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A58787 The Christian life from its beginning, to its consummation in glory : together with the several means and instruments of Christianity conducing thereunto : with directions for private devotion and forms of prayer fitted to the several states of Christians / by John Scott ... Scott, John, 1639-1695. 1681 (1681) Wing S2043; ESTC R38893 261,748 609

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consists in Virtue and true Goodness it hence follows that all the Religion of the Means is insignificant to our Reconciliation with God if it doth not render us truly virtuous So that till this is effected there is so vast a Gulph between God and Us that neither We can go to Him nor He come to Vs and unless he alter his Nature by becoming impure as we are impure or we alter ours by becoming pure as He is pure there will be so immense a Distance between Him and Us as that it is impossible we should ever meet and agree So that what the Prophet saith of Sacrifice may be truly affirmed of all Religion of the Means Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of Rams or with ten thousands of Rivers of Oyl will He be reconciled upon our bare believing praying or receiving Sacraments c. No no He hath shewed thee O man what is good And what doth the Lord require of thee but to do justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with thy God Mich. vi 7 8. II. THIS Religion of the Means is of no farther Use as to the perfecting our Natures than as it is instrumental to produce and promote in us those Heavenly Virtues which are implied in the Religion of the End For doubtless to be a Perfect Man is to live up to the Highest Principle of Humane Nature which is Reason and till we are once released from the slavery of Sense and Passion and all our Powers of Action are so subdued to this superiour Principle as to be wholly regulated by it and we chuse and refuse and love and hate and hope and fear and desire and delight according as right Reason directs we are in a maimed and imperfect Condition Now what else is Virtue but a Habit of Living according to the Laws of Reason or of demeaning our selves towards God our selves and all the World as best becomes Rational Beings placed in our Condition and Circumstances And till we are in some measure arrived to this our Nature is so far from being perfect that it is the most wretched and confused thing in the whole world A more undistinguished Chaos where Frigida cum Calidis Sense and Reason Brute and Man are shuffled together without any order like a confounded Heap of Ruines And therefore as for this Religion of the Means it will be altogether insignificant to the Perfection of our Natures unless by the Practice of it we do acquire a Habit of acting according to the Law of our Reason which Habit includes all Heavenly Virtue For constantly to know and do what is best and most reasonable is the very Crown and Perfection of every reasonable Nature and therefore so far as our Faith and Consideration our Sorrow for Sin and the other Instrumentals of Religion promote this Heavenly Habit in us so far are they perfective of our Nature and no farther III. THIS Religion of the Means is of no farther Use to Us as to the Entitling us to Heaven than as it is productive of those Heavenly Virtues which the Religion of the End implies For our Title to Heaven depending wholly upon Gods Promise must immediately result from our performance of those Conditions upon which he hath promised it which till we have done we can have no more Claim or Title to it than if he had never promised it at all But the sole Condition upon which he hath promised it is Universal Righteousness and Goodness for so without Holiness we are assured that no man shall see God and Mat. v. our Saviour intails all the Beatitudes of Heaven upon those Heavenly Virtues of Purity of Heart Benignity of Temper c. So also Rom. ii 7 the Promise of Eternal Life is limited to our Patient Continuance in well doing And that we may know before hand what to trust to our Saviour plainly tells us that not every one that cries Lord Lord that makes solemn Prayers and Addresses to me shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven but he that doth the will of my Father which is in Heaven And this is the will of God saith the Apostle even our Sanctification that is our being purged from all Impurities of Flesh and Spirit and inspired with all Heavenly Virtues And the Apostle expresly enumerates those Virtues upon which our Entrance into Eternal Life is promised 2 Pet. i. 5 6 7 8. Add to your Faith Virtue and to Virtue Knowledge and to Knowledge Temperance and to Temperance Patience and to Patience Godliness and to Godliness Brotherly Kindness and to Brotherly Kindness Charity For if these things be in you and abound saith he they make you that you shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the Knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ that is That you shall receive the proper Fruit of that Knowledge which is Eternal Life for thus v. xi he goes on For so or upon this Condition an Entrance shall be ministred unto you abundantly into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. So that unless our Faith purifies our Hearts and works by Love unless our sorrow for Sin works in us Repentance or a Change of Mind unless our Prayers raise in us Divine and Heavenly Affections that is unless we so practise the Duties of the Religion of the Means as thereby to acquire the Virtues of the Religion of the End it will be all as insignificant to our Title to Heaven as the most indifferent Actions in the World IV. THIS Religion of the Means is of no farther Use to the disposing and qualifying us for Heaven than as it is an effectual means of the Religion of the End Which is a perfectly distinct Consideration from the former For it would be no advantage to us to have a Right to Heaven unless we were antecedently qualified and disposed for it Because Pleasure which is a Relative thing implies a Correspondence and Agreement between the Object and the Faculty that tasts and enjoys it But in the Temper of every wicked Mind there is a strong Antipathy to the Pleasures of Heaven which being all chast and pure and spiritual can never agree with the vitiated Palat of a base and degenerate Soul For what concord can there be between a spiteful and devilish Spirit and the Fountain of all Love and Goodness between a sensual and carnalized one that understands no other Pleasures but only those of the Flesh and those Pure and Virgin Spirits that neither eat nor drink but live for ever upon Wisdom and Holiness and Love and Contemplation Certainly till our Mind is contempered to the Heavenly State and we are of the same disposition with God and Angels and Saints there is no Pleasure in Heaven that can be agreeable to us For as for the main we shall be of the same Temper and Disposition when we come into the other World as we are when we leave this it being unimaginable how a Total Change should be wrought in us meerly
whole he should maintain a Modest Opinion of himself and not think better of his own Conduct and Management of himself than it deserves For by so doing he will be apt to overlook his own Misgovernments and so incapacitate himself for any farther Improvements And in these five Particulars consists all that Virtue which belongs to a man considered meerly in the Capacity of a Rational Animal The First is the Virtue of Prudence The Second is the Virtue of Moderation The Third is the Virtue of Fortitude The Fourth is the Virtue of Temperance The Fifth is the Virtue of Humility All which as I shall shew are Essential Parts of the Christian Life and such as do effectually contribute to our Heavenly Happiness I. PRUDENCE And this is the Root and Ground-Work of all other Virtues 'T is this that gives Law and Scope to all our Motions that proposes the Ends and prescribes the Measures of our Actions For Prudence consists in being guided and directed by Right Reason as it proposes to us the worthiest Ends and directs us to the fittest and most effectual Means of obtaining them So that to live prudently is to live in the constant Exercise of our Reason and to be continually pursuing such Ends as Right Reason proposes by such Means as Right Reason directs us to which is the proper Business of all the Virtues of Religion And hence Religion in the Scripture is frequently called by the Name of Wisdom or Prudence The Fear of the Lord that is Wisdom saith Job and to depart from Evil that is Vnderstanding Job xxviii 28 And the fear of the Lord is the beginning of Wisdom saith David Psal. cxi 10 where the Fear of the Lord comprehends all the Acts of Religion which are therefore wise and prudent because they are the fittest Means to those worthiest Ends which Right Reason proposes So that to exercise our Reason in the Search and Discovery of what is absolutely best for us and to follow our Reason in the Pursuit and Acquest of what it discovers to be so is that virtue of Prudence whereunto we stand obliged as we are Rational Animals FOR our Reason being the noblest Principle of our Nature That by which we are raised above the Level of Brutes yea by which we are allied to Angels and do border upon God himself ought upon that account to be submitted to as the supream Regent and Directress of all our other Powers and to be looked upon as the Rule of our Will and the Guide of all our Animal Motions And when to gratifie our sensual Appetites or unreasonable Passions we either neglect those Ends which our Reason proposes to us or pursue them by such Means as our Reason disallows of we reverse the very order of our Natures and tread Antipodes to our selves And while we do so it is impossible we should be happy either here or hereafter For every thing you see is diseased while it is in an unnatural State and Condition while its Parts are displaced or put into a Disorder or distorted into an unnatural Figure And so it is with a Man who while he preserves his Faculties in their natural Station and Subordination to each other while he keeps his Affections and Appetites in subjection to his Will and his Will to his Reason he is calm and quiet and enjoys within himself perpetual Ease and Tranquillity But when once he breaks this order and suffers his Passions or his Appetites to usurp the Place of his Reason to impose contrary Ends to it or prescribe contrary Means his Faculties like disjointed Members are in perpetual Anguish and Anxiety And hence it is that in the Course of a wicked Life we feel such restless Contentions between our Spirit and Flesh between the Law in our Minds and the Law in our Members because our Nature is out of Tune and its Faculties are displaced and disordered and that sovereign Principle of Reason which should sway and govern us is deposed and made a Vassal to our Appetites and Passions For in all our evil Courses we chuse and refuse resolve and act not as Reason directs us but as Sense and Passion biasses us and our Reason having nothing to do in all this Brutish Scene of Action either sleeps it out without minding or regarding or else sits by as an idle Spectator of it and only censures and condemns it And it is this that causes all that Tumult and Contest that is in our Natures and till by the Exercise of Prudence our Faculties are reduced and set in order again our Mind will be like our Body while its Bones are out of Joint continually restless and unquiet And therefore to remove this great Indisposition of our Nature to Happiness Prudence is required of us as one of the principal Virtues of the Heavenly Part of the Christian Life FOR thus our Saviour injoins that we should be wise as Serpents as well as harmless as Doves Mat. x. 16 which though it be here prescribed in a particular Case only viz. that of Persecution yet since the Reason of it extends to all other Cases and it is fit we should be Prudent in all our Undertakings as well as in suffering Persecution it is upon that account equivalent to an universal Command So also Ephes. v. 15 See that ye walk circumspectly not as fools but as wise i. e. In the whole Course of your Actions take heed that ye follow the Guidance of your Reason and do not suffer your selves to be seduced by your blind Passions and Appetites which are meer Ignes Fatui or the Guides of Fools And accordingly the Apostle prays for his Christian Colossians That they might be filled with the Knowledge of God in all Wisdom and spiritual Vnderstanding Coloss. i. 9 i. e. That they might have such a knowledge of Gods will as might render them truly prudent and cause them to pursue the best Ends by the best Means And though this Virtue seldom occurs in the new Testament under its own Name yet as in the above-named Places it is expressed by Wisdom so it is elsewhere by Knowledge as particularly 2 Cor. vi 6 where he commands the Ministers of the Church to approve themselves such by several Virtues and particularly by Pureness i. e. Continence and by Knowledge i. e. by Prudence For besides that Knowledge as it signifies an Vnderstanding of Divine Things was not a Virtue in the Apostles but a Gift of God and so not proper to be enumerated amongst these Virtues there is hardly any Account to be given why the Apostle should place Knowledge in the midst of so many Moral Virtues if he did not thereby mean the Virtue of Prudence which is as it were the Eye and Guide of all the other Virtues So again 2 Pet. i. 6 where he bids us add to Faith Virtue i. e. Fortitude or Constancy of Mind and to Virtue Knowledge and to Knowledge Temperance By Knowledge it is highly probable he means Prudence