and a stubborn uncompliance with it in the issues of things is direct Rebellion mixt with ingratitude obstructive to our present Peace and future Happiness If the Afflicted would for a while suspend their Tears and Sighs and with free Reason consider that what relation soever they had in their dearest Loss whether of a Father a Son of a Husband or Wife or any other amiable and passionate terms yet God hath a nearer right and juster claim in those Persons being his by the best Titles of Creation and Redemption it would silence murmurings and impatience and stop the scope of inordinate Sorrow Our Propriety in them was derived from his Favour and our Possession was depending on his Will for his Right in all his Creatures is unalienable This consideration was the foundation of Job's Patience when he was stript of all his outward Comforts how composed was he in his Mind how considerate in his words he reflects upon his Native Poverty Naked came I into the World and naked shall I return thither and Adores God's Dominion The Lord hath given and the Lord hath taken blessed be his Name Add farther that which by immediate connection follows the consideration of the glorious Majesty of God and our natural meanness and unworthiness The distance and disproportion is so vast between him and us that we are not able to conceive the full and just Idea of his Excellent Greatness We are fain to assist our Minds in the Thoughts of God by sensible representations and to express our Conceptions by borrowed terms His Immensity by the Ocean his Eternity by the returning of a Circle into it self his Power by Thunder his Majesty by the Sun in its Meridian splendours As the flying Fishes Shoals of which are met in sailing to the Indies can fly no longer than their Wings remain moist when those Membranes are dry they cannot move and are forc'd to dip themselves again in the Sea that by softening them they may renew their Flight Thus when we ascend in our Minds to God we form no Conceptions but what take their rise from sensible things which infinitely fall short of his Perfections Who can fully understand the transcendent Excellencies of his Nature Who can describe what is ineffable and most worthy to be ador'd with silent admiration and extasy of Mind He dwells in that Light which is inaccessible the Angels the most comprehensive Spirits vail their faces in the presence of his Glory He is his own Original but without Beginning alone but not solitary one ever Blessed God yet communicates his intire Deity to the Son and Spirit he is not divided in number nor confused in Unity He is not compell'd by Necessity nor chang'd by Liberty nor measur'd by Time If we ascend to the first Fountains of all Ages then his Infinite Understanding comprehended in one clear view the whole compass extent and duration of all things His powerful Word made the visible and invisible World and upholds them That which was spoken with Flattery of a Roman Emperour by Seneca who as much degenerated from the dignity of a Stoical Philosopher in licking Nero as in biting Alexander is absolutely true of the Sovereign Lord of the World His Providence is the Band that unites the parts of the Universal Common-Wealth the Vital Spirit and Vertue that sustains all Without his Eye and Hand his dispositive Wisdom and Power the whole frame would disband and fall into Confusion and Ruine He is seated upon the Throne of the Universe Thousand thousands of glorious Spirits minister unto him and ten thousand times ten thousand stand before him in the quality and humility of his Servants ready to execute his Commands He is the Judg of the Living and the Dead that disposeth of Heaven and Hell for Ever And what is Man a little Breathing Dust. He is infinitely above us and so strangely condescends in having a tender care of us that the Psalmist was swallowed up in Extasy and Amazement at the thoughts of it Lord What is Man that thou art mindful of him or the Son of Man that thou regardest him Nay we are beneath his Anger as a Worm is not worthy of the indignation of an Angel Now the more we magnify God and exalt his Authority in our Judgments the more our Wills are prepared to yield to him His Excellency will make us afraid to oppose his Providence When the Son of God appeared to Saul in his Glory and commanded in Person he presently lets fall his Arms of Defiance and says Lord what wilt thou have me to do His Resignation was absolute nothing was so hard to do nothing so formidable to suffer but he was ready to accomplish and endure in obedience to Christ. The more we debase and vilify our selves the more easy it will be to bear what God inflicts Humility disposeth to Submission Our Passions are not excited at the breaking of an ordinary Glass but if a Vessel of Christal be broken it moves us the lower esteem we have of our selves the less we shall be transported for any breach that is made upon us We read in the History of Job many heavy Complaints uttered by him of his Sufferings all the sad Figures of passionate Eloquence made use of to represent them and the fruitless Essays of his Friends that did rather exasperate than appease his Spirit And it is very observable that when the Lord interposed himself to justify the ways of his Providence he did not charge upon him the guilt of his Sins that deserved the severest Judgments but appears in his Glory and reminds himof his original nothing Where wast thou when I laid the Foundations of the Earth declare if thou hast Understanding He opens to him some of the Excellencies of the Deity in the works of Creation and Providence and the present effect was Job adored with humble Reverence the Divine Majesty and acknowledged his own unworthiness Behold I am vile what shall I answer thee I will lay my hand upon my mouth now mine eyes see thee I abhor my self and repent in Dust and Ashes The thickest smoak by ascending dissipates and vanishes If the troubled Soul did ascend to Heaven and consider that even the worst Evils are either from the operation or permission of the Divine Providence the Cloudy disturbing Thoughts and Passions would be presently scattered David had a blessed experiment of this in his distress I was dumb and opened not my mouth because thou didst it Such an awful apprehension he had of God as transcendently superiour to him and unaccountable for his Proceedings When any impatient Thoughts arise we should presently chain them up for there is Folly and Fury in them What am I that my sullen Spirit should dispute against the Orders of Heaven that my Passions should resist the Will of of the highest Lord that my Desires should depose him from his Throne For thus by implication and consequence they do who
the best Men are not all Spirit but united to Flesh and when the Body is under strong pains the Soul suffers in its sufferings and while we are thus compounded the loss of those Comforts that support and sweeten the present Life must cause Grief 'T is easy to utter brave Expressions and lay down severe Precepts in contempt of Evils when they are at a distance but hard to sustain the Spirit under the actual feeling of them 't is one thing to discourse of a Battel and another to be engaged in the heat of it But supposing by a Philosophical Charm the Heart were so hardned as to be proof against the most piercing afflictions such a forced insensibility is not regular but proceeds from the extinction of Humanity and Piety and that will appear by considering Afflictions in a natural or moral respect First in a natural respect for so they are destructive or oppressive Evils and a pensive feeling of them is suitable to the Law of our Creation for the Humane Nature is framed with such Senses and Passions as according to God's intention should be affected suitably to the quality of their objects and if the Soul acts rationally 't is moved accordingly A Saint on Earth is not a Saint in Heaven raised above all Disasters and Troubles freed from all hurtful impressions from without and sorrowful impressions within but is liable to afflicting evils And it is becoming his Duty to have his passions pliable to his condition but without excess the Eyes must not be drown'd nor dry but tenderly affected Secondly Considered in a moral respect as they are sent from the high and just Providence of God it is absolutely necessary there should be an humble resentment of his Displeasure This is a consequent of the former for if our affections are seared up that we do not feel the stroke how shall we regard the hand that smites us If we are not sensible of Affliction we are secure in our Sins Natural Sorrow is introductive of Godly Sorrow There are two extreams to be avoided by the afflicted according to the direction of Solomon in the person of Wisdom and repeated by the Apostle My Son despise not thou the chastening of the Lord nor faint when thou art rebuked of him Some are discouraged and over-born by Afflictions as insupportable others are stubborn and careless and never lay them to heart they never look upward to the original efficient Cause an Offended God nor inward to the impulsive deserving Cause their Sins but esteem them fortuitous Events that happen in this mutable state without a design to correct and reform Sinners or to proceed from a blind necessity things of course or meerly regard the second Causes and Instruments of their Troubles accordingly when they meet with Calamities all their care is by a perverse shift to seek for relief onely in Temporal Comforts without serious applying themselves to God whose end in sending Troubles is to reclaim us from Sin to Holiness from Earth to Heavens from the Creatures to himself This secret Atheism like a benumming Opium stupifies the Conscience and the insensibility of God's hand inflicting Evils is as different from Christian Patience and Constancy as a mortal Lethargy is from the quiet soft Sleep of Health Nothing kindles his Anger more than neglecting it 't is equally provoking with the despising of his Love It is a symptom of a wretched state of Soul if there proceed no sighs and groans no signs of grief from the sense of God's displeasure it is a sad evidence there is no Spiritual Life Indolence under the effects of God's Anger is like the stilness of the Dead Sea whose Calm is a Curse The Jews tho intitled the People of God are deeply charg'd for this prodigious Madness O Lord thou hast struck them but they have not grieved thou hast consumed them but they refused to receive correction they have made their faces harder than a Rock they have refused to return Jer. 5. 3. We have whole Quarries of such obdurate Wretches amongst us this impenitent disregard of God's hand is a dreadful presage of future and more heavy Judgments Who ever hardned himself against the Lord and prospered Do we provoke the Lord to Jealousy are we stronger than he The most refractory Sinner he can compel to acknowledg with bitter lamentations his Wickedness and weakness how unable he is to contend with his Judge But supposing a respite from Punishment here there is an Hell prepared for stubborn Sinners where is Weeping and Wailing for ever Whom the Rods do not awaken the Scorpions shall Secondly I shall now proceed to explicate what is included in the resignment of our selves to God in times of Affliction This will be made evident by considering the leading powers and faculties which Grace sanctifies and works in according to their natural subordination The Understanding approves the severest dispensations of Providence to be good that is for reasons though sometimes unsearchable yet always righteous and for gracious ends to the Saints When Hezekiah heard the heavy Prophecy that all his Treasures should be carried to Babylon and his Royal Progeny should become Slaves there he said to Isaiah Good is the Word of the Lord which thou hast spoken His sanctified Mind acknowledged it to be a just Correction of his vain Pride and quietly submitted to it And as there is a satisfaction of Mind in the rectitude so in the graciousness of his Proceedings The misapprehension and mis-belief of God's design in afflicting causeth Impatience and Murmuring but when the Mind is convinced that he afflicts us for our Benefit that Bodily Diseases are Medicinal Advantages the remedies of the Soul that the losses of Earthly Comforts prepare us for Divine Enjoyments that the way which is sowed with Thorns and watered with Tears leads to Heaven the Heart is compliant with the sharpest methods of Providence But these things will be more fully opened under the several heads of Arguments to enforce the Duty This Resignment principally consists in the consent and subjection of the Will to the Orders of Heaven The Will is an imperious Faculty naturally impatient of opposition to its Desires and we pay the highest honour to God in the lowest submission of our Wills to his Appointments 'T is true the Will cannot make a direct choice of Evil nor love Afflictions but the Holy Spirit by a powerful Operation so disposeth it as to renounce its own inclinations when discordant with the Will of God And the more humble ready and entire the Submission is the more difficult and harsh the denial of our natural desire is the more supernatural Grace shines and is acceptable It is the perfection of Holiness to do what God loves and to love what God does There is a rare example of this in David's carriage when under his greatest Affliction 't was in his flight from his Son Absalom who endeavoured to deprive him of
his Kingdom and Life And the King said unto Zadock the Priest Carry back the Ark of God into the City if I shall find favour in his eyes he will bring me again and shew me both it and his Habitation but if he shall say I have no delight in thee behold here I am let him do to me as seems good unto him O happy frame his Spirit was so equally ballanced That if God would suffer a Rebel that violated the most tender and strict relations of a Son and Subject to a Gracious Father and Sovereign the Murtherer of his Brother and a Parricide in his desires to usurp his Throne he humbly submitted to it The Duty of Resignation consists in the composure of the Affections to a just measure and temper when under the sharpest Discipline Of the Passions some are tender and melting others are fierce and stormy and if a ponderous oppressing Evil happen or the loss of that good that was very pleasing they sometimes join together as the Clouds at the same time dissolve in Showers and break forth in Thunder and Lightning Now when sanctified Reason hath a due Empire over them and the Soul possesseth it self in Patience it is a happy effect of Resignation to the Divine disposal Of this we have an eminent instance in the afflicted Saint forementioned When David was so wickedly reproached by Shimei and Abishai fired with Indignation would presently have taken exemplary revenge by stopping his Breath for ever Should this dead Dog Curse my Lord the King Let me go over I pray thee and take off his Head How cool and calm was David's Spirit he felt no aestuations nor tumults within exprest no outragious complaints but said Let him Curse because the Lord hath said to him Curse David There is a twofold excess of the Sorrowful Affections in Troubles I. In the degrees of them II. In the continuance First In the degrees of them when they exceed their causes Afflictive things that deeply wound us are usually represented by the reflection of Sorrow with all the heightning Circumstances the Loss as unvaluable the Evil as intollerable As objects are greater than their true proportion when seen through a Mist so do Evils apprehended through Grief and after such a false judgment the Passions take their violent course and the Spirit sinks under overwhelming heaviness The Soul is disabled from performing what belongs to it with respect to the general and particular Calling and cannot with freedom wait upon God but neglects its duty and felicity 'T was the complaint of the afflicted Poet Hei mihi quod miseros prudentia prima relinquit The first effect of misery is black confusion in the thoughts that the Mind doth not distinctly consider and apply such things as would be effectual to mitigate or remove it Besides as when the Stream overflows the Channel it runs foul and turbid so immoderate Sorrow often causeth secret Discontent and Anger at the Almighty disquieting and tormenting risings of heart against his Providence All things are disordered and turbulent in the little and marvelous Monarchy of the Soul And such seeds of incitation are in our corrupt Nature that in the extremity of Anguish the furious Passions swell into a Storm and break the restraints of Reason and Grace Job in a hot fit expostulates strangely with God Is it good unto thee that thou shouldest oppress He was a Holy Man and a Prophet who in the Paroxism of his Passion curst the day of his Birth Secondly There is an Excess in the continuance Deep Grief doth more arrest the Thoughts upon its object than the Affection of Joy doth The Mind is not so easily diverted from what afflicts as from what delights The main strain of the Soul is towards the mournful Object and in the midst of Comforts to support the fainting Spirts there still remains a sad remembrance of that which torments a swarm of stinging thoughts continually wound and inflame the Breast no Counsels prevail but the Soul is resolved in its grief and always restless with a bitter desire of what is irrecoverable Thus the Prophet describes the misery of Rachel weeping for her Children and would not be comforted because they were not As some Venomous Creatures turn all that they eat into Poison so obstinate Sorrow takes occasion from every thing to encrease it self This consumes the strength and the Mourner lives only to feel his Misery and thinks Death too slow for him that was so precipitate for the person lamented Thus by the fixed contemplation of its Trouble the Soul is distracted from its heavenly Original and from pursuing its blessed End and indulgeth its Sorrow as if the loss of a Temporal Comfort were utterly undoing to it This obstinate grief is inconsistent with a resigned frame of Spirit Though in great Afflictions there will be a conflict of Nature and it is Wisdom to let Grief breath forth and have a passage yet Grace will asswage the Fury and limit the time by regarding the Will of God and by deriving from the Springs of Comfort above some inward refreshings when the Streams below totally fail I shall now propound the Arguments that will clearly convince us of this Duty of Resignation some of which are powerful to silence all rebellious Arguings and suppress all the transports of the Passions others to raise the drooping Spirits and incline the Heart to a calm yielding and compleat subjection to the Divine Will The first Argument ariseth from God's Original Supream Right in our Persons and all things we enjoy He is the Fountain of Being and produced us out the depth of our native nothing and made us little lower than the Angels He is the Author of all our Good the just and true Proprietor of all his Benefits From hence results his Sovereignty and Dominion over us which is declared in his Law and the dispensations of his Providence His Law is the Rule of our Lives and Actions his Governing Providence the Rule of our Sufferings and Passions There is indispensibly due a free and full Obedience to his Commands and an intire universal Resignation to the Orders of his Providence The enjoyment of all our Blessings is from his pure Goodness and rich Bounty which requires our humble and affectionate Thankfulness and his resumption of them should be entertained with a Holy and a Patient Submission He gives them freely and may recall them at his Pleasure In whatsoever instance his Will is declared we must with Humility and Meekness submit for he hath an equal Empire in disposing all things that are equally his own and we are bound by an equal Obedience to acknowledg his Dominion When Eli received the terrible message of the ruine of his Family the final excision of it from the dignity of the Priesthood he patiently submits It is the Lord let him do what seemeth him good The meer desire of exemption from his over-ruling Will is a heinous Sin