if the Wicked be not dreadfully Besotted to go on in a course of Ungodliness Oh tell me or yourselves rather if the Flesh be not a deadly Enemy if the World be not a murtherous Traytor that for the Pleasures of Sin which are but for a season would make us to forfeit such fulness of unutterable Joyes at God's right hand for evermore What Man that is well in his Wits considering these things would delight in the Pleâ—sures of Death to losâ— for them the Paradise of God To live a life of sensual Pleasure or to win the World by works of Darâ—ness what is your Gain poor Mortals if you lose the Inheritance of Saints in light Remember Heaven is an holy place into which nothing that defiâ—eth or is unclean can ever enter Queen Elizabeth they say observing once in her Progress some Pictures of her self hung up that were much unlike her caused them to be pulled down and burnt Burning and everlasting Destruction in Hell must be the end of all those who strive not to become like God in Purity and Holiness Besure therefore that you be found changed into his Image Let every unrighteous way be shunned and let Religion be your 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the great Business of your Lives would you ever escape Misery and be Crowned with Glory You must both begin and hold on in the Spirit would you ever come to the Spirits of Just Men made Perfect He that would have his Holiness carry his Soul to Heaven must be sure to carry it to the Grave with him Perseverance that is the Crowning Grace and yet few there be who do Crown their good Undertakings with Perseverance Albeit that those alone who continue in Well-doing to the end shall be Saved Yet small is the number of those who make not a full end of Well-doing before ever Salvation be obtained The hands of our Faith and Obedience like those of Moses are apt to grow weary and to hang down if the living Stone of an eternally glorious Reward be not put under them by a due Respect had thereunto That therefore our Hearts may never fail us nor our Hands grow weary in Well-doing the Lord allows us to have with Moses an Eye-fixed upon the Recompence of Life everlasting WHAT then remains but that we all give diligence to answer the Lord's Bounty with undaunted Perseverance in a way of Duty looking carefully to ourselves that we lose not the things which we have wrought but that having finished our Course with Joy we may receive a full Reward He that holâ—s the Mystery of the Faith in a pure Conscience shall be Saved but he that makes Shipwrack of Faith and a good Conscience shall be Damned Look to it Christians exchange not Canaan for Egypt exchange not Heaven for Hell Oh take heed that you make not Sale of a Crown of Life of a Kingdom that cannot be shaken for the Wages of Unrighteousness NOW may the Lord make this ensuing Discourse to you like a Golden Spur to extimulate and provoke to Diligence in the way to Sion May He cause it like so much divine Nepenthe to expel your worldly Sorrows and to fill your Souls with the Oyl of Gladness May he let you find it as a Pillar of Fire to guide you through this Wilderness to the Land of Promise May he change it whilst you shall meditate upon it into the Chariot of Amminidab that will carry your Hearts away into Heaven enabling you to lay up for yourselves a Treasure there So Prayeth Yours in the Faith Love and Service of the Everlasting Gospel for JESUS's Sake JOSEPH COOPER A PROSPECT OF Heavenly Glory For the Comfort of Sion's Mourners HEB. XI xxvi For he had Respect unto the Recompence of the Reward CHAP. I. The Con-Text Cleared the Text Divided and the Terms Explained with the Doctrine Observed from the Words SINCE first the Tree of Knowledge became an occasion of eternal Death to us the Tree of Life it self hath brought forth almost nothing else but Apples of Contention amongst us some Affirming That we are to Merit eternal Life by our Obedience and others denying the Lawfulness of having any respect at all to eternal Life in our Obedience though only by way of Incouragement and as the unmerited and gratuitous Reward which God hath freely promised to all that Diligently seek him Heb. 11.6 BUT as Christ himself the sole Author of eternal Life to all that obey him was Crucified betwixt Two Thieves so that which I take to be the Truth of God in this case as neither Derogating from the Freeness of his Grace nor yet Patronizing Disingenuity and a Mercenary Spirit in Man why it lyes inviolate betwixt these Two Extremes which are both of them Errors of no less dangerous Consequence than of manifest and palpaâ—â—e Repugnancy to the unerring Rule of Truth God's holy Word For though we may not have Respect to the purchasing of eternal Life by our Obedience yet we may lawfully have Respect to the Possession of it in our Obedience And though we must not make eterâ—al Life the sole Ground of Obeying the Lord yet we may lawfully with Moses to quicken us in our Obedience have Respect to the Recompence of Reward as I hope by Divine assistance having first given you the Dependance and genuine Sense of them to make good from the Words of my Text. FOR the Dependance of the Words we must know that if we look upon the general state of this Chapter wherein they have their place of residence we shall find it to be an Apostolical Abridgment of the Old Testament in that part thereof which is Historical containing a Narration of the Heroical Atchievements of those Famous Worthies of the Lord the excellency of whose Faith in the many eminent Fruits and invincible Operations of it is herein left upon everlasting Record as that which shall be found unto Praise and Honour and Glory at the blessed Appearance of Jesus Christ. 1 Pet. 1.7 AMONGST these Famous Worthies of whom both Men and Women our Apostle gives a particular Catalogue as of Persons made Glorious by the unblastable Fruits of a lively Faith some have Renowned themselves as Servants actively by their doing and living to God and others have approved themselves as Soldiers passively by their Magnanimous Suffering and Dying for God But now Moses of whom my Text is spoken stands fully interested in both Conditions as having given sufficient Testimony of his Faith not only by what he did but also by what he suffered not only by laying forth his Life in the ways of God but also by his readiness to lay down both Riches and Honours and Pleasures yea and Life it self for the Cause of God For whereas whilst yet in his Non-age he had the Honour to be called the Son of Pharoah's Daughter yet no sooner did he come to Age and arrive at the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of true Wisdom but he voluntarily renounced that Priviledge
patient waiting upon God in all the ways of Obedience that whatsoever the Lord shall call us out to do or suffer we may with chearfulness undergo it all This is that I confess which some will not endure telling us that as we are to give looking for nothing again so we are to walk in all dutiful Obedience before God doing and suffering Whatever he calls us out to without taking any incouragement at all thereto from the Recompence of Reward But certainly the Holy Ghost hath given us in Holy Writ such abundant satisfaction concerning the lawfulness of taking incouragement from the Recompence of Reward to follow hard after God in all the ways of Obedience that no Christian need perplex himself upon that account (g) Justitiae operanti dabitur Corona Ne qui justitiam operatur segnescens oneri laboris succumbat For is not this the great design of God in making Promises of Life Happiness and Eternal Glory to those that obey him thereby to incourage us to all dutiful and obedient walking before him God hath tyed our Work and our Wages together that expecting to receive from him at death the Wages of Eternal Glory we might work the more chearfully for him all our life And that we may not look upon the way of Duty as tedious nor count his Commandments grievous he hath set up a Crown of Life at the end of Duty and assured us That in keeping his Commandments there is great Reward Psal 19.11 GOD is not so austere a Task-master as to envy his People their Comforts in a way of Duty nor will he ever impute it to them as their ruin that in keeping his Commandments they had an eye for their own incouragement to the Recompence of the Reward And truly if to be incouraged in a way of Obedience by the Recompence of Reward may be construed a just forfeiture of a Mans ingenuity as some would bear us in hand I see not for my part how we shall be able to excuse any of God's dearest Children no nor our Blessed Lord himself but must confess them to have been acted by a slavish and servile Spirit which yet to do were the first-born of all horrid Blasphemies For though it should have been written in Capital Letters with a Pen pluckt from the wing of a glorious Seraphim yet it could not have been more plain and legible than the Holy Ghost hath already expressed it that the most holy of all God's Children our Blessed Redeemer himself not accepted had an eye for their incouragement in all the ways of Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward WHAT else did holy Moses but incourage himself to suffer Affliction with God's People by the consideration of Life and eternal Glory in Heaven prepared of God from Eternity for all that Love him Was not this also the Paradice of those Primitive Martyrs who took joyfully the spoiling of their Goods having this as their great Incouragement thereto that they knew themselves to have in Heaven a better and more enduring Substance Heb. 10.34 THE like we may say of those other Worthies who scorned all earthly Injoyments that their Persecutors could offer as Allurements to insnare them not accepting Deliverance from them upon any base and unrighteous Terms but were endued with such a Gallantry and Christian Resolution that rather than dishonour God in the least rather than cast a little Incense upon the Altar in honour of the Idol for the saving of their Lives they would dye the Death they would be Slain with the Edge of the Sword they would be Stoned they would be Burned and Sawn asunder having this strong and everlasting Consolation incouraging them with Patience to undergo all this barbarous and inhumane Cruelty that they hoped to obtain a better Resurrection even a Resurrection to Life and eternal Glory in the Kingdom of Heaven Heb. 11. BUT waving these and the like Instances I shall give you an Instance against which none can except but those whose proud Spirits would make them seem more Holy than Holiness it self and that is of Our blessed Redeemer concerning whom it is thus Written That for the Joy which was set before him he endured the Cross despising the Shame Heb. 12.2 I shall not hence take occasion to determine whether the Sorrow the Cross and the Humiliation of Christ were the Meritorious Cause or only the Antecedent of his Joy his Crown and his Exaltation at the Right Hand of God in Glory as being wholly Excentrick to my present Design But let the decision of that famous Controversy from this Text be what it will yet I think the Apostle's words do concludingly Evince thus much That Christ having an eye to his Mediatory Glory and Exaltation at God's Right Hand in Heaven was incouraged thereby with Patience to undergo that most execrable painful and ignominious Death of the Cross for our Sakes DO not then Question the Lawfulness of this holy Practice any longer but having an Eye stedfastly fixed upon the Recompence of the Reward be incouraged thereby to all diligent and upright walking before God in wayes of Obedience whatever it cost you IF the Men of the World for your Integrity Frown upon you and hate you let this incourage you to hold it fast that God himself will Smile upon you and afford you his Loving-kindness which is better than Life (h) Affecit te aliquis ignominia Quiu tu ad eam suspice gloriam quae reposita est in coelis Jactura rerum tuarum adijsti Oculos imprime fixius coelestibus divitijs Patrione solo exclusus es At patriam habes coelestem Hierusalem If because you cannot comply with the Men of the World in their sinful and ungodly Practises they should cast you into Prison yet let this incourage you still to keep close with God that he will shortly knock off your Fetters and take you up into Mansions of eternal Glory If you meet with any Cross in Heaven's way let this incourage you with Patience to undergo it that e'er long you shall receive from Christ a Crown of Righteousness If in a word any subtil Persecutors should promise you injoyment of Life and Liberty on condition that you will but comply with them and do as they do why let the Hopes of obtaining a better Resurrection that is to say a Resurrection to eternal Life and Glory in the Kingdom of God let this incourage you to scorn the motion not accepting Deliverance from them upon any such dishonourable and unrighteous Terms For when for the Joy which is set before us we can do any thing part with any thing and suffer any thing with Patience that God calls us to chosing rather to indure the most exquisite Torments than in the least to Dishonour our God why then we have an Eye indeed to the Recompence of the Reward 6. TO design in all your Obedience the Salvation of your own Souls making this the great end of your Lives that at
nor could Mary Magdalen refrain her weeping by Christ's (b) John 20.14 15. Sepulchre because though Christ was present with her yet she did not know him So though the Well of Life Everlasting be before us and Christ having the Reward of eternal Glory in his Hand be present with us to Crown us yet if we know not all this we may well be filled with Sorrow and go weeping as Men without Hope from day to day For it is not so much Heaven as the Assurance of Heaven nor so much an Interest in eternal Life as the Knowledg of our Interest in that glorious reward that can wipe away all Tears from our Eyes and make our Hearts rejoyce with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory The Safety of your Souls depends indeed upon your Interest in the Recompence of eternal Glory that gives them the strongest Security against an everlasting Shipwrack so that let what Storms and Tempests will be abroad in the World yet having an Interest in heavenly Glory they shall never miscarry but be landed safe upon the wished Shoar of eternal Rest But yet the Comfort of your Souls and Hearts and Lives doth mainly depend upon the Knowledg and Assurance of that blessed Interest You may be safe with a bare Interest in Heaven but you can never be Comfortable nor free from Heart-perplexing Thoughts all the day long without knowing your Interest without some Assurance of Heaven as your eternal Inheritance The Sun when hid in a Cloud doth not yield those comfortable Irradiations and guilded Beams of Brightness to refresh us as at other times when shining forth in its Noon-day Splendour So neither must you expect the like Comfort from Heaven and eternal Glory to solace your Hearts your Interest therein being hid from your Eyes as otherwise they would afford did you but know Heaven to be your home and eternal Glory to be entailed upon you as your Portion in another World You then that would live Comfortable and die Triumphing give diligence to know what Right you have to the Recompence of Reward 'T will afford you little Comfort to have Heaven in your Eye so long as you want the Assurance of Heaven in your Hearts not knowing but you may eternally fall short of it A prospect of eternal Glory without a known Interest in eternal Glory will prove but a dull Cordial Be thy Right to eternal Life never so good yet thou losest the Comfort thereof so long as thy Evidences for eternal Life are not cleared up And had you rather dwell in the Tents of Kedar invelop'd in thick Darkness than to live and die assured of the heavenly Jerusalem as your own Inheritance Had you rather walk under the Fears of Death and be filled every day with the dreadful Apprehensions of eternal Burnings than to know that your Names are written in the Book of Life Had you rather be wandring in the Wilderness not knowing whether ever you shall come to Canaan than to be upon sure ground for that holy Land Had you rather be shut up in a black Cloud than solace your Souls in the bright Sun-shine of God's Love and Favour Had you ratheâ— be under continual Tossings at Sea and live at the Mercy of every enraged Wave than to come with full Sails into the peaceful Harbour of a divine Plerophory Had you rather be upon Uncertainties for an heavenly Mansion than to know that if your earthly House of this Tabernacle were dissolved you have a Building of God an House not made with Hands eternal in the Heavens In one word had you rather barely look upon heavenly Glory than to behold it with an Eye of Faith as that which shall infallibly be the Reward of all your Obedience to Crown you with What alas are all the Royalties of Heaven and Glory to me if I may not know them to be mine Were all the Beams of heavenly Glory collected and gathered together in one Sun yet what were all this to me if still I be left to sit in Darkness not seeing any ground of Claim to one beam of that Glory Let all the Clusters of Canaan let all the Grapes of that Holy Land be pressed and strained into one Cup yet what Comfort can my Soul have thence when seeing them I know not but I may want them for ever God allows us in all our Obedience to look at Heaven and Glory and eternal Happiness but wherewith shall I clear up my Heart and make glad my Soul if I cannot look upon Heaven as my Heaven upon Glory as my Glory upon eternal Happiness as my own Happiness and exceeding great Reward What sweetness can a Christian draw from the Promise of eternal Life if he know not himself to have an Interest in it and be not sure to live eternally by it Lose not therefore the Comfort of your Souls in an heap of Uncertainties do not cast away through your Unbelief those Cordials which God hath provided for you oh sit not down satisfied any longer without the assurance of Heaven if you would not live and die without the Joys of Heaven Many there are I confess that cry down Assurance under the reproachful Nick-names of carnal Confidence Presumption and Security as if this heavenly Manna like that in the Wilderness were subject to Corruption and would breed Worms making Men turn Libertines grow careless and cease to work out their own Salvation with Fear and Trembling But the truth is there are none that ever walk so chearful so upright so circumspect in Heavens way as those that know they shall infallibly come there Amongst all Men in the World those are always most stedfast most immoveable most abounding in the Work of the Lord that know their Labour shall never be in vain but be Crowned at length with eternal Rest Whoever expects to receive much from God and hath the Hope of eternal Life abiding in him such an one will most willingly spend and be spent in the Service of God giving diligence above all others to purify himself as (c) 1 John 3.3 he is pure As well you may say that the Fire will make a Man freeze with cold as that the Assurance of eternal Life will make God's People grow secure sloathful and negligent in their Christian Course taking boldness to live as they list What doth the Assurance of future Glory dispose those that have it to turn the Grace of God into Wantonness Shall a known Interest in the Reward of eternal Life be thought to make Men love the Wages of Unrighteousness Must the knowing that we have an Inheritance amongst the Saints in Light incline us to have the more Fellowship with the unfruitful Works of Darkness Can you think that the Souls Evidences for Heaven should encourage it to walk the way which leads to Hell Men that are yet unacquainted with the Spirit of Adoption not knowing what it is to have the hope of eternal Life abiding in them may tell you so
way as thou dreamest of or if there be why yet in that very Lyon thou mayst find Hony The way to Heaven is not so dark and gloomy as most imagine though indeed it be strait and tedious to Flesh and Blood yet there stands a bright Crown of eternal Glory at the end which makes it comfortable Be ashamed then having such encouragement to walk disconsolate in Heavens way There are not so many Thorns to prick you as Roses to refresh you Nor half so much cause of Sorrow â—s there is of Comfort and rejoycing of Spirit Christians walking in Heaven's Way they may meet I confess with a fiery Tryal but then there is some Light for their Comfort as well as Heat to Torment them And let me tell you the more your Hearts are melted and softned in such a Flame the deeper will be the Impression of divine Love Consolation and Sweetness upon them A sight of Glory from Heaven is then most Cordial when we can see nothing but Bonds and Imprisonments and forest Afflictions to abide us on Earth (a) Acts 7.55 How sweetly did Stephen that blessed Proto-martyr fall asleep under a Shower of Stones as if he had gone to Heaven in a Bed of Down The Reason of all was this he saw Heaven open and Jesus standing at the right Hand of God ready to turn every Stone that was thrown at him into an orient Pearl and to Crown him so soon as ever he had passed the Straits of Death with eternal Life Thiâ— made him forget his Sorrow and walk on with Comfort through the Valley of Death that at length he might come to that Glory in Heaven which he found such a Cordial to his Soul when ready to leave her earthly Tabernacle And why is it that we having the same Recompence of Reward set before us cannot endure the like Hardships with the same Comfort Must there be so much ado to make us live upon those Cordials which Heaven it self hath provided for us Are the Consolations of God grown small with us that we resolve thus to walk with sorrowful Hearts whilst he shews us Heaven as in a Glass and sets Glory in our Eye Shall every light Affliction eat â—ut the Heart of our Comfort when we see there lies before us a far more exceeding and eternal Weight of Glory Either Christian let thy Heart feel more or thy Eye see less of Heaven And do not go to bring up an ill Report upon the celestial Canaan by walking disconsolate in the way thither For you that have Heaven before you to come weeping after for you that have Glory in your Eye to be filled with Sorrow for you that may hope to live with God for ever in the Mount to go mourning from day to day like Doves of the Valley how unseemly were this If the World be bitter yet sweet is Paradise If the Earth cast you out yet Heaven will receive you If here you be tossed with Storms like a Ship at Sea yet arriving at the wished Shoar of Eternity you will find rest If in this (b) Mat. World Men Revile you and Persecute you saying all manner of Evil of you falsly for Christ's sake yet still you should walk rejoycing and be exceeding glad because great is your Reward in Heaven And what so great Matters are all our Afflictions on Earth that they should be able to imbitter Heaven Pray you (c) 2 Cor. 4.16 what is Affliction to Glory What is light Affliction to a weight of Glory What is a short momentary Affliction that like a little Cloud will soon be blown over to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a far more exceeding and eternal Weight of Glory beyond all possible Hyperbole that will never be over That Man sure never looked by Faith so far as Heaven whom any Affliction on earth can make to go weeping â—ike Rachel refusing to be Comforted 11 WALK purely endeavouring to cleanse your selves from all filthiness of Flesh and Spirit and to mortifie every Lust â—hat would spoyl you of your Reward It becomes not those that have the Recompence of eternal Life before them to love the Wages of Unrighteousness Nor those that have Glory in their Eye to make themselves by the Polâ—utions that are in the World through Lust like one of the base Fellows The Inheritance of the Saints in Light â—ts a pure and an undefiled Inheritance And therefore beholding it we must labour to be changed into the â—ame undefiled Purity and Holiness with it would we ever come to the full Enjoyment of it The Lord alows us a sight of Heaven in all our Obedience that beholding from day to day we might at length receive a Tincture of Purity and unspotted Holiness from it He gives us a prospect of our future Happiness that be (d) 2 Cor. 3.18 holding with open face the Glory of the Lord we might be changed into the same Image from Glory to Glory The difference betwixt Grace and Glory is not as some observe from these words specifical but gradual They differ not in Kind but only in Degree Grace is Glory inchoate and Glory is Grace consummate Grace is Glory Militant and Glory is Grace Triumphant Grace is Glory dawning and Glory is Grace shining forth in its noon-dayâ— brightness And I know no better way to ripen Grace into Glory than for Grace to behold and continually sun it self in the warm Beams of eternal Glory The Hope of future Happiness is the strongest Inducement to present Holiness Every Man (e) 1 John 3.3 that hath this Hope in him purifieth himself as he is pure Hope to be like Christ hereafter Glorious as he is Glorious and Blessed as he is Blessed will work in us a desire to be as like him as we can here Pure as he is Pure and Holy as he is Holy He that hath most hope of being saved will give most diligence of all others to be sanctified We never cleanse our Hands so much as when we have Glory in Hope Nor do we ever Purify our Hearts so throughly as when we have Heaven in our Eye When Moses had been with God upon the Mount he came down with his Face shining Thus if at any time God calls us up into the Mount with himself giving us a sight of that Glory which shall shortly be revealed in us we should be sure to come down having not only our Faces but our Hearts likewise shining with unspotted Purity It were the most unbecoming thing in the World for those to Dâ—file themselves with any Unrighteousness who have their Eye continually fixed upon an undefiled Inheritance expecting as the full Reward of all their Labours a Crown of Righteousness What shall not Heaven's Brightness expel the Darkness of Hell Shall not the Hope of eternal Happiness promote in our Hearts and Lives the Work of Holiness Is there a Crown of Glory at the end of our Christian Course and shall not that make us walk Pure
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
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
runneth not the Race hath no hope of the Garland he that Fighteth not the Battel hath no hope to obtain the Crown Why thus my Friends if you sit down satisfied without Grace not labouring to become pure and holy and unblameable before God in love you can never have any good hope to enjoy the Harvest the Garland the Crown of Eternal Life Ephes 2.12 PROMISE yourselves what happiness you please and be as confident of your own good condition as you will Yet believe it Sirs unless now with the Wise Virgins you get Oyl in your Lamps and Grace in your Souls you must never sit down with Christ in the Kingdom of God to the Marriage-Supper For to presume of Life and Happiness without (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Grace and Holiness is the next way to lose them both and to plunge yourselves deeper in Eternal Misery Presumption being still the Preface to Damnation And are you grown so secure indeed that you can sit down satisfied without that which alone can make you meet for Heaven and Eternal Glory Oh methinks that unmarcescible Crown of Life that far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory whereof you must everlastingly fall short if you keep it not in the way of serious Practical Holiness should make you give all diligence to get Grace into your hearts and to become holy Is it nothing do you think to miss of Eternal Glory to be eternally shut out of God's heavenly Kingdom and for ever to lose that Crown of Righteousness that fulness of Joy and those Pleasures which are at God's Right Hand for evermore Oh what everlasting hellish horrour will fill your Souls at Death and Judgment should you spend your lives in Vanity not striving to perfect holiness in the fear of God! Oh that you would look upon a graceless condition and negligence in the ways of God now as you will look upon it when for want of grace and diligence in Heaven's way the Lord shall throw you down for ever into hellish Torments the Lord shall punish you with everlasting destruction from his own blessed Presence and bid you depart accursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels Oh the unspeakable horrour Oh the everlasting dreadful confusion that will then fall upon you Oh what Worlds would you not give to be saved when for want of sanctifying grace you must of necessity be damned for ever Oh what would you not now do to come to Heaven when for want of Holiness you are sure to be thrown down into hellish Torments and there shut up amongst damned Spirits in everlasting Chains under darkness In the fear of God Sirs and out of tender compassion to your own Immortal Souls do not rest a moment longer in a graceless condition but as ever you desire to be saved now labour to be throughly sanctified and as ever you would see the face of God in Glory now labour to walk before him in all holy Conversation and Godliness Never think to be Mercenarij if you will not be Operarij You can never receive the Reward of Eternal Glory when you dye if you work not hard in God's Vineyard so long as you live The Lord will give you both the upper and the nether Springs both Grace and Glory But on this condition that you espouse Achsah his Daughter that you devote yourselves to the practice of Piety endeavouring to perfect holiness in the fear of God Heb. 12.28 There is a Kingdom that cannot be moved there is a (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Crown of Life more glorious than the (c) 1 Cor. 9.25 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sun in it's Noon day Brightness there is fulness of Joy in God's Presence together with Soul-satisfying (d) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Words signify such Pleasures as shall never end but will run Parallel with Eternity it self Pleasures at his Right Hand for evermore and all this you may have for your Portion and to make you everlastingly happy but then you must seek it in God's own way by patient continuance in (e) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyrill Hier. Cateches 1. Pag. 2. Well-doing and by a life of Serious Practical Holiness He that would have a good Harvest must diligently Till and Sow his Ground So you must break up the fallow Ground of your Hearts endeavouring to Sow to the Spirit would you ever obtain a blessed Harvest in which you may reap a full Crop of Eternal Joy God hath tyed Grace and Glory Holiness and Happiness together So that no Grace no Glory no Holiness here no Happiness hereafter Whosoever leads a lewd unsanctified life on Earth shall never lead a blessed and glorified life in Heaven As no Man might be in the Wedding-house not having on a Wedding-garment Mat. 22.11 12. So whoever is not found cloathed with the garments of Righteousness he shall never enter into a Mansion of glory into an house not made with hands eternal in the Heavens 2 Thes 2.13 The Image of God must first be renewed upon you in the Beauties of Holiness before ever you can be capable of seeing the face of God in Sion or be counted meet to be Inhabitants of the New Jerusalem Look at Heaven and Glory as much as you will and let your eye be still fixed upon the Recompence of the Reward Yet if you seek it not by patient continuance in well doing endeavouring to cleanse yourselves from all filthiness of Flesh and Spirit you are never like to be Crowned with it In vain do we look at Heaven and Eternal Glory so long as we live in Sin never striving to be holy which is nothing but to walk in the way that leads to Hell and everlasting Misery For then only have we due respect to the Recompence of the Reward when we seek it in a way of Obedience endeavouring to be changed into the likeness purity and holiness of that God who hath promised that so doing he will Crown us with it CHAP. V. The Doctrin Proved evincing the lawfulness of having a Respect to the Recompence of the Reward in Twelve Particulars III. HAVING thus shewed you What it is to have Respect to the Recompence of the Reward and how you may do so we are in the next place to evince it for your better satisfaction by some Scriptural Demonstrations That you are allowed of God to have respect to the Recompence of the Reward and may lawfully do so in all your Obedience 1. WE may lawfully have Respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward because God himself hath commanded us that we should do so Had not the Lord by his own Authority enjoyning us by Patient continuance in Well-doing to seek after Heaven and Glory made it our duty to do so we might well have questioned the Legality of such a practise But now there is not the least ground of Hesitancy nor any colour of Reason why we should question Whether
deum ordinata est For God himself is the Centre of all Good and Holiness from which the Lines of all Moral Rectitudes and Divine Virtues are drawn according to which they are regulated in which they are conserved and into which returning they must ultimately resolve themselves SINCE Holiness then is nothing else but an harmonious Conformity with and a Transcript of his righteous Will concerning us Why should we count our having a Respect to eternal Glory any Forfeiture of our Holiness ¶ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Catech. Mystag 5. pag. 244. or go about to censure that Practice as Unlawful for which we have God's own Fiat Were not this to make more Sins than God ever made and to go about by a kind of Interpretative Blasphemy to impeach the infinitely Holy God of giving not only his Imprimator but his Fiat also to unholy Practises commanding Men to seek after Heaven and Glory from the beholding whereof they should according to what some †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Hier. Cat. 6. p. 55. â— Dogmatize turn away their eyes as the greatest Vanity But dare we say That Mens walking in the Light of the Sun is Darkness to them Or That Conformity with God's Righteous Will is the cause of any unrighteous Practise Sirs to question the Legality and Holiness of Duties commanded is to question his Holiness and the Lawfulness of his Authority who commanded them How dare we then say that is Bitter in the Fruit which we know to be Sweet in the Root How can we count that Impure in the Streams which we dare not but confess to be Pure in the Fountain How dare we traduce that as Sinful in the Practise which we know to be Holy and Just and Good in the Precept How dare we to be short look upon Christians as Disingenuous and Transgressing in that which they purely Act in Obedience to God's Commands If God Christian bid thee by patient continuance in well-doing seâ—k for Heaven and Glory do not doubt but his Command will sufficiently secure thee from the Censure of a Legalist or Mercenary in so doing before Men and Angels For Who shall lay any thing to the Charge of God's Elect in those Precepts which are justified by the Holy Precepts and Commandments of God himself injoyning them Rom. 8.33 2. WE may lawfully have Respect in our Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward because the most Eminent of God's faithful Servants have done so before us We have not only Precept but President to warrant our Practise in this case there being none of the People of God but by striving to enter in at the strait Gate by laying up for themselves a Treasure in Heaven by Suffering with Christ that they might be Glorified together with him have clearly Commented and Paraphrased upon those and the like Portions of Holy Scripture that we knowing thus the mind of God therein may go and do likewise Thus David a Man after God's own Heart Psalm 119.112 and therefore surely no Mercenary he inclin'd his Heart to perform God's holy Statutes alway as expecting in the end the Reward of eternal Glory In the Original it is even to the end 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fructus praemium eò quod fructus postremum et finis laboris est and so our own Translation renders it But yet the same Word doth also signify a Reward which is not usually given before the end of our Works clearly implying That David having an Eye to the Recompence of the Reward did more Cheerfully run the way of God's Commandments David was willing to take pains in God's Vineyard spontaneously inclining his Heart to perform God's holy Statutes all his dayes as expecting at the evening of his Death to receive the Penny of eternal Life and Glory in God's heavenly Kingdom This also we find to be the Practice of holy Paul a man so Ambitiously desirous to promote God's Glory that through an holy Transport of Love thereto he once wished himself suspended and put apart from the Comforts of Christ in the Jews stead that God might but be glorified thereby Rom. 9.3 And yet he hath an Eye in all his Obedience to the Recompence of the Reward putting forth himself with the greatest Intenseness of Zeal and Diligence imaginable for the Price of his High-calling 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Graece quod magnam habet Emphasim significat enim manus totumque Corpus protendere ad scopum ut eum apprehendas ante quam pedibus eum attigeris A lapide in locum He did not grudge to Spend and be Spent in the Service of but stretching forward and extending himself usque ad extremum virium he pursues 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the Aim which he had taken the Reward set before him so the Original Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth as impatiently desiring to be seized of God's Kingdom and Glory to which he was called And though he was a man daily exposed to Reproach Persecutions and greatest Dificulties in Heaven's way for the cause of Christ 2 Cor. 4.18 yet whilst he looked at the things which are not seen making Heaven and Glory the scope and end of his Life as the Original may well import he was incouraged thereby with cheerfulness and alacrity of Spirit to encounter them all not thinking his Life dear if by any means he might win the Crown and be landed safe at the Haven of eternal Rest So that the Respect which this holy Apostle had to the Recompence of Reward it was instead of a Cordial to comfort him amidst all his Afflictions it was a strong Incentive with him to Obedience putting Life and Vigour into all his Endeavours and from this he took Incouragement most gladly to Spend and be Spent in the Service of God Heb. 10.32 The like we may say of those Primitive Christians mentioned in the Epistle to the Hebrews who though they were encountred with a whole Army of Afflictions though they were spoiled in their Goods by wicked men as so many Harpies preying upon them at their pleasure though they were Theatriz'd and brought forth upon the Stage not only as Spectacles of Scorn and Reproach but also as Objects of Persecution for wicked men to exercise their Malice and Cruelty upon from whom they received not only bitter Words but also hard Blows Yet they joyfully underwent it all enduring the Cross and despising the Shame as Christ their Redeemer had done before them and all this because they had an Eye to the Recompence of Reward believing themseves to have in Heaven an induring Substance a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory that would abundantly make amends for all their Sufferings So that the grand Reason inducing these Primitive Christians to indure Afflictions and take joyfully the spoyling of their Goods on Earth was their Hope of a better and more induring Substance when they came to Heaven Besides these many pregnant Instances might be given
'T is fictioned by the Poets in their Mythology of Prometheus that he did work and fashion the Bodies of Men out of Clay but he was fain to steal Fire from Heaven for the informing and quickning of them with living Souls (a) Psal 139.1 When the Body is curiously formed and admirably organized in the lower Parts of the Earth yet still it would remain a lifeless and unspirited piece of Clay did not God animate and quicken it with a living Soul with a celestial Spark lighted by his own Breath from Heaven THE Body of Man is but a Flower springing out of the Earth that will quickly wither and return to its Dust but his Soul hath Immortality written upon it it s a Bud of Eternity that can never be blasted nor wither away into nothing The Body indeed is nothing but a Compound of Death and Mortality it will quickly crumble away into dust and rottenness but the Soul having no Principles of Death and Corruption bound up in it will run a Line parallel to aâ—l Eternity it can never be confined by time but will for ever be launching forth in the boundless Ocean of an endless Duration †Matth. 10.28 The Body is obnoxious to the stroke of Death and by the Hand of Violence may before its time be matriculated amongst those that sleep in the Dust but the Soul being an immaterial Substance is above that fatal blow and hath from the spirituality of its own Nature everlasting impregnable security against every Hand of Violence written upon it so that Death itself is not able to touch the Life of the Soul THE Soul therefore being thus Divine in its Original and Eternal in its Being and Duration there is no Man unless he will renounce his own Understanding and apostatize from his own essence but must acknowledge it a point of the most important and masculine reason in all the World to consult the Salvation of our Immortal Souls providing above all things for their Eternal Welfare Should we prefer the Casket before the Jewel a frail Mansion of Mortality before an heavenly Inhabitant or the dark Lanthorn of the Body before the Soul that Divine Lamp which if fed by the Oyl of Grace would always shine forth with most radiant dazling beams of Brightness The excellency of our Souls is so transcendently Great and Glorious that it justly lays claim to our principal care and because they will never be raked up with our Bodies in the cold Embers of Death why therefore hath the Lord made it the great end of our Lives to work out Salvation for them giving diligence to make them meet through Grace for everlasting Mansions of Glory in the Kingdom of Heaven But how can we thus take care of them or design their Eternal Happiness as the great end of our Lives in case we may not have respect to the recompence of the reward seeking Life and Eternal Glory by patient continuance in well-doing to Crown them withal Can the Salvation of our Souls be the object of our principal care next to Gods own Glory when out of a pretended Zeal for that we would seem altogether careless and unsolicitous about the saving of our own Souls How can we say we make salvation the great end of our lives endeavouring that our Souls may be happy when we hold it unlawful to bend and level all our desires for the hitting of that fair mark Believe it Christians they that would perswade you 't is unlawful to have respect in our obedience to Heaven and Glory do in effect go about to argue your Souls into the careless neglect of their own everlasting welfare But can you be regardless of your own Salvation Can you sleight the great end of your lives and turn your back upon your own happiness Can you indeed neglect your immortal Souls that must either be happy or miserable either imparadised Souls in Heaven or damned Spirits in Hell to all eternity Do you know what Salvation is how everlastingly blessed those Souls will be that may approach the presence of their God that may see his Face that may rest in his eternal embraces that may enter into the joy of their Lord and drink freely of those Rivers of pleasure which are at his right hand for evermore Oh then make not light of so great Salvation but give all diligence to get an interest therein for your immortal Souls To make sure of eternal happiness was the great errand upon which God sent us into the World oh therefore take heed that you do not leave it upon uncertainties seeking after the Kingdom of God and the righteousness thereof as if you were loth to find it 10 WE may lawfully have respect in our obedience to the recompence of the reward because the very nature and proper genius of true Grace is to make a blessed divorce betwixt the world and the heart wherein it is resident and so to carry out the heart in strong desires and unsatisfiable breathings after Heaven and Glory True Grace is an Heaven-born Spark and therefore it doth naturally ascend upward aspiring after Heaven and Glory as its proper region As all the Lines meet in the Center and as all the Rivers do run into the Sea uniting themselves in the vast Ocean so all the desires of a gracious Soul they meet in Heaven uniting all their forces in one continued and insatiate anhâ—lation after fulness of Communion with God in Glory The Sun though seen in the Water yet hath his Tabernacle fixed in Heaven (a) Phil. 3.20 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Macar Hom. 17. so though a Christian hath his commoration upon Earth yet his Conversation his Trade his Commerce is daily in Heaven the place of his Eternal Abode The Men of this World are ever inveloping themselves in thick Clay they are not soaring Eagles but crawling Muck-worms but now all those that are truly gracious they are Men of another Spirit they live in the highest Region and are compared to Eagles in regard of their Heavenly-mindedness (b) Isa 40.31 Life enables Men to lift up their Body from the Earth and to tread upon it with their Feet (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Macar Homil. 16. Thus whoever have the Life of Grace begun in them they tread upon all earthly Enjoyments and are carried upon the Wing of desire quite above all sublunary Comforts into Heaven itself The heart that is seasoned with saving Grace is restless till it come to be fixed in a sure State of Glory and Happiness just like the Needle that is touched with a Load-stone upon which there is nothing but unquiet agitations and tremblings till it be firmly fixed and settle immovably in the North Point We read of Noah's Dove that she found no place whereupon to rest the sole of her Foot but only in the Ark so the People of God they find no place but in Heaven whereupon to rest themselves and therefore all their breathings
saving of our (f) 1 Pet. 1.18 19. Acts 20.28 Souls but yet they were never said to give their Souls a ransom for their Brethren which is said of Christ nor to purchase the Church of God with their own Blood which is plainly affirmed of Christ to let us know that in his suffering and dying for his people there was something peculiar unto him that could not possibly be communicated to any other (g) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Just Martyr Epist ad Diogenet pag. 386. Behold than a miracle of transcendent love Oh sweet exchange oh unsearchable artifice oh benefits surpassing all expectation that the iniquity of many should be hidden in one righteous person and that the obedience of one Christ should make many unjust persons righteous Oh what manner of love was this where the unjust sins and the just is punished the guilty transgresseth and the guiltless is beaten the impious offend and the pious is condemned what the evil deserves the good suffers what the servant perpetrates the Lord payeth and what Man commits the Son of God himself undergoes for our sakes All the Glory of the godly it wholly springs out of the shame of theit Lords sufferings and passion All the Rest of the godly it lies in the wounds of their Saviour by whose * Peccat iniquus punitur justus delinquit reus vapulat innocens offendit impius damnatur pius quod meretur malus patitur bonus quod perpetrat servus exolvit dominus quod committit homo sustinet Deus Aust Medit. 67. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Just Martyr ubi suprà stripes they are healed Jesus Christ was in a bitter agony sweating clods of Blood that a cold sweat in the agony of Death may not seize upon us He would wrestle with the Powers of Death that in our last conflict with Death our Faith might not fail us He would undergo most grievous anguish and have his Soul exceeding sorrowful unto Death that our Hearts might be filled in Heaven with joy unspeakable and full of Glory He would begin his Passion in the Garden that he might expiate Sin which was first committed in the Garden of Paradise He would be unjustly condemned on Earth that we being absolved in Heaven may at length have admittance into the glorious liberty of the Children of God He would have his Face covered that the Veil of Sin which hinders us from the beatifical Vision of God in Glory might be taken away He walked in heaviness towards Mount Calvary bearing the weight of his Cross that he might remove the burden of Eternal Punishment not suffering us to lie under the stroke of God's heavy displeasure for ever He cryed out in the bitterness of (a) Omnis piorum gloria est in Dominicae passionis ignominia Omnis piorum requies est in vulneribus salvatoris nostri Gerhard Medit. 6. Christus pro nobis sargâ—â—â—neum sudorem fudit ne frigidissimus in mortis agone sudor nos opprimeret Luctari voluit cum morte ne in agone mortis deficeremus Anxieâ—atem gravissimam tristitiam usque ad mortem sustinere voluit ut aeternae laetitiae in Caelis participes redderemur In horto fieri voluit passionis initium ut expiaret peccatum quod in horto Paradisi habuerat principium Condemnatus est in terris ut nos absolveremur in Coelis Facies ipsius tegitur ut a nobis removeret velum peccati quod in nobis aspectum Dei impedit damnabilem ignorantiam inducit Crucis pondus portavit ut onus aeternae poenae à nobis submoveret A Deo se derelictum clamavit ut aeternam Dei cohabitationem nobis pararet Sitivit in cruce ut rorem divinae gratiae nobis promereretur ac ne aeterna sitâ— perire cogeremur Lacrymas profudit ut nostras abstergeret lacrymas Coronâ spineâ coronatus est ut coelestem coronam nobis promereretur Gerhard Medit. 7. his Soul as forsaken of God that we might never be forsaken of God but have eternal Communion with him in Heaven He thirsted upon the Cross and would have Gall to drink that having merited for us the enlivening nectareous Dew of Divine Grace we might not pine with perpetual thirst but be satisfied with the sweet Wine of Eternal Consolation He would often weep and be filled with sorrow that coming to Sion with Songs and everlasting Joy upon our Heads we might obtain Joy and Gladness and have all tears wiped from our Eyes so that sorrow and sighing shall fly away He in a word would be crowned with Thorns that having laid aside the Rags of Mortality we at length might be crowned with Life and Eternal Glory in God's heavenly Kingdom Since then Christ was thus afflicted that we might be comforted since he drank of the Brook in the way that we might lift up our Heads with everlasting Joy since his Soul was sorrowful unto Death that we might receive the reward of Eternal Life since he came into the World for our sakes enduring the Cross and despising the Shame for this very end that we at length might be crowned with eternity of heavenly Glory what incongruity can you think it to have respect in our obedience to the recompence of the reward Had Christ our Redeemer a respect in all that he did and suffered to the meriting of Eternal Glory for us and may not we have respect in our obedience to the enjoyment of that Happiness and Glory which Christ hath so merited Did the beloved Son of God come down from the Bosom of the Father live such a miserable Life and die so painful execrable and ignominious a Death to purchase such a reward as a Christian cannot look at in his obedience but it will make him forfeit his ingenuity and transform him presently into a mercenary Indeed to fall in love with the Gift and forget the Giver highly to prize Redemption and to undervalue our Redeemer to have our Hearts more set upon Heaven and Glory than upon Christ himself who hath purchased it for us with his own Blood this were monstrously sordid and disingenuous but yet the respect which Christ had to the purchasing of Heaven and Glory for us in his Death and Sufferings doth sufficiently evince that we also in our obedience may have some respect thereunto I read of a certain Young Gallant that having received a Wound in the Wars whereof he came halt home his Mother told him Son this Wound will make you remember Virtue every step that you take To be sure Christian since Christ was wounded for our transgressions purchasing Life and Eternal Glory for us by the Price of his own Blood this may well make us think of Heaven every step that we take in the way of Gods Commandments Not frequently to make glad our Hearts with the sweet Meditation of Eternal Life not often to dwell upon it in our Thoughts taking encouragement therefrom to all holy and self-denying and
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
which indeed is the Life of thy Soul Did the Body of thy dearest Relation lie dead upon the floor what a woful Spectacle would it be and how bitterly wouldst thou weep over it But O Sinner thy Immortal Soul which should be more preciously dâ—ar in thy sight than all thy Relations in the World that lies dead in Sin it 's estranged from God the Fountain of Life it hath no interest in Christ the Prince of Life it hath no Portion in the Holy Ghost the Spirit of Life it hath neither Part nor Lot in Eternal Glory the Crown of Life and is not this a far more sad and woful Spectacle such as may well turn thy Head into Water and thy Eyes into a Fountain of Tears Oh what should fill thy Heart with Groans thy Eyes with Tears and thy Mouth with doleful Complaints if not this to see thy Soul without Life without God and Christ and without all hope of Eternal Glory in the World Canst thou weep bitterly for a dead Relation and yet canst thou not weep for thy self hast thou no Tears to shed over a dead Soul For a Man to be killed by Sin and yet to live to Sin taking pleasure therein what a woful condition is this If yet Sinner thou hast pleasure in unrighteousness to be sure the Tokens of Death are upon thee thou hast neither Life nor yet any hope of Eternal Life abiding in thee A Soul taking delight in the pleasures of Sin it 's a dead Soul * John 3.36 and a Dead Soul it shall never see Life but the Wrath of God abides upon it 2 CONSIDER so long as you take delight in the pleasures of sin you remain uncapable of and can never enjoy communion with God If conformity be that which capacitates for a mutual communion then doubtless an unholy sinner that hath pleasure in unrighteousness is altogether unfit for communion with an holy God †Heb. 1.13 whose Eyes are so infinitely pure that he cannot behold the least iniquity (a) Fit nostra societas cum Deo per similitudinem Ferrar. There can be no fellowship where first there is not some similitude What fellowship can there then be betwixt the great God who is all light and profane ungodly sinners delighting themselves in the unfruitful works of darkness You may say there is fellowship betwixt you and the God of Heaven (b) 1 John 1.6 But then if you walk in darkness making sin your delight you lie saith the Apostle and do not the truth 'T is an exempt priviledge and that which is peculiar to the pure in Heart that they shall see God and have communion with him (c) 2 Cor. 6.14 15. Hence St. Paul puts the question intending thereby a more vehement negation what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness and what communion hath light with darkness and what concord hath Christ with Belial We see by experience the darkness cometh not till the light be gone and when the light cometh the darkness vanisheth they cannot dwell together it being the nature of things contrary mutually to take away each other Thus the infinitely holy God and a voluptuous sordid Sinner who hath pleasure in unrighteousness they are of such contrary natures that they can no more have fellowship together than the clearest Light and the thickest darkness Amongst all the creature there are none that can have communion with any that live not the same life with themselves as a Plant whose life is only vegetative can have no communion with a beast whose life is sensitive neither can a beast have communion with Men because they live a rational (d) Ephes 4.18 life Thus all sensual wicked Men they are estranged from the life of God they live a life of sensuality delighting in sin as their proper Element and therefore can have no communion at all with God whose life is a life of unchangably blessed and spotless Holiness Oh then how miserable is the condition of all voluptuous sensualists who render themselves uncapable through their brutish lusts of communion with an holy God! Michael and the Dragon could not agree in one Heaven nor the Ark and Dagon in one House no more can a wicked Man and an holy God agree to have communion together Your carnal pleasures they shut out from communion with God as the Plague of leprosy shut out of the Camp debarring a Man from all society with such as were clean (e) In his rebus quae inter se pugnant ita ut neutra ferat alterius consortium quotiens hanc amplectimur illam abdicavimus quotiens unam rejioimus alteram agnoscimus Cyprian de dupl Martyr pag. 600. And had you rather with the Prodigal be feeding upon Husks amongst Swine than to feed with delight upon this bread of life in your fathers House Will you still go on to preferr these Onyons and Garlick of Egypt your carnal delights and pleasurable vanities before all the delicious Clusters of Canaan before the hidden Manna of Sweet communion and fellowship of an holy God Poor brutish sinners did you but know by experience what it is to walk in the light of God's countenance what it is to enjoy his favour what it is to be under his smiles in the face of Christ to receive daily the fresh communications of his love and for ever to have the sweet influences of these heavenly Pleiades falling down like a Golden showr into your own bosoms oh how quickly would you nauseate all carnal delights how quickly would you come off with shame and self-abhorrency from your pleasurable vanities making choice of Communion with God as the only Paradise of true delight and Soul-satisfying pleasures in all the World (f) Psal 34.8 Oh therefore do but tast and see how good the Lord is and what fulness of joy you may have in communion with him You have long been sucking the Breast of carnal delights and tasting how good the pleasures of sin are though but for a season Come now in like manner and draw the sincere milk of comfort from the breasts of Divine promises lay your mouths to the Hony-Comb of Heavenly communion sit you down a little under the shadow of the most High ascend with God into the Mount of transfiguration take a turn or two with him in the Galleries of love and if you find not a day thus spent to be better more laden with Fruits of Paradise to refresh and make glad your Souls than a thousand else where then turn aside again to your carnal pleasures renounce this Heavenly Canaan as a barren Wilderness and go back to the flesh-pots of your sensual delights in Egypt and spare not But oh the fulness of joy and divine satisfaction of a Man walking close in communion with God! You may as well perswade the most pompous Monarch faring deliciously every day to lay aside his princely Robes to desert his Throne and go feed upon husks with the Prodigal as
and Undefiled in the way thither With what Face Christian canst thou look upon the Recompence of eternal Life and yet study to gratify thy own brutish Appetite defiling thy self every day with the Pollutions superstitious Observances ungodly Practices and sinful Compliances of a wicked World Believe it Sirs the very Mire in the Streets shall sooner be transubstantiated into massy Gold than a Man thus weltring in the Filth and Mire and Vomit of his Sins shall ever be suffered to enter into the Kingdom of God Sin blocks up the way to Heaven nor must any Man ever think he shall come to Glory there if he enter not in through the Suburbs of Grace (f) Psal 24.4 The Prophet David hath resolved the Case long ago telling us that he who is of clean Hands (g) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cor mundum scelerisque purum politum omnique immunditiâ vacuum prorsus defaecatum haec denotat phrascologia and of a choice pure polisht Heart as the original imports shall ascend into the Hill of the Lord and shall stand in his holy Place Without Holiness we cannot serve the Lord in a way of Duty ¶ Jos 24 19 Heb. 12.14 much less are we fit without Holiness to enjoy the Lord in a State of Glory A Man living in fleshly Lusts hath the very Plague-sores of Hell running upon him And shall such an one ever think to stand before an holy God in Heavenly Places To be sure the inheritance of Saints in light it was never prepared for those that have any fellowship with Works of Darkness And do you love your Lusts better than your lives or will those Pleasures of Sin which are but for a season countervail the loss of Heaven and Eternal Glory Oh foolish and unwise Sinners who for a draught of Wine for a brutish lust for a moment of carnal Pleasure will let go whatever Joy whatever Happiness the Lord hath provided in Heaven for those that fear him (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Hieros Cateches 2. pag. 5. Why is it that you see not the danger of Sin how sadly it provokes the Lord against you how it emasculates and disinews your Souls how it blocks up your way to Heaven how it robs you of your present Comfort how it forfeits your future Crown and Happiness exposing you in the World to come to Eternal unpreventable misery And will you still be defiling your selves with this mortal pollution And that when Heaven and Glory lie before you as a bait to all Purity Uprightness and holy walking before God will you thus provoke the Lord with Manna in your Mouths Shall not the ripe Fruits of Canaan make you nauseat these wild Grapes and for ever to dâ—srelish these clusters of Sodom When the Glory of Heaven is in your Eye will you have upon your Hands the pitch and in your Hearts the very plague of Hell itself Oh why is it that you will thus render your selves uncapable of Heavens Glory by your own sinful Soul-defiling and unrighteous conversation Is not the recompence of Eternal Life which God sets before you attractive enough to draw you out of the mire of all your fleshly Lusts and ungodly Practices You have stronger engagements to purity of Life and holiness of conversation than others upon you You may daily see the Beauties antedate the Pleasures behold the Glory of the Heavenly Jerusalem and yet will you strive to be no more holy no more pure no more undefiled than others 'T is your duty to be every whit as good as others are bad every whit as holy as others are profane every whit as pure as others are polluted and whilst others are running into all excess of riot you must labour the more to cleanse your selves from all filthiness of Flesh and Spirit (b) 2 Cor. 7.1 endeavouring to perfect Holiness in the fear of God What if others profane the Sabbath (c) Jer. 17.22 You must sanctify it What if others drink till they be drunk (d) Ephes 5.18 You must study to be sober What if others defile themselves with the pollutions that are in the World through lust You must labour to keep your selves unspotted of the World What if others cast in their lot and strike hands with the workers of iniquity (e) Ephes 5.11 You must have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of Darkness ¶ 2 Tim. 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Hieros Praefat. 'T is only the Self-purifying Soul that is capable of Heaven such an one and none else is a vessel of Honour fit as for the Masters use here so to be filled with the new Wine of Eternal Consolation hereafter Oh therefore do not go to exclude your selves out of Heaven by your sinful compliances nor to make your selves unfit for the Kingdom of God by your self-pollutions What in all the World will encourage to Purity and Holiness if not to live daily upon the mount of Transfiguration thence taking a prospect of Heaven and Eternal Glory God allows you to have a respect to the recompence of the Reward setting Heaven continually before you and let that make you to walk before him in all holy conversation and Godliness You never deserve to see the least glimpse of Heavenly Glory any more if having such a pure undefiled reward in your Eye you keep not your Hearts pure and your lives undefiled in the World 12 AND lastly walk perseveringly never growing weary of well-doing but labouring to be faithful to the death that then you may receive that Crown of Life that transcendently glorious reward which God now sets before you (f) Non quaeruntur in Christianis initia sed finis Paulus male caepit sed bene finivit Judae laudantur exordia sed finis proditione damnatur Hier. epist 16. ad Furiam Christians must not think it is enough to set out for God at the first but they must know 't is their Duty also to hold on in their obedience with God to the last They that have begun to do the Work of God in the Morning of their youth they must continue working in God's Vineyard till the evening of Death would they ever receive their penny of Eternal Glory Be thâ—u faithful unto death (g) Rev. 2.10 and I will give thee sai h Christ speaking to those of the Church in Smyrna a Crown of Life The Lord Jesus will never yield that those shall be crowned after Death who have not been faithful and constant in obedience to him all their Life We must continue stedfast in well-doing to the end would we ever be blessed of God with Eternal Salvation in the end (h) Mat. 24.13 Amongst all those that are hired to work in Gods Vineyard not he that begins first but he that holds on to the last and he alone shall receive the Reward of Eternal Life (i) Rom. 9.22 As God condemneth no Man before through final impenitency persisting
be the Hell the Misery the eternal Heart-rending Reflexions of all Apostates who notwithstanding all their groundless hopes are now like to be swallowed up of black Despair They thought themselves once in an happy condition but now distress and anguish takes hold upon them They promised themselves to drink for ever of the River of God's Pleasures but now whole Vollies of Brimstone and all the Vials of God's Wrath come thundering down upon them They expected to sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the Prophets in the Kingdom †Ascendens ad montem Loth retrò reliquit Sodomit and flagitia quae autem reflexit retrò non potuit ad superiora evadere Ambros Epist 11. ad Irenaeum ¶ 2 Pet. 2.21 of God but now they are shut up irrecoverably amongst damned Spirits in everlasting Chains under Darkness They presumed themselves to be in the ready way to Heaven but now they are inevitably dropping into Hell the rageful Flames of which Infernal Lake are now ready to seize upon them and burn them without quenching for ever And can there possibly be a greater emphasis of Misery than such everlasting dreadful disappointment Look to it then all you that have taken up the practise of Piety and take heed that you never draw back to your own destruction O labour to hold fast your Integrity be not weary of well-doing but look well to your selves †2 John 8. that you lose not the things which you have wrought that you lose not your Prayers your religious performances and all your sufferings but that you may receive a full Reward You have not only Hells horrour behind you to keep you from drawing back but you have also Heaven's Glory before you to keep you stedfast and unmovable always persevering in the work of the Lord. (a) Non taedeat incipere magna nec fastidiat tenere inchoata scientes quod perseverantia remunerat currentem coronat pugnantem ducit ad brabium conducit cunctos ad portum Aug. Serm. 8. ad fratres in eremo And why will you ever have thoughts to leave that way which leads to Glory or grow weary of that Work which will shortly be crowned with an Eternal Reward If Jacob thought not his fourteen years hard service tedious having Rachel a beautiful indeed but yet a fading Flower in his Eye Why then should you look upon the service of God as tedious or ever grow weary of it having Heaven itself in your Eye where you may gather not only Beautiful but unfadable Flowers of Happiness and Joy and Glory for ever What greater reproach can you bring upon your selves than to fall from your own stedfastness making shipwrack of Faith and a good conscience when the Glory of Heaven lies before you as an encouragement to all patient continuance in well-doing Columbus having sailed long without making any discovery his company at last began to grow weary of the Voyage till at length they espied Land and then they went on chearfully Thus though you be all weather-beaten and tossed as with Storms upon the troublesome Sea of this World yet having the Land of Promise the Heavenly Canaan in your Eye you should never grow weary in well-doing but hold on chearfully It 's but a while Christians and in case we hold fast our integrity we shall have done wrestling and weeping and praying and then reap the fruit of all our labours It s but a while and holding Faith and a good Conscience we shall have done suffering and bleeding and dying for the cause of Christ and so be crowned with Life Everlasting It 's but a while and continuing patient in well-doing we shall come amongst all the redeemed of Christ to Sion with * Isa 35.10 Songs and everlasting Joy upon our Heads we shall obtain Joy and Gladness and sorrow and sighing shall fly away Let not therefore your hearts grow faint nor your hands be weakned through any Afflictions Tryals or Difficulties that you meet with in Heavens way but having such everlasting consolation and good hope through Christ let all your Righteousness be like the Morning-light never declining but still shining more and more to the perfect day They should never backslide nor grow weary of serving God on Earth whom the Lord allows for their encouragement to all holy self-denying and upright walking before him a clear prospect of Heavens Glory In vain doth God shew us the reward of Eternal Life if the sight of it makes us not faithful unto the Death CHAP. X. The Doctrine improved by way of Exhortation to poor ungodly Sinners advising them to give all diligence for an Interest in this glorious reward and pressing the necessity thereof upon them by Five weighty Considerations II BY way of exhortation to you that have no interest in this glorious Reward which God sets before us give all diligence that it may be yours What will Heaven and Glory and Eternal Life avail you if you can not look upon Heaven as your Heaven upon Glory as your Glory and upon the recompence of Life Eternal as that which shall be your portion for ever Wealth in the Mine doth no good at all till actually severed and set apart for persons and uses Water in the Fountain is of no service to a Man till conveyed thence into his own cistern So though the recompence of Reward be as a Mine full of excellent and unsearchable Riches as a Fountain overflowing with living Waters yet till it be actually made our own that we come to dig in this Mine and to draw Water with Comfort out of this Fountain of Life we remain as Poor and Miserable as if this recompence of Eternal Life had never been set before us 'T is not a prospect of Heaven but an interest in Heaven not the tender of Eternal Life but the having of Eternal Life that will make us Happy Moses himself had a sight of Canaan and yet died in the Wilderness Thus God may give you a sight of Heavenly Glory in the tenders of the Gospel yet not embracing it by Faith you may die in your Sins fall short of the celestial Canaan and be damned for ever Sit not down therefore satisfied in hearing of this Eternally Glorious Reward but give diligence now to get an interest in it and to make it your own Oh lose not your precious Souls lose not Heaven and Eternal Glory for want of looking after them 1 CONSIDER if you get not an Interest in the Recompence of the Reward which God sets before us you are like to have all your Portion in this present Life You may possibly promise your selves great things hereafter because your Barns are full and your Cup overflows here But in vain shall you look for Glory when you come to die if you seek it not by patient continuance in well-doing all your Life 'T is no good Argument that your Hearts are filled with saving Grace because your
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
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
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
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
plunge the Soul in remediless intolerable Misery 2 Be sure that you quit your own Righteousness giving diligence to see the Insufficiency of it to Life and Salvation Such is the Corruption of our Nature that though the Covenant of Works be violated and the Condition thereof unperformable to Man lapsed Yet still we would Trade for Heaven in a way of working building our Hope for eternaâ— Life upon the sandy Foundation of a Self-opiniative Righteousness If at any time Men are startled by the powerful Impressions of a Soul-searching Ministry and begin to feel the Sting of Sin in their Consciences you may presently see them have recourse not to Christ but to Moses not to the Righteousness which is of God by Faith but to the Righteousness which is of the Law placing their whole Affiance in the supposed Worth and Merit of their own good Works as if these could save them But know you must that those who put Confidence in their own Righteousness will as surely fall short of Heaven and Glory as those who make no Conscience of Righteousness at all Good Works when rested in and made the Matter of our justification before God are as infallibly Damning as evil Works when never Repented of (p) Gal. 3.10 For as many as be of the Works of the Law trusting in and expecting Salvation by them are under the Curse The Law at first was an easie way to Righteousness and from thence to Salvation But now every step thereof sinks as low as Hell It 's written within and without with Curses which way soever a Man stirs he finds nothing but Death before him One Man's way by the Civility of his Education the Ingenuity of his Disposition the Engagement of other ends or Relations may seem more smooth and plausible than anothers but by Nature they all run into Hell as all Rivers though never so different in other Circumstances run into the Sea And the Reason of all this the Apostle hath subjoyned in the following words taken from that everlasting Inability that we lie under to fulfil all Righteousness which the Law in its utmost rigour and latitude doth require at our Hands as pronouncing all those Accursed that continue not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law (q) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 M. Eremita to do them So then though Sin and Death go together as Work and Wageâ— yet eternal Life must never be expected as the Purchase of our own good Works but as the free Gift of God in Christ Jesus The Ways of Sin (r) Rom. 6.23 is Death saith the Apostle But the Gift of God saith he purposely changing the manner of his Speech is eternal Life Say therefore the Papists what they will of their Merit of Condignity proportionate in worth and excellency to eternal Glory Yet would you not for ever be shut out of Heaven and fall short of Glory you must Renounce all Opinion of your own Merit laying hold on eternal Life as the free Gift of God For can we rationally think that our imperfect Obedience should justly deserve with God the Reward of eternal Glory Do we fail coming short in every Duty and shall we yet look for Heaven and not of Debt and not of Mercy If the (s) Rom. 8.18 Sufferings of this present Life are not worthy to be compared with the (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Oecum in loc Glory that shall be revealed in us what little reason can we have to think by any inferior act of Obedience to merit such a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost in Philip. Homil. 11. The Reward of eternal Life is the gift of God and therefore not to be sought by Works of Righteousness as infinitely exceeding in Worth and Dignity all our performances how glorious soever Misinterpret me not as if I were declaiming against the necessity of inherent Righteousness when indeed the meritoriousness and condignity thereof proportionate to eternal Life is all that we here deny We do not cry down Obedience and good Works as they stand in subordination to â—â—ace and are the genuine Fruits of Sanctification as they of the Romish Faction have maliciously traduced the Reformation But only as they stand in opposition to the free Grace of God in our Justification and are made by Pharisaical self-justitiaries the Foundation whereupon to bottom their hopes for eternal Life We of the Church of England do maintain the necessity of good Works pressing earnestly to the practise of them as antecedaneous to Life Eternal without which no Man can be saved But that wherein we dissent from the Church of Rome is about the causality of good Words with whom we dare not affirm (a) Si propriè appellentur ea quae decimus nostra merita Spei quidem Seminaria sunt charitatis Incentiva occultae praedestinationis Judicia futurae foelicitatis Praesagia Via regni non causa regnandi Bern. lib. de Grat. liber Arbitr but deny them to be meritorious of Eternal Life as if a Man should be saved for them We do allow them with Bernard to be the preservatives of Hope the Incentives of Charity the marks of hidden Predestination the Presages of future Happiness the Way that leads to the Kingdom of Heaven but not the meritorious causes of our reigning with Christ there Take heed then that you think not of your own Righteousness above what you ought to think 'T is your duty to fulfil all Righteousness but will certainly be your undoing if you trust in any Beware therefore oh Man of this sugared Poyson within thee let there be no depending upon thy good Heart thy good Life thy good Performances But remember the proud Pharisee who stands upon his own bottom as well as ungodâ—â— Sinners whose lives are notoriously infamous for all manner of abominable impieties will fall short of Heaven Whoever thinks to find Life in his own Righteousness and Glory in his own Graces will be sunk through such carnal Confidence to lose Life and Eternal Glory for ever Oh then let not any Man be found cloathed in his own Righteousness that would ever be cloathed upon with the Garments of Salvation For Men to despair in themselves counting all their Righteousness but loss for the excellency of Heaven This is the best way to obtain the reward of Eternal Glory in the Kingdom of Heaven He that here cries out as a Man lost and undone in himself will hereafter be found in Christ to the saving of his Soul Never did any Man yet get to Heaven by trusting in his own Righteousness Nor shall any Man fall short of Heaven who renouncing his own Righteousness trusteth wholly to the Mercy of God in Christ Jesus 3 GET renewed Natures making sure of a principle of Grace within (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Macar Hom. 30. A Wicked Man in his unregeneracy is no more capable of an
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
of God! If Sirs you think â—an Honour to appear Good (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignat epist ad Magnes pag. 52. Omnino enim nihil prodest nomen sanctum habere sine moribus quia vita à professione discordans abrogat illustris tituli honorem per indignorum actuum vilitatem Salvian de Gubern Dei lib. 3. pag. mihi 94. is it not much morâ—â—n Honour to be so indeed What alas is the Name of Christian worth if you will goâ— put on the Nature of a Christian To think I was well reputed of amongst God's People I was called a good and had the Name of a Christian can this be a Cordial when you come to die Or will it comfort your Hearts when appearing before the Judgment-seat of (c) Quid est in quo nobis de Christiano nomine blandiamur cum utique hoc ipso magis per nomen sacratissimum rei simus qui à sancto nomine discrepamus Nam ideo plus sub religionis titulo Deum ludimus quia positi in religione peccamus Idem paulo post the great God where all your Paint and Varnish being washed off you must now be punished as Hypocrites with everlasting Destruction from the Presence of God and from the Glory of his Power To be counted Rich and yet turn Bankrupt to be judged healthful and yet sick unto Death would but aggravate in such cases a Man's Misery So to be counted Holy and yet Profane to have a Name to live and yet after all be found dead in Trespasses and Sins oh this will most dreadfully aggravate the Hypocrites Misery another day this will sink them deeper in Hell than the notoriously ungodly this will prepare flaming Ingredients for the Cup of Wrath and put new Stiâ—gs into those fiery Scorpions that will vex and torment them for ever If then you love your Souls give diligence now to have the best side inward doing every thing from the Heart sâ—â—cerely as unto God! Strive you must to make clean the inside as well as the outside of the Platter and to have pure Hearts as well aâ—â—lean Hands would you ever (d) 2 Tim. 2.21 be Vessels of Honour 〈◊〉 for the Master's use The foolish Virgins they had Lamps in their Hands a Profession of Godliness (e) Mat. 25.3 adorned with many glorious Performances But these were not animated with an upright Heart they wanted the Oyl of Grace within and therefore depart from me saith Christ I never knew you Christ will know those well he will know them to be Men of pure Minds and upright Hearts whom he receives to dwell with himself in eternal Mansions of Glory Otherwise if a Work of Grace be wanting within if the Heart be unsound and not inwardly Holy they must look to depart accursed into everlasting burnings where the painted fire of all their pretended zeal shall most surely be punished with the true fire of God's heavy wrath and sore displeasure Thus you may possibly appear Holy before Men and have your Christian Profession adorned with many seemingly glorious Performances But in case your Hearts be not upright before God now he throws you down for ever into Hellish-torments now he punisheth your Souls with everlasting Destruction from his own Presence now he commands you to depart accursed into everlasting Fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels and you must obey him Oh then what a woful thing is a rotten Heart and how much doth it concern us all to be that indeed which we are in shew He that is seemingly good but really bad though die he may with seeming hopes for Heaven and Glory yet fall he must into a real Hell of Misery and eternal endless Torments 7 SEE that you mortify through the Spirit the Deeds of the Body That which thou sowest saith the Apostle (f) 1 Cor. 15.36 is not quickned except it die so except first you die to Sin you can never be quickned nor raised to enjoy the Reward of eternal Life The way to die hereafter is to live here And the way to live hereafter is to die here They that now live in Sin must hereafter expect Death and eternal Misery as the just Reward and Punishment of their Sins But they that now die to Sin crucifying the Flesh with the Affections and Lusts shall hereafter live with God in eternal Mansions of Glory For saith the Apostle if ye live after the (h) Rom. 8.13 Flesh ye shall die But if ye through the Spirit mortify the Deeds of the Body ye shall live Here you see are described two ways the one leading to Death the other to Life the one to Hell the other to Heaven the one to endless Torments the other to all fulness of Joy in God's own presence So then he that will save the Life of his Sins shall lose his Soul But he that will mortifie himself his beloved Lusts and Sins and dearest Corruptions he shall live for ever Though then you cannot totally kill (g) Gal. 5.24 your Corruptions in this Life yet see that you be daily mortifying them Though you cannot wholly cast them out from remaining yet be sure to keep them under from reigning in your mortal Bodies that you should obey them All Sins are meritoriously Mortal but none save those which are left unmortified do eventually prove so (i) Rom. 6. Though it be true that every Sin deserveth Death even the Motus primò primi concerning which the Schoolmen write the very first risings and ebullitions of Lust in the Soul which do prevent all use of Reason though standing in her highest Watch-tower of Vigilancy to descry and with all curiosity to make observation of every approaching Enemy Yet there is no Sin though aggravated by supervening Circumstances to an equality of Guilt and heinousness with the most prodigious and horrid â—mpieties that were ever yet perpetrated by any Offender that doth actually infer Death exposing a Man to the Vengeance of eternal Fire unless suffered to go unmortified The least Sin when allowed of is enough for thy Damnation and the greatest when mortified can by no means hinder thy eternal Salvation The Life of Sin and the Life of a Sinner are like two Buckets at a Well if the one go up the other must go down Thus if your Pride your Hypocrisie your Covetousness your Carnality your vile Affections live in you you must die eternally but if through the Spirit you mortify them you shall live for ever Behold then I now set before you Life and Death Mount Ebal and Mount Gerrizzim Blessings and Cursings the Pleasures of Heaven and the Torments of Hell and oh that you would choose not Death but Life not Ebal but Gerizzim not Cursings but Blessings not hellish intolerable Torments but heavenly Glory There are but two Estates of Men in this present Life and but two proportionate to them in the Life to come Some here live after the Flesh and they must die
Water to refresh the Thirsty and an eternal Sabbath of Rest for all that are now weary This Reward is Manna cujuslibet suporis like the Manna prepared for God's People in the Wilderness which they say had that very tast and relish in every Man's Mouth that pleased him best Here if one thing suite well with your Desires yet another goes cross or if one thing answer your Expectations yet in some other Mercy or Comfort you are often disappointed Oh but the Reward of heavenly Glory this will answer your Desires this will answer all your Wants your Grievances your sorrowful Sighs and careful Groans accommodating it self most exactly to your longing Expectations in all things Every poor Soul in this Life is a very Compound of manifold Miseries Wants and heart-breaking Distresses But as it is said of Mony that answers all things so this Reward it answers them all and removes them all What is it poor Child of God that thou standest in most need of What are thy Wounds that most pain thee thy Troubles that most oppress thee and what are thy daily Burdens that lie most heavy upon thy Spirit to grieve and afflict thee What is it after which thy Heart doth so pant and breath so impatiently long for Oh it may be thou art now upon the Rack sorely distressed But this Reward it will give thee a Writ of Ease from all thy Pain not suffering thee to groan under them any longer It may be with Zion thou sittest with Tears upon thy Cheeks weeping bitterly in the Night Oh but this Reward it will bring in fulness (b) Isaiah 35.10 of Comfort wiping away all Tears from thy Eyes Thou may'st possibly go mourning and be bowed down by reason of great Affliction Oh but this Reward it will give thee the Oyl of Gladness and make thee lift up thy Head with everlasting rejoycing Possibly thy Sins thy Unbelief thy Unfruitfulness thy hardness of Heart thy want of love to God and our dear Lord Jesus these trouble and afflict thy Spirit Oh but this Reward it destroys all our Sins turns faith into open Vision Hope into full Fruition crowning all our Graces how weak soever here with fullness and everlasting Perfection If thou groan because thy Pilgrimage is prolonged and thou dwellest as it were in the Tents of Kedar Oh remember this Reward it will bring thee home to thy Father's House it will gather thee to the Spirits of just Men made perfect it will change thy Sodom into a Zion it will turn the Brick-kilns of Egypt into Canaan's Golden Mines and the barren Wilderness of this World wherein thou now wandrest up and down like a poor distressed Pilgrim this Reward will change it into the Garden of God into the heavenly Paradise into a spiritual Eden full of purest Delights and divine Contentments Now peradventure thou hast Sorrow to remember thy Sins thy former Miscarriages thy daily Troubles thy absence from the Lord who alone is thy Hope thy Life thy Comfort thy Hearts desire oh but dear Christian this Reward it will make thee to forget (c) John 16.20 22. the days of thy Mourning it will put thee into the Bosom of thy dearest Lord it will turn thy Sorrow into Joy that shall never be taken from thee On Christians there is that suitableness in his Reward that it 's the very Plaister for your Sore the very Balm for your Wound the very Voice of Joy to your Spirits in heaviness the very Harbour of Rest and Happiness after all your Storms that have so grievously tossed you That variety of Expression made use of by the holy Ghost to shadow out the transcendent Excellency of this Reward doth most clearly evince the suitableness of it to all the Wants Indigences and desires of an immortal Soul If the Soul be dislodged from its earthly Tabernacle this Reward (d) 2 Cor. 5.1 provides Mansions of Glory for the comfortable Entertainment thereof in another World If a Man be hungry it 's a pot of hidden Manna to feast him If sorrowful (e) Rev. 2.17 it s the Joy of the Lord to comfort him If any Man be thirsty (f) Mat. 25.21 it's Rivers of Pleasure at God's right Hand for evermore to cool and refresh him If any Man walk in darkness (g) Psal 16. and have no light in him (h) Col. 1.12 it is the Inheritance of the Saints in Light If any Man walk in the valley of the shadow of Death it 's a Crown of Life (i) James like a Death-bed-cordial to revive him If any Man suffer Nakedness for Righteousness sake it 's the Garments of Salvation to cloath him it 's the white Robes of Glory to hide the Shame of his Nakedness If any Man lose Houses or Lands for Christ it 's an Inheritance incorruptible Undefiled (k) 1 Pet. 1. and that fadeth not away reserved in Heaven for him To the weary Soul that hath long been troubled through the Malice of an ungrateful World (l) Rev. 14.13 it 's a resting from his Labours To be short if any Man endure Afflictions it 's a far more exceeding and eternal weight of (m) 2 Cor. 4.17 Glory Oh then how suitable is this Reward that a poor Soul cannot be in any Distress nor labour under any Wants but this Reward will afford supply of Comfort giving ease to all that are now in pain the Garment of Praise to all that are now in heaviness and to all that are now labouring and weary and heavy laden the sweet enchearing Bosom of God himself for their eternal easeful Repose 4 THE Reward whereunto God allows his People a Respect in all their Obedience it 's a sure Reward So you may find it called by Sâ—lomon a Man in whose Breast all the Lines of Wisdom met as in their proper Center (n) Prov. 11.18 The Wicked worketh a deceitful Work but to him that soweth Righteousness shall be a sure Reward Both the Righteous and the Wicked are Men of active Spirits only the Works of the Wicked they prove abortive promising all good but exposing to Misery and so deceive Expectation But the Righteous he never meets with any such sad Disappointment but as the Harvest naturally follows the Seed-time so after a short Seed-time of Grace there will spring up as the never failing sure Reward of such a Person a full crop of eternal Glory So (o) Gal. 6.8 that you see the Text though but short doth yet carry in it both Blessing and Cursing both Life and Death both Heaven and Hell Blessing Life and Heaven to Crown the Righteous Cursing Death and Hell as that which must inevitably be the Portion of all the Ungodly The Wicked he worketh the work of a Lie that is a sinful Work every Sin being a Lie and such a Work that albeit it tells us a fair tale yet it will miserably deceive us at last betraying us into the Hands of Wrath Hell and
chiefest Good for our Portion we must needs have the chiefest Happiness the chiefest Delight true Liberty perfect Charity eternal Security and secure Eternity excluding all possibility of future Misery Here Christians here is the true Gladness the fullest measure of divine Knowledg the most peerless Beauty the perfect Enjoyment of all Blessedness So that you shall see God even to the Satisfaction of your utmost Curiosity have him for your Pleasure and enjoy him for your greatest Delight flourishing in his Eternity shining with the bright Reflexions of his Truth upon you and rejoycing in his Goodness with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory Moses's Face shined with the brightness of God's back-parts Paul was sensless of all other Joys when rapt up into the third Heavens Peter was thrown into an Extasie of Admiration when he only saw a glimpse of Christ's Glory in the Mount Oh then what Joy Christian will this be to thy Soul what Beauty to thine Eyes what Musick to thy Ears what Hony to thy Mouth what Perfumes to thy Nostrils what fulness of Delight to thy Heart when enjoying Communion with God in Heaven thou shalt behold nor his back-parts as Moses did but shalt (c) Omnes lectantur in laetitia exulatione omnes delectantur de Deo cujus aspectus pulcher facies decora eloquium dulce Delectabilis est ad videndum suavis ad habendum dulcis ad perfruendum Ipse per se placet et per se sufficit ad meritum sufficit ad praemium nec extra illum quicquam quaeritur quia totum in illo intenitur quicquid defideratur Semper libet eum aspicere semper habere semper in illo delectari in illo perfrui Bern. ubi supra see him Face to Face Here it is that all God's People shall rejoyce and be exceeding glad they shall delight themselves greatly in the Lord Jehovah whose Countenance is most aimable whose Face is Comely whose Voice is sweeter than the Hony and the Hony-comb Oh this Christians is a beatifical Object indeed most delightful to behold most pleasant to have and most sweet to enjoy Such is the fulness of all Good in God that of himself he can please the Soul of himself he sufficeth to merit and to be our eternal Reward Nor can the Soul desire ought out of him as finding the whole of all Happiness in him whatever it be that she can desire Here Christians if any where it contenteth to see him ever to have him ever to enjoy him for ever In God is the Understanding clarified to know and the Affections purified to love (d) In illo clarificatur intellectus et purificatur affectus ad cognoscendam diligendam veritatem Et hoc est torum bonum hominis nosse scilicet amare creatorem suum Idem ibid him as the first Truth as the chiefest Good And this surely is the whole Happiness of Man to know and love the great God his Maker in a way of divine beatifical Vision in a way of full Enjoyment and sweetest Fruition 15 THE Reward whereunto God allows his People a Respect in all their Obedience it 's a very near and proxim Reward and such as you shall speedily be put in possession of The time when the Lord will reward you with all heavenly Glory is of no long date though the time for your enjoyment of that glorious Reward will bear date to all Eternity 'T is but a little while and having finished your Course God himself will be your Portion and your exceeding great Reward The whole time of Man's Life here is so short that it goes but for one day in the Kalender of Heaven And yet as short as it is no sooner shall it close up in the peaceful Evening of a blessed Death but the Peny of eternal Life shall be given you We are usually long before we seriously set our selves to work in God's Vineyard But when once the Lord sees us working in good earnest he delays nor but comes quickly to reward us (e) Rev. 22.12 Behold saith he I come quickly and my Reward is with me to give every Man according as his Work shall be The Lord doth not say he will come to reward us which had implied some delay But as one ready to set the Crown upon our Heads behold saith he speaking in the present Tense I come quickly and my Reward is with me Or if any where the Lord speaks of his People's Reward as a thing to come you may find him qualifying the Speech with such comfortable Diminutives as are enough almost to remove the Futurity of this glorious Reward and to give it a present Subsistence (f) Heb. 10.37 Take that one Instance where the Apostle shewing the Hebrews what need they (g) Quod vero ait 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quod valet parum quantum quantum valde parum significat Theoph. in loc had of Patience that having done the Will of God they might receive the promised Reward he tells them that yet a little while and he that shall come will come and will not tarry Great is the Emphasis of the words in the Original and such as our English cannot with any handsomness of Expression render to the life For the Apostle not willing that these Believers should think the time long he speaks the whole of it by the help of three Diminutives into one short moment telling them that yet a little while yea a very very little while and their Lord who already was coming would no longer adjourn their Happiness but reward them speedily Your Seed-time of Grace how needful soever yet because it 's a dropping time the Lord will not suffer it to last always but hath provided before-hand that shortly it shall end in a rich Harvest of heavenly Glory where all Tears shall be wiped from your Eyes Truth is we have but a few days in this World and therefore many days there cannot be till God will Crown us with fulness of Reward in the World to come Be it so Christian that now thy own unbelieving dead Heart is thy trouble within and that the World and Satan trouble thee from without Yet remember after a few weary days the Lord will give thee a Writ of Ease he will give thee a Sabbath of Rest and will presently notwithstanding all contrary Winds land the Ship of thy precious Soul at the wished shoar of blessed Immortality What Athanasius said of the Arian Perfection calling it nubeculam citò-transituram will hold true of all the Afflictions Tryals and Persecutions of God's People in this Life which are but as a little Cloud that will soon be blown oâ—er So that though now you bear the burden and heat of the day yet Night comes on a pace as a time of (h) Acts 3.19 refreshing from the Lord and then you shall most sweetly repose your selves in the downy Bed of God's eternal Love Be your Sorrow never so grievous over
a Land all whose Rivers run heavenly Nectar and all whose Trees are ever laden with the sweet delicious Grapes of Paradise (o) Si tanta nobis tribuis in careere quid dabis in patria Aug. de civit Dei If here in the Land of your Pilgrimage so much of Heavens Glory be revealed to you what Tongue of Man or Angel can tell the Happiness the Glory to be revealed in you when at home in your own Country The Crown of Life if now so bright and orient to an Eye of Faith beholding it Oh then what a far more excâ—â—ding and Eternal Weight os Glory will be found in it when a glorious Christ shall set it upon your Head with his own remunerative Hands 12 AND lastly a due respect had to this glorious Reward will bring you safe to it never leaving you till your Souls be crowned with fulness of Glory The Loadstone will draw Iron to itself when intra Spheram activitatis suae within the reach of its own attractive influence Thus the Reward of Eternal Life as an heavenly Loadstone hath that magnetick Virtue in it that if you put yourselves by a due respect had thereto under it it will draw you home to itself The wise Men keeping their Eye upon the Star which went before them were at length brought to Christ Thus keeping your Eye Christians upon this Eternal Reward as a glorious Star it will bring you at length to Christ in Glory whom fully to enjoy is our Life our Comfort our Happiness yea the Heaven of Heavens 'T is true Christians we must be uncloathed of this Body of Death before we can enter into the Joy of our Lord and be cloathed upon with the white Robes of Blessed Immortality Death must break down the Prison Walls of a Mortal Body before our Souls can ever come to the glorious Liberty of God's Children (a) 2 Cor. 5.1 Till our earthly Tabernacle be dissolved there is no having of a Building of God an House not made with Hands Eternal in the Heavens And why should we not be willing that God should pull down these Cottages of Clay who hath promised to raise us up a more glorious Temple The Loadstone cannot draw Iron as some say whilst the Diamond is in Presence Doubtless were it not for a Body of Death that is still present with us an Eye fixed upon Heaven's Glory would immediately draw us into Heaven For besides the interposition of an earthly gross Body together with those corruptions whose Foundation is in that Dust there is nothing as one well observes that hinders a Christian from the full enjoyment of God in Glory So that Death's peculiar Office is to break down this Wall of separation that the Soul may the better come to her God her beloved Redeemer her Eternal Habitation in the Kingdom of Heaven The Soul when once loosed from this dying Body then she hath the Crown of Life set upon her Head then she sees God no longer through a Glass darkly but Face to Face then she is ravished with the unconceivable sweetness of the beatifical Vision (b) Mori plane timeat sed qui ex aqua spiritu non renatus Gehennae ignibus mancipatur mori timeat qui non Christi cruce passione censetur mori timeat qui ad secundam mortem de hac morte transibit quem de seculo recedentem perennibus poenis aeterna torquebit flamma Cyp. de Mortalit pag. 344. Let those therefore tremble at the knocking and approaches of Death who know not what will become of their immortal Souls who not being born again from above are every moment liable to infernal Flames who have no interest in the Glory purchased by Christ who must pass from Death to Death from short momentany Pleasures to everlasting hellish Torments Death to the Wicked is the Trap-door that opening lets them fall down irrecoverably into the dark vault of Eternal Misery But to the Gracious Soul there is no cause of Terrour in Death no Fear in the Grave no Sting to perplex in a bodily dissolution as that which only ushers in her everlastingly Blessed and Glorious Coronation Death comes to a Man dying the recompence of Reward like Moses to the Israelites to deliver him as the Angel to Peter in Prison to set him free as God's fiery Chariot to carry him like Elias into heavenly Glory And are you Christians afraid of entring upon your own Blessedness are you afraid to be cloathed upon with your House from Heaven Get a right notion of Death which as Bernard calls it is nothing but the Gate of Life the Portal of eternal security Though Death look upon thee with a grim Countenance yet it comes upon a good errand to God's People to fetch them out of their Wilderness-condition and to bring them to an everlasting estate of Happiness By Death we go from Earth to Heaven from conversing with Sinful Men to converse with Millions of glorious Angels and what makes us so loath to remove Who would not leave a Cottage to gain a Kingdom Who would not leave an Egypt to inherit Canaan Who would not leave gladly an oppressive Babylon to be made a Citizen of Sion of the heavenly Jerusalem OUR greatest Misery lies not in Death but in Life 'T is the Veil of Flesh that keeps us from entring into the holiest of all c Death gives us a pasport from corruptible Joys to an incorruptible Crown from a Mortal Life to a Life of blessed Immortality from a troublesome condition to a State of perfect tranquillity So that the name of Death should not offend us But the Happiness and Glory to which it leads should delight us The Moon never comes to the full til after her change Thus through the change of Death a Christian comes to all fulness of Joy and hath the white Robes of Glory given him Now the Bridegroom comes to meet the Soul in Happiness now all Tears are wiped away and Heaven Gates are set wide open to give her everlasting glorious entertainment Now the Reward of life everlasting now the Joy of Eternal Salvation now the full possession of the heavenly Paradise comes Now heavenly Mansions instead of earthly Tabernacles now greatest Glory instead of small and Eternal Happiness instead of poor temporal enjoyments are bestowed upon every Child of God What Man that is well in his Wits woâ—ld not part with Life and bid Death welcome upon terms of such everlasting blessed and glorious advantage (d) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost ad pop Ant. hom 7. Death in the true notion (c) Mors haec transitus universorum est transitur à corruptione ad incorruptionem à mortalitate ad immortalitatem à perturbatione ad tranquillitatem Non igitur nomen mortis te offendat sed boni transitûs beneficia delectent Ambros lib. de Bono mort cap. 4. Proemium vitae gaudium salutis aeternae perpetua laetitia possessio Paradisi
ΜΙΣΘΟΣΚΟΠΙΑ A PROSPECT OF Heavenly GLORY For the Comfort of Sion 's MOURNERS By Joseph Cooper Minister of the Gospel Author of the Domus Mosaicae Clavis For our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory while we look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen For the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal 2 Cor. 4.17 18. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cyril Hier. Catech. 18. p. 210. Legant priùs posteà despiciant ne videantur non ex judicio sed ex odii praesumptione ignorata damnare Hieron 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alex. 290. London Printed by W. Redmayne and to be Sold by John Cooper Apothecary at the Half-moon and Seven Stars in White-chappel and Joseph Cooper Toyman at the Corner of Hungerford-market in the Strand 1700. TO THE Honourable the LADY Elizabeth Barnadiston AT the Desire of the Authors Relations I prefix your Ladyships Name to a Treatise by himself prepared for the Press and committed to my purusal at the motion of Dr. Bates who among the brightest Luminaries now shines in his expected and desired Firmament The ensuing Picture drawn by his impartial Intimate will revive your remembrance of the Blessed Mr. Cooper who was so highly esteemed by your Honourable Mother and among many other ejected Ministers no small sharer in the effects of her Beneficence which she exerted there not as a Boon to oblige the Needy but for a Testimony to that cause for which he suffered and a just return to his occasional Labours whence greater Blessings were designed to herself and Family But seeing the Subject treated of viz. The Glory of the Saints Reward is that under the Power whereof you determine your Choice bear your Afflictions and direct your Actings it would be vain to labour at a further Apology for this Dedication The Design pursued by the high displays of Glory in this Book respect both Sinners and Saints Sinners are concernedly perswaded to enter into the way of Heaven from a Conviction that the good there received infinitely exceeds in Pleasure Honour and Advantage whatever can be found in a sinful course This part is so warmly and wisely managed that the obstinate Reader must ascribe his ruin to his own perverseness for this motive from eternal Rewards is enforced with that account of the vanity and vileness of a temporal Bliss as must put any considering Person to the blush who sets up Earth as a Rival with Heaven or takes up with a Portion in it yea though endless Misery were not the Wages of that Madness Yet assured this last will be found true and that God governeth us by fear as well as hope the prudent Author describes Hell in a manner fit to terrifie the most secure from persisting in ungodliness to their neglect of Christ and forfeiture of this great Salvation The mind impressed with the prospect of these two extremely different States he leaves neither under despair of recovery nor yet under darkness what means he should apply himself to And therefore he prescribes the method to be used by the unconverted yet still in a dependance on the Grace of Christ from the demonstrated impotency of meer nature and total want of human merit and encourageth a compliance with the said method by full assurances that a disappointment cannot arise from our fallen State as irrecoverable But least the mistaken Presumption of the Hypocrite should fix his danger by a claim to Saintship he faithfully states the infallible sign of the Heirs of this heavenly Kingdom and warns against a conceit of safety before these be evident The other part of his design is to fix the Eyes of Saints so upon this certain and glorious Crown of Life as thence to derive relief and strength against those endangering Snares worldly Allurements afflictive Sufferings and tiresome Labours which will attend them in their Pilgrimage this he treats of as a Man first forced on this Subject for a divine composedness under his own exercise and then from the experimented fixing transporting power thereof commends the same to Zion's Mourners as effectual to make them happier even under Sufferings than without them It may be less proper in an Epistle to your Ladyship to mention the doctrinal points wherein this divinely heated Soul discovers much Light and Judgment How accurately and strongly doth he prove against the Antimonians the lawfulness of a Saints respect to the recompence of reward the rectoral connexion between Gospel Duties and Benefits the necessity of Repentance in order to forgiveness c. which I hope will be the more regarded from him because his opinion about Predetermination and the object of Reprobation is more pleasing to them than that of others of us be Madam a Book of which these are the Contents must be acceptable to one in whom such Truths had an early regenerating Power and can entail on Posterity a great stock of Prayers sent up by the Author and his Brethren at the request of the Lady Wimbleton whose Death invites you to an imitation of her exemplary Life Her Ladyship with the Reverend Author are now beholding and enjoying that Glory in its fullness the darker glimpses whereof sufficed to raise them above this World and reconcile them to Death yet were their present Station capable of a blush reflections on their low Apprehensions remiss Labours scanty layings out and faint longings for that Glory would compel it It s but a few moments and our State is decided for Eternity and the unseen World shall be felt in its greatness as well as reality beyond our comprehension Oh what a change will the very Borders of it make in our Thoughts advancing cleansing and improving such as are most sublime and best whilst all others perish which are carnal false or foolish That you may dayly proceed in a meetness for Heaven by further evidence of title and agreeableness of temper that none of your Off-spring may come short thereof by degenerating from their eminently pious Ancestors And that these uncontroverted Truths which deserved an earlier Publication as well as larger Auditories than the time of Preaching them would admit may be of saving use to them and many others shall be the fervent Prayer of Madam Your Ladyship 's Most Humble Servant Daniel Williams THE EPISTLE Some Memorials of the holy Life of that Learned Person Mr. Joseph Cooper the Author of the ensuing Treatise SEeing some Readers are better pleas'd with a Book when they know who and what manner of Person he was that wrote it tho' it be excellent in itself it is thâ—â—ght fit to prefix something of the Characters of this Great and Good Man both which Titles the Reader shall find made good to him before he hath gone over many Pages Great for his Learning and acquired Abilities Good for his extraordinary Piety Modesty Sobriety Contentment
fearing the Shame and not knowing well how to spare so much Mony as was needful in the case To all other Duties he finds mighty impulsions to close with any opportunity for them and against every Temptation to sin strong aversations and reluctances so that he feels the Law of the Spirit of Life within his own Bowels though too often alass too often he is disobedient to it 3 He measures all Persons Places Employments by their subserviency to the Divine Life in his Soul and still comes off with Shame and great Heaviness where he spends one Hour without some spritual advantage 4 He hath a real compassion for all Men making it his Heart's Desire to God that they may be saved but his delight lies in those that have most of the Image and likeness of God upon them those that are begotten by the same immortal seed formed into the same divine Nature acted and fed by the same Almighty Spirit of Life with himself these are his Beu'ah's his Hepthsibahs he thinks â—he could not live in the World without â—hem 5 This notwithstanding he still finds himself out of his Proper Center he is daily under powerful tendencies and restless desires after the full enjoyment of and the nearest conjunction with the blessed God in Christ Jesus which desires are mightily strengthned by a deep Sense of his present misery under hard bondage the impetuousness of in-dwelling Corruption and violent Temptations which make every Day of his Life a bloody Warfare so that his Soul almost chooseth Strangling and Death rather than Life he loaths it he would not live always at such distance from the blessed God in such incessant and dangerous conflicts with World Flesh and Devil for a thousand Worlds so far as he is willing under the Tears and tediousness the Conflicts and Dangers of this Mortal Life by way of pure Compliance with the Will of God he really judgeth the greatest act of Self-denial that he is capable of performing 6 To sweeten a Life so much in the Gall of Bitterness and Bonds of Iniquity he makes it his Business to be much with God through an Almighty Redeemer and much in the Fellowship of the Holy-Ghost and this not only at the stated times of publick private and secret Duties but especially of secret Duties where he sets himself no bounds but takes all opportunities which he finds his Heart fit to comply with many times in company and employment of another Nature he is weary of forbearing and his Heart restless till he find room for such retirement for he hath found that Life and Power that divine solace and sweetness in it with which all the Delights of Sense are no more worthy to be compared than a Dunghil with the Sun And oh when Heaven hath thus come down in Smiles to him and filled him with Righteousness Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost how often hath he been afraid to make an end of the Duty How often when rising off his Knees hath he fallen down again not willing to leave his sweetness and his Fatness so and so doubled the Time of his Duty Thus was his whole Sheet of Paper filled whether there was any thing more written of this kind we cannot find The preservation of this Sheet seems to be an intimation of Divine Providence that he shou'd be shewed to the World in those colours that he had lay'd on himself He lived till the Non-conformists had a little Smile from the Court after a Decad of Severity and Frowns And now having got a little Liberty by the Licences the King granted to those of his Station he took the Gale of Opportunity to be more abundant in the work of the Lord. And that in the Age of his full Vigour and Strength Yet even now see he is at leisure to think of Death and being Poetically given composed this Dialogue betwixt a Person dying and Death Thus prefacing it Oppress'd with Pain I groan'd as one unwise Death's horrid Aspect did my Soul surprize This frightful Picture ghastly to behold Did all his Terror on my Thoughts unfold At first confounded all amaz'd I stand But gaining confidence thus I demand Moriens or Person Dying Are you that King of Terrors which they say Doth conquer Empires and great Kings dismay Death The very same Sir Death both name and thing My Looks kill some all die that feel my Sting Person Dying Poor Death your looks speak not your strength but fear You cannot live I guess self-judg'd you are Death And would it not torment the greatest Powers My Empire large as Nature Grace devours Person Dynig What that 's the reason of your hollow Eyes Of all the paleness on your Cheeks that lies You have some secret Wound if I guess right Your vital Blood is gone you look so white Death My vital Blood was Poyson and my Sting Did give me Power and create me King Person Dying Your Poyson who destroy'd Christ on the Cross Your Sting great Jesus dying caus'd this loss How came this Palsie in your trembling Hand For fear of losing Scepter and Command Scepter Poor Death it is a Spade I judge No sign of Majesty but of a Drudge Go dig my Grave I would repose in Dust Death you must help to scower off my Rust This Mortal Life will kill me Welcome Grave My hidden Life in Christ is all I have Death do your Office Heaven calls away Dissolve my Bonds my Soul shall win the Day I cannot live indeed unless I die Such is Death's Triumph such his Victory Neither did he forget to think on Heaven upon which he hath bestowed a larger Poem as also others upon Faith Hope Repentance c. which shew the way thither Which possibly the Reader may find in some other place For he delighted to fetter his Thoughts in Verse And though he hath not such high flights as some may expect yet there is in his Poems the devout Breathings of a Divine Poet he wrote not for the Stage nor a King Arthur But that which speaks his Heart most to have been in Heaven is not a Poem but what his serious Reflections and Meditations wrote in Prose in the Treatise following God is pleased to exercise many of his Servants with thoughts of Heaven as it were to prepare them for it immediately before he call them to it Thus Mr. Bolton was writing de quatuor novissimis particularly of Heaven when he dyed Thus the late Reverend Dr. Bates had finished his last Treatise of spiritual Perfection not long before he had expired the last words of which Book are Enter thou into the Joy of thy Lord. Many more might be named But our own Author must not be forgotten who had taken much pains to transcribe what he had preached and fitted for the Press his Meditations upon this Subject It may be there are few Subjects more cultivated and none on which more is to be said God and Heaven fall under no Hyperbole A late Doctor
Eternal Reward that God sets before us Heart Purity with a Life of practical Godliness that 's the Regia Via the King of Heaven's High-way which leads to Glory So that whoever hath a due respect to heavenly Glory desiring that as the Reward of all his Labours can no more make liâ—ht Performances than a Man who desires Life can sâ—t Light by Food and Raiment with such like Comforts that are as Oyl to feed that Lamp ¶ Scientia id praestat ut quomodo et quo perveniendum sit noverimus virtus ut perveniamus Alterum sine altero nihil valet ex scientia enim virtus ex virtuâ—e Summum Bonum nascitur Lact. Instit lib. 3. câ—p 12. p. 271. As there is no possibility of arriving at Heaven without Knowledge of the way So neither is it possible that we should ever come to Heaven the way being known without walking therein 'T is not the Jacob's Staff of Speculation but the Jacob's Ladder of a Godly Conversation by which we must Climb the Tree of Life The School-men have large Disputes pro and con about the Nature of Divinity Whether it consist more in Speculation or in Practise Aquinas makes Theologiam Speculativam and Scotus will have it Practicam but indeed 't is the Complication of both these that makes a good Christian whose Gospel Light must be Animated with a Gospel Life and all whose Knowledge must Expatiate into Obedience These things if you know saith the Lord of Life happy are ye if you do them John 13.17 Knowledge may be our Pilot to guide us in our course but Practise is the Ship in which we must Sail to the Shore of eternal Soul-satisfying Happiness Hence the Apostle James 1.25 pronounces the Practical Hearer Blessed though not for his Deed yet in his Deed clearly making Practise the Evidence thô not the Ground of our Happiness the Way that leads to a Crown of Life though not the Price whereby we should think to purchase it As God is a plentiful Rewarder of those that diligently seek him so he will be sought before ever the reward of eternal Glory can be had Having therefore our Eyes upon the Star of True Happiness let us keep our Hands to the Helm of Practical Holiness [†] Qui vult sapiens ac beatus esse audiat Dei vocem discat justitiam humana contemnat divina suscipiat ut Summum illud Bonum ad quod natus est possit adipisci Lact. He that would be Blessed desiring to be Wise to Salvation let him hear the Voice of God let him work Righteousness let him despise humane Vanities let him enterprize divine Offices that he may come at length to the full Enjoyment of that Chiefest Good for which he came into the World We must quit ourselves like Men on Earth or never look to be made glorious like the Angels in Heaven True Happiness is a rich Jewel Lockt up in the Cabinet of Heaven in the Kingdom of God Holiness must turn the Key or the Door of Blessedness the Gates of the Heavenly Jerusalem will never open to us Keep we therefore our Eyes upon Heaven's Glory and then forbear we to do the Work of God upon Earth if we can It 's hope of Gain that makes the diligent Tradesman be up so early and so patient to endure hardship How much more should the Hope of gaining not Earth but Heaven not those Riches which perish in the using but the Riches of eternal Glory make us labour to be Holy Oh let Carking for this World be expelled with our Care for Heaven Let this eat up our Hearts with desire to have the Injoyment of that glorious Inheritance 'T is Fabled of Leobis and Biton that their Father having been imploring the greatest Blessing from the Gods upon these his Two Sons the next morning they were found both Dead in their Beds The greatest Blessing that can befall a Child of God is to dye in the Lord bidding Adieu to this vale of Tears and so entring upon his Master's Joy The Happiness of God's People doth indeed dawn in this Life in the Beauties of Holiness from the womb of the Morning but the Noon-tide of their Happiness the Meridian Light of Glory doth never shine forth upon them till they come to Heaven Most of a Christian's Drink in this Life is Oxymel Heaven alone puts that pure Cup of Consolation into his hand wherein there is no sour Ingredients True Blessedness grows indeed upon the Tree of Godliness which hath indeed some Bloomings and Buds of Comfort here but it comes not to it 's full growth till another Life This World is too Cold a Climate to bring it to Ripeness it must first be transplanted into the heavenly Canaan and have the Sun of Righteousness shining upon it in full strength before the blessed Fruit of this Tree will ever be brought to it's full Maturity So that a Christian doth not Wither when plucked up of Death as it were by the Roots but he changes the place of his growth leaving the Wilderness to be Planted in Canaan where the Fruit of Holiness is now Crowned with Life everlasting COME ¶ Veniant qui esuriunt ut coelesti cibo saturati sempiternam famem ponant Veniant qui sitiunt ut aquam salutarem de perenni Coelestique Fonte plenissimis faucibus trahant Hoc cibatu atque potu Dei et coeci videbunt et surdi audient muti Loquentur claudi ambulabunt stulti sapient aegroti valebunt mortui revivescent Lact. de vit Beat cap. 27. pag. 732. Edit Gal. then come all ye that Hunger that being satisfy'd with this heavenly Food ye may lay aside your Hunger for ever This Meat and Drink which God hath provided in Heaven is of that Sovereign Virtue that it both makes the Blind to See and the Deaf to Hear and the Lame to Leap for Joy and the Foolish to know Understanding and the Sick it restores to Health and the Dead it makes to Live a life of endless Glory Tully would have a Prince fed with Honour and drawn to Heroick Atchievements by the desire of Glory and Renown And I â—â—kewise would have God's People to live upon the Glory to come as that which will draw them to walk worthy of God who hath called them out of Darkness into the Kingdom of his dear Son Can any Man that sees Heaven and knows what it is to be with the Lord for ever go on in a course of sensual brutish living not regarding to prepare himself for the Glory to be revealed in him So sweet is the Pleasure of that eternal Light that if we should enjoy the same no more than one short hour yet for this one hour's Happiness we ought and that deservedly to despise all the Delights and Pleasures that the universal confluence of Worldly enjoyments could afford us TELL me then if God's People be not well advised to study Holiness Tell me
they will never be able to reach the Price thereof Besides Christians whatever we do or suffer for God Luke 17.10 it 's no more than what we are obliged unto and surely in doing our duty we can never lay the (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost ad Rom. Homil. 7. Foundation of Merit for Eternal Glory Nor may we think to make a Purchase of the New Jerusalem by paying an old Score WOULD we ever Merit Heaven and Eternal Glory of God we must present him with some acceptable (d) Debemus enim deo et nos ipsos et nostra omnia Cha. n. Tom. 3. lib 14. cap. 20. pag. 497. Services which we owe him not but how shall we give him any thing wherein he hath not already a full propriety when there is nothing that we are or have there is nothing that we can do or suffer in a way of Obedience but is due unto God from us by every kind of Right Had we any thing of our own wherewith to come before the Lord there might then be some ground of pretence for the Merit of good Works (e) Ex gratia enim datur non solum justificatis vita bona sed etiam glorificatis vita aeterna Fulgent ad Monim l. 1. p. 18. But since all that we have is due to God because it came from him and bears his Image and Superscription upon it we cannot rationally think it possible for us to Merit any thing thereby of God unless we can think it rational that God should be obliged in point of Justice by giving us one Mercy to give us another by giving us Grace to put us at length in Possession of Eternal Glory That whereby Christians you differ from others from the vilest of Sinners from the Damned themselves that are now roaring out in Hell is not of Merit but of Grace not of Debt but a free Donative 't is nothing in your selves but the free distinguishing love of God dropping the Pearl of Grace into your hearts whilst others are left to perish in their Sins that hath made the difference And surely by those graces which you freely receive from God you may not think to Merit Life and Eternity of Glory at the hands of God For certainly whatever grace you have it obligeth you to Duty so that your Graces and your Obligations of Obedience to God they grow up together and the more grace you receive from God the more deeply do you stand engaged to abound in the fruits of Righteousness towards God How then can you once have a thought that that Grace and Holiness which God hath freely wrought in you and whereby he hath laid you under the strongest engagements to all holy and upright walking before him should make God your Debtor obliging him in point of Justice to render you the Reward of eternal Glory Indeed to whomsoever the Lord gives Grace he will also give Glory and whomsoever he now makes Holy he will Crown them at length with Eternal Happiness But this you must know not an act of Justice founded upon Man's Merit but an act of free Grace bottomed upon the Remunerative goodness of God in the Blood of Christ Rom. 6.23 (f) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost 'T is an act of Justice in God to punish Sin which is wholly our own and purely Evil and therefore Death is here called the Wages of Sin But to Reward the good Works of Believers which are neither their own nor purely good is an act of free Grace and therefore we find the Apostle to exclude all opinion of Merit calling Life Eternal in this place the gift of God (g) Non dixit similiter stipendia justitiae quia non est antequam remuneratur in nobis non enim nostro labore quaesita est Jerom. So that we see though it be of Justice that the Wicked are Punished yet it is of Grace that the Righteous are Crowned (h) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost And if it be of Grace then not of any Merit in our own good Works otherwise grace were no more grace if not every way free and gratuitous Rom. 4.4 For how can we count it a point of grace to give a Man his due Or what need he sue for Mercy who requireth no more than his own at the hands of God Admit but of Merit and you leave no place of entrance for the grace of God (i) Non est quo gratia intret ubi jam meritum occuparit Bernard Cant. 67. So likewise the grace of God in Christ it leaves no place for the Merit of our good Works For Grace and Merit are altogether inconsistent and mutually destructive one of another Rom. 11.6 So that if you pull down the Merit of good Works you set up Grace and if you go about to establish Merit you do utterly destroy the Grace of God and make it of none effect Let us not then Christians look in our Obedience to have that of Debt which God hath decreed to be of Grace nor go about to seek Heaven and Glory by way of Purchase which the Lord hath intended to be a Donative and of free Gift Whilst others trust to the Merit of their own good Works let us wholly rely upon the free Grace of God in Christ Jesus looking for the Recompence of Eternal Life not from the Justice of a Judge but from the Mercy of a Father not from the worth and dignity of our own Performances but from the free Bounty and Remunerative Goodness of the Lord our Redeemer You may do good Works and walk in ways of Obedience with an Eye to the Recompence of the Reward But yet none of these things must be done with respect to the Meriting of Eternal Life by them For though as (k) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost Tom. 8. Serm. 15. Chrysostome sweetly saith we had done ten thousand good deeds yet it is of Grace that we must look to be saved and of Loving-kindness not of any desert in ourselves that we must seek to obtain Eternal Glory (l) Totis licet animae et corporis laboribus desudemus totis licet obedientiae viribus exerceamur nihil tamen condignum merito pro coelestibus bonis compensare et offerre valebimus Euseb Emissen homil 3. ad Monarch We stand so infinitely indebted to the God of Heaven that though we should with all the strength of Body and Mind exercise ourselves in Obedience to God all our Life long though with bitterness and anguish of Spirit we should bewail our own Sins mourn in some Wilderness till Doom's-day and dissolve our Souls with weeping into (m) Flaccescant licet membra vigilijs pallescant licet ora jejunijs non erunt tamen condignae passiones hujus temporis ad futuram gloriam Idem Rivers of Tears though we should live like Angels of Light shine like the Sun in it's Noon-day Brightness and exercise ourselves unto Godliness continually with all
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
will readily grant but that Christ should lay down his Life and die in our stead that we through Faith in his Blood might escape the Damnation of Hell and so have an entrance into heavenly Glory they will not abide They make him like Job upon the Dunghil or Stephen the Proto-martyr under a storm of Stones a rare pattern of patience in his Death but as for the Treasury of his Merit to Life and eternity of Glory that they do wholly reject The most that they will allow concerning the Death and Sufferings of Christ our Redeemer is only this that he died as a famous Martyr to confirm the Doctrin he preached and to be an example unto us that we might walk in all patience and self-denial before God But as for that expiatory Sacrifice which in his Death he offered up to God the Father and that full satisfaction which he made thereby to Divine Ju tice against this they bend all their strength as Men that were industriously resolved to undermine the whole Work of our Redemption and to reduce themselves into the same estate of hopeless and everlasting unpreventable misery with lapsed Angels that are now shut up in everlasting Chains under Darkeness However there is a sufficiency of Scripture-evidence shining forth with most clarified Beams of brightness enough to satisfy all those whose eyes the God of this World hath not blinded that Christ died by way of Satisfaction to Divine Justice that he laid down his Life in our stead and that in all his sufferings he designed the purchasing of Life and eternal Salvation for us Hence besides the several Types and daily hibastical Sacrifices under the Old Testament all prefiguring that Jesus Christ was by his Death to make an Attonement for Sin we have the Holy Ghost every where in holy Writ asserting this as the grand end of Christ's coming into the World and of his becoming obedient unto Death that he might save Sinners that he might make satisfaction to Divine Justice that he might reconcile us unto God that he might impetrate the forgiveness of Sins for us and so put us at length in possession of endless Glory As the Lord doth naturally hate Sin so likewise he is naturally inclined to punish it and though there be a Remnant according to the election of Grace that shall be saved yet in order hereunto the Lord stands upon terms of satisfaction to his own Justice resolving to have an adequate satisfactory price deposited or the Captive shall never be released (a) Rom. 3.25 26. To declare therefore the righteousness of God that he might be just Jesus Christ was set forth to be a propitiation for our Sins redeeming us out of the hands of Divine Justice which once being violated becomes inexorable till full Satisfaction be given not with Silver or Gold or any such corruptible thing but with his own precious Blood as of a Lamb undefiled and without spot In our first and grand Apostacy from God the Fountain of our Life and Happiness we together with the light of Gods countenance did miserably lose our selves (b) Luke 19.10 1 Tim 1.15 For this end therefore Christ came into the World that he by the Sacrifice of himself might seek and save us Though before the Fall there was a sweet accord a blessed Covenant of Love and Friendship betwixt God and Man yet no sooner did our first Parents prevaricate but this peaceful League was changed into a dissentious and mutual enmity God for Sin hating Man and Man through Sin hating God To make up therefore this sad breach to compose this unsociable difference Christ humbles himself unto Death that so this dissentious Flame which threatned to involve the whole Race of Mankind in one general conflagration being by the effusion of his own Blood supprest there might be a mutual Reconciliation and an unjarring indissoluble League of Love betwixt God and Man established The Socinian I know will tell you that the enmity was not mutual betwixt God and Man and that Christ by his Death did not pacify God reconciling him to lost Sinners but only destroyed the enmity that was in our Natures against God shewing us thereby that the Lord was already reconciled unto us and ready to receive us into the bosom of his eternal Love But though 't is true that the very coming of Christ into the World was an evident demonstration of that Philanthropy and Stupendious Love of Benevolence whereby the Lord stood inclined to do good to lost Man yet without the propitiatory Sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross there was no Love of complacency but the Wrath of God abiding upon us Reconciliation as Chrysostom observes well presupposing enmity and pacification some kind of hostile opposition Hence Christ our Redeemer is so often called the Propitiation for our sins * 1 John 2.2 4 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Significat peccatorum expiationem ipsam propitiationem seu id quo propter quod tum pâ—ccata expiantur consequenter Deus placatur Zanch. Christus dicitur 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 non quod reddat Deo homines propitios sed quod Deum reddat hominibus propitium Maccov which word doth properly signify somewhat whereby the anger of another is pacified and so he is induced to become propitious favourable and merciful towards the Party offending A time there was when Man stood not obnoxious to any guilt but sate enthroned in spotless Innocency so that Divine Justice it self could then bring in no black charges nor any Bills of Indictment against him but since first our first Parents touched the forbidden Fruit we stand every moment obnoxious to the Arrests of Divine Vengeance are involved in an universal guiltiness of nature and must eternally lie under the Dint of Gods heavy displeasure had we not †Ephes 1.7 Redemption through Faith in the Blood of Christ even the forgiveness of our Sins Had not Adam and we in him apostatized from God the Death of Christ would have been needless but now by reason of that first prevarication and our own supperadded Iniquities we could not otherwise escape the damnation of Hell since without the shedding of Blood there was no * Heb. 9.22 remission of Sins If Christ undertake to blot out and cover the black lines of sin he must draw them all over with the red lines of his own Blood 'T is not that unbloody Sacrifice of the Mass so much extolled in the Roman Synagogue that can expiate our guilt and cleanse us from Sin but if the deep stain of Sin be fetched out of our Souls and our Robes washed white it must be in the †Rev. 7.14 Blood of the Lamb. A Popes Indulgence may be of efficacy to send some ignorant People to Hell with more chearfulness and security than otherwise they would have gone thither but that Pardon which will prove effectual indeed to calm your Consciences when estuated through the guilt of sin
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
Oh Sirs do you well consider how by such sordid refusals of Mercy you turn that into a favour of Death which breaths out nothing but Life and Happiness you provoke the Lord to rain down Vollies of Wrath and Fury yea Hell it self as the Father said of Sodom's destruction out of Heaven upon you necessitating him to vindicate the reputation of his holiness in your Eternal Misery and Damnation What to blaspheme against the Goodness of God when pursuing you as unwilling to let you without a Blessing To turn your backs upon the gracious condescentions of God when following you with strong importunities of Love and intreating you to provide for your Happiness To make light in a word of Heaven and Glory when offered by the Hand of free Grace upon no harder terms than only that you should cordially accept of them and by patient continuance in well-doing seek after them Oh Sirs such prodigious Ingratitude as this it will destroy you with a double destruction This will heat the Furnace of God's Indignation against you seven times hotter This will set an accent of greatest horrour upon Hell and be the greatest emphasis of your Misery and Eternal Damnation in that place of Torments 3 THIS may give us to understand what a pleasant thing it is to serve the Lord and how unjustly the ways of God are traduced by Men of corrupt minds as if there were no Joy no Comfort no solid grounds of Consolation nor any Cordials to make glad the Heart to be found in them God's People in all the ways of obedience are never suffered to go without the hope of Eternal Life in their Hearts and a fair prospect of Heaven and Glory in their Eye how should they go disconsolate or want matter of delight and comfort to make them rejoice with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory If as Solomon tells us it be such a pleasant thing for a †Prov. 3.17 Mortal Eye to behold the Sun how pleasant then are the wayes of Wisdom wherein the Soul having fixed its Eye upon the reward of Eternal Life is always irradiated with most clarified Beams of Joy and reflexions of Glory from the Sun of Righteousness Goodness is true Naomi that will be turned into a Marah into bitterness as she was but is always a pleasant object as that name sounds yeilding matter of delight and spiritual pleasure to all that embrace her The ways of God are like green Fields full of vernal Flowers the Beauty whereof doth exhilerate the Mind making a Man forget his weariness and so come to his Journeys end before he is well aware God deals with all his People as with Moses in the Wilderness to whom he granted for his comfort and satisfaction a prospect of Canaan though he suffered him not to enter therein so though his People cannot enter into the Heavenly Canaan whilst traveling through the Wilderness of their Earthly Pilgrimage yet he brings them down Heaven upon Earth he brings the Harbor into Sea the Rest into their labour the Glory into their trouble and something of the future * Psal 19.11 reward into their present work allowing them for their comfort a â—rospect of the Heavenly Canaan which doth wonderfully rejoyce and make glad their Hearts Men of carnal Hearts are apt indeed to look upon Religion as a sullen and austere exercise that comes to plunder them of all their Comforts as if embracing that they would never have a merry hour nor see one Summers day of joy after As Christ cast out of the Minstrels when he †Mat. 9.23 25. raised up the Rulers Daughter from Death to Life So Christianity they think banisheth all Joy necessitating them to take their longum vale of all delight and to bid farewell to it for ever A Life of serious practical Holiness transforms Men as they imagin into mopish Monks possessing them with unsociable melancholy and causing them like Rachel weeping for her children to refuse all comfort as persons ambitiously desirous to make themselves perfect emblems of sorrow and discontent But surely that encouragement which God allows his People in a way of Duty setting before them a Kingdom of Eternal Glory a Triumphant Crown of Righteousness together with the reward of Eternal Life as the recompense of all their labours may well satisfie us that all those are intolerably abusive and calumnious bringing a most false Report upon a Christian Conversation who do thus shamefully traduce it as a thing destructive of and wholly inconsistent with all Joy If Abraham could rejoice foreseeing by an Eye of Faith the day of Christs incarnation when he only came to purchase Heaven and Glory for his People How much more may the Children of Abraham lift up their Heads with Joy and everlasting consolation foreseeing by an Eye of Faith that Happy day when Christ should be * 2 Thess 1.10 glorified in his Saints and admired in all those that do believe as coming to put them in full possession of that glorious inheritance which is †1 Pet. 1.4 uncorruptible undefiled and which fadeth not away but is reserved sure in the Heavens for them That Christians which the Bernadine Monks fondly conceited that the Sun shone only in their Cell it holds true of you with reference to the Sun of Righteousness he irradiates none with the pure Beams of comfort he lifts up the light of hâ—s Countenance upon none but such as walk close in Communion with him The outward Sun that shines with promiscuous undistinguishable Beams both upon the Good and upon the Bad both upon Frâ—ends and Enemies but the Light of the Knowledge of God in the face of Jesus Christ the Sun of Righteousness that shines upon none that communicates its heart-entrancing heavenly influences of joy and gladness to none but those whom God loves with his special dearest and eternal Love (a) Numb 17.8 Amongst all the Rods of the Princes of Israel the Rod of Aaron the high Priest alone brought forth Buds and bloomed Blossoms and yeilded Almonds Thus amongst all the Children of Men they alone that are made spiritual Priests unto God have their Souls like an Aaron's Rod bringing forth the Buds Blooming the Blossoms and yielding the delicious Fruit of inward comfort to make glad their Hearts God will never pour the new Wine of consolation into the old Bottles of ungracious carnal (b) Deus non infundit oleum misericordiae nisi in nos nutritum Est enim gaudium quod non datur impiis sed iis qui te gratis colunt quorum gaudium tu ipse es August Confes lib. 10. cap. 22. Revel 2.17 Hearts Till therefore the Heart be spiritualized it can never relish the Sweetness of God and his ways nor ever meet with any solid comfort to feed upon The people of God are not left comfortless in the World only they feed upon hidden Manna which a carnal Heart is not able to relish they live upon the
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
all carnal pleasures which like that at the last will bite like a Serpent and sting like an Adder Those that now live in carnal pleasures will shortly pass into a place of Torments where their Flowers being all faded that Fire will kindle upon them that must burn for ever (b) Prov. 5.4.5 Though lust come in with a painted face and be sweet in the act yet her end is bitter as Wormwood her feet go down to Death and her steps take hold of Hell (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignat ad Tral Epist pag. mihi 69. There is a certain Herb the juice whereof being taken makes a Man laugh till he dieth Thus whoever takes pleasure in sin well may he laugh and make merry a while but to be sure he must die eternally and be damned for ever The seeming pleasure of sin is but coloured cruelty all being nothing but a sweet sawce to make Men swallow down with greediness those morsels of poyson the fiery venom whereof will afterwards drink up their Spirits and inflame their Souls with everlasting burnings in Hell The sting of sin will remain when the pleasure of sin is gon And though here Men make it their delight and merriment yet in Hell it will fill them with Horrour and Eternal torments As Diana of the Ephesians seemed to smile on such as came into her Temple but to frown upon such as went out So sin at first seems to smile upon those that have pleasure in it but at last it exposes them to the frowns of an angry God and for ever lays them under the stroak of his heavy displeasure Such is the deceit of sin that at first it presents (d) Laeta veâ—ire Vâ—nat tristis aâ—â—◠〈◊〉 pleasure and profit before us but so soon as ever the act thereof is over it deals with us as Amnon with Thamar thrusting us out and hating us wounding our Consciences and destroying our Souls Your carnal pleasures they may so far infatuate you a while (e) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Alexand. Paedag. lib. 3. cap. 7. pag. 172. as to make you think you are steering a right course towards the harbour of Eternal rest but if still you go on to delight in them you are sure to make shipwrack of your precious Souls and to be broken in pieces inevitably upon the rock of God's eternal Displeasure Who then for a moments pleasure could run the hazard of eternal Vengeance Do the damned in Hell think you find comfort in those pleasures of sin wherein for the present you so much delight Is there so much as one drop of hony in that bitter cup of Divine Fury whereof they are forced to drink deep to all eternity Oh Remember Sirs your carnal pleasures they turn you into vessels of wrath and so make you fit for destruction (f) Isa 5.14 If Hell beneath hath enlarged herself and made her Mouth wide without Measure it is that all such as rejoyce in sin may descend into that place of torment Look over Sirs the beginning and see what will be the end of your sin The fish Swim down Jordan pleasantly but they fall at last into the dead Sea So through a Jordan of carnal Delights you will come at last into the boundless Ocean of God's Wrath and Eternal Displeasure Here you sport it with your carnal pleasures but there you must smart for them Here they are your pleasure but then they will be your eternal Torment And oh how intolerable will eternal Burnings in Hell seem to you that are now for nothing else but your sensual contentments Now your flesh is delicate and tender it may lie soft and fare deliciously and have all sensual provision made to satisfy it But how will it do when cast into a Bed of sorrow when it comes to dwell with eternal Burnings when it must be tormented Night and Day without ceasing for ever Oh let the heat of Hell overcome the heat of lust and the bitter end of sin let it keep you from ever taking pleasure therein The Lord hath tied sin and the punishment thereof together as with Chains of Adamant so that if you break not off your sins by repentance (g) Luke 13.5 't is impossible that ever you should escape the damnation of Hell Who then can tell the misery the flames the everlasting burnings which at last like a tempest of Fire and Brim-stone wiil fall upon all that have pleasure in ungodliness Go to then ye Sons of Belial let loose the reins to all licentiousness please Flesh in all sensuality eat drink and be merry account our words as wind and Death and Hell as some poetick fictions cloath yourselves in Scarlet and fare deliciously every day Yet know that ere long destruction will overtake you as a Whirlwind and for all these things God will bring you to judgment (h) Eccles 11. And is this such a merry jocund life to go from short joy to eternal sorrow and after you have surfeited a while upon your carnal delights then to be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of God and from the Glory of his power Oh what Tophet is not a Paradise what flames are not a Bed of down to such a destruction And yet this must be the Eternal portion of all the ungodly and thus it will be done to all those that have pleasure in unrighteousness Remember this ye that are mighty to drink Wine and that follow strong drink till ye are inflamed your Bacchus-bowls will ere long be turned into vials of wrath and after all your pleasant Liquors you must not expect the least drop of Water to cool your Tongues when eternally tormented in hellish flames Remember this ye whose strength is consumed in chambering and wantonness you will shortly have enough of all your lascivious practices when you must embrace deformed Devils lie down in a Bed of sorrow and have the Fire of Lust turned into the Fire of Hell Remember this in a word ye covetous rich Men that go cloathed in Scarlet and fare deliciously every Day weep and howl for the miseries that will come upon you when all your worldly treasures shall be turned into treasures of wrath and the rust that now corrupteth your Silver (i) Jam. 5.3 shall devour your flesh and like Fire seed upon you for ever And shall all our warnings be lost that tell you of a storm to drive you to the Harbour Was Sodom though pleasantly situated any safe place to be dwelt in especially for Lot when the Lord had given him notice of a cloud of Fire and Brimstone hanging over it and now ready to fall down in a storm of forest wrath upon it Will you never be serious in these Eternal concernments that those Eternal hellish torments of sin which follow after may deterr you from the Pleasures of sin which are but for a season Oh what everlasting furious Heart-rending reflexions will you have upon your
continued to render them capable of everlasting Destruction from the Presence of God and from the Glory of his Power They have a being but it 's only to fit them for an eternal Misery they have a Life but such that they would (h) Vellet damnatus potiùs non esse quà m talis esse qui miseriâ intensisimâ cáque aeternò duraturâ urgerentur Barl. Exercit. 1. conclus 3. pag. 7. give ten thousand Worlds to be eased of that heavy Burden as being made thereby obnoxious to the stroak of eternal Death So that whatever be the Goodness of a Physical Being which the Damned have yet sure it doth not preponderate the Vengeance of eternal Fire conjunct with it But still you may look upon Hell would you conceive aright thereof as a place of Torment wherein they shall never have the least ease as a place of Sorrow wherein they must never expect the least Joy as a place of Destruction from the blisful Presence of God wherein they may never tast the smallest of his Mercies nor expect one comfortable Smile from his Face to all Eternity And oh what Tophet is not a Paradise what Flames are not a Bed of Down to the loss of all our Comforts but especially to the loss of the God of our Comforts That which is privative taking away from the Sinner all Good is worse (i) Omnia vâ—ro Gehennae supplicia superabit Deum non videre bonis carere quaeâ—in potestate habuisset obtinere Bern de inter Dom. cap. 38. than that which is Positive in Damnation though hereby be brought in an universal Deluge of all Evil a whole Iliad of Miseries at once The Pain of Loss doth infinitely preponderate the Pain of Sense So that (k) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil de Ascenc cap. 2. the Reflexion of a Sinner upon the loss of God and Christ and eternal Glory will be the Sting of all his Sorrows the Head of that envenomed Arrow which will drink up his Spirits like Poyson for ever and this is that Worm of Conscience which never dies the furious gnawings whereof will be far more dreadful and intollerable than the Vengeance of eternal Fire it self If the departure of God from his own People though Partial and only for a Time be so dreadful that they usually cry out as Men undone thinking no Rhetorick sufficient to express it in but Sighs no Tongue but Shreeks and Groans no Ink but mournful Tears no Paper but that of a wounded and broken Heart oh then how unsufferable will the loss of God be to all the Damned in Hell who must be Punished with a full and everlasting Destruction from God and from the Glory of his Power Do they mourn so bitterly when for a small moment he forsakes them though with great Mercy he gathers them when in a little Wrath he hides his Face from them though with everlasting Kindness he will have Mercy upon them Oh then how bitterly wilt thou Mourn and with what heart-rending furious Reflexions wilt thou look back upon thy own prodigeous Folly when the Lord shall forsake thy Soul to all Eternity when he shall hide his Face from thee for ever commanding thee to depart from his Presence Accursed into eternal Fire Should you imagine ten thousand Hells (l) Si mille aliquis ponat Gehennas nihil tale dicturus est quale à beatae illius gloriae repelli honore Summa mors animae est alienatio à Dei vita in aeternitate supplicii Aug. de Civit. Dei lib. 6. yet all this were not so much as to lose the beatifical Presence of God in Glory The full Enjoyment of God that is the Crown and the Glory of Heaven And so the total loss of God that is the greatest Emphasis of Hell and eternal Damnation Oh that is the Sting which enters into the Bowels that is the Worm of hellish Horror which will feed upon them for ever that is the heavy Milstone of God's sorest Wrath which will inevitably sink and drown them in eternal Perdition A Man who enjoyeth God can never want Comfort But whoever loseth God he loseth all his Comforts together with him How woful is then the Condition of all the Damned in Hell who must neither enjoy God nor the least Mercy from God to all Eternity Here possibly you have Riches and Honours many Friends and carnal Pleasures But losing God thou must leave them all behind thee nor shall any of them be able to bring thee Tidings of Comfort when shut up in Hell You (m) Luke 16.24 know how it fares with Rich Dives he denied the Crums to poor Lazarus and in Hell though he seek it with Tears of Blood yet the Comfort of one drop of Water to cool his Tongue when tormented with infernal Flames will not be granted him For that 's a Place of Judgment without Mercy there the Eye sees no Comfort the Tongue tasteth no Comfort the Ear heareth no Comfort But Punishment without Pity Sorrow without Succour Torment without Ease and the loss of God over all Blessed for ever is the Portion of all the Damned And what Sinner hast thou any Lust any Sin any Dalilah whose Love will be able to compensate the loss of God of his Kingdom and Glory for ever Can'st thou dwell Sinner in Misery without Mercy in continual Mourning without Mirth in Heart-killing-sorrow without any Solace in the Valley of the shadow of Death without the Favour and loving Kindness of God which is better than Life Why what reason hast thou poor Self-destroying-soul by thy careless neglect of Heaven and eternal Glory thus to run the hazard of being Punished for ever from the Presence of God of his Grace of his Mercy and Goodness in hellish Flames where are all things to fill with Terrour but nothing to excite Desire or to Minister the least Comfort Oh this this is the grand Aggravation of the Damned's Misery and that which makes it saddest of all that in Hell they must not only lose their Riches Honours and Relations which were all in themselves Good but the Presence of God himself who is best of all 2 CONSIDER the Society you are like to have in Hell-torments which is none other than that of Devils and that of damned Spirits whose Names were not Written in the Book of Life As in Heaven there are none but Saints and glorious Angels So in Hell there are none but Sinners and snaky Devils and these are they that for ever must be your cursed Associates in Wrath and Misery The Tares and the Wheat in this Life they grow both together But when Christ who is our Life shall appear having gathered home the Wheat into his own Garner he will bind up the Tares in Bundles and burn them together Here the (n) Mat. 25.4 32. Sheep and the Goats the Foolish and the wise Virgins are promiscuously mingled together being oftentimes not only of the same Nation but of the same
consolationis aeternae Raynold de lib. Apoc. praelect 162. When once the damned come within the confines of Hell they have then shot the Gulf through which there is no returning again to Heaven and Glory Hell will not be to the Sinner like Jonah's Whale when once it hath swallowed him up to cast him again upon the Shore of true Happiness But rather like the Red Sea to the Egyptians wherein all further Hopes of Comfort of Mercy of Deliverance from that place of Torment will be drowned for ever The Sun may go down in a Dark Cloud and yet rise Gloriously again bespangling the World with more pure clarified Beams of Light and Splendour But those who once go down in the Pit of Destruction making their Beds in Hell they must never look any more coming out of those Hellish Torments to rise in Glory The Place of the Damned is like the Lyons Den where all the Footsteps look forward but not one backward So that what Solomon saith of such as go in to an Harlot is here verified of those who have their portion in Hell (l) Prov. 2.19 none that go in unto her return again neither take they hold on the paths of Life For the Arrest of Hell and Damnation as it will take no Bail so neither doth it admit of any the least Hope of evasion for ever but unpreventably shuts up the Soul in remediless Misery And oh how dreadful will it be for all you who now make light of Heaven and Glory to be shut up irrecoverably in Hell and remediless Torments Oh this is the emphasis of the damneds Misery in Hell this is the sting and Poyson of all their Sorrows that there is now no further Hope of obtaining Mercy no way to fly from the Wrath to come (m) Prov. 13.12 If Hope deferred maketh the Heart sick How dreadfully then will it break and rend their Hearts to be plunged deep in that bottomless Sea of Divine Wrath where all their Hopes shall be dashed against the Rock of Eternal Despair That Hell is such a Prison as admits of no Hope of release such a Night as shall never see the dawning Day of Grace such a black Storm as will never end in a Sun-shine of Glory this hath more Torment more Pain more Terrour in it than all the Torments of Hell 'T is a diminution of our Happiness to enjoy that good which may be changed for Evil and the greatest aggravation of our Misery to lie under that evil which we can never hope will be changed for good That which makes the Saints in Glory compleatly Happy and the Reprobates in Hell compleatly miserable is this that the one need expect no worse and the other can never expect any better Condition As Heaven would not be so full of Joy if not above all Fear of Future Evil So neither would Hell be so full of Horrour if not quite below all hope of future Good For to be without all hope of Good is infinitely worse than the suffering of any of the sorest Evil So that whatever Flames whatever Wrath is determined upon the damned in Hell yet all this doth not now torment them so much as the loss of their Hopes ever to be made Happy Why then will you now let go your Hopes of Heaven exposing yourselves to remediless hellish Torments Is it nothing to be shut up in that darkness where you shall have no hope at all of Light for ever Nothing to undergo that Misery in Hell which excludes all hope of future Happiness in the Kingdom of Heaven Nothing to be plunged in that unconfined ireful Ocean of God's fiercest Wrath out of which you can never have Hopes of swimming to the wished Shoar of Blessed Immortality Oh what will you do when filled with that Horrour which shall never give way to any the least Comfort When overwhelmed with that Sorrow which shall never be turned into Joy When surprized with that Everlasting Night of Wrath and Gloominess which will never have a Day-break of Love and Mercy Oh this if any thing will make the Torments of Hell tolerable that they are unchangeable shutting out the Hope of all true Comfort Here you must never think to change Torments for Ease Death for Life the never dying Worm for the light of God's Countenance nor the Flames of Hell for the Glory and Happiness of the new Jerusalem 5 CONSIDER the extremity of Hell Torments which for exquisiteness are so dreadful that no heart can meditate the terror of them What Burton saith of prevailing Melancholy is much more true of the damned in Hell whose Misery is so dreadfully accented that there is in it no hope of a lighter nor any place for an heavier stroak No torture of Body like unto it no Strapadoes Hot-irons nor Phalaris's Bulls all Fears Griefs Suspicions Discontents are swallowed up and drowned in this Euripus this Ocean of Misery as so many small Brooks Here the Wrath of God is poured out in full Vials upon all the Damned * Psal 90.11 and who knows the power of that Wrath or the unconceivable horror it brings with it So infinitely dreadful is the Wrath of God that no Man in the World can understand it much less stand under it if once the stroak thereof falls upon him And yet a Cup of this implacable Wrath full mixed with all sorts of Plagues †Psal 78.5 Revel 14.10 but unmixed without the least drop of Mercy must be the Portion of all the Damned in Hell where every Vessel of Wrath shall have that fulness of Wrath that extremity of unutterable Torments which no Tongue can possibly express nor Heart of Man though enlarged to the utmost reach of all created capacities conceive A Melancholick Man saith a learned Divine of our own may fancy vast and terrible Fears Fire Sword Tempests Wracks Furnaces Scalding-lead Boyling-pitch running Bell-mettal and being kept alive to feel their Torment But yet all this if compared with those most dreadful Horrours and exquisite Torments which the damned in Hell must for ever be plagued with are no more than a little spark falling upon the Hand to the furious Rage and Burnings of Nebuchadnezzar's hot fiery Furnace We have heard tell of some that have endured mangling of Body ripping of Bowels breaking upon the Wheel Fleeing alive Wracking of Joynts Burning of Flesh Pounding in a Morter tearing in pieces with Flesh-hooks Boiling in Oyl Roasting upon hot fiery Grid-irons And yet all these though you should superadd thereto all Diseases such as the Plague Stone Gout Iliack Passion Strangury or whatever else you can name most Torturing to the Body together with the most inhuman Cruelties and prodigeous Butcheries ever Executed by the most bloody Persecutor upon the blessed Martyrs of Christ in any Age from the Blood of Righteous Abel to this present time would come infinitely short albeit they were all collected into our extreamest Torment of that Wrath that Horrour that unconceivable Anguish
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
cruore sopiret Cyprian epist 9. pag. 26. The like wonderful expressions of unshrinking constancy in the Martyrs of his Days dote St. Cyprian in a certain place afford us The tormented saith he stood stronger than the Tormentors The beaten and butchered Members overcame the Hands they did beat and butcher them Cruel Stripes oft repeated long continued could not vanquish their impregnable Faith no not although their Bowels were torn out and not so much the Members as the Wounds of God's dear Servants were tormented Their Blood gushed out which even quenched the Fire of Persecution yea extinguished the Flames of Hell with a (a) Nostri autem ut de viris traceam pueri mulierculae tortores suos taciti vincunt exprimere illis gemitum nec ignis potest Ecce sexus infirmus fragilis aetas dilacerari se toto corpore urique perpetitur non necessitate quia licet vitare si vellent sed voluntate quia confidunt Deo Lactant. Instit lib. 5. cap. 13. pag. 496. glorious Stream Lactantius also makes boast against the Heathen Philosophers of Boys and Women who through invincible silence under Sufferings overcame their Tormentors when by the violence of Fire they saw themselves unable to extort so much as a Groan from them Behold saith he Women though the weaker Vessels and Boys though of tender age do yet suffer themselves through the whole Body to be mangled and tortured in fiery Flames nor of necessity for would they but defile themselves with Idols they might escape all this but willingly because they hope in God that he will Crown them at length with a glorious Reward So that by these few Instances you may see what an Antidote a Respect duly had to the Recompence of Reward is against all slavish Fears and how it steals the Soul against all Hardships enabling it with holy Scorn to Confront the proudest Adversary Would you have Christians the like heroique Spirits never fearing any of those things that may befal you in Heaven's Way be sure (b) Rev. 2.10 to have your Eye Heaven-ward remembring that if faithful unto the Death God will then bestow upon you a Crown of Life Glory in the Eye will be sure to establish the Heart with undaunted Resolution So that a Man expecting a Crown of Life will not fear for the sake of Christ to die the Death From such an one you may take his Liberty his Estate his Life for Christ But his Courage and undaunted Resolution to endure all Hardships for Christ you can never take from him so long as he knows that the hottest Flames which ever Martyrs were burnt in for Christ's sake are but like Eliah's fiery Chariot wherein they ride in Triumph unto Heaven What is the Fowler 's snare to a Bird soaring a loft or a Storm though never so great to a Ship lying fafe at Harbour So what are all Dangers and Storms of Persecution to God's People soaring aloft and by Faith hiding themselves in the sure Harbour of blessed Immortality that they should tremble at them Doubtless if well considered the everlasting Peace and glorious Rest of such an Haven of Blessedness may well quiet our Spirits and Steel our Hearts with Courage under every Storm that befalls us in our Passage thither What need he fear a Prison a Dungeon a fiery Tryal or the Face of a Man that must die who sees Heaven open and a Crown of Life ready to be set upon his Head This is the way to get free from a trembling Heart from unruly Passions from all slavish Fears to have the Hope of eternal Life abiding in us and an Eye continually fixed upon Heaven's Gloy This will make a Man bold as a Lyon this will command a glorious Calm out of every Storm this will give the Soul a Sabbath of Rest from all frightful Thoughts this like a strong (c) Isaiah 16.3 Man Armed will keep the (d) Quid enim gloriosius quidve faelicius ulli hominum poterit ex divinâ dignatione contingere quà m inter ipsos carnifices interritum confiteri Dominum Deum quà m ipsam quae ab omnibus metuatur moriendo mortem subegisse quà m per ipsam mortem immortalitatem consecutum fuisse quà m omnibus saevitiae instrumentis excarnificatum extortum ipsis tormentis tormenta superasse quà m omnibus dilaniati corporis doloribus roboâ—e amâ—ni reluctatum fuisse quám sanguinem suum proflaentem non horruisse Cyprian epist 26. pag. 59. Heart quiet and in perfect Peace And as thoso noble Confessours have it what greater Glory or Happiness can God vouchsafe any Man than to stand amongst our Tormentours confessing the Lord God without any fear What greater Happiness than by dying to vanquish Death it self that King of Terrors to all the Ungodly What greater Glory than by dying the Death to arrive at the peaceful Harbour of Life and blessed Immortality What greater Renown than for God's People when Tortured and Butchered by all Instruments of Cruelty that Hell it self can devise when beholding their Blood and their Lives gushing out together not to have the least Terror upon their Spirits but to ascend triumphing to Glory and wonderously to go up into Heaven like Manaoh's Angel in a Flame of Fire Oh little would you think what a sovereign Cordial against all slavish and distracting Fears a due respect had to the Recompence of Reward would be to you (e) Isaiah 35.4 Say to those saith the Lord that are of a fearful Heart be strong fear not behold your God will come with a Recompence he will come and save you Come what Reproaches Persecutions and fiery Tryals will yet to think of the Lord coming with a glorious Reward and saving us with an everlasting Salvation this may well make us bold as a Lyon If therefore Christians you would not daily be perplexing your selves with slavish Heart-killing Fears about that Reproach that Imprisonment those many tall Anakim's which may possibly fall heavy upon you before you get to Canaan be sure that by Faith you take a Prospect every day of that good Land a Land wherein you shall reign for ever in all fulness of Joy with Salem's glorious King This sweet Work you must inure your selves to every day would you not do every thing with a trembling Heart and walk continually for the Fear and Horror that will be upon you as in the Subburbs of Hell We cannot serve God with any chearfulness any longer than our Eye is fixed upon Heaven's Glory but are almost distracted in times of Persecution thinking what if I should lose my Liberty what if my Estate what if my Life should go for this Duty Oh 't is a miserable Life which is nothing else but a Meditation of Terror and continually tossed with Storms like a Ship under Winds This makes our Hearts sad our Lives sad our Duties sad this makes us go trembling every day If then Christians you desire Comfort that you may
delight in Sin or take pleasure in it 10 A due respect had to this glorious Reward it will comfort your Hearts in all your Afflictions and make you greatly rejoice under them how many and grievous soever An Eye stedfastly fixed upon heavenly Glory this will bring down Heaven inro your Souls causing your consolations to abound by Christ (c) 2 Cor. 1. when ever your sufferings abound for him A bright prospect of the celestial Canaan as it bears up the Spirits of God's People with invincible patience under all their Pressures and Calamities which befal them in the Wilderness of this present World So it anoynts their Head with Oyl causeth their Cup to overflow with Gladness and makes their Hearts to rejoice with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory (d) 2 Cor. 7.4 Thus we find Paul professing of himself I am exceeding joyful in all our tribulation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I do overflow saith he with Joy I have more than Heart can hold (e) Acts. 16.25 Nor is this profession of his any hyperbolical strain but an experimented Truth whereof we have full assurance from Paul and Silas his Prison vouches when in bonds together then brim full of Joy so full that their Hearts could not hold it from breaking out and running over at their Mouths into Psalms of Praise Like the Tree cast into the bitter Waters of Marah Faith eying the recompence of the Reward it sweetens all Afflictions enabling the Soul not only to stand it out in a fiery tryal but to glory for Gladness of Heart under the Cross at the Stake in the Flames of Martyrdom The Soul that can rejoice in hope of the Glory of God will easily glory in all the tribulations that it suffers for God (f) Rom. 5.3 So saith the Apostle we glory in tribulation also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that word implieth the triumphant act of Joy a Joy expressed with holy Boasting and exultation of Spirit such a Joy as the Soul is not ashamed to own and make her boast of let Earth and Hell let the Devil and wicked Men do their worst This Truth I might give you subscribed by all the holy Martyrs and confessors of Christ who thought Famine dainty fare for Christ that complemented wild Beasts to devour them that snatcht at Torments as if they had been rich Treasures that laid down their Bodies as a Man would lay off an old Garment to put on a new that went as gladly to their Flames as a labouring Man to his Bed and embraced the most cruel Martyrdom as an holy stratagem to escape the stroak of Death (g) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to pass from Life to Life as Basil hath it (h) Euseb Eccles Hist lib. 5. cap. 1. Hence when Juliâ—n the Apostate had caused Marcus Bishop of Arethusa to be tormented one of his Nobles admiring that holy Man's Joy cries out we are ashamed oh Emperour the Christians laught at your Cruelty growing more resolute thereby so that these things are more fearful to the Tormentors than to the sufferers (i) Acts and Mon. vol. 3. pag. 177. Were it needful I might tell you of Dr. Tayler Martyr in the Marian persecution who drawing nigh to the place of Execution leapt for Joy as Men do in dancing professing himself never better in all his Life for now I know saith he I am almost at home I have but two Stiles to go over and then I am at my Father's House With like holy Joy was Cicely Ormes Martress filled (k) Acts and Mon. vol. 3. pag. 853. who when brought to the Stake came and kissed it saying Welcome the sweet Cross of Christ and when now the Flames were kindled upon her my Soul quoth she doth magnifie the Lord and my Spirit rejoiceth in God my Saviour (l) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil Orat. in 40. Martyr After the same manner we find certain Martyrs that were cast out naked in a Winters night and to suffer the next Day comforting one another from this Recompence of Reward in these Words sharp is the Cold but sweet is Paradise troublesome is the way but pleasant will be the end of our Journey let us endure cold a little and the Patriarchs Bosom shall refresh us for ever Nor is the story of Theodoret unworthy our remembrance who found so much sweetness in this even when he was upon the Rack in the midst of his grievous Torments that he found not the least anguish in his torture but a great deal of Pleasure Insomuch that when they took him off from the Rack he complained that they had done him much wrong in ceasing to torment him For said he all the while I was tortured upon the Rack me thought there was a young Man in white an Angel from the Lord stood by me who wiped off the sweat wherein I found much sweetness which now I have lost In these and many the like instances which might be given we see how an Eye fixed upon Heaven's Glory in our sufferings brings down much of that Glory into them making the cruel Tortures of God's People infinitely more sweet than their ease and more desirable to them Let Faith but reallize the Glory of Heaven behold the Reward of Eternal Life and observe the infinite Pleasures which are at God's right Hand for evermore and then the Soul cannot choose but rejoice taking Pleasure in Reproaches in Persecutions in Exile in Imprisonments in Death itself for the sake of Christ This good Mr. Glover found true who going to the stake though before he were a Man of Sorrows yet now he is a Man of Joys and so filled with divine Consolations that he can no longer contain but crieth out speaking of the Comforter making his Heart to rejoice in hope of this glorious Reward he is come he is come Oh little can you now conceive what Comfort what Gladness of Soul what Joy in the Holy Ghost God's People have in their sufferings when stedfastly eying the Glory that shall be revealed in them NOW they find an Hony-comb in the Lyon's Carcass they suck sweetness out of the bitterness of Herbs now they gather Grapes of Thorns and Figs of Thistles now they have a warm Sunshine of Comfort from God to make glad their Hearts Would you therefore have Comfort Christians and be able to smile when the World frowns upon you Would you have your Prison be turned into a Paradise Would you if banished into a strange Land find a spiritual Eden a Garden of all heavenly delights in every howling Wilderness through which you may wander When reproached when fawn asunder when cruelly scourged tormented and dying in the hottest Flames of Martyrdom would you then triumph rejoicing with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory Oh see then see that you look within the veil fixing your Eye upon that Crown of Life which is set before you This will turn your Sorrow into Joy this will give you the Oyl of
(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
thoughts and care in God still centre To cleave to God is the best venture Would you for ever live above In raptures and transports of Love God's Word believe love Christ hate Sin Have Grace in Life have Truth within Be holy harmless fly from Vice This is the way to Paradise My Blessing I amongst you part See you serve God with all your heart That you may be with me possest Of endless Joy and happy rest And Hallelujahs ever sing With Christ our Lord and Heavenly King A Morning Soliloquy The Eye-lids of the beauteous Morn Which from the rising Sun are Born Open themselves and shed down light That Men may see God's Glory bright This Glory courts thy love my Soul Let not Nights Charms such Bliss controul The Morning is of every day The Maiden-head give 't not away Keep that for God wouldst thou be chast Let not thy Virgin Thoughts lie wast Awake embrace the Bridegroom royal That Love is early which is Loyal Hark how the soaring Lark doth sing And of the day glad tidings bring Prevent her Lyrick Harmonies When first the Light breaks in the Skies Let sleep give place to wakeful praise When Heaven calls on thee to rise Aurora with her blushing Face Doth seem to suffer much disgrace Where Men unmindful of their Duty Regard not Heaven in her Beauty Do not this Virgin Queen Disdain Who rise with her great Glory gain The World now shines with early Beams Heaven pours down light in vital Streams Be gone dull sleep do nor confine My Mind in Darkness Grace doth shine Arise my Soul arise and move Love him who feels no charms but Love All Praises to thy glorious King With heart indite when day doth spring What Chains of Darkness can thee bind When Life from God embalms thy mind Anthems Divine and Hymns most sweet To Christ are due when he doth greet Then wake my Soul thy thoughts sublime Court not Night Shades those Dregs of time To God thy Life through Christ aspire Feed still on his celestial Fire Dwell in the Light put on the Sun Of Grace for Glory thou must run Awake awake hug not fond Dreams Bright Phoebus sheds abroad his Beams Such golden day can never number Whose minds do rust with sleep and slumber Frail mortal Flesh how much I lose When for thy ease my eyes I close Most pure delights and thoughts Divine Waking with God are always mine If in dull sleep I must me hide Yet let my Soul with God abide How irksom is that sleeping space Which spoils me of such glorious Grace Sacred to Muses is the Morn The Graces then do Souls adorn They visit Mortals with great Bliss When night and day part in a Kiss Resist not Soul their powerful Charms But throw thy self into their Arms. Day breaking from a Throne of Gold Chides all whose Love to Christ is cold His Light comes to sue out Divorce Betwixt those lids which Night did force The Lord is jealous nor will he With Dreams and Shades still rival'd be The Worlds great Lamp doth guild the Plain And calls my Soul to entertain Thy Saviours Love and vital dew Which will thy Life and Strength renew Wast not in drowsie Dreams and Sleep Christ for thy Morning Love doth weep Ungrateful Soul break as the Light Through all the Clouds of Hell and Night With Christ each Day end and begin His Love controuls the charms of Sin When Heart and Soul in God still center No Lust can live no Vice can enter See how great Sol circuits our Sphere Diffusing Light now here now there With him for God set out and run Till Joys Immortal thou hast won Though Storms from Hell obstruct thy way Yet Heaven will make eternal day An Evening Soliloquy My Soul what shall I do for thee Approaching Night sings Lullabie Betake thee to thy Saviours Arms Hee 'l save from sin Hells mortal charms Night turns to Day when he his face Vnveils and doth with Love embrace Dark shades invite to take thy rest But first in God wouldst thou be blest Repose thy self his favour crave Sleep is the emblem of thy Grave From Sleep and Death he will restore That thou his goodness mayst adore He is thy Life and resting Place We sleep most sweetly in his Grace When God a Bed of Love doth make For us we 're well asleep or wake Night past the Day will shine and then The dead in Christ shall live again When Lord my Thoughts are full of thee And Heaven in smiles comes down to me How gastly is each look of Night What fatal Shades eclipse my Light Methinks I have no time to live When Sleep suspends what God doth give Night Opium through each sense diffused My active Soul hath oft abused And ravisht by his drowsie charms My Saviour from my feeble Arms Propitious Lord my Heart enlarge And let my Powers resume their Charge Divine sensations fall asleep While Night in Leatheâ— doth me sleep My Soul of Heaven all sight doth lose When Morpheus coâ—â—s my Eyes to close Come joyful Day let shadows fly Till blest I wake Eternally No envious sleep shall then surprize My ravish'd Heart or Amorous Eyes While fill'd with Glory from Christs face Shall nought but Joys of Love embrace Out of that sleep which next I take 'T were Life into this Life to wake O blessed Sleep thus to expire Were not to die but to live higher Above dull Nights and empty Dreams In Heavens great Lights and crystal Streams Where dwells no Sleep to wast our Time But Joys immortal and sublime FINIS
Vengeance of Eternal Fire You then that would not for ever thus dreadfully miscarry and come short of God's Kingdom and Glory oh see that you now give diligence to close with Christ making him your Wisdom to direct you your Righteousness to justify your Persons your Sanctification to prepare you for Glory and your Redemption to free your Souls from the Wrath to come b His Merit is beyond all your Misery his Pardons are more than all your Debts his Power to succour is infinite and therefore it can never (i) Et verè malorum profunditas necat si quos desperatio indulgentiae detestanda cordis obduratione praejudiciat Fulgent epist ad Venant pag. 560. 1 Cor. (k) Deus etenim noster sic est misericors bonus sicut infinitus invictus proinde bonitas invicti non vincitur infiniti misericordia non finitur Idem Qualecunque sit ergo peccatum à Deo quidem potest remitti converso sed ille sibi remitti non sinit qui desperando contra se indulgentiae ostium clauserit Fulgent pag. 562. be non-plust by any thing but an Evil Heart of unbelief Have Faith in Christ and though the universal Guilt of all Mens Sins in the World lay upon you yet they could never damn you But want Faith refusing to accept of Christ upon Gospel Terms and Heaven itself cannot save you Every Sin hath such infinite evil and malignity bound up in it that of itself it deserves Damnation But yet no Sin doth actually expose the Soul thereto without Infidelity Were there but one Soveraign medicine against some mortal Disease in all the World surely his case must needs be desperate who laboring under this Mortal Distemper should refuse that Soveraign Remedy Such is the case of every unbeliever who refusing the Redemption purchased by Christ and making light of so great Salvation can never escape the Damnation of Hell nor the Wrath of God nor the Vengeance of Eternal Fire (l) Act. 4.12 For there is no other Name under Heaven given amongst Men by which we must be saved Out of a tender care therefore of your own Souls make sure of Christ and do not dare to live a Moment longer without an interest in him Christ alone is the Way which leads to Life and therefore not believing in him not embâ—acing of him not accepting of him as your Saviour You walk every moment on the frontiers of Hell not knowing how soon you may drop irrecoverably into that Place of Torments Why then will you not come to Christ applying his Righteousness to your selves by Faith that you may have Life obtain Mercy and be crowned with an Eternity of heavenly Glory Oh little do you know the Happiness of a Soul believing in Christ for remission of Sins and for Life everlasting His Faith gives him an interest in that Christ who hath Life Heaven and Eternal Glory following after him so that Faith alone doth more for him than all other Graces besides for tho Faith in the Substance of it considered as an inherent Quality hath no singular excellency above other Graces Yet as it is receptive of Christ and an Instrument appointed of God for the applying of his Righteousness to our Souls whereof no other Grace is any more capable than the Eye of receiving food to nourish the Body so 't is the most precious and useful of all others What the Eye was to an Israelite when stung in the Wilderness that Faith alone is to us when mortally wounded with the sting of Sin It was not a quick Ear nor a strong Arm nor an active Hand nor an eloquent Tongue that could heal him but only an Eye looking up to the brazen Serpent Thus 't is not Knowledge though Angelical nor Sorrow for Sin how afflicting soever nor any Religious Performances how many and glorious soever that can help us but only Faith in the Lord Jesus (e) John 3.15 through whom we shall never perish but have Eternal Life Oh then what encouragement may this afford to all such as lie bleeding and groaning under the Sense of their own Sinfulness Whatever your wounds be the Blood of Christ applied by Faith can heal them Whatever your Sorrows be the Spirit of Christ can abundantly comfort you What ever your Fears of Wrath and Hell be the Redemption purchased by Christ can remove them all Whatever your unworthiness be yet being cloathed upon through Faith with the Garment of Christs Righteousness you are sure to obtain the Blessing of Life Glory and unconceivable Happiness in the Kingdom of God! If then you desire when your Souls shall be dislodged from these Tabernacles of Clay to have them received into everlasting Habitations do not oh do not any longer refuse but now see that you close by Faith with a precious Christ There is not a Soul of you I am sure that is willing to go to Hell and be damned for ever (f) Acts. 16.31 Believe therefore in the Lord Jesus Christ and so escaping the Wrath the Flames the Damnation of Hell you are sure to be saved with an Everlasting Salvation Remember Jesus Christ in that blessed Zoar unto whom retiring by Faith unfeigned thy Soul shall live and be crowned with fulness of Joy when Fire and Brimstone Storm and Tempest Wrath and Hell shall be rained from Heaven upon the whole World of the Ungodly 5 BE sure that you make an universal Resignation of your selves to the Lord Jesus devoting yourselves wholly both Soul and Body and all that you are to the service of Christ That Faith which is saving hath two Hands the one to receive Christ and the other to give up the Soul to the obedience of Christ 'T will not suffice for us barely to rely upon Christ that he may save us But if our Faith be of the right Stamp a Living and not a Dead Faith (g) Acts. 11.23 it will make us cleave unto Christ with full purpose of Heart (h) Luke 1.74 75. that we may serve him in Holiness and Righteousness all our Days We must here live to Christ by sincere obedience would we ever live with Christ in Glory as our Eternal Recompence Give Diligence then that as Christ is yours you also may be Christs You must look as well at Christ commanding Duty as promising the Reward thereof Would you ever have Christ looking after you to Crown you with Eternal Glory In vain shall you expect the Dignities and Priviledges that come by Christ so long as you refuse to perform the Homage and Services that are due to Christ Oh therefore beware lest there be any amongst you that fall short of Eternal Life by building their Hopes for it upon a partial accepting of Christ If you take not Christ for your Soveraign to obey and serve him he will never be your Saviour to redeem and crown your Souls with eternal Glory (q) Jam. 2.17 20 26. Your Faith is dead and will never save