping You travel thorow a Valley of Tears a Mournful Valley where all the Trees that grow are Mulberry Trees Emblems of Grief and Wo. You are frequently overspread with the black Shades of Fear Unbelief Doubt Distrust Despair You often fall into the hands of violent Robbers Evil Spirits in the forms of various Temptations Corruptions Passions These spoil you leave you naked wounded desolate You dig up pits in Duties Ordinances But many times no Rain no Descent of the Spirit from Heaven filleth these Pits Yet be not discouraged all you who believe the Love of God in Jesus Christ. Strengthen the feeble Knees You shall go on from Strength to Strength from Light to Light so you shall come every one of you at last to a Clear Sight to a Compleat Fruition of the God of Gods on Mount Sion of God in his Supreme Glory in the Nakedness Purity Simplicity Unity of the Eternal Spirit Lift up the feeble hands These weak Graces of yours mixt interrupted with so much Corruption These weak Persons Bodies and Spirits wearied wounded stained with so many Sufferings Sins and Sorrows shall be crowned with perfect Glory For why Pure Love Almighty Love That Love which is itself God over all Blessed for ever This Love comes forth casting off all vails pouring forth itself from all its Eternal Springs in all its Infinite Fulnesses in the Glorified Person of Christ This Love hath begun and shall it not make an End As Certainly as it hath laid the Foundation and you have cried to it Grace Grace Pure Love Preventing Love as Certainly as it hath gone on to build you up thus far and still you have cried to it Grace Grace Pure Love
Power in the Beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning thou hast the dew of thy Birth The words lie thus in Hebrew Thy willing People in the Day of thy Power oâ— thy Armies in the Beautiâ—s or Excellencies or Majesties of holiness or in thy holy Pure Beauties from the Womb of the Morning to thee the Dew of thy Youth You have here the Lord Jesus in Glory in his Kingdom in the Day of his Power with his Armies of Angels round about him in the Beauties of holiness in his Frâ—shest Beauties in the heighth of Excellency and Majesty in the Glory of his God-Head filling shining thorow overspreading his humane Nature You have him here in the Brightness Sweetness and Newness of his Eternal Sonship as he cometh â—orth Immediately from the Womb of the Morning the Bosom of the Father who is the Morning the Day-Spring of the God-Head Thus is Jesus Christ with the Dew of his Youth upon him as Fair as Fresh as unfading as a New-blown Rose in the Morning while the Pearly Dew lieth yet upon it Jesus Christ is now as a Bridegroom upon his Coronation Day or as a King upon his Marriage-Day Now his People are a Princely People all Fellow-Kings together with him Now the holy Soul is That Princess and Daughter which is his Queen all in Beaten Gold at his right hand The Willing People are Princes heavenly Spirits in Glory This is the Answer to the Second Question 3. Qu. What are the Chariots of the Princely People Answ. 1. The Chariots are the holy Angels Psal. 68. 17. The Chariots of the Lord are Thousands Ten Thousands of Angels God is in the midst of them as on Sinai in the holy Place You may observe in your Bibles that word Place not to be printed with the same letter as holy to signifie that it is not in the Hebrew but added by the Translatours The Holy may be here any of these or rather all of these in their Subordinations the Sanctuary or Temple the Holy Placâ— the Figure the Lord Iesus the Substance Life to this Figure the holy One the Saints the holy Ones the members of Christ Christ Mystical the Spiritual Temples Heaven the Everlasting Glory of the God-Head in which Christ resideth Sinai was a Type to all these These in their several degrees are Sinai heightned to Sion to the Perfection of the Divine Presence in the Beauty of Holiness and Love You may see too that As before Sinai is added The Hebrew lieth thus Sinai in the holy The Thousands and Ten thousands of holy Angels make all One Chariot in which God rideth Each Angel is also a Distinct Chariot The Chariots of the Lord are according to the number of the Angels But Each Angel comprehendeth in himself the whole Millions of Angels They are distinguished in their Essential Forms but undivided As the same Colours and Lines varied make all Beauties So all Angelical Forms in distinct Relations make up the Essence and Glory of Every Particular Angel God with the Thousands of his Chariots rested on Mount Sinai Sinai or Sion rather is in the Lord Jesus in the Assemblies of the Saints in the Person and Spirit of every Saint in Heaven in the Spirit thorow all the Heavens and the Earth in the Lord Jesus and every Saint The Chariot of Solomon is the Chariot of his Queen also The Bridegroom and the Bride ride together in the same Chariot Jesus Christ and his Spouse Jesus Christ and his Brethren his Fellow Kings Behold then the Chariots of the Princely People of the Immortal Kings of Saints in Glory in the Glory of Christ and of the Spirit whether in the Body or out of the Body They are the Chariots of God The Thousands andâ— Ten Thousands of the holy Angels These are in a double sense the Chariots of these Divine Princes 1. These Princes ride in them 2. God rideth upon them in these Princes as on Sinai as on Sion as in Heaven Answ. 2. The Chariot is the Divine Presence in the Light and Evidence of its own Appearance with all its Train of Glories and Angels as in Heaven with the Universal Form of things comprehended in it enlivened and enlightned by it as in the Glorious Person of Christ at the last day This Divine Presence descending and ascending resting upon and shining forth in the Prophets and Holy men of old in their Visions is described Mystically Ezek. c. 1. and called by the Jews The Chariot There are Wheels Living High Dreadful Glorious Shining as a Pretious Stone full of Eyes that is of Angels of heavenly Spirits I humbly offer it to be considered whether these Wheels be not the Elements these Globes of the Visible Earth and Heavens made New made Spiritual filled with Angelical Lives cloathed with Angelical Forms and Glories in the Kingdom of the Spirit and Mystical Person of Christ. Then the Horses which draw these Wheels are the Living Creatures full of Eyes If the Wheels may be understood to be the visible Part these Living Creatures may present the Invisible Part of the Creation in its Renovation by a Spiritual Glory flowing forth from the Fountain of The God-Head in the Glorified Person of the Lord Jesus These Wheels and Horses together may perhaps not improbably be thought to be the New Earth Above the Wheels and the Living Creatures is the Chariot itself a Firmament If I may pursue my former Apprehension with Submission to the Spirit of Truth in every Spirit I shall call this the New Heaven The heavenly Image the God-Head unvailing itself appearing in a New Glory This is the Firmament the Heaven born up and carried along by the Innumerable Company of Angels while Jesus Christ sitteth in it as in his Chariot Above this Firmament is the Similitude of a Man as Fire from his Loins upward and as Fire from his Loins downward This is our Blessed Saviour in the Union of his Divine and Humane Nature The Glory of the Divinity of the Eternal Spirit cloatheth both with the same Similitude of Fire which shineth with the Sweetest Light burneth with the greatest force of Love transformeth all things with an Almighty Power into One Pure Immortal Divine Flame with itself The Lord Jesus himself speaketh of his own Coming and Appearance in his Kingdom after this manner The Son of Man shall come in his own Glory in the Glory of his Father and in the Glory of all His holy Angels Our Saviour seemeth to have had the same Vision in the Eye of his Spirit which Ezekiel had The Jews distinguish the Angels into Angels of the Throne nearer to the Divine Majesty Angels of Service at a greater Distance The Glory of the holy Angels make the New Earth the Horses and the Wheels in the Chariot of the great King The Wheels the Visible Part of the Creation the Wheels are made of Angelical Glory But they are the Angels of Service in a New Spiritual Glory The Invisible Things of
the Creation the Living Creatures in the Chariot are the Angels of the Thronâ— in the Glory of the Kingdom of the Coronation and Marriage-Day The Firmament the New Heaven is the Glory of the Father The Chariot itself which containeth him in which he descendeth bowing down the Heavens as he descendeth The Lord Jesus himself in his own Glory is Distinct from all these Glories compreâ—endeth them and rideth forth in them This is that Image in which he shall appear at the last Day as a New Creator and a New Creation making all things New as the most Entire most Naked Image of the Invisible God in all his most Pure and most Invisible Glories as the First-born of the whole Creation in general and of every Creature in Particular as the Whole Creation in its Virgin-State in its Ideal Glory while yet it sprung up out of the Bosom of God and stood onely in the Bosom of God and was a Sister-Spouse to the uncreated Beauty This is that Testimony of Jesus which is the Spirit of Prophesy That Divine Presence that Word of God which came to all the Holy Men of old in the Light of which as in the Glass of Eternity the First and Supreme Truth they saw Visions dreamed dreams and spake of him This is the Chariot of the Princes of the Saints in the Glory of the Spirit 4 Qu. How doth the Soul of the Spouse make her as this Chariot of her Princely People or set her in it Answ. The Soul of the heavenly Bride is her Lord her Life her Love her heart her True Self her Beloved her Jesus He descendeth in his Chariot and taketh her up into it He appearing in his heavenly Image composed of the Glory of his Father his own Glory the Glory of all his holy Angels which is his Chariot as he appeareth in her translateth and transfigureth her into the same heavenly Image She also is now become a Chariot made up all of the same Glories with the same Jesus the same Queen the same Company of Princes riding together in it The Soul of the Bride is also Faith the 〈◊〉 of God the Divine Nature the Spirit in a Saint This Divine Life in a Saint by a Descent of the Lord Jesus upon it in a moment ere a Saint is aware he knoweth not how both taketh him up to set him in this Chariot and Transformeth him into it I have onely prepared you by all this for the Application of the Scripture opened by us to our present purpose that we may take in with a greater Sense with a Deeper Impression the Comfort and Joys of Finishing Love making Perfect its most Beautiful Works and Displaying its most pleasant Strengths in our Weaknesses Ere I was aware my Soul made me as the Chariots of my Princely People or set me in them Hearken to me my Brethren Is there not among you a Poor Believer a Mournful Saint which hath long prayed long sighed for a Clear Sight of Jesus Christ a Sense and Seal of his Love Sweet and Constant Communion with him To this Soul I now speak Perhaps after all this thou art embracing the Dunghil of Distrust and Despair Perhaps thou art sitting upon the Dunghil of some Fleshly Lust or Earthly Care of Covetousness or Lasciviousness Vanity or vexation Now in a moment which thou thinkest not of ere thou art aware Jesus Christ in the Divine Brightness of some heavenly Truth flashing like Lightning in upon thy Spirit may descend may discover himself in his Heavenly Image with his naked Glories naked Loves to thee Now are thou art aware he may make this heavenly Image at once a Laver of Precious Blood in which he washeth Thee white as the Light itself from every Spot a Chariot of heavenly Princes in which he cometh down to Thee upon thy Dunghil taketh Thee off from thy Dunghil to ride with him in the Fellowship of all Immortal Spirits while all the holy Angels bear Thee up and carry Thee on upon the Firmament of the Father's Glory at the side of thy Beloved whither the Mind of the Spirit is for Thee to go Ere thou art aware the Lord Jesus can change thy Dunghil can change Thee into a Divine Chariot of Eternal Spirits in which he will ride forth with Thee thou shalt ride forth together with him having his Loveliness in thine Eye his Love in thine heart thorow all Forms of things Light and Darkness Life and Death as thorow various Fields differing Regions of Spiritual Beauties and Delights in the Vast Continent the Vast World of the Divine Nature Thus comfort thy self against the Discouragements of Life with the Fulness of Divine Love â—inishing Love in the Glorified Person of Christ which maketh Perfect its Strength and Sweetness in Weakness and Enmity which giveth Thee the Desire of thy Soul thy Jesus most clearly most dearly into thy Bosom when thou lyest locked up fastest in the Bosom of the Strange Woman oâ— This Strumpet and this Witch the Hellish Darkness cloathed with Figures of Fleshly Softnesses Sweetnesses Lights and Treasures Gen. 28. 11 12. Jacob had pursued the Spiritual Blessing the heavenly Birth-right and had obtained the Promise the Purchase After all this he flyâ—th alone as a Banished Person from his Father's house He is benighted in an open field He lieth upon the naked ground He hath under his head for a Pillow a Cold Hard Stone Now Finishing Love maketh Perfect its Strength in this Weakness giving him now the Evidence the Pledge the First-fruits of that Spiritual Blessing that heavenly Birth-right which he had a Promise of and a Title to Now Heaven is opened to the Eye of his Spirit in a Dream A Ladder â—â—acheth from Heaven to Earth One End of it resteth on the Bosom of God above The other End standeth upon the Ground at his head below Angels descend and ascend upon the Ladder He awaketh and saith This is none other than the Gate of Heaven the house of God and I was not aware of it The Stone on which he lay is now anointed and becometh a Pillar and Altar a Figure of Jesus Christ in all his Divine Loves and Lovelinesses Jacob is in every holy One. Hear this you broken hearts You complain We have tasted something of the Sweetness of Preventing Love if this be Preventing Love to cast in upon our Spirits gracious hints and hopes of Spiritual Blessings and heavenly things when we sate in the Shadow of Death and did not so much as know or Believe that there was a Spirit a Heaven We have also tasted something of the Sweetness of Assisting Love if this be assisting Love to help us to carry us on for a wearisome length of time with sighs and groans unutterable to cry for the Revelation the Possession the Fruition of these Spiritual Blessings and heavenly things in the Foretast of them But O! where is Finishing Love Now instead of this behold we are benighted with Darkness of Spirit
effect of that union Jesus Christ put a life a divine life into every Creature by his union with it St. Paul seemeth to relate to this Scripture and to confirm this living beautiful and Divine State of all the Creatures as they came forth from God Colos. 1. 16. All things were made in him all things were made thorow him unto him and into him v. 18. All things stood together in him Well then the Dust the Ground the Earth the Darkness in the pure state of the Creation were made in Christ were life in him were made in union with Christ. They were made thorow Christ as their mould and channel They were made by Christ as their Original pattern as the immediate power putting forth itself in them They stood together with the rest of the Creatures in the Divine Unity in Christ. Thus had this Dust of which we speak a Divine life in it a Divine Beauty upon it a Divine Seed in it this life was the life of Christ and so comprehended according to its kind all the lives and vertues of all the Creatures and of Paradise It s beauty was the beauty of Christ in which after the like manner all created beauties centred and met in one Christ himself was the Seed in this Dust and so not only the excellencies and virtues of the whole Creation but all the uncreated Treasures of Life and Glory lay together shaded and vailed within this Dust. But their vail and their shade was a living beautiful and pleasant Picture of themselves all filled with the sweet Odour of those hidden Ointments I have one thing more to say to describe this Dust. Man who was the last days work the comprehension and perfection of the whole Creation was made in a shadowy Image of God For so the word Image in the first of Genesis signifieth and the Scriptures in their whole course testify In the beginning all things came forth from God in an universal Darkness before the Light of the first day This Darknâ—ss is remarkable in several eminent circumstances 1. It was cast forth immediately from the Divine Nature and from the glorious Person of Christ to be a vail round about upon the Eternal Glory itself and to be a ground of the whole Creation 2. It stood in an â—immediate union with the Divine Nature and the glorious Person of Christ springing forth immediately from it and depending immediately upon it 3. The unsearchable riches of the God-Head and of Christ with all the various Excellencies of the creatures as they were in their eternal patterns and principles lay hid together within this shade 4. Out of this ground did God make to spring all the creatures in their primitive paradisical purity and pleasantness being wrapt up here as in their first matter and having their proper seeds sown here Thus was this Darkness a shade indeed but pure indued with a Divine Life cloathed with a Divine beauty and lustre bearing a Divine figure breathing forth a Divine sweetness spread forth every moment fresh with a new lustre and sweetness from the Divine Nature vailing within itself all the Joys and Glories of God Christ Heaven and Paradise and as it hides all these in its Bosom lying itself in the Bosom of Christ. Such is the Ground such is the Dust of the Ground and the Earth out of which the Body of Man was first taken and into which the Body of a dying Saint returns Such is the Darkness of Death that overshadows a Saints body like the Nights in Paradise But there is this advantage now that this pure primitive Dust and Darkness are heightened have a new and greater beauty and sweetness by the Resurrection of Christ from the Dead This is the first Dust the Dust before the Fall 2. The second Dust is that after the Fall understood in that sentence Dust thou art and to Dust thou shalt return This is the Dust of that Death which sin brings forth a cursed Dust the Dust of the cursed Earth which bringeth forth Bryars and Thorns That former beautiful and blessed Dust lies captivated in this as in a Prison or Grave of contrariety and enmity This Dust is composed of three things 1. A Separation Dissolution and Desolation from the â—orce and power of Enmity 2. A Blackness of Darkness from a cloud and storm of wrath 3. The seeds of shame pain anguish horrour and torment hidden in it This Dust is that which the Body of a Saint casts off in Death upon this worldly Image and Spirit together with the Spirit and Image of this world This is that which suffereth dissolution which representeth deformity and striketh the horrour in Death All which are now of the Image of this world and to the Image of this World in the Spirit of this World and to the Spirit of this World within the Kingdom of the Devil having no more relation to a Saint in Death than the filthy raggs of a Prince in a Dangeon to the Prince at Liberty and in his Pallace Death rubbing off the Rust of this cursed Dust from the Body of a Saint leaves it all a shining rich incorruptible Dust of pure Gold His Body is now entirely with Christ a precious pleasant and living Dust in the Garden-Beds the Beds of Spices or perfumed Flowers in Paradise This is the second Distinction of the two Dusts 3 Dist. The third distinction is of a twofold sense Rom. 8. 6. St. Paul teacheth us That to be carnally minded is Death but to be spiritually minded is Life and Peace The Greek runs thus the mind of the flesh and the mind of the spirit The word mind is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth a practical understanding and comprehendeth a twofold act one of the understanding to disâ—â—rn and judge another of the will to tast and rellish So the mind is here a sense and a favour both in one Thus you have here a twofold sense Spiritual and Carnal or Fleshly 1. The Spiritual sense is set forth three ways 1. By the Principle 2. By two effects of this Principle 3. By two companions of these effects 1. The Principle of a Spiritual sense is the Spirit this holy and blessed Spirit is the only and proper Principle of a Saint and Saintship of a Son of God and a Sâ—â—ship to God Art thou indeed a Saint then thou art in the Spirit of Glory and of God as in thy Root and Element as a Tree of Life in the Root of Eternal Life and Love as Fishes in the water of Life as Birds in the pure air of Divine Love as Angels in Heaven Rom. 8. 9. You are not saith St. Paul to the Saints in thâ— Flesh but in the Spirit Art thou indeed a Son of God Then is this Spirit of Grace and Immortality in thee as thy natural Principle as the power of Nature according to the new and Divine Nature which acteth thee Rom. 8. 16. As many as are led by the Spirit of God are
to dye with you This is the true Church-fellowship a Fellowship in our Souls and in our Bodies by a Spiritual Principle and Life with the Church and Assembly of the first-born with all things in their first born State in one Spiritual and Heavenly Body in Christ. 3. How amiable and lovely doth this make death to the Saints This is the chief end I aim at in my discourse and the point to which I bring it With what a beautiful and smiling Face doth Death now look forth even in the Body of a Saint in which he hath been wont generally to appear so grim to the holiest Persons Thy Body O Believer so far as thou standest in a Spiritual Principle is a Fellow-member with thy Soul in the Body of Christ It is a Jewel the work of a faithful and curious workman the most holy Spirit as Solomon in the Canticles speaketh of the Spouse of Christ. But here the mixture of the fleshly and carnal Principle is as Dust and Dirt which covereth and fullyeth this costly Jewel With what a sweet pure lustre of Immortality and of Heavenly Glory doth it sparkle and shine forth ravishing thine own and all spiritual Eyes and Hearts in the moment of Death when the blessed hand of Death clean wipes off the dust and stain of the carnal Principle and brings it forth entirely into its Spiritual Principle that now it stands singly as a Spiritual Member in the Spiritual Body of Christ The Lord Jesus saith if thine Eye be single thine whole Body shall be light as when a Candle enlightens a Room In this life O Saints we have a double Eye and have a double sight The mixture of the Spiritual and Carnal Principle is the double and divided Eye O welcome Death receive it with open embraces Now is your Eye single Now is the carnal Principle cast out for ever Now you look forth with the open and single Eye of the single Principle of the Eternal Spirit Now is your whole Body nay now is the whole body of things filled to you with a Heavenly light of Immortality Glory This single Eye pours forth from the Unity of the Spirit as from the Fountain of blessed Light thorow your whole Souls and Bodies thorow all things round about them a Light of Glory as when a Candle enlightneth a Room A way of cleansing Pearls when they have any spot or cloud upon them is to thrust them down the throat of a Pigeon into its Crop where the heat of the Pigeon takes off the stain and makes them perfectly white This is the mystery of a Saints Death The Heavenly Dove the Holy Spirit in the same moment takes a Saint entirely in Soul and Body out of this Life out of the Carnal Principle into himself into his Bosom of Love by the Divine heat of that Love takes off every spot or cloud of the flesh by consuming it both in the Soul and in the Body and makes them both purely white and shining Pearls in the Heavenly Body of that one great and only Pearl the Lord Jesus 2. The second relation into which the Body of a Believer is taken at the new birth is that of a Temple to the Holy Ghost There are 4 things proper to a Temple 1. The Figure 2. The Glory 3. The Communion 4. The Defence 1. Every thing in the Tabernacle and so in the Temple to the least things and lowest actions were divine Types of Spiritual Truths and Heavenly Excellencies in the Person of the Lord Jesus So it is said that all things were made and ordered according to the pattern in the Mount which pattern in the Mount was Christ in Glory O Saints This Tabernacle and Temple were Types first of Christ then of you whose Souls and Bodies both are the true and living Temples of God The Body of a Saint is a more excellent Temple in as much as Solomons Temple was a shadow only of this It is a Living Divine and Immortal Temple It is therefore in the whole a far more excellent more rich more glorious and delightful Image of the God-Head in its entire form It is in every part and point of it a most lively a most beautiful a most pleasant figure of some particular Mystery and Glory in the God Head All the parts of your Bodies themselves the lowest and least even to a hair of your Heads every thing that befals you in every part of your Body in the meanest and slightest circumstance is formed exactly by the Divine Wisdom and Power according to the Divine Will to answer the Pattern in the Mount to be the holy figure of an eternal Glory in Christ. We read Psal. 29. 9. Every thing in his Temple speaks Glory Every thing in thy Body O Believer so far as thou art a Believer speaks Glory For this is his Temple O live alwaies in the Spirit that thou maist alwaies be in thy Body as in the Temple that there thou maist see understand and enjoy the Glory in every thing 2. The Temple of God is filled with the Glory of God There is a Prophesy in Malachy concerning the times of the Gospel that he shall come into his Temple You O Saints are the Temple which is here Prophefied of Jesus Christ as God in the Glory of the Father in the Third Person the Holy Ghost comes into you into your Bodies also and fills them with his Glory The same word in Hebrew signifieth a Temple and a Pallace The name of a Temple in Greek signifieth an Habitation or dwelling place It is a note of a learned Divine that the Temple had Tables and a Throne and a State in it which was the Golden Mercy Seat called in the Gospel the Throne of Grace to signifie that the Temple of God was his Pallace as he is the great King The Eternal Spirit is present in the Body of a Believer as in his Pallace He keeps his Court there There is his Throne with all the blessed Angels and all the Heavenly Company waiting round about it It is called his resting-place Arise saith David to God thou and the Ark of thy strength into thy resting-place God shineth forth in his Temple filleth it with his Glory within resting upon it and overshadowing it with his Glory without In the 50 Psal. at the beginning the Psalmist speaking of the Temple saith God shineth from Sion the perfection of Beauty What a perfection of Beauty then what a Divine Pallace how full of Glory within how encompassed with a clear shining Glory round about is that Body of a Saint which is the living eternal Temple of the Holy Ghost In what Majesty doth this Eternal Spirit appear here upon its Throne of Love In the midst of what Divine Pleasures and Delights doth it rest for ever here What a Court does it keep here with all its Train of Angels and heavenly Attendants waiting round about its Throne as in another Heaven O Believers honor your Bodies For
which the Fathers Person shines forth in his Person as in a new Heaven with new and increasiâ—â— Beauties O you that are Followers of Christ what a mystery of Spiritual Joy and Heavenly Glory is there in the life of a Saint if this be to be a Saint to walk on Earth as Christ walked that is in a Spiritual Principle in the midst of the Natural Principle and Fleshly Image of things governing comprehending seeing handling rellishing all in the Divine Light Beauty and Sweetness of the Eternal Spirit When the blackest Cloud of melancholy rests upon thy Spirit when the sharpest Sword of Grief pierceth thy Heart retire into thy Spiritual Principle there thou shalt be as on Mount Tabor the Mount of Transfiguration where the Face of thy God shall be as a pleasant Sun of Joy and Glory shining forth in its strength within thee and the whole Image of things in thee and round about thee as a Garment of Light all weaved and wrought with the freshest and purest Beams of this Sun in all living and immortal Figures of the highest Joys and Glories 5. Propos. The Curse with the stings and sense of it upon the Natural and Temporary Principle as also the conflict between the Natural and Temporary the Supernatural and Eternal Principle in the Lord Jesus thorow his whole Person as it lived in a Humane Soul and Body were highest at his Death The Lord Jesus saith the Prince of this World cometh This is your hour and the power or principality of Darkness The Devil came now to make his two last and most furious assaults upon the Lord Jesus in the Garden and upon the Cross. He therefore comes with all the powers of Darkness and Legions of Devils with all the blackest and most dreadful Furniture and force of Wrath from Hell below from Earth and Heaven above as the Prince of this World and the Prince of Darkness The Battel was so sore against the Lord Jesus that he himself who was the Wisdom and Power of God was amazed He who was the eternal delights of his Father day by day cries out My Soul is very sorrowful even unto Death The word in Greek is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth an excess of sorrow and a surrounding sorrow All things round about the Lord Jesus were hung with a blackness of Darkness and amazing horrours that he himself who bears up the weight of all things could hardly sustain the weight of his own fears and sorrows or sustain himself in Life under them He falls beneath them to the ground His whole Person is so prest and opprest with them that through the agony of his Spirits the boiling blood is strained forth through all the parts of his Body He cries to his Father thrice Angels are sent from Heaven to strengthen him and comfort him But after this the conflict upon the Cross was yet sharper Now the Prince of Darkness grows desperate knowing that this is his last effort and that now at once he fights for his Kingdom Liberty and Life that his whole Kingdom of Darkness and his Person too depend upon this one Fight The Earth-quake the rending of the Rocks the total Eclipse of the Sun and the Universal Darkness upon the face of the whole Earth were Types of what Christ the Prince of Glory and the Devil the Prince of Darkness suffered in this last Conflict the like to which never was before nor shall ever be The whole frame of things shook and trembled under the Feet of the Lord Jesus and round about him The Rocks all the supports of his Soul all the Foundations and Pillars of his strength and life were rent in pieces and dissolved The face of the Creature the face of Heaven the face of his Father were all covered with a thick a threatning and an amazing Darkness as in a dreadful Tempest above the course and force of nature The Lord of Life in whom all things subsist is now sinking and ready to give up all for lost How deeply was his Heart pierced how cruelly wounded how were every glympse of Light every drop of Comfort intercepted and with-held when he cried out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me What potent inchantment from Hell was this what power of Darkness what infusion of Wrath what separation ten thousand times more bitter than Death which so wrought that he who is God himself seems divided from himself and totally deserted by all the power and sweet lights of the God-Head Thus you see in this 5th Proposition the trouble of Christ at its height In the two following Propositions you shall see that notwithstanding this dreadful storm in the evening and latest hour of his life this beautiful Sun in his dying moment as in the close itself of the day casts up its cloud comes forth Triumphantly and no night follows Before we pass to the other Propositions let us make a few short observations upon these 1. See how dreadful and hateful an evil Sin is by the effects of it in the Person of God himself our Lord Jesus Let not that be a light thing to us which lay with so great weight upon him neither let us be secure in our Lusts Vanities Covetousness Sloath playing with these which were so many Serpents in the Bosom of Christ and shot deadly stings into his Heart Can we stand under those things which had almost sunk the Son of God into despair and Eternal Darkness It is true God brings good out of the evil of Sin order out of its disorder and reconciles all into a beautiful Harmony of Divine Love and Joy But how by how dear a price by how precious an atonement by how costly how cruel how bloody a Sacrifice by how violent a conflict between all the powers of light and darkness at once by how dreadful a dissolution of the whole frame of things with the blackest Tempest of Divine Wrath from above by what horrours of Death in its ugliest shape with its most venemous stings and all this in the Person of God himself our Jesus 2. Be good Soldiers of the Lord Jesus Endure hardships Endure the fight of Sufferings Think not strange to have the Clouds blackest and the Storm greatest with Thunders and Lightnings round about you in your latest hour in old age and death Thus you bear the Cross of Christ. Thus you fight under the Banner of Love A Husband in Bloods art thou to me saith the Wife of Moses to him concerning the Circumcision Jesus Christ hath been a Husband in Blood to thee O suffering Saint Now art thou also indeed a Sister and a Spouse to him in Blood This Life is the Season of suffering Christ suffered here Can you not suffer with Christ one hour the short Season of this fleeting Life Think how glorious in the Eyes of all the Holy Angels and of the Blessed Saints of Christ and the Father you shall come into Heaven How dear to the Bosom and Embraces
undivided Circle of Eternity always at once in every moment and cast of his eye he saw possest and enjoyed all pleasantnesses In this Face of his Father which is the Light of Eternity he saw his own Face as he passed thorow all changes Even then when he cried out that he was forsaken by his Father he beheld this forsaking of him himself thus forsaken in this Glass the face of his Father in the midst of all Pleasantnesses one of the Pleasantnesses one with all the Pleasantnesses there The Aâ—gels that take care of Children here below in the midst of this their work on Earth ever behold the Face of the Father in Heaven How much more is it true of that Person who is the Face of the Father who is one Essence and Substance with the Father who unites the Humane Nature to the Divine Nature in the Unity of this Person Shall not he much more see the face of his Father in Heaven while he is on Earth or in the Grave serving the little Children of his Father his younger Brethren as their good Angel This Face in which all Pleasantnesses are at their fulness at their heighth was that Joy set before Jesus Christ upon the Cross for which he enâ—ured the Cross and despised the shame I shall now conclude this discourse of our dying and dead Saviour of his sacred Body living and immortal in Death with those four thiâ—gs which were too wonderful for Solomon the way of a Ship upon the Sea of an Eâ—gle in the Air of a Serpent upon a stoâ—e or a rock of a man with a maid or as it is in Hebrew in a maid The most learned Jews teach us to understand this as the Mystâ—ry of the Messiah The most learned of the Christian Divines give us such a Gloss as this upon it while they make this place from the authority oâ— the Jews themselves to prove against them that the Messiah was to be born of a Virgin 1. The Man in the Maid is the Heavenly Man in Womb of the Virgin 2. The Ship upon the Sea is the Humane Nature in its Union with the Divine Nature Sailing along in its course of time and life here below upon the Sea of Eternity 3. The serpent upon the Sâ—oâ—e or the Rock is the deep and Glorious wonder of Death in the Person of Christ who is the Rock oâ— Eternal Life and God himself who lives for ever 4. The Eagle in the Air is the Humane Nature risen and ascending in the Spirit to the right hand of the father above all Heaven to the utmost heighths of all Joys and Glories of the Divine Nature and Eternity Before I leave this Subject I will point out one Use and Application of it When a Voice came with Thunder to the Lord Jesus declaring Love and Glory from on high upon him Jesus Christ saith to his Disciples Tâ—is Voice came not for my sake but for yours In like manner these glorious things are spoken of Christ in his life and in his death not for himself only but for all his Saints Christ and all the Saints are one seed To that one seed to all the Saints in Christ to Christ in himself and in all his Saints are all the Promises made All those pleasant things which we have spoken of Jesus Christ and of his holy Body in Death are true of him as his Humane Nature is joyned to the Divine Nature in one Divine and Eternal Person which is the most High God The same things are true in us also who believe in him by that Mystical Union which joyneth us to the Lord Jesus in one mystical Person and in the Unity of that Spirit which is also the most high God one with the Father and the Son While we live as Saints by the Faith of the Lord Jesus we live not but Christ liveth in us we live and we are Spiritual only as we are Spirits the Birth of the Eternal Spirit and one Spirit with the Lord Jesus in his Resurrection from the Dead All things in Heaven and on Earth of Soul and of Body of Life and of Death are Spirit and Life to us It is true that while we live on Earth a fleshly Spirit a fleshly Image in which Satan hath his Throne have a part in us not as our true selves but as our disguises our diseases our enemy as evil Dreams in our sleep These ofâ—â—n prevail over the Spiritual Man in us and captivate us to many sinful Lusts fears and Griefs But still the Spiritual man in itself which is our true self puts them under its feet and makes them Captives to the Light Love and Immortality of the Spirit The Spirit in us is like the Sua which when we think it under a Cloud or eclipsed by the Moon is so only to our Earthly Light but in truth and to itself it is upon its own Throne of Light triumphantly above the Clouds and the Moon comprehending them in the brightness of its own Glory But besides this in the moment of Death this fleshly Spirit and Image is for ever cast out of all power and rule in a Saint and is entirely subdued to that pure and Heavenly Spirit which is the true Saint which now withâ—â—t any interposing vail or interrupting interval perpetually sees the glorious Face of Jesus Christ in it self which is one Spirit with him and the Glorious Face of the Father in Jesus Christ. Yea one advantage of unexpressible Joy and Glory hath the death of a 〈…〉 of Christ. The Death of Christ had all the stings of 〈…〉 crâ—â—ture â—ver felt or can feel the guilt of Sin 〈…〉 Wrath of the Father all the Powers of Hell in 〈…〉 these stings are taken out of the death of a Saint Christ is risen all the Powers of evil subdued captivated and changed into mysteries of eternal Light and Love in the Glorified Person of Christ by the Virtue of his Resurrection A Believer living and dying stands in the Resurrection of Christ is risen with him in him A Believer is married to Christ as he is risen from the Dead His Life his Death thoroughout all things of them both are Divine Fruits of this marriage-bed brought forth in the Bosom of God to God Break forth then O ye Saints into singing both living and dying tune your last breath to this song of the Lamb and say like him I have set my glorified Jesus my Heavenly Bridegroom and the Father in him before me My glorified Jesus my Heavenly Bridegroom and the Father in him is at my right hand therefore shall I not be greatly moved Therefore doth my Soul rejoyce in Death my Body also sweetly rests in the Grave as in a Marriage-bed in the midst of all Divine delights as Flowers of Paradise strewed upon it It rests in the Bosom of my glorified Jesus my hope This sweet and sure hope is he that will never leave my Soul in the state of Death nor suffer his Holy One
his spouse this Soul or this Body which he hath spoused as chast Virgins to himself to see Corruption No no my Bride-groom with all his Lights of Glory and the Father of lights in him will accompany this Darling-Soul and Darling-Body his pair of Doves which are to him as his two eyes through Death and the Grave There will he filling all things round about me with his shining Beauties make me to see the Path of Life Immortality all composed of innumerable Angels of Glory or the innumerable Glories of the Godhead as the Milky way in Heaven is said to be composed with innumerable Stars thick set Thorow all the shades of Death shall I behold all pleasantnesses in his Face shining forth upon me with a fresh Glory as a new Sun turning those Shades into a flowry and perfumed Arbour in the Heavenly Paradise I shall be continually at his right hand where pleasures are for evermore without mixture interruption or end Thus is his right hand which is the heighth and Fountain of Life and Pleasures the beginning of my Life my strength and guide in my way my end in Death We have finished the answers to the objection against the Immortality and Glory of the Body of a Saint together with the Soul in Death which was taken from the Body itself and strengthened by the particular consideration of the Body of Christ in Death and in the Grave We have finished the distinction between the two Bodâ—es the Body of Death in a Saint and the proper Body of a Saint which is an insâ—parable Member in the Spiritual and Heavenly Body of Christ and the Temple of the Holy Ghost as the Soul is We come now to the last objection taken from the resurrection of the Body at the last day which seems to be without any sense if our Bodies become Glorious and Immortal at our Death This Objection is answered by the distinction of three eminent steps or degrees in the resurrection from the Dead I shall take my ground upon which I shall build this answer and distinction from St. John Chap. 11. v. 25. these are the words of our Lord Jesus in that place I am the Resurrection and the Life He that lives and believes in me shall never die He that beliâ—ves in me though he were dead yet shall he live The Lord Jesus is here comforting Martha mourning over her dead Brother He propounds to her the comfort and Joy of his Resurrection Thy Brother saith he shall rise again That which would have been a present and powerful Joy looked upon with a Spiritual eye in a Light of Glory becomes to Martha a faint and far distant Joy while she looks upon the Resurrection a great way off at the end of the World So she answereth the Lord Jesus Yea Lord I know that my Brother shall rise again at the last Day The Lord Jesus scattereth this Cloud of Flesh by shining out upon Martha in the Brightness and Glory of his Heavenly and Divine Person as that Invisible and Eternal Sun which is at once the Fountain and Treasury of all Lights Lives and Forms of things in a state of Perfection and unchangeableness The Lord as he shineth out upon her annointeth the eyes of her mind with his Spirit and the Light of his appearance to see him as he is in the fulness of Glory as the fulness of the Glory of God and of all things dwelleth in him as he is the same and all things in him are the same yesterday to day and for ever I saith he am the Resurreâ—tion and the Life The latter of these is the cause and demonstration of the former It will not seem strange to him who seeth the Lord Jesus to be the Life of all things all things in their most exact distinction to be living perfectly and Eteâ—nally in him in the vast and unbounded Circle of the Unity of his Person and Spirit as in a secret Paradise a Field of Light and bliss above the Heavens and yet invisibly present every where that he should at his Pleasure bring forth things which have disappeared here by Death into new appearances as Resurrections from the Dead and present them again to our eye in the same Forme in which they before conversed with them not as Pâ—antasms or as empty Apparitions but real and Substantial Thus to Martha inlightned by this Spiritual Vision of Christ it was easie to understand that Jesus Christ could give her Brother Lazarus again out of his Grave living into her Arms even at that present time Having thus cleared my ground for my ensuing discourse by the opening of the words I procced to my distinction of a threefold eminent degree in the Resurrection from the Dâ—ad 1. The first eminent step or degree in the Resurrection from the dead is Regeneration which signifieth a new birth a second birth to be born again of God after the Death of that Life which we receive from him by our first Generation as Sons of God by the Creation 2. The Second eminent step or degree in the Resurrection from the Dead is the Natural Death 3. The last eminent step and degree is the Resurrection of the Dead at the last day 1. I shall begin with the first of these that the difference between these thâ—â—e Resurrections may more clearly appear I shall lay it down in the form of a Doctrine Doct. Regeneration is a Resurrection from the Dead St Paul clearly so expresseth it Eph. 5. v. 14. wherefore he saith Awake thou that sleepest and arise from the Dead and Christ shall give thee Light Behold three things here 1. A Sleep 2. The Awakening from this Sleep 3. The cause of Awakening 1. Here is a sleep Thou that sleepest Every man in his Natural state is a divine Spirit an Immortal Soul an Image of God a Son of God in a deep Sleep The Natural Sleep is defined to be a perfect ligation or binding up of all the senses outward or inward But this is an unnatural Sleep into which we are cast by the Enchantments and Power of the Devil It is the Sleep of Sin O man all thy senses and faculties outward and inward which were true pure and divine in the Similitude of God whilst they were awake and at liberty were continually feasted with divine Objects they possessed and enjoyed a Paradise in themselves But how are they now fallen asleep how are they bound up Thou now no more seest hearest tastest feelest understandest enjoyest any sweet beam of truth any thing of the Harmonious Musick of the delicate Relish of the soft Embraces of the immutable all-satisfying Reality and Substance of pure Love pure Light pure Beauty pure Joy pure Goodness Every thing pleasant every thing Real every thing Divine is to thee as if it were not at all Yet is not thy sleep quiet All this which thou seemest to thy self to hear to see to understand to converse with by any of thy senses or faculties
may not yet be sprung up in thee like the ripe corn in the ear in the Ripeness and maturity of their own Spirituality and of the Heavenly Image Yet may they flourish in the Ear that is in a high and sweet Figure of Spirituality according to the purest letter of the Gospel which may have the Spirit itself for a hidden life in it and ready to reveal itself as the perfect Fruit. But suppose thou hast not attained to this yet sing for Joy the Spring and the Summer Season are come Harvest is not far off if the Kingdom of God which is Christ Heaven Paradise all in one and all in a Heavenly Glory be come up in thee into a Green and Living stalk Perhaps thou art yet subject to the Ministry of the Law Rejoyce in this if it Spring from the Seed of Promise if it flourish by the Virtue and Life of this Seed forming itself into this stalk although it lie vailed there This living Stalk this living Ministry of the Law hath not only an outward Glory and Lustre upon it but the inward Glory of the Spiritual Kingdom within it which sends forth this outward Life and Lustre which will itself also in its proper season sprout forth from it Dost thou fall short of this also dost thou see nothing in thy self of Letter or Spirit of Law or Gospel in any clearness of Life or Power by which thou canst make any comfortable Judgment of thy self Are not these mournings of thine that sence those impressions those desires affections endeavours the causes and companions of these mournings which come up so thick in the ground of thy Spirit by day and by night are not these that Kingdom of God that Jesus with Heaven and Paradise in the midst of thee before thine eyes as in the Blade or the Herb which can hardly be discerned or distinguished from common grass by common eyes In the mean time thou like Mary complainest that Christ is taken away from thee when he standeth before thee risen from the dead and talketh with thee though vailed under the form of a Gardener But let it be that no green things appears in the field of thy Soul it is naked cold and hard like the Earth in Winter Yet mourn not as one without hope This naked ground may be a flourishing field of Corn in the Summer time This naked and hard heart of thine may in its proper Season soften and flourish into an Heavenly Paradise by the springing up of Christ in it For even now in this disconsolate desolate state may God the Father and the Holy Angels from on high have their eye with Love and delight upon it from one end of the year to the other as seeing Heaven and Paradise with all their own Joys and Excellencies treasured up there in their seed which is Christ sown in thee 3. Ans. The Heavenly Image in thee who art born again while thou livest on Earth is subject to various Clouds and Storms It is always in a conjunction with the fleshly Image and the Spirit of the Devil These never suffer it to shine forth clearly and purely These often so cloud it and captlvate it that it can send forth no one sweet beam or spark to enlighten thee to any sensible discovery of it or warm thee with any sensible comfort in it The Law of God which is the Law of the Spirit of Life in which Spirit the Heaven and Paradise of a Saint are seated is within in the inward man in the mind But the Law of Sin which is the Spirit of this World where Death Hell and the Devil have their place and their Throâ—e is still manifest and Powerful in thy Members in thy outward man What wonder then if thine inward Man like the Face of Heaven and of an Heavenly Paradise with the Lord Jesus in his Spiritual Glory shining in them as the Sun in its purity and strength be discerned by thee very weakly and uncertainly when they are to be seen thorough so thick so polluted so troubled an Air of the natural Spirit in thy Members Nay what wonder is it if from the Morning of thy Life to the Evening of it such blackness of darkness cover the whole Face of these beautiful and Heavenly things in thee that they appear not at all to thee although they constantly shine in the same Glory and move in the same order in themselves to themselves within thee when as such Powers of Darkness have their seat in thine outward Man thorough which they are to appear 4. Ans. Thou perhaps O afflicted Soul with the eye of Sense and of Reason by the Light of thine own Spirit lookest to see the Kingdom of God with its Joys and Glories and Glorious Inhabitants in thee But these are Spiritual things and to be discerned Spiritually They are Spiritual Senses which alone can take in the Divine sweetnesses and Beauties of this Spiritual Paradise and Heaven It is the Light of the Spirit alone in which they shine forth and appear It is the Breath of the Spirit alone which makes their Spices to flow forth and give their smells Thou O dejected Soul mayest have thy Spiritual senses yet weak Like a new-born Child thou mayest behold and gaze upon the Light of the Heavenly Sun and yet not understand what that is which thou seest or that thou seest any thing at all Again the Spirit is free he breaths and gives his Light where he pleaseth when he pleaseth and in what degree he pleaseth The Garden of God may be in thee thou mayest be in the midst of this Garden and yet not aware of it because it is either a dark Season where nothing appears or a twilight of the Spirit only where the Flowers and Plants of this Garden appear like little Clouds or dark spots undistinguished 5 Ans. There are three ways by which the new Birth or the Resurrection from the dead evidenceth itself to the Soul 1. The Seal of the Spirit 2. The Witness of the Spirit 3. A Spiritual Instinct 1. The Seal of the Spirit is the clearest and compleatest evidence Of this you read Eph. 1. v 13. You are sealed with that Holy Spirit of Promise The Spirit himself in his own person was the Promise and is the Seal St. John 14. v. 20. Jesus Christ in that Chapter promiseth the Spirit which he would send down when he was ascended to be in them He calleth this Spirit the Spirit of Truth and the Comforter Together with the promise of the Spirit he promiseth them that he would come again to them and that they should see him and have Joy and that none should take this Joy from them because they should never more lose the sight of him He promiseth likewise that at that day of the Spirit his Father and himself would come together and sup with them and lodge with them The rich and glorious ground of all this sweet mystery of the Divine Love and