call for my most earnest compassions and hasty diligence to pluck them out of the burning Iud. 23. and therefore to these first I shall apply my self in these lines But whence shall I fetch my arguments or how shall I choose my words Lord wherewith shall I wooe them whereby shall I win them Oh that I could but tell I would write unto them in tears I would weep out every argument I would empty my veins for ink I would petition them on my knees verily were I able I would O how thankfully I would if they would be prevailed with to repent and turn How long have I travelled in birth with you how frequently have I made suit to you how often would I have gathered you how instant have I been with you This is that I have prayed for and studied for for many years that I might bring you to God O that I might but do it Will you yet be intreated O what a happy man might you make me if you would but hearken to me and suffer me to carry you over to Jesus Christ But Lord how insufficient am I for this work I have been many a year wooing for thee but the damsel would not go with me Lord what a task hast thou set me to Alas wherewith shall I pierce the scales of Leviathan or make the heart to feel that is firm as a stone hard as a piece of the nether milstone Shall I go and lay my mouth to the grave and look when the dead will obey me and come forth shall I make an oration to the rocks or declaim to the mountains and think to move them with arguments shall I give the blind to see From the beginning of the world was it not heard that a Man opened the eyes of the blind But thou O Lord canst pierce the scales and prick the heart of the sinner I can but shoot at rovers and draw the bow at a venture do thou direct the arrow between the joints of the harness and kill the sin and save the soul of the sinner that casts his eye into these labours But I must apply my self to you to whom I am sent yet I am at a great loss Would to God I knew how to go to work with you would I stick at the pains God knoweth you your selves are my witnesses how I have followed you in private as well as in publick and have brought the Gospel to your doors testifying to you the necessity of the new birth and perswading you to look in time after a found and through change Beloved I have not acted a part among you to serve my own advantage our Gospel is not yea and nay Have not you heard the same truths from the Pulpit by publick labours and by private letters by personal instructions Bretheren I am of the same mind as ever that holiness is the best choice that there is no entring into Heaven but by the streight passages of the second birth that without holiness you shal never see God Heb. 12. 14. Ah my beloved refresh my bowels in the Lord. If there be any consolation in Christ any comfort of love any fellowship of the spirit any bowels and mercies fulfil you my joy Now give your selves unto the Lord 2 Cor. 8. 5. Now set your faces to seek him Now set up the Lord Jesus in your hearts and set him up in your houses Now come in and kiss the Son Psal. 2. 12. and embrace the tenders of his mercy Touch his Scepter and live why will you die I beg not for my self but fain I would have you happy This is the prize I run for and the white I aim at My souls desire and prayer for you is that you may be saved Rom. 10. 1. The famous Lycurgus having instituted most strict and wholesome laws for his people told them he was necessitated to go a journey from them and got them to bind themselves in an oath that his laws should be observed till his return This done he went into a voluntary banishment and never returned more that they might by vertue of their oath be engaged to the perpetual observing of his laws Methinks I should be glad of the hard conditions which he endured though I love you tenderly so I might but hereby engage you throughly to the Lord Jesus Christ. Dearly beloved would you rejoice the heart of your Ministers Why then embrace the counsels of the Lord by me forgo your sins set to prayer up with the worship of God in your families keep at a distance from the corruptions of the times What greater joy to a Minister than to hear of souls born unto Christ by him and that his children walk in the truth 2 Iâ—h 4. Brethren I beseech you suffer a friendly plainness and freedom with you in your deepest concernments I am not playing the oratour to make a learned speech to you nor dressing my dish with eloquence wherewith to please you These lines are upon a weighty errand indeed viz. to convince and convert and save you I am not baiting my hook with Rhetorick nor fishing for your applause but for your souls My work is not to please you but to save you nor is my business with your fancies but your hearts If I have not your hearts I have nothing If I were to please your ears I would sing another song If I were to preach my self I would steer another course I could then tell you a smoother tale I would make you pillows and speak you peace for how can Ahab love this Micaiah that alwaies prophesies evil concerning him 1 King 22. 8. But how much better are the wounds of a friend than the fair speeches of the harlot who flattereth with her lips till the dart strike through the liver and hunteth for the precious life Prov. 7. 21. 22 23. Prov. 6. 26. If I were to quiet a crying infant I might sing him into a pleasant mood or rock him asleep but when the child is fallen into the fire the parent takes another course he will not now go to still him with a song or trifle I know if we speed not with you you are lost if we cannot get your consent to arise and come away you perish for ever No Conversion and no Salvation I must get your good will or leave you miserable But here the difficulty of my work again recurrs upon me Lord choose my stones out of the rock 1 Sam. 17. 40. v. 45. I come in the name of the Lord of Hosts the God of the armies of Israel I come forth like the stripling against Goliah to wrestle not with flesh and blood but with Principalities and Powers and the Rulers of the darkness of this world Eph. 6. 12. This day let the Lord smite the Philistine and spoil the strong man of his Armour and give me to fetch off the captives out of his hand Lord choose my words choose my weapons for me and when I put my hand
Luke 14. 26. Well then pause a little and look within Doth not this nearly concern thee Thou pretendest for Christ but doth not the world sway thee Dost thou not take more real delight and content in the world than in him Dost not thou find thy self better at ease when the world goes to thy mind and thou art encompassed with carnal delights than when retired to prayer and meditation in thy closet or attending upon Gods word and worship No surer evidence of an unconverted state than to have the things of the world uppermost in our aims love and estimations 1 Iohn 2. 15. Iames 4. 4. With the sound Convert Christ hath the supremacy How dear is this name to him How precious is its favour Cant. 1. 3. Psal. 45. 8. The name of Jesus is engraven upon his heart Gal. 4. 19. and lies as a bundle of myrrh between his breasts◠Cant. 1. 13 14. Honour is but air and laughter is but madness and Mammon is fallen like Dagon before the ark with hands and head broken off on the threshold when once Christ is savingly revealed Here is the pearl of great price to the true Convert here is his treasure here is his hope Matth. 13. 44 45. This is his glory My beloved is mine and I am his Gal. 6. 14. Cant. 2. 16. Oh 't is sweeter to him to be able to say Christ is mine than if he could say the Kingdom is mine the Indies are mine Fourthly our own righteousness Before Conversion man seeks to cover himself with his own fig-leaves Phil. 3. 6 7. and to lick himself whole with his own duties Mic. 6. 6 7. He is apt to trust in himself Luke 16. 15. and 18. 9. and set up his own righteousness and to reckon his counters for Gold and not submit to the righteousness of God Rom. 10. 3. But Conversion changes his mind now he casts away his filthy rags and counts his own righteousness but a menstruous cloth he casts it off as a man would the verminous tatters of a nasty beggar Esay 64. 6. Now he is brought to poverty of spirit Matth. 5. 3. complains of and condemns himself Rom. 7. and all his inventory is poor and miserable and wretched and blind and naked Rev. 3. 17. He sees a world of iniquity in his holy things calls his once idolized righteousness but flesh and loss and dogs meat and would not for a thousand worlds be found in himself Phil. 3. 4 7 8◠9. His finger is ever upon his sores Psal. 51. 3. his sins his wants Now he begins to set a high price upon Christs righteousness he sees the need of a Christ in every duty to justifie his person and justifie his performances he cannot live without him he cannot pray without him Christ must go with him or else he cannot come into the presence of God he leans upon the hand of Christ and so he bows himself in the house of his God He sets himself down for a lost undone man without him His life is hid in Christ as the life of man in the heart He is fixed in Christ as the roots of the tree spread in the earth for stability and nutriment Before the news of a Christ was a stale and sapless thing but now how sweet is a Christ Augustine could not relish his before so much admired Cicero because he could not find the name of Christ. How pathetically cries he Dulcissime amantis benignis claris c. quando te videbo quando satiabor de pulchritudine tuâ Medit. c. 37. O most sweet most loving most kind most dear most precious most desired most lovely most fair c. all in a breath when he speaks of and to his Christ. In a word the voice of the Convert is with the Martyr None but Christ. 2. The terms to which are either Vltimate or Subordinate and mediate The Vltimate is God the Father Son and Holy Ghost whom the true Convert takes as his All-sufficient and eternal blessedness A man is never truly sanctified till his very heart be in truth set upon God above all things as his portion and chief good These are the natural breathings of a believers heart Thou art my portion O Lord Psal. 119. 57. My soul shall make her boast in the Lord Psal. 34. 2. My expectation is from him he only is my rock and my salvation he is my defence in God is my salvation and my glory the rock of my strength and my refuge is in God Psal. 62. 1 2 5 6 ◠Psal. 18. 1 2. Would you put it to an issue whether you be converted or not now then let thy soul and all that is within thee attend Hast thou taken God for thy happiness Where doth the content of thy heart lie Whence doth thy choicest comfort come in Come then and with Abraham lift up thine eyes Eastward and Westward and Northward and Southward and cast about thee what it is that thou wouldst have in Heaven or earth to make thee happy If God should give thee thy choice as he did to Solomon or should say to◠thee as Ahasuerus to Esther What is thy petition and what is thy request and it shall we granted thee Esther 5. 3. what wouldst thou ask Go into the gardens of pleasure and gather all the fragrant flowers from thence would these content thee Go to the treasures of Mammon suppose thou mightest lade thy self while thou wouldst from hence go to the towers to the trophies of honour what thinkest thou of being a man of renown of having a name like the name of the great men of the earth Would any of this all this suffice thee and make thee count thy self a happy man If so then certainly thou art carnal and unconverted If not go further wade into the divine excellencies the store of his mercies the hiding of his power the deeps unfathomable of his All-sufficiency Doth this suit thee best and please thee most Dost thou say 'T is good to be here Matth. 17. 4. Here I will pitch here I will live and die Wilt thou let all the world go rather than this Then 't is well between God and thee Happy art thou O man happy art thou that ever thou wast born If a God can make thee happy thou must needs be happy for thou hast avouched the Lord to be thy God Deut. 26. 17. Dost thou say to Christ as he to us Thy father shall be my father and thy God my God Iohn 20. 17. Here is the turning point An unsound professour never takes up his rest in God but converting grace does the work and so cures the fatal misery of the fall by turning the heart from its idols to the living God 1 Thes. 1. 9. Now saies the soul Lord whither should I go Thou hast the words of eternal life Iohn 6. 68. Here he centers here he settles Oh 't is as the entrance of Heaven to him to see his interest in God When he discovers
thou shouldst spread forth thine hands God will hide his eyes though thou make many prayers he will not hear Esay 1. 15. If a man without skill set about our work and marr it in the doing though he take much pains we give him but small thanks God will be worshipped after the due order 1 Chron. 15. 13. If a servant do our work but quite contrary to our order he shall have rather stripes than praise Gods work must be done according to Gods mind or he will not be pleased and this cannot be except it be done with a holy heart 2 Chron. 25. 2. IV. Without this thy hopes are in vain Iob 8. 12 13. The Lord hath rejected thy confidence Ier. 2. 37. First thy hopes of comfort here are in vain 'T is not only necessary to the safety but comfort of your condition that you be converted Without this you shall not know peace Esay 59. 8. Without the fear of God you cannot have the comforts of the Holy Ghost Act 9. 31. God speaks peace only to his people and to his saints Psal. 85. 8. If you have a false peace continuing in your sins 't is not of Gods speaking and then you may guess the Author Sin is a real sickness Esay 1. 5. yea the worst of sickness 't is a leprosie in the head Levit. 13. 44. the plague in the heart 1 Kings 8. 38. 't is brokenness in the bones Psal. 51. 8. it pierceth it woundeth it racketh and tormenteth 1 Tim. 6. 10. A man may as well expect ease when his diseases are in their strength or his bones out of joint as true comfort while in his sins O wretched man that canst have no ease in this case but what comes from the deadliness of thy disease You shall have the poor sick man saying in his lightness he is well when you see death in his face He will needs up and about his business when the very next step is like to be into the grave The unsanctified often feel nothing amiss they think themselves whole and cry not out for the Physician but this shews the danger of their case Sin doth naturally breed distempers and disturbance in the soul. What a continual tempest and commotion is there in a discontented mind What an eating evil is inordinate care What is passion but a very feaver in the mind What is Lust but a fire in the bones What is Pride but a deadly tympany or covetousness but an unsatiable and unsufferable thirst or malice and envy but venom in the very heart Spiritual sloth is but a scurvy in the mind and carnal security a mortal lethargy And how can that soul have true comfort that is under so many diseases But converting grace cures and so eases the mind and prepares the soul for a setled standing immortal peace Great peace have they that love thy commandments and nothing shall offend them Psal. 119. 165. They are the wayes of wisdom that afford pleasure and peace Prov. 3. 17. David had infinitely more pleasure in the word than in all the delights of his Court Psal. 119. 103 127. The conscience cannot be truly pacified till soundly purified Heb. 10. 22. Cursed is that peace that is maintained in a way of sin Deut. 29. 19 20. Two sorts of peace are more to be dreaded than all the troubles in the world Peace with sin and Peace in sin Secondly Thy hopes of Salvation hereafter are in vain yea worse than in vain they are most injurious to God most pernicious to thy self there is death desperation blasphemy in the bowels of this hope 1. There is death in it Thy confidence shall be rooted out of thy tabernacles God will up with it root and branch it shall bring thee to the King of terrors Iob 18. 14. Though thou maist lean upon this house it will not stand Iob. 8. 15. but will prove like a ruinous building which when a man trusts to it falls down about his ears 2. There is desperation in it Where is the hope of the hypocrite when God taketh away his soul Iob 27. 8. Then there is an end for ever of his hope Indeed the hope of the righteous hath an end but then 't is not a destructive but a perfective end his hope ends in fruition others in frustration Prov. 10. 28. The godly must say at death It is finished but the wicked It is perished and in too sad earnest bemoan himself as he in a mistake Where now is my hope He hath destroyed me I am gone and my hope is removed like a tree Iob. 19. 10. The righteous hath hope in his death Prov. 14. 32. When nature is dying his hopes are living when his body is languishing his hopes are flourishing his hope is a living hope 1 Pet. 1. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but others a dying yea a damning soul undoing hope When a wicked man dyeth his expectation shall perish and the hope of unjust men perisheth Prov 11. 7. It shall be cut off and prove like the spiders web Iob 8. 14. which he spins out of his won bowels but then comes death with the broom and takes down all and so there is an eternal end of his confidence wherein he trusted For the eyes of the wicked shall fail and their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost Iob 11. 2. Wicked men are setled in their carnal hope and will not be beaten out of it They hold it fast they will not let it go Yea but death will knock off their fingers Though we cannot undeceive them death and judgment will When death strikes its dark through thy liver it will let out thy soul and thy hopes together The unsanctified have hope only in this life 1 Cor. 15. 19. and therefore are of all men most miserable When death comes it lets them out into the amazing gulf of endless desperation 3. There is blasphemy in it To hope we shall be saved though continuing unconverted is to hope we shall prove God a liar He hath told you that so merciful and pitiful as he is he will never save you not withstanding if you go on in ignorance or a course of unrighteousness Esay 27. 11. 1 Cor. 6. 9. in a word he hath told you that whatever you be or do nothing shall avail you to salvation without you be new creatures Gal. 6. 15. Now to say God is mercifu◠and we hope he will save us nevertheless is to say in effect we hope God will not do as he saith We may not set Gods attributes at variance God is resolved to glorifie mercy but not with the prejudice of truth as the presumptuous sinner will find to his everlasting sorrow Obj. Why but we hope in Jesus Christ we put out whole trust in God and therefore doubt not but we shall be saved Ans. 1. This is not to hope in Christ but against Christ. To hope to see the Kingdom of God without being born again to hope to
that if you will walk by this rule your very thoughts and inward motions must be under government Again that they are very strict and self-denying quite contrary to the grain of your natural inclinations Mat. 16. 24. You must take the strait gate the narrow way and be content to have the flesh curbed from the liberty that it desires Mat. 7. 14. In a word that they are very large for the commandment is exceeding broad Psal. 119. 66. Secondly rest not in generals for there 's much deceit in that but bring down thy heart to the particular commands of Christ. Those Jews in the Prophet seemed as well resolved as any in the world and call God to witness that they meant as they said But they stuck in generals When Gods command crosses their inclination they will not obey Ier. 42. 1 2 3 4 5 6. compared with ch 43 v. 2. Take the Assemblies larger Catechism and see their excellent and most compendious exposition of the Commandments and put thy heart to it Art thou resolved in the strength of Christ to set upon the conscientious practice of every duty that thou findest to be there required of thee and to set against every sin that thou findest there forbidden This is the way to be sound in Gods statutes that thou maist never be ashamed Psal. 119 80. Thirdly Observe the special duties that thy heart is most against and the special sins that 't is most inclin'd unto and see whether it be truly resolved to perform the one and forgo the other What sayst thou to thy bosom sin thy gainful sin What sayst thou to costly and hazardous and flesh-displeasing duties If thou haltest here and dost not resolve by the grace of God to cross thy flesh and put to it thou art unsound Psal. 18. 23. Psal. 119. 6. Dir. X. Let all this be compleated in a solemn Covenant between God and thy soul. Psal. 119. 106. Neb. 10. 29. For thy better help therein take these few Directions First set apart some time more than once to be spent in secret before the Lord. 1. In seeking earnestly his special assistance and gracious acceptance of thee 2. In considering distinctly all the terms or conditions of the Covenant expressed in the form hereafter proposed 3. In searching thine heart whether thou art sincerely willing to forsake all thy sins and to resign up thy self body and soul unto God and his service to serve him in holiness and righteousness all the days of thy life Secondly Compose thy spirit into the most serious frame possible suitable to a transaction of so high importance Thirdly Lay hold on the Covenant of God and rely upon his promise of giving grace and strength whereby thou maist be enabled to perform thy promise Trust not to thine own strength to the strength of thine own resolutions but take hold on his strength Fourthly Resolve to be faithful having engaged thine heart opened thy mouth and subscribed with thine hand unto the Lord resolve in his strength never to go back Lastly Being thus prepared on some convenient time set apart for the purpose set upon the work and in the most solemn manner possible as if the Lord were visibly present before thine eyes fall down on thy knees and spreading forth thine hands towards Heaven open thine heart to the Lord in these or the like words O Most dreadful God for the Passion of thy Son I beseech thee accept of thy poor Prodigal now prostrating himself at thy Door I have fallen from thee by mine iniquity and am by nature a son of Death and a thousand-fold more the child of Hell by my wicked Practice But of thine infinite Grace thou hast promised Mercy to me in Christ if I will but turn to Thee with all my Heart Therefore upon the Call of Thy Gospel I am now come in and throwing down my weapons submit my self to thy Mercy And because thou requirest as the Condition of my Peace with Thee that I should put away mine Idols and be at defiance with all thine Enemies which I acknowledge I have wickedly sided with against Thee I here from the bottom of my heart renounce them all firmly Covenanting with Thee not to allow my self in any known Sin but Conscientiously to use all the means that I know thou hast prescribed for the Death and utter Destruction of all my Corruptions And whereas I have formerly inordinately and idolatrously let out my affections upon the World I do here resign my Heart to Thee that madest it humbly protesting before thy Glorious Majesty that it is the firm resolution of my Heart and that I do unfeignedly desire Grace from Thee that when thou shalt call me hereunto I may practise this my resolution through thy Assistance to forsake all that is dear unto me in this world rather than to turn from thee to the ways of sin and that I will watch against all its Temptations whether of Prosperity or Adversity lest they should withdraw my Heart from thee beseeching thee also to help me against the Temptations of Satan to whose wicked Suggestions I resolve by thy Grace never to yield my self a Servant And because my own righteousness is but menstruous rags I renounce all confidence therein and acknowledge that I am of my self a hopeless helpless undone done creature without righteousness or strength And forasmuch as thou hast of thy bottomless Mercy offered most Graciously to me wretched sinner to be again my God through Christ if I would accept of thee I call Heaven and Earth to record this day that I do here solemnly avouch thee for the Lord my God with all possible veneration bowing the neck of my soul under the feet of thy most Sacred Majesty I do here take thee the Lord Iehovah Father Son and Holy Ghost for my portion and chief good and do give up my self body and soul for thy servant promising and vowing to serve thee in holiness and righteousness all the days of my life And since thou hast appointed the Lord Jesus Christ the only means of coming unto thee I do here upon the bended knees of my soul accept of him as the only new and living way by which sinners may have access to thee and do here solemnly join my self in a marriage-Covenant to him O blessed Jesus I come to thee hungry and hardly bestead poor and wretched and miserable and blind and naked a most loathsome polluted wretch a guilty condemned Malefactor unworthy for ever to wash the feet of the servants of my Lord much more to be solemnly married to the King of Glory but sith such is thine unparallel'd love I do here with all my power accept thee and do take thee for my Head and Husband for better for worse for richer for poorer for all times and conditions to love and honour and obey thee before all others and this to the death I embrace thee in all thine Offices I
told thee what thou must do to be saved Wilt thou now obey the voice of the Lord Wilt thou arise and set to thy work O man what answer wilt thou make what excuse wilt thou have if thou shouldest perish at last through very wilfulness when thou hast known the way of life I do not fear thy miscarrying if thine own idleness do not at last undo thee in neglecting the use of the means that are so plainly here prescribed Rouze up oh sluggard and ply thy work Be doing and the Lord will be with thee A short Soliloquy for an unregenerate sinner Ah wretched man that I am what a condition have I brought my self into by sin Oh! I see my heart hath but deceived me all this while in flattering me that my condition was good I see I see I am but a lost and undone man for ever undone unless the Lord help me out of this condition My sins My sins Lord what an unclean polluted wretch am I more loathsome and odious to thee than the most hateful Venome or noisome carcase can be to me Oh! what a Hell of sin is in this heart of mine which I have flattered my self to be a good heart Lord how universally am I corrupted in all my parts powers performances All the imaginations of the thoughts of my heart are only evil continually I am under an inability to averseness from and enmity against any thing that is good and am prone to all that is evil My heart is a very sink of all sin and oh the innumerable hosts and swarms of sinful thoughts words and actions that have flown from thence Oh the load of guilt that is on my soul my head is full and my heart full my mind and my members they are all full of sin Oh my sins How do they stare upon me How do they witness against me Wo is me my Creditors are upon me every commandment taketh hold upon me for more than ten thousand talents yea ten thousand times ten thousand How endless then is the summe of all my debts If this whole world were filled up from earth to Heaven with paper and all this paper written over within and without by Arithmeticians yet when all were cast up together it would come unconceivably short of what I owe to the least of Gods commandments Wo unto me for my debts are infinite and my sins are increased They are wrongs to an infinite Majesty and if he that committeth treason against a silken mortal is worthy to be racked drawn and quartered what have I deserved that have so often lifted up my hand against Heaven and have struck at the Crown and dignity of the Almighty Oh my sins my sins Behold a troop cometh Multitudes multitudes there is no number of their Armies Innumerable evils have compassed me about mine iniquities have taken hold upon me they have set themselves in array against me Oh! it were better to have all the Regiments of Hell come against me than to have my sins to fall upon me to the spoiling of my Soul Lord how am I surrounded How many are they that rise up against me They have beset me behind and before they swarm within me and without me they have possessed all my powers and have fortified mine unhappy soul as a Garrison which this brood of Hell doth man and maintain against the God that made me And they are as mighty as they be many The sands are many but then they are not great the mountains great but then they are not many But wo is me my sins are as many as the sands and as mighty as the Mountains Their weight is greater than their number It were better that the Rocks and the mountains should fall upon me than the crushing and unsupportable load of my own sins Lord I am heavy laden let mercy help or I am gone Unload me of this heavy guilt this sinking load or I am crushed without hope and must be pressed down to Hell If my grief were thorowly weighed and my sins laid in the ballances together they would be heavier than the sand of the Sea therefore my words are swallowed up they would weigh down all the rocks and the hills and turn the ballance against all the Isles of the Earth O Lord thou knowest my manifold transgressions and my mighty sins Ah my soul Alas my Glory Whither art thou humbled Once the Glory of the creation and the Image of God now a lump of filthiness a Coffin of rottenness replenished with stench and loathsomeness Oh what work hath sin made with thee Thou shalt be termed Forsaken and all the rooms of thy faculties Desolate and the name that thou shalt be called by is Ichabed or Where is the Glory How art thou come down mightily My beauty is turned into deformity and my Glory into shame Lord what a loathsome Leper am I The ulcerous bodies of Iob or Lazarus were not more offensive to the eyes and nostrils of men than I must needs be to the most holy God whose eyes cannot behold iniquity And what misery have my sins brought upon me Lord what a case am I in Sold under sin cast out of Gods favour accursed from the Lord cursed in my body cursed in my soul cursed in my name in my estate my relations and all that I have My sins are unpardoned and my soul within a step of death Alas what shall I do Whither shall I go Which way shall I look God is â—rowning on me from above Hell gaping for me beneath Conscience smiting me within temptations and dangers surrounding me without Oh whither shall I fly What place can hide me from Omnisciency What power can secure me from Omnipotency What meanest thou O my soul to go on thus Art thou in league with Hell hast thou made a covenant with death Art thou in love with thy misery Is it good for thee to be here Alas what shall I do Shall I go on in my sinful ways Why then certain damnation will be mine end shall I be so besotted and bemadded as to go and sell my soul to the flames for a little Ale or a little ease for a little pleasure or gain or content to my flesh Shall I linger any longer in this wretched estate No if I tarry here I shall dye What then is there no help no hope None except I turn Why but is there any remedy for such woful misery any mercy after such provoking iniquity Yes as sure as Gods Oath is true I shall have pardon and mercy yet if I presently unfeignedly and unreservedly turn by Christ to him Why then I thank thee upon the bended knees of my soul O most merciful Iehovah that thy patience hath waâ—ted for me hitherto for hadst thou took me away in this estate I had perished for ever And now I adore thy Grace and accept the offers of thy mercy I renounce all my sins and resolve by thy Grace to set my self against them
and to follow thee in holiness and righteousness all the days of my life Who am I Lord that I should make any claim to thee or have any part or portion in thee who am not worthy to lick up the dust of thy feet Yet since thou holdest forth the golden Scepter I am bold to come and touch To despair would be to disparage thy mercy and to stand off when thou biddest me come would be at once to undo my self and rebel against thee under pretence of humility Therefore I bow my soul unto thee and with all possible thankfulness accept thee as mine and give up my self to thee as thine Thou shalt be Soveraign over me my King and my God Thou shalt be in the Throne and all my powers shall bow to thee they shall come and worship before thy feet Thou shalt be my portion O Lord and I will rest in thee Thou callest for my heart Oh that it were any way fit for thine acceptance I am unworthy O Lord everlastingly unworthy to be thine But since thou wilt have it so I freely give up my heart to thee Take it it is thine Oh that it were better But Lord I put it into thy hands who alone canst mend it Mould it after thine own heart make it as thou wouldst have it holy humble heavenly soft tender flexible and write thy law upon it Come Lord Jesus come quickly enter in triumphantly take me up for thy self for ever I give up to thee I come to thee as the only way to the Father as the only Mediator the means ordained to bring me to God I have destroyed my self but in thee is my help Save Lord or else I perish I come to thee with the rope about my neck I am worthy to dye and to be damned Never was the hire more due to the servantâ— never was penny more due to the labourer than death and Hell my just wages is due to me for my sins But I fly to thy merits I trust alone to the value and virtue of thy Sacrifice and prevalency of thine intercession I submit to thy teaching I make choice of thy Government Stand open ye everlasting doors that the King of Glory may enter in O thou spirit of the most high the comforter and sanctifier of thy chosen come in with all thy glorious train all thy Courtly attendants thy fruits and Graces Let me be thine habitation I can give thee but what is thine own already but here with the poor Widdow I cast my two mites my soul and my body into thy treasury fully resigning them up to thee to be sanctified by thee to be servants to thee They shall be thy patients cure thou their maladies they shall be thy agents govern thou their motions Too long have I served the world too long have I hearkened to Satan but now I renounce them all and will be ruled by thy dictates and directions and guided by thy counsel O blessed Trinity O glorious Unity I deliver up my self to thee receive me write thy name O Lord upon me and upon all that I have as thy proper goods Set thy mark upon me upon every member of my body and every faculty of my soul. I have chosen thy precepts Thy law will I lay before me this shall be the copy which I will keep in my eye and study to write after According to this rule do I resolve by thy Grace to walk after this law shall my whole man be governed And though I cannot perfectly keep one of thy Commandments yet I will allow my self in the breach of none I know my flesh will hang back but I resolve in the power of thy Grace to cleave to thee and thy holy ways whatever it cost me I am sure I cannot come off a loser by thee and therefore I will be content with reproach and difficulties and hardships here and will deny my self and take up my Cross and follow thee Lord Jesus thy Yoke is easie thy Cross is welcome as it is the way to thee I lay aside all hopes of a worldly happiness I will be content to tarry till I come to thee Let me be poor and low little and despised here so I may be but admitted to live and reign with thee hereafter Lord thou hast my heart and hand to this agreement Be it as the laws of the Medes and Persians never to be reversed To this I will stand in this resolution by Grace I will live and dye I have â—worn and will perform it that I will keep thy righteous judgments I have given my free consent I have made my everlasting choice Lord Jesus confirm the contract Amen CHAP. VII Containing the Motives to Conversion THough what is already said of the Necessity of Conversionâ— and of the Miseries of the Unconverted might be sufficient to induce any considering mind to resolve upon a present turning or Conversion unto God yet knowing what a piece of desperate obstinacy and untractableness the heart of man naturally is I have thought it necessary to add to the means of Conversion and Directions for a Covenant-closure with God in Christ some Motives to perswade you hereunto O Lord fail me not now at my last attempts If any soul hath read hitherto and be yet untouched now Lord fasten in him and do thy work Now take him by the heart overcome him perswade him till he say Thou hast prevailed for thou wast stronger than I. Lord didst not thou make me a fisher of men And have I toyled all this while and caught nothing Alas that I should have spent my strength for nought And now I am casting my last Lord Iesus stand thou upon the shore and direct how and where I shall spread my net and let me so enclose with arguments the souls I seek for that they may not be able to get out Now Lord for a multitude of souls now for a full draught O Lord God remember me I pray thee and strengthen me this once O God But I turn me unto you Men and Brethren Heaven and earth do call upon you yea hell it self doth preach the doctrine of repentance unto you The Angels of the Churches travel with you Gal. 4. 19. the Angels of Heaven wait for you for your repenting and turning unto God O sinner why should the devils make merry with thee Why shouldst thou be a morsel for that devouring Leviathan Why should harpies and hell-hounds tear thee and make a feast upon thee and when they have got thee into the snare and have fastened their talons in thee laugh at thy destruction and deride thy misery and sport themselves with thy damnable folly This must be thy case except thou turn And were it not better thou shouldst be a joy to Angels than a laughing-stock and sport for devils Verily if thou wouldst but come in the Heavenly Host would take up their anthems and sing Glory be to God in the highest the morning Stars would sing together