Job 28.13 14. So if the like Enquiry be made after True Happiness both Sea and Land both the Riches of the Earth and the hidden Treasures of the Deep must needs say It is not in them A Man having Crowns and Scepters and Bags of Gold under his Feet may seem to stand upon a little higher Ground than his Neighbours But for all that if God in Christ be not his Portion he is not one Cubit higher in the Stature of true Blessedness The Truth is we are all ready as Samuel in the case of David to mistake the Blessed Man and to set the Crown of Happiness upon their Heads for whom God never intended it as Samuel over look'd little David and would fain have Anointed Eliab King because so goodly a Personage But we must not Measure Happiness by Worldly Things nor pronounce them Heirs of Heaven and Glory who have the fairest Portion of Earth and Earthly Enjoyments The Pen-Men of Holy Scripture when-ever they go about to Decipher a Blessed Man they never do it by his Outward Condition but by his Inward Qualification not by his Large Purchases but by his Holy Practices not by what he hath in Possession for this Life but by what he hath in Reversion after Death Hence it is that you shall never hear any such Words fall from their Mouthes as to say Blessed are they that are Rich. Blessed are they that are Mighty Blessed are they that are Honoured before Men. Blessed are they that have Gorgeous Apparel and Fare Deliciously every day But Blessed are they whose Sins are Forgiven them Psal 31.1 2. Blessed are they that Walk in the Law of the Lord. Blessed are they that Mourn Mat. 5.3 11. Blessed are they that Hunger and Thirst for Righteousness Sake Blessed are the Pure in Heart for they shall see God A Man may have many Blessings and yet not be Bless'd And again he may lye under many Miseries and yet not be Miserable Have all the Blessings in the World yet without God thy Condition is Miserable Have all the Miseries that the World can inflict yet still if God be thy Portion thou art perfectly Blessed 'T is not what Men have but what they are not what is their Present and Temporal but what shall be their Future and their Eternal Condition that speaks them to be either compleatly Miserable or truly Blessed THIS Ensuing Treatise have I therefore Composed on purpose to beget both in my own and others Hearts more serious fixed Thoughts of our Eternal Condition And as you will find that in it which may be as a flaming fiery Sword turning every way to keep Men from having any thing to do with the Forbidden Fruit of Sin So it may be for a Jacob's Ladder to the Righteous whereby Scaling the Walls of the New Jerusalem as in an Holy Storm they may come to eat at length of the Tree of Life which is in the midst of the Paradise of God Durst I compare this Treatise with the Ark of the Covenant I might tell you there is laid up in it both an Aaron's Rod and a Pot of Mannah There is something of Hell's Horrour discover'd to Affright Men out of their Ungodly Courses and a Glimpse of Heaven's Glory such as it is to Decoy them into a Life of serious practical Holiness Every Man is either of God by Regeneration living a Life of Faith and going to Heaven Or of Satan by Corruption living a life of Sense and running on in a swift Career to Hell This Discourse have I suited to both Conditions endeavouring to shew you according to the small Talent wherewith the Lord hath entrusted me That if there be any Fire in Hell the Wicked shall Everlastingly be Tormented in it and if there be any Glory in Heaven God's People shall for Ever be Crowned with it When Zuinglius at any time like a Boanerges a Son of Thunder was Rattling proud and hard-hearted Sinners he would often like a Barnabas a Son of Consolation let fall some Beam of Comfort upon the poor trembling Soul Bone Christiane haec nihil ad te Whatever Terrour is here spoken will fall heavy upon none but the Wicked who walk according to their own Hearts Lusts There is a Vein of Comfort laid in to Refresh God's People the whole Discourse is a River of Life sendâ—ng out thô through an Earthen Pipe those Streams which may well make Glad every Gracious Heart Hell I have herein Deciphered to deter from Sin when Men shall fear the Vengeance of Eternal Fire which will follow after Heaven I have also in some measure Described to work Joy in Well doing when God's People shall fix their Eyes upon that far more exceeding and eternal Weight of Glory to which it leads He that by patient continuance in Well-doing â—eeks for Glory Honour and Immortality may turn and read of Heaven how Blessed he is like to be when God shall Crown him with Life Everlasting He that hardens his Heart in a Course of Ungodliness let him turn and read of Hell how dreadfully Miserable he is sure to be when he shall be Punished both Soul and Body from the Presence of the Lord and from the Glory of his Power THE * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epigrammatist would have the Silver Axe of Justice carried before the Magistrate to Proclaim If thou be an Offender let not the Silver Flatter thee but if an Innocent let not the Axe Fright thee I testify the same to every one that shall Read the Words of this Book if thou be an Impenitent Ungodly Sinner let not the Glory discoursed of Flatter thee since Wrath and Hell are thy Portion But if thou be a Child of God let not the Flames and Misery that abide Ungodly Men Affright thee for there is a Crown of Righteousness there is a Kingdom of Eternal Glory that will after all present Troubles fall to thy share Truth is what ever Discourses we can make of this kind have neither Thunder enough in them to Awaken us nor yet Glory enough to Attract our Eyes to the due Beholding of those Eternal Concernments which God hath set before us Men are generally as Careless in Religious Affairs as if Hell were but a Melancholick Dream and Heaven a Devout Fancy as if there were no Horrour in the one to Affright them nor any Glory in the other to Engage their Thoughts and Attract their Desires Most Men are so Infatuated with the Painted Beauty of this Earthly Jezabel the World that they can let out their Affections upon nothing else They set up their Rest here building Tabernacles below never caring for that Building which is of God Eternal in the Heavens How many Thousands doth the World carry Captives at her Wheels so strangely Tyranizing over fond Mortals Affections that they can neither Spirare nor Sperare Coelestia no more Hope for than Breath after Eternal Enjoyments 'T is Storied of the Duke of Alva That being ask'd by Henry the
by this Treatise that it is of wonderful great Concern to a Christian in all his Obedience and therefore no such Forbidden Fruit as some would have it be but a Tree of Life planted by Heaven for all God's People to Feed upon Some I know have Applauded Un-bribed Obedience without eying the Reward by the Emblem of a Lady with a Water-pot in the one Hand and a Fire brand in the other Resolving to Serve the Lord though Hell-fire were Quenched with the Water and there were no Torments to Punish her for Sin though Paradise were Burnt up with the Fire and there were no Reward no Heaven no Glory to Crown her for Well-doing How far such Hyperbolical Abstractions are Commendable I have shewed else-where And must here only say That though the New Nature would Act like it self let God deal with it how he please yet it 's dangerous to Perplex poor trembling Consciences with those Suppositions wherein we have not the Spirit of God going before us This were just â—s if you should set a Man to Shoot and then take away the Mark Or as if you should bid a Man go Work in your Field and allow him no Wages for his â—ncouragement Sure I am that as the Gospel deâ—erreth us from Sin by Arguments formed out of Hell â—nd eternal Damnation So it incourageth us to wait â—pon God in a way of Duty by Arguments made out of Heaven and Glory *âŽ* 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost Hom. 6. ad Pop. Antioch There is nothing more usual with the Holy Ghost calling poor Sinners to Repentance than to interweave Mercies and Judgments Promises of Heaven that we may not Despair and Threatnings of Hell that we may not be Secure and Presume True it is God must first be Loved and Served for Himself And so he may be and yet be Loved for Heaven too so long as we seek no other Heaven but what stands in the Full Injoyment of Himself There is no such a vast Hiatus such a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such a great Gulf betwixt God's Glorâ— and man's Salvation as some do Fancy The Sacred Oracles do no where speak of such an implacable Enmity betwixt them nor any where teach them to stand upon Terms of Opposition so that he who beholds the one should not be capable of casting an Eye upon the other also ¶ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alex. Paedag. Lib. 1. Cap. 13. Pag. 101. Clemens Alexandrinus will have the great end of all Religion and true Piety to be the Acquisition of an eternal Rest in the Downy Bosome of God's Love To be sure it doth not Illegitimate any Man's Piety nor Impeach the Truth of his Religion to make this his End in serving God that he may arrive at length to the full Fruition of God in Glory The Lord by a Miracle of Condescending Love doth allow us in Glorifying him to seek our own Glory And in Serving Him he gives us leave to eye the Saving of our own Souls Should I tell you that in all his Commands the Lord seeks not Himself but you not that he may reap any Accessions of Happiness and Glory by your Obedience but that you may carry away the whole Crop there is a Truth in it for which both Lactantius and Clemens Alexandrinus will be my Vouchees * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alex. Admonit ad Gent. p. 42. The great work which God hath been contriving from all Eternity and still hath upon the Wheel in the World is to save his People from their sins and to bring them to a state of endless Happiness So saith Clement ‖ Propterea igitur coli se Deus expetit et honorari ab homine tanquam Pater ut virtutem ac sapientiam teneat quae sola immortalitatem parit Nam qui Deam honoraverit hoc afficietur praemio ut sit aeternum beatus sit que apud Deum et cum Deo semper Lact. de vit beat cap. 5. pag. 666. Therefore God wills his People to worship and do Homage to him as a Father that keeping on in the pleasant Paths of Virtue and divine heavenly Wisdom they may come at length to Life and blessed Immortality with Himself So Lactantius The Lord sets us to Work in his Vine-yard that he may give us the Reward of eternal Glory not that any Revenues of further Felicity may be brought â—nto the Exchequer of Heaven for him by our workâ—ngs The Lord knows how Dead we are Naturally to the things which concern our eternal Peace And therefore doth he tempt our desires as it were with the tenders of Glory Honour and Immortality that he may bring us to chuse the way of Life AND O how Serious should this make us in the study of Holiness how willing to spend and be spent â—n the Work of the Lord when so sure that all the Lines of Obedience which we draw shall center in Happiness †{inverted †} Licet ipsa vitium sit ambitio frequentur tamen causa virtutum est Quint. Institut Orat. Lib. 1. c. 2. p. mihi 14. Quintilian is of Opinion That though â—n it self Ambition be a Foul Vice yet it begets as the Off-spring thereof many a Beautiful and Amiable Virâ—ue Sure I am there is an holy Ambition a Desire to be Great in the Kingdom of God to sit High in Glory that if deeply rooted in our Hearts would bring forth a most virtuous Off-spring in our Lives making us Men of brave Resolutions of high Majestick Spirits We should then think it as much below ourselves to be dabling like Children in the Mire of Worldly Drudgery and filling our Laps with the Dirt of Earthly Injoyments as Alexander thought it below his Princely Grandeur to be found exercising â—t the Olympick Games When Hormisdas that Noâ—le Persian could not be drawn by a sordid Office in * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alex. Admon ad Gent. pag. 45. the Stable to Revolt from Jesus Christ yet the King thought by some greater Preferment to overcome him and therefore promoting him in his Palace Jam nega Fabri Filium said he Now deny the Capenter's Son speaking Reproachfully of Christ But such Principles of Heroicalness such a Spirit of Gallantry did a due respect had to the Recompence of Reward put into him that he can Trample with an holy Scorn upon all those Honours when coming to Bribe him out of his Interest in Christ and Glory Thus it would make us Scorn the World and let go all worldly Injoyments rather than Deny Christ or do any thing unworthy our Christian Profession did we but ponder upon the Crown prepared for us He that hath this Hope purifies himself saith the Apostle 1 John 3.3 speaking of the Hope of Glory at Christ's Appearance as he is pure If any thing there be which can beget in us a care to walk before God in all holy Conversation and Godliness 't is certainly the due Consideration of that
length you may attain to the full injoyment of God in Glory Here also I confess the Truth meets with some Adversaries who do tell us That to make Heaven the end of our Duties seeking in all our Obedience our own Happiness our own Glory our own Salvation is Mercenary and utterly inconsistent with the free Spirit of a Christian But the truth is if we consult holy Scripture we shall find this Practice so far from being Mercenary and inconsistent with the free Spirit of a Christian that he is unworthy the Name of a Christian who in all his Obedience and Performances is not found so doing For if Christ himself hath Commanded us That we should seek the Kingdom of God and the Righteousness thereof in the first place That we should lay up for our selves a Treasure in Heaven not labouring for the Meats that Perish but for the Meat which shall endure to eternal Life How can we then count that Man a Christian who despising the Authority of Christ cares for none of these things but carelesly goes on in a way of Duty as if Heaven and Glory were not worth the looking after YOU may Believe it Sirs the main Errand upon which God sent you into the World was to work out not only his Glory but your own Salvation with fear and trembling And let me tell you so inseparably is the Glory of God and your own Salvation joined together that you never Dishonour God more than when Salvation-work is neglected by you and you begin to be unmindful of your own Happiness GOD's Glory I must confess must be the Ultimate and Highest End of all our Obedience as will farther be shewed you But yet this hinders not but that in all our Obedience we may design our own Happiness making the eternal Salvation of our immortal Souls the great End next unto God's Glory of our Lives For Subordinata non Pugnant is a sure Maxim We do never Oppose God's Glory when we only make Heaven our End and seek the Salvation of our own Souls with a due Respect had unto his Glory THERE is indeed a Two-fold End Fine Operis Finis Operantis the End of the Work and the End of him that Worketh And though in some cases they are diverse if not contrary to one another yet in the Case now spoken of they are co incident and both of them materially the same thing (l) Nam quis alius noster est finis nisi pervenire ad regnum cujus nullus est finis August de Civit. Dei lib. 22. cap. 70. For not only doth the Scripture make Salvation the end of Faith and Obedience but also of Christians themselves Believing and Obeying the Lord when it teaches them to work out their own Salvation with fear and trembling 1. Pet. 1.9 Phil. 2.12 BE not therefore such enemies to your own Souls as to neglect that Happiness which God in all your Obedience would have you to look after but now see that you make Heaven and eternal Glory the great end of your Life Whilst others are designing to make themselves Rich and Great and Honourable in the World Oh! let it be the grand design of your Souls to surprize Heaven and to take by an Holy Violence the Kingdom of God Mat. 11.12 IF Christians you would make again of Godliness be sure then that by all holy and godly Conversation you gain for yourselves in Heaven a Crown of Life Rest not satisfied with the low and beggarly injoyments of this World but now see that you set your Affections on things above endeavouring to lay hold on eternal Life Your present life is a flitting shadow a vanishing bubble a day which though never so pleasant must yet have the dark Curtains of death drawn over it and cannot be long but the life which is to come is a leaf never fading a light ever shining and such a day as shall know no evening Tell me then which is most rational to seek after that life and those Pleasures which are lost almost as soon as found or after that Life and those unfadable Pleasures which being once found can never be lost nor taken away from us Luke 10.42 (k) Praeferantur vera falsis aeterna brevibus utilia jucundis Lactant. de vero Cult c. 21. p. 123. LEARN now to prefer true Happiness before deceitful Riches eternal Comforts before short injoyments and those things that will prove everlastingly advantageous to your Souls before the Pleasures of Sin which are but for a Season God doth not grudge that you would seek your selves in his Service only he would have you to seek after your selves not in the Meat that perisheth but in the Meat which shall endure to eternal Life John 6.27 There is a kind of holy Ambition which our Blessed Lord hath not only allowed but also exhorted us to and that is that we should aim at and seek after a Kingdom Not an earthly Kingdom from which we may soon fall but an Heavenly Kingdom which connot be shaken wherein we shall reign with Christ for ever and ever Revel 22.5 Here then is a whet-stone to diligence and matter for our ambitious thoughts with warrant to be working upon Earthly Princes if under pretence of serving them you seek to possess your selves of their Crowns and Kingdoms will deal with you as Traytors but the King of eternal Glory he is never better pleased with you than when in serving him you aim at a Crown of Life indeavouring to get Possession of the Kingdom of Heaven For then you have respect indeed to the Recompence of the Reward when by patient continuance in well-doing you seek for Glory Honour and Immortality and therefore you need not to doubt but God will shortly render unto you eternal Life Rom. 2. (l) Nullus labor durus nullum tempus longum quo aeternitatis gloria comparatur THINK we therefore no Labour too much no time too long for the gaining of eternal Glory in the Kingdom of Heaven If upon uncertain hopes of a fading Kingdom whose foundation is in the dust Men will take such pains laying all at stake and hazarding not only Liberty but Life it self What should we do then but contemn the World run the hazard of greatest Sufferings and move chearfully forward in all the ways of Obedience towards the Crown of eternal Life towards a Kingdom that cannot be moved towards a City that hath foundations whose builder and maker is God For (m) Quisquis corruptelas terrae virtute calcaverit arbiter iâ—â—o summus et verax ad lucem vitam quae perpetuam suscitabet Lact. de vit Beat. ad finem who ever contemning the corruptible Enjoyments of this Life shall aspire in the ways of Obedience after Heavenly Glory why God the Righteous Judge of all the World will make such an one meet to be a partaker of the Inheritance of Saints in light and will honour him at length with a Crown of Eternal
Life Whilst Christians you seek after in the ways of Obedience the Recompence of the Reward why you have then a due respect unto it and shall therefore in no case lose your Rewards THUS you see what it is to have respect to the Recompence of the Reward you must stedfastly believe that there is a Reward for the Righteous you must fiducially apply it to your selves as that which you in particular shall be Crowned with you must often meditate upon and be spending your Thoughts about Heavenly Glory you must earnestly long after Life Eternal desiring to be cloathed upon with your House which is from Heaven you must take incouragement from the Glory that shall shortly be revealed in you to keep close with God in ways of Obedience whatever it cost you and you must also by patient continuance of well-doing seek for Glory Honour and Immortality making this the great end of your Lives that you may work out your own Salvation with Fear and Trembling and so doing you need not doubt but you have a due respect unto Heavenly Glory and have rightly fixed your eyes upon that eternal Recompence of Reward which God hath set before you CHAP. IV. The Doctrine explain'd further shewing how we must have respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward In Six other Particulars II. THAT which according to the Method at first resolved upon comes next to be cleared is The manner how you are to have respect to the Recompence of the Reward which with all plainness I shall endeavour to explicate in these subsequent Propositions 1. WE are to have respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward not Principally but Secondarily and with due Subordination to God's Glory Heaven and Glory may be the subordinate ground and end of our Obedience but they are not to be made the supream ground nor the ultimate end of our Obedience (n) Mercedem oportet non spectari ut principale motivum sed deum ejusque gloriam tanquam ultimum finem respiciendum nostram vero beatificam visionem ut finem sub fine ideo enim appetere debemus mercedem beatitudinis ut securius et ardentius deum diligamus in aeternum Davenant Col. 1.5 p. 4. 6. We may eye them secondarily and with subordination to God's Glory but not primarily before nor supreamely and above the Glory of God GOD hath indeed so inseperably conjoyned his own Glory and Man's Salvation together that they cannot possibly be divided nor put asunder but yet as 't is said of them in the Resurrection God will have every thing in it's own order we may intend the Salvation of our own Souls making that an inferiour and subordinate end in our Obedience however that which we ought to make the supream and the ultimate end of all is the glory of God For the glory of God you must know it 's the greatest good 't is the Perfection and united splendour of all the glorious Rayes of his other Attributes infinitely surpassing the glory of all Created Excellencies and therefore more to be preferred than the Salvation of the whole World better all the World should be Damned and go to Hell for ever than that God over all blessed for ever should not be Glorified And truly when we go about to subordinate the glory of God to our own Salvation making eternal Life and Happiness our ultimate end and God's Glory subservient to that we commit an act of the grandest Sacriledge as doing what in us lyes to take the Crown from God and set it upon our own heads GOD is willing to give us Heaven to give us Life and Immortality with any thing that may conduce to our eternal Happiness but his own Glory and that he professeth he will not give to any other The Benefit the Comfort the eternal Recompence of all our Obedience shall be our own but the Glory and Praise that doth wholly belong to God and must more be regarded than our own Salvation What Pharoah said to Joseph having set him over all the Land of Aegypt In the Throne will I be greater than thou the like methinks God saith to us Though I have set you over the works of my hands vouchsafing you eternal Life and Happiness with all the good things of Heaven that lye before you yet on the Throne will I be greater than you and my glory you must seek in the first place endeavouring to set the Crown upon my head Gen. 41.40 (o) Neque hoc satis est ut quis dixerit se velle rectè agendo et praemium consequi propositum et deo eadem operâ parêre videre autem oporteat ne mercedi et praemio primas partes dederit quia semper inter fines ut earum quaeque natura sua praestantior est illa priori loco haberi debet Pet. Martyr in Lib. Jud. 'T IS not sufficient that in well-doing we profess our selves willing by the same act of Obedience both to obtain for our selves the Recompence of Reward and also to promote the glory of God but we must here solicitously beware that we make not the Recompence of Reward our ultimate end giving that the preheminence of God's glory For where there are divers ends subordinate to each other that which of it's own nature is the most excellent must always be accounted of in the first place and most chiefly had regard unto (p) Magis convertendus est oculus mentis ad dei honorem quam ad propriam mercedem potiusque induci debemus ad bene agendum ac patiendum ex divino amore quam remunerationis desiderio aliter essemus mercenarij non servi fideles neque amici Carthusian in Locum THE eye of the Soul saith Carthusian in all our Obedience is rather to be fixed upon God's glory than our own Reward and we should rather be induced to do well and to suffer by an impulse of divine Love than by the desire of a Recompence otherwise we should shew ourselves to be Mercenaries and neither faithful Friends nor Servants As they say of the Moon and Stars they have an innate light of their own but it 's nothing in comparison of that mutuatitious light which they receive from the Sun So God's People they have and lawfully may have an eye to their own Salvation in what they do but that which they make the principal and most noble end of all their Obedience is the glory of God (q) Servus domini in rebus agendis non tam intuetur successum et fructum operum quam ut fiat in ipsis omne illud quod spectat ad gloriam dei THE Servant of the Lord saith the devout Granatensis Lib. de Perfect Amoris dei c. 13. p. 156. in what he doth looks not so much at the Recompence of his good Works as that every thing may be found in them conducing to the greatest advancements of God's glory Though then Christians you may have
our might though we should give our Bodies to be burnt die ten thousand deaths and lye frying as Firebrands in Hell upon the Grid-iron of God's displeasure so many Millions of Imaginary Ages as there be Stars in the Firmament of Heaven Yet by all this we could not possibly oblige the God of Heaven to render us the Reward of Eternal Life nor bring forth any thing that by way of condign Merit could purchase that Crown of Righteousness that Kingdom of Eternal Glory that fulness of Joy and everlasting Happiness which abides us in the World to come So then though we may look at Heaven in our Obedience yet it 's utterly in vain to think of Meriting Heaven by our Obedience Though the Reward of Eternal Life may encourage us to Well-doing yet in vain shall we look to Purchase that glorious Reward by our well-doing Though we may assure ourselves of the Blessing of Eternal Life and Glory from God in keeping his Commandments Psal 19.11 yet if for keeping his Commandments we expect that God should bless us with so glorious a Reward we are sure everlastingly to fall short of it For if you think to Merit with God expecting upon Terms of Justice the Reward of Eternal Glory from him do but cast up your Reckonings aright and you will find that there is nothing but an Eternal (n) Quanto labore digna est requies quae non hâ—bet finem Si verum vis computare et verum judicare aeterna requies aeterno labore emituor Aug. in Ps 93. Travail which can Merit an Eternal Rest nothing but an everlasting Conflict that can deserve to be Crowned with an everlasting Triumph nothing but Infinite Labour that can Purchase that Infinitely Glorious and Soul-satisfying Reward which the Lord for our encouragement hath set before us Why then should we put ourselves upon such a Prince as we shall never be able to discharge seeking Glory Honour Immortality and Eternal Life by the Merit of our own scanty and imperfect Obedience when we know that the Glory Honour and comfort of Eternal Life can only be obtained through the Riches of God's free Grace and divine Indulgence LOOK you may Christians having fought the good fight having finished your course and kept the Faith to receive from Christ the Righteous Judge and Immarcessible Crown of Glory 2 Tim. 8. But take heed that you never think by your Fighting for God Running the Race he hath set before you and Believing him in all his Promises to Purchase that glorious Crown which is not the Wages of an hiâ—â—ling but an Inheritance prepared of God for all his Children If you think Christians to spin Salvation out of the Bowels of your own good Works and to raise up the Seed of Eternal Life to yourselves out of the dead and barren Womb of your own Righteousness why let me tell you then all your Hope 't is but as a Spider's Web which will quite be swept down by the Besome of Death You never think to live and Purchase Eternal Glory by your own Righteousness but you forfeit that Crown of Righteousness which Christ hath laid up with himself for all that love his appearance Col. 3.3.4 Whilst therefore you look at the Recompence of Eternal Life remember 't is the free gift of God and not the Purchase of your own Obedience (o) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Marcus Heremita For to be sure their life was never hid with Christ in God who think to find Life and Happiness amongst the rubbish of their own ruinous Performances Nor shall they ever appear with Christ in Glory who make a Christ of their own good Works thereby thinking to Merit at God's hands the Reward of Eternal Happiness For to put confidence in our Holiness will as certainly shut us out of God's Heavenly Kingdom as if we were altogether unholy 4. WE are to have respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of Reward not carnally looking for a Sensual Happiness but Spiritually as longing for an Happiness that shall consist in the adequate Perfection of all our Graces together with the full enjoyment of God in Glory We are not to look for a Turkish Paradise to gratify the Flesh but for a Sinless state of Holiness where Grace shall be perfected into Glory We may not think of bathing our Souls in Worldly Delights and Carnal Pleasures but of coming to the full injoyment of God himself whom to see without end love without loathing and praise without ever being weary is the only complement of all our Happiness There are multitudes of Men and Women in the world who having imbibed some gross Conceits and carnal Notions of Heaven would be glad when they can live no longer here to take up there as conceiting it to be a place accomodate to the desires of their own carnal Hearts But we never have any due respect to the recompence of the Reward till we look upon Heaven as a place where Sin shall be wholly abolished Grace perfectly glorified the World trampled upon and God over all blessed for ever enjoy'd as the Center of perfect Rest and everlasting Satisfaction As Balaam desired to dye the death of the righteous which he knew would be Crowned with Peace but had no care at all to conform himself to the life of the righteous so many there be who desire Heaven as a place of Happiness but not as a place of perfect Holiness Such is the Malignity of a carnal Heart that it will assimulate whatever it meets with and turn it into the likeness of it's own brutish Lusts So that whenever a carnal heart desires Heaven it 's not an Heaven of God's preparing but an Heaven of it's own fancying not an Heaven to make it perfectly Holy but an Heaven that will make it sensually Happy As a little Leaven turns the whole Lump into it's own Sourness or as the Salt Sea turns the Fresh Rivers and the Sweet Showers of Heaven into Salt Waters So the Heart which is Unsanctified it turns Bethel into Bethaven the holy City of Sion into a filthy Sodom and the heavenly Jerusalem it self into Babylon looking only for the Wages of Unrighteousness and for Heaven as a place of Sensual Pleasure but not as a place of Spiritual Injoyments As some Jews Acts 1.6 had carnal Notions of Christ and his Kingdom looking for a carnal Messiah who should come in Worldly Pomp and Splendour to restore the Kingdom to Israel So many that profess themselves to be Christians they have carnal Notions about the Recompence of the Reward looking after a Turkish Paradice after an Heaven that is wholly Carnal like their own hearts abounding with nothing but Fleshly Delights and Sensual Contentments They conceive indeed of Heaven as a place where there is Freedom from all Misery and as a place wherein all Fulness of Joy of Delights and everlasting Pleasures dwells But yet both these the Misery removed and the Pleasures indulged both Freedom
And this is your Husband said he and bringing forth his Staff and Scrip Why this adds he is like to be your Dowrey But now the Lord doth what in him lyes to Incourage us telling us what Treasures of Love and Sweetness 1 Cor. 2.9 what heaps of Joy and fulness of Glory what unseen unheard of unconceivable and Soul-ravishing Pleasures are prepared for us in case we will but love him and walk in Obedience before him 'T was one of the Devil's Master pieces when he Tempted Christ hoping to draw him to his impious Desires that he carried him up into an exceeding high Mountain shewing him from thence all the Kingdoms of the World and then promised him saying All these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me Why thus with holy reverence be it spoken what the Devil did to Christ Wickedly the Lord doth Graciously to his own People He takes them up into Mount Nebo from thence shewing them thrô the Perspective of his Promises not the Kingdom of this World but the Kingdom of Heaven with all the Royalties and Glory thereof assuring them Mat. 5.3 that all shall be their own if they will but walk humbly before him indeavouring to worship him in Spirit and Truth The Lord understands full well the Frailties of our Nature and what great Discouragements we are like to meet with in Heaven's way And therefore he is pleased most Graciously to draw us on the wayes of Holiness by the proposal of such Rewards as may incourage us to go on therein whatever it cost us Our Condition in this World is like that of the Israelites passing towards the Land of Canaan we must go through the Red Sea of Persecutions and through an howling Wilderness where we shall often be Stung with fiery Serpents before ever we can get to the heavenly Canaan and therefore the Lord he allures us by all sorts of Promises and sweet Inticements I will allure her saith God Hos 2.14 speaking of his Church and bring her into the Wilderness The word in the Original which we Translate Allure doth also signify to Deceive Seduce or to Beguile But here it 's taken in a good Sense implying with much Emphasis That God doth sweetly till men on in ways of Holiness and by an heavenly Artifice wrapt up in Promises of Life graciously seduce them into the Obedience of his own Commandments In the Precept he acquaints us with our Duty and in the Promise he shews us what shall be our Reward By that he appoints us our Work and by this he would incourage us Cheerfully to go through with it that having the Promise of an eternal Recompence we may never grow weary in well-doing 2 Thess 3.13 Gal. 6.9 Such is the goodness of God that he sweetens all his Commandments with Promises And whenever he calls us out to any Duty he incourageth us to the Performance thereof by the Proposal of some glorious Recompence Rom. 8.13 He bid us through the Spirit mortify the deeds of the Body and that we may not want Incouragement to so difficult a Work he tells us that so doing our Souls shall live He bids us to take up our Cross not detrecting to suffer for Christ And he gives us this incouragement thereto That if we suffer with him we shall also reign with him 2 Tim. 2.12 He bids us in a word Sow to the Spirit indeavouring to be fruitful in every good word and work And for our incouragement to that holy practise he tells us that so doing we shall of the Spirit reap Life everlasting Gal. 6.8 So then since God himself is graciously pleased to allure and draw us on in wayes of Obedience by the proposal of an eternal Recompence we may lawfully sure having Respect thereunto take Incouragement from it For to what end should God sweeten his Commandments with Promises but to make us more Cheerful in the way of Duty when we know how transcendently great and glorious our Reward shall be Promissiones nullas dedisset deus pijs de beatitudine nisi vellet ut inter bene agendum easdem respiceremus Daven Col. c. 1. v. 5 p. 46. Those men do begrudge the Lord's Bounty and would seem wiser than God himself who deny us a Liberty to make use of the Spirit 's Motives Pietas habet promissiones vitae praesentis et futurae at frustrà si non licet intuitu illarum excitari ad bene agendum Dav. ubi sup In vain hath God made Promises of Life to such as keep his Commandments if in keeping thereof we may have no respect to that Life that Happiness that Glory which is held forth in the Promises to us Doubtless Christians 't is not Ingenuity but Ingratitude to deprive ourselves of those Incouragements to Obedience and of that Comfort in a way of Duty which the Lord himself hath graciously allowed us to make use of And thô possibly you may think that you highly please the Lord whilst you walk on in a way of Duty without any respect to your own Happiness yet the Truth is you do Presumptuously tempt him as Ahaz did when refusing to ask a Sign which God promised to give them Isa 7.11.12 The Lord knew the necessity of giving a Sign to his People in that Exigence in order whereunto he bids Ahaz ask a Sign but he 's Modest he 's ashamed that God should be put upon the working of a Miracle to confirm his Faith far be it from him so to Tempt the Lord and to question his Faithfulness he will believe him without a Sign that he will However here were specious Pretences yet the Lord was no little displeased that his Favour should be made so light of and a Sign under a pretence of Modesty refused as if they better knew what was needful for themselves than the God of Heaven Hear ye me now O House of David it 's a small thing for you to weary men but will ye weary my God also Thus Christians when we refuse to take Incouragements from the Promises of Life to walk in Obedience before the God of Heaven when under a pretence of Ingenuity and a Gospel Frame of Spirit we take on us to serve God for himself He bids us seek for Glory and Honour for Immortality and eternal Life by patient continuance in well doing but far be it from us to be Mercenary or to seek ourselves we will serve God and run the way of his Commandments without any Respect at all to Heaven and Glory that we will why now we weary the Lord and making light of his Favour to us we Tempt him as if we knew better what Motives to make use of and what to seek in our Obedience than God himself For to be sure we do no less Tempt the Lord in not seeking after what he hath Commanded than we do in expecting what he never Promised We do no less Tempt the Lord in creating occasions of Desperation than in
way fâ—â—e and gratuitous in the rise of it as proceeding wholly from the instigation of God's goodness and not depending upon any antecedent Condition in us as the impulsive Cause thereof Yet since the promise of Life eternal doth bear in it the nature of a Reward which hath always relation in the accomplishment of it to some presupposed Performances we must therefore know that it will never be made good to us but with dependance upon Duties in us that may fit and qualify us to receive so glorious a Promise First we must do the Work and then receive the Reward First we must get Grace and then God will give us Glory first we must finish our Course ¶ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost Hom. 4. ad pop Ant. and then we shall receive a Crown of Righteousness first we must Sow to the Spirit and then we have the Promise of God for our Security that of the Spirit we shall Reap Life everlasting We must not therefore anticipate and perturb that comely and blessed Order which God hath put in his Promises expecting that God should glorify us in Heaven before we have glorified his Name on Earth For be the promises of Life and Glory never so free and absolute in their Rise yet they are conditionate in their Accomplishment so that unless by the due and faithful performance of the Conditions annexed thereto we be qualified for them we can never receive them Amongst many other Conditions and Provisoes upon which God hath made us the Promise of eternal Life this is not the least that by patient continuance in well-doing we should seek after it For saith the Apostle to them that by patient continuance in well-doing seek for Glory and Honour and Immortality God will render eternal Life Rom. 7. As God when he bad promised deliverance unto Israel Ezek. 36.37 yet tells them that for this he will be enquired of by the House of Israel to do it for them So though the Lord hath given us a promise of eternal Life and Glory yet he will have us seek it by patient continuance in well-doing before ever he will Crown us with it In vain shall we think to find eternal Life if we seek it not in the first place giving diligence to lay hold upon it For when Promises have the Condition annexed to them we cannot take any Comfort in the Promise till we are sure of the Condition To say then that we may not have Respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of Reward to Eternal Life and Glory which is one grand condition specified in the Promise thereof is to render this glorious Reward altogether unfeasable and indeed to reflect dishonourable Blasphemy upon God himself as if he had Promised Eternal Glory with such a Promise as may not lawfully be seen unto with such an unrighteous condition as can never be performed without Sin But dare we say that the Infinitely Holy God will make us tenders of Life and Glory upon any other terms than what shall be Holy and Just and Good Hath the Lord threatned that without Holiness we shall never see him and will he then make disingenuity and unholiness the way leading to him Doth this pure indeficient Fountain which is always one and the same send forth such sweet and such sower Water Is the God who hath promised us Life and Glory Holy and dare we think that he would suspend the Promise thereof upon any unholy and Sinful condition Doubtless since the Good and Holy God hath made a respect to the Recompence of the Reward a condition of our receiving the Promise of Life Everlasting we need not fear the doing any thing unlawful but may well have a full Plerophory that what we do must be Holy and Just and Good whilst by Patient continuance in well-doing we seek to make sure of Heaven and Glory 7. WE may Lawfully have Respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward because otherwise we should not exercise nor have many of our Graces conversant about their proper Objects The Lord doth not only require that we should have an harmonious compages and an universal complexion of all saving Graces in our Souls but also that every Grace should be acted upon and regularly conversant about it's own Object which yet without a due respect had to the Recompence of the Reward cannot possibly be For how can Faith be the Substance of unseen Glory how can desire long after it or hope expect it if it be not a thing lawful for a Christian to look after and to have respect unto it Faith saith the Apostle is the Substance of things hoped for the Evidence of things not seen Betwixt ¶ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Oecumen Faith and Hope there is a very near affinity and they stand mutually related to one another each of them having respect to the other as the two Cherubims looked one towards the other over the Mercy Seat Faith layes the Foundation of Happiness and Hope builds upon that Foundation a glorious prospect of it Faith leaning upon the Promise of God concerning Eternal Life puts strength into Hope and Hope looking for that Eternal Life which God hath Promised pours the Oyl of gladness into Faith That Good which Faith sees Hope patiently waits for Faith fixeth an Eye upon future Glory and Hope tarrieth for it till it becomes present Faith in believing the Joys of Heaven gives Hope a sight of them and Hope in expecting of them makes Faith to rejoyce with joy unspeakable and full of Glory Faith believes it shall end in Salvation 1 Pet. 1.9 and Hope bids the Soul be patient and wait to the end that it may be saved Faith discovering a weight of Glory makes strong the hands of Hope and Hope climbing up thereby into the Mount of Transfiguration makes the face of Faith to shine with the reflexions of the same Glory upon it Fides accipit praesentia dei beneficia vel etiam in spe posita repraesentat ac veluti oculis subijcit Polan Syntag. Lib. 9. cap. 9. Pag. 3851. In a word what Hope looks upon as future Faith gives it a present subsistency reallizing those things to the Soul which have now no other being than what is in the Promise so that Faith steadfastly believing Hope cannot but with Patience expect that Crown of Life that Heavenly Kingdom that Eternal Happiness and Glory which God hath Promised Thus whilst we have respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward these Graces of Faith and Hope they are exercised about their proper objects the one believing the Promise of Eternal Life and the other waiting to receive it which otherwise they could never do but must either act irregularly embracing those objects which they ought not so much as to glance upon or else must be perpetually cloystered up in the Soul devoting themselves to an unprofitable Lethargical unactive Life and so antidating a supersedeas from their
desires and longings are carried out that way The Child doth not more naturally breath nor the Fire more naturally contend upward than the Children of Grace do affect those things that are above (a) 2 Cor. 5.2 desiring to be cloathed upon with their House which is from Heaven Oh this is the pure Fountain after whose (b) Psal 42.1 Waters they insatiably thirst and pant like the chased Hind this is the only Centre of rest towards which they are constantly bending their motion this is their choicest Treasure and therefore no wonder if their Hearts be set upon it The Soul that is truly gracious like the several Elements hath a proper principle of motion within it self so that it can never rest below but is still aspiring after things above 'T is Glory and Honour 't is Immortality and Life everlasting in the kingdom of Heaven which true Grace fixeth the heart upon and makes it long after Who ever is truly gracious he hath Heaven in his eye and the World under his feet not labouring for the meat that perisheth but for the meat which will endure to eternal Life An hyprocrite may indeed be possessed with a kind of inefficacious lazy desires after Heaven and Glory there may be some velleities unactive wishings and wouldings in a graceless Soul after eternal Life and Happiness which are broken by the pre-apprehensions of difficulties and so produce no suitable endeavours Desires fly from such a mans Heart like Sparks from a Furnace which though they break forth in heaps yet they suddenly die and so presently quench the Spirit which gave them motion But now a gracious Soul his Hands they second his Heart his inward Affection 't is followed with eager prosecution so that he doth not only desire Glory and Honour and Immortality but he likewise by patient continuance in well doing seeks after them and will not leave off his pursuit of Heaven whatever difficulties may occur in the way His desires are turned heavenward and therefore he digs for heavenly Treasure this is the mark at which he aims this is the prize for which he runs this is the crown for which he so earnestly contends Give him Riches give him Honours give him worldly pleasures give him the very Flower and Quintessence of the whole creation nay give him the universal confluence and aggregation of all creature-injoyments and yet in vain shall you think to satisfy him his Heart is set upon Heaven upon Life and eternal Glory so that you may as well stop the Sun in his course as prevail upon such a man to sit down satisfied with any thing here below As the Sun exhales and draws up the vapours from the earth so true Grace it hath a magnetick virtue in it whereby it draws up the heart from earth in a continued anhelation after Heaven and Glory (a) Luke 9.51 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Obfirmavit faciem Hoc est omnem metum ac honorem mortis deposuit animo suo constituit hanc mortem esse ferendam Leigh Crit. 'T was said of Christ that he set he obfirmed he hardned his Face as the original sounds to go to Jerusalem thus all that are living members of Christ's mystical Body they set their Faces heaven-ward continually directing their course and urging their passage through all difficulties towards the heavenly Jerusalem Such are bound for the Holy Land and therefore they will never put in any where for harbour till they come to appear before their God in Sion (b) Col. 3.1 They are risen with Christ and must needs therefore by virtue of this their spiritual resurrection seek the things which are above where Christ sits on the right hand of God They have layd up for themselves a Treasure in Heaven and therefore a stone doth not more naturally move towards its proper Center than their hearts upon that account do move heavenward For as where the Carcass is there will the Eagles be gathered together so where-ever a Mans Treasure is there will his Heart be also IF then the proper Genius of Grace be thus to make a divorce betwixt the World and the Heart and to carry out the Soul in strong uncontroled and invincible desires after Heaven and Glory how can we once think it unlawful to have respect in our obedience to the recompence of the reward What may not true Grace be allowed to act like it Self and to carry back the Heart to Heaven from whence it came True Grace is a Bird of Paradise and will nothing serve the turn unless we clip her Wings that she may Soar no more aloft in uncurbed desires and panting anhelations after Heaven and Glory There is a native beauty and amiableness in all actions agreeing with and proportionate to the dictates of right reason and shall we then judge it unbecoming a Christian to act suitably to the dictates of true Grace in having respect to Heaven and Glory in his obedience to the seeking whereof Grace so strongly inclines May the Fire contend upward and every Element according to that Principle of motion which it hath within be carried to its proper Center and may not Grace Is the Grace of God shed abroad in the Heart a Creature so badly principled that we may not suffer it to act us according to its proper Genius without forfeiting our ingenuity and becoming mercenary Can we not hold fast our integrity and be filial in all our obedience unless the Grace of God whereby we are become his Children must be banished from its own essence renounce its proper inclination and move excentrical to that heavenly Orb wherein God hath placed it Doubtless the Fire doth not more naturally burn nor the Sparks fly upward than Grace doth carry forth the Soul upon the swift wing of desire after Life and eternal Happiness To be sure then whilst according to the law of Grace you seek after Heaven and Glory in all your obedience you can never be counted ungracious nor do any thing unbeseeming a gracious Soul 11 WE may lawfully have respect in our obedience to the recompence of the reward because otherwise we should undervalue the purchase of Christ's precious Blood ungratefully turning our backs upon that which the Lord Jesus in all that he did and suffered for us did next unto Gods glory aim at The Socinians who are only Christians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and as Salvian said of some in his days in contumeliam Christi they I confess cannot endure to hear that Christ by his Death and Sufferings designed any such thing as the purchasing of life and salvation for us They will allow him to be the Prince of life and a constituted God after his Resurrection but his Blood and Sufferings they will in no case acknowledge them to be the price of our Life and the meritorious cause of our Redemption from the wrath to come That he died for our good leaving us an example that we should follow his steps they
saving of his own Soul doth thereby advance God's Glory and set the Crown upon his Head For God out of the Riches of his Grace hath so joyned his Glory and our salvation together that he who duely seeks the one must seek the other and he who neglects the one must needs make light of the other also Let Men pretend never such Hyperboles of love to God and Transports of Zeal for his Glory yet if they will go on in a voluntary neglect of life and eternal salvation never seeking after them by patient continuance in welldoing they do certainly make forfeiture of all their pretended Zeal as Men that do even embezel God's Honour and fall short of his Glory For no Man can rightly aim at God's Honour and Glory as his ultimate end who doth not also intend the beatifical vision of God and everlasting communion with him in the Kingdom of Heaven as his greatest Happiness Neither do those rare and almost unparallelable instances of Zeal for God's Glory in Moses and Paul any thing prejudice but rather establish and add strength to this reason whilst ambitious to express an Hyperbole of love to God if such a thing may be and how much they were affected with his Glory they do it by a certain velleity or a kind of incompleat willingness to be divorced from something of their own happiness rather than that the Lord Jehovah should suffer any thing in Point of Honour thereby fully assuring us that next to God's Glory their own welfare and eternal salvation was most precious in their Eyes And truly had they not first made Choice of God as their happiness and reward they would never have been so tender of his Honour desiring with such an holy ambition to promote his Glory For 't is only the hope of everlasting communion with God in Heaven firmly botomed upon our interest in him that can beget a true Zeal for God and make us willing to Sacrifice all our interests on Earth how precious and dear soever to his Glory Men like Jehu may go far and pretend much for God and his Glory till the Lord's interest and their own fall asunder But they only will run the hazard of losing all (k) Acts 20.24 and most zealously contend for God's Glory in this Interim of Mortality who do most earnestly seek after Glory Honour and Blessed immortality in the life to come As no Man can raise up a stately edifice till first he have layed a good foundation so truly unless a care to provide for our own eternal happiness be first laid as a foundation we shall never be able to raise up a sumptuous building of Glory or any monument of due praise to the God of Heaven For though God's essential Glory be independent like himself (l) Job 35.6 7. Psal 16.2 Nec crescit Deus accedente te nec decrescit decedente te Aug. in Psal 145. Totum quod rectè colitur Deus ab homine prodesse homini non Deo idem De Civit. Dei Lib. 10. cap. 5. and so infinitely excellent that being always in the full of Divine splendour and brightness it can neither admit of * Tibi autem qui semper idem es nihil accedit si amando proficimus ad te nihil decedit si non amando deficimus à te Guil. à S. Theodor. de Amor. Dei Cap. 8. waxings nor wanings by any transactions of sinful mortals as we are yet his declarative Glory doth still shine forth and is eclipsed according to our conversation in the world so that God hath then most Glory by us when we walk most Heavenly seeking life and eternal salvation by patient continuance in well-doing whereas his Glory undergoes an eclipse and the Lord always suffers in point of Honour when at any time we seek not the Kingdom of God and his righteousness but begin to make light of our own salvation If then the Lord hath thus inseparably conjoyned knit together his own Glory and our salvation so that whoever turns away his eyes from beholding the one must needs neglect and make light of the other also how can we look upon it as unlawful to have respect in our obedience to the recompence of the reward Is the end our duty and the means our Sin Is God most transcendently glorified in our eternal Salvation and yet may we not lawfully take care for the saving of our immortal Souls Is it the Honour of the God whom we worship and that which sets the Crown of Glory upon his Head that he is a rewarder of all those who diligently seek him and yet is it not lawful but sin in us to have respect whilst here we seek him and walk in obedience before him to that eternal recompence of reward which out of the Riches of his Grace he hath provided for us Believe it Christians since the Glory of God is bound up in the bundle of your life and must needs be eclipsed when ever that is neglected you need doubt no longer but that you may lawfully have an eye to the recompence of the reward seeking life and eternal salvation in all your obedience CHAP. VI. The Doctrin branched forth into several uses and prosecuteth the first by way of Information in Four Particulars 4 AND lastly having hitherto given you to understand in several particulars what it is to have a respect to the recompence of the reward how you are to do so and withall let you know the arguments evincing the lawfulness of such a practice there is now only remaining the practical improvement of the Doctrine by way of use and application which indeed is the life of all Doctrinal discourses bringing every thing home to the Soul in a close and particular accommodation and therefore more longly to be insisted upon For as the Sun in the firmament of Heaven hath a twofold virtue the one of illumination whereby sending forth its beams of light it guides this lower part of the World and the other of influence whereby it communicates itself to inferiour Bodies covering them all over with its * 2 Tim. 3.16 healing wings So in every portion of holy Writ there is an illumination of truth upon the mind and understanding and withall there is an influence of Grace and Goodness upon the Will and Affections As therefore I have hitherto shewed you the light of truth for the irradiating of your minds in the doctrinal part of my Text so in the next place I am to make some use of the words that they may shed forth their influence of Grace upon your Hearts covering them all over with their healing virtue And truly the Doctrine observed from the words is like a box of precious oyntment which in the Application I shall endeavour to break that it may send forth a spiritual fragrancy and a sweet smelling savor to refresh your Souls 'T is not an empty Vine but a Tree of life richly laden with fruits of Paradise
which I shall now in the practical improvement of it endeavour so to shake that unloading all its precious Fruits into your own bosoms it may feed and enrich your Souls to eternal life The Lord having planted a Garden Eastward in Eden for our first Parents he caused a River to go out of Eden to water †Gen. 2.10 the Garden from whence it parted itself and became into four heads Holding resemblance herewith if your Souls be the Garden of God my Doctrine is a River of life proceeding from the Eden of the Text from whence also to Water your Souls and make them fruitful as the Garden of God it divideth it self into four Heads in the use of it yeilding us matter of Information Reprehension Exhortation and Consolation 1 THEN by way of Information since that it is thus lawful for us to have respect in all our obedience to the recompence of the reward this may well satisfy us concerning the truth of these ensuing Corollaries As 1 THIS may give us to understand that it s no argument of insincerity nor any just forfeiture of a Christians uprightness and ingenuity for him to have an eye in his obedience to the recompence of the reward A Christian in seeking after Heaven and Glory in all his obedience he doth nothing but what is holy and just and good which doubtless can never make him unholy nor be any just forfeiture of his uprightness and integrity in the sight of God You may as well extract dross out of the purest Gold and dregs out the most refined Spirits as a Christian may become disingenuous and contract upon himself the guilt of hypocrisy by having an eye in his obedience to the recompence of the reward Indeed I Read of many in holy Writ * 2 Tim. 4.10 censured as mercenaries and stigmatized for gross hypocrites because they were wholly acted in God's service by sinister ends and worldly considerations serving the Lord not for love but for loaves for esteem of Men secular Advantages Honours Preferments earthly Emoluments together with the like external accommodations But that a Man should be impeached of insincerity and branded for a Mercenary a Legalist an Hypocrite because acted in the ways of God by a desire after the full enjoyment of God in Glory seeking Heaven and Happiness seeking Life Immortality and eternal salvation by patient continuance in welldoing this never could I find recorded in God's sacred Oracles Live not then Christian any longer upon self-created Racks let not thy Countenance be sad from day to day suffer not any groundless sorrow to have Dominion over thee as if thou delightest in nothing but to make thy Soul a map of misery neither let thy Heart any longer be filled with fears and jealousies and perplexing thoughts about thy own sincerity censuring thy self for that wherein God did never yet condemn but always justifie thee To be labouring in all our obedience not (b) Joh. 6.27 Mat. 6.20 Luke 12.33 Psal 4.6 2 Cor. 4.18 for the Meat that perisheth but for the Meat which will endure to Eternal Life not for Earth but Heaven not for the favour of Men but for the smiles of God in the Face of Jesus Christ not for things Temporal which are seen but for things Eternal which are not seen not for a Portion in this World (c) Luke 10.42 but for that better part which shall never be taken from us not for the Honour which comes from Men (d) Joh. 5.44 but for the Glory the Felicity and that Eternal Soul-raping Happiness which comes of God only this argues not Hypocrisie and Mercenariness but an Heart that is truly Upright and Sincere in the Sight of God! There is a certain Fish with one Eye called Uranoscopus which they (a) Zach. 7.5 Joh. 6.26 Joh. 5.44 say is always gaâ—ing upwards towards Heaven Thus every true Christian hath his Eye still fixed upon Heaven he looks within the Veil and would always by his good will be on the top of Mount Nebo thence taking for his better encouragement to all holy self-denying and upright walking before the Lord a prospect of the Celestial Canaan Make not that then Christian any sign of Hypocrisie which doth clearly argue thee to be a true Nathaniel (a) Joh. 1.47 an Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile Had the Lord by prohibition or otherwise made it unlawful for us to have respect in our obedience to the recompence of the reward and yet still thou wouldst allow thy self in that practise this indeed might have forfeited thy Integrity but since the Lord himself doth approve of it both commanding and commending it as praise-worthy in Holy Writ let not Christian thy Heart reproach thee and smite thee for an Hypocrite whilst by patient continuance in well-doing thou seekest after Glory and Honour and Immortality in the Life to come 'T is of dangerous consequence for a Christian as to make those things evidences of Sincerity so to make those things signs of Hypocrisie which God never intended to be such If the Lord have any where made it the distinctive Character of an Hypocrite to have an Eye in his obedience to Heaven and Glory then indeed you might well make sad inferences against and pass hard censures upon your selves But if otherwise you find the Lord commanding you to do so and have the practice of the most eminently Holy and Upright of all God's People plainly paraphrasing upon that Commandment for your better satisfaction oh then take heed that you be not rash to conclude hard things against your selves because you cannot but have an Eye in all your obedience to the recompence of Eternal Life lest you be found reflecting dishonour thereby upon God himself and blaspheming against the Generation of his Children What shall a Christian bring in an action of disingenuity against himself and conclude himself an Hypocrite for that which all along hath been the laudable practice of Gods true Nathaniels who have received Letters testimonial subscribed by the Hand of Heaven itself that they were Israelites indeed in whom there was no guile What think you Christians of Moses of David and of Paul the Apostle Were â—hey not all of them Men according to God's own Heart Men upright in their lives and conversations and far enough from being mercenaries in the service of God And yet all this notwithstanding they lived upon the Mount of transfiguration their Faces were still Sion-ward they had always an eye to the recompence of the reward seeking always for themselves by patient continuance in well-doing no less than eternity of Life and Glory in God's Heavenly Kingdom If then Christians upon this account you dare not censure them take heed that upon the same account you do not censure your selves as persons that are altogether disingenuous hypocritical and mercenary in the service of God! There is nothing unlawful but what is holy and good in obeying the Lord with respect to
will you censure them as perverse zealous Fanatiques and Sons of violence because they willingly spend and are spent in the service of so bountiful a Master when their Eye is continually fixed upon so glorious a Prize The Men of the World how freely do they spend their †Isa 55.2 mony for that which is not Bread and their labour for that which cannot satisfy And will you then wonder at God's people and think it strange that having set before them the Bread of Life together with that Fountain of living Water which yields all fullness of satisfaction to those who drink of it they should proportionate their endeavours to the worth and dignity of such transcendently desirable and beatifical objects Have you never observed with what unweariedness the Husbandman undergoes the labours of his calling in hope of a plentiful Harvest Did you never see with what undaunted courage the Souldier will endure the hostile incursions the fierce onsets the cruel encounter of an Enemy in hope of uncertain victory And what shall I say of those that run in a Race have you not seen them rallying up all their strength putting forth themselves to the utmost of their ability and contending with an ambitious uncontrouled violence towards the Goal for the Crown that was set before them Wonder not then if God's People be unwearied in the work of the Lord will encounter the greatest difficulties and contend with a sacred violence towards the mark of their high Calling when their Eye is always fixed upon a full harvest of Eternal Glory upon an everlasting victorious triumph upon a far more pearly and incorruptible Crown of Life f IF as Tertullian speaks Men purchase Glass the brittle enjoyments of this Life at so dear a rate will you count it an unreasonable nimiety in Religion indescretion and an excess of superfluous Zeal in Gods People that they are willing with the like expense of Time labour and strength to purchase the rich Jewel the enchasing orient Pearl of Eternal Glory What is not Heaven more worthy of our Care and utmost Diligence than Earth Is not a Crown of Righteousness more worth than a Crown of Rose-buds and therefore with a greater proportion of Zeal and Carefulness to be sought after Is it Reason that we should more earnestly pursue the uncertain perishable comforts of this present World from which we must erelong be eternally divorced than Glory Honour Immortality and Eternal Life in the World to come Doubtless Sirs if Life and that Eternal If a Crown and that of Glory if an inheritance and that of a Kingdom incorruptible undefiled and that fadeth not away be worth seeking after then we need not be much solicitous about vindicating God's People in the zealous Passages severe Endeavours circumspectious Deportments and sanctified Singularities of their Christian course from the Imputations of Indiscretion misguided Zeal and Fanaticism which Men of corrupt Minds carnal Gospellers and such as have nothing but a bare Profession to shew for themselves are apt to lay them under For having that Crown that Kingdom that glorious Inheritance continually in their eye should not their care their diligence their endeavours be in some measure answerable and proportionate thereto You deceive your own Souls and do most sordidly undervalue (a) Tanti vitreum Quanti verum margaritum Tertul. lib. ad Martyr cap. 4o. Si pro terrenis bonis tantos labores tam gravia pericula homines aequo animo patiuntur quare pro fide pro constantia pro integritate pro thesauro aeterno pigri sumus Quare sumus timidi pro illis divitiis quas nec naufragia nobis possunt auferre August Serm. 105. de Temp. the recompence of the reward when you think upon easier terms to have Heaven than Earth and the Meat that will endure to Eternal Life than the Meat which perisheth yielding no satisfaction Oh brutish and unreasonable Sinners what are all your Riches and Honours what are all your Profits and Pleasures but as Weeds to Flowers or as Dross to the purest Gold if compared with that far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory which abideth God's People in another World And shall we then think you have reason to censure them as guilty of too great severity superfluous Zeal and unnecessary Preciseness for giving diligence to make sure of such a glorious Reward when you yourselves think no time too long no diligence excessive no pains too great which you are at in pursuance of those fading Vanities Judge all you blessed Saints that stand already possessed of this eternal heavenly Glory yea let those among you that have had but the least foretasts prelibations and gleanings thereof if this be not an unreasonable censure judge freely Shall the covetous Worldling rise early go to bed late eat the Bread of carefulness macerate his own Body and wholly exhaust his strength in pursuit of that which in the judgment of the wisest of Kings (a) Ecclesiast 1.14 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Depastio animi consumitur enim animus aum in re nihili inani occupatus est Buxt is nothing but vanity and vexation of Spirit like a Moth eating up and consuming it as the original sounds And shall not the People of God having such a glorious Crown in their eye much more lay hold upon all opportunities walk closely with him that hath called them to his Kingdom and Glory and gladly spend and be spent in all holy Exercises that at length they may partake of that fulness of Joy which is in God's presence together with those super-celestial Soul-satisfying Pleasures which are at his right Hand for evermore (b) 2 Pet. 1.5 10. Doth not the Lord in his sacred Oracles of truth require that we should give all diligence to make our Calling and Election sure Are we not commanded to work out with greatest †Phil. 2.12 Non dicit Apostolus nude 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 id est accuratè magnoque cum studio operamini cum multa diligentia solicitudine pergite vestram operari salutem A Lapide Labour and Industry as the Original hath it our own Salvation Hath not our blessed Lord commanded that we should earnestly contend striving as in an Agony to * Luke 13.24 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 contendite agonizate quasi in agone agonia contendite extremas summasque vires velut agonizantes exerite quasi pro vita si vincitis vel morte si vincimini luctaturi A Lapide enter in at the strait Gate of Eternal Life And must we not also storm the Kingdom of Heaven assaulting it with a kind of Holy Violence and forcing our way thither through all difficulties would we ever enter into it What then is the Blasphemy of all those who in opposition to the holy Spirit of Truth calling us out thus to spend and be spent in the service of God do take upon them a cursed
that Glorious Inheritance Were there but few damned and many saved yet in that case it would much concern us to look to our selves lest we should be some of those few that must go to Hell How much more should we look to our selves laying hold upon Eternal Life when so few shall be saved and go to Heaven when so many walk on in the Way of Destruction and must go to Hell Oh deceive not your own Souls expecting to go to Heaven in a croud but give diligence to be found of that little Flock upon whom it is the Fathers good Pleasure to bestow a Kingdom Whilst multitudes of Men and Women go crouding into Hell strive you to walk in that narrow Way which will bring you to Glory Be not discouraged by the paucity of those that shall be saved but because they are so few resolve to be found in that blessed Number that they may be the more Remembring this still for your encouragement that though there be but few yet some there are who shall receive the reward of Eternal Life and you as soon as any if by patient continuance in well-doing you will but seek it Be they never so few that shall find the Way which leads to Glory yet no Man can ever lose the Way thither but through his own negligence 5 CONSIDER you have yet an opportunity wherein to seek the recompence of Eternal Life and let that make you to give all possible diligence in labouring for it When God affords us an opportunity of Grace he then expects that by patient continuance in Well-doing we should seek for Glory When he holds open the Gate of Mercy then if ever he calls us to enter in When in a word he makes reports of Life and Salvation to us in an acceptable time then oh then above all things in the World it concerneth us to work out our own Salvation with fear and trembling Well yet the fair-day of God's Grace is not over and therefore deal wisely in your Heavenly Merchandise now buying of him Gold tried in the Fire that you may be rich and purchasing for your selves that one Pearl of great price Yet your seed-time is not past be sure therefore to sow in tears that hereafter ye may reap in Joy now sow to the Spirit that of the Spirit ye may reap Life Everlasting Yet Christians the six Days of the Week are not all of them gone see therefore that you gather Manna now labouring to make provision for an everlasting Sabbath of Rest in God's Heavenly Kingdom Though the damned in Hell be shut up in an Everlasting Night under Darkness yet still it is Day with you Work therefore while you have the Day because the Night cometh wherein you cannot work If ever you would be able to go through with the work of your Salvation you must be sure to set about it in the Day of Salvation And if you ever would find the Reward of Eternal Life you must be sure to seek it before the glass of your Life be run out and your strength exhausted Pray therefore to Day repent to Day seek Heaven to Day thou art not sure of to morrow And he that is not fit to Day will be less fit to seek after Heaven when to morrow comes How vainly then do Men talk of working for Heaven when they are just going to the place of Reward and of doing the greatest Work to repent believe and seek the Kingdom of God when their strength is at the lowest ebb (f) Poenitentia quae ab infirmo petitur infirma est poenitentia quae à moriente tantum petitur timeo ne ipsa moriatur August Serm. 57. de temp But believe it Sinners you will find it too much for one to look after a sick Soul and a sick Body together too much to get a lively faith when he lieth a dying too much to mount up as on Eagles wings to Heaven when his feet are going down to the Grave and his steps take hold of Hell If ever you would have your works in the full and Eternal Reward of them to follow you when dead you must be sure to follow your work close while you live now seeking by patient continuance in well-doing for Glory Honour Immortality and Eternal Life Now therefore delay not the doing of that which must be once done or your Souls are undone for ever What do you not yet know the certainty of an approaching Death together with the Vanity and shortness of your own Life which according to the just estimate of Truth is no more than a span which is soon measured a Vapour that quickly vanisheth a Flower that presently fadeth or a little spot of time betwixt too vast Eternities Do you not know that upon this short moment of time dependeth your Eternal condition of Happiness if improved well but of Misery if ill-improved (g) Quippe ex voluntate perversa facta est libido dum servitur libidini facta est consuetudo dum consuetudini non resistitur facta est necessitas Aug. Confes lib. 8. cap. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arest Eth. lib. 2. cap. 6. Natura consuetudo robustissimam faciunt invictissimam cupiditatem Aug. ad Simpl. lib. 1. q. 1. Non pudet te reliquias vitae tibi reservare id solum tempus bonae menti destinare quod in nullam rem conferri possit Sen. de brevit vit cap. 4. Juventutem tuam in peccatis traducis ubi verò labore fracta fuerint instrumenta tunc ipsa ad Deum adducis eum jam illorum nullus sit usus Basil Orat. 4. Do you not know that the longer you delay to seek after this Eternal Reward the more unfit you will be for it and the less able to go through with so difficult a province it being impossible that your Hearts thro' procrastination should not grow harder your corruptions stronger whilst custom converted into a second Nature produceth without a miracle of Mercy an irrecoverableness in a course of Sin Do you not know it 's a point of the greatest disingenuity that can be to exhaust the Spirits of your strength in the service of Sin consecrating the first fruits of your Time to such a cruel Aegyptian Taskmaster and to reserve no better for the service of the great God than the very ruins of your strength nor any other than the dregs of your time wherein to seek the Kingdom of Heaven (h) Sicut dormiens in navi vehitur ad portum ita tu dormis sed tempus tuum ambulat Ambr. in Psal 1. Do you not know how fast your lives unravel being not of a permanent but transient nature continually wasting like the Oyl in the lamp whether you work or stand idle in God's Vineyard whether you will seek for a Crown of Life or not seek it Do you not know that be the time of your lives never so short yet the term allotted for us of God
wherein to seek after Heaven and Glory is never extended beyond it (i) Exod. 16.26 Qui promisit poenitenti veniam non promisit poenitendi horam qui poenitenti misericordiam premisit peccanti crastinum non promisit Aug. de verb. Dom. Serm. 59. as the Israelites might gather Manna on any of the six days in the Week but not on the seventh Do you not know but if you neglect the present opportunity refusing now to seek after the reward of Eternal Life God may seal you up in your impenitency for ever denying you all further advantages for your Souls as not having promised a Day of Repentance to any though he have promised to all that are truly penitent a Crown of Glory (k) Cor. 6.2 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epic. Stob. cap. 16. Oh then to Day if you will hear his Voice harden not your Hearts neglecting the reward of Eternal Life till tomorrow when the present time is the only Day of Salvation If the Day of Salvation be neglected your hope of Salvation will for ever be frustrated If now you let slip the Day of Grace you cannot chuse but fall short hereafter of the Crown of Glory Time and opportunity in this case do vastly differ Time is the continuation of Hours Days and Years successively coming after each other But opportunity is the universal concurrence of all other helps and advantages to give birth by their auspicious Midwifery to your wished ends So that you may have time and yet lose your opportunity You may have in the Glass of your time many sands when there is not a sand left in the Glass of your opportunity You may have the Moon-light of time when the Sun of opportunity is gon down in an everlasting Night of Darkness upon you And to be sure Sirs if you lose the Sun-light of opportunity you will never be able by the Moon-light of time to find out and walk in that narrow Way which leads to Glory (l) Matth. 25.10 11 12. The five foolish Virgins came too late and for that cause were everlastingly shut out from the marriage Supper (m) Luke 19.42 Si eo ipso die resipuisset quo Christus urbem ingressus est haec sententia lata non fuisset quod quia neglexit in posterum nullus misericordiae locus ex quo liquet quantum interest resipiscentiam non dico in annum sed in diem differre Cart. in loc Heb. Jerusalem had the things belonging to her peace hid from her Eyes because in the Day of her visitation she would not know them And Esau having lost through delays his Fathers Blessing he found no place of Repentance nor opportunity to recover it though he sought it with Tears So that you see the least of opportunity to get Heaven once fallen never springeth again The Market-day of Grace once over we must never expect a second wherein to purchase for our selves that one Pearl of great price The swift tide of God's mercy in the strivings of his Spirit once returned we must never look to see it high water again nor think by the reflowings thereof to have our Souls landed safe upon the wished shore of Eternal Rest And this dear Friends I tell you not to plunge you in despair but to beget in you desires after the lively hope of Eternal Life not to shut you up under a sentence of wrath and unpreventable Misery in Hell but to hasten you in your pursuit of Heaven and Eternal Glory Though you have formerly made light of Salvation yet if now you will prize it though you have heretofore turned your backs upon Heaven yet will you but now seek after it though hitherto you have undervalued all those inestimable tenders of Life and Eternal Glory which God hath made you yet if now you will close with them seeking diligently by patient continuance in well-doing for Glory Honour and Immortality you need not doubt but Salvation shall be your Crown Heaven shall be your home and the full enjoyment of God in Glory that shall be your portion and your exceeding great reward Yet the Golden Scepter of God's Grace is stretched out now therefore be sure to lay hold upon it Yet there is a door of Mercy stands open be sure now to enter in thereat Yet you are not sealed up under an irreversible Sentence of Wrath in Hell give diligence therefore this day this hour this present moment to lay up for your selves a Treasure in Heaven Now oh now my beloved is your Term-time wherein to plead with God for the lives of your Immortal Souls shortly comes an everlasting Vacation of Happiness or Misery where you cannot be heard pleading for your selves though with Tears of Blood ¶ In morte cheu nec vel semel quidem peccare licet nam hoc tale peccatum est irrevocabile Semel mortuus es semper mortuus es semel male mortuus es semper damnatus es Hanc mortem corrigere hanc damnationem excutere per omnem aeternitatem non poteris As in War so in this case we are not permitted to err twice now Heaven and Eternal Glory lie before you either speedily get an interest in them or together with your present opportunity you will lose them for ever When Death begins to make his arrest upon thee it s not then a time to sow but to reap the fruit of our doings not to labour for Eternal Rest but to rest from our labours not by works of Righteousness to seek a Crown but to receive a Crown of Righteousness not to lay up for our selves a Treasure in Heaven but to go to Heaven where our Comfort our Treasure our Happiness are all laid up That Seed of Grace must be sown in season from which we would ever reap a crop of Eternal Glory Now therefore while the Lord waits to be gracious while his Spirit strives and calls you to break off your Sins by Repentance be sure to work out your own Salvation with fear and trembling providing for your selves everlasting Heavenly Mansions against the Time that your Earthly Tabernacles will be dissolved Oh remember if while God affords you the auspicious gales of his own Spirit you shall not now hoyst up your Sails setting forward in your Voyage for the holy land you must never expect to arrive safe at the shore of blessed Eternity CHAP. XI A Sixth Consideration added to move Sinners to seek an Interest in Heaven and Glory taken from that everlasting Misery that will otherwise befall them where also the Horror of that Hellish Misery is set out in Six Particulars 6 AND lastly consider if you get not an interest in Heavenly Glory the reward of Eternal Misery must be your portion It hath by some been fiction'd that what every Man affected in this Life with that he should be solaced in the Elisian fields The Moral carrieth in it a certain truth that look what Men set their Hearts most upon here such shall
eternal unpreventable Burnings But the Righteous he worketh uprightly serving the Lord in Spirit and in Truth and therefore the Reward of Truth shall be given him that is the Reward of Life of Heaven and eternal Glory which the Truth and Faithfulness of God stand engaged for Hence the Apostle speaking of eternal Life (p) Tit. 1.2 he tells us that God who cannot lie hath promised it Giving us clearly to understand thereby that it 's as possible for the God of Truth to be impeached of lying as for those that are Heirs of the Promise to fall short of eternal Life This maâ—â—â— the same Apostle bold to tell us (q) 2 Thes 1.6 7. that it 's a Righteous thing with God to give a Writ of Ease (r) Heb. 6.10 an eternal Sabbath of Rest to (s) Si Dominus enim oblivisceretur operum fidelium suorum nec eos remuneraret utcunque injustus putaretur quod omnino nefas est dicere Haymo in loc those that are now troubled for Righteousness sake implying that it were an unrighteous thing with God to do otherwise Only we must not think that it were an unrighteous thing with God not to give the Reward of eternal Glory to the Righteous because of any Condignity in them whereupon to claim it or because of any (t) Quoniam Deus sibi debitor est ut agat condecenter prout congruit bonitati suae uti scipsum negare non potest ita non debet aliud se indignum facere Arrows Tact. l. 3. c. 3. Cum omnia nostra ex Deo sint nec quisquam quippiam dederit pro quo sibi à Deo retribuatur jure in ipso justitâ—a non est Aq. 1. quaest 21. art 1. Manifâ—stum est autem quod inter Deum hominem est maximâ— inaequalitas in infinitum enim distant totum quod est hominis bonum est à Deo unde non potest hominis ad Deum esse justitia sâ—cundum absolutam aequalitatem Aq. 1. a 2. d q 1â—4 a. 1. c. Debitorem Dominus ipse se fecit non accipiendo sed p rmittendo Aug. in Ps 83. Debitor enim factus si non aliquid à nobis accipiendo sed quod ei placuit promittendo Idem de verb. Apost 16. Work done by them equivalent thereto But because it would argue him inconstant mutable and unfaithful should he fail to make good the Word that is gone out of his Mouth or not render Heaven and Glory to whom he hath graciously promised it So that Righteousness here and else-where is not taken strictly for Justice properly so called as if Man could do any thing to oblige God or that should be proportionate in Worth and Dignity to eternal Glory for betwixt the great God and his Creatures there is no such Justice But it 's taken for his Truth and Faithfulness which doth yet in a sort oblige him to Crown with Immortality and Glory his own People and they may urge him with his Promise though still he is a Debtor to none but his own Fidelity Or if you will have Austin's Thoughts in the case he tells you that God hath made himself a Debtor to us albeit he be Debtor to none Not by receiving any thing from us but by promising (u) Qui credit pâ—omittenti fiâ—enter promissum repetit promissum quidem ex misericordiâ sed jam ex justitiâ persolvendum Bern. de grat lib. Arb. Justè jam ex debito requiritur quodcunque vel gratis promittitur Idem ibid. what he pleased to us And thus thoâ— it were out of Mercy that eternal Life is promised Yet it is now of justice to be given to those that can plead the Promise So that what the Apostle saith of God's pardoning Mercy may well be accommodated here to his remâ—nâ—rative Goodness If we by patient continu nce in well-doing seek for Glory and Honour and Immortality the Lord is faithful and just to Crown us with Life (a) Agnoscere debemus totum illud jus quod nos habere dicimur ad vitam aeternam in eo positum quod Deus quasi sibi ipsi debitor est ut agat conformiter tum condescentiae bonitatis suae tum fidelitati promissionis suae Davenant de just hab actual pag. 640. everlasting being many times better giving more but never worse than his Word giving less than he promised Oh then whâ—t greater Security can any Man desire for eternal Life than the Promise of the faithful God who cannot lie (b) Fidelis est enim Deus nec tibi auxilium denegat in hoc saeculo nec praemium subtrahet in futuro Fulgent epist 2. ad Gallam pag. 477. Though if we speak properly both the Word of Life and the Crown of Life born the Promise and the actual fulfilling thereof be of Grace Yet having promised it is but just that God should be so far Faithful as to make good all his Promises The Lord therefore having made over by Promise an immarcessible Crown of Life a Kingdom that cannot be moved an eternal weight of Glory to his own covenant People Let them not stagger through Unbelief but as stedfastly expect it as if they had the Crown already upon their Heads and were fully possessed of that Kingdom and Glory (c) Rom. 11.29 For as his Goodness hath moved him to make us promises of Life and Glory So his Faithfulness will engage him to make them all good I might further tell you for the strengthning of your Hopes of God's electing Love which as it began in eternal Purposes of Grace towards you so it shall never have an end but in your full Enjoyment of endless Glory To be sure (d) Heb. 12.2 God never repented in time nor ever will he of what he purposed towards his People before all time I might tell you of the Redemption purchased by Christ giving all the Members of his own Body everlasting Security that where he is there they shall be also For we may not think that the Lord Jesus would be so prodigal of his precious Blood as to pour it out for Uncertainties or to die without good Security that all who are truly Gracious should live with himself for ever in Mansions of heavenly Glory I might tell you how much it is for God's Honour that where-ever he hath been the Author of any good Work he should also be the (e) Author fidei nobis est quia ipse nobis fidem infundit non enim possumus credere nisi ab illo praeviamur ipse consummator fidei quia consummationem nobis praestat in hoc ut in fide perseveremus Haymo in loc Qui tibi demonstravit rectam viam ipse tibi deductor in patriam Fulgent epist 2. ad Gal. pag. 477. Finisher going through with it And not like that foolish Builder who began to build but could not make an end nor carry on his Work to Perfection So that if the Lord
though possibly it might have proved a Preludium to Royal Dignity intitling him to the Crown and Government of all Egypt so great was his Ambition to be found in the number that he might have a Right to all the Priviledges of God's Children ver 24. WHEREAS he might have lived a Courtier enjoying what Heart could wish faring deliciously every day and glutting himself with all carnal Pleasures that either variety of melodious Sounds and exquisite Harmony or gorgeous Apparel or extremity of Luxury could possibly afford Yet we find him bidding adieu to all these and rather chusing to suffer undeserved Scorn Reproach and Persecution with the People of God than to enjoy those and the like Pleasures of Sin for a season v. 25. WHEREAS in a word the whole Land of Egypt was before him and likely for ought I know to entertain him with the sway of a Royal Scepter with the Government of the whole Kingdom and with an universal Confluence of all the Happiness that either Riches or Honours or the whole Treasury of Egypt could suppeditate Yet in the preceding part of this Verse wherein my Text lyes the Holy Ghost there testifies of him that he preferred the reproach of Christ before all this the very worst and that which is most bitter in Christ before the choicest Treasures before the very best the most sweet and delightful Enjoyments in all the Land of Egypt esteeming it his greatest Honour to be dishonoured in the World for the sake of the Lord Jesus and the reason of all this you have subjoyned in the Words of my Text even because he had a Respect to the Recompence of the Reward THUS I have in short given you the Dependance of the Words and thereby also given you to understand that they are brought in as one grand reason of Moses his Obedience and Self-denyal letting us plainly know why Moses should thus refuse the great dignity of being called the Son of Pharaoh's daughter why he should rather choose to suffer Affliction with the People of God than to enjoy the Pleasures of Sin for a season Why he should esteem so highly of Reproach for Christ as to count it greater Riches than the choicest Treasures in all the Land of Egypt and the reason of all this was because he had Respect to the Recompence of the Reward which if seriously consider'd of why it will make him take up his Cross chearfully it will make him follow hard after Christ as well in Adversity as in Prosperity it will make him do and suffer and willing to become any thing if by any means he may attain such a transcendently glorious Reward a Reward that is nothing less than the full enjoyment of God over all blessed for ever in whose Presence there is fulness of Joy and at whose Right-hand there are Pleasures for evermore Psal 16.11 BUT waving the Relative Consideration of the Words we purpose to insist upon them as Absolutely Considered and as they are an intire Proposition of themselves and so they will present us with these Two Considerables following I. A Gracious Act exerted by Moses the Man of God and that we have expressed in these Words For he had Respect II. A Glorious Object about which that Act of Moses was exercised and that we have expressed in these Words To the Recompence of the Reward THESE are the parts of the Text the Genuine sense whereof I shall give you in the explication of the Terms labouring now to break the Shell that so you may come to that sweet Kernel of Gospel-truth which is wrapt up and enclosed therein FOR he had respect In this Phrase is implyed that gracious Act of Moses whereby he had respect to stedfastly fixing his eye upon the recompence of the Reward as matter of singular incouragement to deny himself for the Lord's sake in all those Riches Honours and variety of carnal Pleasures which by dissembling Conscience and continuing a Courtier he might probably have enjoyed at least for a Season The Original word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is metaphorical signifying in this place to look from one thing to another not with the eye of the Body by any corporeal sight but with the eye of the Soul by a spiritual sight And so truly it doth most emphatically set forth the power of Moses his Faith enabling him to look from the things that are seen to the things that are not seen from things Teâ—poral to things Eternal by which means he was wonderfully encouraged to let go all worldly Advantages and to suffer Affliction chearfully with the people of God Moses had the whole Land of Egypt together with all the Riches Glory and Pleasures thereof before him which a Carnal heart would think might have made him content to live and die a Courtier But such was the power of Faith within him fixing his heart and mind upon things above upon the Land of Promise the Coelestial Canaan the Heavenly Jerusalem together with the Beatifical Vision of God in Eternal Glory that for these he can chearfully renounce whatever Riches whatever Honours whatever Pleasures the Land of Aegypt could possibly afford him TO the Recompence of the Reward That glorious Object upon which Moses fixing his eye did so chearfully deny himself in all his worldly enjoyments you have here expressed by one word in the Original 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying such a Reward whereby a Man is Recompenced This Recompense is diversly taken according to the Persons to whom and work for which it is given When to a wicked Person for an evil work it intendeth a fearful Revenge comprizing under it Indignation and Wrath Tribulation and Anguish as that which is due to Sinners upon the commission of any the least Transgression But when to a Righteous Person accepted of God through Christ as here in my Text for a work approved by him then indeed it doth not import any merit or desert on Man's part but abundance of Mercy and Grace on God's part who though we are unprofitable Servants and can merit nothing at his hands yet will not suffer us to do or endure any thing for his sake without a most transcendently great and glorious Recompence WHAT that recompence of reward was upon which Moses so stedfastly fixed his eye is not here I confess distinctly set down but yet we may easily collect from the carriage of Moses that it was some higher Honour some better Pleasure some more excollent and durable Treasure than the Land of Aegypt could ever afford him otherwise making choice of these why is it that we find him renouncing those unless we should think him to have changed for the worse when yet we find the Spirit of God in the words of my Text commending his choice 'T WAS not then any Temporal Reward but an Eternal Reward that Moses had in his eye 'T was not Earth but Heaven 't was not the Meat that perisheth but the Meat which will indure to Everlasting Life
an eye to your own Salvation to eternal Happiness to the Recompence of Reward making that the end of all your Obedience yet remember 't is but an inferiour end that which you ought to make the ultimate and chiefest end of all is the glory of God If a Man should stop at a Colon and give over Reading there before he came to a Full-point the Sentence would be imperfect Thus Christians your Salvation is but a Colon at first God's glory is the Full-point if therefore you stop at your own Salvation not looking beyond it to the Glory of God why let me tell you there is not one perfect Sentence to speak for you in the whole contexture of all your Obedience but they are every one of them imperfect and will signify nothing at all before God's Tribunal when you shall come to read them as Evidences of your interest in Heaven and eternal Glory (r) Si salus nostra famula et gloria dei domina non oportet posteriori loco nos dominam ponere ac famulam iniquo jure praeferre GOD will not have us make the Mistress wait on the Handmaid make a Tabernacle the Temple make our own Salvation which is but a secondary matter our principal end as if worthy to be valued more highly than the glory of God it self which yet is the most noble and principal end of all We never shoot so far beside the mark as when we aim more at our own Blessedness than the glory of God over all blessed for ever In other miscarriages we violate God's holy Law but in this we violate his glorious Dignity endeavouring as much as in us lyes to Un-god him and Idolatrously to sit down ourselves upon the Throne of his Glory When ever therefore you are tempted with Sacrilegious hands to lay hold upon God's glory preferring your own Salvation before that why repel the Temptation as Joseph once did the unchaste importunity of his amorous Mistress The Lord hath commited all that he hath to my hand there is none greater amongst all his Creatures than my self the Lord hath given me his own Son out of his Bosome he hath given me grace he hath given me the hope of Life of Heaven and eternal Happiness neither hath he kept back any good thing from me but his own glory because that only belongs to him How then shall I do this great wickedness How shall I lay Sacriligious hands upon his glory How shall I prefer my own Salvation my own Life my own Happiness before it and sin against God REMEMBER Christians though you may seek your selves you may seek Heaven and Life and eternal Happiness yet not in the first place the honour of God why that must lye next your heart and the glory of God must be most in your eye as not being a subordinate end like your own Salvation but the principal end of all God's glory must be the Terminus Reductivus to which all our Obedience must be reduced as the ultimate end of it Every Christian is a Spiritual Archer and God's glory must be the mark that he shoots at He is a Spiritual Traveller and though he may take up his lodging at his own Salvation yet God's glory must be the end of his Journey He is in a word a Spiritual Navigator and though he may cast forth the Anchor of hope at his own eternal Happiness yet he is like to make Shipwreck of himself if he go about to put in any where else for harbour but at the fair haven of God's glory As all the Rivers run into the Sea and all the Lines meet in the Center so all our actions and all the Rivers of our own Happiness they must meet together Concentring themselves in God's glory And certainly Christians we never attain the end of our Faith the Salvation of our Souls better than when Faith and Salvation both are referred to the glory of God as their ultimate end We never come sooner to that Rest which remains for the People of God than when God's glory is made the Center not only of the works which we do but also of the Rest it self which we look for as the eternal Reward of them We are never in a word more sure to hit the mark of our own Salvation than when we aim most directly at God's glory For then your respect to the Recompence of Reward is such as God would have it to be when you principally seek for Heaven and eternal Glory that God himself may thereby be glorified 2. WE are to have respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward not singly but joyntly and in conjunction with God's Glory If we may not principally have respect to Heaven in our Obedience preferring that before God's glory much less may we think it lawful to make Heaven the sole end of our Obedience not regarding but wholly neglecting his glory that prepared it If we may not prefer our own Happiness before God's glory much less may we wholly leave off the care of God's glory and exclude it out of our thoughts in seeking to make our selves happy Since God in seeing his own Glory did also consult the Happiness and eternal Salvation of our Souls why 't were a point of the greatest ingratitude in the World for us in seeking our Salvation not also to consult his Honour endeavouring that whilst we are saved his Name may be glorified 'T is unlawful to Dogmatize that we must be willing to be damned that God may be glorified or else we are still but Hypocrites and were never sufficiently humbled but to be willing to have God himself dishonoured and lose his glory that we may be saved is most wicked and abominable For betwixt the glory of God and our own Salvation the 〈…〉 is so strong and inseparable that 't is impossible for any Man rightly to seek the Salvation of his own Soul who doth not also intend God's glory as his ultimate end He that doth not take aim before he shoots can never hit the mark So Christians if you only look at your selves not taking in all your Obedience a right aim at God's glory you can never hit the mark of your own Salvation If you separate the Soul from the Body it 's no longer a living Creature but a dead Carcass Thus if a due respect to God's glory which is the very Soul of all our Obedience be separated from the care which we seem to have of our own Salvation it 's no longer a living Sacrifice holy and acceptable unto God but a dead service that will nothing at all avail us to Life and eternal Happiness THE Moon when in the full looking directly upon the Sun is a glorious Creature but if once the Earth interpose it self betwixt her and the Sun she becomes a dark obscure Body of whom we may say That there is no form nor beauty nor comeliness in her that we should desire her Thus Christians whilst in our
Obedience we look directly upon God's glory endeavouring to promote that as well as our own Salvation we are glorious in the Eyes of God but if once we suffer self-ends to intercept and wholly to shut out our respect to God's glory we presently lose our beauty in God's eyes and his Soul can no longer take pleasure in us (s) Etsi non injustè agimus intuendo mercedem a deo nobis oblatam dum in bonis operibus laboramus id tamen attentiùs videndum est ne solum causà oblati praemij commoveamur Pet. Martyr Libr. Jâ—d Though then we do not amiss in having an eye to the reward which God sets before us whilst labouring in God's Works yet we must heedfully see to it that we are not only acted in ways of Obedience by a desire to the Recompence of the Reward but also by a care to promote God's honour and to glorify him For when we respect our selves in what we do either alone or above God God hath no respect at all to us nor will he ever Crown our Souls with eternal Happiness in case we seek it alone and not in the nearest conjunction with his glory THOUGH then Christians you may seek your own Happiness yet be sure that you do it not singly but joyntly and in the nearest conjunction with God's honour endeavouring as well that God may be glorified as that your own Souls may be saved The Sun hath Heat as well as Light and no Man can possibly separate betwixt them Thus we must not only have an earnest desire after our own happiness but must also endeavour by the light of an holy Conversation to glorify God giving all diligence that nothing may separate betwixt a desire of our own Salvation and a care to promote God's glory in the seeking of it God hath joyned his own glory and our Salvation together When therefore we eye them both then we rightly have respect to the Recompence of Reward so that God himself will now be glorified and we shall be saved 3. WE are to have respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward not mercenarily thinking by any thing that we can do or suffer to merit it at God's hands but filially expecting it as the free gift of our Heavenly Father The first Covenant that ever God made with Mankind was a Covenant of Works and ever since we are naturally prone to be trading for Life and Salvation in that way thinking to spin the Thred of our eternal Happiness out of the bowels of our own good Works But unless we come off from that way looking wholly for Heaven and Glory by a Covenant of Grace we shall never have them the Lord having resolved to deny those Heaven and Glory who will not accept of them upon terms of Grace (t) Regnum Coelorum non stipendium servorum sed filiorum haereditas Calvin GLORY is not the Wages of a Servant but the Inheritance of a Son So that we never have respect rightly to the Recompence of the Reward till we look for it as the free bestowance of our Heavenly Father and not as the purchase of our own good deservings (u) Non datur nobis merces ut mercenarijs sed haereditas ut filijs ex thesauris paternis Gravat de Amor. Dei pag. 20. The Church of Rome will tell you indeed that you must Repent and preform good Works and walk in Obedience before God and all this with an eye to eternal Happiness as Wages for Work and as that which you have dearly bought at the hands of God with the Merits of your own Righteousness But since that Blessed Apostle Rom. 8.18 hath already pronounced all the Afflictions of this present Life Martyrdom it self not excepted too light to be put in the Ballance with that weight of glory which abides God's People in the Life to come What are all our Prayers and Humiliations What are all our good Works and Religious Performances that these should be counted worthy of and fully commensurate in equality of worth and dignity to Eternal Happiness (w) Superant certamina coronae non compátur cum laboribus remunerationes labor enim pavus est sed magnum â—â—c scieâ— speratur Theodoret. If by suffering and resisting unto Blood and dying for Christ we cannot deserve the Recompence of Eternal Glory in vain then by obeying Christ by doing for him and by living to him shall we think to Merit it 'T was a good saying of (x) Si homo mille annis serviret deo etiam ferventissimè non meretur ex condigno dimidiam diem esse in regno Coelorum Anselm de mensur Cras. cap. 2. Anselme that though a Man should serve God never so fervently for a Thousand Years together yet should he not thereby condignly Merit one half-days enjoyment of God in Heaven And truly Christians so vast is the disproportion betwixt your Work and the Reward of Eternal Life which God hath promised that if a Man should have all the World given him for speaking a word it were nothing in comparison of this For betwixt a Temporal Obedience and an Eternal Recompence betwixt the work of a finite Creature and that of unconceivable glory which the infinitely Blessed God will bestow upon you What comparison can you make This made (y) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost in Mat. Hom. 79. Chrysostom affirm That though the godly should have done a whole Million of good Deeds yet that such a Crown of Life that such an Heaven of Happiness such a Kingdom of Eternal Glory such transcendent Honour and Dignity should for such small and pidling matters be given them it is of God's free Grace and not of due Debt (z) Tantum ibi gratia divinae retributionis exuberat ut incomparabiliter at que ineffabiliter omne meritum quamvis bonae et ex deo datae humanae voluntatis et operationis excedat Fulgent ad Monim l. 1. The Recompence of Reward given out by the hand of free Grace doth so exceedingly abound that it incomparably excelleth all humane Merit and therefore to expect it upon the account of our own good deservings were nothing else but to go about by a kind of Spiritual (a) Nullum opus nostrum aequale potest esse vitae aeternae neque illam largitur nobis deus ex justitia sed ex quadam liberalitate Durand in 2 Sent. d. 28. Plunder to enrich our own good Works and to enhance the price of them by the Spoils of Heaven and Glory it self For if by the Merits of our own Righteousness we think to obtain the Crown of Eternal Life we must first pluck from it the many rich (b) Illi namquae beatae vitae in qua cum deo et de deo vivitur nullus potest aequari labor nulla opera comparari Gregor Jewels with which it is hung otherwise such is the Poverty and Imperfection attending the best of our good Works that
(r) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyrill Catech. 6. He serves God because he loves him and he loves him because he will love him looking upon this as a sufficient reward of all that he hath a God to serve and love in whom he cannot but rest and delight according to the Notation of the Word for Love in the (ſ) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as some conjecture is derived of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth much and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to Rest the Nature of the affection expressed by this word being such that it makes a Man acquiess and rest fully satisfied with what he loves And for the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 significat as Grammarians observes aliquid tenerum et affectione plenum ut sit is diligens dominum qui in eo sibi placet et acquiescit Psal 116.1 Greek and the Nature of the Letters making up the word for Love in the Hebrew Tongue which are all of them quiescent as in his proper Centre Love to God winds up a Christian's Affections to that intention of Zeal and Fervency that he undergoes a kind of compulsion and hath an holy necessity within himself constraining him to walk before God in all dutiful Obedience The hope of Heaven before may draw him and the fear of Hell behind may drive him But Love is that vital Principle within whereby he is acted and which like the very Soul of Obedience teacheth him a natural Motion So that in a Christians Obedience Force and Freedom Violent and Voluntary Necessity and Liberty yea the most pure Liberty and the most powerful Necessity they meet together (t) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For though the Love of Christ doth constrain them yet 't is not by any forcible but by a loving necessity (u) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Truly Love alone is the greatest Tyrant over-powering all other Powers as Chrysostom well observes and yet there are none that do perform such spontaneous and willing Obedience to God as those that have the commands of this Heavenly Tyrant upon them lying under the sweet constraints of Divine Love 6. AND Lastly We are to have an Eye to the Recompence of the Reward not Preposterously neglecting to use the means appointed by God for the attaining thereof but Regularly giving all diligence to become holy and to work out our own Salvation in a way of all upright and holy walking before the Lord. We may lawfully have respect to the Recompence of Reward but remember it must be in the ways of Obedience that we may not deceive ourselves expecting a Crown of Happiness when we never take care to follow after Holiness God cloathes indeed the Lilies of the field though they neither Toyl nor Spin Mat. 6.26 29. But unless we toil and give diligence to put on the Lord Jesus Christ for Sanctification God will never cloathe our Souls with the Robes of blessed Immortality He feeds the Fowls of the Air though they neither Sow nor Reap or gather into Barns But if we should neglect to Sow Righteousness not endeavouring to gather the Fruits of his holy Spirit into our own Souls to be sure we shall never be suffered to feed upon the Tree of Life in the Paradise of God The Lord hath stiled himself a plentiful Rewarder but it 's only of those who diligently seek him Heb. 11.6 And because he is an Holy God we must therefore seek him in a way of Holiness would we ever find him rewarding us with a Crown of Righteousness If a Man saith the Apostle strive for Masteries yet is he not Crowned except he strive lawfully 2 Tim. 2.5 The only lawful striving for Heaven and Glory is against the Corruptions of our own Nature to cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of Flesh and Spirit labouring to perfect Holiness in the fear of God to mortify through the Spirit the deeds of the Body and to enter in at the strait Gate of Regeneration and except we thus strive look we may at the Recompence of Reward but God will never Crown us with it For certainly God makes none happy hereafter but whom first he makes holy here Nor will he put any thing in Possession of Eternal Glory but those in whom he first puts his holy Spirit to make them Gracious The only way amongst the Romans to the Temple of Honour was through the Temple of Virtue Thus the Lord hath made Virtue the way to Honour amongst Christians calling them first to Virtue 2 Pet. 1.3 and then to (w) Natura mentis humanae quantumcunque perfecta naturalibus donis obsque gratia non est susceptibilis gloriae Parisiensis lib. de Virt. c. 11. Glory so that Virtue must be sought by way of Preparation before ever a state of Glory can be their Fruition Heaven must first be brought down into our Souls by Sanctification before our Souls can possibly be taken up into Heaven for their Glorification The Kingdom of Heaven it 's a pure place it 's an Inheritance that is Incorruptible and undefiled Whatsoever therefore is unclean and defileth can never enter into it Rev. 21.27 In Ireland the Soil is so pure that no venemous Creature will live there To be sure such is the infinite purity of that Soil in the Land of Promise the heavenly Canaan that those who are infected with the Venome and Poyson of Sin not labouring to cleanse themselves from it cannot possibly live there Foolish Sinners are apt to please themselves with some pleasant dreams about going to Heaven when they dye not considering how vexatious and contrary that holy habitation would be to them should they come thither with their Natures unsanctified For the accomplishment of true delight there must be an harmonious conformity and correspondency betwixt the faculty and the object about which it is conversant So that if the faculty be not duely prepared let the object be never so pleasant yet it will afford nothing of true delight but a deal of vexation and weariness The Sun is a pleasant object affording much delight and satisfaction to one that hath no impediment in his sight and yet to sore Eyes there is nothing more afflicting and tedious than to behold it Thus though Heaven be a place of unspeakable Pleasure adorned with all glorious Objects that a gracious heart can desire yet should a Man unsanctified come there he would think himself in the very Suburbs of Hell and instead of meeting with happiness therein he would find it a place of his greatest disquietment If our first Parents were by one Sin so far indisposed for Communion with God that they were not able to bear his Presence nor so much as able to look upon the back parts of God in the Earthly Paradice but sought through the dread of his Presence seizing upon them to hide themselves from the Eyes of Omnisciency How then will unsanctified Sinners whose Souls are become a very Sodom of all Unrighteousness be able to
upright walking before the Lord what less could it be than to undervalue the precious purchase of Christ's dearest Blood and to make light of that great Salvation which he by his Death and Sufferings hath procured for us True it is not so much Heaven itself the Purchase of Christ's precious Blood as that unfathomable Love which made him Purchase it for us at so dear a Price that should be minded of us and constrain us to obedience but doubtless unless we fix our Eyes upon the recompence of the reward considering how glorious the Kingdom how immarcessible the Crown and how entransing the Joy is which Christ our Redeemer hath provided for us we shall never be able to take a due estimate of the Love of Christ in all its dimensions The best way to know what is the heigth and the depth the length and the breadth of the Love of Christ to our Souls is often to be considering how great things he hath done for us to what a contemptible Birth to what a miserable Life to what a lamentable Death he humbled himself to Purchase Life and Eternity of heavenly Glory for us And surely Christians as Heaven and Glory must needs make us stand admiring that Love of Christ which provided them for us why so the Love of Christ which made him willing to suffer and bleed and die that our Souls might live and be eternally blessed it will make us more highly to value the recompence of Eternal Life That Inheritance of Saints in Light is of itself most glorious and above all things in the World to be desired but when we consider that it is a purchased Possession and that our Evidences for it are sealed with the Precious Blood of Christ as of a Lamb undefiled and without spot this will wonderfully enhance the Price of it and cause it to shine forth with greater Oriency Lustre and Glory in our Eyes Should a Wife receive from her Husband in his absence a Rich Jewel as a pledge of his Hearts Love to her which he purchased for her with the hazard of his own Life how highly would she prize it and how often with delight would she look upon it Believe it Christians Eternal Life is that rich Jewel that Pearl of great Price which Christ the Husband of your Souls hath purchased for you not with Silver nor Gold nor any such corruptible things but with his own precious Blood and therefore so far is it from being unlawful to have respect unto it that if you do not very highly esteem of it and often with delight in your Obedience cast an Eye towards it you do ungratefully come short of the instance but now given undervaluing the Purchase of your Saviour's Blood 12 AND lastly we may lawfully have respect in our obedience to the recompence of the reward because we cannot otherwise seek Gods Glory as we ought to do Betwixt Gods Glory and our own salvation the Connexion is inseparable so that without a due respect had to our own happiness we can never give God that honour which of right doth belong to his Holy name The Tyrians when Alexander besieged them they chained their City to the Statue of Hercules so that the one could not perish and be destroy'd without the other Thus the Lord he hath tied the eternal wellfare of our Souls to the Statue of his own Glory so that no Man can look off and make shipwrack of his own salvation but the Glory of God together therewith will suffer and be much eclipsed The Lord can indeed get himself great Revenues of Glory out of â—ur Eternal Ruine making his Justice to appear orient and shine bright in punishing us with everlasting destruction from his own Blessed presence But yet the redundancy of his pardoning mercy and the Rules of his free Grace can no otherwise appearâ— glorious nor any where shine forth in their own native lustre and Beauty but only in the happiness and eternal salvation of our immortal Souls A Man that would draw a Chain after him must hold fast some particular Link thus we must lay fast hold upon the Silver link of eternal Life would we ever draw the Golden Chain of God's Glory along with us Our own salvatioâ— though it be an end yet it s only intermediate and to be sought in subordination to God's Glory which is the supreme and ultimate end of all When therefore we have not respect to our own salvation which is a necessary Medium we can never promote God's Glory as our ultimate end The Man who provides not food for his own sustenance can never preserve Life Thus in vain shall we think to promote God's Glory and preserve that if we labour not for the †Joh. 6.27 meat which will endure to eternal Life T is storied of Phidias that he had so artificially wrought and so curiously intrailed his own Name in Minerva's Buckler which he made for her that it could not be taken out without the dissolution of the whole frame Thus the Lord out of his own infinite goodness he hath by a strict connexion knit and united his own Glory and the salvation of his people together he hath most divinely wrought their name and eternal welfare in the frame of his own Glory so that now without eclipsing his Glory it cannot be taken out we cannot cast off the care of our own Salvation but the costly frame of God's Honour and Glory will thereby be broken and fall asunder There are some who would pass for Christians of the highest form and pretending much to a Gospel-frame of Spirit tell us that a Man is never sincere nor in capacity to give Glory to God as he ought till he can be willing to be damned making light of his own salvation that God may be glorified But the truth is Men never so much dishonour God take the Crown from his Head and turn his Glory into shame as when once they begin to make light of Heaven and Hell of eternal joy in God's presence and everlasting destruction from his presence not seeking by patient continuance in well doing for Life and eternal Salvation What I find storied of Hippocrates his sympathizing Twins which is that they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exactly Contemporaries both living and dying together the same will hold true in our preâ—ent case of a care to promote God's Glory and withall of a due respect to the recompence of the reward as both of them live so they die together the one of them never surviving the other 'T is not here as in the Service of two contrary Masters who carry Antipathies in their bosoms and speak forth nothing in all their Commands but mutual contradictions where the Servant will either hate the one and love the other or else he will adhere to the one and despise the other but (h) Matth. 6.24 he that seeks God's Glory doth thereby promote the wellfare of his own Soul and he that seeks the
of his Wife what she thought of him truly said she I cannot tell for I did not so much as look on him whom then said he wondring did you then look upon On whom should I replied she but on him that would have redeemed my Life with his own Liberty Thus Christians you should so much be taken up with Love to Christ and the delightful contemplation of that Happiness and glorious Liberty which he by his own preciouâ— Blood hath purchased for you as not to think the whole World with all the Glory thereof worth the looking after much less to spend your Thoughts your Time your Affections your Strength upon it The Reward which God sets before you it 's an heavenly Reward and therefore do not like Men under the curse of the Serpent lie crawling-upon the Ground and licking the dust of the Earth but let all your Thoughts your Desires your insatiate breathings of Soul be continually running Heaven-ward 'T is enough for Heathens who know not God never had any glimpse of his Glory nor any tenders of an eternal Reward made to them to consult of their own Profit Pleasure and Honour in the World suffering all their affections to run out that way But for you that have seen the Back-part of Jehovah that have been upon the Mount with Christ that have Heaven with all its Royalties and Glory lying before you as thâ—â—â—â—ard of all your obedience for you to be Earthly-minded seeking great things in the World for your selves is the most dreadful miscarriage that can be What is Earth to Heaven What are the Riches of the World to the Riches of Glory What is the Mammon of Unrighteousness to that immarcessible Crown of Righteousness which the Lord sets before you for your better encouragement to all holy Self-denying and upright walking before him (c) Confundere igitur quod ita abutaris desideriis tuis adhaerendo foetidis mundi stercoribus cum possis recreari odoriferis rosis coelestibus Stella de contemnendis mundi vanitatibus lib. 1. cap. 31. Oh methinks Christians you should even blush and be ashamed to let the World get possession of your Hearts having no less than an Eternity of Life and heavenly Glory in your Eye 'T is said of the Loadstone that it cannot draw Iron so long as the Diamond is in presence And shall earthly Vanities draw out your affections after them when a Crown of Life all set with sparkling Diamonds of Glory is in presence Are you cloathed with the Sun as with a garmeâ—â— and cannot you now trample the Moon with all the Sublunaries under your Feet Have you Heaven in hope and will not that content you unless you may have the Earth with the fulness thereoâ— in your Hand Do you not know what * Fortunae malè creditur magno viatico breve vitae iter non instruitur sed oneratur Minut. Foel Oct. 122. Enemy the World is to the progress in Heavens way denying Men if once they go about to court it a quiet passage through its Territories as the King of Edom did the Israelites to the promised Canaan Esau by hunting too long after Venison he lost his Fathers Blessing Thus whilst hunting after Honours Riches and Promotions in the World you will lose with out a speedy return the Blessing of an Eternal Life A Man with a Mote in his Eye cannot see clearly nor with any delight behold the Sun Thus if you suffer your Eyes to be filled with the dust of the World you can never clearly see much less look upon with delight that glorious Reward which God sets before you (e) Dulces sunt divitae amantibus sed mors in olla cum et enim reddant hominem insolentem superbum trahunt secum ad mortem aeternam Idem lib. 1. cap. 18. Luke 10.41 The Riches Honours Glory and all the accomodations of his World are but sugared Poysons that will then most certainly destroy us when we delight to be feeding upon them Impossible it is for Men inordinately affecting the World not to be mortally infected by it Whilst Martha was much cumbred about many things she forgot to look after the one thing necessary And so whilst Men are troubled in the World pursuing with eagerness the enjoyments thereof they do easily forget to look after the Reward of Eternal Glory 'T is a rare thing for Men not to lose in Spirituals when they gain much in Temporals not to be impoverished in Grace by their Riches not to starve their Souls when their Bodies prosper and not to fall in their desires after God and Heaven and Glory when raised a few steps higher in this present World Crates Thâ—â—anus was a huge despiser of all worldly enjoyments as judging them prejudicial to the serious study of Philosophy and shall we then drown our selves in worldly cares who pretend to be studying Heaven and Eternal Glory (f) Igitur ut qui viam terit eò felicior quo levior incedit ita beatior in hoc intinere vivendi qui paupertate se sublevat quanòn sub divitiarum onere suspirat Minut. Foel Oct. 118. Qui plus habet minori gaudet libertate nec tam facilè eor suum attollere potest ad Dominum Idem lib. 1. cap. 12. Non potes vel per terram iter facere ferens onus adhuc speras te iturum ad coelum cum sis onustus Idem ibidem Believe it Christians the more you love the World the less Liberty you enjoy for Heaven Neither can you so easily meditate Eternal Glory and lift up your Hearts to God when burdened with the cares of this present Life How many wither in Spirit whilst they flourish in the Flesh growing the more cold in their devotion the more warm they find themselves in their worldly possessions The better some feather their Nests the more unfit they are to soar aloft and fly to God upon the wing of Divine Meditation And to tell you the truth what an holy Divine of our own once thought many might have gotten well to Heaven had not the World gon so well on their side as to make them believe there was no better Heaven to be found Consult then if you love your Souls their Eternal Welfare and do not go about to undo your selves for ever by your Earthly-mindedness Where the Carcase is there let the Eagles be gathered together Your Reward your Treasure your Happiness they are all laid up in Heaven let therefore your Heart and your Affections be there also 'T is not for such Eagles as you to stoop at Flies for those whose Eye should be fixed upon an Eternally glorious Reward in Heaven to be always moving towards the Earth as their proper Center Doth God take you up into the Mount giving you a prospect thence of Heavenly Glory and cannot you think it good to be there but you must be going down in Worldly-mindedness to your earthly Comforts Will you still like
you could never obtain you might well in such case make light of it But when thus you have a Crown a Kingdom an eternal Wâ—â—ght of Glory set before you together with this Encouragement that in seeking you shall be sure to find them how inexcusable must you needs be if still you should go on in the careless neglect of them Because the Recompence of eternal Life is possible to be obtained therefore impossible will it be for those that seek it not that ever they should escape the Vengeance of eternal Death 3 CONSIDER how unable all your Creature-enjoyments will be to afford you any solid Comfort at Death and Judgment not having an Interest in the Recompence of eternal Life What the Holy Ghost saith of Riches may truly be affirmed of all Creature-enjoyments and worldly Accommodations they profit not in a Day of Wrath. The Night approaching we lose the benefit of the Sun for a time and can no longer we enjoy the Light of his beauteous Beams So the darksom Night of Death and Judgment approaching you can now no longer enjoy the Comfort of Riches Honours and the like worldly Accommodations but must lose them for ever You may cry Brethren to your Riches and cry to your Honours and cry to your Friends and cry bitterly to your dearest Relations but not having an Interest in the Recompence of Reward all these will then answer you as the King of Israel (e) Kings 6.26.27 sometime answered the poor Woman of Samaria if God do not help you whence shall we help you The good things of this Life they are only calculated for the Meridian of Time and do only shine with a borrowed light So that when Death shall seize upon you and Judgment overtake you they will then be gone and like a Shadow disappear for ever And will you not labour all this considered that you may not be comfortless when all your Creature-comforts fail you not without good ground of rejoycing when all your Enjoyments will avail you nothing Oh that you were but wise to consider this that you would but remember your latter end Will your Health and your Strength and your Life endure for ever or have you any thing in this present World that can deliver you from Death and the Jaws of Hell Boast you may for a while of your worldly Enjoyments without an Interest in heavenly Glory but when you come Sirs to look pale Death in the Face and must hold up thy Hand to be judged at the Bar of Christ the Righteous Judge of all the World though now you had the very Quintessence and most refined Spirits of all Creatures mingled in one Cup for your Comfort yet assuredly you would find them but a cold Cordial Though Sirs you were Cloathed in Scarlet faring deliciously every day though you were all bespangled with the Pearls of Heaven enjoying the whole Empire of the World as your own Yet what alas were all this against the fatal Stroak of impartial Death or against the Judgment of the great God now Sentencing your Soul and Body to the Vengeance of eternal Fire Never think that your Riches Honours and the like earthly Comforts will avail you any thing against the Thunder and Fire of Heaven in such a day An Interest in heavenly Glory this indeed will be able to comfort you But have all the Riches Honours and Pleasures that the World can afford and yet without this your condition is equally helpless with the Damned in Hell And shall not all this constrain you to seek the Kingdom of God endeavouring to get an Interest in eternal Glory Since Earth cannot relieve you why will you not resolve to look after Heaven 4 CONSIDER how small the number is of such as shall ever obtain the reward of Eternal Life and let that make you labour the more for an interest in it The Lord hath indeed prepared a Kingdom yet not for the reception of all promiscuously whatever good or bad (a) Luke 12.31 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But only for the housing of that twice little diminutive Flock for whose sake the good Shepherd hath laid down his Life This glorious recompence of the reward will be given but to very few because so many refuse to work in God's Vineyard for it Of those many that are called (b) Matth. 20.16 there are but few that are chosen to obtain Salvation by Jesus Christ And yet how few are all those that are called in comparison of such as never yet had any call from Christ in the Gospel If the learned Brerewood compute right who divideth the whole World into thirty parts assigning nineteen of those thirty to idolatrous Pagans six to Mahumetans and but five to Christians within how narrow a compass will salvation be confined Salvation to be sure is no plant of India nor is it any commodity to be found in Turkey Such Goats and Swine as inhabit there whether Idolaters worshipping false Gods or Infidels worshipping the true God out of Christ they must never think to enter into Paradise nor to gather fruit from the Tree of Life So that if any where Salvation may be found 't is only amongst those that are Christians And yet even here such is the number of seduced erroneous Papists on the one hand and of profane formal Protestants on the other that undoubtedly there are not many of them that shall ever be saved (c) Luke 8. Of the four sorts of grounds that we read of in the Parable of the Sower there is not three good and one only bad nor two good and two bad but only one good and all the rest bad to teach us how small the number is of sincere Christians who receive the blessing of Eternal Life in comparison of those impenitent fruitless and ungodly Christians who are nigh unto cursing (d) Heb. 6.8 and whose end is to be burned Amongst all the inhabitants of the Earth there are but few to be found that will ever find the right way to Heaven and Glory (e) Matth. 7.14 For strait is the gate saith Christ and narrow is the way which leadeth unto Life and few there be that find it Though all Men desire and many seek yet few they be that find the Way to true Blessedness This is the mark that all Men aim at but so many take their aim amiss that but few hit it This is that wished Harbour for which all Men are bound but so many sail by a false Compass that small is the number of those who steer a right course thither There are multitudes of Men and Women that perish in the Broad Way which leadeth to Destruction But few that walk in the narrow Way which leadeth unto Happiness and blessed immortality in the Kingdom of God And what will make you cast off Presumption and offer violence to the Kingdom of Heaven if not this consideration that there is but a very few who have either part or lot in
their delight is present but momentany their pain is future but Eternal some do here by the Spirit mortify their beloved corruptions their present Work is difficult but short their Reward is future but Eternal and Glorious Oh therefore above all things see to it that every Lust every Sin every vile Affection in your Souls be subdued mortified and abstained from with the most religious Solicitude If with Jehu you will still have your Calves at Dan and Bethel notwithstanding your pretended Zeal for the Lord if with Herod you must still keep your Herodias notwithstanding your readiness to hear John Baptist to be sure you will lose your Souls and fall short of Glory But if making it your great care to mortify through the Spirit the deeds of the Body you shall keep your selves from your own iniquity hewing in pieces your delicate Agag and giving an Eternal Divorce to every Delilah that pleaseth you then doubt not but Heaven shall bâ—â—our home and the God of Heaven himself your â—â—fe your Portion your exceeding great Reward For a Life of Mortification on Earth is the sure way to a state of Glorification in Heaven 8 BE careful that you have an impartial respect to the whole Law of God endeavouring with Zachary and Elizabeth (a) Luke 1.6 to walk in all the Commandments and ordinances of God blameless A partial respect to Gods Commandments will be sure to expose you to a fatal Destruction from God's blissful Presence But an universal Love and Obedience to Gods holy Will this will set you above the reach of Hell and Misery crowning your Souls with an universal Confluence of all Joy and Happiness and purest Pleasures in the Kingdom of God (b) Psal 119.6 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Verbum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Piel ubi geminata litera intendit significationem respondet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Graecorum quod actum quasi fixis oculis exacto intuitu aliquid contemplantis denotat Then saith Holy David that spiritual Orpheus shall I never be ashamed when I have respect unto all thy Commandments When our Obedience is not universal but partial it will end in shame and â—ause us to lie down in Eternal Confusion But when with all Religious Exactness and Godly curiosity as the original Word implies we have a respect to the whole Will of God endeavouring that all our Obedience may be adequate thereto now Glory Honour and Life Everlasting will be your Portion See therefore that you go not about to indent and capitulate with God in matters of Obedience as if the universal Respect of all his Commands were not a Duty incumbent upon you (c) Acts 14.16 But give Diligence now to have a Conscience universally void of offence both towards God and towards Men (d) Heb. 13.18 in all things willing to live honestly Like Moses would you ever enter into the heavenly Canaan you must have both your Handâ—â—â—d with the two Tables of the Law respecting both 〈◊〉 and Man God in each Duty of Piety walking purely before him and Man in each Duty of Equity deporting your selves Righteously towards him To make conscience of one Duty and not of another is indeed to make Conscience neither of one nor other Every Command of the Decalogue hath the same Image the same Superscription the same Divine Authority stamped upon it (e) Jam. 2.10 So that a Man allowing himself in the disobservation of any one quoad vinculum formale doth violate all reflecting contempt upon the Authority of the whole Law though he do not actually violate it in every part And yet how many are there who answer the Lord with an half-obedience just like the Eccho which makes not a Perfect respondence of the Voice but of some part thereof (f) Mark 10.21.22 We read of a certain young Gentleman who came in a sad and serious manner to learn of Christ the Way to Heaven But yet one thing was lacking his desires of Heaven and Glory they were bounded with secret Reservations Proviso's and Conditions of his own upon the discovery whereof by Christ he went away discouraged as not able to accept of Glory upon Terms of universal obedience Thus frequently a deceitful Heart turns Men aside entring Caveats against an universal devotedness to Christ and causing them to stand upon abatements with him in the bargain of Salvation not considering that a due respect to all the Commandments of God is necessary in those that shall be saved albeit that the Covenant of Grace never intended to make the perfect Observation of God's Commandments any Condition of our obtaining Salvation So then if you would not fall short of Glory be sure that the Obedience of your Heart and Life be of equal extent and latitude with the whole Law of God (g) Quando enim servus ex domini jussis ea facit tantummodo quae vult facere jam non dominicam voluntatem implet sed suam Sal. He that stands upon abatements with God keeping only such Commandments as will stand with his carnal Interest his Worldly credit his Safety and his secular Projects doth not serve the Will of God but his own choice The Will of God revealed that 's the grand motive to obedience So that because the whole Law is but a Transcript of Gods holy Will there is the same reason why you should perform obedience to all as to any one of his Commandments (h) Jam. 2.11 Neque enim justa causatio est cur praeferantur aliqua ubi facienda sunt omnia Salvian de Gub. Dei lib. 3. pag. 80. Shame therefore your selves into the universal Obedience of God's Commandments when ever you find your Hearts to make shy of any Duty with this pressing Consideration that he who commanded one hath commanded all Every Christian he must be a through-paced Conformist to the Will of God not speaking both Hebrew and Ashdod not swearing by God and Malchom not taking one step straight and another crooked not keeping a covetous Heart for the World nor a proud Heart for Hell nor a sensual Heart for the Flesh But endeavouring to observe all things whatsoever Christ hath commanded us giving Diligence to walk before the Lord in all holy Conversation and Godliness (i) Numb 32.12 That for which we find Caleb and Joshua so highly renowned was because they fulfilled it after the Lord Thus would you ever have the highest Renown of heavenly Glory you must follow the Lord fully resolving that though you cannot fulfil all Righteousness yet you will neglect none Thy failing in every Duty shall never keep thee out of Heaven if there be no Duty in the careless neglect whereof thou allowest thyâ—elf Where the Eye of a Christian is upon the whole Law of God and his Heart open to do it (k) 2 Cor. 8.12 there the Goodness of God will accept the Desire for the Deed of the Purpose for the Performance and of the Will for the Work
so dark and gloomy could they ever expect a Day-break of Comfort to bring them out of that fiery Furnace Nor would the Day of the Saints Glory and Eternal Triumph be so unconceivably bright and gladsome to them were it possible for this glorious Day to be overtaken with the ghastly shadows of the Night and to end at length in the most hideous Darkness of annihilation But the Lord hath so ordered it that both the Wicked and the Godly having quit the Shoar of Time (f) Mat. 25.46 Shall go away those into everlasting Fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels but the Righteous into Life everlasting So that here you see the Lord keeping his best Wine to the last writing Eternity upon his Peoples Reward as that which is the Top-stone of their future Happiness the very Heart the very Kernel and quintessence of heavenly Glory (g) 2 Cor. 12.4 If Heaven be a goodly Paradise to be sure the Eternity of it is the sweetest Flower in it deriving unperishable fragrancy into all the rest (h) 2 Tim. 4.9 If the Reward of God's People be a Crown of Righteousness this Eternity is the richest Jewel that hangeth upon it the Pearl of greatest worth If Glory be a Bright Constellation made up of all good things yet everlastingness is in it as a Star of the first magnitude that shines upon all the godly with most clarified Beams of Light and Heart enchearing refreshment (i) Revel 22.1 If the recompence of the Saints in Heaven be a River of Life clear as Chrystal the perennity of it is doubtless the sweetest Stream flowing from it and that which above all the rest will everlastingly make glad the City of our God For as the damned in Hell are more horribly tormented to think that they must always lie burning in Hell Fire but never be consumed always be filled with Heart-breaking Groans for the Wrath of God poured out upon them but never be so happy as to groan out their Sorrow and their Lives together always be kept in everlasting Chains of Darkness without any hope that a Day of Mercy will ever dawn upon them (k) Plus cruciabit eos cogitatio de continuatione doloris quam sensus tormenti exterioris Gerh. Med. 50. as for this I say that their Torments still never end poor damned Creatures are more horribly tormented than they can be with the Sense of their present Misery So that which above all other the Royalties of Heaven will replenish the Hearts of Gods People with Joy unspeakable and full Glory is to think (l) Rev. 3.12 now we are made Pillars in the Temple of God and shall go no more out for ever now we are in the Arms of our blessed Lord and shall never be let fall more now we are cloathed upon with our House Eternal in the Heavens and shall never more be found naked now we are set down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the Prophets in God's Kingdom to an Eternal Banquet of Loves and from which we shall never rise up to hunger and thirst any more now we have the smiles of a glorious God abounding in sweetness towards us and shall never see him frown any more now we are got above Sin and Sorrow and Temptations and shall be troubled with them no more (m) Psal 73.26 now God is our Portion and will be our Portion for ever now we are in the Bosom of our heavenly Father and there we shall rest ourselves with fulness of delight for ever now the Holy Ghost is our Comforter indeed and shall comfort our Hearts with richest redundances of Joy and unspeakable Gladness for ever now our Sorrow our Grief (n) John 16.22 our Heart perplexing Trouble it 's all turned into fullest Joy and our Joy no Man taketh away from us to all Eternity Oh my Friends no Heart is able to conjecture with what Pleonasms what Diffusions what overflowings of Joy God's People will be filled when they shall see themselves possessed of that glorious Inheritance (o) 1 Pet. 1.4 which is incorruptible undefiled and that shall never fade away reserved for them Eternal in the Heavens Hear all our Comforts are like a small Candle whilst it gives us light is still wasting and spending itself till all be consumed But the Reward laid up for God's People in Heaven that 's an everlasting Reward that 's a Kingdom which can never be shaken that 's a far more exceeding and an Eternal weight of Glory Though Christian thy Riches thy Honours thy Friends thy dearest Comforts in the World cannot always abide with thee Yet the recompence of the Reward that 's for everlasting the enjoyment of God in Christ that 's for everlasting the Joy the Happiness the Glory of Heaven these are all for everlasting and will never leave thee This Reward it 's the free Gift of God in Christ (p) Rom. 6.23 and can therefore be no less than Eternal Life We think it 's a great matter to be free from changes enjoying our Estates our Liberty our Relations for some twenty or forty Years together But to compare this short time of Health Relations and other Comforts of this Life with blessed Immortality with that boundless Eternity which is put into the lease of heavenly Glory and what is it but as a small Drop to the whole Ocean O Sirs when you shall have passed through Millions of Years in Heaven with a blessed God with a glorious Christ with the sweetest Spirit of all divine Comfort and shall find upon tryal that no Millions of Years though able to out-vie the very Sands upon the Sea-shore for number can either shorten or diminish your Joy what high admiring Thoughts will you then have of this glorious Reward this fulness of Joy these Pleasures which are at God's right Hand for evermore (q) Psal 16.11 surpassing for the Eternity of them the utmost reach the most curious Search of all finite capacities O dreadful O blessed Eternity 'T is Eternity that gives Life both to the Torments of Hell and to the Joys of Heaven This will make every moment of hellish Torments seem a long Eternity And this will make the longest Day of heavenly Glory seem no more than one pleasant moment Oh this is that which is most accumulative 't is the Heaven of Heavens this is Glory swelling out into a boundless Ocean of Joy unspeakable that knows neither banks nor bottom Oh this is that immarcessible Flower which no Time can crop or make to wither Time itself being now swallowed up in the vast Ocean of Eternity Oh this is the highest Pisgah of the Saints Blessedness that having once put on the Robes of Glory and being cloathed with the Garments of Salvation they shall never put them off again 'T is this that makes them transcendently Happy beyond what Eye hath seen or Ear heard or the Heart of Man can conceive that they shall be with
white through the holy Conversation of the Brethren But now in Purple in a scarlet Robe made glorious in the Blood of (g) Erat ante in operibus fratrum candida nunc facta est in Martyrum cruore purpurea Floribus ejus nec lilia nec rosae desunt Certent nunc singuli ad utriusque honoris amplissimam dignitatem ut accipiant coronas vel de opere candidas vel de passione purpureas Cypr. Epist 9. pag. mihi 27. Dicatis Deâ— hominibus fidem suam religiosà virtute testa tibus ornamenta sunt ista non vincula nec Christianorum pedes ad infamiam copulant sed clarificant ad coronam O pedes faeliciter vincti qui non à fabro sed à Domino resolvuntur O pedes faeliciter vincti qui itinere salutari ad Paradisum diriguntur O pedes in saeculo ad praesens ligati ut sint semper apud Dominum liberi O pedes compedibus transversariis interim cunctabundi sed celeriter ad Christum glorioso itinere cursuri Omnis ista deformitas detestabilis tetra Gentilibus quali splendore pensabitur Saecularis haec brevis paena quam clari aeterni honoris mercede mutabitur Iid. epist 77. pag. 255. the Martyrs Amongst the Flowers wherewith she is adorned are wanting neither Lilies nor Roses Let every one now strive for the ample Dignity of this double Honour that they may receive either white Crowns for well-doing or Crowns of Purple as the Reward of all their Sufferings The same Author writing to some of God's People under manifold Sufferings he thus comforts them against their Chains and other disgraceful usages which they met withal These are not Bonds but Ornaments they tie not Christians Feet to any Disgrace but only fit them for the Crown O Feet happily bound which not the Smith but the Lord himself shall set at liberty O Feet happily bound which by a saving Journey are directed to Paradise O Feet bound a while in this World to be at liberty with the Lord for evermore All this Deformity though detestable and matter of foul reproach amongst the Gentiles with what everlasting Splendor shall it be rewarded This short and momentany Suffering how soon shall it be changed for the recompence of bright eternal Glory So that you see disgrace Persecution and foulest Reproaches will be counted but as Badges of Honour when the Eye is fixed upon that Crown to which they lead If we put the Finger in the Eye and bewail our Unhappiness when reproached and evil spoken of in the World it 's a sign that eternal weight of Glory that will follow after is not in our Eye O then that you may not suffer your selves to be scoffed out of your Profession look well to that eternal Reward which lies before you O Christians 't is not your Shame but your Glory 't is not your Dishonour but your greatest Renown to suffer Reproach for Christ's sake and so would you quickly count of it did you but seriously think with your selves to what a glorious Kingdom you will shortly come Be not then like some whom Tertullian speaks of that were pudoris magis memores quam salutes more solicitous about a little worldly Disgrace to shun that than about their immortal Souls that they might be saved Christ himself was counted a Wine-bibber an Enemy to Caesar David was the Song of the Drunkards and shall we think to escape saving both our secular Repute here and our Souls hereafter Paul rattles his Chain which he bore for the Gospel taking an holy Pride in it And shall we be dash'd out of countenance by the Reproaches of a few pitiful Fellows whose only Character of Commendation is that they as Justin Martyr saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 rail upon honest Men in handsom Language Did Christ wear a Crown of Thorns for us and shall not we bear a little Scorn and Reproach in the World for him O let us count all Accusations that are brought against us for Righteousness sake our Glory and bind every Reproach that we suffer to our Head as a Crown of Honour The Sun never shineth more brightly than when newly come from under a Cloud the more Christians you are under a Cloud of Reproach and Disgrace in this World the more brightly will you shine for ever in the Kingdom of God Be it so that you are now counted the off-scouring and refuse of all things yet the time is at hand when Christ will come to be glorified in his Saints and admired in all them that believe Oppose then your future Glory to your present Suffering and that when cloathed with nothing but Shame and Reproach in this World you may glory therein think often of those white Robes those Garments of Salvation which will shortly be put upon you Give me my Chains too and dub me a Knight of that noble Order said a Martyr of great Quality in France when he saw his Fellow-sufferers bound with Cords and himself for his Dignity let go unbound Reproach it self when suffered for Christ will be matter of Glory if your Eye be once stedfastly fixed upon this eternal Reward The Spouse is never more beautiful than when the World counts her base constraining her to wallow in Sack-cloath By all Aspersions God's People are washed fairer the white Robes of Glory are most sure to be put upon them who were first scoured for the sake of Christ with the Soap and Fullers-earth of worldly Disgrace The Reproach which we suffer for Christ is a precious Treasure which though it have weight in it to press and grieve us yet there is in it such fulness of Worth as will everlastingly Enrich and Crown us You may bear the Reproach of Men a while but that Honour which comes from God you shall wear for ever Here you may be wrap'd up in Darkness and buried in Disgrace But hereafter you shall be adorned with Robes of Light and Crowns of Glory Now you may lie among the Pots and be smutted with the foul calumniating Tongues of ungodly Men but the Reward of eternal Life it will make you like the Wings of a Dove covered with Silver and her Feathers with yellow Gold Psal 68.13 3 A due Respect had to the Recompence of the Reward would be a strong Cordial against all worldly Sorrow and make you walk chearfully Though the Soul may walk as if Sorrowing yet indeed it will always be rejoycing whilst turning away from beholding the things which are but for a Season it fixeth an Eye upon that far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory 'T is storied of Caesar that when at any time surprized with Melancholy he used to smite upon his Breast saying to himself cogita te Caesarem esse â—emember thy self Man to be Caesar and cast away Sorrow And if he thought his earthly Greatness was enough to make him chearful how much more will this glorious Reward if duly thought upon chear up our
't was not any Momentary Pleasure lasting only for a Season but it was Fulness of Joy in God's presence it was perfect freedom from Sin it was Grace glorified it was the Beatifical Vision of God in Heaven together with those Soul-satisfying Pleasures that are at his right hand for evermore to which in all his obedience we find Moses so stedfastly looking SO then from the practise of Moses the Man of God thus fixing his eye in all his obedience upon the recompence of Reward and encouraging himself therewith chearfully to bear the Cross of Christ to Mortification Self-denyal and the like wholsome severities of Religion you may observe with me this point of DOCTRINE That God's People for their better encouragement to all holy self-denying and obediential walking before him they may lawfully have Respect to the Recompence of the Reward WHILST we are denying our selves running the way of God's Commandments and doing the work which he hath given us to finish here on Earth 't is no Soloecism at all in Christianity for us to have our eye stedfastly fixed upon that eternally glorious Reward which the Lord hath laid up with himself for us in the Kingdom of Heaven We may lawfully walking with God all our life be encouraged against whatever Difficulties and Persecutions we meet with in Heaven's way to think how incorruptible the Crown is how glorious the Kingdom how unspeakable the Joy how secure the Rest how endless the Pleasures how undefiled the Inheritance how full uninterruptible and everlastingly satisfying the Communion with God over all blessed for ever is whereof we shall take Possession in the hour of death HOLY Daniel when praying in the Land of his Captivity he opened his Window and set his face towards Jerusalem Thus when Praying when Repenting when Suffering and Dying for Christ we may lawfully open the Eye of Faith and set our faces towards the heavenly Jerusalem towards the promised Canaan towards the Temple of God in Zion the place of our eternally blessed and glorious Rest 'T IS a bold attempt for Men to make restrictions where God himself hath made none for Men to say we must not when God himself saith we may in all our obedience have an eye to the recompense of Reward to the full enjoyment of him in Glory THE example of Moses in this place doth evince beyond all exception that some respect may lawfully be had to the recompence of the Reward at least by way of motive and encouragement to stir us up and to quicken us both in doing and suffering for the God of Heaven For this you see is given in as one special reason Why he refused to be called the Son of Pharaoh's Daughter Why he chose rather to suffer affliction with the People of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season And why he esteemed the Reproach of Christ greater Riches than the Treasures of Aegypt even because he had a respect to the Recompence of the Reward esteeming of all the Riches Honours Pleasures and Enjoyments of this World as not worthy to be compared with the Glory that was to be revealed in him AND if Moses might thus incourage himself to indure hardship as a good Souldier of Jesus Christ by having an eye fixed upon the recompence of Reward upon Glory Honour and Immortality why should it not be lawful for Christians to do the same How can that be unlawful in Christians which the Holy Ghost hath left upon eternal record as a matter of high commendation in him Let us not think that the Lord will condemn us for looking at that in our Obedience for which he hath so highly commended his Servant Moses That which was imputed to him for a Virtue will never be imputed to us for a Crime But we also as well as he may for our better encouragement in all the ways of obedience have respect to the recompence of reward to that far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory The Husbandman can cheerfully undergo the Labour and Charges of Seed-time though many times very great when his eye is fixed upon the Harvest Thus to make us chearful in sowing to the Spirit we may lawfully have an eye to the great Harvest when every one that now soweth Righteousness shall be sure to Reap a full Crop of Eternal Glory Gal. 6.8.9 CHAP. II. The Method laid down with two introductory Propositions for the better understanding of the Doctrin IN the prosecution of this Heavenly Truth having first premised something by way of Introduction I purpose annuente Deo to observe this Method I. I shall shew you What it is to have respect to the Recompence of the Reward II. I shall endeavour to let you understand How you are to have Respect to the Recompence of Reward III. I shall give you Some Scripture Reasons proving that you may have respect to the recompence of reward IV. AND lastly I shall help you to improve this Truth by way of Use and Application that so it may not be Unprofitable but every way Advantageous to your Souls BEFORE I come to these things you must give me leave to premise something as was hinted by way of introduction which I shall wholly comprize in these two particulars 1. THAT we are bound to serve the Lord and to walk in all dutiful obedience before him though there were no Heaven no Glory nor reward of Eternal Life to be expected from him The obligation of our obedience to the Lord Jehovah ariseth not so much from the promise of Eternal Life annexed to the Commandment as from the authority of God's Commanding INDEED when-ever God sweetens his Precepts with Promises crowning our Temporal Obedience with an Eternally Glorious Recompence this lays us under a stronger engagement But yet if you separate betwixt the Precept and the Promise if you take away the Reward of Eternal Life yet all this will not dissolve nor nullify that obligation of Obedience to God that lies upon us For impossible it is and utterly repugnant to the quality of Rational Creatures as we are not to be subject to the will of our Creator and indebted in all possible Obedience to him that made us SUCH is the transcendent Excellency of God that in himself he is infinitely worthy of all our Services and such is the Sovereignty of God over us that though we should serve him ten thousand years together in the most holy seraphick and heavenly manner that ever Saint or Angel did yet after all this he might annihilate us and yet do us no wrong WHATSOEVER we are whatsoever we have whatsoever we are able to do in this world the Lord hath more interest in it than we have our selves and therefore we owe our selves we owe our enjoyments and services to him so that he may justly require them at our hands upon any terms and we are bound to surrender them though he should never vouchsafe us the least recompence of Reward for so doing
(a) Nos tamen in praemijs non oportet consistere sed loâ—gius spectare ad gloriam dei ut quamvis nulla 〈◊〉 proponerentur tamen velimus recte facere Though we may look to the Recompence of Reward yet we must not stay there but must look beyond it to God's Glory resolving that though he should never Reward us yet in well-doing we would glorify him A Child is bound in duty to obey his Parents though they have no Portion no Riches no Inheritance to bestow upon him because they are his Parents Thus Christians though there were no Heaven no Happiness no reward of Eternal Life for God to bestow upon you yet doubtless you were bound to obeâ— him even because he is God over all blessed for ever (b) Pluribus de causis in solidum omnia opera nostra bonâ— sunt debita deo ita ut possit omnia exigere etiamsi praemium nuâ—lum dare volit Bern. in Serm. de Quadruped FOR sundry respects whatever good works we do or can do they are all of them due to God and therefore saith Bernard he might require them of us and we accordingly were bound to perform them though he should never render to us for them the reward of Eternal Life 2. THAT though we thus owe Obedience to God and are bound to serve him were there no Reward to be expected yet such is the infinite condescention and goodness of God that he hath provided an Eternally glorious Reward for all such as walk sincerely in Obedience before him He might exact Obedience at our hands upon terms of absolute Sovereignty but such is his matchless condescention that he only desires it upon Terms of Bounty and remunerative Goodness (c) Quamvis deus qui omnium Conditor est et dominus pro suo in nos jure et impio voluntatis suae praecepta simpliciter proponere et a nobis obedientiam maga authoritate exgiere possit patris tamen ingenium potius quam severi et immitis domini mores imitari vult una cum praeceptis suis amplissimas omnis generis bonorum promissiones proponens quo facilius a nobis obedientiam impetret qui tot tamque graves sentimus Remoras quae a via salutis revocant Gualther in 1. Johan 4.18 Pag. 61. THE Lord though in regard of his absolute Sovereignty over us he might yet such is his remunerative Goodness that he will not suffer any thing which we do for him to go unrewarded but will certainly Crown it with Eternal Glory AS Christ commanded the broken Meat to be gathered up not suffering the least fragment to be lost So the Lord will gather an exact account of all our Performances and will never suffer us to lose so much as a Prayer as a Sigh as a Tear no nor so much as a Cup of Cold Water by him Mat. 10.24 God's People are now indeed by those that have their Hope in this Life counted of all Men most miserable But when Christ shall come to be glorified in his Saints and admired of all those that believe then shall the Wicked themselves be convinced that verily there is a Reward for the Righteous Psal 58.11 Wicked Men think it in vain to serve God they can see no profit in keeping his Ordinances but however if we walk uprightly abounding in the work of the Lord we shall find that our labour will not be in vain with the Lord and that in keeping his Commandments there is great Reward Psal 19.11 1 Cor. 15.5 8. (d) Nullum etenim bonum irremuneratum deus relinquit Carthusian in Luke 16. God will never forget our labour of Love nor suffer any good thing that we do for him to go unrewarded 'T IS storied of Caius the Emperour that after he came to be Emperour the first thing he did was to prefer Agrippa who for wishing him that Imperial Dignity had suffered Imprisonment to whom he gave a Chain of Gold full as heavy as the Chain of Iron which Agrippa had worn in Prison for his sake Thus to be sure when the Lord comes to sit upon the Throne of his Glory the first thing he will do shall be to Reward all those that have done or suffered any thing for his sake then he sets upon their Heads a Crown of Righteousness then he puts them in full Possession of Eternal Glory then he calls them up into Everlasting Communion with God in Heaven saying Come ye Blessed of my Father Mat. 25.34 Pharoah's (e) Vtcunque homines pactum mercedem detinere et negare solent Christus tamen id nec faciet unquam nec facere potest Titus 1.2 Daevenant in Col. c. 3. v. 24. p. 479. Butler may forget the Kindness of Joseph but the Lord will never forget our Labour of Love nor suffer any thing that we do for him to go unrewarded Heb. 6.10 We have the Promise of God who cannot Lie for our Security that if by Patient continuance in well-doing we seek for Glory Honour and Immortality he will certainly Crown us at length with Life everlasting Rom. 2.7 CHAP. III. The Doctrine explain'd shewing what it is to have a Respect to the Recompence of the Reward in Six Particulars I. THESE things premised I come now to shew you What it is to have Respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of Reward And that I shall indeavour to do in these few Particulars 1. STEDFASTLY to believe that there is a Reward for the Righteous and that our Labour shall never be in Vain in the Lord. 1 Cor. 15.5.6 Faith is the Eye of the Soul that gives it a sight of those eternal good things which are not seen So that when in our Obedience we get as it were upon the top of Mount Pisgah thence taking by the Eye of Faith a Prospect of the Heavenly Canaan where after our wearisom Pilgrimage we shall have an everlasting glorious Rest then we have respect to the recompence of the Reward MEN may possibly discourse of Heaven and Glory telling you to Admiration how incorruptible the Crown is how everlasting the Joy and how transcendently Glorious the Happiness which God hath provided for those that Love him But till they stedfastly believe the Truth of all this till by Faith they can look within the Vail till by Faith they can Antedate Heaven and bring down the bright Reflections of eternal Glory into their own Hearts they have no respect to the Recompence of the Reward For how can he have respect to Heaven and Glory to eternal Life and Happiness in the World to come who Believes them not THE Sun is a Glorious Body but that 's undiscernable to a Blind Man who wants an Eye to behold the Lustre and Splendour of it So though the Recompence of Reward be transcendently Glorious and ten thousand times more Radiant than the Sun in it's Noon-day brightness yet an Unbeliever can have no respect to it as wanting an Eye of Faith to discern all
that Practise may be lawful and currant amongst Christians which hath God's own Image and Superscription written upon it The Lord commands us that we should seek the Kingdom of God Mat. 6.33 as our end and his Righteousness as the only adequate means leading thereto he hath bid us lay up for our selves a Treasure in Heaven he requires of us all that we should work out our own Salvation with fear and trembling Phil. 2.12 he hath willed us the seeking of those things that are above Col. 3.1 2. enjoyning us to lay hold upon Eternal Life 1 Tim. 6.12 And shall we still question the lawfulness of that Practice for which we have a Mandamus sent forth of God and therein an unquestionable Warrant sealed and subscribed by the unerring hand of Heaven it self From God's Oportet which is wrapt up in every one of his Commandments that are all of them holy and just and good Rom. 7.12 we may doubtless concludingly infer the Christians Practical Licet without seeming in the least to patrocinate or give countenance to any Unchristian Disingenuous and Mercenary Performance If God say we must the inference will be undeniable that Christians by patient continuance in Well-doing may lawfully here on Earth seek for Glory and Honour for Immortality and Eternal Life in the Kingdom of Heaven Form the Argument in what mode and figure you please sure I am That wherever the Will and Command of God are made the Premises the least that you can put in the Conclusion without reflecting dishonour upon God himself must be the Legality and Holiness of the practise inferred from them For since the Will of God is the only adequate rule and measure of all Holiness How can we but acknowledge that to be lawful and holy which doth harmoniously accord with it and in every way proportionate thereto so far as we find it to be transcribed into Holy Writ The Holiness of Man doth consist in his (f) Summa puritas consistit in adhaesione cum deo nam deus est ratio objectiva et mensura sanctitatis Less de Perfect divin lib. 8. c. 1. Anological resemblance of and conformity with God who is alone the sure Standard the grand Exemplar and the objective cause of all Purity and Holiness in the Creature Every action of Man is holy or unholy according to it's conformity with or contrariety to the Will of God Holiness is nothing else but a pure derivation from God himself the Spring and Fountain of all Purity And therefore whatever is conveyed into the Heart and Lives of Men from this pure Fountain through the Golden Pipes of God's Commandments it must needs be holy and just and good For to be sure conformity with the rule of Holiness can never make a Man unholy no more than walking in the light can produce darkness Did our Holiness consist in a conformity with some else besides God's holy Will in a conformity with the Decrees of Counsels with the uncertain Records of Antiquity with the Judgment of Fathers with Ecclesiastick Constitutions with Enthusiastick Impulses or with the dictates of an Erronious Conscience embracing many times the shadow of Holiness and engaging Men to the strict observation of that for the doing whereof God never gave his Fiat we might then indeed come under censure and be impeached of unholiness for conforming our selves to the Will of God endeavouring to transcribe his Commandments into our Lives and Conversations But to set up all these or any of these for a Rule making them the standard of Holiness were to usurp God's Sovereign Authority and to set the Crown of his Glory upon the head of a poor obscure non-entity or something worse just as if a Man should go about to make a small Drop the Spring and Mother of the vast Ocean or as if he should make that little Ray of Brightness which dissembles itself in a dark Glow-worm the Fountain of Light to the glorious Sun Doubtless as God is the sole Author of our Being so he must be the only Rule of all our Operations We can no more be independent in these than we are in that For since we live in God and have our Being from him there is nothing in all the World that can denominate us truly Holy but a care to act and move according to his Righteous Will Every Impression supposes a Seal from whence it came every Stream will lead you to the Spring-head out of which it issued and came bubbling forth every Beam of Light doth put you in mind of the Sun out of which it shines and upon which it doth necessarily depend So whatever you see that is Good that is Pure and shining forth with a native Lustre and commanding Beauty in the Lives of Men it may well bring to your Remembrance the God of Heaven who is the Fountain of all Goodness the Chrystalline Spring out of which all Moral Purity by a Blessed Emanation issues and the glorious Sun of Righteousness by whom our Lives are irradiated with most clarified Beams of Holiness and without whose uninterrupted Irradiations like refracted Beams they would presently cease to shine and become a dark Chaos of all confusions For as Light in the Air is nothing but a derivation from the Sun that Fountain of Light So Holiness in us is nothing but a Pure Emanation of Goodness and a noble progeny of Moral Rectitudes springing from and born not of Blood nor of the will of the Flesh nor of the will of Man but of the will of God himself John 1.13 whose Image and Superscription they bear Indeed some things are intrinsically good they have a native Beauty they are essentially Pure and therefore God wills them whereas other things are only Amiable and holy and good because God wills them so that they have no moral Entity and Goodness but what they receive from the Signature of God's Will and Command upon them However whether we seek of things that are Intrinsically Good or of things that are Meerly Good from the Command of God injoyning them yet surely their Goâ—dness is not Independant and the measure of it self but doth wholly consist in that beautiful Resemblance and harmomious Analogy which they have with God's holy Will For all Created Excellency it shineth with a borrowed light whatever Goodness is in the Creature it is only by way of Participation from God pre-supposing (g) Omnis Sanctitas participata supponit Sanctitatem per essentiam the same transcendently treasured up in him even as the Impression presupposes the Seal that made it So that there is no form nor comeliness nor beauty in any thing that we should desire it any further than we find either the bright Stamp of divine Sovereignty or the plain Superscription of his Holiness in legible Characters written upon it (h) Nihil est bonitatis creatae in toto entis ambitu quin a deo producta a deo exemplata a deo conservata et in
neutrality indifferency and insipid formality in the ways of God censuring all those that will not be formal outsided and negligent like themselves as persons of furious Spirits perverse Zealots and humoursome Fanaticks as if they were afraid of too much Holiness Believe it Sirs these and the like Scripture Injunctions do concludingly evince that Christianity is no idle speculation but a business of greatest activity requiring the quintessence and vigour of the Spirit the very strength and sinews of the Soul together with the greatest intensness of all the affections There is such an attractive magnetique virtue in that eternally glorious reward which Religion proposeth to all them that do cordially embrace it that their Hearts are so inflamed with desire after it that it turns all difficulties into fuel for their Zeal to feed upon Impossible it is for such as are truly gracious to be remiss and negligent in Heavens way as being transformed by a prospect of Heavenly Glory into so many incarnate Seraphims whose proper nature it is to have their affections boyled up to the highest consistency of uncurbed Zeal for Gods Glory (c) Rom. 12.11 making them fervent in Spirit serving the Lord. Would you therefore approve your selves to be true Nathaniels Israelites indeed in whom there is no guile Then see that ye willingly spend and be spent in the service of God contending with an holy Violence that you may enter through the strait Gate into the Kingdom of Heaven 'T is no heartless wish nor languishing endeavour no still-born Prayer nor abortive resolution which will argue your Souls to be sound and of the right Complexion Many there are amongst us who taking up the form and denying the Power of Godliness are all for a moderation in Goodness So that with them lukewarmness though it speak the Soul in the saddest temper shall be graced with the name of Discretion and Christian Prudence The truth is as that holy Man now with God whom before I quoted saith all unregenerate Men in a manner do usually cast unto themselves in the mould of their own worldly Wisdom a religious Mediocrity and they pitch with resolution and security upon a degree of Zeal compatible with their own secular concernments and this must be a competent sufficiency of Holiness for Heaven and serve their turn for Salvation This glorious formality if God's People out of a consciousness of their duty and from the strength of desire which they have to the recompence of Eternal Life transgress why now the Wicked to prevent the estuations of a troubled Conscience and the dreadful pre-occupations of Eternal Flames which would otherwise seize upon them they are forced to censure God's People as guilty of too much preciseness circumspection and affected singularity For should they not fancy an easier way to Heaven than that of striving and running contending and wrestling wherein God's People walk they must needs cast away the confidence I say not of their Hope but of their groundless presumption and sit down in despair as Persons for whom it is impossible that they should come to Heaven or ever escape the damnation of Hell But believe it Christians whatever short Cut carnal Gospellers fancy to Heaven you must resolve to serve the Lord with fervency of Spirit excellency of Zeal and enflamed affections together with a supernatural singularity above all ordinary and moral perfections would you ever come there Fair and softly saith the Proverb goes fair But as one wittily observes it never goes so far as Heaven (a) Non dormientibus provenit regnum coelorum nec otio desidia torpentibus beatitudo aeternitatis ingeritur Prosp Omnis qui ad Paradisum redire desiderat oportet transire per ignem Aust God prepared a Wife for Adam in Paradise sleeping But there are no preparations of Happiness Life and Eternal Glory made for sleepers in the Paradise of God Our first Parents sinning were cast out of Paradise and therefore we can never return thither to feed upon the Tree of Life unless we return with undaunted resolution upon the Cherubims flaming Sword We must not only take up the form but also embrace the power of Godliness we must not be almost (b) Acts 26.28 but altogether Christians would we ever receive the Crown of Eternal Glory For to be sure they that have only an appearance of Holiness shall go to a real Hell and they that are but almost Christians shall but almost be saved which indeed will be the emphasis of Damnation to have been within a step of Heaven and Eternal Glory Let then Christians the blind World entertain you with what malicious invectives and approbrious Sarcasms it will censuring you for Phanticks perverse Zealots and dissembling Hypocrites Yet see that you abate not one scruple of your former Zeal either taking up with a slothful oscitancy in the ways of God or leaving your selves at a profane liberty to comply in any sinful practices but having always an Eye to the recompence of the reward give diligence to be still as precise circumspect and accurate in all your walkings as ever Remember when ever the Men of the World ask you what need you be so strict and accurate so precise and circumspect not contenting your selves to do as others do Why it is in plain language and to paraphrase a little upon those profane Queries as if they should ask you what need you make matter of Heaven and Glory what need you so much to regard Life and Eternal Salvation in the Kingdom of God not contenting your selves to go to Hell and be damned for ever as the Wicked must And can you indeed make light of Heaven and Eternal Glory can you Christians be willing to fall short of Gods beatifical presence in Heaven and for ever to lie under his frowns in Hell that such ungodly questionings as these should make you ashamed to own Christianity in the Life eminency and power of it As they Christians have little reason to censure you for your Diligence Zeal and circumspection in Heavens way So little reason have you to be ashamed thereof being come within ken of your Rest already and may with Moses from Mount Nebo take a clear Prospect of the Holy Land of the Celestial Canaan CHAP. VII The Doctrine improved by way of Reprehension reproving all such as do inordinately love and pursue the World and discovering the vanity of all Secular Enjoyments in Six Particulars 1 BY way of reprehension this Doctrine affords just matter of Reproof against and may smite as with a mighty Scourge two sors of Persons 1 Since God allows us to seek Glory Honour and Immortality for our selves by patient continuance in well-doing (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost in Mat. 22. how justly are all those reproved who making light of these eternal concernments do wholly spend their time and exhaust their strength in pursuit of the profits Emoluments and comforts of this present World The Lord makes
them tenders of a Crown of Life But they chose to deck themselves with Rose-buds preferring Earth before Heaven and troubling themselves about many things (c) Luke 10.42 whilst that better part is neglected which if chosen should never be taken from them Like Esau they sell their Birth-right for a mess of Pottage Like Judas they betray the Lord of Life who would save their Souls for thirty pieces of Silver Or like our first Parents to get the forbidden Fruit they let go their Happiness in Paradise preferring one deadly Apple from the Tree of Knowledge before all the delicious Apples on the Tree of Life What pains do we see Men take What hazards do they daily run to satisfie their unsatiate desires after Creature-enjoyments whilst Heaven with all the Glory and Royalties of it are neglected as the pleasing fictions of some devout Fancies rather than matters of reality With what wracking of Brain with what strength of endeavour with what Conflicts of Passions with what vehemency of desire and remorse of Consciences do Men resolving to be rich pursue their Earth-born vanities making that pitiful Religion they have serve turn and Christianity it self become Handmaid to wait upon their gain and secular advantage (d) Boni quippe ad hoc utuntur mundo ut fruantur Deo mali autem contra ut fruantur mundo uti volunt Deo Aug. de Civit. Dei lib. 15. cap. 7. Whereas the truly gracious do improve their Earthly Treasures for high and Heavenly ends using them in a subserviency to their Christian devotion that they more freely enjoy God Why on the contrary carnal Hearts they subordinate every thing to their own sordid ends using God his Name his Worship his Ordinances that they may more plausibly prosecute and enjoy the World Doth not daily sad experience let us see how Men will hazard their own lives in desperate undertakings make themselves perpetual Drudges to the Times comply with every prevailing Faction throw away their own Mercies make shipwrack of Faith dissemble conscience and exchange their salvation together with all Hopes of Heaven and Glory for Earth and Earthly enjoyments Oh that I could but speak to the Heart of such amongst you who thus inordinately pursue the World grasping continually with adulterous embraces Was this the end of your being in the World to Idolize the Creature loving prizing and serving that above God your Creator Have you not things of greater consequence and that more nearly concern you to look after than the profits emoluments and perishable comforts of this present Life Is it not an immortal Soul more worthy your care than a sinful Body the Riches of Heaven and Glory than your Earthly Treasure and the recompence of Eternal Life is not that more worthy your care than the confluence of all Creature-enjoyments Your approaching Death your Eternal Judgment before Gods Tribunal your everlasting condition in the world to come should not these things be seriously minded and much rather regarded of you than the husky enjoyments of a dying Life What alass Poor brutish Muck-worm will thy full Garners thy Bags of Gold thy sumptuous Buildings thy long Leases thy gorgeous Apparel or thy dainty Dishes and sweet Morsels avail thee when the great God calls to Judgment when Death as God's inexorable Serjeant shall arrest thee and thou must now breath out thy Life and thy Hope together Will your Deeds and Leases be evidences for Heaven Will your Riches Honours and Pleasurable enjoyments be able to comfort your Hearts when now breaking through the bitter pangs and dying groans that will shortly take hold of you Will your Coffers or your Bags of Gold be accepted as a ransom for your lost Souls or can they purchase your pardon when now tryed for your Lives for your everlasting unchangable State before the righteous Judge of all the World To bring you off from the over eager pursuit of these perishable enjoyments and to beget in your cheeks an holy blush that ever you should neglect Heaven to seek them dwell a little on these things 1 (a) Vacuum quodcunque est si nullam nobis affert utilitatem CONSIDER all Creature-enjoyments they are vain and unprofitable The very choycest of your Worldly comforts they have nothing in them but that which is unprofitable and good for nothing There is always most vanity where there is the least profit And where there is no profit at all there is nothing at all but vanity And yet this is the Character which Solomon hath given us of all our Creature-enjoyments Every Creature in his Diary hath vanity written upon it and (b) Eccles 1.2 therefore since the whole cannot exceed the particulars when added together he gives us in this as the total Sum of all sublunary comforts Vanity of vanities all is vanity Add a thousand Cyphers together and yet without a figure they signify just nothing So though a Man had the whole confluence and universal aggregation of all Creature-comforts yet such is the vanity bound up in them that without the figure of Divine favour they are altogether insignificant and stand for just nothing in the Register of true profit And therefore (c) Prov. 23.5 Solomon endeavouring to call off Men from the too eager pursuit of Riches will not vouchsafe them any station amongst things really existing but thrusting them down into the bottomless Abyss of a non-entity he thus queries with the insatiate Mammonist Wilt thou set thine Eyes upon that which is not and make them to flie as 't is in the original upon a meer nothing The generality of Men they idolize Riches and look upon them as some great matters But the comfort the benefit the profit accrewing to us by them is so small that if you count them any thing at all you do quite over-prize them and do count them a great deal more than what they are ever like to amount unto We can hardly form up a conception of our Creature-enjoyments so diminutive and small as indeed they are Nor can we be able to reach so low in our thoughts as the bottom of that vanity and unprofitableness which is written upon them Most Men look upon their Riches Honours and Worldly accommodations through a Multiplying-glass which doth swell them up far above the proportion of their own magnitude and quite stretcheth them beyond the line of their proper dimensions But would they look upon these things as they are in themselves how would their tall gigantine stature shrink up into a Pygmey-dwarfishness and what a line of unprofitableness and vanity would they find stretched out upon them all * Psal 4.2 How long then ye Sons of Men will ye love vanity and go on to set your Hearts upon that which is not Oh turn not aside from seeking after Glory and Honour after Immortality and Eternal Life (d) 1 Sam. 12.20 21. For why as Samuel said in another case should you go after vain things after
Carrion of bestial Delights you will thus renounce the Communion of Heavenly Joys Is this your Wisdom your Prudence to make Sin the object of your Joy the Theatre of your Delight the Centre of your Desires and the Element wherein you would continually chuse to live when God by a Miracle of rich Grace calls upon you to seek after Glory and Honour after Immortality and Eternal Life in the Kingdom of Heaven Can you think to maintain the comfort of your Life by Sin which is nothing but the fuel of Death and Misery Will you make that the sole object of your Joy which alone is the inlet to an ocean of Sorrow and perplexing disquietments The truth is we have many amongst us who wear Christ's Livery and are called Christians but yet they live as Persons resolved to chuse Epicurus that grand Sensualist for the Master oâ— their licentious Faction making Pleasure with him the Alpha and Omega of all their Happiness Seneca though an Heathen had a far more noble â—â—d heroick Spirit than such esteeming it the greatest Pleasure to contemn all carnal Pleasures whilst these reckon it for the highest accent of â—â—licity to live in them Such voluptuous Wantons walk directly antipodes to the end of their own being living in nothing but carnal Delights as if God sent them into the World to be therein like the Leviathan sporting themselves and feasting their Souls in an Ocean of sensual Pleasures They begin to anticipate here that Paradise of swinish Delights which Mahomet promised his own naâ—â—y Herd at leastwise to take an earnest of it continually soaking themselves in their own intemperance and brutish luxury They look after no other Heaven than only to go singing to Hell and though you give them the greatest variety of delightful objects yet they cannot be Merry unless they may have Treason against Heaven it self for the game and the Devil for their playfellow But be ashamed oh carnal Gospellers thus to give up the strength of your Souls in the service of sensual Pleasures making light in the mean time of Heaven and Glory together with those unsullied Paradisical Pleasures which are at God's right Hand for evermore Oh let not that be matter of Pleasure and Delight to you which lay so heavy upon the Soul of your blessed Redeemer Did Christ bleed and groan and die to save you from your Sins and yet will you live with delight in the Pleasures of Sin How ever can you have a good thought of Sin when you look upon it as that which brought down the Son of God from Heaven and that murthered the Lord of Life and Glory Must the beloved Son of God undergo the curse due to your Sins and must he also humble himself unto Death to purchase for you the reward of Life everlasting that after all this you should undervalue his Love and make light of so great Salvation preferring the Pleasures of Sin which are but for a season before it Will you see I beseech you your folly in the glass of these ensuing considerations 1 CONSIDER thus to delight in carnal Pleasures it argues your Souls to be utterly void of Grace and dead in sin Where ever Grace comes with power it mortifies all vile affections and quite alienates the Heart from all sinful delights so that whoever delights in the Pleasures of Sin to be sure he is yet in a state of Nature and was never brought under the Power of converting Grace (a) Quâ—madmodum impossibile est ut ignis flammam concipiat in aquâ ita 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 est voluptates mundi cum poenitentia Christiana manere Otho Casman A voluptuous Man cannot be a gracious Man Nor is it possible for the Dove of true Piety to find any place whereon to rest the sole of her foot in a deluge of carnal Pleasures Our first Parents by eating of the forbidden fruit they lost their right to the Tree of Life and were shut out of Paradise (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ait Xenophon By feeding with delight upon the forbidden fruit of Sin Men forfeit their right to all saving Grace and must need be shut out of Gods presence which is better than life it self as that alone which can quicken and revive a dead Soul T is the dead Fish only and not the living that are carried away with the stream Thus when Men are carried away with a deluge of Sin and swim willingly down the stream of carnal delights it s a sign they were never alive unto God but that still they are dead in trespasses and Sins Hence the Widow who indulges a sensual appetite living in Pleasure (c) 1 Tim. 5.6 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alexand Paedag. lib. 3. cap. 7. pag. 172. is said to be dead whilst she lives Who ever hath Pleasure in unrighteousness delighting in that as his proper element he hath no principle of Life and Grace abiding in him but is spiritually dead whilst he lives in the Body When Wickedness is sweet to our taste and we delight our selves in it here is the reigning power of Sin separating betwixt us and the God of Heaven and that indeed is not only the Death but the Hell of every graceless Soul A Life of sensuality speaks that Man to be spiritually dead who in such a manner lives after the Flesh (d) Rom. 8.13 For if you live after the Flesh saith St. Paul ye shall die When Men give their full consent to sinful desires not only committing iniquity but having Pleasure therein Not only esteeming a sinful Life to be happy but also counting it their Wisdom with profane Esau to sell their Eternal Birth-right for one mess of such pottage why this now is to live after the Flesh and whoever thus lives he is dead whilst he lives Doth then thy fancy run in a way of Sinful objects with delight taking thought for the Flesh to fulfil it in the lusts thereof Dost thou make thy self the standard and thy sensual appetite the rule of all thy actions Hast thou an Heart carried out continually after sinful objects if absent desiring and grieving for them but if present rejoicing and delighting in them How dreadful oh brutish Sinner is thy present condition If thus to enjoy the Pleasures of Sin be the Life of thy Soul it s estranged from the Life of God and thou art dead though thou livest (e) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Philo. Leg. Alleg. lib. There is a Death saith Philo of the Man and there is a Death of the Soul The first which he calls the Death of the Man that 's the separation of the Soul from the Body the second which he calls the Death of the Soul that stands in the want of Grace and the presence of Sin Tho then thy Soul be not separated from thy Body yet what will all this avail so long as thou livest in Sin which is the most dreadful Death and wantest the Grace of God
the Prodigal be feeding upon Husks when there is Bread enough to spare in your Fathers House Will you still be building Tabernacles for your selves on Earth when the Lord shews you such Mansions of Glory prepared in Heaven Foolish Children When such an eternally glorious Reward is held out to you by the Hand of your heavenly Father how can you with any patience behold the World or think it worthy that you should spend so much as one thought upon it You should live Christians in the highest Region of an heavenly Conversation leaving those to scramble for the World that have nothing else to live upon (g) Sua sibi habeant regna reges suas divitias divites suam verò prudentiam prudentes relinquant nobis stultitiam nostram Lact. de Just lib. 5. cap. 12. pag. 493. That of Lactantius was a brave heroick Spirit which if throughly imbibed would make you all say with him let the Kings of the Earth have their Kindoms let â—â—e Rich Men have their Riches and the Prudent of this World let them have their Prudence to themselves so that they will only leave us the folly of seeking by patient continuance in well-doing Glory and Honour and Immortality and Eternal Life Get your Hearts fixed upon your Treasure in Heaven and I dare say it will never grudge you to see the Lord filling the Bellies of the Wicked with his hidden Treasure on Earth It matters not much what they have in hand so long as God allows you to have always an immarcessible Crown of Glory in you to Eye Oh this is the Happiness of Gods People even in this present World that having gotten their Hearts once weaned from earthly Comforts they live in the suburbs of the heavenly Jerusalem When once they leave off to feed with delight upon the Garlick and Onions of Aegypt they shall then sit down under the shadow of Gods dearest Love in Canaan and there find his Fruit sweet to their tast When once they turn away their Eyes from beholding worldly Vanities they may behold with delight the promised reward and have their Eyes continually feasted with the bright entrancing beams of Heavenly Glory (h) Quis non illius vitae desiderio praesentem vitum despierat Quis non illius abundantiae delectamento divitias temporis labentis exhorreat Quis non illius regni dilectione omnia terrena Regna contemnat Fulgent ad Theodor. epist 6. pag. 551. Who then for the desire of such a Life would not despise this present World Who for the delight of that abundance would not even fear the Riches of gliding time Who for the Love of that glorious Kingdom would not contemn as things of no value all earthly Kingdoms Oh believe it Christians you will have Meat to eat which the World knows not of living Heavenly-minded The World can never feast her greatest Favourites with those redundancies of Joy and Comfort which you may expect getting weaned affections to things below and living above Let therefore the Price of earthly Commodities fall and the price of heavenly Commodities rise in your thoughts And tho you be absent from your Treasure in Body yet see that you be always present therewith in Spirit In vain doth God afford you a prospect of Glory on Earth if it prove not a spiritual Load-stone to attract and draw up your Hearts as high as Heaven 8 WALK patiently as well satisfied to suffer and bear the worst of Afflictions that at length you may come to Heaven the best of Rewards Their Hearts may well be established with divine Patience in every condition whose Eyes God allows to be fixed in every Duty upon heavenly Glory And truly the condition of God's People in this present World doth evince the great necessity of Divine Patience to all that will live Godly in Christ Jesus Luther makes it the very definition of a Christian to be a Crucian who denying himself must take up his Cross and follow Christ The Lord Jesus hath two Crowns the one of Thorns the other of Glory They that would enjoy the latter and be crowned with Glory they must first undergo the former and be crowned with Thorns What the Holy Ghost said of Christ that it behoved him to suffer and so to enter into his Glory the very same holds true of all his People (i) Acts. 14.22 who through many afflictions must enter into the Kingdom of God The stones in Solomon's Temple were first hewen and polished and then set up into a stately Building So God's People first they must be hewen and carved by sufferings before they can be fit to build the Temple of God in the heavenly Jerusalem To all the People of God this World is a Wilderness not a Canaan an Egypt not a Paradise a troublesome Sea not an Harbour of Rest The day that is without clouds the light that is without Darkness the Joy that hath no sorrow is reserved for Heaven So then the misery of our present condition may well let us see the necessity of Christian Patience to suffer and wait upon God in it Without Patience every burden will seem too heavy every Cup that our heavenly Father puts into our Hand too bitter and every affliction too long But get Patience and that will lighten every burden have Patience and that will sweeten the bitterest potion lengthen Patience and that will make the time of all your afflictions seem short There is â— passive obedience required of all Christians that they may quietly suffer and 't is patience must help them If we bring evil upon our selves then we should afflict our Souls with Godly Sorrow but if the Lord bring evil upon us then we must exercise Patience both quietly hoping (k) Lam 3.26 and waiting for his salvation Christian Patience is not only a comely Grace making misery it self by a pious deportment under it seem amiable but 't is also a necessary Grace making the very worst of Miseries seem tolerable by framing a Mans mind to his present condition when his condition is not to his mind There are many Men professing the Christian Faith who if deliverance come not at their own Time they presently grow impatient of waiting God's time resolving to trade for it in their own way But were their Hearts established with divine Patience they would never thus precipitate their Mercies nor think that deliverance worth the having which only springs up out of the ruines of Faith and a good Conscience 'T is the nature of Christian Patience to make a Man tenacious of his integrity working in him a strong resolution not to purchase the greatest good with the commission of any the least evil This makes a Man the same in Prison as at Liberty the same in Poverty as when abounding with Riches the same when under reproach persecution and sorest calamities in the World as when the Sun of outward prosperity shone bright upon him Let what Storms will bluster abroad in the
in Sin he hath made himself a vessel of Wrath fitted for destruction So neither will he crown any Man before through patient continuance in well-doing he hath made himself meet to be a partaker of the inheritance of Saints in light We must first conquer before we can triumph first win the Garland before we can wear it first seek by Patient continuance in Well-doing Glory Honour and Immortality before ever God will crown us with Life Eternal How injurious then are all such to their own Souls that like Orpah take their leave of Christ to decline afflictions forsaking the favour of God for the love of this present World exchanging the Ark for Dagon the Doctrin of Christ for the Traditions of Antichrist the Worship of God in its native Beauty for the pomp and varnish of sordid superstition thus miserably ending in the Flesh though sometimes they seemed to have begun in the Spirit Are there not some amongst us (k) Gal. 5.7 with whom it is thus and of whom we may say as sometime Paul to the Galatians ye did run well who did hinder you that you should not obey the truth At your first setting out in the ways of God you did run to purpose then you were very resolved and sensible and seemed very serious But wo and alass such fatal effascination hath now bewitched you that like Sampson having lost your strength you move not at all in the Zodiack of true Godliness unless with Hezekiah's Sun by way of retrogradation Time was that Jehu-like you seemed to drive on with an holy fury for God in the work of reformation But now alas the Chariot-wheels of your Zeal are taken off and if you build not up Calves with Jeroboam at Dan and Bethel yet you can well sit down in a luke-warm indifferency under them Time was that you could not let a Day pass you without the performance of some Duty nor any duty without some experience of Gods Grace and Love and Goodness to you But now alass you can spend whole Days and Weeks if not some Months and yet never give the Lord a visit at least in such a formal manner that as God hath no Glory so your Souls have no comfort no incomes of Grace from Heaven no spiritual advantage thereby Time was that you spent much time in clearing up your evidences for Eternal Life giving all diligence to make your calling and election sure But now alass you can put Eternity it self to venture you have left off working for Heaven a sad sign that your motion was artificial not natural proceeding from a principle of Life within Time was that you counted it your delight to consecrate the Sabbath as holy unto God waited with joy for the rising of the Sun of Righteousness on that Day and were filled with many vehement pantings anhelations and breathings after God in his Ordinances But now alass there is such an unsavouriness upon your Spirits that you count it a weariness to serve the Lord and are so far from esteeming one Day in God's Courts better than a thousand elsewhere that you think that to be the longest Day in all the week crying when will the Sabbath be over In one word time was that you seemed to have escaped the pollutions that are in the World through Lust to be convinced of the evil of Sin to resolve against all Unrighteousness to bewail bitterly your Drunkeness your Pride your Uncleaness your improvident mispence of Time your horrid Oaths and bloody execrations together with all your Ungodly Practises But wo and alass do you not now turn from the holy Commandment delivered to you and instead of going on to reform your lives do you not return to your former vomit breaking forth into more obscene prodigious and abominable impieties than ever Oh let me my dear Friends out of that tender Love which I bear to your immortal Souls bespeak you in the language of God to his own People (l) Jer. 2.5 What iniquity have your Fathers found in me that they are gone far from me So what iniquity did you ever find in God and the ways of God that you are thus gone away from them and so soon grown weary of them What iniquity have you ever found in the invocation of holy fervent prayer that the wings thereof are now clipt your devotion grown cold and you come like slothful Suitors to God (m) Qui frigidè rogat docet negare as if you would teach the Lord to give you the repulse What Iniquity have you found in God's holy Sabbaths that you are grown weary to bear them and count it no great priviledge thereon to wait upon God and have sweet communion with him in the Beauties of Holiness What Iniquity have you found in Heavenly meditation that you cannot now soar aloft as formerly but like Sisera whose Head was nailed to the Earth have your hearts nailed and fast riveted to Earthly projects In short what iniquity did you ever find in the reformation of your lives abstaining from the many gross infamous and horrid pollutions that are in the World through lust Is there not as much evil in your Drunkeness swearing and the like abominable impieties now as ever Are they not as highly displeasing to the holy Spirit of God as greatly prejudicial to the welfare of your precious Souls as truly meritorious of Eternal Burnings in Hell as ever and is not that God who cut off Herod in his Robes Belshazzar in his Cups Babylon in its Pride Jezabel in her paint and whoredoms as able now to cut off you sinning after the same ensample and to punish you with everlasting destruction from his Presence and from the Glory of his Power Oh then if you love your Immortal Souls beware of recidivation take heed of relapsing again into any of those sinful courses which you formerly had escaped and be sure that you walk perseveringly endeavouring that you may never turn aside from the holy Commandment delivered to you Remember Lot's Wife nay remember Judas that Son of Perdition and take heed that you never look back in your Christian course If having set your hand to the Plough of an holy Profession you should afterward look back if having begun in the Spirit you should afterward end in the Flesh if having escaped the Pollutions that are in the World through lust you should again be intangled therein and overcome thereby your latter end will be worse more dreadful and damnable than your first beginning Your hopes have been raised high by your Christian Profession and therefore should you now miscarry you must needs sink the deeper in Hell and eternal Damnation And oh what Millions of Worlds would you not now give to change places in Hell with a Turk or an Infidel and to have no greater punishment there than an ordinary Damnation * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Every evil after the expectation of its opposite good becomes the greater evil What then will
Bags and Coffers are stored with Gold Because the World dandles you upon her Lap 't is no sure sign that you shall rest for ever in Abraham's bosom You may not think to be Heirs of Heaven because you are the Possessours of the Earth For not getting an Interest in the Recompence of the Reward now you are sure to go without it to all Eternity The good things of this present World you may love but the good things of Heaven and Glory you shall never have You may have a large Portion of earthly Enjoyments But shall never enjoy the Inheritance of Saints in Light †Psal 17.14 'T is no new thing for God to fill their Bellies with his hidden Treasures with the choicest of all earthly Comforts who never take any care to lay up for themselves a Treasure in Heaven But what alas will it profit you to have Earth in Hand if you have not Heaven in hope What though Riches and Honour are the Lot of your Inheritance amongst those whose Lot is Happiness and eternal Glory What relish think you hath Dives now left him of all his Delicacies or Esau of his dear-bought Pottage What pleasure hath the Rich Fool of his full Barns or that young Man of his large Possessions What delight hath Jezabel in her Paint or Ahab in Naboth's Vineyard What comfort can a Man have in the choicest Quintessence of any or in the greatest Confluence of all earthly Enjoyments who must receive them as his Portion and can never expect any other Happiness any other Portion or Reward in God's heavenly Kingdom It may be for the present thy Mony is thy Idol and thou art held in Thraldom under thy own Possessions but what will remain of thy Silver and Gold to carry thy Soul through the Storm of Death save only the (b) Jam. 5.3 rust thereof to joyn in Judgment against thee and torment thee eating thy Flesh like Fire for ever It may be thou art acted now by vain Glory and Desires of popular Applause but what will it then avail thee to be admired by thy fellow Prisoners and condemned by thy Judge It may be thou servest thy own Lust and another's Beauty but what Pleasure will there be in all this when the Fire of Lust shall be turned into the Fire of Hell It may be thy worldly Comforts and Accommodations are now looked upon by thee as thy greatest Happiness but what miserable Comforters will these be when peeping out of thy Grave thou shalt see Heaven and Earth all on a fire and Christ coming in the Flames thereof to take Vengeance upon thee There is a blessed God that could comfort in such an hour but thou must never see him There is a Crown of Glory that fadeth not away there is a Kingdom that cannot be moved there is all fulness of Joy and Soul-satisfying Pleasure but having thy Portion in this present World thou shalt never have these to comfort thee in the World to come Make the best of your Portion here of your Riches Honours and Pleasures on Earth for you must never receive any Portion hereafter you must never look to be Crowned with Life and Eternity of Glory in Heaven Oh then how unhappy are all those who neglect to get an Interest in the Recompence of the Reward have no Heaven but Earth no Glory but what will end in everlasting Shame and perpetual Contempt no Pleasures but what must shortly be changed into Hellish Intolerable and remediless Torments If you love your immortal Souls come away from all worldly Vanities and be sure to get an Interest in this glorious Reward that your Lives and your Happiness your Rejoycing and all your Comfort may not end together The greatest Portion in this Life will afford you but small Comfort of upon good Grounds you cannot look for a better Portion after Death 2 CONSIDER the Recompence of the Reward which God sets before us it 's a thing feasable and that which you may obtain if you will but seek it The Riches Kingdom and Glory of this World may be sought and yet never found But whoever by patient continuance in well-doing shall seek for Glory and Honour * Rom. 2.7 and blessed Immortality God will certainly Crown them with Life everlasting The Lord is willing to bestow Heaven the best of Rewards upon the worst of Sinners will they but embrace it This eternal Recompence of Reward 't is a thing indeed difficult to be obtained that none may despise it But yet it 's possible to be obtained that so none may sit down discouraged as despairing of it This Exhortation would be out of season to the Damned in Hell betwixt whom and eternal Glory there is a great Gulf fixed so that they are now no longer within the Possibilities of Life and Salvation But for you there is still Balm in Gilead to heal all your Wounds there is an all-sufficiency of Merit in Christ to expiate your Sins and there is still a most merciful Propensity of Will in God to Crown all those that diligently seek him with a glorious Reward And why then since Life is before you will you die the Death Why will you choose to be miserable under Tenders of Glory and eternal Happiness Why will you expose your selves to hellish Torments when the Lord himself doth so earnestly invite you to accept of Heaven Shall God be willing to give and yet you so unwilling to receive the Reward of eternal Life Oh why will you be such Enemies to your own Happiness making light of that great Salvation which though difficult is yet possible to be obtained Can you be content to fall short of eternal Glory and for ever to (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alexand. Admonit ad Gentes pag. mihi 6. a. be shut out of Heaven where is fulness of Joy Shall God hold out the Golden Scepter of his Grace and will you not so much as touch it to save your own Lives Must he follow you with daily Importunities of Love intreating you to accept of this glorious Reward to make you happy and will you still with Disdain turn your backs upon him as if the Favour of God in Christ as if Heaven and eternal Glory were not worth the having (d) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Hier. Praef Cateches pag. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Idem Cateches 1. pag. 3. The Lord is Bountiful and willing to give But yet he expects that you should be so dutiful as to receive with all thankfulness what he gives The bestowance of this glorious Reward doth indeed belong to God as his part But then the seeking and acceptance thereof doth belong to every one of you as your necessary indispensable Duty Give diligence then since God so freely offers with all thankfulness to embrace the Reward of eternal Life Were the Matter of this Exhortation an Impossibility exciting you to seek for what you could never find and to labour for what
be their Eternal condition in another World whether it be upon Sin unto Death or upon Righteousness unto life everlasting Whatever the Church of Rome may dogmatize of their Limbus Infantum a Receptacle for the Souls of Infants dying without Baptism or of a Purgatory for such as die in venial Sins whose guilt was not fully expiated * Omnis homo aut est cum Christo regnaturus aut cum Diabolo cruciandns Aug. Ser. 85. de Temp. Aut Caesar aut nullus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gregor Naz. in Pentecost Rom. 2.7 8 9. Yet as the ways of Men in this life are but two either Holy or Unholy so the Divine Oracle acknowledgeth no more than two Final and Everlasting estates for Men in the Life to come the one of Happiness the other of Misery the one of all fulness of Joy in God's presence and the other of everlasting Destruction from his Presence and from the Glory of his Power Hence it is said of God that to those who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for Glory and Honour and Immortality he will render eternal Life But to every Soul that hath Pleasure in Unrighteousness not obeying the Gospel Indignation and Wrath Tribulation and Anguish (*) Mat 25.31.46 And Christ himself declaring the Process of that great Day as he only takes Cognizance of two sorts of Men the one Righteous the other Wicked the one as Sheep on his right Hand the other as Goats on his left So he only makes mention of a twofold Sentence the one of Absolution the other of Condemnation each assigning to its proper Objects their everlasting Condition so that the Wicked in the Execution of this Sentence must go away into everlasting Punishment and the Righteous into life Eternal They that have not the Happiness to stand amongst the Sheep of Christ on the right Hand they must stand amongst the Goats on his left They that are not pronounced Blessed are pronounced Accursed And whoever is not called to inherit the Kingdom of God to be sure he must have his Portion with Hypocrites in the Lake that bumeth with Fire and Brimstone for ever Every Man's Works when he once comes to be matriculated amongst the Dead will (†) Opera sequuntur bonos persequuntur malos illi secundum opera coronâ justitiae donantur hi propter opera injustitiae quae injusti perpetrârunt oeternâ plectuntur miseriâ be sure to follow him either for his Comfort if they have been Righteous or for his eternal Confusion if Unrighteous Never think then my Brethren falling short of Heaven and Glory to escape the Damnation of Hell For as when the Light is departed a gloomy Darkness immediately thereupon succeedeth and taketh place So whoever are not counted Meet to be partakers of the Inheritance b of the (a) Col. 1.12 Saints in Light for them is reserved the (c) Heb. 10.27 Blackness of Darkness for ever And who to avoid Misery would not choose Happiness Who to escape everlasting Shame and perpetual Contempt in the World to come would not now make Glory his Option Who to prevent the heaviest Stroak of God's eternal Displeasure the furious gnawings of that Worm which never dies and the most exquisite Torments of everlasting Burnings in Hell would not now give diligence to lay up for himself a Treasure in Heaven Believe it Sinner thou that art a Demas embracing this present World thou that art a Judas betraying thy Lord and Master for thirty pieces of Silver thou that art an ungodly Achan hugging thy self in any accursed thing which God hath devoted thou in a word that art a prophane Esau selling thy Birth-right for a Mess of Pottage I have received a Commission from God to write bitter things against thee and out of love to thy poor Soul let me tell thee that if thus thou go on to make light of Heaven and Glory there remaineth nothing but a fearful looking for of Judgment d and fiery Indignation from the Lord to devour to torment and to burn thee for ever Oh then consider this all ye that forget God left he tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver you What is there in all the Profits Honours and pleasurable Vanities of this World that for them you should run the hazard of everlasting hellish Torments What is not Life to be preferred before Death Happiness before an Eternity of Misery and the Joys of Heaven before the everlasting Pains Tortures and Burnings of Hell Oh remember it Sinner there is that in Hell which though thy Flesh were of Iron and thy Bones of Brass might make thee tremble and thy Knees to smite one against another And yet in case thou be a Drunkard a Swearer a Covetous or an unclean Person making light of Heaven to enjoy thy Lust this is the place whither shortly thou (b) Jude 13. must go and wherein thou must erelong receive for thy Portion the Vengeance of eternal Fire For the Mouth of Truth hath spoken it and will make it good (d) Psal 9.17 that the Wicked shall be turned into Hell with all the Nations that forget God But that what I have said may effectually influence your Souls to look after Heaven give me leave to Epitomize Hell and to shew you in some few Particulars the Horrors wherewith this place of Torment is filled up to the brim 1 CONSIDER the Purity of Hell Torments which are a Cup of the Wine of God's fiercest Wrath unmixed wherein there is not to be found any one Ingredient of his Love or Mercy Here the worst of Men do enjoy some Good But in Hell even they whose Condition is the best they have nothing but Evil. There is not any Grant of the least Comfort to the greatest Torment not one drop of Hony in all the Gall which is given them to drink of nor so much as the least glimpse of heavenly Light in all that Cimmerian Darkness But (e) Jam. 2.13 Sorrow without Joy Death without (f) Potest dici quod etiam in eis damnatis scil misericordia locum habet in quantum citra condignum puniuntur Aq. Sup. 3. part q. 99. art 2. 1. Life and Judgment without Mercy must for ever be their Portion 'T is I know the Opinion of the Schoolmen that the very Reprobates in Hell are punished oitra condignum Whence some would infer that there is no place wherein there is not some Impression of God's Mercy nor any Creature which doth not tast of his Goodness But however God should mitigate some part of that Torment which the Sinner justly deserved and which in the Rigour of his Justice he might rightly have inflicted Yet as for any positive Effect of God's Mercy and Goodness in Hell the Damned are altogether unacquainted with it 'T is true both the Devils and Reprobates in Hell they have a Physical Being which in it self is good But yet to them it is nothing so as being only
interest in this Glorious Reward than a dead Man is capable of being made the Monarch of the whole Universe The Tree must first take root and be filled with sap before any precious Fruit can grow upon it So you must first have the Root of the matter within you and be filled with the Sap of Sanctifying Grace before ever you can be Trees of Righteousness bearing Fruit to Eternal Life A Man must first be born into the World before he can have any Dignities Honour on Preferment conferred upon him in the World Thus a Man also must first be born again from Heaven by the Holy Ghost before ever he can be preferred to the full enjoyment of Life and Eternal Glory in the Kingdom of God (c) John 3.3 For except a Man be born again from above saith Christ he cannot see the Kingdom of God d A Man must first be a Member of the Church militant on Earth by Sanctification before he can possibly be made a Member of the Church triumphant in Heaven by eternal glorification (e) Rom. 5.21 The Grace of God in Christ Jesus is that alone which must Crown us with Glory if ever we have it And yet know you must that the Grace of God itself will never reign but through Righteousness unto Eternal Life The grand Reward of a Christian is the beatifical Vision of God in Glory But because he is an infinitely pure and holy God (f) Heb. 12.14 why therefore without Holiness you must never look to see him as your Happiness and Reward What should they do with an Holy God who are not themselves sanctified Or how can they behold with Comfort the Holy one of Israel who have not a pure Eye but are all over polluted and stained with Sin Never think to be a Vessel of Glory if first thou be not seasoned throughout in Body Soul and Spirit with renewing Grace But oh how long shall these things be Paradoxes and hidden Mysteries amongst you Where is the Man in our Congregations that knows by his (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alex. own experience what it is to be made a new Creature to be born of the Spirit from above to have his Heart washed in the Laver of Regeneration from all uncleaness and in a Word to be â—aised by the Almighty irresistable power of God from the Death of Sin to the Life of Grace Are not most Men pleasing themselves with external performances making their Prayers their Alms their good Works a fufficient Qualification for Heaven whilst they never think of getting sanctified Hearts and renewed Natures (g) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Macar Hom. 30. Oh that all such amongst you would now consider how impossible it is for any Man to obtain the Reward of Eternal Glory not being first born again from above and made a new Creature Poor self destroying Sinners if here you become not Men of a pure Heart you must never see the Face of God in the Kingdom of Heaven but the Furnace of Hell is heating for you and a Night of Eternal Darkness abides you in the World to come And is it nothing do you think to be shut out of Heaven and to fall into Hell irrecoverably Is it nothing to miss of Eternal Life and for ever to lose the Reward of Eternal Glory that you can live and die so well satisfied in a carnal unregenerate Condition True it is while we are in this World living by sense little do we conceive what it is to be saved to sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the Prophets in the Kingdom of God what it is to have full and Everlasting Communion with God in Glory nor can we so prize these things now as we ought to do Oh but we shall come to breath out our Souls into Eternity and must stand trembling at God's Tribunal to receive our everlasting doom then to be sure Life Happiness and Eternal Glory will be in request Oh then that in such a Day when all the World cannot comfort you Life may be yours and Salvation yours and the full enjoyment â—f God in Heaven yours give diligence now to have the Truth and Life of Grace in your inward Parts endeavouring to find a through sanctifying Change wrought upon you Remember if you die in a carnal Condition you are undone for ever damned for ever But if sanctified through the Spirit and made new Creatures the Reward of Eternal Glory shall be your Portion 4 Lay hold upon Jesus Christ by a lively Faith above all things labouring to get an interest in him Christ hath purchased by his own Death the reward of Eternal Life But it s not for all promiscuously whether good or bad but only for those that by Faith receive him making him their Saviour Though Christ were as universal a cause of Salvation as the Arminians dogmatize Yet till by Faith you embrace him as willing to receive him in all his Offices as a Prophet to instruct and teach you as a Priest to intercede and die for you as a King to command sanctifie and govern you to be sure he will never profit you to Life and Salvation * John 5.12 He that hath the Son hath Life but he that hath not the Son hath no Life Both the Life of Grace and the Life of Glory come in by Christ he alone is the Tree from whence you may gather this Fruit of Paradise And therefore of necessity you must close with Christ would you either have the Life of Grace to make you holy or the Life of eternal Glory to make you happy Salvation for lost Sinners could no otherwise be purchased but by the precious Blood of the Lord Jesus And though now the purchase be thus made yet the Blood of Christ cannot save you unless you receive him to dwell in your Hearts by Faith Communion is never to be found but where first some kind of union went before to usher it in So that though Christ came into the World to repair our lost condition to cleanse us from all unrighteousness to deliver our Souls from the Wrath to come and to make us meet by â—his Spirit working in us for the full enjoyment of God in Glory Yet if first we be not united to Christ we can never have the Happiness of Communion with him in these and the like glorious Priviledges but notwithstanding the Blood the Death the Sufferings of Christ must for ever fall short of Eternal Glory How dreadful then is the condition of every Christless Sinner There is an All-sufficiency of Merit in Christ but it shall never procure their Pardon There is a redundancy of Grace in Christ But it shall never sanctify nor make them holy There is a Soveraignity in the Blood of Christ but it shall never cleanse their Souls from Sin a There is an indeficient Fountain of Life in Christ But refusing him they must inevitably die the Death and suffer the
(b) Erimus Christiani cum Christo gloriosi de Deo patre beati de perpetua voluptate laetantes semper in conspectu Det agentes Deo gratias semper Cyprian ad Demetr pa. 331. you shall be glorious as Christ is glorious blessed of God replenished with all fulness of Joy and shall have an everlasting Sabbath of Rest taking up your sweetest Repose in the Bosom of your blessed Redeemer loving praising and enjoying him in one eternal Soul-entrancing Fruition HOW chearfully then may the People of God undergo their present Sufferings and entertain when it comes their approaching Dissolution The hope which Jacob had to enjoy the beautiful Rachel was to him a comfortable Hope under all his Hardships yet not worthy to make an Emblem of ours who hope within a few days more to enjoy the Light of God's Countenance and the Soul-ravishing Beauty of our blessed Redeemer's Face in Glory Affliction may attend God's People all their Life long but only as a Foil to set off their future Blessedness and make Heaven so much the sweeter Death it self that bold Pursuivant will erelong look in at the Windows of God's dearest Children but only as their Birth-day to an Eternity of Joy unspeakable and beyond imagination Lift up then your Heads with Joy amidst all your Afflictions to that Crown of Life that follows after And while the Thorn of Death is at your Breast ready to let out your Life-blood even then let your Souls break forth like so many heavenly Nightingales into singing as knowing that your bodily Dissolution will only make way for your Coronation in Glory You (c) Psal 126.5 6. may sow in Tears but shall reap in Joy You may go out weeping though you be such as bear precious Seed but shall doubtless come again rejoycing and bring your full Sheaves of Glory along with you Sorrow you may have over Night when you have the advantage of the Season to sleep it out and pass it over But your Joy will come in the Morning when you shall enter fresh upon it and have before you to enjoy it in the whole Day of a blessed Eternity that will never be over Your Joys are now mixt with Sorrows your Comforts with many Crosses and your Light with much Darkness But having finished your Course Death will put an end to all your Sorrows remove your Crosses and so compass you about with the Light of Glory When wicked Men die their Works follow them in eternal Hellish-torments But when the People of God die their Works follow them in the full Reward of everlasting heavenly Glory For Believers over Hell and Death Christ hath got the Victory and lets (d) 1 Cor. 15.57 them wear the Grown So that (e) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost now Death which to wicked Men is porta inserni the Gate of Hell to you that believe is become in tâ—â—itus coeli an entrance into Heaven Death which to the wicked is as God's Serjeant to drag them into the infernal fiery Dungeon is to you the Lord's Gentleman Usher to conduct you into the supernal Palace of heavenly Glory And who would not through Storms and Tempests to come to such a Harbour Who would not embrace a fiery Tryal Complement Death and come to the Grave with gladness knowing that to be the ready way to the coelestial Paradise They that come from (f) Chrysost hom de divit Laz. a City to a Country Village to transact Matters of Concern there when their Business is well accomplished they return into the City again with Joy Thus Christians you whose Souls came from the new Jerusalem to Negotiate the great Matters of Eternity here in this World having finished your Course and kept the Faith how joyful may you return like so many Royal Ships laden with the richest Merchandise to that heavenly City where the (g) Rev. 21.23 Lamb will be your Light and God your Glory Well may you be content to serve an hard Apprentiship here so you may come hereafter to be made free Denizens of this heavenly Jerusalem Well may you go on in the Work of the Lord having such a Crown in your Eye and so sure after all your Conflicts to be set upon your Heads Well may you Christians having that clear prospect of Glory which (h) At enim nos exequias adornamus eadem tranquillitate quâ vivimus Minut. Foel Oct. 125. erelong like a divine Load-stone will draw you to it self subscribe your selves upon all Occasions with that resolved Servant of Christ Ann Ayscough such as neither Fear Death nor dread his Might but as merry as those that are bound for Heaven Now unto the King Eternal Immortal Invisible the only Wise God be Honour and Glory for ever and ever Amen FINIS Mr. Joseph Cooper's Advice to his Wife and Children THE Regions of Eternal Love Which I approach my Soul doth move Something Divine with you to leave While Death of me doth you bereave When I in silent Dust do dwell These Lines to you my Love shall tell Your Widows Vail when you put on Your Fatherless when they make moan Accept these Words naught else I crave Do not despise your Husband 's Grave Know Life is short and Death most sure To dying thoughts yourself inure What I am now Dust and a Shade Your self must be your Life doth fade Let warm Repose nourish no Sin Old Age approaching courts Death in Of my cold Bed in Dust take part You must with or against your Heart This I suggest from silent urn That whilst I speak your Heart may burn And be inflam'd with heavenly Love Aspiring still to things above Your Children sweet in number many Resign to God reserve not any He is their Father and he will Their Souls with all his Goodness fill Doubt not his Love or tenderness To Widows and to Fatherless Can Love you hate can Life you kill Can evil spring from God's good will This is his will that Widows chast Should trust in God and not make hast This is his Goodness to their Seed He will them help in time of need Upon this Promise still depend It fills with joy makes God your Friend His heart is open and his hand Treasures of Love and Grace command To Widows that are pure in heart And Children he doth Life impart And let me whisper one thing more You and your Children have in store Treasures of Sighs Tears Groans and Prayers Of which you are the rightful Heirs He that in silent dust doth sleep For you to God did often weep Nay weeping was his easiest part He sigh'd he groan'd he broke his heart Strugling with God that he might give You Grace in Christ to make you live Hoping for this he did expire God will you save you shall admire Sweet Children and my Spouse most dear Live still by Faith and nothing fear But Sin which is the root of Strife The Seed of Death the Plague of Life Your