Heedless Inadvertency 't is thus express'd v. 13. of this 13. ch Therefore speak I to them in Parables because they seeing see not and hearing they hear not neither do they understand That is because his Plainer and more Common Discourses were but little regarded by them and not consider'd and attended to as they should be but forgotten as soon as heard therefore the more to engage their Attention and induce them to look close into and dwell longer upon what he said he put his Discourses into a more Mystical and uncommon Dress that their desire of understanding his hidden Meaning might employ more of their Thoughts about it and put them upon making a further enquiry than otherwise they would do and by that means his Doctrine make a deeper Impression upon their Minds and Memories For Men are naturally desirous of finding out Mysteries and Hidden Meanings and more than ordinary Attentive to what is unusual and out of the common road of talking and will take Pains to discover what is under the Disguise of a Parable and be much more pleased and affected with the Discovery of such a hidden Treasure to which our Lord elsewhere resembles the Gospel than if the same thing had been offer'd them at an easier Rate And accordingly St. Luke after he had recorded several of our Saviour's Parables subjoyns that all the People were very Attentive to hear him and no Doubt but they were as Inquisitive to Understand what they had heard And indeed tho' this be a Mystical way of Instruction and hath something of Obscurity in it yet as it may be manag'd nothing can be more Familiar or more suitable to the Capacities of the Meanest Auditors For the vulgar sort are but little Receptive of Abstracted Notions and Nice and Lofty Speculations and that is most likely to take with them which is cloathed in a Dress they have been well acquainted with and Illustrated by some Material Representation For by this means a Truth which otherwise deliver'd they would either not Apprehend or not Consider and Attend to being express'd by way of Resemblance to what they have been much used to and understand very well is presently entertain'd and becomes Familiar and Easie to them and they can as well remember and attend to it as to other common Concerns of Life And accordingly we find our Lord's Parables taken either from some common and known Actions of Men such as of a Husband-man sowing Corn in his Field and the springing up of Weeds with the good Corn of a Fisher throwing his Net into the Sea of the looking for a lost Sheep and the Extravagancies and Repentance of a Prodigal Son and the like or from some common Accidents and Events that are taken notice of in the World such as of a Treasure found that was hid in a Field the Plentiful Product of a Man's Ground the Vnfruitfulness of a Tree the Reckoning of a Master with his Servants the Importunacy of a Poor Widow for Justice and such like Relations of this nature are easily Remembred and People are naturally apt to listen and attend to them and the meanest Capacity can understand and apprehend them and if well manag'd they make what is repesented by them appear very Lively and Affecting as if 't were Acted before our Eyes and by this means the Truths deliver'd under that Disguise insensibly Insinuate themselves and work upon the Mind even before a Man is aware of it or can set himself to make Resistance And as these Parables of our Lord were drawn from the most Familiar things they were so Apt likewise and so excellently Manag'd and there was so great Analogy between the things represented and the Representations of them that a little Thought and Reflection of even an ordinary Vnderstanding would discover what was hid under so thin a Veil And accordingly we find several of our Saviour's Parables taken presently by the Auditors in their true and naked meaning and no doubt but more were so than the Evangelists took notice of But least they should not be apprehended we find our Lord when in Private explaining them to his Disciples and giving them command to speak in the Light what he told them in Darkness Matt. 10.27 and by this means that Impression which the Parable made upon the Fancy and Imagination of the People at the first relation of it would afterwards either by Mens own Interpretation or the Apostles have its due effect upon their Understandings Wills and Affections Besides this General Vsefulness of Parables there is one thing they are more peculiarly proper for and that is Reproof which is a thing Men are most of all Impatient of and that must be manag'd with great Prudence and Nicety or it will do much more Harm than Good If it be too Plain and Open and Severe it often Hardens an Offender still more and if it be too Cool and Lifeless it loses its Force and makes no Impression In an Effectual Reproof then there must be sufficient Strength and Smartness and likewise so much Privacy and Secrecy in it as may not exasperate the Man too much from a Sence of the great Shame and Ignominy that attends the laying Open his Faults to the World Now Reproving by way of Parable does all this There may be Strength and Smartness enough in it if it be well chosen and applied and yet there is so much of a Disguise and Covering upon it as makes it very Private and not to grate so much upon that Tender Passion of Shame as a more publick and barefac'd Reproof would do 'T is as one handsomly expresses it like Lancing a Sore with the Lancet wrapt up in a Sponge when under Pretence and Shew of nothing but smooth and gentle Vsage the place is unexpectedly open'd and the Corruption let out which the Patient would not have suffer'd to be done if attempted Roughly and without that Stratagem And there is a notable Instance of this Parabolical way of Reproving mention'd 2 Sam. 12. Vpon David's Murder of Uriah that he might enjoy his Wife without Disturbance the Prophet Nathan was sent to Reprove him for it and denounce God's Great Displeasure against him And that he might do this the more effectually did not Flatly and Immediately tell him of his great Wickedness but frames a Parable of a Rich Man that had great Flocks and Herds of his own who yet to entertain his Guest took the Only little Ewe Lamb of a Poor Neighbour of his which he had bought and nourish'd up with great Tenderness and Pleasure and dress'd it for the Man that was come to him And David 's Anger the Story says was greatly kindled against the Man and he said unto Nathan as the Lord liveth the Man that hath done this thing shall surely die and shall restore the Lamb Four-fold because he did this thing and because he had no Pity When the Prophet saw that his Design had so far taken effect he immediately follows
his Blow takes Advantage of the Kings Displeasure and makes the Application home Thou art the Man And this Mystical Reproof struck David so deep that without making any Excuses he presently confesses his Guilt that he had sinned against the Lord when 't is very likely a Rougher and more Downright Reprimand would have exasperated the King into Rage and Impatience at his being so expos'd by the Prophet rather than have melted him into so humble and pungent a Remorse as this This Course then our Lord took not without great Wisdom and by Parables apt and well chosen and very expressive of his Meaning reproved the Obstinacy Hypocrisie and other Vices of the Jews who were Men Stubborn and Refractory and Impatient of too open a Rebuke Especially the Pharisees whose Pride and Haughtiness and great Repute with the People made them not able to endure any thing of Reproof tho wrap'd up in the Disguise of a Parable much less when publick and open and in plainer Terms Tho' as to the Pharisees when this milder way would not do he more plainly and sharply rebuk'd and expos'd their Great Wickedness and Vile Hypocrisie These are the Reasons why our Lord spake so much in Parables and t was a Course which many of the Greatest and Wisest Men had taken before him The Prophets in the Old Testament and several of the Heathens express'd their Instructions and Reproofs in such a Mystical manner and by way of Fable or feigned Relation of some Action or Occurrence that bore Resemblance to what they would Inculcate as is very evident to such as Converse with their Writings Which Course had it not been very Effectual to the Ends for which it was design'd it would not have been so much in Reputation as it was and if it was so effectual then why may it not be so still if not to frame new Parables yet to explicate and inforce the Old Especially those which our Lord with admirable Wisdom and Judgment made use of to reprove Vice by and encourage a Sincere and Persevering Piety The Truths that are couch'd under these Parabolical Expressions are of the greatest Importance and such as it nearly concerns us to attend to and Practice accordingly and the manner of expressing them is such as illustrates with great Advantage and very movingly recommends them and that in such a Familiar way as fits them to all Capacities tho' never so Indifferent and may be of great use to work upon the meaner sort who I fear are too little apprehensive of what is deliver'd in more Abstracted Terms I have therefore Practically consider'd the most and most useful of our Saviour's Parables passing by those only that wholly relate to the Jews and that Infant State of the Gospel and can't without Violence be made Serviceable to the Improvement of Religion amongst Christians especially now at this Distance from the Times wherein they were spoken But of this sort there are but Three or Four and the rest that are not Particularly Discoursed of are Co-incident and of the same Sense with those that are And I hope this may not be an UnprofitableVndertaking thro' his Blessing who Alone can give the Increase to Advance whose Honour in promoting the Good of Souls they are made Publick I desire only that two things may be further observ'd The one is That these Discourses are on Purpose design'd to be Purely Practical as I have stil'd them in the Title Page and as every Intelligent Reader will discern when he finds me wave many Fair Opportunities of Controversie that lie in my way and my Reason for so doing I think is very sufficient viz. Because 't is too Observable that the great Defect of Christians now-a-days is in their Practice which yet is the One thing Necessary The other is that According to the excellent Advice of * More Nevochim in the Preface Maimonides the Reader expect not Rationem Explicationem omnium verborum rerum in Parabola Contentarum ad Rem Significatum c. a Minute and Particular Application of every Word and Thing in a Parable to the Sense that is couch'd under it but be contented with a more General Explication of the Sum and Scope of it For otherwise either the main Intention of the Parable will be quite lost or at least the Mind will be tir'd in hunting after an Explication of what cannot be explain'd and nothing be the Result of such Fruitless Study but that Empty Vexatious Disappointment which all those Experience who make it their endeavour to find out or rather force from the Words of an Author that which the Author himself never so much as dream'd of All therefore that a Man should propose to himself in the Explication of the greatest part of any Parable is to find out what is the main Drift and Design of it and what it is which the Author of it would Instruct Men in by that Allegorical Scheme of Speech But tho' this be Excellent Advice and I have endeavour'd to observe it in the following Discourses yet where it could be done without unnatural Straining and Violence I have been very Particular in my Explication And indeed most of our Saviour's Parables are so aptly express'd in the Parts as well as in the Whole that they not only will Bear but Require a Minute Application of the Allegory to that which is represented by it and which receives a great Advantage from it as may be observ'd in the Perusal of what is now offer'd to the Reader 's View The INDEX Par. I. OF the Sower Matt. 13.3 c. Page 1 Par. II. Of the Tares Matt. 13.24 p. 35 Par. III. Of the Pearl of great Price Matt. 1345. p. 82 Par. IV. Of a Merciful King and his Vnmerciful Servant Matt. 18.23 p. 122 Par. V. Of a King that made a Marriage for his Son Matt. 22.2 p. 164 Par. VI. Of the Ten Virgins Matt. 25.1 p. 204 Par. VII Of the Good Samaritan Luke 10.30 p. 232 Par. VIII Of the Talents Matt. 25.14 p. 270 Par. IX Of the Covetous Rich Fool. Luke 12.16 p. 304 Par. X. Of the Barren Fig-tree Luke 13.6 p. 338 Par. XI Of the Prodigal Son Luke 15.11 p. 365 Par. XII Of the Rich Man and Lazarus Luk. 16.19 p. 395 Par. XIII Of the Importunate Widow Luke 18.1 p. 424 Par. XIV Of the Pharisee and the Publican Luk. 18.9 p 456 The most Considerable Errata occasion'd by the Author's distance from the Press the Reader is desir'd thus to correct with a Pen before he peruses the Book viz. PAge 14. Line 1. dele in p 15. l. 6. r. these p. 16. l. 24. r. tells p. 24. l. 28. dele it p. 25. l. 14. dele and. p. 26. l. 29. r. cometh oft p. 29. l. 23. r. showers from p. 30. l. ult r. Track p. 39. l. ult dele in the Ear. p. 60. l. 6. r. our p. 74. l. penult r. Tares that p. 78. l. 23. r. pass'd p. 83. l. 5. r. Fine
about Spiritual Humility because it has been taught by some that pretend to the most extraordinary Religion that we ought to entertain none but vile and abject Thoughts of our selves to be conscious of nothing that is good in us but to call our selves the vilest of Sinners and the worst of Men according to St. Paul's Example who calls himself the chief of Sinners 1 Tim. 1.15 But since it cannot be true for a sincerely pious sober and chaste Man for Instance to call himself the most prophane the most intemperate and debauch'd Wretch living for he must needs be sensible that is not so therefore a more discreet Way of Humiliation and Confession of our Faults should be introduc'd in its Room for nothing that is untrue can be pleasing and acceptable unto God And as no Man ought to think of himself more highly than he ought to think so neither should he untruly vilifie and miscall himself but think and speak soberly according as God has given to him the Measure of Faith 'T is the same St. Paul's Advice Rom. 12.3 whose Example is urg'd for so extremely debasing a Man's self in his own Esteem and therefore when he said of himself That he was the chief of Sinners it must look back to his former Wickedness in persecuting the Church of Christ and could not be true as to his present Condition when he spoke it for he was then a chosen Vessel and not inferior to any of the Apostles And whatever good Man will use that Expression after him its Signification must be restrain'd either with Reference to past Wickednesses or some particular Vice which too easily besets him and cannot be true in its largest Sense of any sincerely good Man And 't is a strange kind of Humiliation that is made up of the Confession of Faults which a Man never knew himself to be guilty of which yet is much in Vogue with some sort of People but does indeed look too Stage-like to be thought real by any discerning Man Poverty of Spirit therefore does not consist in a Man's making himself worse than he is and truly there is no neâ—â— he should do so every Man living having enough of real Vileness to humble him before God and in overlooking every thing that is commendable in him and the Pharisee in the Parable might very innocently have thank'd God that he was not as other Men Fornicators Unjust Adulterers or even as a Publican had there not been something much worse than this mix'd with his Thanksgiving And it was this He was proud of his living more circumspectly than other Men he arrogated much of the Praise to himself and despis'd one who by reason his Profession he thought was a more loose and careless Liver and never reflected upon his Failures and Imperfections but was wholly taken up with admiring himself and vaunting of his Vertue and did not return as he ought to have done all the Glory to God So that 't is not all thinking well of ones Conversation and Virtuous Living that is Spiritual Pride but only when we think better of it than we should do and forget our Sins and Imperfections or arrogantly ascribe the Praise to our selves not remembring who made us to differ and neglecting to return the Glory to him and are so exalted in our own Conceits as to despise and contemn others because their Religion is not with Shew and Ostentation Spiritual Humility then as 't is oppos'd to this Spiritual Pride consists in two things First In not overvaluing our spiritual Excellencies nor our selves by reason of them but returning all the Praise and Glory to God who is the Author of every good and perfect Gift 'T is to remember that he made us to differ and that we have nothing not so much as a good Thought but what we receive from him in whose Divine Aid is all our Sufficiency 'T is to reflect upon the Imperfections and Defects of even our best Actions and how much Need there is of God's Mercy and favourable Judgment after we have done all that we can in his Service 'T is to remember likewise that with such great Assistances from above as we have receiv'd we might have been much better than we are and have practis'd more Graces of Christianity and that in higher Degrees of Perfection And when there arises any inward Complacency in our Breasts from a Vertuous Action or we meet with any commendation from others 't is then immediately to give God the Glory and transfer all the Praise to him and suffer no vain Tumours to remain upon our Minds nor look down with Scorn upon others that have less Esteem and Reputation in the World But rather to humble our selves before God at the Thoughts of the Pollutions that are still upon our Souls and reflect how great a Debt of Gratitude lies upon us to our great Benefactor who has given us unworthy as we are such great Measures of his Grace and resolve to make him a due return of a daily increasing Praise and Obedience and Love Secondly Spiritual Humility consists in a due Apprehension of the Vileness of our Sins and the great Aggravations of them and as we must not overvalue our Vertues nor our selves by Reason of them so neither should we undervalue our Vices i. e. endeavour to palliate and excuse them and give them more favourable Names than they deserve such as unavoidable Frailties pitiable Infirmities the Effects of Surprize and the like Nor think our selves to be less abominable in the Sight of God for our Commission of them than indeed we are There is no Manliving how good soever but is still a Sinner and not only Imperfections and Frailties may be laid to his Charge but God knows too often Sins of a deeper Dye as David and Peter we know fell into the very worst of Wickednesses though the one otherwise a Man after God's own Heart and the other an Apostle of our Lord and Holy Martyr for his Truth Now Spiritual Humility will give a Man a due Sense of his Spiritual Vileness and represen this Sin whatever it be as indeed the greatest Evil a Violation of the highest Authority and of a most Holy and Just and Good Law and the very heighth of Ingratitude too as being a Resisting the Will of our greatest Friend and Benefactor And 't will shew him the Aggravations of his Guilt as being contracted against sufficient Light and Knowledge and when he had sufficient Aid likewise from Abve to enable him to resist the Temptations to it if he would These and the like Considerations which a Man truly humble in Spirit will call to mind will humble him still more and render him as vile in his own Eyes as he thinks he is in God's and make him prostrate himself before the Throne of the Divine Majesty with Shame and Sorrow and Confusion of Face confessing his Guilt condemning himself for it and humbly imploring Forgiveness of his offended God and
Practical Discourses UPON THE PARABLES OF OUR Blessed Saviour WITH Prayers annex'd to each Discourse By FRANCIS BRAGGE Vicar of Hitchin in Hertfordshire Vtile est Libros Plures à Pluribus fieri diverso stilo non diversâ Fide etiam de Quaestionibus Iisdem ut ad Plurimos ad alios sic ad alios autem sic Res ipsa Perveniat Augustin de Trinitate Lib. 1. Cap. 3. IMPRIMATUR Sept. 27. 1693. Guil. Lancaster R. P. D. Henrico Ep. Lond. a Sacris Domest LONDON Printed for S. Manship at the Ship near the Royal-Exchange in Cornhil 1694. To the Right Reverend Father in God Thomas Lord Bishop of Lincoln My Lord I Humbly beg your Lordships Favourable Acceptance of this Address which is design'd as a Publick Expression of the Great Veneration I have for your Lordship and of the Grateful Sense I retain of the Favour and Incouragement you have hitherto been Pleased to shew me since your Happy Accession to this See I do not cannot think this a Present worthy of your Lordship but being induc'd to publish these Discourses in hopes that the Novelty of the Dress they appear in may incline some to look upon them who seldom take notice of things of this nature when in the usual Garb I could not but Dedicate them to your Lordship as my Diocesan and as an Account in part how I discharge my Duty in my Cure under your Lordships Inspection and Government If I shall be so Happy as to do any Service to God and Religion by this Publication I am sure your Lordship will not disapprove of it and I shall have what I aim at I therefore beg your Lordships Blessing and your Prayers that these my well-meant Endeavours however otherwise Deficient may be Successful to that Great End And with all due Deference to your Lordships Eminent Worth as well as Station I am and shall make it my Care to Approve my self My LORD Your Lordships Dutiful and Humble Servant Fr. Bragge THE PREFACE THE Parables of our Saviour being full of Excellent Instruction and in a Familiar way teaching the Greatest and most Necessary Truths I thought it would be a very useful Vndertaking to Discourse Practically upon them And by explaining them and enforcing the Sense couch'd under them to make them serviceable to the Great Ends for which they were design'd The engaging Men in a Hearty Love and Obedience to our Great Master Jesus and in an Industrious Provision for the Happiness of the other World But before I proceed to consider the Parables themselves I think 't will be convenient to give a Brief Account why our Saviour so often spake in that Mystical Manner to his Hearers And 't is a Question which his own Disciples ask'd him after he had deliver'd his first Parable of a Sower they came unto him and said Why speakest thou unto them in Parables Matt. 13.10 To this our Lord gives a double Answer in the 11th and following Verses thus I speak to the People in Parables because it is given to you that are true Believers and my Faithful Disciples to know the Mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven or of the Gospel but to them that is as they are described in the 15th Verse whose Heart is waxed Gross or Obdurate and Obstinate and their Ears dull of Hearing and who have closed or willfully shut their Eyes against the Light and Truth that I manifest to the World lest at any time they should see with their Eyes and Hear with their Ears and Understand with their Heart and should be Converted and I should Heal them To such as these as very Vnworthy of the Favour it is not given to have the Mysteries of Religion plainly reveal'd to them but only Mystically and Covertly by way of Parable That is 't was by way of Punishment for their Infidelity and Hardness of Heart and Despising and Rejecting His former Plainer Discourses on the Mount and in other Places and their Averseness to believe in him notwithstanding the Miracles he did and Blasphemous Attributing his casting out a Devil from one possessed who was Blind and Dumb to the Power of Beelzebub the Prince of the Devils 'T was by way of Punishment for this strange Obduracy of theirs that he took upon him that more Obscure way of Instructing them than he before had used and which new Practice of his was a tacit Intimation of his Displeasure against them and did threaten a Total Concealment of those Glad Tidings from them which he came to bring unto the World if they persisted in their Obstinacy and Disbelief And this is manifest from the whole of what St. Matthew records of our Lord's Discourses before this 13th Chapter which we find to be very Plain and expressed in the usual manner till the Pharisees with Hellish Malice would disparage the Great Miracle he wrought upon the possessed Man by ascribing it to Art-Magick and the Power of the Devil And from that Time after Confounding that Objection and sharply reproving their Perverseness and great Obstinacy he very frequently express'd himself by way of Parable in his publick Discourses and afterwards in private explained all to his Disciples and he gives this reason for his so doing verse 12. For whosoever hath to him shall be given and he shall have more Abundance but whosoever hath not from him shall be taken away even that he hath That is He that upon my former Plain and Open Instructions hath Believed and Obeyed me shall have still more and more as Plain Manifestations made to him of the Mysteries of the Gospel But he that hath made no Good Vse of what was then so clearly made known to him but continu'd still Faithless and Obstinate shall for the Future be Depriv'd of that full Light and Sun-shine of the Gospel and be afforded only some Obscurer Glimmerings of it and behold it as through a Veil A Punishment this had they understood it very Great and which was enough to cure them of their Stubbornness and make them more ready to embrace that Heavenly Discipline before it was too Late For that Eclipse of that Glorious Light was a certain fore-runner of that Eternal Night which was to follow unless they speedily Repented and Believ'd And this should be an Admonition to us likewise to Fear und Tremble and walk with the greatest Circumspection lest we Fall after the same Example of Unbelief and Disobedience lest we so long Reject that Light which is come into the World and prefer Darkness before it as to become utterly unworthy of it and it be quite hid from our Eyes and outer Darkness at last become our Portion This is one Reason our Lord gives of his speaking to the People in Parables it was by way of Punishment and as an Expression of his Displeasure at their hardned Infidelity There is another and that a very Merciful one as respecting a sort of People not Maliciously Faulty as those before-mention'd but chiefly to blame for
't is true but he that provides not for his own Soul is still more unnaturaly cruel These are the things that our Blessed Lord says make this Heavenly Seed the Word of God unfruitful and therefore those should with the greatest Care and Application possible be provided against nothing being of so great Importance to us as the Flourishing and Encrease of the Word of God I come now to consider the last Part of this Parable viz. what it is that will make this holy Seed to thrive and bring forth plentifully the Fruits of Righteousness and which Course consequently it highly concerns us all to take that we may not be barren under the Means of Instruction that we enjoy Our Lord expresseth it thus But other Seed fell into good Ground and brought forth Fruit some an Hundred-Fold some Sixty and some Thirty That is he that receiv'd Seed into the good Ground is he that having heard the Word understandeth it and receives and keeps it in an honest and good Heart and brings forth Fruit with Patience according to his Ability whether Thirty Sixty or an Hundred-Fold In this Part of the Parable there are Five things to be consider'd First That the good Ground in which the Seed of the Word will take deep Rooting and bring forth Plentifully is an honest and good Heart Secondly That that which infixes the Seed of the Word in this good Ground is Consideration translated understanding the Word Thirdly That the Seed so planted in this good Ground must be diligently kept and preserved in it Fourthly That we must expect the Encrease of it with Patience and take care that the Fruits come to Perfection and Lastly That this Increase must be proportionable to the Quantity of the Seed that is sown and to the Strength and Power of the Soil in which it is sown that is to every Man's Ability and the Opportunities he has had of Improvement whether Thirty Sixty or an Hundred-Fold First The good Ground in which the Seed of the Word will take deep Rooting and bring forth plentifully is an honest and good Heart that is a Heart sincerely desirous to be inform'd in its Duty and that cordially proposes to perform it and is truly humble and of a modest teachable Temper St. 1 Cor. 3.5 6. Paul tell us that though he plants and Apollos water yet 't is God alone that giveth the Increase Now can any Man imagin that God will make that effectual to our Good which we despise and value not and force those Favours upon us which we neither now desire nor if we had them should do other than neglect The Graces of Religion are too precious to be bestow'd upon such brutish Natures and none but those that have Hearts earnestly desirous of his Divine Assistance that they may be purifyed and renewed by his blessed Spirit and instructed in his holy Will that they may know how to pay a more acceptable Service to him none but those that have such honest and good Hearts can expect the Word should flourish and grow fruitful and they only that thus hunger and thirst after Righteousness shall be filled And this those would do well to consider who frequent our religious Assemblies in complyance to Custom only and because their Neighbours do or to learn new Modes and Dresses or to shew their own or to while away the Time that lies useless upon their Hands or to meet a Friend or please their Ears with some new Notion or to gratify their Curiosity or the like Let not such Persons be deceiv'd God is not mock'd let not such think they shall receive any thing of God but the Fierceness of his Displeasure for their prophaning to such vile Purposes what he intends as a Means to their Salvation Those only shall receive Advantage by God's Word that sincerely and earnestly desire its Nourishment that they may grow thereby This honest and good Heart is likewise Modest and Teachable and indeed this Disposition is very necessary in order to the Fruitfulness of the Word For Pride and Conceitedness are naturally the greatest Hinderers of Improvement in all Sorts of Acquirements whatever but in Religion they do the most Mischief of all and are the great Destroyers of whatever is religious and good For besides that a high Opinion of ones own present Endowments cuts off all Endeavours of growing better and renders all spiritual Advice barren to him that thinks he hath no need of it Besides that Reproof frets and inrages one that thinks Commendations rather belong to him and Instruction in Cases of Difficulty is thrown away upon a Man that thinks himself Wiser than his Teachers Besides these and several other Natural Ill Consequences of an over-weening Opinion of ones self which might be mentioned there is this yet above all that it utterly bars and shuts out God's holy Spirit it deprives the Soul of his gracious Influences and diverts the Streams of his Grace and Benediction from watering our Hearts Prov. 16.5 For Pride is an Abomination unto the Lord a thing that he hates and detests above all things And St. James tells us that instead of assisting God resists the Proud Jam. 4.7 is his profess'd Enemy And no wonder if that Soul be barren which is thus cursed of God and denyed those refreshing Dews of his Favour which alone can make it fruitful Let us therefore lay our Foundation low in Modesty Sincerity and Humility and God will build us up to Life everlasting We shall then be like Trees planted and deep rooted by the Rivers of Water that bring forth their Fruit in their Season our Leaf shall not wither and whatsoever we do it shall prosper Psal 1.3 Secondly that which infixes the Seed of the Word in the good Ground of an honest and good Heart is Consideration and Meditation render'd in our Translation understanding the Word The Word in the * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Original signifies weighing pondering and considering And St. James says agreeably whoso looketh into the perfect Law of Liberty and continueth therein that is as the * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Words in the Greek signify has look'd close and dwelt upon it by serious Meditation he being not a forgetful Hearer but a Doer of the Work this Man shall be blessed in his doing Jam. 1.25 He therefore that desires the Word should encrease and multiply must not only receive it in an honest and good Heart but infix it there by serious Consideration and be not like those compar'd to thorny Ground in the Parable who having heard the Word go sorth and think no more of it but suffer the Cares and Pleasures and Riches of the World to enter immediately into their Minds and choak the Word so that it becomes unfruitful But by after Meditation and Recollection of Thought make it sink still deeper into their Souls and strike a Root to the very Bottom of their Hearts And indeed without such Consideration there can
deceiving his own Soul From him shall be taken away even that which he hath he shall be deprived of it to inrich his industrious Brother and add to his Abundance What Grace he had before shall be withdrawn and he naked and defenseless left to the Fury of his Spiritual Enemies the Dews of Heaven shall no longer drop upon his barren Soul but parch'd and sapless it shall be reserv'd to eternal Burnings Consider this all ye that forget God and are unfruitful under all his Care and fatherly Nurture and Admonition lest at length he pluck you away and there be none to deliver you And remember the Words of Solomon Prov. 29.1 He that being often reprov'd still hardeneth his Neck shall suddainly be destroyed and that without Remedy And thus have I done with the first of our Saviours Parables in which is set before us a Blessing and a Curse a Blessing if when the good Seed is sown and we have heard the Word we receive it into honest and good Hearts and according to our several Abilities bring forth Fruit to Perfection that is obey and Practise it with Constancy and Perseverance And a Curse if we remain still barren and unfruitful not Doers of the Word but Hearers only deceiving our selves into eternal Perdition It becomes us all therefore to take heed how we hear and not be like the High-way-side suffering our Thoughts to wander from the Instructions we have heard and leaving the good Seed unregarded to the Mercy of the great Enemy of Souls and exposing our Minds as a common Tract to vain and wicked Fancies and Imaginations and diabolical Suggestions nor like the stony Ground impenetrable to any deep and lasting Impressions of the Word of Life nor like that over-run with Thorns and Briars and noxious Weeds such as are the Cares and deceitful Riches and Pleasures of this Life which will choak the Word and render it unfruitful But that we treasure up this Divine Word in our Memories ponder and consider it and set our Love and Affections upon it So shall it grow and prosper and bring forth Fruit in some Thirty in some Sixty in some an Hundred-Fold to the Honour and Glory of God and the eternal Salvation of our immortal Souls Which God of his infinite Mercy grant for Jesus Christ his Sake Now 2 Cor. 9.10 He that ministreth Seed to the Sower both give us this Heavenly Bread for our Food and multiply the Seed that is sown and encrease the Fruits of our Righteousness that being inrich'd in every good thing to all Bountifulness there may be given through us Thanksgiving unto God Amen Amen The PRAYER I. MOST Holy Jesus thou blessed Author of the best Religion who hast in great Plenty sown among us the Seed of a happy Immortality even thy holy Word and watered it with the Dew of thy heavenly Grace and art wanting in nothing on thy Part to cause it to flourish and bring forth abundantly the Fruits of Righteousness I thy unworthy Servant unfeignedly bless this thy infinite Goodness and tender Care for the Children of Men but must with Shame confess that hitherto thy Care has been in too great Measure defeated by my Inconsiderateness and Obstinacy my Soul still remains barren as the High-way-side impenetrable to the Sermons of the Gospel or at best flitting and unconstant in religious Purposes which have been short-liv'd as the Grass that grows upon the Top of the Rocks or else choak'd with the Briars of worldly Cares and Distractions with covetous and sensual Desires Thus have I courted Death in the Error of my Life But now being awaken'd by thy Mercy and become sensible of the Danger I am in and the sad Consequence if my Barrenness continues I humbly beg and earnestly at the Throne of Grace that Thou from whom is all our Sufficiency wouldst aid me with thy blessed Spirit and help my Infirmities and strengthen me mightily in the inner Man that thy Word may ever hereafter take so deep a Rooting in my Soul as to produce the genuine Fruits of Christianity II. I am sadly sensible O Lord that the Heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked who can know it Do thou therefore who art the Searcher of our Spirits purge my Soul of all lurking Hypocrisy and Pride and Self-conceit and every thing that will hinder the Growth and Increase of this heavenly Seed and make me apt to receive and cherish it by creating in me an honest and good Heart and renewing a sincere and right Spirit within me Grant that I may so seriously attend to and consider the great Truths thy Goodness hath revealed to us in the Gospel as intirely to assent to them and heartily endeavour to conform my Practice to my Belief and may I always heedfully preserve those divine Instructions and moving Arguments to a persevering Piety which I have learned from thy Word lest the infernal Bird of Prey deprive me of the good Seed and in its room plant devillish Affections And O that Patience and Hope and an humble Dependance upon thee for Direction and Defence may be my Support in this my Pilgrimage That so chearfully running the Race that is set before me and thankfully acknowledging the early Influences of thy blessed Spirit in my tender Years and waiting for the later Distillations of thy Grace which will bring my Fruit to Perfection and always endeavouring o proportion my Increase to the Means and Opportunities of it thy Goodness hath vouchsafed me I may at last escape the Intolerable Punishment of Unfruitfulness and having my Fruit unto Holiness the End may be everlasting Life through thy Merits and Mercies O blessed Saviour Jesus Amen PARABLE II. Of the Tares Matth. xiii 24 25 26 27 28 29 30. Another Parable put Jesus forth unto them saying The Kingdom of Heaven is likned unto a Man that sowed good Seed in his Field But while Men slept his Enemy came and sowed Tares among the Wheat and went his way But when the Blade was sprung up and brought forth Fruit then appeared the Tares also So the Servants of the Housholder came and said unto him Sir didst not thou sow good Seed in thy Field From whence then hath it Tares He said unto them an Enemy hath done this The Servants said unto him wilt thou then that we go and gather them up But he said nay lest while ye gather up the Tares ye root up also the Wheat with them Let both grow together until the Harvest and in the time of Harvest I will say to the Reapers gather ye together first the Tares and bind them in Bundles to burn them But gather the Wheat into my Barn THE Interpretation of this Parable is thus set down Vers 37. of this Chapter He that soweth the good Seed is the Son of Man the Field is the World the good Seeds are the Children of the Kingdom but the Tares are the Children of the wicked one the Enemy that sowed them
is the Devil the Harvest is the End of the World and the Reapers are the Angels As therefore the Tares are gather'd and burnt in the Fire so shall it be in the End of the World The Son of Man shall send forth his Angels and they shall gather out of his Kingdom all things that offend and them that do Iniquity and shall cast them into a Furnace of Fire there shall be weeping and gnashing of Teeth Then shall the Righteous shine forth as the Sun in the Kingdom of their Father From this Interpretation of this Parable it appears that the Design of it is to shew for the Encouragement of the sincerely good and Terrour of the Hypocritical that though there may be many wicked Professors of Christianity that are Christians only in Name and Out-side and who in this World may be confusedly intermix'd among the good and go undiscover'd of Men and unpunish'd of God nay thrive and prosper here more than the good and to all outward Appearance be the Favorites of Heaven whilst the sincerely good undergo many Afflictions and appear to Men to be under God's Displeasure Yet in the great Harvest that shall be at the End of the World there shall be a Distinction made between the one and the other the hypocritical shall be separated from the sincere and the former consign'd to ever lasting Burnings and the latter received into the Heavenly Regions the Place prepared for them from the Beginning of the World This is the Design of the Parable We shall now briefly consider how aptly expressive it is of this Sense and then discourse upon the several Parts of it The planting of the Gospel in the World in order to the converting Men to Christianity is compared to the sowing of Seed because as was said upon the former Parable the Gospel like Seed is that Principle of a future great Increase of Piety and Holiness in this World and of Glory and Happiness in the next 'T is that which if sincerely embrac'd and its Growth and Progress not hindred will spring up to Glory Honour and Immortality And 't is said to be like Seed sown or committed to the Furrows and then left to its own seminal Powers and the favourable Influences of Heaven because the Gospel being actually planted in the World is as to particular Persons left to make its Way by its own Power and Efficacy the Excellency of its Precepts and its transcendent Rewards and Punishments together with the constant Dews of the Divine Grace that attend it without any more extraordinary Means unless upon some extraordinary Occasion to make it take Root and fructify 'T is generally propos'd to all in its whole Latitude which is the sowing of it and then Men are left to their own free Choice whether they will embrace it with its Promises or turn their Backs upon it and run the Hazard of its Threats without any irresistible Force to the one or the other only the small still Voice of God's Spirit in Men's Hearts and Grace descending like the gentle Dew to soften and incline them to cherish this good Seed which is the leaving the Gospel to its own seminal Powers with only the benign Waterings of the Divine Grace and Blessing Our Lord is call'd the Sower of the good Seed because he is the Author and first Teacher of this holy Religion and its Validity to the great Purposes to which it is design'd depends upon the Merit of his bitter Death and Passion and the invigorating Vertue of his precious Blood For 't was upon his satisfying the Divine Justice by his Death that he receiv'd Authority to mark out to us this Way to Life and Reconciliation as the only Principle and Seed of Immortality The World is call'd the Field where this Seed is sown because this blessed Religion is catholick and universal not confined to any particular Place or People as the Jewish Religion was but whosoever of what Nation or People soever shall believe in Jesus and repent shall be saved And agreeably in another Parable which for its great Analogy to this I shall not particularly discourse of the Gospel or Kingdom of Christ is represented by a Net cast into the Sea Mat. 13.47 not any particular Lake or River And this World is stiled the Field because this is the only Place of receiving this Seed and bringing forth the genuine and expected Fruits of it and he that shall refuse to receive this divine Seed now while he continues here or not suffer it to grow and increase and bring forth Fruit shall never have the like Opportunity again but suffer for ever the Punishment threatned to obstinate Infidelity or barren Unfruitfulness This World is the only Field this Life the only Seed-time and at the End of it comes that one great Harvest which shall consign Men to an eternal Condition either happy or miserable according to their Barrenness or Fruitfulness during this Time and in this Place of Growth and Increase The Children of the Kingdom or those that are sincere Christians intirely devoted to the Service of their great Master and have receiv'd the good Seed of the Gospel into honest and good Hearts as 't is express'd in the preceeding Parable These are themselves likewise compared to good Seed because they have a substantial Piety the Power as well as the Form and Appearance of Godliness and bring forth the genuine Fruits of their holy Religion That divine Seed that was sown in their Hearts has produced not only the Blade in the Ear but the full Grain in the Ear the same Kind of Seed that was sown appears in their Lives and Conversations the Seed of the Spirit brings forth the Fruits of the Spirit and the Seed of Holiness produces real and substantial Holiness so that the Gospel is called good Seed as 't is the first Principle of Holiness and truly pious Men are likewise call'd good Seed as the genuine Product and Increase of that first Principle The Gospel is the good Seed sown and the sincerely religious are the good Seed as springing from it and being produc'd by it The Children of the wicked one or the hypocritical Professors of Christianity are compared to Tares or Gockle because they have only a Shew and Appearance of Religion as Tares and Cockle have of Corn but like them no Substance of good Corn none of the real Excellencies of Religion nothing but hurtful and vicious Qualities as Tares are said to have hurtful to themselves in the final Consequence as bringing them to so miserable an End and hurtful to others by their ill Neighbourhood and Converse as Tares to Wheat and likewise injurious to the holy Religion they profess as reflecting Dishonour upon it by their scandalous Conversation Upon all Accounts 't is infoelix Lolium as the Poet calls it unhappy Tares they are that bring Dishonour upon God and Destruction upon themselves and others The Devil is very fitly stiled the Enemy that
say to his angelical Reapers gather ye first together the Tares and bind them in Bundles to burn them but gather the Wheat into my Barn And accordingly they shall gather out of his Kingdom all that have been a Scandal to it and under the Disguise of Christianity have done Iniquity and shall cast them into a Furnace of Fire where shall be wailing and gnashing of Teeth And then shall the righteous shine forth as the Sun in the Kingdom of their Father That is when the Close of the World shall come and the whole intelligent Creation be met together at the Summons of the Trump of God Men to receive their several Sentences whether of Absolution or Condemnation according to their several Deserts and Angels to execute these Sentences Then shall the sincerely good Christians indeed and in Truth be plac'd by the blessed Angels of God on the right Hand of the glorious and just Judg and after a Display of their excellent Piety and Charity to all the World hear this joyful Sound Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom prepar'd for you from the Foundation of the World and then be immediately caught up into the Clouds to meet their dear Lord in the Air and from thenceforth be for ever with him and shine forth as the Sun in the Kingdom of their Father having Crowns of eternal Glory plac'd upon their Heads and loud and rapturous Halleluja's in their Mouths Whilst those miserable Wretches that knew no more of Christianity than the Name in whom Religion was only Shew and Formality having no real Influence upon thir Lives and bringing forth no Fruits of Piety whilst these shall find to their Confusion that God is not to be mock'd and be plac'd on the left Hand as Vessels of Wrath and be doom'd to depart for ever from the Fountain of Happiness into eternal Burnings prepar'd for the Devil and his Angels Then will the good find by a happy Experience that there is indeed a Reward for the Righteous and that however they were laugh'd at and discourag'd here their Labour is not in vain in the Lord. And then will the Mock Hypocritical Christians be sadly assur'd notwithstanding all their Plea of having eaten and drank in the Presence of the Judge and at his Table and of his having taught in their Streets that without real and substantial Holiness no Man shall see the Lord. And instead of being receiv'd into their Master's Joy for cringing and fawning upon him and giving him magnificent Titles Lord Lord Jesus Saviour but heeding little his Commandments they shall be rejected with I know you not depart from me ye Workers of Iniquity And then will God be justifyed in the Face of the whole World and found to be not an unconcern'd Spectator of the Affairs of Man-kind but a wise all-knowing and just Governour of the Universe And though Clouds and Darkness seem here to be round about him yet Righteousness and Judgment are the Establishment of his Throne Then will there be eternal Joy and Exultation of the blissful beatify'd Souls of the righteous and weeping and wailing and gnashing of Teeth in the wretched Companies of the Damn'd for ever Mal. 4.1 Behold the Day cometh saith the Prophet Malachi that shall burn like an Oven and all the proud and all they that do wickedly shall be as Stubble and the Day that cometh saith the Lord of Hosts shall burn them up that it shall leave them neither Root nor Branch Rev. 9.6 And in that Day shall Men seek Death and shall not find it and shall desire to die and Death shall flee from them And now for a Conclusion of the whole Matter Since from this Parable of our Lord's it appears that though an empty Shew of Religion may pass well enough in this World and meet with no open Discrimination or Punishment from God here yet there shall most certainly be an after Reckoning when all the Thoughts and Intentions of Men's Hearts shall be reveal'd and their vile Hypocrisy and secret Impiety laid open before Men and Angels and an irreversible Doom of greatest Severity pay'd upon them according to their Deservings Since this is true it nearly concerns us all to be Christians in Reality as well as in Name and Appearance to obey the Commands of Christ as well as call him Lord and to approve our selves true Disciples of this holy Institution by leading our Lives in all holy Conversation and Godliness diligently endeavouring to be found of this great Judg in Peace without Spot and blameless Remembring that God shall bring every Work into Judgment with every secret thing whether it be good or evil and that the wicked shall go into everlasting Punishment but the righteous into Life eternal The PRAYER I. O Holy Saviour Jesus from whom are deriv'd all our Possibilities of Salvation the Means of Grace and the Hopes of Glory but who expectest our Concurrence with thy gracious Endeavours for our Hapiness and for the Tryal of our Sincerity permittest thine and our great Enemy to scatter his hellish Injections where thou sowest thy heavenly Doctrin I earnestly intreat thee so to assist me with thy Life-giving Spirit that my Faith and Obedience which thou hast made the Condition of my Happiness may be so vigorous and active as to manifest that I am thine not only in Word and in Shew but in Deed and in Truth Grant that I may ever esteem those inward Motions which I feel to a progressive Holiness to be what indeed they are thy gracious Endeavours to promote my eternal Welfare and may I always thankfully and chearfully embrace and follow them And whatever Thoughts and Inclinations tend to discourage sincere Religion and perswade to rest in the Formality of it for thy Mercies Sake help me to reject them with the greatest Abhorrence and Indignation as the Endeavours of Satan to involve me in his own Ruin And since 't is while we sleep that our great Adversary sowes these his Tares Give me Grace O blessed Jesus to awake to Righteousness and rouze from my thoughtless Inadvertency and shake off my Dreams of Vanity lest this spiritual Slumber at length prove fatal and betray me into eternal Death II. Thou hast assur'd us O Lord to whom the Father hath committed all Judgment that this Life is the only Time of our Probation O therefore grant that now in this our Day all we that name the Name of Christ may depart from Iniquity and embrace the things that belong to our Peace before they be hid from our Eyes That by serious Consideration we may make Religion our Choice and adhere to it firmly with all our Powers and Faculties and be in Reality thy peculiar People zealous of good Works remembring thy blessed Words why call ye me Lord Lord and do not the things that I command And that though here the wicked go unpunish'd it will not be always so and at last Hypocrisy shall meet with its Deserts And
satisfie his Justice some other Way As a convict Criminal we say has not satisfyed or is indebted to the Law till he has suffered the Punishment for his Crime which the Law thinks fit to inflict or else finds Favour and has it remitted him As for the Greatness of the Debt which Mankind by his Sin has thus contracted to the divine Justice 't is express'd in this Parable by ten thousand Talents which according to our Way of Reckoning is above a Million of Pounds A vast Sum this but yet far short of what we owe to the Justice of God by Reason of our Iniquities which are not only Millions but Innumerable even as the Stars in Heaven and the Sand upon the Sea-Shore Nor are they only numberless but very great not only many Thousands but many Thousands of Talents Every Sin as 't is a wilfull Violation of the Laws of God has Weight enough if God should be extreme to mark what is done amiss to sink a Soul into eternal Ruin And the Reason is because God's is the highest Authority and his Laws most just and equal and we have an infinite Obligation to obey him both as his Creatures and Dependents who live by his Favour and Bounty and have received numberless and inestimable Blessings from him and likewise as rational Creatures that we may perfect our own Nature by the Practice of those Virtues which will conform us to the Image and Likeness of God himself And therefore Sin being an Opposition to the highest Authority a Violation of the best Laws a Breaking through the strictest Bonds those of Submission to the Author of our Being and of Gratitude to the Giver of all the Blessings we enjoy and likewise of Self-Love and Preservation in rejecting the Means of advancing our own Nature to the Similitude and Enjoyment of God which is our chief Happiness Sin being all this must needs be exceeding sinful and indeed the greatest Evil and in no case eligible And therefore the oftner 'tis repeated and the more of Choice there is in the Commission of it and the more heinous the Instances of it are and the greater Obligations Men are under by Reason of God's Bounty and Goodness to them whether as to natural or spiritual Endowments to serve and obey him the higher proportionably rises the Guilt of Sin And he that often and wilfully commits great Impieties notwithstanding infinite Obligations to the contrary which was and is the Case of every Sinner is indebted to God's Justice not only Ten Thousand Talents but Ten Thousand Millions of Talents i. e. his Debt is infinite and unless some Miracle of Mercy intervene the divine Justice cannot be satisfyed but by his undergoing an infinite Punishment And all the World must acknowledge it just that Sin being the greatest possible Evil should be repay'd with the greatest Possible that is eternal Punishment So vast a Debt then lying upon all Mankind by reason of their Sins it is most true in the Second Place That 't was utterly impossible for them of themselves ever to clear this Debt and make Satisfaction to the divine Justice and the sad Consequence should it have still remain'd upon Account would have been no less than eternal Misery Which is represented very lively in the Parable by the King's Debtor having nothing to pay and the King thereupon commanding that he should be sold and his Wife and Children and all that he had and Payment made According to the Custom of the Jews in so using Debtors that were not able to pay 2 Kin. 4.1 'T is utterly impossible for Mankind of themselves ever to have paid this vast Debt because every individual meer Man is deeply engaged and always will be so in the same Account so deeply that he can never clear himself much less make Satisfaction for others Nor is there any thing valuable enough in all the Treasures of Nature to buy off this Sentence just though sad The Soul that sinneth it shall die Wherewith shall I come before the Lord Mic. 6.6 says the Prophet Micah when he had a Controversy with the People for their Sins and wherewith shall I bow my self before the high God Shall I come before him with Burnt Offerings with Calves of a Year old will the Lord be pleased with Thousands of Rams or Ten Thousands of Rivers of Oil Shall I give my First-born for my Transgression the Fruit of my Body for the Sin of my Soul As if he had said what 's all this to him that is the Creator of every thing the Lord and great Proprietor of all already and whose Glory and Happiness is infinitely above even our most exalted Thoughts and Conceptions He is an Ideot that does not confess that all the Riches of the Universe are utterly insufficient as the Psalmist expresses it to redeem the forfeited Souls of Mankind so that that must be let alone for ever All therefore that is in Man to give being far from sufficient to commute for the Punishment his Sins has deserv'd God's Justice must be satisfyed by his undergoing that Punishment that is eternal Death for ever dying yet never dead extremely miserable and for ever so A Punishment so inexpressibly great that Annihilation is much to be preferr'd before it for who can dwell with everlasting Burnings Who can bear an eternal Banishment from the supreme Good and Confinement to the dire Abodes of the Devil and his Angels those merciless Executioners of the divine Justice who will exact the Pains we are to suffer with the utmost Cruelty Who can bear the Gnawings of that never dying Worm Remorse of Conscience for forfeiting such infinite Happiness and plunging our selves headlong in such a bottomless Misery and that for the Sake of what was always empty and unsatisfying even when we did enjoy it And who can bear the Horrors of Despair of ever seeing an End of such Torments as these which yet might have been intirely avoided if we would This is indeed an unconceivably miserable Condition and all Men that ever lived must have been involv'd in it had not the Wisdom and the Goodness of God found out a Means both to satisfie his Justice and at the same Time to be merciful to his miserable Creatures To forgive the Debt to those that had nothing to pay and yet to have full Satisfaction made him for it 'T is what could never have enter'd into the Heart of Man to conceive 't is the great Mystery of divine Love which even the Angels desire to look into and 't is that which is and shall be the Subject of eternal Hallelujah's in Heaven Thirdly therefore let us consider the wondrous Compassion of our good God in pitying our sadly deplorable Condition and forgiving us all that Debt which we could never have paid though we had suffer'd the Pains of Hell for those shall never have an End and this is express'd in the Parable by the King 's being mov'd with Compassion at the miserable
Condition of his insolvent Servant and loosing him and forgiving him the Debt The King in the Parable was very merciful who upon the humble Entreaty of his poor Servant and his Promise if he would have Patience with him at length to pay him all was moved to Compassion and forgave him But God is infinitely more merciful in compassionating our Condition and forgiving our great Debt as will appear from the following Considerations For First our Debt is infinitely greater Ten Thousand Talents in Comparison of the numberless Number of the heinous Sins of Mankind are but as the Sand of an Hour-Glass compar'd with that of the Sea-Shore and one wilful Violation of our Obedience to God is a far weightier Debt to the divine Justice than Millions of Talents would be from one Mortal to another And the Reason is plain because the Distance between God and Man is infinite and for a Beggar to spurn at a Prince is certainly a Crime of much higher Aggravation than to do the like to one of his own ragged Gang. All that is culpable as was said is met together in a wilful Sin and therefore infinite and amazingly great must be the Guilt of all Man-kind who have heap'd up Transgressions without Number and have no Way left of paying this great Debt but by suffering without End the Pains of Hell And such a dreadful Punishment as this being annex'd to Sin by him who is infinitely good and just is Argument sufficient that there is no Debt comparable to that which a guilty Sinner owes to the Justice of God And therefore when God gives Mercy so great an Exaltation as to forgive so vast a Debt as this 't is Compassion impossible to be parallel'd Secondly God's Compassion in forgiving us is infinitely greater than that good King 's in the Parable because we less deserve God's Favour than that poor Servant did his Lord's He acknowledg'd his Debt and was griev'd for his not being able to discharge it and humbly submitted himself to his offended Lord but 't is quite otherwise with us we add Obstinacy and Pride to our long Score are still in actual Rebellion against God and daily more and more provoke him by new Impieties We make what Haste we can as the Prophet expresses it to fill up the Measure of our Fathers Iniquities and our own rather than by Repentance and better Life to lessen the great Account that is against us And this is to enflame God's Anger rather than to move his Compassion and does indeed deserve quick Vengeance rather than Forgiveness And yet so boundless an Ocean is the divine Goodness even in this rebellious State God pities his poor unhappy Creatures and is full of Compassion long-suffering and of great Kindness and repenteth him of the Evil and when we deserve nothing but the severest Punishment thinketh upon Mercy and forgiveness and proposes very easie Conditions of Reconciliation and Readmittance to his Favour and even courts us to accept them Turn ye turn ye from your evil Ways for why will ye dye O House of Israel Now for the great and infinitely happy God to treat such hardned Rebels at so tender and compassionate a rate to be so ready to forgive those who not at all deserve it but rather the utmost Expresses of his Vengeance is doubtless a Mercy infinite and beyond Comparison Thirdly The poor Debtor in the Parable humbly besought his Lord's Pity and Forbearance he fell down on his Face and worshipped him and by that his humble Behaviour and earnest Intreaty inclin'd his Lord to commiserate his sad Condition But instead of this we are not so little sensible of or afflicted with any thing as that great Debt we owe to the divine Justice So far from passionately begging for our Pardon that we spend but very few Thoughts about it and most of us are very little and some not at all apprehensive of the Need we have of being again receiv'd into God's Favour and the sad Consequence if we are not And are far more sollicitous about promoting some petty Interest in this World than about the Pardon of our Sins which is the One Thing necessary in Order to our Escape from Hell And this is so great a slighting and undervaluing God's Forgiveness expresses so much Indifferency whether he does it or no that one would think it should be enough to provoke God to resolve the Destruction and swear in his Wrath that they shall never enter into his Rest And yet so wondrously compassionate is our good God unsought to undesired he of his own meer Tenderness intirely forgave the past Offences of his thoughtless Creatures and for the Future still promis'd Forgiveness to such as should offend anew upon this only easie Condition that they should no more wilfully break his holy Laws and immediately repent when through Surprize or Inadvertency or the Force of Temptation they should do amiss And to be thus merciful notwithstanding so much Provocation to the contrary is Compassion that has no Parallel Fourthly God's Goodness in pitying and forgiving Sinners is infinitely greater than that of the King in the Parable in forgiving his poor Debtor because the Misery Mankind is delivered from by this Mercy of God is infinitely greater than that which the poor Wretch in the Gospel escap'd by the Compassion of his Lord. His Punishment had his Lord dealt rigorously with him would have been that he should be sold and his Wife and Children and all that he had that so in some Measure at least Payment might be made and the utmost that this could amount to was Poverty and Slavery both of himself and all his Family all the Days of his Life Which though indeed a very sad Condition and such as no Submission could be too great no Entreaties too earnest to avoid yet certainly comes infinitely short of these eternal Miseries in the Regions of Darkness and in the Society of the Devil and his Angels which would have been the Portion of the whole Race of Mankind had not God's merciful Forgiveness prevented it and given us better Hopes Now the greater the Necessity the greater the Charity that relieves it the greater and more general the Danger the more valuable the Rescue the more extreme the Misery and the greater the Number of those that were condemn'd to suffer it the greater the Compassion that relents and delivers from it It being therefore absolutely necessary that God should pardon Sinners that they might escape the Punishment due to Sin for they had nothing to pay and the Danger of those Punishments being imminent the Measure of Men's Iniquities rising to so great a Height and the Misery that would have involv'd all Man-kind had God's Vengeance had its free Course and Sin its due Reward being no less than that of Hell and that for ever too That Compassion of God that inclin'd him to forgive so many wretched Debtors as the whole Race of Man-kind and prevented such otherwise
and the great Obligation we have to imitate this Example of our merciful God To forgive one another in Imitation of the Divine Example is first to forgive such as have injured us freely and without Reserve and that though they still continue to shew themselves our Enemies and are ready to do us fresh Mischiefs when it lies in their Power For thus as we have seen God dealt with us miserable Sinners he first lov'd us and while we were yet Sinners and consequently in open Hostility and Rebellion against him even when he sent his Son to dye for us and be the Propitiation for our Sins He took pity upon us when we were still adding new Wickednesses to our long Account and when we deserved nothing but eternal Misery thought upon Mercy And in Imitation of this our Lord commands us to love our Enemies not to render Evil for Evil but contrariwise Blessing that so we may be the Children of our Father which is in Heaven For to use our Saviours Enforcement of this if those only share in our Affections or Esteem who are as beneficial and kind to us as we to them what Thank have we Self-Love and Interest may there be the Motives and very little of True Piety and Goodness nay even the very worst of Men may be as eminent for such Sort of Charity as the best Publicans and Sinners as our Lord observed doing the same But Christians should be of a more Godlike Temper their Charity more free and disinteressed the greater and more frequent their Injuries the more ready should they be to pardon and forgive and not only be reconciled after a seven-fold Wrong but after one repeated seventy times seven And our Saviour has likewise further inforced this by his own Example who with his last Breath pray'd for the Forgiveness of his cruel Murtherers Secondly We must not only forgive such as but little deserve it but likewise in Correspondence to our divine Pattern whether they desire it or no For thus it was in God's Forgiveness of Sinners he prevented us by the Riches of his compassionate Goodness and entreated us his rebellious Creatures first by his Prophets then by his only Son to be reconcil'd to him and embrace their Pardon And thus those that will be Imitators of God as dear Children must likewise do Rather than Enmity should continue we must seek to our Enemies to be reconcil'd though they were the first that offered the Offence And this however hardly it may sound is not only our Duty by Vertue of that general Conâ—â—â—d of forgiving one another as God has forgiven us but is expresly commanded by our compassionate Saviour Mat. 18.15 which occasion'd that Question of St. Peter Vers 21. How often shall I forgive my Brother Upon which our Lord deliver'd this Parable his Words are these and deserve our serious Attention Moreover if thy Brother trespass against thee go and tell him his Fault between thee and him alone If thy Brother trespass against thee or as we usually express it first did the Injury or gave the Affront go thou to him stay not till he comes and acknowledges his Fault to thee for that 's a thing Men are very backward in doing either for fear or for Shame or out of Pride and Greatness of Spirit as it must be term'd or for other Reasons and Time usually widens such Breaches and encreases Strangeness and Aversion But go thou therefore to him in Meekness and the Spirit of Forgiveness and with Resolutions of passing by all further Unkindnesâ—â— and it may be reproacheâ— for your good Will calmly tell him his Fault expostulate the Case with him and in all Likelyhood he will hear thee a right Understanding between you will ensue and thou shalt gain thy Brother This is indeed to be like God in this great Excellence of forgiving Injuries and is as a most noble Expression of christian Charity so we see very plainly commanded by our Lord and should be taken into our serious Consideration in order to our agreeable Practice Thirdly We must not only so far forgive as not to revenge but in Imitation of the divine Pattern of Forgiveness set before us be ready to do all Acts of Kindness and Beneficence to our Enemy as Occasion shall serve and his Needs require Remembring the Words of our great Master Do good to them that hate you and pray for those that despightfully use you and persecute you for so sâ—â— ye be the Children of the Highest who is 〈◊〉 to the unthankful and to the evil And we must endeavour to confirm the new made Agreement by more than ordinary Expressions of good Will that we may heap Coals upon our Enemies Head to melt him into a Correspondent Charity and likewise that there may be no Place left for our Enemy or our selves to doubt the Sincerity of our Forgiveness For the smoothest Words may be rotten and deceitful and the not revenging an Injury may be for want of Power or Opportunity but when to good Words beneficial Actions are added then may a Man well be thought to love and forgive not in Word only but in Deed and in Truth This is Christian Forgiveness of Injuries or Ephes 4. ult in the Apostle's Words the forgiving one another if any have a Quarrel against any even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven us i.e. freely and intirely though their Malice still cotinues against us nay to go and offer 'em Forgiveness and Reconciliation tho' they neither desire nor deserve it and to accompany our Forgiveness with Acts of Kindness and good Turns But what has been said upon this Account must have a Limitation lest it bound indiscriminately upon all Men and at all Times that is in all Instances of Wrong it thwart and run Counter to other Duties of our holy Religion Now in order to our being inform'd of the just Limits of this great Duty we must consider that Injuries may be of three Sorts affecting either Men's Persons their good Names or their Estates And each of these may be either in Danger of Ruin by the Injuries of a wicked Man or only greatly damag'd or the Injury may be but small and trifling and such as brings no considerable and lasting Ill Effects along with it Now such Injuries as threaten Ruin to a Man in any of those Respects ought not to be silently let pass nor the Man so forgiven as to have no Notice taken of him and such a legal Prosecution of him as is necessary to secure a Man's Person or to vindicate or recover his blasted Reputation and to preserve his Estate all or either of which would be ruin'd by the injurious Person if tamely let alone a legal Prosecution in such Cases as these is allow'd by the Law of God and Nature as well as that of the Land And the Case is proportionably the same as to Injuries that greatly endamage a Man in any of those Respects before mentioned And were all
divine Love and Philanthropy upon the Souls of his Creatures to see 'em love and compassionate one another according to his glorious Example we are infinitely obliged to imitate his Pity and Forgiveness towards us in passing by the Offences of our Fellow-Servants Further those to whom God has forgiven so vast a Debt as that which miserable Sinners ow'd to the divine Justice are questionless bound and that with the strictest Ties to love him infinitely again but now St. John says plainly 1 Joh. 4.20 21. that he that loves God must love his Brother also and if a Man say I love God and yet hateth his Brother he is a Lyar and the Truth is not in him For as he says Chap. 3.17 He that shutteth up his Bowels of Compassion from his Brother how dwelleth the Love of God in him And therefore as much as we are bound to love our good God who has forgiven us our numberless Iniquities so much are we bound to manifest that our Love to him by being pitiful and gentle to our brethren that have injur'd us and ready to forgive them For so says our Lord shall ye be my Disciples and so shall ye be the Children of your Father which is in Heaven And doubtless that wicked Servant in the Parable had not so due an Apprehension of his Lord 's great Compassion to him nor so grateful a Sense of it as he ought to have had who could immediately forget the miserable Condition he was so lately in himself and how much he dreaded lest his Lord should rigidly exact his great Debt of him and how importunately he begg'd that he would have Patience with him and yet use so much Cruelty to his Fellow-Servant for a Debt very inconsiderable He could not but know that such Barbarity would be very contrary to the compassionate Temper of his Lord and therefore was bound in Gratitude if upon no other Account to imitate his Lord's Example and not immediately act what would be so displeasing to him And so it is in our Case God is Love and has wondrously manifested his Love in forgiving us miserable Sinners and therefore we are bound in Gratitude and because 't will be pleasing to him were that all to imitate that his Charity and mutually to love and forgive one another But when besides we have our Saviour's express Command for it Mat. 5.44 and Luk. 6.37 and that not until seven times only but until seventy times seven as in the Verse before this Parable As much as Men are obliged obliged to obey the Commands of God their Saviour so strong is their Obligation to forgive Injuries with Respect to God Secondly Our Obligation is very great to imitate God's compassionate Example with respect to our selves For 't is the best Way to secure Quiet and Peace and Happiness and as much as every Man is bound to provide for his own Quiet and the Peace and Happiness of Society and of his own Soul too in the other World so much is every Man bound not to be malicious and revengeful but of a Temper ready to forgive For however sweet Revenge may seem to be to malicious Spirits in the Execution it must needs make the Mind very uneasie before 't is executed and bring great Calamities along with it afterward and is the most base devillish Temper in the World and makes a Man a Fiend incarnate Whereas an Aptness to forgive is a Godlike Disposition for God is Love the Spring of Kindness and Compassion of Mercy and Forgiveness and as his Happiness is the Result of the Excellencies and Perfections of his Nature so those who resemble him in the most glorious of those Perfections must needs likewise enjoy a great Share of Tranquillity and inward Bliss But if God be the great Exemplar of Forgiveness how groundless is the usual Objection against this excellent Vertue of Christianity that it betrays a mean servile Spirit and is a thing much below a Gentleman Can any Man of common Sense think it a Disgrace to be like God and that in his most glorious Perfection too If God be the Fountain of Honour we must allow it to be rather the most noble generous Action in the World It is the best Way likewise of ending Strifes and overcoming our Adversaries by rendring Good for Evil. It eases the Mind of those great Disquietudes that constantly attend Desires of Revenge it prevents all the Mischiefs that follow it such as fresh Injuries from the Party we revenge our selves upon if we leave him his Life and the Stroke of Justice if we persue him to the Death But besides these evil Consequences of Revenge and many others which Forgiveness prevents there is more true Pleasure and Sweetness in the Act of Forgiveness and Reconciliation as was hinted above than in that of Revenge For however the Devil may hurry Men on in an eager Persuit of Revenge and flatter 'em with the Hopes of great Satisfaction when 't is perfected yet there is a secret Horrour and Aversion to it from within which as 't were pulls back the Hand when going to strike or what other way soever it be expressed endeavours to hinder it and makes the Heart recoil and repent of the Undertaking and execute it with trembling and misgivings of Soul and immediately after come dire Forebodings of the Venge ance of him to whom Vengeance belongeth and a Kind of Hell upon Earth But Forgiveness is attended with Applauses of Conscience and the Approbation of Reason and Chearfulness of Spirit There is an inward Pleasure and Satisfaction of Mind quite throughout the Action and when 't is compleated no Man can express the silent Joy that runs through the whole Soul and it seems a Foretaste of the Joys of the Blessed in Heaven Even that Part of Forgiveness which seems most of all impracticable and contrary to Flesh and Blood that of suing to a Man to be reconciled that has done the Injury and still continues to be one's Enemy this does of all yeild the greatest Pleasure to the Soul And that not only because 't is the nearest Resemblance to the Mercy of God who sent his Son to mediate between him and us and by his Death to reconcile us to himself when 't was we miserable Wretches that had offended and were then in actual Rebellion against him but from the Nature of the thing it self For 't is a kind of surprizing a Man into Charity before he is aware When Men do Injuries they generally stand upon their Defence and expect to receive Injuries again but when a Man finds instead of this Acts of Friendship and Good will and Readiness to forgive and Peace and Quietness offer'd so freely and upon such easie Terms without the Shame and natural Regret in seeking it and asking Pardon and making Satisfaction and the like How pleas'd must the Man needs be to find a Friend when he fear'd and expected an Enemy Few Men love Strife for Strife's Sake and
many a Man injures another in suddain Heat and Passion and in cooler Blood repents of it though he can't prevail with himself to ask Forgiveness And sometimes a Man injures another in retaliating something that he took amiss from him though perhaps far otherwise intended and it may be false Reports may have made the Difference But now this Way of Reconciliation presently sets all right again it creates a right Understanding between Party and Party it nips Quarrels in the very Bud and leaves no Room for further Malice and Ill Will And what a holy Triumph will there then be in the forgiving Soul thus to have softned his Enemy and overcome Evil with Good And such happy Effects of Forgiveness of Injuries as these methinks should engage every considering Man to put it in Practice were this all but when besides all this so great a Mercy as the perfect Recovery of the Favour of God the Forgiveness of our own vast Debt and the Enjoyment of the Glories and Felicities of Heaven shall be the Reward of it Surely no Man in his Wits but must think himself as much obliged to forgive Injuries as to make himself eternally happy if he can And that this exceeding great Reward shall attend the hearty Practice of this Vertue is plain from our Lord 's own Words Luke 6.37 Forgive and ye shall be forgiven And as it appears from what has been said that we have upon all Accounts great Obligation to imitate the compassionate Example of our merciful God so in the Second Place Our Baseness will be very great if we do not And that both with Respect to God and Man With Respect to God not to forgive a petty Injury from our Brother when God has forgiven such infinite Provocations as ours against himself is the vilest Baseness because as was said before 't is the vilest Ingratitude and Forgetfulness of his great Mercy to us I say a petty Injury from our Brother for every Injury how great soever that one Mortal can do to another is indeed but of no regard in compare with those mountainous Heaps of Wickednesses which we have been guilty of against God and bear not so great Proportion to them as an Hundred Pence does to Ten Thousand Talents as the Parable expresses both Debts that which the compassionate King forgave his Servant and that which that wicked Man would not forgive his Fellow-Servant The infinite Goodness of God to us if it has made its due Impression upon our Spirits will leave so charming an Idea of Forgiveness upon our Souls as will incline us to a suitable Practice upon all Occasions especially since we know from God's great Compassion towards us how pleasing to him Compassion is in others But notwithstanding God's unspeakable Kindness to us to cherish a Temper of Mind which we can't but be sensible he infinitely Hates and endeavour to make those miserable as far as our Malice will reach to whom God has forgiven as much as he forgave us and for whose Redemption Christ dyed and for whom are reserv'd Crowns of Glory in Heaven through the wondrous Mercy of God and all this unmercifulness for a small Matter for the Debt of a few Pence This shews the basest of Ingratitude and weak Sense of God's Compassion shewn to us that is possible Well may our Lord say to such Men with a little Variation as the King in the Parable said to that cruel Servant of his O thou wicked Servant I forgave thee all that Debt and that though thou didst not desire it of me shouldst not thou also have had Compassion on thy Fellow-Servant even as I had Pity on thee Obligation sufficient there was no Doubt and that his Ingratitude and Forgetfulness of God's Favour and his cruel hardned Temper was very provoking will appear in the Sequel But Secondly To be revengeful and implacable after such Mercy receiv'd our selves is the greatest Baseness with Respect to Men. For we are all Fellow-Servants of the same great Lord and his Mercy has been the same to all of us we are all of us through Christ under the same Covenant of Grace and Reconciliation Now this methinks should endear us to one another and our mutual Joy for each others Happiness should put an End to all other petty Quarrels and Animosities between us But instead of this to hate and mischief one another to endeavour by all means to make one another as unhappy as we can here below and with him in the Parable pluck out Throats for Trifles and become inexorable to any that have injur'd us this is such an unnatural Piece of Barbarity and betrays so much devillish Baseness of Spirit as that every sensible Man when he considers it will abominate 'T is as if a Man should escape to Shoar from a Wreck at Sea and there meet one whom Providence had bless'd with the same Deliverance and instead of congratulating his Safety and joyning with him in praising and blessing the Mercy of their great Deliverer endeavour to knock out his Brains in Persuance of some old Grudge Nothing can be more base than this nor more justly provoking to the God of Mercy and Compassion Which leads me in the Last Place to consider the miserable Consequence of this Baseness viz. We shall thereby provoke God to recall his Pardon to us and deal with us as the King in the Parable did with his wicked ungrateful and cruel Servant and deliver us over to the Tormentors till we shall have paid all that is due unto him For so likewise says our Lord shall my heavenly Father do unto you if ye from your Hearts forgive not every one his Brother their Trespasses God's Pardon to Sinners though it be very full and free and given in infinite Mercy yet is not pass'd in such a Manner as that it can never be revok'd 't was given at first upon Conditions and may be again forfeited if we fail of performing what God requires in order to his final ratifying it Now Forgiveness of Injuries is expresly mention'd by our Saviour as Part of what God expects from us in order to his comfirming his Pardon to us for thus Mat. 6.14 15. If ye forgive Men their Trespasses your heavenly Father will also forgive you but if ye forgive not Men their Trespasses neither will your heavenly Father forgive your Trespasses but as 't is in the Parable his Wrath will again wax hot against you and he will make void his former Pardon and deliver you over to the Tormentors till you shall pay all that is due unto him That is will consign you to the Portion of the Devil and his Angels Spirits of like malicious and revengeful Tempers who as the merciless Executioners of God's Vengeance will not for ever spare to torment and cruciate those wretched Souls who might have escap'd those Miseries and had their Pardon seal'd with the Blood of their Redeemer but forfeited it again by indulging to that devillish Temper of
or Christian Religion does 1. create the nearest Relation between Christ and Believers it makes us Members of his Body of his Flesh and of his Bones and as was before quoted from St. Paul Ephes 5.30 i. e. it makes us as near to him as the Members are to the Head the Flesh and Bones to the Body or as our Church expresses it it makes us one with Christ and Christ with us 't is so near a Relation that nothing can sufficiently express it but what expresses an Union It creates likewise 2. the dearest Relation for thus our Lord John 14.21 He that hath my Commandments and keepeth them he it is that loveth me and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father and I will love him and will manifest my self unto him and Vers 23. We will come unto him and make our Abode with him and Chap. 15.14 Ye are my Friends if ye do whatsoever I command you And Rev. 3.20 Behold says our Lord I stand at the Door and knock if any Man hear my Voice and open the Door i. e. by Faith and Obedience I will come in unto him and sup with him and he with me he will shew the greatest Expressions of Dearness and Affection to him And as the Gospel makes the nearest and dearest Relation between Christ and Believers so that Relation is 3. inseparable i. e. unless we willfully divorce our selves from him by Apostacy or Disobedience Thus a little before his Ascension he tells his Apostles and in them all faithful Believers that observe whatsoever he hath commanded that he will be with them always even to the End of the World And because he was to ascend to his Father and their Father to his God and their God therefore says he I will not leave you comfortless but will pray to the Father and he shall give you another Comforter that he may abide with you for ever John 14.16 and in the 2. and 3. Verses of that Chapter I go to prepare a Place for you and if I go and prepare a Place for you I will come again and receive you to my self that where I am there ye may be also And John 10.27 28. My Sheep hear my Voice and I know them and they follow me and I give unto them Eternal Life and they shall never perish neither shall any pluck them out of my Hand And St. Paul with great Assurance asks this Question Rom. 8.35 Who shall separate us from the Love of Christ and after enumerating what in the Esteem of the World was most likely to do it he concludes Vers the last that nothing shall be able to separate us from the Love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. And he is likewise in a spiritual Manner always with us in the Reception of those Mysteries which he instituted in Remembrance of him The Gospel then effecting so near so dear and so inseparable a Relation between Christ and Believers that nothing can so fitly resemble it as the State of Marriage we may from hence collect in the next place what Privileges the Gospel intitles Believers to by reason of this their so intimate Relation to Christ As first it intitles to the peculiar Love and Tenderness of Christ such a Love as will incline him to promote the Happiness of Believers and to pity and compassionate their Infirmities Failures and Imperfections for Love covereth a Multitude of Faults Thus the Apostle Col. 3.19 Husbands love your Wives and be not bitter against them be not extreme to observe every little Defect and Failing in them but consider 'em as the weaker Vessel and bear with their Infirmities And accordingly the Author to the Hebrews says of our Lord he is not one that cannot be touch'd with a Sense of our Infirmities but knows and pities them having been in all Points tempted as we are though without Sin Heb. 4.15 And as for his Tenderness and Care of our Happiness 't is miraculously evident in that he gave himself for us sacrific'd his very Life for our reconciliation to his offended Father that he might sanctifie and cleanse us and present us to himself a glorious Church not having Spot or Wrinkle or any such thing but that we should be holy and without Blemish as the Apostle expresses it in the before cited Eph. 5.26 c. And he does continually nourish and cherish us by the Communications of his Grace in the blessed Sacrament that spiritual Body of his which whoso eateth of shall live for ever and by the Comforts and Assistances of his holy Spirit And to lye thus in the Bosome of the Son of God to have such great Degrees of his Love and Tenderness to us express'd in such amazing Instances to be thus pitied and commiserated and our Failures excus'd and past by by him that is to be our Judge and our Happiness in all Respects so carefully endeavoured by him who is the Fountain of it This is such a Privilege as can never be enough valu'd and is infinitely above the Reach of any Comparison Another Privilege the Gospel intitles Believers to upon their so near Relation to Christ is Christ's Protection of them from Dangers and Defence against Assaults of Enemies For as in Marriage the Husband is the Shield and Guardian of his Wife so Christ is the Protector and Defender of the faithful he covers them from the Rage and Malice of unreasonable Men and arms them against the Attacks of the Spirits of Darkness by the Supplies and Aids of his blessed Spirit who helps our Infirmities and strengthens us mightily in the inner Man so that the Gates of Hell all the infernal Powers shall not be able to prevail against us And accordingly says St. Paul I can do all things through Christ that strengthneth me Phil. 4.13 Rom. 8.37 In all these things Tribulation Distress Persecution Famine Nakedness Perilor Sword in all these things we are more than Conquerers By what means Why through Christ that loveth us And our Lord says expresly in the forecited John 10.27 my Sheep that hear my Voice shall never perish neither shall any pluck them out of my Hand And if the Almighty Son of God be for us and takes us into his own Protection and shields and guards us as a Husband does the Wise of his Bosome who then can be against us We shall be hid under his Wings and safe under his Feathers his Faithfulness and Truth shall be our Shield and Buckler And to dwell thus under the Defence of the most High and abide under the Shadow of the Allmighty is no doubt an inestimable Privilege Again as the Husband confers Honour upon his Wife intitles her to have a Share in that Honour that is due to him so Believers by their intimate Union with Christ are advanc'd to the highest Step of Honour that Mortals can arrive at For what more honourable than to be in so near a Relation to the most glorious Son of God! Accordingly the
in their own native Language and a Power of working Miracles to confirm the Truth of their Doctrin and with this Message and these supernatural Abilities were they sent to the most remote Corners of the Earth even our Britain as little known and as barbarous as then it was receiv'd and that very early the glad Tidings of the Gospel And for a Supply of the Cortality of the first Teachers of this holy Religion that no Age might want those that should instruct Men in and invite them to it there was an Order of Men set apart on purpose for this great Work and empower'd to ordain others that should tread in their Steps when they were gone and those likewise others and so down successively till Time shall be no more and as so many Ambassadors from the great King of Heaven to perswade Men to hearken to the Proposals of Reconciliation made to them through the Merits and Intercession of his Son and to partake of the infinite Happiness that will follow upon that blessed Agreement These like the King's Servants in the Parable are to let Men know what Bliss will be the Result of their coming to this spiritual Marriage and entring into so near a Relation to the eternal Son of God that all things are ready to compleat that glorious Solemnity the Feast prepar'd the Oxen and Fatlings kill'd i.e. Heaven and the ineffable Pleasures of it ready to receive those that shall sincerely enter into this near Relation to Christ and continue always faithful in it and in the mean time the secret Joys of a good Conscience and the enravishing Expectation of the Time when those Felicities shall be enjoy'd shall unspeakably cheer and refresh the Soul and be as so many Antepasts of Glory This is like the Course that the Lord took with the obstinate Jews mention'd Jer. 25.4 He sent unto them all his Servants the Prophets rising early and sending them they cry'd Turn ye again now every one from his evil Way and from the Evil of your Doings and dwell in the Land that the Lord hath given to you and to your Fathers for ever for why will ye dye O House of Israel Many the like pathetick Expressions there are in Scripture of God's great Desire of the Happiness of Mankind and as earnest Intreaties that we would accept of those inestimable Favours he would confer upon us if we were to confer the Favours and he to receive them Now when we consider the infinite Distance between God and us what despicable Creatures comparatively the best of us are poor and maim'd halt and blind as the Parable expresses it how infinitely perfect and happy the divine Nature is and would for ever be though the whole Creation were annihilated so that our Righteousness will not reach to him to make any Addition to his Felicity nor will it be in the least profitable to him that we make our Way perfect and if we consider likewise our great Rebellions against him obstinately persisted in even until now the little Desire we have of his Favour the many Slights that we have made of his Overtures of Peace and the like We shall soon perceive that his Mercy is indeed over all his Works and that his Compassions fail not as long as there is any Hopes of our complying with his gracious Intentions for our Happiness And such stupendious Goodness as this to Creatures in our vile Circumstances can never be enough ador'd and magnifyed Only let us remember that the greater the Expressions are of God's Love and Tenderness to Sinners the greater will be his Anger the more severe his Vengeance to such as finally reject it and obstinately persist in their Rebellion against him The Third thing express'd in this Parable is what Kind of Reception the Gospel and the Teachers of it are like to meet with in the World represented by Men's making light of the King's Invitation to the Marriage of his Son and offering frivolous Excuses such as of having bought a Piece of Ground and a Yoke of Oxen and of having married a Wife and that these things would engage 'em so that they could not come and accordingly going their Way one to his Merchandise another to his Farm and the rest taking those Servants that came to invite them and intreating them despightfully and slaying them In general slighting and undervaluing the glad Tidings of the Gospel was and is still and is too like to be the Reception of it Men's Lusts and vile Affections dissuading them from embracing so holy a Religion and the Evil of their Deeds making them love Darkness rather than this glorious Light which will discover and reprove them And Men having so little Relish for the Religion have as little Respect for those that preach and enforce it and endeavour to silence and discourage them by their malicious ill Treatment of them like those in the Parable who took the King's Servants and entreated them spitefully and slew them And as in this Case it seems very strange that those who came upon so friendly an Errand as to invite to the Pleasures and Festivities of so great a Marriage as that of a King's Son should be treated so inhumanely in Return so methinks 't is as strange that those whom God has sent to invite Men to their Happiness and to prepare them for the Enjoyment of himself in Glory should be us'd like so many Enemies and despis'd as the Pests of Society and the Offscouring of the Earth But so it is too generally and the Reason must be this as St. Paul expresses it we are therefore look'd upon as Men's Enemies because we tell them the Truth Because we tell 'em they must love God above all things and not be too fond of the World and deny and mortifie the unruly Passions and Desires of the Body and lead this present Life in Sobriety Righteousness and Godliness if they hope to partake of the Joys of Heaven therefore we are the Troublers of Israel as King Ahab said to Elijah and as such made the Object of Men's Scorn and Hate But as our Lord takes all the Kindness Reverence and Respect which his Ministers receive as done unto himself the Treatment of an Ambassador being look'd upon as the Treatment of the Prince that sends him and we are the Ambassadors of Christ so on the contrary he that shall treat despightfully the least of these his Servants 't were better for him that a Milstone were hang'd about his Neck and he cast into the Midst of the Sea But of this something more in the Sequel Let us now consider the Excuses those in the Parable made for their not going to the Marriage of the King's Son and which are offer'd still by irreligious Men and the great Weakness and Invalidity of them The first two of having bought a Piece of Ground and a Yoke of Oxen and going to see the one and prove the other are much the same and so shall be consider'd
Bubble because it shines and glitters So utterly without Excuse are those who despise and reject the Offers of the Gospel and the Invitations to Religion upon Account of the Riches and Pleasures of the World or indeed upon any other Account whatever For Religion is our cheif Interest and therefore nothing can stand in Competition with it Those that put by the Thoughts of it till a more convenient Time that is till they are fit for nothing else are no doubt very highly displeasing to the great Author of it but those are much more so who totally and insultingly reject it To defer the great Business of Religion is a very heinous Provocation but atheistically to oppose and vilifie it is certainly much worse Which leads me to the Fourth thing express'd in this Parable namely the Sadness of their Condition who when they have heard of either totally reject this holy Religion and abuse those that invite them to embrace it or else though they profess it are negligent of its Duties and live not agreeably to it The first of these is represented by the King 's being Wroth with those that made light of and complyed not with his Invitation to the Marriage of his Son and pronouncing them unworthy of that Favour and that they should not taste of his Supper and sending his Servants to invite others to the Wedding and commanding his Armies to go and destroy those Murderers that had spitefully entreated and slain his Servants who brought the gracious Invitation to them and to burn up their City And indeed well may God's Wrath be kindled against those that reject these wondrous Expressions of his Love and trample under Foot the Son of God and despise and vilifie his holy Religion and undervalue all his Condescentions and use his Ambassadors despitefully and call the whole a Trick a State Juggle and glory in their Infidelity and too often blaspheme that blessed Jesus by whom alone cometh Salvation These Men will do well to consider that if it should prove true that there is no other Name by which we can be sav'd but that of Jesus their Case will be infinitely miserable who have not believ'd in that Name but made it their Business to prophane and ridicule it as much as was possible but should it prove not true their Belief in it will not at all be injurious to them either in this world or in the next should there be any after this And therefore since the wittiest Infidel in the World cannot prove but that 't is possible and may be true that Jesus is the only Saviour of the World and the Consequence of not believing in him being so sad should it at length prove indeed to be true certainly it must be the most prudent Course to be of the surest Side and embrace that Faith which if true is the only Way to Happiness and if false will not however leave a Man in any Respect in a worse Condition than it found him How sad the Consequence will be of not believing in Jesus as the only Saviour of the World and of rejecting the Religion he taught is express'd in this Parable by the King 's pronouncing those that would not come to the Marriage of his Son to be unworthy of that Favour and resolving that they should not taste of his Supper and sending his Servants to invite others to the Wedding Which was literally verifyed upon the obstinate Jews and will be as effectually upon all other Infidels That is Men's obstinate Infidelity shall at length be repay'd with God's withdrawing that Favour which he so long tender'd them and they refus'd and putting an End to their Day of Grace and Salvation and sealing 'em up as irreclaimable to Destruction Because I have called and ye refused says Solomon personating Christ or the Divine Wisdom I have stretch'd out my Hand and no Man regarded but ye have set at nought my Counsel and would have none of my Reproof I also will laugh at your Calamity and mock when your Fear cometh when your Fear cometh as Desolation and your Destruction as a Whirlwind when Distress and Anguish cometh upon you then shall they call upon me but I will not answer they shall seek me early but they shall not find me Prov. 1.24 The things that belonged to their Peace which once were tender'd and made known to them shall then be hid from their Eyes And no Condition can be so miserable as theirs who by obstinate Infidelity put themselves out of all Possibility of Salvation The sad Consequence of using those spiritual Persons contumeliously and despitefully who come as Ambassadors from God with these glad Tidings of Salvation is express'd in the Parable by the King 's sending forth his Armies to destroy those Murderers and to burn up their City which was likewise literally fufilll'd in the Destruction of Jerusalem and shall be as effectually verify'd upon those wicked Men who vent their Spleen against the Religion upon those that preach it and vilifie and abuse and trample upon the one because they hate the other But Vengeance is mine I will repay saith the Lord and a fiery Destruction even that of Hell shall without a deep Repentance which we beseech God to grant them be the Portion of those whose Malice was so inveterate against Men sent from God to invite them to Salvation This is the Case of such as when they have heard totally reject this holy Religion and abuse and vilifie those that perswade them to embrace it And theirs is as bad who though they profess it are negligent of its Duties and live not agreeably to it Which is express'd in the Parable by a King 's finding a Man at the Marriage Supper that had not on a Wedding Garment and saying unto him Friend how camest thou in hither not having on a Wedding Garment And the Man's being speechless upon it and the King 's commanding his Servants to bind him Hand and Foot and take him away and cast him into outer Darkness where shall be weeping and gnashing of Teeth This is in Allusion to what was customary in those Eastern Countries the having peculiar florid Sort of Garments on purpose to grace such festival Solemnities and none being permitted to taste of those Feasts but who had such Garments on So in Christianity Repentance and Reformation of Life are the Wedding Garment without which none let them make never so specious Professions shall taste of that Happiness which is propos'd as the Reward of believing in Jesus Faith without Works is dead the Soul without Repentance is polluted whatever it professes to believe and without real and substantial Holiness no Man shall see the Lord. And when at the great Scrutiny in the last Day God shall take a View of every Man of the State and Condition of his Soul that every Man may be disposed of according to his Deserts and shall ask those formal Professors who have liv'd like Heathens or as if Faith
obstinate Infidelity and their murdering their Saviour was to urge the Jewish Christians to a Preparation and watchful Care against that Time of Sorrows and that they would be so wise as to make Provision for their Safety by being very careful that that Time surprize them not in wicked Courses but that living like faithful Disciples of Christ in all Obedience to his holy Commands his Providence might watch over them and secure them from perishing in that dreadful Destruction Though this might be the first Intention of this Parable yet I suppose it designed likewise to represent the Necessity of Men's constant Preparation for Death and Judgment by a sedulous Care and Watchfulness over themselves and diligent Practice of all religious Duties and Obligations Because 't is very uncertain when God will summon any of us to leave this World and appear before his just Tribunal and his Call may be very suddain and unexpected and because the Consequence of being unready and not fit to obey it will be inexpressibly miserable Watch therefore says our Lord in the Conclusion of this Parable for ye know neither the Day nor the Hour when the Son of Man cometh In my Discourse upon this Parable thus understood I shall do two things First I shall give a particular Interpretation of the Parable and shew how aptly expressive it is of the Sense our Lord couch'd under it And Secondly I shall urge that upon the Practice of Christians which is express'd by it namely that they would watch and be ready because they know not the Day nor the Hour First I shall give a particular Interpretation of this Parable and shew how aptly expressive it is of the Sense our Lord couched under it The Parable is an Allusion to a Custom among the Jews of the Friends and Neighbours of the Bridegroom when there was a Wedding conducting him to the Bride-Chamber with Songs and burning Lamps and partaking of an Entertainment that was prepar'd for them and shutting the Door when the Bridegroom was enter'd to keep out the intruding Rabble and afterwards admitting none that were not ready to attend him at the Hour he came which was uncertain And the Sense which our Lord couch'd under this Representation is this That 't is highly necessary every Christian should be always ready and prepar'd by a holy Life to attend the Call of Christ whenever he shall summon him out of this World by Death in order to his final Judgment because the Time of that great Summons is so very uncertain and eternal Happiness or Misery respectively depends upon Men's being prepar'd or not prepar'd for it Now how aptly and movingly expressive this Parable is of this Sense will appear from the following Interpretation of it By the Virgins in the Parable is represented the Society of Christians those that profess to believe in and to be Disciples of the holy Jesus who like Virgins ought to be pure and spotless innocent and modest and humble solâ— and temperate in all things pious and devout and the like And as the Want of these or any of these good Qualifications is to a Virgin the greatest Blackening and Disparagement so the Want of them in Christians is likewise the greatest Dishonour to them exposes them to the Scorn and Contempt of God and all good Men renders them unworthy of that holy Name by which they are call'd and defiles and stains those Souls which Christ purified with his precious Blood that they might be his own Peculiar zealous of good Works By half of those Virgins being wise and half foolish is represented the great Difference there is among those that go under the same general Character of Christians some vain and idle careless and unthoughtful taken up with the Gaieties and Follies of the World lavish of their Reputation and loose in their Conversation and Behaviour while others are so wise as to consider the Character they bear and live as those that make Profession of Holiness that is with Care and Circamspection Watchfulness and a diligent and attentive Piety That so they may preserve their Honour and the Dignity of their Profession inviolate and unstain'd and be presented as chaste Virgins unto Christ that divine Bridegroom whenever he shall come By the Lamps of those Virgins is expressed the Souls of Christians which are to burn with holy Fires of Love and Devotion to God and their Saviour and make them as so many Lights in this dark and benighted World for ye are the Light of the World says our Lord to his Disciples therefore let your Light so shine before Men that they may see your good Works and glorifie your Father which is in Heaven Mat. 5.14 16. That is as the Souls of Christians are illuminated by the Spirit of him who is the Father of Lights and in whom is no Darkness at all as they are warm'd by his Influences who descended upon the Apostles in the Likeness of Fire and have divine Affections by his holy Breathings inkindled in them so they should influence the whole Man and make those that name the Name of Christ like so many burning and shining Lights in the Midst of a crooked and perverse Generation so many eminent Examples of Piety and real Goodness such as by theis own Practice should recommend their most hloy Religion and set before Men's Eyes the Beauty of Holiness by their own Conversation By the Bridegroom whom these Virgins with their Lamps went forth to meet is represented our dear Saviour that heavenly King 's divine Son for whom he made so glorious a Marriage in the Parable I last discours'd of where the Reasons why the Gospel is compar'd to a Marriage and our Lord to a Bridegroom are particularly insisted on And by going forth to meet this divine Bridegroom is signifyed our preparing against his calling us from this World by Death and providing against his Advent to Judgment that is by frequently contemplating our Mortality reflecting on the Shortness and Uncertainty of Life and therefore making the best Use of our Time while we have it as not knowing how soon our Breath may be required of us and because after Death comes Judgment therefore endeavouring to make ready our Accounts by frequent Self-Examination and from the serious Consideration of the Terrors of that great Day and the severe Scrutiny into our Thoughts as well as Words and Actions that we must then undergo collecting with S. Peter 2 Pet. 3.11 what manner of Persons we ought to be in all holy Conversation and Godliness that we may be found of the great Judg in Peace and as Virgins without Spot and blameless By the Oyl in the Virgins Lamps and which they took with them in their Vessels when they went to meet the Bridegroom is represented the Graces and Vertues of Christianity which are the proper Nourishment of the Soul that Lamp of the Lord as Solomon calls it and will brighten and enliven it as Plenty of Oyl does a
Lamp and make the Way of the Just like a shining Light shining more and more unto the perfect Day and which when they fail spiritual Darkness will follow as in a Lamp gone out And if the Light that is in you be Darkness says our Lord how great is that Darkness But the Christian Vertues were very aptly represented by Oyl upon these further Accounts First Because Oyl was generally reckonen in the eastern Countries as a great Part of a Man's Riches and when they would express great Wealth they do it by magnifying the Plenty of Oyl Thus Job when he reflected in his Affliction upon his former opulent Condition the Rock or the stone Jar that was made use of to preserve Oyl in says he pour'd me out Rivers of Oyl Job 29.6 And the Prophet Micah when he represented the Impossibility of appeasing his offended God even by the most rich and costly Offering will the Lord be pleas'd says he with ten Thousand Rivers of Oyl Micah 6.7 and in Abundance of Places of Scripture the Increase of Oyl signifies the Increase of Riches And therefore to have a Soul plentifully stored with divine Graces and Vertues whereby we lay up a Treasure in Heaven and become rich towards God being the greatest and only true and durable Riches is very aptly represented by having Oyl in our Vessels and our Lamps Secondly Oyl was likewise among the Easterns a Symbol of the greatest Honours as is evident from the whole Story of the Bible where we read that at the solemn Consecration and Inauguration of Kings and Priests Oyl was always us'd and that among the Jews by the Appointment of God himself and is still in Use with us at the Coronation of our Kings And therefore very fit to represent those Christian Vertues which so highly enoble the Soul as to render it like to God holy as he is holy pure as he is pure perfect as he is perfect and whereby through the Merits of Christ we become Kings and Priests to God Rev. 1.6 and shall reign with him for ever Thirdly Oyl was an Emblem of Joy and Pleasure and much us'd therefore in Feasts and Entertainments as is evident not only from heathen Writers but from holy Scripture There we read of the Oyl of Joy and Gladness and our Lord in his Directions concerning fasting bids his Disciples not make a vain glorious Shew of it by an affected Sullenness and Down Look disfiguring their Faces as the Hypocrites did But thou when thou fastest says he anoint thy Head that thou appear not unto Men to fast i. e. make Semblance rather by this means as if thou wert going to a Feast And David when he recounts God's Goodness to him says amongst other things thou hast prepar'd a Table for me thou hast anointed my Head with Oyl and my Cup runneth over Psal 23.5 which signifies the Happiness of his Condition in general as well as his being advanc'd to the Throne of Israel Many other Places there are of this Nature but these are sufficient to shew how fitly those Christian Graces are express'd by Oyl which cause the greatest Joy and Satisfaction to a holy Soul and the Practice of which is full of Pleasure and unspeakable Delight Sincere Religion is the most chearing thing in the World and a good Conscience a continual Feast Indeed to rejoyce is only proper for a good Christian whose Mind is clear and undisturb'd and in constant Hope and Expectation of the Happiness of Heaven But he whose Mind is rack'd with a Sense of his deep Guilt and feels the Lashes of an enraged Conscience and is terrified with the unexpressible Fears of Damnation has little Reason to have Joy or Comfort in any thing Oyl therefore or the Emblem of Joy and Chearfulness is of nothing more aptly expressive than of the Graces of our holy Religion whose Ways alone are indeed Ways of Pleasantness and Joy By the Virgins all slumbering and sleeping while the Bridegroom tarry'd is signified the Inadvertency and Frailty of even the best of Men. Because this divine Bridegroom delayeth his Coming we are all of us too apt to lay aside the Thoughts of it to think but little upon Death and Judgment as things a great Way off and for which there will be Time enough to provide hereafter And for want of due Advertency to these rousing Subjects we are apt to grow heavy in our Religious Performances and suffer spiritual Drouziness to creep too much upon us This made holy David call upon God so often to quicken him in his Righteousness and St Paul to exhort his Corinthians to awake to Righteousness and thus to rouze the Ephesians awake thou that sleepest Eph. 5.14 And in this spiritual Slumber though the unavoidable Frailty of humane Nature will in Part be accepted as our Excuse by our merciful Saviour who knows and pities our Infirmities yet even the best of us indulge our selves too much and enter into the Number of the foolish Virgins and endanger the Extinction of our Lamp through the Decay of our Virtues and expose our selves to many Dangers and Temptations and frequent Falls For this Inadvertency to that great Truth that the End of all things is at hand is one great Reason why even the righteous fall seven times a Day whereas would we oftner set our Lord before us as coming to judge the quick and the dead and reflect that perhaps the next Hour our Soul may be required of us by him that gave it and so an End put for ever to our State of Probation and an irreversible Sentence soon after be pass'd upon us according to our Deservings we should not dare to be so often mov'd from our Duty but be careful and circumspect and always upon our Guard lest that Day surprize us unawares and while we drouze away our Opportunity our Lamps go out and the Bridegroom call before we are ready to enter with him into the Marriage Chamber and so the Door be shut It therefore highly concerns even the best of us not to sleep as do others but to watch and be sober having our Loins girded about and our Lights burning as our Lord expresses it and our selves like unto Men that wait for their Lord when he will return from the Wedding that when he cometh and knocketh we may open to him immediately Blessed are those Servants whom the Lord when he cometh shall find thus watching I verily I say unto you Luke 12.35 c. that he shall gird himself and make them sit down to Meat and after the Manner of Bridegrooms will come forth and serve them i. e. will impart to them the Joys and Felicities of his heavenly Kingdom And if he shall come in the second or third Watch that is in the Time most addicted to Vanity and Inadvertency as is Youth and Manhood Blessed in a more especial Manner are those Servants And what the Angel said to the Church of Sardis Rev. 3.2 is very
would have return'd again to their Dream of Vanity when this their Fright was a little over And so it is with those that think not of Repentance till Death and Judgment stare 'em in the Face they are then wondrous sorry for having offended God because they see they are like to be for ever punish'd for it with the Devil and his Angels and wish they had liv'd better and beg God to forgive 'em and promise Amendment for the Time to come But all this very seldom proceeds from Love to God or his holy Religion as appears by their being as bad as ever when God has been pleased to restore them to their former Health But such Repentance as this is but a Piece of Mockery and will not be accepted it must be a real and thorough Change of Mind express'd in an intire Reformation of Life and Manners that will incline God to pardon and forgive Notwithstanding all the Hurry of the foolish Virgins to get Oyl for their Lamps upon this suddain Notice of the Bridegroom 's coming because their Lamps were before suffer'd to go out we see the Door was shut upon them By the wise Virgins that were ready their going in with the Bridegroom to the Marriage Feast is represented the great Happiness of the sincerely good who by holy living are ready and prepar'd for their Departure hence into the World of Spirits That is as there was great Preparation made to receive the Bridegroom among the Jews and other Easterns great Joy and Festivity and which the Children of the Bride-Chamber or those that attended the Bridegroom did partake of singing Epithalamiums or nuptial Songs in Praise of the Bridegroom and his Bride and rejoycing in their Happiness and wishing them long Prosperity So the Joys of the highest Heavens which are the Marriage Chamber of this divine Bridegroom our Saviour in the Society of innumerable Saints and Angels and glorified Spirits are prepar'd for those that love our Lord Jesus in Sincerity and by a constant holy Life are ready to leave these earthly Habitations and enter with him into that holy Place Where they shall enjoy a most blisful Eternity for ever singing Halleluja's to the Praise and Honour of that glorious Name in which all the Nations of the World are blessed praising God and saying Rev. 19.7 9. Let us be glad and rejoyce and give Honour to him for the Marriage of the Lamb is come and his Wife hath made her self ready and blessed are they which are call'd to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. And well is that Care and Watchfulness and holy Preparation repay'd which will procure an Entrance into that holy Place where Christ is sitting at the right Hand of God and make us Sharers in the Joys of Angels and in the Happiness of our dear Redeemer In the last place by the foolish Virgins coming after the Door was shut and saying Lord Lord open unto us and his answering I know you not is express'd the sad and remidiless Condition of those whom Death and Judgment surprize unawares and that are not prepar'd by a holy Life They may cry Lord Lord long enough in the Bitterness and Anguish of their Souls and profess that they believe in him and are his Disciples and call'd by his Name that they have eat and drunk in his Presence and that he hath taught in their Streets and the like but yet for all this without a constant persevering Piety Christ will tell them I know you not whence you are depart from me all ye that work Iniquity And what inconceivable Agonies will those excluded Wretches then be in What Horror and Despair will then take Seisure of their Souls What Outcries what hideous Wailings will there be How will some frame fruitless Excuses Lord we have eaten and drank in thy Presence and thou hast taught in our Streets c. while others with deep Sighs in vain beg Pity and Commiseration of him who never before deny'd it What intolerable Anguish will they feel to see those whom they hated and despis'd on Earth then enter'd into the glorious Marriage Chamber of the Son of God and they themselves they who are prosperous here and to all Appearance the Friends and Favourites of the divine Bridegroom eternally shut out from his Presence and the Joys of those celestial Regions and left behind in unconceivable Torments and in the Company of malicious Fiends and Devils to linger under an Eternity of Misery No Words can ever reach those Horrors nor can our Thoughts conceive them and may none of us ever be so unhappy as to feel them But be so wise as to watch and be ready and have our Lamps burning and our selves always prepar'd for this great coming of our Lord for we know not the Day nor the Hour And thus have I given a particular plain and practical Interpretation of this Parable of the Ten Virgins whereof five were wise and five foolish and shewn as I went along how aptly expressive it is of the Sense our Lord couch'd under it I proceed now to the other thing to be done which is to urge that Watchfulness and Preparation by all manner of holy living against this coming of our Lord which is necessary to our being admitted into his Joy and to shew how great the Wisdom of so doing is and how great the Folly of the Contrary For those that were ready and trimm'd their Lamps are call'd wise Virgins in the Parable and those that were not ready and their Lamps out are call'd foolish As for the Folly of not taking Care to be ready and prepar'd against that great Change of Death shall come it is a thing justly to be wonder'd at that Men who know that one Time or other they must surely die and are wholly in the Dark as to the precise Time of their Death and that they must die but once and that without any any further Probation after Death comes Judgment it is much to be wonder'd at that those who know all this to be true as Christians are suppos'd to do should live so much at random and be so foolishly careless in managing their last Stake so heedless in doing that well which admits of no Repetition and which if done ill they are for ever miserable 'T is the very Height of Folly this and which one would think a Man of any Sense could not be guilty of There is nothing that Men are more afraid of than dying and yet so strangely contradictious are they to themselves they make the least Provision against this greatest Evil. In other Matters Men are so wise as to endeavour to secure themselves against their Fears they provide against Poverty by Diligence and Parsimony against Pain and Diseases by proper Antidotes and Preservatives against the Approach of Enemies by the best Defence they are capable of making and the like and this many times when there is only a Probability of these Evils coming upon them And yet against
Death though they dread it above all things and know that it will certainly come and are uncertain how soon they make as little Provision as if they were immortal as the Angels in Heaven what a Bundle of foolish Inconsistencies is here They look upon Death as the greatest of Evils and yet regard it the least of all things they know it highly concerns 'em to make Preparation for it by a good Life and they know the sad Consequence if it surprize 'em unawares and they are not sure they shall not be surpriz'd the next Hour or Minute and yet for all this they put the evil Day far from them and by all Arts endeavour to remove such melancholy Thoughts as if they were resolv'd not to avoid but suffer what they fear and secure to themselves the Miserie 's consequent upon an untimely and unprepar'd Death And what is this but just the same Piece of Folly and Madness as for a Man because he greatly dreads the Plague therefore to run into an infected House because he is afraid of Poverty therefore to grow prodigal and squander away what he hath And what can be more strangely foolish and contradictious than this Indeed a Sinners whole Life is the greatest Folly and Contradiction but 't is most gross and palpable with Relation to dying for because a Man loves his Body therefore so to indulge it in this World as to make it become eternally miserable in the next and live in such a Course of sinful Pleasures as will be repaid with a double Death is unaccountably foolish and against all the Dictates even of natural Reason I need not say more I think to expose the Folly of not making Preparation for so great a Change as Death will effect in every Man's Condition or in the Phrase of this Parable of not keeping Oyl in our Lamps nor watching against the divine Bridegroom's coming but slumbering in a careless Inadvertency to those great things of Religion Death and Judgment till they overtake us as a Thief in the Night And from what has been said of the Folly of not preparing for that Time of Terrors and greatest Concern to every Man we may in a few Words collect the great Wisdom of being always in a Readiness to obey the Summons of our great Lord with Chearfulness For in short to be ready and prepar'd to die when God shall please to call us has all the Wisdom in it of making a constant due Provision against the greatest and most concerning Change that can befall us and which we must certainly undergo and how soon we know not and that but once neither and which will be follow'd by the final Judgment without any new Opportunity being afforded wherein to amend the Errors of our then irrecoverably past Life 'T is to make such a Preparation for this great Change as may render it advantageous to us whenever it shall come than which no greater Piece of Wisdom can be imagin'd For that certainly is the greatest Wisdom that makes a Man wise to Salvation Wherefore to conclude this Parable Since it is appointed to Men once to dye and after that the Judgment or in the Stile of this Parable since Jesus the divine Bridegroom will one time come to summon every particular Member of the Christian Church his mystical Spouse to leave this World and attend him in the World of Spirits there to partake with him if ready and adorn'd with the Wedding Garment and their Lamps burning with the Oyl of Righteousness of the everlasting Felicities of this heavenly Kingdom or else if not prepar'd to appear before him then to be for ever excluded his Presence and thrust into the dire Abodes of the Devil and his Angels Since this is so let us all make it our sincere Endeavour by a serious and hearty Observation of those holy Rules of living which our Lord has mark'd out to us as the Way to Immortality and a Preparation for his Appearance to be always ready to go out and meet him that we may enter with him into the Marriage Chamber before the Door be shut and not hear that dismal Sound I know ye not depart from me ye Workers of Iniqutity And because this great Coming of the Bridegroom will be but once for 't is appointed to Men but once to dye and after that but one final Judgment let us by no means trifle away this only Opportunity of working out our Salvation in Folly and Impertinency much less in Wickedness and Vice but often reflect upon the Agonies we shall feel when we shall find this one only Life which we have so wretchedly mispent drawing to a Conclusion and no Hopes of any further Opportunity to recover our selves in but just as we then are in that deplorable unprepar'd Condition be hurried away to give Account of our Works Lord What Confusion must such wretches feel what horrid Tortures must needs pierce their Souls to see Hell gaping to receive 'em and no Possibility of Escape or so much as a Reprieve but plunge they must into those Lakes of Fire and Brimstone which yet they might have avoided if they would If this be a Case infinitely deplorable and if this be not certainly nothing is then it nearly concerns us all while we have Time that is while this one only Life does last to make Provision for a happy Departure out of it by a more holy and circumspect Conversation in it And because the Time when this one only Life shall end is wholly in the Dark to us and we know not the Day nor the Hour when our Lord will come let this awaken us into serious Thoughts and Resolutions of making the best Use of the remaining Portion of our Lives and break off immediately our sinful Course of living lest the Opportunity for so doing be gone before we think of it and we be surpriz'd into endless Misery e're we are aware Let us always keep our Lamps burning our Souls employ'd in holy Meditations and our selves in a Readiness by a good Life and then though it is appointed for us all to die and that but once and after that the Judgment and we know not the Day nor the Hour when the Summons shall be given We may with Comfort wait for our dear Lord's appearing and say Come Lord Jesus come quickly The PRAYER I. O Glorious Jesus The Saviour and the Judg of Mankind before whose just Tribunal we must all certainly appear but when we know not and there give Account of our Works and be rewarded according to them assist me I beseech thee with thy Grace that I may make it my chief Care with Cheerfulness and Comfort to obey thy Summons to this great Audit whenever thou shalt call And to that End grant I may be frequent in the Contemplation of my Mortality how short and frail my Life is here how inevitably and closely Judgment follows Death and how certainly the one will find me as the other leaves
me Thou holy Jesus though a stern Judg to obstinate Rebels to thy Father art yet the Bridegroom of thy Spouse the Church and infinite is thy Love to those that preserve inviolate their Fidelity to thee and happy will they be beyond Expression who at thy glorious coming to receive thy Bride into thy Kingdom shall be admitted into thy Marriage Chamber and be for ever where thou art and behold and partake of thy Glory O may I therefore like a wise Virgin preserve my Innocence untouch'd be cloath'd with Humility and adorn'd with a meek and quiet Spirit and sober and temperate in all things having my Lamp full of Oyl my Soul replenish'd with Vertue and constantly burning with the Fires of Piety and Devotion that so when the Cry shall be made Behold the Bridegroom cometh go ye forth to meet him I may be ready to obey thy Call though it be made at Midnight and be found of thee our dearest Lord as a Virgin in Peace without Spot and blameless II. I must confess with Shame and Sorrow O merciful Jesus that I am too prone to slumber and sleep and forget to advert as I ought to this thy glorious Second Advent and the Forerunner of it Death and am apt foolishly to put that Day far from me and to think thou delayest thy coming whereby my Oyl is wasted and my Lamp almost gone out O do thou therefore quicken me in thy Righteousness blessed Redeemer and grant that the Consideration of the surprizing Suddainness of thy Appearance upon the Throne of Judgment and the great Uncertainty of the Time when I shall be call'd from hence and bound over to that great Assize there to give Account of my Works and how I liv'd and how I dy'd Grant that this Consideration may put an End to my spiritual Drouziness and engage me in Prayer and Watchfulness and pious sober Conversation because I know not the Day nor the Hour And when by the Decays of Age or Violence of Diseases my Departure into the World of Spirits seems to be near approaching O then enable me with thy prevailing Grace to trim my Lamp with an extraordinary Diligence to enliven my Religion and not be to seek for Oyl then when my Lamp should be best replenish'd with it and burn most vigorously O let me never trust to the great Uncertainty of a Death-Bed Repentance nor vainly depend upon the redundant Merit of others except that of my Saviour which is my only Hope but now in Time of Health provide for a happy Death lest my Lamp being out when thou shalt call me to attend thee Amazement and Horror seize me and the Door be shut upon me And well will my wakeful Preparation be rewarded dearest Jesus when I shall be admitted into thy glorious Presence and enjoy the endless Blisses of thy heavenly Bride-Chamber O therefore grant me thy Grace not to sleep as do others but to watch and be sober and so much the more as I see that Day approaching Amen Blessed Saviour Amen Amen PARABLE VII Of the good Samaritan Luke x. 30 31 32 33 34 35. A certain Man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among Thieves which stripped him of his Rayment and wounded him and departed leaving him half dead And by chance there came down a certain Priest that Way and when he saw him he passed by on the other Side And likewise a Levite when he was at the Place came and look'd on him and passed by on the other Side But a certain Samaritan as he journyed came where he was And when he saw him he had Compassion on him And went to him and bound up his Wounds pouring in Oyl and Wine and set him on his own Beast and brought him to an Inn and took Care of him And on the morrow when he departed he took out Two Pence and gave them to the Host and said unto him take care of him and whatsoever thou spendest more when I come again I will repay thee THIS Parable was spoken upon occasion of a Lawyer 's asking our Lord What he should do to inherit eternal Life Who upon Christ's referring him to his own Law and his Repetition of the two great Commandments of loving God with all our Hearts and our Neighbours as our selves and Christ's returning to him this do and thou shalt live being willing to justifie himself as an Observer of all this ask'd this further Question and who is my Neighbour That so knowing our Saviour's Sense in that Particular he might the better make it appear to him that he not only lov'd God with all his Heart which he thought he could safely affirm but likewise his Neighbour as himself and therefore stood fair for eternal Life To this latter Question Jesus answer'd by the Parable above recited and then ask'd the conceited Lawyer Which now of these Three thinkest thou was Neighbour to him that fell among the Thieves the Priest and Levite that were his Country-Men Children of the same Abraham who yet took no charitable Notice of him but passed by on the other Side or the Samaritan who though a schismatical Stranger to the Common Wealth of Israel and an Enemy to every Jew yet had Compassion on him and reliev'd and succour'd him with Charity suitable to his Distress To this the Lawyer answer'd as he could not choose but do he was his Neighbour that shew'd Mercy on him Then said Jesus immediately to him Go and do thou likewise Which Words struck home upon his Conscience that they put a Stop to his intended Justification of himself and we hear of no further Intercourse he had with our Lord and may imagine how he sneak'd away asham'd and confounded The Design therefore of this Parable is to give us a true Notion of Charity or Compassion and Relief of such as are in Distress and that both with Respect to the Object of it and the Manner and Measure of expressing it to such Object And therefore in discoursing upon this Parable I shall do three things First I shall shew who are the proper Objects of this Sort of Charity according to the true Sense and Meaning of our holy Religion Secondly How we are obliged to relieve them in what Manner and in what Measure Thirdly What great Encouragement we have to this excellent Duty with respect both to this World and that above or what a Blessedness it is to be able thus to give rather than receive First As for the proper Objects of this Charity they are in general the really Indigent and Calamitous and such as are unable to help themselves And that without excepting any whether they be Strangers and Foreigners or Enemies or Heathens or Hereticks or wicked Persons All that are indeed necessitous and helpless are made by our holy and most merciful Religion the Objects of our Compassion and Relief Thus the Apostle As we have Opportunity let us do good unto all Men Gal. 6.10 and our Lord Do good to
them that hate you Mat. 5.44 and Rom. 12.20 If thy Enemy hunger feed him if he thirst give him Drink and in this Parable our Lord proposes to our Imitation the Example of a Samaritan taking great Care of an unfortunate Jew though there could be no greater Enmity than between the Jews and the Samaritans and that grounded upon what of all things makes Ill Will the most inveterate Diversity of Opinion in Religion And indeed 't would be a barbarous Piece of Cruelty and Inhumanity if I should let a Man perish without any Commiseration or Help from me when I am able to give it him because he has formerly it may be been unkind or injurious to me or is of a different Religion and of a Nation that is in Hostility with that to which I belong This certainly is not doing as I would be done to nor loving my Neighbour as my self for every Man in a religious Sense is my Neighbour 't is more like the Rage of a Tiger than the Bowels of a Man or the Malice of a Devil than the Charity of a Christian As for Charity to Strangers and Foreigners that is expresly commanded in several Places of Scripture particularly 1 Pet. 4.9 where what we translate use Hospitality one to another is in the Original 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Be kind to Strangers Hob. 13.2 and by the Author to the Hebrews the Probability of receiving Angels unawares in that Disguise as Abraham and Lot did Gen. 18.3 and 19.2 is made the Motive to it And how excellent a Piece of Charity this is and how conducive to the Prevention of much Sin and Misery I need not spend much Time to prove There are few that have liv'd any considerable Time in the World and have seen more Parts of it than one but have some Time or other either tasted the Comfort of an hospitable Disposition or smarted for the Want of it and such Men are the fittest to tell their Thoughts of either That is how inhumane 't is to be without Bowels to an indigent Stranger and how happy Mankind would be in every Place were the Orders of the great Governour of the World duly observ'd in this Matter And as for wicked-Persons who deserve the least Compassion of any if they are in other Respects real Objects of Charity their Wickedness must not put a Bar to it for we are to imitate the Example of the merciful God who is kind and Beneficent to the unthankful and to the evil But all this is to be understood with Respect only to the really necessitous and helpless whose Wants and Calamities are not feign'd and who are unable to help themselves to better Circumstances For there are a very vile Sort of People who make a Trade of going about from House to House and with doleful Accents and a forlorn Appearance and formal Complaints endeavour to melt People into Compassion towards them who yet are far from being Objects of this Sort of Charity their Necessities being counterfeit or at least they being very well able to supply them by their own Labour if they would 'T is well known how gainful they make this lazy Course of Life how unwilling they are to work when any would employ them how much abominable Debauchery there is in those vagrant Societies and how great a Pest they are to the Publick they being no better than a Band of Villains and Robbers and unprofitable idle Drones that live upon the Labour and Spoil of others and are no Way useful or serviceable themselves And therefore to relieve their pretended Necessities is to encourage the worst Men living in a Course of Life highly dishonourable to God injurious to the State and ruinous to their own Souls Nay further 't is to deprive those that indeed deserve our Charity of considerable Supplies which are though insensibly bestow'd upon those vile Wretches and were it computed what some charitable Persons give in a Year in Mony to common Beggars at their Doors or otherwise 't would amount to a Sum big enough to cheer the Hearts of many Fatherless and Widows and decay'd Houskeepers that are in greater Want than those Vagrants though not so whining and so affectedly nasty and ragged And 't would be worth while for a Person that has us'd hitherto to scatter his Charity among those counterfeit Objects of it to try the Experiment what such Gifts would amount to in a Twelve Month's Time by laying aside what he would otherwise have bestow'd that Way whenever he is importun'd by such Wretches for an Alms and then see whether he can't dispose of it to better Purpose Indeed Labour and Correction is the best Sort of Charity to such Kind of Beggars And would Men in Authority resolve to do their Duty in this Matter and other Persons resolve to send such Vagabonds away empty and with Reproof and Shame the Case would soon be altered and they would find it better to work than starve and look upon honest Industry more eligible than the Lash Much Wickedness would by this Means be prevented and it would be a double and treble Charity 't would provide for the Happiness of both Body and Soul of such as should be reformed by it from such a hellish Course of Life 't would be a great Benefit to the Publick and Men would find themselves more able to support such as are really oppress'd with Want and utterly unable to help themselves And such Behaviours as this to sturdy Vagrants however harsh and severe it may seem to some indiscreetly compassionate Persons is plainly commanded by the great Apostle 2 Thes 3.10 He that will not work neither let him eat He that Will not work that is that appears to be able to labour but rather chuses an idle wandring Life and there is not One in Twenty of our common Beggars but are of this Sort hail and lusty and strong and in more Heart and better fed than many honest and industrious People And they that can travel as they do around the Kingdom we can't suppose whatever they may pretend to be incapable of Labour Indeed sometimes a real Object of Charity may present it self at ones Door or Abroad such as the blind and aged and maimed and the like and these no Question ought to be reliev'd but there being so many Counterfeits and the ill Consequence of misplacing ones charity upon them being so very great He is very indiscreet in bestowing his Alms that will not be first very well satisfied whether they are what they pretend to be and deserve his Charity or no. But this Severity must be used with Prudence and he that does deserve Correction as a Vagrant may yet by some calamitous Accident in following his lew'd Trade be at present in urgent Necessity of Relief and here the Way is first to supply the Necessity and afterwards in due Time to superadd the Correction For I must let no Man how wicked soever perish if I can prevent
of the Wealthy over the Poor would then consist chiefly in this That they are by God's Providence enabled to be the Supporters of the weak it being according to the Words of the Lord Jesus Acts 20.35 more blessed to give than to receive Especially if we in the Next Place consider the Measure of this Charity And in general it must be equal to the Necessities of the Poor or at least agreeable to every Man's Ability A great Necessity must have a great Supply as suppose a whole Family be in want the Relief ought to be greater than to a single Person If a Forreigner is distress'd and has not wherewithal to carry him to his own Country he should be more plentifully reliev'd than a Traveller that is in his Native Country and has comparatively but a little Way to go He that is a Prisoner or Captive for a great Debt or Ransom should receive more liberally of our Charity than one that may be releas'd for less the Necessities of a poor Man that is sick being doubly great the Relief that is given him should bear Proportion and be more liberal than ordinary And the more dangerous and lasting and consequently chargeable the Sickness is the Charity should rise the higher still and greater Care be had of him and Visits oftner made to him He that is utterly helpless and uncapable of working ought to receive more largely of our Charity than one that is in some Measure able to help and provide for himself In these and all other Cases of this Nature he that has the greatest need must have the greatest Supply and he that has the greatest Ability his Charity must be answerable and he must give most But to prevent all unnecessary Scruples in this Matter we should remember that Charity does not consist in an Indivisible Point less than which shall not be accepted for a Mite given with a free Heart and good Intention by a poor Widow that could afford no more was not only accepted but the Charity highly commended by our Lord himself and no doubt but was crown'd with a great Reward The general Rule in this Case is that of the Apostle 1 Pet. 4.11 As every Man has receiv'd the Gift even so minister the same one to another as good Stewards of the manifold Grace of God That is every Man's Charity must be proportionable to his Ability he that has much must give plenteously and he that has little must chearfully give of that little and no Man that has any Share in this World 's Good must wholly shut up his Bowels of Compassion from his Brother that hath need Remembring That he that soweth sparingly 2 Cor. 9.6 shall reap sparingly and he that soweth plenteously shall reap also plenteously So that according to the Order of our good Creator we see Riches are like our Blood to circulate and ought to be convey'd in due Proportions to every Part of the great Body of Mankind The greater Channels are to supply the lesser and the fuller they are the more they must communicate And none must presume upon Pain of the worst of ill Consequences to stop this Course or divert it to unprofitable Uses When our own Needs and those of our Relatives are modestly and reasonably satisfied and provided for all the rest God gives us to bestow upon the poor and needy 't is their Inheritance and we shall be unjust in our Stewardship if we with-hold it from them And in the Words of the excellent Bishop Taylor Certainly there is not any greater Baseness than to suffer a Man to perish or be in extreme want of that which God gave me for him and beyond my own Needs And it must ever be remembred That as Men's Estates increase their Charity must in due Proportion increase likewise it must not lie an useless Lump in a Chest or be improv'd only to increase the Hoard or minister to Luxury and Excess or the Extravagancies of a prodigal Heir but this Blessing of God must be distributed according to the Will of God to sweeten and alleviate the Miseries of Man And now would Men but act according to this their Duty what abundant Supply would there be for the Necessities of every one That of Isaiah 49.9 10. would then be literally fulfill'd Say to the Prisoners Go forth to them that are in Darkness shew your selves they shall feed in the Ways their Pastures shall be in all high Places They shall not hunger nor thirst neither shall the Heat nor Sun smite them for he that hath Mercy on them shall lead them even by the Springs of Waters shall he guide them How many bitter Complaints how many Sighs and Tears how much Misery and how much Sin would by such Charity be prevented How many more might most Men relieve than they do How very many might a Man of a large Estate take care of and what vast Numbers of poor might have a very comfortable Subsistence if all such Men would conscientiously perform their Duty in this Matter And with what Ease might this be done too That which is every Day squander'd away to no Purpose or consum'd in Vice and Vanity could it be computed would amount to a prodigious Sum and were but so much bestow'd in Charity by every rich Man as heedlesly and unaccountably slips from him how many would enjoy a comfortable Maintenance who now want Necessaries and are ready to be starv'd and all the while the rich Man be not discernably the poorer for it And if so little when rightly dispos'd of would go so far in this blessed Work what happy Effects should we soon see if Men of large Possessions would be perswaded to obey their great Benefactor and give largely of their Abundance And in order to this they would do well to remember that Riches are not properly and intirely Men's own but Talents committed to them by God to improve and lay out to his Glory That 't is he that is the great Lord and Proprietor of all and Men how opulent soever no other than his Stewards inrich'd on purpose that they may supply those that have need and take care that none in this great Family of the World perish for want of what is needful for their Support And that of the Discharge of this their Steward-ship they must render an Account at the Day of Judgment the general Audit of all Mankind and then the faithful and good Stewards that have fulfill'd their Lord's Command and gave the poor of this great Family their Portion of Meat in due Season shall be receiv'd into their Master's Joy But the unfaithful and wicked Stewards that were cruel and hard-hearted to their fellow-Servants and only feasted and pamper'd themselves grew excessive and luxurious with their Lord's Allowance and did eat and drink with the Drunken their Lord will come in a Day when they look not for him Luk. 12.42 and cut them asunder and appoint them their Portion with Unbelievers
where shall be weeping and gnashing of Teeth And thus much may suffice to be spoken to the second Enquiry How we are to express our Charity to the proper Objects of it in what Manner and in what Measure But before I proceed to what remains to be done according to the propos'd Method I think it will not be amiss to enquire whether in the Expresses of our Charity to the sick Danger of infection will not excuse from visiting them To this I answer first in general that Danger of Infection will not excuse all from visiting the sick For 't would be strangely inhumane and contrary to this Christian Pity and Compassion which we are now discoursing of to desert a poor helpless Creature in his greatest Necessity only because there is a Probability of falling into the like Calamity And would any Man be willing to be serv'd so himself Some then ought even in Case of Contagion to visit and attend the sick but who are they for every one will be ready to shift it from himself In the first place I think the nearest Relations of the Party ought to do it for they have a double Tye upon them that of Nature as well as of Religion and among these Relations those that are the most disengag'd from Business and the Affairs of this World and have therefore the least Obligation to come into other Company where there may be Danger of spreading the Infection further and likewise such as have the fewest Dependents upon them That is Private and single Persons are oblig'd to this Duty before those that are of more publick Callings and have Families and among these he that is most free and disengag'd and capable withal is the most oblig'd If there be no Relations of the infected Person whether he be Poor or Rich Friend or Enemy Good or Bad the Case is the same or none that will venture upon such hazardous Attendance I think the nearest Neighbours are oblig'd to do it i.e. the single and disengag'd from a Necessity of publick Converse For those that have Wife and Children and Families their Charity must begin at home to take care of their own Relatives is the prime Obligation and the Safety of a whole Family is in most Cases to be preferr'd to that of a single Person And those whose necessary Employments call them into much Company are bound to avoid what would endanger their bringing Infection to that Company and that for the same Reason as before because the Safety of many is generally to be preferr'd to that of one And those upon whose Life depends under God the Maintenance and Support of divers Persons for the sake of those Persons should be very careful to preserve themselves Only this ought to be observ'd by such as upon these and the like Accounts cannot personally visit and attend the infected Person viz. That they take great care to procure others that may do it and according to their Ability and the Wants of the Person to send Supplies of all things necessary And there are very many who though they will not venture their Lives for Conscience sake and to gain the Reward of being merciful in the other World yet for Mony they will do it and therefore such Encouragements must not be wanting from those that are of Ability As for Physicians and Clergy-Men whose Professions engage them to converse with great Numbers of People how far they are oblig'd in this Matter I think may be resolv'd thus If only one Person in a Parish or Neighbourhood or but a few in comparison with the whole Body of Men be contagiously sick to me it seems that neither Physician nor Divine are in such case oblig'd personally to visit them but rather to forbear and only to convey to them by other Hands what is needful for their Bodily and Ghostly Health respectively The Reason is because the Physicians and Divines being often sent for to divers Families must either not go after they have visited an infected Person and so neglect their Duty and many suffer and some perish for want of their Assistance or if they should go would very probably endanger the whole Neighbourhood And therefore the Safety of great Numbers of People being to be preferr'd before that of one or but a few they ought I think in this Case to keep at distance But when a Contagion spreads so that it becomes epidemical and the greater Number of Persons are seiz'd with it then the Case is alter'd and then I think both Physicians and Divines are bound to visit personally For in such Case to send Relief by other Hands whether Medicines or ghostly Comfort and Advice would by reason of the Numbers of the sick become impracticable and 't would be unreasonable for the sake of a few that were well to deprive a greater Number that are sick of the great Benefit of personal Visits of Physicians which for many Reasons prove more effectual than prescribing at a Distance and of the Comfort of the Prayers and more close and particular Discourses of Divines which no doubt are much more beneficial and make a deeper Impression upon the Soul than several Advices and Exhortations sent in Writing And Divines in this Case seem to be more oblig'd than Physicians though the Obligation is very strong upon Physicians too and that because the Safety of the Soul is infinitely to be preferr'd before that of the Body And if it perishes it perishes for ever and will at length involve the Body too in the same eternal Ruin And for a Shepherd to desert his Flock in their greatest Necessity to leave the Care of their Souls when there is the greatest Need of his Help and the infernal Lyon roaring about seeking whom he may devour This I think is the greatest Barbarity and most base betraying that great Trust that is possible The good Shepherd says our Lord giveth his Life for his Sheep And he the great Shepherd and Bishop of our Souls set the Example but the Hireling fleeth because he is a Hireling and careth not for the Sheep and the Wolf catcheth and scatters and devours them John 10.12 13. We should remember that God is infinitely powerful and can protect even from the noisom Pestilence if he thinks fit and nothing more intitles a Man to the peculiar Protection of the Allmighty than a faithful Discharge of his Duty And however it may fare with us here there is a glorious Recompence reserved for so great a Charity in a better World Proceed we now to the third and last thing to be done upon this Subject which is to shew what great Encouragement we have to this excellent Duty of Charity or what a Blessedness it is to be able thus to give rather than to Receive and that both with Respect to this World and that to come For in the first place with Relation to this World What can be a greater Pleasure to a Generous Spirit than to be the Happy
would they have Men forcibly with-held from being guilty of such Vices as ruin Thousands such as Pride and Luxury and Wantonness and Excess Or if as well they may they think this too unreasonable to be desir'd would they have God when Men are thus reduc'd to Poverty immediately work Miracles for their Relief Would they have Ravens bring Food to the Hungry as they did to Elijah 1 Kings 17.6 or would they have every Poor Widows Cruise of Oyl and Barrel of Meal be as lasting as the Widow 's of Sarepta was 16. or would they have Water spring from Rocks and be immediately turn'd into Wine to chear and refresh such as are parch'd with Thirst Would they have our Lord come down a second Time from Heaven to heal Diseases or an Angel always set open the Prison Doors when good Men are confined and macerated or the like That such extraordinary things have been sometimes done is sufficient to evince that God is not an idle Spectator of Humane Affairs but to expect it should be always so is foolishly presumptuous But it may be those that are asham'd of this would yet by all means have God take a severer Course with his unfaithful Stewards than he does and at least displace them and give their Riches to others that Men might see and fear and do no more wickedly Thus Man will be replying against God and the Clay saying to the Potter Why hast thou made me thus But I would fain know whether these Counsellours of the All-wise God would have all that are unfaithful in their Stewardship us'd in this Manner or only some for a Terrour to the rest If all the World would quickly be in Confusion by such frequent Changes in States and Governments and Private Families as would then be made if some only in Terrorem and to affright the rest into a more Conscientious Discharge of their Duty why that is often done nothing is more common than the Rise and Fall of Men and Families and sometimes their Decay is made very remarkable by some extraordinary Accidents Which if Men would observe it is warning enough to them to be faithful in their Stewardship but if they will be thoughtless and regard it not the Blame ought to be their's not God's and their's will be the Punishment too at the long Run when he shall call every Man before him to make up his Accounts Wherefore let no Man any more for the future pass Impious and Rash Censures upon the All-wise and Good Governour of the Universe because his Servants neglect their Duty in this Matter but rather humbly and earnestly intreat him to incline their Hearts to a better Observance of his Holy and Just and Merciful Commands And if the Poor shall still go unpitied and unreliev'd let us commit their Cause unto him who if with Patience they persevere in well-doing will at length abundantly recompence their Sufferings here with Glory Honour and Immortality in the Kingdom of Heaven Secondly From what has been said I infer the great Baseness and Ingratitude of those who thus wickedly betray their Trust and thereby bring such Odious Aspersions upon their great Benefactor and so much Sin and Misery upon Mankind Good God! That ever Men should be so low sunk so vilely brutish and degenerate as to prefer a Shining Coach and Gay Livery 's and Vanity and profuse Folly in many other Instances before the Honour of their God and the Comfort and Reward of a Poor Afflicted Christian That they should be contented to hear the Groans of the Distressed and the Blasphemies of Atheists against that God who gave them all they have rather than by retrenching any thing from their Excessive Way of Living to silence either 'T is a Monstrous Complicated Impiety this and will at last pull down a Heavy Vengeance Wherefore from the whole I infer in the last place how highly it concerns us all to imitate the Example of the discreetly and thoroughly charitabe Samaritan in the Parable and be more careful of this our Duty for the future For if we prove ill Stewards of the Talents God has committed to our Trust for the Relief of the Calamities of our Brethren we shall not only have the Sins of Unfaithfulness and base Ingratitude to answer for but the Prophane Flouts and Cavils of the Atheistical the Curses and Imprecations of the desperately Miserable the Thefts and Murthers and other Villanies of such whose Unrelieved Poverty forced to be thus wicked and the Blood of such as dy'd for want of Succour All this will be charg'd upon us and overwhelm us with Eternal Horrour and Confusion Wherefore to conclude while we have Time let us do good unto all Men but especially to those of the Houshold of Faith let us make Friends with the Mammon of Unrighteousness that when all this World 's Good shall fail us we may be receiv'd into Everlasting Habitations Let us lay up for our selves a good Foundation against the Time to come and be Faithful Stewards of the manifold Grace of God committed to us lest our great Lord should come in a Time when we think not of him and place us on the Left Hand and pass this Dismal and Irreversible Sentence upon us Depart from me ye cursed into Everlasting Fire prepar'd for the Devil and his Angels For I was Hungry and ye gave me no Meat Thirsty and ye gave me no Drink a Stranger and ye took me not in Naked and ye cloathed me not Sick and in Prison and ye visited me not From which terrible Condemnation and that hardned Disposition that deserves it and will inevitably bring it down upon us if not speedily amended the Merciful and Good Lord deliver us all for the Sake of his Compassion in Jesus Christ our Saviour Amen Amen The PRAYER O Most Compassionate Jesus The great Pattern of Charity who in the Days of thy Flesh wentest about doing Good to Mankind relieving the Necessities both of Body and Soul and hast commanded thy Disciples to go and do likewise give me the Grace I beseech thee according to my Ability to be charitable to all that are really Necessitous without excepting any but always to guide these good Works with Discretion Lest by my ill-plac'd Alms I encourage Debauchery and Sloth and have the less to give to those that truly want And since the Poverty and Sickness of the Soul is of all the most dangerous and deplorable O that I may be so happy as by Fraternal Correption and Seasonable wholsom Counsel and Advice according to my Opportunities and Capacity to relieve the Spiritual Necessities of my Brethren and convert a Sinner from the Errour of his Way and save a Soul from Death And may I always chearfully perform this Godlike Duty and take Delight in being Instrumental in the Blessed Work of chearing the Hearts of the Distressed and making light the Burthens of the Afflicted and thereby vindicating thy Providence from the Vile Aspersions of
of our selves but our Sufficiency is of God and Phil. 2.13 't is God that worketh in us to will and to do of his good Pleasure and accordingly says John the Baptist speaking of our Lord of his Fulness have we all receiv'd and Grace for Grace John 1.16 and Ephes 4.7 To every one of us is given Grace according to the Measure of the Gift of Christ Which Scriptures put together make this Argument God is desirous of the Happiness and Salvation of every Man 2 Pet. 3.9 1 Tim. 2.4 2 Cor. 3.5 Phil. 2.13 but without his Assistance and the Aids of his Grace and Holy Spirit no Man can arrive at that Happiness Therefore Joh. 1.16 Ephes 4.7 he gives sufficient Grace and Assistance to every Man wherewith if he be not Idle and Wanting to himself he may work out his Salvation For we can't but allow that what God desires for every Man and which no Man can attain without his Aid and Assistance he will give every Man sufficient Assistance with his own Industrious Concurrence to compass Otherwise he would desire that for some i. e. those to whom he should deny his Divine Assistance which he knows 't is impossible for them to attain to which I think can't be consistent with his Infinite Wisdom This seems to me to be sufficient Scripture Proof for this Position And to this I shall add this one Plain Reason For because the Commands of Religion in order to the attaining the Rewards of it are given in General to every Man and there is no Exception made but every one that names the Name of Christ must depart from all Iniquity therefore every Man must be suppos'd able to keep and observe those Commands unless we will be so Blasphemous as to say with the Unprofitable Servant in the Parable that God is so unreasonable as to reap where he did not sow to command Impossibilities and then so unjust and cruel as to punish Men Eternally for not obeying them But now that no Man is of himself able to keep the Commandments is evident from the whole Tenor of Scripture and from the sad Experience of even the Best of Men and consequently this Ability must be allow'd to proceed from the Aid of some other namely from him who is the only Giver of every good and perfect Gift and who giveth to every Man liberally and upbraideth not Indeed he giveth to every Man severally as he pleases to some more to some less to some five Talents to some two and to others but one according to Men's Ability to improve them and as in his Infinite Wisdom he sees most conducive to his own Glory and the Edification of the Church but he is wholly wanting in this Divine Gift to no Man that is capable of improving it but bestows upon every sensible Christian Grace sufficient wherewith if he makes good Use of it to work out his Salvation And this should have this fourfold good Effect upon us It should make us unfeignedly thankful to the Infinite Goodness of God for this his unspeakable Gift looking upon the Grace he hath bestow'd on us as an Earnest of our Salvation It should put us upon begging devoutly and earnestly and frequently at the Throne of Grace for still greater Degrees of this Heavenly Aid in order to his greater Glory and our more perfect Happiness remembring that this is of all the greatest Treasure and what a Frail Sinful Creature should above all things hunger and thirst after For though every Man at first receives as much Grace as he is able to improve yet he that has improv'd what he at first receiv'd is by that his Diligence grown capable of more and able to make a suitable Improvement As he in the Parable that had improv'd his Five Talents to Ten was capable of Receiving and Improving still more and accordingly had his Talent given to him who buried it in the Ground and brought it without any Improvement to his Lord. Five Talents was at first proportionable to his Ability but by duely improving them his Ability was much enlarg'd and he became capable of and received more And to God should all the Praise be given of all the good Things we perform by means of this his Divine Assistance reflecting upon the Words of St. Paul 1 Cor. 4.7 Who maketh thee to differ and what hast thou that thou didst not receive And finally because to all of us is given Grace sufficient to our Happiness therefore to work out our Salvation with it in fear and trembling lest by our Negligence and Sloth we fail of this Grace of God and it be withdrawn and taken from us For in the second Place God expects that every Man should improve the Grace he hath receiv'd and that proportionably to the measure in which he has receiv'd it and make use of it to the Ends for which it was bestow'd upon him For thus we see in the Parable how angry the Lord was when his Servant brought him the Talent he committed to him unimprov'd he calls him slothful and wicked Servant and deprives him of his Talent and gives it for an Encouragement to him that had made the greatest Improvement and sentences the Unprofitable Servant to outer Darkness where is weeping and gnashing of Teeth And agreeably says St. Paul 1 Cor. 12.7 The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every one to profit withal Christianity is not an idle lazy Profession does not consist in fine Words and specious Pretences but in an active lively Piety suitable to every Man 's several Ability He that has received much Grace must be eminent for much Holiness his Piety must arise proportionably to the Communications of the Holy Spirit which he enjoys and his Diligence be commensurate to his Strength He that has received five Talents must gain other five with them and he that has receiv'd two other two and no Man must be without some Increase though he has receiv'd but One. The End for which God bestows his Grace upon us is threefold 1 For the Advancement of his own Glory 2 For the Good and Edification of the Church 3 For our own Happiness and Salvation And therefore the more Grace and Assistances from Above a Man has receiv'd the more should he endeavour to glorifie God with it to edifie the Church and by a holy Life to secure his own Salvation And he that either makes no use of the Grace that God hath given him like him in the Parable who instead of trading with his Talent hid it in the Earth or else abuses it to vile and wicked Purposes is a wicked and unprofitable Servant and shall be cast into outer Darkness To know when a Man has receiv'd plenty of this Divine Grace and to what Improvement he is consequently oblig'd is for him in the first place to reflect upon his natural Parts and Abilities upon his Capacity for understanding and considering the great Truths of Religion and then
what Instruction he hath met with in the School of Righteousness what plenty of Religious Discourses and Exhortations he has enjoy'd and how frequently he has felt Motions from within to a still more and more holy and exemplary Life He that hath experienc'd all this in a great degree that hath had his pregnant natural Capacity well cultivated by an early and excellent Instruction and had the whole of Religion plainly laid before him in all the Doctrines Duties Rewards and Punishments of it and been often and affectionately exhorted to live accordingly in all holy Conversation and Godliness and has frequently felt secret internal Motions and Perswasions to it this Man has received much more than One Talent at the hands of God and God will expect from him a proportionable Improvement and he must abound in every good Word and Work For unto whomsoever much is given of him shall be much requir'd and to whom Men have committed much of him they will ask the more But because all Men are not of equal Abilities naturally neither have the same Opportunities of Instruction and Improvement nor the same immediate Impulses of the Blessed Spirit where there is any defect in these Respects God will abate proportionably in his Expectations and he that received the One Talent had he gained but One other with it would have been call'd a good and faithful Servant and been receiv'd into the Joy of his Lord. Let us all therefore endeavour to grow in Grace according to the measure of this unspeakable Gift to perform our Duties each in his Station and according to his Ability faithfully and industriously that when our Lord comes to make Enquiry into each ones Improvement of his Talent and call for every ones particular Account we may all from the least to the greatest chearfully give it up and receive the immense Reward of a sincere Diligence For In the third Place There will most certainly be a Time when our Great Lord will come to take Account of every Man's Improvement of the Grace that was given him and reward every Man according to his Deserving That there will certainly be a Day of Judgment both of Quick and Dead when every Man shall be rewarded according to that he hath done in the Body whether it be good or evil is a Truth so evident from Scripture that those who have read and do believe those Writings can make no doubt of it And the Proof of this from Reason has been so convincingly manag'd by several Learned Pens particularly of late by Dr. Sherlock in his Excellent Discourse upon Judgment that I think nothing can be added to it I shall only therefore Collect such a Description of that Great Day and the Proceedings in it out of the Revelations where it is the most movingly represented as may incline us all with the greatest Diligence and immediately by self-Examination and Amendment of every evil Way to prepare for that great Audit that we may give up our Accounts with joy and not with grief In the 20th Chapter of the Revelations ver 12. after the divine Apostle had given a Description of the Appearing of the great Judge upon his Throne I saw a great White Throne says he and him that sat on it from whose face the Earth and the Heaven fled away and there was found no place for them He proceeds I saw the dead small and great stand before God and the Books were opened And another Book was opened which is the Book of Life and the dead were judged out of those Things that were written in the Books according to their Works and the Sea gave up the dead that were in it and Death and the Grave deliver'd up the dead which were in them and they were judged every man according to their Works And whosoever was not written in the Book of Life was cast into the Lake of Fire That is The Records shall then be laid open wherein every Man's Receipt of Grace is enter'd and those whose Works shall be found proportionably good according to the Assistance they have receiv'd from Above or in the Stile of the Parable that have made an answerable Improvement to the Number of Talents committed to them their Names shall be written in the Book of Life and they received into the eternal Joy of their Lord. But those who can then give no good Account of their Talents shew no suitable Improvement in Holiness according to the measure of Grace they have received shall never see Life but be cast into the Lake of Fire which is the second Death And because so very few will be so wise as to make due Preparation for this great Day of Account by improving the Grace God has given them to the great Ends for which it was design'd therefore as 't is describ'd Rev. 3.15 The Kings of the Earth and the great Men and the rich Men and the chief Captains and the mighty Men and every Bond-man and every Freeman many of all Qualities and Conditions from the highest to the lowest shall hide themselves in Dens in Rocks and Mountains and say to the Rocks and Mountains fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the Throne and from the Wrath of the Lamb for the great Day of his Wrath is come and who shall be able to stand May these Terrors of the Lord perswade us to provide in this our day for the Things that belong to our Peace before they be hid from our eyes looking for by frequent Meditation and hastning unto by a diligent Improvement of our Talents the coming of this dreadful day of God and being above all things careful That we be found of him in Peace without spot and blameless for God will bring every secret Thing into Judgment whether it be good or evil and exactly adapt every Man's Recompense to his Work Which brings me to the next Thing I am to consider in this Parable namely Fourthly That at that great Day of Account when every Man's Work is fully known and his Improvement compar'd with what he has receiv'd the Diligent shall not only in general be receiv'd into the Joy of their Lord and the unprofitable cast into outer Darkness but the most Diligent those that have made the greatest Improvement shall receive the greatest share of Happiness And those that have been most careless and Unprofitable shall be doom'd to the greatest misery That is in short there will be degrees of Happiness or Misery respectively awarded to Men according to the degrees of their Holiness or Impiety I know this has been much question'd by some and wholly deny'd by others and their main Reason against it I conceive to be this That since the Happiness of the Just in Heaven consists in the Vision of God or the Excellencies and Beauties of the Divine Nature which will fill a holy Soul with eternal and inexpressible Delight for so St. John expresses the Bliss of Heaven by seeing God as
Affections and cannot afford to take any pains to be Religious are frequently heard to say They serve God as well as they can and they can do no more and that such a Religion as we urge Men to is much too hard for Flesh and Blood 'T is a Law fitter for Angels than Men and tho they wish they could observe and do it and can't but consent to the Excellency of it in the Inner Man yet they find a Law in their Members warring against the Law of their Minds and bringing them into Captivity to the Law of Sin and so the good that they would they do not and the evil that they would not that they do And they take up with this as a sufficient Excuse and because God is infinitely merciful and good they think he will accept the Plea of the great Hardship of his Commands and their Inability to perform them instead of Obedience to them But as the Lord in the Parable said to his slothful Unprofitable Servant Out of their own Mouths will I judge those wretched Persons that thus mock and abuse God and deceive their own Souls into Ruin For if God be infinitely good and merciful then certainly he will not expect any Thing from Men beyond their Ability nor command their Service and Obedience any farther than they are able to pay it And consequently what this merciful and good God commands by All Men to be done without any Exception or Dispensation and threatens Eternal Misery to such as shall dare wilfully to disobey him this Every Man no question is able to perform through the Divine Grace and Assistance which as I have before prov'd is in sufficient measure given to every Man And to deny this is in effect to charge God with the greatest Cruelty Oppression and Injustice that is possible For what less is the giving Men such Commands as they are not able to perform and withal threatning and actually inflicting unconceivable Torments for such are those of Hell upon all that shall be found disobedient to the impracticable Law This would be indeed to require Brick without Straw as the Egyptian Task-masters did and then to lay on Stripes for a Failure in the Work nay 't would be infinitely worse because the Punishment for Irreligion and not improving our Talents is infinitely greater and shall be inflicted to all Eternity Since therefore God knows whereof we are made and remembers that we are but Dust and can tell how difficult his Commands will be to us and how proportionable our Ability is to keep and do them better than we our selves for 't is he that hath made us and gave us our natural Powers and Faculties and the Superadditions of Grace and Aid from Above since he is infinitely good and will not overload his Creatures nor exact impossible Tasks or such as are extremely difficult and but one degree below impossible since he is likewise infinitely just and will not damn Myriads of poor Wretches to all Eternity for not making an impossible Improvement of their Talents and expects only that they should give a reasonable Account according to what they have received from him From all this it will follow Not that therefore a Man shall be excus'd for pleading Inability but that every Man is Able through the never deficient Grace of that good God to such as heedfully attend to it to keep his holy just and good Commands and make Improvement suitable to the Talents he hath receiv'd and if for all this he perish his Blood will be upon his own Head Wherefore let no Man for the future be so Impious as to charge God with expecting impossible Services from his Creatures or think to palliate his Irreligion by crying out of the extreme Hardship of living like a Christian but let every Man set heartily and sincerely about his Duty and he will find that God's Grace will be sufficient for him to his daily Improvement and that the Ways of Religion are ways of pleasantness and all her paths are peace I come now to the last Thing to be consider'd in this Parable which is That the Condition of the diligent Improvers of their Talents will be unspeakably happy but the Condition of the Unprofitable beyond Expression miserable and that both in this World and in the next First The Condition of the diligent Improvers of their Talent will be unspeakably happy both in this World and that above In this World a quiet and serene Conscience will be to them a continual Feast the Sense of having perform'd their Duty according to their Ability of having been good Stewards of the Grace of God bestow'd upon them and that they can give a sincere Account though not a perfect one to their great Master when he shall come to look into their Behaviour in their Stewardship this will fill their Breasts with unspeakable Satisfaction their Soul will be calm and their Thoughts at Rest in Conscience of their Fidelity their Life not imbitter'd with anxious Fear and Dread of a sad After Reckoning but like that of a faithful Servant who is in his Master's Favour steady and easie and moving cheerfully in the Circle of his Duty and in joyful Expectation of the Reward of his Diligence when his great Lord shall advance him from the State of a Servant to that of a Friend and Bosom Favourite nay of a Coheir with himself of the Joys and Felicities of the Eternal Kingdom of Heaven And besides this Serenity and Satisfaction of Mind and comfortable Prospect of so glorious a Recompense of Reward which are Blessings of the first Magnitude and to which nothing in this World is comparable the improving Christian shall have more Talents given him more Grace shower'd down upon his Soul what the Slothful have forfeited shall be conferr'd upon him and he shall abound still more and more in every good Word and Work And what Condition can approach nearer to the state of Heavenly Glory than that of a holy Soul thus plentifully stor'd with the divine Grace And if Grace and Glory differ only in degree and the One be but the Completion and Perfection of the other a Soul so filled with Grace as the improving Soul will be must needs live a Heaven upon Earth and have frequent Antepasts of Glory And in that other World when the Glory shall be reveal'd that is prepared for them that love and serve our Lord Jesus in Sincerity then will their Happiness be as ineffable as endless It is express'd in this Parable by entring into the Joy of our Lord that is partaking of his Glories and Felicities in the Presence of the Immortal God They shall be conducted after having given a good Account of their Stewardship by the Blessed Angels into the Presence of the great King of Heaven where they shall see him face to face and with wondring Eyes and enravish'd Hearts behold his Glory gaze upon his Splendors and nearly view his Beauty who is the Fountain of
Perfection He who is Light it self and in whom is no Darkness at all will hide nothing of his Glory from the Eyes of their pure and prepar'd Minds but communicate the Knowledge of his most Excellent Nature to the utmost Capacity of their Beatified Souls and make 'em full of Divine Gladness with the Joy of his Countenance Their Apprehensions shall be clear'd and brightned their Faculties act upon this best of Objects vigorously and without any Hindrance or Distraction and every View of the Divine Beauty shall discover new Graces and Perfections for God is an Immense and Fathomless Ocean of Beauty as Plato excellently expresses it and their Capacities by every such View shall be enlarg'd and made still more and more capacious for the Reception of a following greater Manifestation And so their Love and Admiration of this Divine Being always increasing and their Enjoyment of him compleat and sull to the utmost of their Capacity their Joy and Happiness will be like that of God himself because springing from the same Fountain Unspeakable and Eternal And since the Reward of a Pious Industry will be such an Exceeding and Eternal Weight of Glory methinks we should take off our Affections from these lower Goods and doat no longer upon these vain and worthless Trifles nor throw away our Love upon that which satisfieth not and spend our Labour for that which is not Bread but make it our great Endeavour to be rich towards God and by improving the Talents he hath given us lay up a Treasure in Heaven 1 Cor. 2.9 Remembring That Eye hath not seen nor Ear heard neither can it enter into the Heart of Man to conceive the things which God hath prepar'd for them that love him And certainly that Diligence is well bestowed which shall be rewarded with a Crown of Glory Eternal in the Heavens But with the Unprofitable and Slothful Servant it is not so neither in this World nor in the next In this World the Lashes of a guilty Conscience will be unto him a Continual Torment the Sense of his having carelesly neglected his Duty and not performing according to his Ability the Just Commands of his great Lord but being an Unfaithful Steward of the Grace of God bestowed upon him and that he is far from being able to give in a good Account when his Lord shall come expecting the Improvement of his Talent This will fill his Breast with unspeakable Trouble and Perplexity and imbitter all his Worldly Enjoyments with the Mixture of Anxious Fear and Dread of a severe After-Reckoning and the terrifying Expectation of his sad Fate that will ensue will be to him even like a Hell upon Earth and cruciate his Soul with unspeakable Pangs and Agonies And which is much worse still the Grace that has so long lain unimprov'd shall at length be taken from him and the Man as desperate and irreclaimable be given over and as 't were seal'd up to Remediless Misery And in the next World at that great Day when he shall be actually call'd to give Account of his Works the Dire Sentence of Depart from me ye Cursed into Everlasting Fire prepar'd for the Devil and his Angels shall strike him through with Horror and Confusion and he shall be driven into Outer Darkness where he shall Eternally bewail his Miserable Condition and gnash his Teeth in bitter Remorse for bringing himself to that Place of Torment by slothfully neglecting the Improvement of that Divine Grace with which he might if he would have work'd out his Salvation Crying out to Eternal Ages in utter Despair and most tormenting Agonies of Soul O that I had consider'd in that my Day the things that did belong unto my Peace but now they are for ever hid from mine Eyes And now for a Conclusion of this Discourse Here is in this Parable we see on the one Hand all the Encouragement in the World to Diligence and Industry and a Lively Improving Piety such as more and more Abundance of Grace with all the Blessed Attendants of it in this World and a full Enjoyment of God himself in Heaven And on the other side here is what if duly consider'd will make any Man afraid of Spiritual Sloth and Idleness and not dare to neglect the Improvement of his Talent for if he does he shall be depriv'd of God's Grace here and doom'd to Eternal Misery at the Day of Judgment Wherefore let us seriously consider what has been now commented upon this Parable and beg of God so to bless it to our Good that we may be inclin'd by it to make a due Improvement of the Talents he has committed to our Management to his Honour and Glory and our own Eternal Salvation The PRAYER MOST Glorious God the Fountain of Perfection whom I humbly acknowledge to be the Giver of every good and perfect Gift I beseech thee assist me with thy Grace that according to thy Just Expectation I may make a suitable Improvement of the Talents I have receiv'd from thy Bounty to thy Glory and the Publick Good And may my Industry be excited by this great Consideration That thou wilt certainly call me to give an Account of my Improvement and very speedily perhaps and wilt proportionably reward or punish me in the Eternal World I thankfully own most merciful Father that thou hast given me sufficient Grace wherewith to arrive at the End of my Hopes and art not at all wanting to me in this unspeakable Gift O may I not be wanting to my self and neglect and bury this Precious Talent but with Diligence and Carefulness endeavour to work out my Salvation with it in Fear and Trembling Remembring what Confusion I shall be in how utterly without Plea or Excuse when for my Wicked Slothfulness thou shalt consign me to outer Darkness since thou didst enable me to perform all thou expectedst from me And may the unspeakably Happy Condition of the Diligent encourage me to an Active Persevering Piety and always to abound in the Work of thee my Lord since I know my Labour shall not be in vain but be rewarded with still larger Additions of thy Grace in this World and with the Participation in great Degrees of thy Glory in the next O God assist me more and more with this thy Heavenly Grace and may I always gratefully acknowledge from whom I have receiv'd it and return thee all the Praise of what I shall do well by thy Assistance and always fear lest by my Negligence I forfeit it That so faithfully improving the Talent thou hast here committed to my Trust I may at the great Day of Retribution hear these Blessed Words Well done good and faithful Servant enter thou into the Joy of thy Lord. Which grant O Gracious God for the Sake of Jesus thy Beloved Amen PARABLE IX Of the Covetous Rich Fool. Luke xii 16 17 18 19 20 21. And Jesus spake a Parable unto them saying The Ground of a certain Rich Man brought forth plentifully And
Riches or Abundance of Gold and Silver in which now-a-days we esteem Riches chiefly to consist they are really no better than Heaps of Earth of different Colours impress'd with different Stamps and made of different Sizes and to which Men have given a different Value and Esteem according to their different Colour Size and Impression and which in themselves are good for little but to be look'd on and which he that would live must part with when he has them in Exchange for other Things that are necessary for his Subsistence Now what can be more vile and base than for so Noble and Excellent a Creature as Man so far to degrade himself as to employ his greatest Love and Admiration and Desire upon a Piece of Earth which was originally made for him to tread upon and produce Things for his Food and Pleasure To make that his Master nay his God which was made to be his Servant For a Rational Soul to doat upon a sensless Clod to neglect the Contemplation of the Excellencies of his infinitely perfect Maker and admire one of the lowest of his Creatures to desire a Piece of Earth with the greatest Application and have no Value for the Immortal Glories of Heaven to place his Happiness in what is so very much inferiour to him and upon that which is indeed his Happiness to bestow no Thoughts what can be more vile and abject than this what more unbecoming the Dignity of the Rational Nature and of a Creature that has such glorious Hopes Where is the Reason of a Man that lays out all his Endeavours to acquire a Trifle and in the mean time disregards that which is his chief good and where is the Religion of a Christian that has been redeem'd not by Corruptible Things such as Silver and Gold but with the precious Blood of Christ as of a Lamb without Blemish and without Spot where is his Religion that notwithstanding this makes Silver and Gold the chief Object of his Affections and treads under foot the Son of God and counts the Blood of the Covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy or common Thing and does despight to the Spirit of Grace and loves and admires Mammon more than his Saviour What more vile and brutish than this what more stupidly ungrateful This is to come down to a Level with the Beasts that perish nay 't is to sink much lower for They act according to their Natural Instincts and choose as they are directed by their Great Creator and serve him obediently in that Rank of Being in which he has plac'd them But that Man much more that Christian that makes perishing Riches the main Object of his Desires and Endeavours acts directly contrary to the Reason that God has given him degenerates many degrees below the Dignity of his Nature disobeys the Orders of his Creator slights the Heavenly Counsel of his Saviour despises the Glories and Felicities of the Kingdom of Heaven and of a Man and a Christian makes himself a vile Muckworm delighted in nothing Noble and Excellent but groveling upon the Earth as if that were the Centre of his Happiness And what can more vilifie and degrade a Reasonable Soul made after the Image of God than such base Affections as these 'T is certainly a most vile Degeneracy and renders a Man the most contemptible Creature in the Universe both to God and Angels and all wise and good Men. And thus much may suffice to expose the Folly and Vileness of an immoderate Desire of Riches as in them placing the Happiness of Life I shall now shew The ill Consequences that attend it which besides that great Perplexity of Mind they cause mention'd before are chiefly these two 1 It mightily hinders a Man's Progress in Religion which is the one Thing necessary 2. It exposes a Man more than any thing to the Danger of Apostacy or falling from the Truth First An immoderate Love of Riches does mightily hinder a Man's Progress in Religion which is the one Thing necessary We may remember our Lord in his Interpretation of a Parable before discours'd of Matt. 13.22 says that the Cares of this World and the Deceitfulness of Riches like Thorns that spring up with Seed choke the Word of God and render it unfruitful and in another Parable of a great Supper made at the Marriage of a King's Son Matt. 22. Luk. 14.18 by which as was discours'd upon that Parable is represented the glad Tidings and Invitations of the Gospel he tells us That that which detain'd Men from it was likewise the Cares of the World and the Love of Riches they had Ground to look after and Oxen to prove and therefore they could not come to the Wedding Supper And accordingly says our Saviour in as express Words as can be Matt. 6.24 No man can serve two Masters ye cannot serve God and Mammon Now the Reason of this is twofold For first Nothing so much distracts a Man's Thoughts as an eager Desire and Pursuit of Wealth for Riches are so difficult to be acquir'd as has been said and so very slippery when gain'd that as to get them will exercise all a Man's Contrivance employ all his Thoughts and Attention and consume his whole Time so to keep them when once gotten will to a Man that knows the Hardship of getting them and how soon they are lost again engage him in constant Care and Solicitude to watch his Idol lest he be depriv'd of it and so his Mind becomes distracted with continual Apprehensions of Danger and at leisure for no other Thoughts than how to secure his Riches And this those that are acquainted with Men much wedded to the World may soon perceive by their careful anxious Looks and distrustful Timorous Discourse Now the immoderate Love of Riches thus engrossing a Man's Soul and the great Business of Religion or making Provision for Another World and laying up a Treasure of good Works in Heaven being a Thing that likewise requires Time and Diligence and a close Application of all our Faculties to the Performance of it and it being impossible for a Man to attend closely to two Things at once and the Love of this World and of the next being not only different but contrary the one to the other How can it be but that he that eagerly loves Riches and has his Soul prepossess'd with a strong Desire of them and all his Faculties before engag'd in their Pursuit must move very slowly in the Way of Religion if he moves at all nay indeed rather move backward than forward and the more he loves the World grow colder still in his Affections to God Another Reason of this is Because an Immoderate Love of Money is a kind of Fascination and Enchantment it casts a Mist before a Man's Understanding and makes him less sensible and apprehensive of the great Obligation to a Religious Life and so dulls and stupifies the Soul that it becomes very little moved with the Sermons of
the Gospel What else should be the Reason of that strange Unconcernedness in the Worldly-minded though press'd never so home with the Necessity of minding Religion more and the World less of endeavouring before all Things to be rich towards God and to give of their Abundance to the Relief of the Poor and not to trust in uncertain Riches and the like They give us the Hearing perhaps and that 's All and go on still in their own Course as earnestly as ever and if they offer any thing in their Defence 't is so strangely weak that a Man can't but admire at it Sometimes we shall hear them say they don't know what Streights they may be reduc'd to yet before they dye and therefore they think it but Prudence to provide for the worst forgetting all the while that our Lord expresly forbids all such anxious Solicitude for the Morrow and commands an humble Trust in the Providence of God who never forsakes those that are moderately industrious and depend upon him for a Blessing and never reflecting upon the miserable Streight they will be in at the Day of Judgment if destitute of good Works and not able to give a sincere Account of their Stewardship Sometimes these Men will quote Scripture and tell us the Apostle says He that provides not for his own House is worse than an Infidel forgetting in the mean time the Words of the same Apostle in another Place that the Love of Money is the root of all Evil and those of our Saviour immediately before this Parable Take heed beware of Covetousness for a mans Life consisteth not in the Abundance of the Things which he possesseth And in Matt. 6.32 Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness and all these Things shall be added unto you for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things 1 Cor. 6.10 Eph. 5.5 and that the Covetous are in the number of those that shall never see the Kingdom of Heaven Of all Vices that we reprove and warn Men against Covetousness and Worldly-mindedness we find to be most stubborn and irreclaimable and 't is very seldom indeed that we can stop a Man that is in a hot pursuit of Wealth so strangely bewitching is this Love of Money and more than ordinary destructive of a true Sense of Religion in the Soul And accordingly says our Lord How hard is it for a rich man one that makes a God of Riches and confides and trusts in them to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven 't is easier for a Camel to pass through the Eye of a Needle 'T is next door to an Impossibility and nothing but the Almighty Power of God changing his Heart can make him capable of that Happiness And St. Paul agreeably Not many rich not many mighty are call'd and the God of this World hath blinded the Eyes of those that believe not And the Pythagoreans by the meer Light of Nature were sensible of this and taught their Scholars a Separation from the Affairs of the World if they would Philosophize well and find out pure Truth and the Secrets of Wisdom Wherefore we see it highly concerns us to take no such Thought for the Morrow but endeavour to lay up a Treasure in Heaven because Where our Treasure is there will our Hearts be also Another very sad Consequence of an Immoderate Love of Riches is that it exposes a Man more than any Thing besides to Apostacy or falling from the Truth St. Paul 1 Tim. 6.9 says They that will be rich fall into Temptation and a Snare and more expresly in the next Verse The Love of Money is the root of all Evil which while some have coveted after they have erred from the Faith and the Event has often prov'd this true and the Hopes of gaining and the Fear of losing Riches has prevail'd with Thousands to turn Apostates to the Truth For the sake of a little Money 't was that Judas betray'd his Master and Saviour and to tempt with Money is a way of proceedure so very successful an Engine so almost irresistable that 't is made use of by all sorts that would gain Proselites to a Party and the great Tempter with much Confidence after his other Stratagems fail'd him made Offer of Riches to our Lord Himself as his best Reserve when he would perswade him to Fall down and Worship him And so unreasonable a Love have Worldly-minded Men for Wealth as to be and do any Thing at the Frowns or Promises of him who has Power to give or take away Riches This has been the Experience of all former Ages and too much of our own too and will still be so till Men grow so wise as to know how to be content with Food and Raiment and believe our Lord's Words that a mans Life consisteth not in the Abundance of the Things which he possesseth and that Godliness with Contentment is the greatest gain And therefore as much as it concerns Men to be constant in the Profession of the Truth of God that is as much as their Salvation is worth so much it concerns them to take heed and beware of Covetousness For 't is very true in more Senses than one that it is Idolatry Colos 3.5 Having thus shewn the great Folly and Vileness of an Immoderate Desire of Riches and of expecting the Happiness even of this Life from Abundance of Wealth and mention'd two very ill Consequences of this Covetousness I proceed now to the Third Thing I intended to do which is to Answer the Rich Fool 's Question that he proposed to himself upon the great Increase he had What shall I do because I have no room where to lay my fruits And shew how many good Ways there are of Disposing of Abundance Of all the Ways of bestowing what was more than his Barns would hold by which I suppose is express'd his having more than was needful to his own comfortable Subsistance Covetousness would let this Rich Man think of none but of Building New Barns wherein to lay up his Abundance and then to take his Ease and eat and drink and be merry He looked no farther than Himself and the more God's Blessings increas'd upon him the more he purpos'd to live in Luxury and Excess and Epicurize away that which God gave him to a quite different and much better Purpose Quod superat non est melius quo insumere possis Cur eget indignis quisquam te divite quare Templa Ruunt Antiqua Deum cur improbe chara Non aliquid Patriae tanto emetiris Acervo Horat. Serm. Lib. II. Sat. 2. For every Man whom God has blessed with Abundance is God's Steward of that Abundance and must bestow it according to the Will of his great Lord for so St. Peter in his first Epistle chap. 4. ver 10. As every man has receiv'd the Gift even so minister one to another as good Stewards of the manifold Grace of God Now the
Duty of a good Steward is thus represented in the 42d Verse of this 12th of Luke Who then is that faithful and wise Steward whom his Lord shall make Ruler over his Houshold to give them their portion of Meat in due season That is To give the Family their Portion in due Season is the Duty of a Faithful and Good Steward Now the Race of Mankind is God's great Family in the World and some of the Members of this his Family he has made Choice of as his Stewards and Purveyors to provide for the rest and has according entrusted them with such a share of his Revenue to some more to some less as in his infinite Wisdom he has thought most fit and order'd them to expend it to the Advantage of his Houshold that every one be provided for according to his Needs and that no Man be suffer'd as much as in them lies to be miserable and perish And this he requires should be done faithfully after a moderate Provision first made for themselves and Relatives as they shall answer it at that great Audit when every Man must give Account of his Stewardship The Rich Man then in the Gospel being as every other Rich Man is God's Steward to provide for such as were in Necessity and Want according to the Abundance God had given him 't is an easie Matter to answer the Question he propos'd to himself upon his great Increase What shall I do because I have no room where to lay my fruits Why act like a good Steward for thy great Master and let the Houses of the Poor be the Granaries for the Abundance of thine Increase Charity to the Necessitous is the best Way of bestowing Abundance and as many Ways as there are of expressing that Charity which are innumerable so many Ways are there of disposing of what is more than needful for our own comfortable Support To Feed the Hungry to give Drink to the Thirsty Harbour to distressed Strangers Cloaths to the Naked Visits of Comfort and Relief to the Sick and Freedom to Prisoners to be a Father to the Fatherless and a Husband to the Widow and the like this is to discharge a good Stewardship this is what every Rich Man ought to do with his Abundance And Blessed is that good Servant whom his Lord when he cometh shall find so doing Of a truth saith our Lord his Master will make him Ruler over all that he hath he will commit still more of his Reuenue to his Management bless him with greater Prosperity and Increase and at last he shall be received into the Joy of his Lord and Reign with Christ his Great Master in Glory for ever Whoever therefore has Abundance needs not much to perplex himself how he shall bestow it for the Poor are always with us and for the Relief of their Necessities not the Gratifying our own Luxurious Desires must God's Extraordinary Blessings be laid out Let us now in the Fourth Place consider the great Wisdom of not setting our Hearts upon nor eagerly pursuing Riches and disposing of them as Religion directs if it shall please God in an extraordinary Manner to bless us with them If Riches increase set not your Heart upon them is excellent Advice of the Royal Psalmist Psal 62.10 and very true is that of St. Paul to Timothy Ephes 1.6 10. that while some have coveted after Mony they have err'd from the Faith and pierc'd themselves through with divers Sorrows and that Godliness with Content is great Gain and therefore wise indeed is that Man that knows how to be content with his present Portion and by setting his Affections upon more noble Objects escapes the Snare of coveting after Wealth He is free from the most dangerous Passion the Love of Mony being the root of all Evil and is secure of Quiet and Satisfaction amidst all the Turns and Varieties of Fortune the great Uncertainties of a false and fickle World If Poverty should become his Lot he is prepar'd for 't he knows there is no Stability in this World 's Good and therefore values it accordingly and remembers that he has a much greater Treasure in a better Place of which none can deprive him and which he shall enjoy to Eternity and upon that fixes his Affections and longs for the Happy Time when he shall take Possession of it While he hath a plentiful Fortune he acts like a good Steward of his great Lord and enjoys the Comforts of it by letting those share with him that want a Supply and thanks God that he is so blessed as to give rather than receive and in every respect makes the best use he can of what he has to the Advancement of the Glory of his great Patron and the Good of his Brethren and then can step securely though Dangers and Misfortunes threaten if God thinks fit to divert them and continue to him what he has he knows he can do it if not he knows that all will end for the best at last and so chearfully resigns what God before had lent him he is satisfied that Happiness does not consist in Abundance and that a good Conscience is a continual Feast and therefore his main Endeavour is to preserve a good Conscience a Soul clear and unspotted and with that coarse Fare will relish well and a homely Garment sit easie upon him and such Necessaries as these he that feeds the Ravens and cloaths the Lillies will surely provide for him And he that is thus dispos'd must needs be in perpetual Tranquility and Peace and very wise consequently in taking that Course which helps him to those inestimable Blessings As for the Wisdom of disposing of abundance when God thinks fit to bless a Man with it according to the Direction of Religion in the Relief of the Poor and Needy there needs nothing more to recommend it to Christians than for them to read the latter Part of Mat. 25. where we are informed that the Expresses of Men's Charity shall at the great Day of Judgment be particularly enquir'd into and the Charitable rewarded infinitely with Glory and Happiness in Heaven and the Uncharitable doom'd as accursed Persons to depart from God the Fountain of Bliss into Everlasting Torments prepar'd for the Devil and his Angels And if so to direct our Steps in this World as to avoid the Miseries of Hell and arrive at the unspeakable Happy Kingdom of Heaven be the greatest Wisdom then is it the greatest Wisdom by a Charitable Disposal of Mens Abundance to the Poor to make Provision against that great Day of final Retribution when Charity shall be so particularly enquired into and so highly rewarded There remains nothing now to be done but to urge what has been said upon Mens Practice We have seen in this Discourse how great Folly 't is eagerly to desire and pursue Abundance of Wealth that 't is very uncertain whether ever such Desire shall be gratified or no and that there is no Satisfaction in
the greatest Riches when possess'd and that they are often very suddenly lost again and then the Grief for being depriv'd of them will fill the Soul with abundantly greater Trouble than the Enjoyment of them did with Pleasure and we have seen as the Folly so the Vileness of Covetousness how much a Christian is debas'd by thus groveling on the Earth and placing his Happiness in what is so much beneath him and neglecting that which is the only proper Object of his Affections and is of infinitely greater Value than all the Riches of Ten Thousand Worlds we have seen likewise the ill Consequences of Covetousness what a great Hindrance it is to nay Destroyer of Religion how it indisposes a Man for the Service of God and endangers more than any thing his steady Adherence to the Truth we have been directed to much better Ways of disposing our Abundance when we are blessed with it than either in hoarding it up or wasting it in Luxury and Excess namely in relieving the Necessities of the Poor which will intitle us to the Reward of a good and faithful Steward even the Eternal Joy of our dear Lord and we have seen the great Wisdom of a contented Mind the Blessedness of not overvaluing Riches and the great Advantage that will be made by the Charitable Disposal of them when Christ shall come to take Account of Mens Works at the great Day of Recompense Wherefore to conclude all in the excellent Exhortation of our Lord immediately after my Text let none of us take Anxious and Perplexing Thought for our Life what we shall eat nor for the Body what we shall put on for the Life is more than Meat and the Body than Rayment and he that gave the Greater will no Question provide the Lesser Let us consider the Ravens for they neither sow nor reap have neither Store-House nor Barn and God feedeth them how much better are we than the Fowls And which of us by taking thought can add one Cubit unto his Stature If we then be not able to do what is least why take we thought for the rest Let us consider the Lillies how they grow they toil not they spin not and yet Solomon in all his Glory was not arrayed like one of these If then God so cloath the Grass which to Day is and to Morrow is cast into the Oven how much more will he cloath us who very much betray our little Faith in doubting it Wherefore let us not immoderately seek what we shall eat or what we shall drink or wherewithall be cloathed neither be of doubtful or anxious and too careful Mind for our Father knoweth that we have need of all these things but seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness and all these things shall be added unto us in such a Proportion as Infinite Wisdom and Goodness knows to be best for us Remembring that as the Covetous Rich Fool in this Parable that trusted in his Riches and propos'd to himself much Happiness from a Luxurious Enjoyment of them was suddenly snatch'd from them to give Account of his Stewardship so shall it be with every one that layeth up Treasure for him self and is not rich towards God The PRAYER OEternal God the great Creator and Governour of all things and whose Wisdom and Goodness in all the Disposals of thy Providence is Infinite grant me the Wisdom to be contented with my present Lot and satisfied with a moderate Proportion of this World 's Good and not to be too careful and solicitous in my Pursuit even of that For ever preserve me I entreat thee from the great Folly and Sin of Covetousness and may I be so thoroughly convinced of the Uncertainty of Riches both in the getting and the keeping how unsatisfying they are when possess'd and the many Snares and Temptations that attend them as always to preserve a great Indifferency to them and make it my chief Endeavour to attain the real Happiness of a contented Spirit Grant that I may be more and more sensible how vile a thing it is to place my Felicity in what is so much beneath me as these Perishing Riches are and which instead of improving me in what is really valuable tend to betray me into many vile and hurtful Lusts retard my Progress in Religion which is the one thing necessary and too often betray into Apostacy from thy Truth O grant that I may act like a Man and a Christian and make it my chief Aim to be rich towards thee my God and to lay up a Treasure in Heaven and if through thy Bountiful Goodness Riches here increase give me grace I intreat thee not to set my Heart upon them but to dispose of them so as may most conduce to thy Glory and the Good of the Community that making Friends with the Mammon of Unrighteousness according to thy Blessed Will when these fading Riches shall fail and be left behind me my Charity may procure for me a Reception into these Everlasting Habitations where I shall have a glorious Inheritance that fadeth not away where neither Rust nor Moth doth corrupt and where Thieves break not through and steal and where my Happiness shall be ineffable fully satisfying and Eternal Amen Blessed God Amen Amen PARABLE X. Of the Barren Fig-Tree Luke xiii 6 7 8 9. A certain Man had a Fig-Tree planted in his Vineyard and came and sought Fruit thereon and found none Then said he to the Dresser of his Vineyard Behold these Three Years I come seeking Fruit on this Fig-Tree and find none cut it down why cumbereth it the Ground And he answering said unto him Lord let it alone this Year also till I shall dig about it and dung it And if it bear Fruit well And if not then after that thou shalt cut it down THIS Parable was spoken upon the News that was brought to our Lord of the sad Fate of some Factious Galileans whom Pilate the Roman Governour had set upon and destroy'd mingling their Blood with the Sacrifices they were offering To this our Lord first made this Answer Suppose ye that those Galileans were Sinners above all the Galileans because they suffered such things I tell you nay but except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish Or those Eighteen upon whom the Tower in Siloam fell and slew them another sad Accident that had lately happen'd think ye that they were Sinners above all that dwelt in Jerusalem I tell you nay but except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish And then he added this Parable that he might further enforce the Necessity of a speedy Repentance and Amendment of Life in all Men in order to their escaping the Just Judgment of God in this World and the Eternal Punishments of Sin in the next From what our Lord said to his Disciples upon the sad Fate of the Galileans and those slain by the Tower in Siloam think ye that they were Sinners above all c. we may
Dresser of it Christ Jesus who have such great Helps and Assistances to bring forth fruit unto Holiness and consequently such full Assurance of Hope Heb. 6.11 that the End will be Everlasting Life Let Them give Thanks from the Bottom of their Hearts whom the Lord hath thus Redeem'd and deliver'd from the Hand of the Infernal Enemy and be telling of his Salvation from Day to Day And let us of these Happy Islands in the first place magnifie him for this his Infinite Goodness for none have had a greater share of it than we none better Planted nor better Cultivated than the Members of this Church of England and which does much advance the Blessing none were in a more sad and deplorable Condition than the Inhabitants of these Islands before the Preaching of the Gospel And indeed what the Prophet Isaiah says of God's dealing with the Jewish Church which was then his Vineyard Isa 5.4 may be very truly said of his gracious Dealing with this our Church What could have been done more to his Vineyard that he hath not done in it He hath planted it in a very fruitful Hill and fenced it by his Providence from the Incursions of its Enemies and gather'd out the Stones thereof purg'd it from scandalous Heresies and Superstitions which are Stones of Stumbling and Rocks of Offence and built a Tower in the midst of it guarded it with the Civil Power making Kings its Nursing Fathers and Queens its Nursing Mothers and made a Wine-press in it furnish'd it with all Necessaries of Holy Instruction and the Service of an Excellent Ministry to inforce the great Truths of Religion and lay all the Beauties and Excellencies of it before the People And now what could have been done more for this Church than the Lord has already done for it And what an inestimable Happiness is it that we enjoy who were Born in this Church early Consecrated to God in Baptism and thereby planted in this Vineyard and sed with the sincere and unmix'd Milk of the Word plainly and without Reserve or the cunning Craftiness of Men that lye in wait to deceive We are invited to a Frequent and Entire Reception of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper that great Conveyance of the Divine Grace and Aid and have as many and as moving Exhortations to live up to our Holy Profession as are enjoy'd by any Part of the Christian World What an inestimable Happiness is this And what great Reason have we as to bless God for this his unspeakable Goodness to us so to bring forth the Fruits of Righteousness in great Abundance 'T is but Just and Right that we should do it and God expects it from All that are Planted in his Vineyard much more from such as have had extraordinary Care and Cultivation bestow'd upon them as we have had For so in the Second Place we find in this Parable that the Owner of the Vineyard came to the Fig-Tree he had planted in it expecting Fruit from it The Fruit that God expects from Christians that have enjoy'd the Means of Grace and spiritual Improvement is that which is call'd Fruit meet for Repentance and the Fruits of the Spirit Fruits meet for Repentance are the Advances to a New and Spiritual Life such as shall demonstrate a sincere Renovation and Change of Mind a Turning from a Course of Rebellion against God and Hatred of him to entire Obedience to him and hearty Love But he that to the Profession of Christianity adds Debauchery of Manners and instead of bringing forth the Fruits of the Spirit such as Love Joy Peace Long-Suffering Gentleness Goodness Faith Meekness Temperance and such like Drudges in the Works of the Flesh such as Adultery Fornication Uncleanness Lasciviousness Idolatry Witchcraft Hatred Variance Emulations Wrath Strife Seditions Heresies Envyings Murthers Drunkenness and such like such Men as these are as St. Jude expresses it Trees Jude 12. whose Fruit withereth without Fruit twice dead or dead a second Time after they were enliven'd by the Grace of Christ and planted in his Vineyard where they might have lived and flourish'd and brought forth much Fruit well pleasing unto God and by this their Barrenness are as 't were pluck'd up by the Roots and to whom is reserv'd the Blackness of Darkness for ever and whose End is to be burn'd When our Lord as he was returning from Bethany to Jerusalem saw a Fig-Tree at a Distance very promising and full of Leaves and went to it expecting to find Fruit upon it but finding nothing thereon but Leaves only curs'd it and said unto it let no Fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever he plainly enough told the World that the Profession of Christianity must always be attended with the Fruits of Piety that he expects to find it so and will severely punish where he finds it otherwise The Leaves of a Fig-Tree are broad and strong and hang thick and are of a lovely Colour and therefore very apt to represent the Profession of Christianity which makes the fairest Appearance of any Religion that was ever taught the World and the Title of a Christian does include all that can be suppos'd excellent and good in a Man But as the Fig-Tree besides flourishing Leaves bears a Delicious Fruit and has always upon it Fruit coming to Maturity so Christianity must not be all Shew and Profession but the Fruits of Holiness must appear as well as the Leaves of Fair Speeches and the outward Performance of some of the more Customary and Publick Duties of it and as is observ'd in the Fig-Tree there must always be some Fruit growing to Ripeness and Perfection God expects to find it so and where he is disappointed the Fate of the Barren Fig-Tree will be their Portion We are all of us too apt with our first Parents to cover our Spiritual Nakedness with Fig-leaves and by tacking together a few External Observances of Religion think to hide our Shame and pass for good Servants and Disciples of the Lord Jesus But this is too thin a covering to conceal our Vileness from his Eye to whom all things lie naked and open and who knows the very Secrets of the Heart He that is indeed a Follower of Christ and loves him in Sincerity must walk as he walk'd imitating his Example and treading in his Blessed Steps departing from all Iniquity denying himself and all his vile Lusts and Affections obeying chearfully the Holy Commands of his great Lord and giving all diligence to add to his Faith Virtue and to Virtue Knowledg and to Knowledg Temperance and to Temperance Patience and to Patience Godliness and to Godliness Brotherly Kindness and to Brotherly Kindness Charity 2 Per. 1.5 6 7 8. for if these things be in us and abound they make us that we shall be neither Barren nor Unfruitful in the Knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ And he only that has thus his Fruit unto Holiness shall in the End attain Everlasting Life
Thou hast done all O blessed God that can be done to secure the Happiness of Rational and Free Agents I therefore beg with all the Earnestness of an awaken'd Soul that thy Goodness Long-suffering and Forbearance may soften my Spirit and lead me to Repentance and melt me into Shame and Tears of Penitential Sorrow for having so long abused the tender Kindness of so good a God O let not thy Lenity ever extinguish the Dread of thy Vengeance which though slow is sure and may I seriously consider that if this thy Mercy is not effectual to my Reformation 't will but add weight to the Eternal Ruine I deserve May these Considerations most gracious God never depart from my Mind till Fruit be added to my Leaves and I experience the Power of True Godliness which Thing if thou wilt grant me then will I praise thee without ceasing and magnifie thy Goodness for ever and ever Amen Amen PARABLE XI Of the Prodigal Son Luke xv 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24. And Jesus said a certain Man had two Sons And the younger of them said to his Father Father give me the portion of Goods that falleth to me And he divided unto them his Living And not many days after the younger Son gather'd all together and took his Journey into a far Country and there wasted his Substance in riotous living And when he had spent all there arose a mighty Famine in that Land and he began to be in want And he went and joyned himself to a Citizen of that Country and he sent him into his Fields to feed Swine And he would fain have filled his Belly with the Husks that the Swine did eat and no man gave unto him And when he came to himself he said How many hired Servants of my Fathers have Bread enough and to spare and I perish with Hunger I will arise and go to my Father and will say unto him Father I have sinned against Heaven and before thee And am no more worthy to be called thy Son make me as one of thy hired Servants And he arose and came to his Father But when he was yet a great way off his Father saw him and had Compassion and ran and fell on his Neck and kissed him And the Son said unto him Father I have sinned against Heaven and in thy sight and am no more worthy to be called thy Son But the Father said to his Servants bring forth the best Robe and put it on him and put a Ring on his Hand and Shooes on his Feet And bring hither the fatted Calf and kill it and let us eat and be merry For this my Son was dead and is alive again he was lost and is found THIS whole Chapter from the Third Verse to the End is intended to represent the great Tenderness and Compassion of God towards Sinners his great Desire that they should Repent and turn from their wicked Courses and how highly pleasing to him it is when they sincerely do so And this is express'd in Three Parables The First of a Man's seeking diligently a Sheep that he had lost and leaving the rest of his Flock till he had found it and then rejoycing greatly and telling his Neighbours the good News and inviting them to partake of his Joy The Second is of a Woman's having lost a Piece of Silver and seeking very carefully till she had found it and then in like manner rejoycing with her Friends for her good Success And the Third Parable is that of the Prodigal Son And because they are All to the same purpose 't will be sufficient to discourse of One of them only and the Last being the most full and comprehensive I shall consider That The Occasion of Our Lord 's speaking these Parables was The Scribes and Pharisees finding fault with him for Instructing and Conversing with Publicans and Sinners for they look'd upon it as very scandalous and a kind of Pollution to have any Familiarity with those worst of Men as they thought them and murmur'd against our Saviour saying This Man receiveth Sinners and eateth with them ver 2. To this Objection of theirs against him he answers in the Parables before mention'd and shews how unreasonably uncharitable they were to think much of his Teaching and Conversing with those who because the vilest of Men had therefore the most Need of his holy Instructions and excellent Example that they might be Reform'd and Reclaim'd from their wicked Practices For as he said elsewhere the Whole have no need of a Physician but those that are Sick and therefore he came to Seek and to Save those that were lost and Not to call the Righteous but Sinners to Repentance Nay more he tells them in the 7th and 10th Verses of this Chapter that There shall be more Joy in Heaven in the Presence of the Angels of God over One Sinner that Repenteth than over Ninety and Nine Just Persons that need no Repentance or such a total Change of Mind as is in a Sinner that breaks off his vile Courses by Repentance And farther to explain and enforce this great and most comfortable Truth and represent it more lively to their Apprehensions he spake the Parable of the Prodigal Son and therein very naturally and movingly expresses these Four Things First The great Extravagancy of Wicked Men when they give themselves up to the Conduct of their own Wills and Affections and are weary of the Government of God their Heavenly Father Secondly The sad Condition such Men quickly reduce themselves to by that their Extravagancy and loose self-will'd Course of Life or in other Words the miserable Consequences of Debauchery and Riot Thirdly The sharp Remorse of Conscience that attends such Courses the Shame and Sorrow for them and the Resolutions of an awaken'd Sinner to return again to his Obedience to God And Fourthly The great Tenderness and Compassion of the Father of Spirits to such as Repent in earnest and keep their Resolutions His Readiness to receive them again to his Favour and great Joy for their Return Because they were dead but are alive again were lost but are found Which last Particular is the Reason of the greater Joy that is in Heaven over one Sinner that Repenteth than over Ninety and Nine Just persons that need no Repentance and is a very satisfactory Account of our Lord 's so often Conversing with and Instructing Publicans and Sinners For they had the most need of that great Physician of Souls and consequently their Salvation would cause the greatest Joy in Heaven and therefore our Compassionate Saviour so industriously endeavour'd their Conversion And had the Pharisees had any of that Goodness in them they so much pretended to they would have rejoyced at our Lord's Charity and admir'd and lov'd him for it rather than have murmur'd at it as they did and used it as an Objection against him The first Thing express'd in this Parable is the great Extravagancy
rise and give him because he is his Friend yet because of his Importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth And the Application of this Parable is Ask and it shall be given you seek and ye shall find knock and it shall be open'd unto you And the Reason why our Lord applies the first Parable to God's certainly avenging his Elect which cry Day and Night to him though he bear long with them I suppose to be with Dr. Hammond the great Discouragements his Disciples were then under by reason of the Malice of the Jews which made it necessary for him to keep up their Spirits by assuring them that God's not immediately hearkening to their Prayers by manifestly appearing in their Cause to protect them and punish their Enemies was no Argument that he wholly disregarded them but that if they persisted in their grateful Importunity he would at length answer their Desires For if Importunity be so prevalent even with Wicked Men how much more will it be so with the God of Mercy and Compassion 'T is plain then the chief Design of these Parables though differently worded and apply'd is to enforce the Necessity of frequent and earnest Prayer and therefore without any farther minute Explication of them they being so plain that they neither need nor will bear it I shall address my self to discourse upon what is couch'd under them and endeavour to evince the Necessity of Praying frequently and with Earnestness and Importunity That Prayer or a Liberty of making our Requests known unto God is a Privilege and Happiness inestimable no one that considers the Nature of God and the Nature of Man can question The latter a poor dependent Creature helpless and weak short-sighted and ignorant full of Wants and Necessities obnoxious to innumerable evil Accidents of unruly Passions and Affections the Hate and Envy of the Spirits of Darkness strongly prone to what is Evil and averse to what is Good the former a Being of infinite Fullness and Perfection infinitely wise and powerful and good the Maker of the Universe whose is the whole Creation and to whom every Thing that is obeys Now that this indigent helpless Creature should have such a Patron to make his Wants known to a Patron so inexhaustibly full so wise so able and so willing to direct and guide him to support and comfort him to protect and defend to relieve and succour him to have Freedom of Address to such a Patron as this is without all doubt a Privilege and Favour that no Man can sufficiently esteem And yet so unaccountably stupid and thoughtless are Men for the Generality What is more neglected nay despis'd than this invaluable Privilege As if they were full and had need of Nothing or were self-sufficient and could be their own Helpers when indeed they are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked In pity to this our doubly Forlorn Condition our Blessed Saviour the God of Compassions that if possible we might receive the full Benefit of so great a Favour and Divine Condescention has made this Privilege become our Duty and bound it upon us by the Commands of his Holy Institution encourag'd our Practice of it by his own Example and by Himself and his Apostles left such Directions for the more effectual Performance of it that every Man for the Future might be without Excuse if he either Pray'd not at all or to no purpose Among which Directions the Importunity recommended in this Parable and in that other before-mention'd so near of Kin to it is greatly to be regarded as that which will certainly if other Requisites are not wanting for there are others bring down a Blessing But because there are other Things requir'd both by our Lord and his Apostles in order to our Praying successfully besides Importunity I think it will not be amiss if I discourse more largely of this great and concerning Duty of Prayer than I could do if I strictly confin'd my self to the Bounds of this Parable and endeavour these three Things First To prove that Prayer is not only an inestimable Privilege but the Duty of every Christian Secondly To shew how far the Obligation to this Duty does extend And Thirdly What are the necessary Requisites that this Duty may be perform'd successfully First Prayer is not only the Privilege but the Duty of every Christian Watch and pray Mat 26.41 that ye enter not into Temptation was Our Lord's Charge to Peter and the two Sons of Zebedee in the Garden of his Agony and not to them only but to all others that are in their Circumstances i. e. in great Danger of being tempted and weak and unable of Themselves to make Resistance and that God knows we all of us are and therefore to all of us is this Command directed Ask and ye shall have seek and ye shall find knock and it shall be open'd unto you says the same Blessed Jesus immediately after one of the Parables before mention'd as if he had said God will be gracious and relieve your Necessities but 't is upon Condition you will lay your Wants before him and implore his Help according to that of S. James chap. 4. ver 2. Ye have not because ye ask not In the Sixth of Matthew our Lord has set us a Pattern of Prayer and commanded us to use it When ye pray say Our Father c. And he spake the Parable we are now discoursing on to this very purpose That men ought always to pray and not to faint and he himself was our Example too in this Matter and continued whole Nights in Prayer unto God and his Example in Things within our reach as assiduous Prayer is we are upon innumerable Accounts obliged to follow And as our Lord so his Apostles bind this upon us as our Duty Phil. 4.6 Col. 4.2 Eph. 6.18 1 Tim. 2.8 1 Thes 5.17 Thus S. Paul bids us in every thing by Prayer and Supplication with Thanksgiving to let our Requests be made known unto God and to continue in Prayer and watch in the same with all Perseverance and to Pray every where and without ceasing The Duty we see is sufficiently bound upon us by our Holy Religion 'T is plain and express and must as carefully be observ'd as any other Command so sollicitous is our good God for our Happiness as by all Means to bring us to the Practice of what will be so highly beneficial to us And where the Love of a Thing upon Account of its own Excellency and Serviceableness to our Selves will not attract our numbred senseless Souls there to goad and prick us on and even force us to it by Threats of Punishment if we refuse Good God! That Men should need haling to Felicity And that God should be so desirous of it as thus to take all Measures to bring us to it O the unaccountable Stupidity of Man and the unsearchable Riches of the Goodness of God! And what a
that of St. James If any Man lack Wisdom let him ask of God but let him ask in Faith nothing wavering for such a Man shall not receive any thing of the Lord James 1. 5 6. The meaning of all which I suppose to be this That as the Apostles upon their firm Belief of the Truth of our Lord's Promise of enabling them to work Miracles for the Advancement of the Christian Religion and of his Power to do accordingly should when they pray'd for his Help be enabl'd to do as they desired so all other Believers if their Prayers are accompanied with a strong Belief of his Veracity in promising to hear the Prayers of the Faithful of his Ability to relieve and help them and of his infinite Goodness and Willingness to grant them their Desires if it be expedient for them they shall certainly speed well and receive a Blessing at the Hand of God The very Petitions they offer up if for their Good shall be granted them and if not for their Good God in his infinite Wisdom will bestow something else upon them that shall be more for their Advantage And they may depend upon it they shall not be sent away empty But he that wavereth and is of doubtful Mind in these Particulars and prays with great Diffidency and distrust of prevailing as his Prayers must needs be very cool and without that Life and Fervour and Importunacy which we shall see presently is likewise necessary to our Success so his Mind must be in strange Agitation and toss'd between the Waves of two contrary and very perplexing Passions Hope and Fear and the latter having manifestly the Advantage with such a Man for if his Hope were stronger than his Fear he would be more fix'd and steady than he is 't is a Thousand to one but at length after intollerable Disquietudes and Anxiety of Mind he will split upon Despair or down-right Atheism So true is that of St. James Chap. 1. Vers 6 8. He that wavereth is like a Wave of the Sea driven about and tossed a double minded Man is unstable in all his Ways and so necessary is it that we should firmly believe and be actually perswaded when we pray that our Petitions if for our Good shall be granted us by our Heavenly Father There is yet one thing more requir'd if we would succeed in our Devotions and which is of very great Avail in this Matter and that is a Holy Earnestness and Importunity And 't is a thing so much to be observ'd that our Lord deliver'd two Parables cited at the Beginning of this Discourse to this very Purpose That Men ought always to pray and not to faint In both there is a Delay and Denial for a Time but at length the Importunate prevail Now though the Reason why our Saviour directs to this Importunity cannot be the same with that mention'd in the Parables God's Quietness and Happiness being not to be disturb'd nor he teas'd and weari'd into Compliance as those in the Parables were yet there may be several other Reasons given for it 'T is a Manifestation of our earnest Desire of prevailing and that we indeed highly value what we thus importunately beg for 't is a means to make us prize a Blessing the more which we so hardly come by and to be the more thankful for it when we receive it and the more careful not to lose or forfeit it 'T is a Tryal of our Patience an Exercise of our Faith and Hope and Dependence upon God it teacheth Humility and Self-Denial and Amendment of our Faults lest our Continuance in them render us unworthy of God's Favour it makes Devotion burn bright and vigorously and is of great Advantage to all the Purposes of Religion For these and such like Reasons it is that our good God who giveth to all Men freely and upbraideth not has made Importunity a Condition in order to the obtaining our Requests and indeed the Blessings God encourages us to ask and bestows upon us are so great that the utmost Earnestness and most importunate Addresses and the longest Attendance will be abundantly repaid with a Grant at last Having thus done what I at first propos'd to do upon the Parable of the importunate Widow and prov'd that Prayer is not only the Privilege but the Duty of every Christian and shewn how far the Obligation to this Duty does extend and what those Requisites are which are necessary to the effectual Performance of this Duty viz Purity of Life and Manners Sincerity of Intention Just and Upright Dealing with one another express'd by St. Paul by lifting up Holy Hands and likewise a quiet peaceable Temper of Mind not given to Strife and Wrath but apt to be reconcil'd and to forgive together with a full Assurance of Faith in the Veracity and Power and Goodness of God accompanied with a Holy Earnestness and Importunity It remains only that we all of us be exhorted diligently and heartily according to the Measures before describ'd to put in Practice this so beneficial a Duty There is no Place no Time but we have need of God's Favour and Protection and we may always and in every Place beseech it of him and he has promis'd to hear and accept us whenever we address to him as we ought 'T is Prayer that sanctifies Prosperity and makes light the Burthens of Adversity and brings a Blessing upon our Business and Callings and is the greatest Cordial upon the Bed of Sickness wherefore Let us pray every where lifting up Holy Hands without Wrath and doubting and by an Importunity not to be denied do a pleasing Violence to Heaven For every one that thus asketh Matth. 11.10 c. receiveth If a Son shall ask any of us that is a Father Bread or a Fish or an Egg will we give him a Stone or a Serpent or a Scorpion If we then being evil know how to give good Gifts to our Children how much more shall our Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit and all other needful Blessings to them that ask him The PRAYER MOst Gracious God who not only permittest but dost encourage nay command us to make our Requests known unto thee and hast promised by thy Blessed Son that whatever we ask in his Name if it be expedient for us we shall receive assist me with thy Grace so to advert to the All-sufficiency and Almighty Goodness of thy Divine Nature and the miserable Indigency of my own that I may have a due Value for this inestimable Favour and be so much my own Friend as often to bend my Knees before the Throne of thy Grace and lay my Supplications before thee I humbly confess O Lord and deplore my hitherto great and stupid Backwardness in this Heavenly and most beneficial Duty and earnestly beseech thee that for the time to come thou would'st prepare my Soul by the Inspirations of thy Blessed Spirit that it may become a House of Prayer and a fit Habitation for
that he would turn away that fierce Anger from him which he is very sensible he has but too much deserv'd Thus David fram'd a Psalm on purpose to confess and bewail his great Transgressions in the Matter of Uriah He then forgot all that was good in him and did not expect that his former excellent Piety should cover and make Amends for those foul Sins He did not search for Excuses and endeavour to extenuate his Guilt but like a truly humble Penitent chang'd his usual Strain of Praise and Thansgiving for the Accents of Grief and Shame and better Remorse acknowledging his Transgressions and having his Sins ever before him and with the most pathetick Earnestness of a broken and contrite Heart begging God's Forgiveness and that he would again Greate in him a clean Heart and renew a right Spirit within him As if those his great Wickednesses had not only polluted all that before was good in him but quite destroy'd the Rectitude and Integrity of his Soul And as David so S. Peter when he reflected upon the great Baseness of Denying his divine Master and Saviour his Spirit was so truly humbled that without endeavouring in the least to conceal or palliate his Fault he went out and wept bitterly And so the Publican in the Parable would not so much as lift up his Eyes to Heaven but stood afar off in the Court of the Gentiles which was the lowest of all and with great Compunction of Spirit smote upon his Breast and said God be merciful to me a Sinner And thus much for the First Thing to be done upon this Parable which was to shew what the Grace of Spiritual Humility is viz. a not Over-valuing our spiritual Excellencies nor our Selves by reason of them nor despising others as less Holy but returning all the Glory to God who made us to differ nor undervaluing or endeavouring to excuse and extenuate our Wickednesses but an impartial considering the Vileness and great Aggravations of them and sincere humbling our Selves for them at the Throne of God The Second Thing to be done is to shew how excellent and beneficial this Vertue is in our Christian Course and how vile and mischievous the contrary Vice is 'T is a sufficient Argument that this Vertue is very excellent and of great Benefit to Christians that our Lord has plac'd it in the Front of his Beatitudes which he begins thus Blessed are the poor in Spirit Like a wise Master-Builder he lays the Foundation low of a Building that was to reach so very high and Humbleness of Mind must be the Ground-work of that Religion which will advance a Man to Heaven Piety without Humility is very apt to make Men top-heavy and over-set like a Ship without her Ballast 't is this that preserves the Soul unshaken amidst the Temptations of the World as that makes a Ship sail sure and steady amidst the mighty Billows The House in the Gospel that was founded upon a sandy Surface of the Earth soon yielded to the Fury of the Tempest and great was the Fall of it our Lord therefore begins with poverty of Spirit as the Basis and great security of all his other Building which he foresaw and foretold was to undergo the Shock of many a furious Storm and contend with all the Powers of the Prince of Darkness But more particularly this Grace of Spiritual Humility is so excellent and highly beneficial that nothing more conduces to a Man's Spiritual growth and Encrease in Vertue nor renders him more dear both to God and Man First Nothing more conduces to a Man's spiritual growth and Encrease in Vertue For 't is very true in Religion as well as in Worldly Affairs That nothing makes Men more industrious than a due sense of their Wants and the poorness of their Stock whereas when a Man thinks he has Abundance he is generally Slothful and Careless and Impoverishment becomes his Lot rather than a farther Improvement An humble Sense of a Man's Imperfections and Sins will make him doubly diligent and consequently to improve greatly in the School of Righteousness but haughty Conceitedness will certainly make him grow worse and worse Nay there will be no End of the humble minded Man's Improvement for 't is always found in the pursuit of Vertue as well as of Knowledge that the more real Vertue increases in the Soul of a Good Man the more and greater the Defects of his Vertue appear to be and consequently the more will his Diligence be quickned and spurr'd on as St. Paul the farther he advanced in the Christian Race the more conscious he grew that he had not yet apprehended what he endeavoured after and was not yet perfect and that made him forget what was behind his former Attainments and reach out to what was still before what he had not yet attain'd to and eagerly press forward to the Mark the Prize of the High Calling of God in Christ Jesus Now the Consequence of this extraordinary Diligence must needs be an extraordinary growth and increase and so still onward in a quick and vigorous Motion till he finishes his Vertuous Race and is perfect as his Father which is in Heaven is perfect And as this spiritual Humility makes a Man move swiftly in the Christian Course so it makes him tread surely too it ballances him and keeps him upon his Centre and secures him from those dangerous Falls which too often are the Fate of the high-minded and proud for 't was Pride and Haughtiness of Spirit we know that ruin'd the Prince of the Fallen Angels and his Accomplices But poverty of Spirit is the great Security of a Christian against the subtle Arts of the Tempter 't is the proper Mark and Character of a Disciple of the meek lowly Jesus and is a disposition of Mind the most of all apt for Repentance which is a Grace of infinite Value as being absolutely necessary to Salvation and entitles a Man in a peculiar manner to the Divine Aid and Assistance for God giveth Grace to the Humble Secondly As this spiritual Humility is of the greatest Benefit to a Christian so does it render him highly dear both to God and Man All Men love an humble Man and look upon him as a Wise and Extraordinary Person and he that is pious and circumspect in his Conversation and yet is not proud of it nor despises or haughtily reflects upon others that live more at large than he does but advises them better seasonably and with Meekness and Humility such a Man is esteem'd as a Person sent from God to do Good to Mankind that seeing his Good Works mix'd with poverty of Spirit they may be inclined to imitate so lovely an Example and glorifie their Father which is in Heaven by treading in his Steps And as for God S. Peter and S. James and the Wisest of Men all agree that he resisteth the proud but giveth Grace to the humble And our Lord himself at the end of the Parable we
unavoidable endless and unconceivable Misery was certainly infinite Compassion wonderfully great and beyond Comparison Fifthly The Consequence of God's forgiving Sinners is infinitely happier than that of the Forgiveness of the poor Debtor in the Parable He after his Lord 's loosing and forgiving him was out of Fear indeed of that sad Misfortune which otherwise must have faln upon him he enjoy'd his Liberty and that of his Wife and Children and continu'd still in Possession of what he had 'till he forfeited all again by his Cruelty to his Fellow-Servant which was no mean Comfort but then this was all We read of no new Favours conferr'd upon him or that he was entrusted with any more of his Lord's Revenue or the like But now the compassionate God has to Forgiveness of Sinners added innumerable and inestimable Faziours dignifi'd them with the Title of his Sons communicated to them fresh Assistances of his blessed Spirit to help and guide them in the Way to Happiness and promised them Crowns of eternal Glory and everlasting Inheritances in Heaven and an intimate Vision and Enjoyment of himself who is the Center of Felicity provided they continue sincerely obedient to him for the Time to come There is no Happiness which a rational Creature is capable of but God in his infinite Mercy freely and bountifully confers upon Man-kind now that his Compassions have reconciled them to him 1 Tim. 6.17 and in the Words of St. Paul He gives us richly all things to enjoy And for God not only to forgive obstinate Rebels against his divine Government to pass by their vile Ingratitude to him their greatest Benefactor and base Abuse of his Blessings to his Dishonour but to confer upon 'em Favours of the greatest Value to receive 'em into his own Bosom and make 'em Coheirs with his eternal Son and advance 'em to his heavenly Kingdom This is such an admirable Expression of the divine Goodness and Love of Mankind as could never proceed from any other but him who is Goodness it self In the last Place that which exalts the Compassion of God to the highest Degree and makes it indeed miraculous is the amazing Course he took thus to shew Mercy in the Pardon of Sinners and yet satisfie his Justice too The King in the Parable was at Liberty to dispose of his own as he pleased and he might have forgiven without further Regard to any thing of Justice in that Case a greater Debt if it had been owing to him But in the Case of God's forgiving Sinners it was otherwise God had before solemnly declar'd to our first Parents and very often afterwards that the Soul that sinned it should die and his Justice was concern'd to see that Sentence executed and in the Nature of the thing likewise 't was perfectly just that the Violaters of God's holy and good Commands ungrateful Rebels against their Creator and greatest Benefactor should receive a due Recompence for their Wickedness Now Justice is as essential to God as Mercy and though his infinite Goodness mov'd him to have Compassion upon Sinners yet his Justice pleaded for their Punishment Mercy would remit the Debt but Justice required Satisfaction A Difficulty this which mortal Wit could never solve But God who is infinitely wise as well as good and just that the Work of his Hands might not perish nor his Image and Likeness be for ever miserable and that his Justice likewise might be fully satisfyed contriv'd a wondrous Way for the Redemption of Sinners by freely forgiving 'em their vast Debt and yet making full Satisfaction to his Justice for the Sins of the whole World And that was by the Incarnation of his blessed Son and substituting him in our stead to suffer as the Representative of Mankind the Punishment due to their Iniquities and by his spotless Blood to make an universal Attonement and through the Merit of that his precious Sacrifice for what 's above the Merit of the Blood of the Son of God To purchase for them Pardon and Forgiveness the Love and Favour of God in this World and the eternal Enjoyment of him in the next And by this means as the Apostle expresses it Rom. 3.26 to declare his Righteousnes that he might be just and the Justifyer likewise of him that beleiveth in Jesus Thus Mercy and Truth are miraculously met together and Righteousness and Peace have kiss'd each other And for ever blessed be that infinitely wise and just Compassion which in so wondrous a Manner contriv'd the Forgiveness of our vast Debt and the Satisfaction of the divine Justice too What Love can be greater than this that God should send his eternal Son into the World to be the Propitiation for Sinners And that while we were Enemies Christ should dye for us and bear our Sins in his own Body on the Tree that through his Stripes we might be healed Wonderful art thou O Lord in thy Doings towards the Children of Men and thy Mercy is over all thy Works And O that our Hearts might be warm'd with the same divine Flame and we might love much to whom so much hath been forgiven And thus much for the first thing to be considered in this Parable namely the glorious Example of Forgiveness that God has set us in his dealing thus mercifully with us miserable Sinners who lay under a vast Debt to the divine Justice and had nothing to pay and how infinitely this Compassion of God to Sinners exceeds the greatest and most generous Expression of Forgiveness that can be shewn by one Man to another 'T is greater than the King 's forgiving Ten Thousand Talents to his poor Servant in the Parable because he entreated him and had nothing to pay I proceed now to the second General to be consider'd in this Parable which is God's great Displeasure against those that will not imitate this his compassionate Example in forgiving such as have been injurious to them but like that wicked Servant to whom the King had been so gracious rigidly requiring full Satisfaction for little Trifles and Punctilios As he no sooner out of the Presence of his compassionate Lord but took his Fellow-Servant by the Throat who ow'd him an Hundred Pence and though intreated to have Patience as earnestly as he had but just before intreated his offended Lord yet without the least Pity threw him into Prison till he should pay the Debt The Consequence of such a revengeful Temper will be like that of this cruel Servant who was not only severely rebuked for his Wickedness but had the Pardon his Lord gave him recalled and was deliver'd over to the Tormentors till he should pay the uttermost Farthing So likewise shall my heavenly Father do unto you says our Lord if ye from your Hearts forgive not every one his Brother their Trespasses And under this General there are likewise as was said Three Particulars to be considered First What it is to forgive one another as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven us