same estimation and resolution But when it comes to practice as his will is less confirmed and more corrupted and divided so little impediments and difficulties are great temptations to him and stop him more in the way of his obedience All his duty is much more tedious to him and all his sufferings are much more burthensome to him than to confirmed Christians And therefore he is easier tempted into omissions and impatiency and walketh not so evenly or comfortably with God When the spirit is willing it yieldeth oft to the weakness of the flesh because it is willing in too remiss a degree Mat. 26.41 Gal. 2.14 3. But the seeming Christian though notionally and generally he may approve of strictness yet secretly at the heart hath alwaies this reserve that he will not serve God at too dear a rate His worldly felicity he cannot part with for all the hopes of the life to come And yet he will not he dare not renounce and give up those hopes And therefore he maketh himself a Religion of the easiest and cheapest parts of Christianity among which sometimes the strictest opinions may fall out to be one part so be it they be separated from the strictest practice And this easie cheap Religion he will needs believe to be true Christianity and Godliness and so will hope to be saved upon these terms And though he cannot but know that it is the certain character of a hypocrite to have any thing nearer and dearer to his heart than God yet he hopeth that it is not so with him because his convinced judgement can say that God is best and the world is vanity while yet his heart and affections so much contradict his opinion as almost to say There is no God For his heart knoweth and loveth no God as God that is above his worldly happiness He is resolved to do so much in religion as he findeth necessary to delude his conscience and make himself believe that he is godly and shall be saved but when he cometh to forsake all and take up the Cross and practise the costlyest parts of duty then you shall see that Mammon was better loved than God and he will go away sorrowful and hope to be saved upon easier terms Luke 18.23 For he was never resigned absolutely to God XV. 1. A confirmed Christian is one that taketh selfdenial for the one half of his Religion and therefore hath bestowed one half of his endeavours to attain and exercise it He knoweth that the fall of man was a turning to himself from God And that selfishness and want of Love to God are the summ of all corruption and ungodliness And that the Love of God and selfdenial are the summ of all religion And that conversion is nothing but the turning of the heart from carnal self to God by Christ And therefore on this hath his care and labour been so succesfully laid out that he hath truly and practically found out something that is much better than himself and to be loved and preferred before himself and which is to be his chiefest ultimate end He maketh not a God of himself any more but useth himself for God to fulfill his will as a creature of his own that hath no other end and use He no more preferreth himself above all the world but esteemeth himself a poor and despicable part of the world And highlier valueth the honour of God and the welfare of the church and the good of many than any interest of his own Though God in nature hath taught him to regard his own felicity and to love himself and not to seek the glory of God and the good of many souls in opposition to his own yet hath he taught him to prefer them though in conjunction much before his own For reason telleth him that man is nothing in comparison of God and that we are made by him and for him and that the welfare of the Church or publick societies is better in order to the highest ends than the welfare of some one Selfishness in the unregenerate is like an inflammation or apposteme which draweth the humours from other parts of the body to it self The interest of God and man are all swallowed up in the regard that men have to self-interest And the Love of God and our neighbour are turned into self-self-love But self is as annihilated in the confirmed Christian so that it ruleth not his Judgement his affections or his choice And he that lived in and to himself as if God and all the world were but for him doth now live to God as one that is good for nothing else and findeth himself in seeking him that is infinitely above himself Luk. 14.31 32 33. Phil. 2.4 21. 2. And the weak Christian hath attained to so much selfdenial that self is not predominant in him against the Love of God and his neighbour But yet above all other sins too great a measure of selfishness still remaineth in him These words own and mine and self are too significant with him every thing of his own is regarded inordinately with partiality and too much selfishness A word against himself or an injury to himself is more to him than worse against his brother He is too little mindfull of the glory of God and of the publick good and the souls of others and even when he is mindful of his own soul he is too regardless of the souls of many that by prayer or exhortation or other means he ought to help As a small candle lighteth but a little way and a small fire heateth not farr off so is his Love so much confined that it reacheth not farr from him He valueth his friends too much upon their respect to please himself and loveth men too much as they are partiall for him and too little upon the pure account of grace and their love to Christ and servisableness to the Church He easily overvalueth his own abilities and is too confident of his own understanding and apt to have too high conceits of any opinions that are his own he is too apt to be tempted unto uncharitableness against those that cross him in his interest or way he is apt to be too negligent in the work of God when any selfinterest doth stand against it and too much to seek himself his own esteem or his own commodity when he should devote himself to the good of souls and give up himself to the work of God Though he is not like the hypocrite that preferreth himself before the will of God and the common good yet selfishness greatly stoppeth interrupteth and hindreth him in Gods work and any great danger or loss or shame or other concernment of his own doth seem a greater matter to him and oftner turn him out of the way than it will with a confirmed Christian They were not all hypocrites that Paul speaketh of in that sad complaint Phil. 2.20 21. For I have no man like minded to Timothy who will naturally
to the possession of Holy Delight and Love And when those Affections which are rather Profound than very sensible immediately towards God himself are sensible towards his Word his Servants his Graces and his wayes and against all sin Theâ— are the Affections and so the man in a confirmed State 4. When our selves our time and all that we have are taken to be Gods and not our own and are entirely and unreservedly resigned to him and used for him When we study our duty and trust him for our reward When we live as those that have much more to do for Heaven than for earth and with God than with Man or any Creature When our Consciences are absolutely subjected to the Authority and Laws of God and bow not to Competitors When we are habitually disposed as his Servants to be constantly imployed in his Works and make it our Calling and business in the world as judging that we have nothing to do on earth but with God or for God When we keep not up any secret desires and hopes of a Worldly felicity nor purvey for the pleasure of the Flesh under the cloak of Faith and Piety but subdue the Flesh as our most dangerous enemy and can easily deny its appetite and concupiscence When we guard all our senses and keep our passions thoughts and tongues in obedience to the holy Law When we do not inordinately set up our selves in our esteem or desire above or against our Neighbour and his welfare but love him as our selves and seek his good and resist his hurt as heartily as our own and love the godly with a love of Complacence and the ungodly with a love of Benevolence though they be our enemies When we are faithful in all our Relations and have judgment to discern our duty that we run not into extreams and skill and readiness and pleasure in performing it and patience under all our sufferings this is the Life of a confirmed Christian in various degrees as their strength is various And now I shall proceed to perswade such to value and seek this confirmation lest with dull unprepared minds my following Directions should be lost and then I shall give you the Directions themselves which are the part that is principally intended And first for the Motives 1. Consider that your first entrance into Christianity is an engagement to proceed your Receiving Christ obligeth you to walk and grow up in him A fourfold obligation you very Christianity layeth upon you to grow stronger and to persevere 1. The first is from the very nature of it even from the Office of Christ and the use and ends to which we do receive him You receive Christ as a Physician of your diseased Souls and doth not this engage you to go on to use his Medicines till you are cured What do men choose a Physician for but to heal them It were but a foolish patient that would say Though my disease be deadly yet now I have chosen the best Physician I have no more to do I doubt not of recovery You took Christ for a Saviour which engageth you to use his saving means and submit to his saving works You took him for your Teacher and Master and gave up your selves to be his Disciples and what sense was in all this if you did not mean to proceed in learning of him It s a silly conceit for any man to think that he is a good Schollar meerly because he hath chosen a good Master or Tutor without any further learning of him When Christ sent out his Apostles it was for these two works first to Disciple Nations and Baptise them and then to go on in Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever he commandeth them Matth. 28 19 20. Christ is the way to the Father but to what purpose did you come into this way if you meant not to travel on in it 2. Moreover when you became Christians you entered a solemn Covenant with Christ and bound your selves by a vow to be faithful to him to the death And this Vow is upon you It is better not to Vow than to Vow and not perform Eccles. 5.5 In taking him to be the Captain of your Salvation and listing your selves under him and taking this Oath of fidelity to him you did engage your selves to fight as faithful Souldiers under his conduct and command to your lives end And as its a foolish Souldier that thinks that he hath no more to do but list himself and take Colours and need not fight so it is a foolish and ungodly Covenanter that thinks he hath nothing to do but to Promise and may be excused from performance because that Promising was enough when the Promise was purposely to bind him to perform 3. Moreover when you became Christians you put your selves under the Laws of Christ and these Laws require you to go further till you are confirmed so that you must go on or renounce your obedience to Christ. 4. Lastly when you became Christians you received such exceeding Mercies as do oblige you to go much higher in your affections and much further in your obedience to God A man that is newly snatcht as from the jaws of Hell and hath received the free forgiveness of his sins and is put into such a state of blessedness as we are must needs feel abundance of obligations upon him to proceed to stronger resolutions and affections and not to stop in those low beginnings So that if you lay these four things together you will perceive that the very purpose of your Receiving Christ was that you might walk in him and be confirmed and built up 2. Consider also that your Conversion is not sound if you are not heartily desirous to encrease Grace is not true if there be not a desire after more yea if you desire not perfection it self An Infant is not born to continue an Infant for that were to be a Monster but to grow up unto Manhood As the Kingdom of Christ in the Word is likened by him to a little Leaven and to a grain of Mustard-seed in the beginning which afterward makes a wonderful increase so his Kingdom in the Soul is of the same nature too If you are contented with that measure of holiness that you have you have none at all but a shadow and conceit of it Let those men think of this that stint themselves in Holiness and plead for a Moderation in it as if it were intemperance or fury to love God or fear him or seek him or obey him any more than they do or as if we were in danger of excess in these If ever these men had feelingly and by experience known what Holiness is they would never have been possessed with such conceits as these 3. Consider What abundance of labour hath been lost and what hopes have been frustrate for want of proceeding to a Rooted Confirmation I say not that such were truly sanctified but I say they were in a very hopeful
speech contradict the matter When hard heartedness and security and deadness and lethargick drowsiness is the common and dangerous disease of Souls let him that loveth his Soul and would not perish by his disease make use of a Physician and remedy that is suited to the cure and not of one to rock him asleep or give him an opiate to increase his malady 8. See also that he be one that is of a truly Catholick spirit not addicted to a Sect nor to Divisions in the Church nor one that liveth in a separation or distance from the generality of the godly sober Ministers For you take him not for your Guide as separated from the Catholick Church but as united to it and a Member of it as valuing the Judgment of all the Church above the judgment of any one Pastor and knowing that you are your selves to be kept in the unity of the Church and not seduced into a Sect and that the Pastors are to be the bonds and ligaments of the body that by their help it may grow up in love and unity and not the dividers of the body Eph. 4.13 14 15 16. As Captains and inferior Officers in an Army that are to conduct each Souldier in Vnity with the Army and not to separate and make every Troop or Regiment an Army by it self that they may be the petty Generals In a word read some good Visitation Sermons which tell you what a Minister must be and choose if possible to live under such a Minister I say if possible for I know to many it is not possible Wives and Children and Servants while they are bound cannot leave their Husbands Parents or Masters and strong Christians who are called to do good to others must prefer that before such advantages to themselves and many other impediments may deny men such a blessing But yet I say undervalue not so great a mercy and neglect it not where lawfully it may be had and prefer nothing before it as a just impediment which is not really more worth And remember that Divines do commonly resolve the case of the Infidel Nations of the World that they are unexcusable in their Infidelity because when they hear that other Nations profess to know the way to Heaven they do not in so great a case go over Sea and Land to enquire after the Doctrine which we profess And if the Tartarians Indians and other Nations are bound to send to Christian nations for Preachers of the Gospel I only leave you proportionably to measure your case by theirs allowing for the disproportion And to consider how far you should deny your worldly profit in removeing your habitations for such helps as your own necessities require DIRECT XII Make choice of such Christians for your familiar friends and the companions of your lives as are holy humble heavenly serious mortified charitable peaceable judicious experienced and fixed in the wayes of God and not of ungodly persons or proud self-conceited censorious dividing injudicious unexperienced sensual worldly opinionative superficial luke-warm or unsetled Professors THe Reasons of this Direction you may perceive in what I said under the last Your company is a matter of exceeding great concernment to you as one of the greatest helps or hinderances comforts or discomforts of all your lives especially those that you dwell with and those that you choose for your familiars and bosome friends And therefore so far as Gods Providence doth not forbid you and make it impossible choose such as are here described or at least one such for your bosome friend if you can have acquaintance with no more It is of unspeakable importance to your Salvation with whom you are associated for most familiar converse A good companion will teach you what you know not or remember you of that which you forget or stir you up when you are dull or warm you when you are cold and watch over you and warn you of your danger and save you from the poison of ill companions O what a help and delight it is to have a holy judicious faithful friend to open your heart to and to walk with in the wayes of life And how exceeding hard is it to scape sin and hell and get well to Heaven in company and familiarity of the servants of the Devil who are posting unto Hell Let not your companions be worse than your selves lest they make you worse but as much wiser and better as you can procure See Eccles. 4.9 12. Psal. 16.2 and 119.63 Prov. 13.20 DIRECT XIII Subdue your passions and abhor all uncharitable principles and practises and live in love maintaining peace in your families and with your neighbours but especially in the Church of God LOve as you would be loved yea Love if you would be loved for there is no surer way to purchase love And love because you are so freely loved by that God whose wrath you have so oft deserved Let the thankful feeling of his Love in Christ even turn you wholly into love to God and man Abhor every thought and word and deed which is contrary to love and tendeth to the hurt of others And hate the backbitings and bitter words of any which tend to make another odious and to destroy your love to any one that God commandeth you to love Allow that moderate passion which is the fruit of love and tendeth only to do good but resist that which inclineth you to hatred or to do evil The more men wrong you remember that you are the more watchfully to maintain your love knowing that these temptations are sent by the Devil on purpose to destroy and quench it and fill your heart with uncharitableness and wrath Give place to the wrath of others and stand not resisting it by words or deeds Rom. 12.18 19 20. Recompense to no man evil for evil in word or action ver 17. Especially be most tender of the Union of true Christians and of the Churches peace When you hear the men of several Sects representing one another as odious understand that it is the language of the Devil to draw you from love into hatred and divisions And when you must speak odiously of mens sin speak charitably of their persons and be as ready to speak of the good that is in them as of the evil Believe not that dividing ungrounded Doctrine which telleth you that you cannot sufficiently disown the Errors of any party in Doctrine and Worship and Discipline without a separation or withdrawing from their Communion and which telleth you that you are guilty of the Ministerial faults of every Pastor that you joyn with or of the faults of all that Worship which you are present at which would first separate you from every worshipping society and person upon earth and then lead you to give over the worshipping of God your selves You must Love Christians as Christians though they have errors and faults repugnant to their Christianity And you must joyn in Worship with Christians as
confirmed Christian. page 1 1. He liveth by such a Faith of unseen things as governeth his soul instead of sight 6 2. He hath cogent Reasons for his Religion 9 3. He seeth the well-ordered frame of sacred verities and the integral parts in their harmony or consort and setteth not up one truth against another 11 4. He adhereth to them and practiseth them from an inward connatural principle called The Divine Nature and The Spirit of Christ. 12 5. He serveth not God for fear only but for Love 14 6. He loveth God 1. Much for his Goodness to himself 2. And more for his Goodness to the Church 3. And most of all for his essential Goodness and perfection 16 7. He taketh this Love and its Expressions for the heart and height of all his Religion 19 8. He hath absolutely put his soul and all his hopes into the hand of Christ and liveth by faith upon him as his Saviour 21 9. He taketh Christ as the Teacher sent from God and his Doctrine for the truest wisdom and learneth of none but in subordination to him 23 10. His Repentance is universal and effectual and hath gone to the Root of every sin 25 11. He loveth the Light as it sheweth him his sin and duty and is willing to know the worst of sin and the most of duty 27 12. He desireth the highest degree of Holiness and hath no sin which he had not rather leave than keep and had rather be the Best though in poverty than the Greatest in prosperity 30 13. He liveth upon GOD and HEAVEN as the End Reward and Motive of his Life 32 14. He counteth no cost or pains too great for the obtaining it and hath nothing so dear which he cannot part with for it 35 15. He is daily exercised in the practice of Self-denial as next to the Lovers of God the second half of his Religion 38 16. He hath mortified his fleshly desires and so far mastereth his senses and appetite that they make not his obedience very uneasie or uneven 42 17. He preferreth the means of his holiness and happiness incomparably before all provisions and pleasures of the flesh 45 18. He is crucified to the world and the world to him by the Cross of Christ and contemneth it through the belief of the greater things of the life to come 47 19. He foreseeth the End in all his waies and judgeth of all things as they will appear at last 50 20. He liveth upon God alone and is content with his favour and approbation without the approbation and favour of men 53 21. He hath absolutely devoted himself and all that he hath to God to be used according to his will 56 22. He hath a readiness to obey and a quick and pleasant compliance of his will to the will of God 58 23. He delighteth himself more in God and Heaven and Christ and Holiness than in all the world Religion is not tedious and grievous to him 59 24. He is conscious of his own sincerity and assured of his Justification and title to Everlasting Joyes 66 25. This Assurance doth not make him more careless and remiss but increaseth his love and holy diligence 68 26. Yet he abhorreth Pride as the first born of the Devil and is very low and vile in his own eyes and can easily endure to be low and vile in the eyes of others 69 27. Being acquainted with the deceitfulness of the heart and the methods of temptation he liveth as among snares and enemies and dangers in a constant watch and can conquer many and subtil and great temptations through grace 72 28. He hath counted what it may cost him to be saved and hath resolved not to stick at suffering but to bear the Cross and be conformed to his crucified Lord and hath already in heart forsaken all for him 74 29. He is not a Christian only for company or carnal ends or upon trust of other mens opinion and therefore would be true to Christ if his Rulers his Teachers his Company and all that he knoweth should forsake him 78 30. He can digest the hardest Truths of Scripture and the hardest passages of Gods Providence 80 31. He can exercise all his Graces in harmony without neglecting one to use another or setting one against another 81 32. He is more in getting and using Grace than in enquiring whether he have it though he do that also in its place 82 33. He studieth Duty more than Events and is more carefull what he should be towards God than how he shall here be used by him 83 34. He is more regardfull of his duty to others than of theirs to him and had much rather suffer wrong than do it 84 35. He keepeth up a constant Government of his Thoughts restraining them from evil and using them upon God and for him 87 36. He keepeth a constant Government over his passions so far as that they pervert not his judgement his heart his tongue or actions 88 37. He governeth his tongue imploying it for God and restraining it from evil 90 38. Heart-work and Heaven-work are the principal matters of his religious discourse not barren controversies or impertinencies 92 39. He liveth upon the common great substantials of Religion and yet will not deny the smallest Truth or commit the smallest sin for any price that man can offer him 93 40. He is a high esteemer and carefull Redeemer of Time and abhorreth Idleness and Diversions which would rob him of it 98 41. His heart is set upon doing all the good in the world that he is able It is his daily business and delight 101 42. He truly loveth his neighbour as himself 103 43. He hath a special love to all godly Christians as such and such as will not stick at cost in its due expressions nor be turned into bitterness by tollerable differences 104 44. He forgiveth injuries and loveth his enemies and doth them all the good he can from the sense of the love of Christ to him 106 45. He doth as he would be done by and is as precise in the Justice of his dealings with men as in acts of piety to God 108 46. He is faithful and laborious in his outward trade or calling not out of covetousness but obedience to God 111 47. He is very conscionable in the duties of his several Relations in his family or other society as a superiour inferiour or equal 112 48. He is the best subject whether his Rulers be good or bad though Infidel and ungodly Rulers may mistake use him as the worst 113 49. His trust in God doth overcome the fear of man and settle him in a constant fortitude for God 121 50. Judgement and Zeal conjunct are his constitution His Judgement kindleth Zeal and his Zeal is still judicious 123 51. He can bear the infirmities of the weak and their censures and abuses of himself and requiteth them not with uncharitable censure or reproach 126 52. He
loveth him more for his Mercy to the Church and for that Goodness which consisteth in his Benignity to the Church But he Loveth him most of all for his Infinite perfections and essential excellencies His Infinite Power and Wisdom and Goodness simply in himself considered For he knoweth that Love to himself obligeth him to returns of Love especially differencing saving grace And he knoweth that the souls of millions are more worth incomparably then his own and that God may be much more honoured by them than by him alone And therefore he knoweth that the mercy to many is greater mercy and a greater demonstration of the goodness of God and therefore doth render him more amiable to man Rom. 9.3 And yet he knoweth that the Essential perfection and goodness of God as simply in himself and for himself is much more amiable than his Benignity to the creature And that he that is the first efficient must needs be the ultimate final cause of all things And that God is not finally for the creature but the creature for God for all that he needeth it not For of him and through him and to him are all things Rom. 11.36 And as he is Infinitely better than our selves so he is to be better Loved than our selves As I love a wise and vertuous person though he be one I never expect to receive any thing from and therefore Love him for his own sake and not for his benignity or usefulness to me So must I love God most for his essential perfections though his benignity also doth represent him amiable As he is blindly selfish that would not rather himself be annihilated or perish than whole Kingdoms should all perish or the Sun be taken out of the world because that which is best must he loved as best and therefore be best loved so is he more blind who in his estimative complacential Love preferreth not Infinite Eternal Goodness before such an imperfect silly creature as himself or all the world We are commanded to love our Neighbour as our selves when God is to be loved with all the heart and soul and might which therefore signifieth more than to love him as our selves or else he were to be loved no more than our Neighbour So that the strong Christian loveth God so much above himself as that he accounteth himself and all his interests as nothing in comparison of God yea and loveth himself more for God than for himself Though his own salvation be loved and desired by him and God must be loved for his mercy and benignity yet that salvation it self which he desireth is nothing else but the love of God Wherein his love is the final felicitating act and God is the final felicitating object and the felicity of loving is not first desired but the attractive object doth draw out our love and thereby make us consequentially happy in the injoying exercise thereof Thus God is All and in all to the soul. Psal. 73.25 Rom. 11.36 1 Cor. 10.31 Deut. 6.5 Mat. 23.37 Mat. 19.17 2. A weak Christian also loveth God as one that is infinitely better than himself and all things or else he did not love him at all as God But in the exercise he is so much in the minding of himself and so seldom and weak in the contemplation of Gods perfections that he feeleth more of his love to himself than unto God and feeleth more of his love to God as for the Benefits which he receiveth in and by himself than as for his own perfections yea and often feeleth the love of himself to work more strongly than his Love to the Church and all else in the world The care of his own salvation is the highest principle which he ordinarily perceiveth in any great strength in him and he is very little and weakly carried out to the Love of the whole Church and to the Love of God above himself Phil. 2.20 21 22. 1 Cor. 10.24 Jer. 45.5 3. A seeming Christian hath a common Love of God as he is Good both in himself and unto the world and unto him But this is not for his Holyness and it is but a general uneffectual approbation and praise of God which followeth a dead uneffectual belief But his chiefest predominant Love is always to his Carnal self and the Love both of his soul and of God is subjected to his fleshly self-love His chiefest Love to God is for prospering him in the world and such as is subservient to his sensuality pride coveteousness presumption and false hopes Luke 18.21 22. 1 Joh. 2.15.2 Tim. 3.2 4. Joh. 12.43 Joh. 5.42 VII 1. A Christian indeed doth practically take this Love of God and the holy expressions of it to be the very life and top of his Religion and the very life and beauty and pleasure of his soul He makes it his work in the world and loveth himself complacentially but so far as he findeth in himself the Love of God And so far as he findeth himself without it he loatheth himself as an unlovely carkass And so far as his prayers and obedience are without it he looks on them but as unacceptable loathsome things And therefore he is taken up in the study of Redemption because he can no where so clearly see the Love and Loveliness of God as in the face of a Redeemer even in the wonders of Love revealed in Christ. And he studieth them that Love may kindle Love And therefore he delighteth in the contemplating of Gods attributes and infinite perfections and in the beholding of him in the frame of the Creation and reading his name in the book of his works that his soul may by such steps be raised in Love and Admiration of his Maker And as it is a pleasant thing for the eyes to behold the sun or light so is it to the mind of the Christian indeed to be frequently and seriously contemplating the nature and glory of God And the exercise of Love in such contemplations is most of his daily walk with God And therefore it is also that he is more taken up in the exercises of thanksgiving and the Praises of the Almighty than in the lower parts of Godliness so that though he neglect not confession of sin and humiliation yet doth he use them but in subserviency to the Love and Praise of God He doth but rid out the filth that is undecent in a Heart that is to entertain its God He placeth not the chief part of his Religion in any outward duties nor in any lower preparatory acts Nor doth he stop in any of these however he neglect them not But he useth them all to advance his soul in the Love of God And useth them the more diligently because the Love of God to which they conduce as to their proper end is so high and exellent a work Therefore in Davids Psalms you find a heart delighting it self in the praises of God and in Love with his word and works in order
care for your state for all seek their own not the things which are Jesus Christs that is They too much seek their own and not entirely enough the things that are Christs which Timothy did naturally as if he had been born to it and Grace had made the Love of Christ and the souls of men and the good of others as naturall to him as the Love of himself Alas how lowdly do their own distempers and soul miscarriages and the divisions and calamities of the Church proclaim that the weaker sort of Christians have yet too much selfishness and that selfdenial is lamentably imperfect in them 3. But in the seeming Christian selfishness is still the predominant principle he loveth God but for himself and he never had any higher end than self All his Religion his opinions his practice is animated by self-self-love and governed by it even by the Love of carnal self self-esteem self-conceitedness self-love self-willedness self-seeking and self-saving are the constitution of his heart and life He will be of that opinion and way and party in Religion which selfishness directeth him to choose He will go no farther in Religion than self-interest and safety will allow him to go He can change his friend and turn his love into hatred and his praises into reproach when ever self-interest shall require it He can make himself believe and labour to make others believe that the wisest and holiest servants of God are erroneous homorous hypocrites and unsufferable if they do but stand cross to his opinions and interest For he judgeth of them and loveth or hateth them principally as they conform to his will and interest or as they are against it As the godly measure all persons and things by the will and interest of God so do all ungodly men esteem them as they stand in reference to themselves When their factious interest required it the Jews and specially the Pharisees could make themselves and others believe that the Son of God himself was a breaker of the Law and an enemy to Caesar and a blasphemer and unworthy to live on the earth And that Paul was a pestilent fellow and a mover of sedition among the people and a ringleader of a sect and a prophaner of the Temple Act. 24.5 6. and which of the Prophets and Apostles did they not persecute Because Christs doctrine doth cross the interest of selfish men therefore the world doth so generally rise up against it with indignation even as a Country will rise against an invading enemy For he cometh to take away that which is dearest to them As it is said of Luther that he medled with the Popes crown and the Fryars bellies and therefore no wonder if they swarmed all about his ears Selfishness is so generall and deeply rooted that except with a few self-denying Saints self-love and self-interest ruleth the world And if you would know how to please a graceless man serve but his carnal interest and you have done it Be of his opinion or take on you to be so applaud him admire him flatter him obey him promote his preferment honour and wealth be against his enemies in a word make him your God and sell your soul to gain his favour and so it 's possible you may gain it XVI 1. A Christian indeed hath so far mortified the flesh and brought all his senses and appetite into subjection to sanctified Reason as that there is no great rebellion or perturbation in his mind but a little matter a holy thought or a word from God doth presently rebuke and quiet his inordinate desires The flesh is as a well-broken and well-ridden horse that goeth on his journey obediently and quietly and not with striving and chasing and vexatious resisting Though still flesh will be flesh and will be weak and will fight against the spirit so that we cannot do all the good we would Isa. 5.17 Rom. 7.16 17 c. yet in the confirmed Christian it is so far tamed and subdued that its rebellion is much less and its resistance weaker and more easily overcome It causeth not any notable unevenness in his obedience nor blemishes in his life it is no other than consisteth with a readiness to obey the will of God Gal. 5.24 25. 1 Cor. 9.26 27. They that are Christs have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts thereof They run not as uncertainly they fight not as one that beateth the air but they keep under their bodies and bring them into subjection lest by any means they should be castawaies They put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to fulfill the lusts thereof Rom. 13.13 14. As we see to a temperate man how sweet and easie temperance is when to a glutton or drunkard or riotous liver it is exceeding hard so it is in all other points with a confirmed Christian. He hath so far crucified the flesh that it is as dead to its former lusts and so far mastered it that it doth easily and quickly yield And this maketh the life of such a Christian not only pure but very easie to him in comparison of other mens Nay more than this he can use his sense as he can use the world the objects of sense in subserviency to faith and his salvation His eye doth but open a window to his mind to hold and admire the Creator in his work His tast of the sweetness of the creatures is but a means by which the sweeter Love of God doth pass directly to his heart His sense of pleasure is but the passage of spiritual holy pleasure to his mind His sense of bitterness and pain is but the messenger to tell his heart of the bitterness and vexatiousness of sin As God in the creation of us made our senses but as the inlet and passage for himself into our minds even as he made all the creatures to represent him to us by this passage so grace doth restore our very senses with the creature to this their holy original use that the goodness of God through the goodness of the creature may pass to our hearts and be the effect and end of all 2. But for the weak Christian though he have mortified the deeds of the body by the spirit and live not after the flesh but be freed from its captivity or reign Gal. 5.24 Rom. 8.1 7 8 9 10 11 12 13. yet hath he such remnants of concupiscence and sensuality as make it a far harder matter to him to live in temperance and deny his appetite and govern his senses and restrain them from rebellion and excess He is like a weak man upon an ill-ridden headstrong horse who hath much ado to keep his saddle and keep his way He is stronglier inclined to fleshly lusts or excess in meat or drink or sleep or sports or some such fleshly pleasure than the mortified temperate person is and therefore is ofter guilty of some excess so that his life is a very tiresome
is made to shine upon the world he could not be content to live idly or to labour unprofitably or to get never so much to himself and live in never so much plenty himself unless he some way contribute to the good of others Not that he grudgeth at the smallness of his talents and lowness or obscurity of his place for he knoweth that God may dispose his creatures and talents as he please and that where much is given much is required Mat. 25. Luk. 12.48 19.23 But what his Lord hath entrusted him with he is loth to hide and willing to improve to his Masters use He is so far from thinking that God is beholden to him for his good works that he taketh it for one of his greatest mercies in the world that God will use him in doing any good And he would take it for a very great suffering to be deprived of such opportunities or turned out of service or called to less of that kind of duty If he were a Physitian and denied liberty to practice or a minister and denied liberty to preach it would far more trouble him that he is hindered from doing good than that he is deprived of any profits or honours to himself He doth not only comfort himself with the foresight of the reward but in the very doing of good he findeth so much pleasure as makeeth him think it the delightfullest life in the world And he looketh for most of his receivings from God in a way of duty Joh. 5.29 Gal. 6.10 Heb. 13.16 1 Pet. 3.11 2. But the weak Christian though he have the same disposition is far less profitable in the world He is more for himself and less able to do good to others He wanteth either parts or prudence or zeal or strength Yea he is oft like the infants and sick persons of a family that are not helpful but troublesome to the rest They find work for the stronger Christians to bear their infirmities and watch them and support and help them Indeed as an infant is a comfort to the mother through the power of her own love even when she endureth the trouble of its crying and uncleaness so weak Christians are a comfort to charitable ministers and people we are glad that they are alive but sadded often by their distempers Rom. 14.1 15.12 3. The seeming Christian liveth to himself and all his good works are done but for himself to keep up his credit or quiet his guilty conscience and deceive himself with the false hopes of a reward for that which his falseheartedness maketh to be his sin If he be a man of learning and good parts he may be very serviceable to the Church But the thanks of that is due to God and little to him who seeketh himself more than God or the good of others in all that he doth Mat. 25 24 25 26. XLII 1. A Christian indeed doth truly love his neighbour as himself He is not all for his own commodity His neighbours profit or good name is as his own He feeleth himself hurt when his neighbours is hurt And if his neighbour prosper he rejoyceth as if he prospered himself Though his neighbour be not united to him in the nearest bonds of Christianity or Piety yet he is not disregardfull of the common Vnity of Humanity Love is the very soul of life Lev. 19.18 Mat. 19.19 22.39 Rom. 13.9 Gal. 5.14 Jam. 2.8 Mark 10.21 1 Joh. 4.10 2. But the Love that is in weaker Christians though it be sincere is weak as they are and mixed with too much selfishness and with too much sowerness and wrath Little matters cause differences and fallings out When it cometh to MINE and THINE and their neighbours cross their interest or commodity or stand in their way when they are seeking any preferment or profit to themselves you shall see too easily by their sowreness and contention how weak their love is Mat. 24.12 1 Tim. 6.10 Luke 22.24 3. But in the seeming Christian selfishness is so predominant that he loveth none but for himself with any considerable love All his kindness is from self-love because men love him or highly value him or praise him or have done him some good turn or may do him good hereafter or the like If he hath any love to any for his own worth yet self-self-love can turn all that to hatred â—f they seem against him or cross him in his way For no man that is a Lover of the world and flesh and carnall self can ever be a true friend to any other For he loveth them but for his own ends and any cross Interest will shew the falshood of his love 2 Tim. 3.2 3 4. Mat. 5.46 XLIII 1. A Christian indeed hath a special Love to all the Godly such as endeareth his heart unto them and such as will enable him to visit them and relieve them in their wants to his own loss and hazzard according to his ability and opportunity For the image of God is beautifull and honourable in his eyes He loveth not them so much as God in them Christ in them the Holy Spirit in them He foreseeth the day when he shall meet them in Heaven and there rejoyce in God with them to Eternity He loveth their company and converse and delighteth in their gracious words and lives And the converse of ungodly empty men is a weariness to him unless in a way of duty or when he can do them good In his eyes a vile person is contemned but he honoureth them that fear the Lord Psal. 15.4 Other men grieve his soul with their iniquities while he is delighted with the appearances of God in his holy ones even the excellent ones on earth Psal. 16.3 2 Pet. 2.7 8. Yea the infirmities of Believers destroy not his Love for he hath learned of God himself to difference between their abhorred frailties and their predominant Grace and to love the very Infants in the Family of Christ. Yea though they wrong him or quarrel with him or censure him in their weakness he can honour their sincerity and love them still And if some of them prove scandalous and some seeming Christians fall away or fall into the most odious crimes he loveth Religion never the less but continueth as high an esteem of piety and of all that are upright as he had before 1 Joh. 4.7 8 10. Joh. 13.34 35. 1 Thess. 4.9 1 Joh. 3.11 14 23. Matth. 25.39 40 c. 2. The weak Christian sincerely loveth all that bear his Fathers image But it is with a Love so weak even when it is most passionate as will sooner be abated or interrupted by any tempting differences He is usually quarrelsome and froward with his Brethen and apter to confine his love to those that are of his own opinion or party And because God hath taught him to love all that are sincere the Devil tempteth him to censure them as not sincere that so he may justifie himself in the
Vnity than the enemies of the Church themselves For he hath not judgement enough to guide him the right way and yet he hath so much zeal as will not suffer him to keep his errours to himself 3. And all these distempers that are but in a lower degree in the weak Christian are predominant in the Hypocrite The Church shall have no concord or peace if he can hinder it but what is consistent with his carnal interest his honour or wealth or dignity in the world The pride and covetousness which rule himself he would have to make the terms of concord and to rule all others It is Hypocrites in the Church that are the greatest cause of discord and divisions having selfish spirits principles and ends and having alwaies a work of their own to do which suits not well with the work of Christ and yet Christs work must be subjected to it and ordered and over-ruled by it And while they pretend to go to the Scriptures or to Councils or Fathers for their reasons indeed they go first for them to their worldly interest and then would fain hire or press the Scripture Church or Fathers to serve their turn and come in as witnesses on their side And thus the Church as well as Christ is betrayed by the covetous Judas's of his own family And the servants of the world the flesh and Devil that take up the livery of Christ and usurp the name and honour of Christians do more effectually hinder the concord and prosperity of the Church than any open enemies do And those that are indeed no Christians do cause Christianity to be reproached Even as Spies and Traitors that are hired by the enemy to take up arms in the Army which they fight against that they may betray it by their fraud and do more harm to it by raising mutinies and by false conduct than a multitude of professed enemies could have done It is proud and worldly carnal Hypocrites that hinder most the concord of Believers LIV. 1. A confirmed Christian is of a peaceable spirit He is not masterly domineering turbulent hurtfull cruell seditious factious or contentious He is like ripened fruits that are mellow and sweet when the younger greener fruits are sowre and harsh He is not wise in his own conceit Rom. 12.16 and therefore not over urgent in obtruding his conceits on others nor quarrelsome with all that cannot entertain them nor will he easily lay mens salvation or damnation no nor the Churches peace upon them He is kindly affectioned to others with brotherly love yea loveth his neighbour as himself Rom. 12.10 13 9 10. And therefore he doth to others as he would they should do to him and useth them as he would be used by them And then how far they are like to suffer by him you may easily judge For Love worketh no ill to his neighbour Rom. 13.10 He is above the portion of the worldling and a contemner of that vanity which carnal men account their felicity and therefore he preferreth love and quietness before it and can lose his right when the interest of Love and Peace requireth it He is become as a little child in his conversion Matth. 18.3 and is low and little in his own eyes and therefore contendeth not for superiority or preheminence either in place or power or reputation of his learning wisdom or piety but in honour preferreth others before himself Rom. 12.10 He mindeth not high things but condescendeth to men of low estate Rom. 12.16 and therefore will not contend for estimation or precedency nor scramble to he highest though he rise by the ruines of mens bodies and souls If it be possible as much as lyeth in him he will live peaceably with all men Rom. 12.18 For he is not one that by word or deed will avenge himself but when the wrath of others is up like a blustring storm he giveth place to it he boweth before it or goeth out of the way Rom. 12.19 If his enemy hunger he feedeth him if he thirst he giveth him drink when oppressors would deprive not only an enemy but the righteous of their meat and drink and thus he melteth his hardened enemies by heaping kindnesses upon them when they are wrathfull and proud and contentious and do him wrong or use provoking words against him he is not overcome of their evil to imitate them but he overcometh their evil with his good Rom. 12.20 21. If God have given him more knowledge and abilities than others he doth not presently set up himself to be admired for it nor speak disdainfully and contemptuously of those that are not of his mind But he sheweth the eminency of his wisdom with meekness by the works of a good conversation and by doing better than the unwiser do James 3. from verse 1. to 13. He is endued with the wisdom from above which is first pure then peaceable gentle easie to be entreated full of mercy and good fruit without partiality or wavering in persecution as Dr. Hammond renders it and without hypocrisie And thus the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace Jam. 3.17 18. As he is taught of God to love his brother 1 Thes. 4.9 So that same teaching with experience of the effects assureth him that they that pretend to be wiser and better than others when they have bitter envious zeal and strife in their hearts they vainly glory and lie against the truth This wisdom descendeth not from above but is earthly sensual and devilish For where envying and strife is there is confusion and every evil work James 3.14 15 16. Read but the story of the Jewish Zealots in Josephus and the heretical Zealots in all ages of the Church and you will perceive the truth of this when such quarrelsome spirits are filling the Church with contentions or vexations about their meats and drinks and daies c. the Christian indeed understandeth that the Kingdom of God consisteth not of such things as these but in righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost and he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved of wise and sober men Therefore he followeth after things which make for peace and things wherewith one may edifie another and will not for meats c. destroy the work of God Rom. 14.17 18 19 20. He stayeth not till peace be offered him or brought home to him but he followeth peace with all men as well as holiness Heb. 12.14 If it fly from him he pursueth it if it be denied him he seeketh it and will not refuse to stoop to the poorest for it and to beg it of his inferiours if it were upon his knees rather than be denied it and live an unpeaceable disquiet life Psal. 34.14 For he believeth that blessed are the Peace-makers for they shall be called the children of God Matth. 5.9 2. And the weak Christian hath the same spirit and therefore the love of peace is most
that day But yet he thinketh not of it with so strong a faith and great consolation nor with such boldness and desire as the confirmed Christian doth but either with much more dull security or more perplexity and fear His thoughts of God and of the world to come are much more dark and doubtfull and his fears of that day are usually so great as make his desires and joys scarce felt Only he thinketh not of it with that contempt or stupidity as the Infidel or hardened sinner nor with the terrours of those that have no God no Christ no hope except when temptation bringeth him near to the borders of despair His death indeed is unspeakably safer than the death of the ungodly and the joys which he is entring into will quickly end the terrour but yet he hath no great comfort of the present but only so much trust in Christ as keepeth his heart from sinking into despair 3. But to the Hypocrite or seeming Christian Death and Judgement are the most unwelcome daies and the thoughts of them the most unwelcome thoughts He would take any tolerable life on earth at any time for all his hopes of Heaven and that not only through the doubts of his own sincerity which may sometime be the case of a tempted Christian but through the unsoundness of his belief of the life to come or the utter unsuitableness of his soul to such a blessedness which maketh him look at it as less desirable to him than a life of fleshly pleasures here All that he doth for Heaven is upon meer necessity because he knoweth that Die he must and he had rather be in Heaven than in Hell though he had rather be in prosperity on earth than either And as he taketh Heaven but as a reserve or second good so he seeketh it with reserves and in the second place And having no better preparations for Death and Judgement no marvel if they be his greatest terrour He may possibly by his self-deceit have some abatement of his fears and he may by Pride and Wit seem very valiant and comfortable at his death to hide his fear and pusillanimity from the world But the 〈◊〉 of all his misery is that he sought not first the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness and laid not up a treasure in Heaven but upon earth and loved this world above God above the world to come and so his heart is not set on Heaven nor his affections on the things above and therefore he hath not that Love to God to Christ to Saints to perfect Holiness which should make that world most desirable in his eyes and make him think unfeignedly that it is best for him to depart and live with Christ for ever Having not the Divine Nature nor having lived the Divine Life in walking with God his complacency and desires are carnal according to the nature which he hath And this is the true cause and not only his doubts of his own sincerity of his unwillingness to die or to see the day of Christs appearance Matth. 6.33.19.20 21. 1 Joh. 2.15 Col. 3.1 2 3 4. Rom. 8.5 6 7 8. 1 Cor. 2.13 14. 2 Pet. 1.4 And thus I have shewed you from the Word of God and the Nature of Christianity the true Characters of the confirmed Christian and of the weak Christian and of the seeming Christian. The Vses for which I have drawn up these Characters and which the Reader is to make of them are these I. Here the weak Christian and the Hypocrite may see what manner of persons they ought to be Not only how unsafe it is to remain in a state of Hypocrisie but also how uncomfortable and unserviceable and troublesome it is to remain in a state of weakness and diseasedness what a folly and indeed a sign of Hypocrisie is it to think If I had but grace enough to save me I would desire no more or I would be well content Are you content if you have but Life here to difference you from the dead If you were continually Infants that must be fed and carried and made clean by others or if you had a continual Gout or Stone or Leprosie and lived in continual want and misery you would think that Life alone is not enough and that non vivere tantum sed valere vita est that Life is uncomfortable when we have nothing but Life and all the delights of life are gone He that lyeth in continual pain and want is weary of his life if he cannot separate it from those calamities He that knoweth how necessary strength is as well as life to do any considerable service for God and how many pains attend the diseases and infirmities of the weak and what great dishonour cometh to Christ and Religion by the faults and childishness of many that shall be pardoned and saved would certainly bestir him with all possible care to get out of this sick or infant state II. By this you may see who are the strong Christians and who are the weak It is not alwaies the man of Learning and free expressions that can speak longest and wiseliest of holy things that is the strong confirmed Christian But he that most excelleth in the Love of God and man and in a heavenly mind and holy life Nor is it he that is unlearned or of a weak memory or slow expression that is the weakest Christian But he that hath least Love to God and man and the most Love to his carnal self and to the world and the strongest corruptions and the weakest grace Many a poor day-labourer or woman that can scarce speak sense is a stronger Christian as being stronger in Faith and Love and Patience and Humility and Mortification and Self-denial than many great Preachers and Doctors of the Church III. You see here what kind of men they be that we call the Godly and what that Godliness is which we plead for against the malicious Serpentine Generation The lyars would make men believe that by Godliness we mean a few affected strains or hypocritical shews or heartless lip-service or singular opinions or needless scrupulosity or ignorant zeal yea a schism or faction or sedition or rebellion or what the Devil please to say If these sixty Characters describe any such thing then I will not deny that in the way that such men call heresie faction schism singularity so worship we the God of our Fathers But if not the Lord rebuke thee Satan and hasten the day when the lying lips shall be put to silence Psal. 131.18 120.2 109.2 Prov. 12.19 22. 10.18 IV. By this also you may see how unexcusible the enemies of Christianity and Godliness are and for what it is that they hate and injure it Is there any thing in all this Character of a Christian that deserveth the suspicion or hatred of the world what harm is there in it or what will it do against them I may say to them of his servants
is upon that work Though it be the highest and noblest part of Worship and should be done with all the heart and might and with a participation of a kind of Angelical reverence devotion and spirituality and if it were so we should see it by some of the signs of reverence and affection Yet alas when we think the best of them should be striving with God or rapt up in his Praises they do but Hear us Pray as they hear us Preach and think they have done fair to give us the hearing They sit on their Seats in Prayer or use some crooked leaning gesture perhaps looking up and down about them perhaps half asleep but few of them with eyes and hands and hearts lift up to Heaven do behave themselves as if they believed that they had so nearly to do with God I know reverent gestures may easily be counterfeited but that shews that they are good when Hypocrites think them a fit cover for Hypocrisie for they use not to borrow credit from evil but from some good to be a cover to the evil And it leaveth the neglects of the godly more unexcusable when they will not go so far herein as hypocrites themselves nor by their behaviour in a publick Ordinance so much as seem to be seriously imployed with God And if we try the Graces or obedience of Professors alas how small shall we find them in the most How little are most acquainted with the life of Faith How little do they admire the Redeemer and his blessed work How unacquainted are they with the daily use and high improvement of a Saviour for access to God and supportation and corroboration of the Soul and for conveyance of daily supplies of Grace and help against our spiritual enemies How few are they that can rejoyce in tribulation persecution and bodily distresses because of the hopes laid up in Heaven and that can live upon a Promise and comfortably wait on God for the accomplishment How few that live as men that are content with God alone and can cheerfully leave their flesh and credit and worldly estate to his disposal and be content to want or suffer when he sees it good for them What repinings and troubles possess our minds if the flesh be not provided for and if God do but cross us in these worldly things as if we had made our bargain with him for the flesh and for this World and had not taken him alone for our portion How few can use prosperity in riches and health and reputation with a mortified weaned heavenly mind Nay how few are there that do not live much to the pleasure of the Flesh and pamper it as indulgently under the appearance of temperance and Religion as others do in grosser wayes Do but try the godly themselves by plain and faithful reproof of their corruptions and see how many of them you will find that will not excuse them and take part with the enemy and be offended with you for your close reproof If any of them be overtaken with a scandalous fault and the Pastors of the Church shall call them to open Confession and expression of Repentance though you would little think a penitent man should once stick at this and refuse to do any thing that he can do to repair the honour of God and his Profession and to save the Souls of others whom he hath endangered yet how many will you find that will add a wilful obstinacy to their scandal and will deliberately refuse so great and clear and necessary a duty So great is the interest of Self and Flesh in them and consequently so little the interest of Christ that they will live in impenitency in the eye of the Church and venture on the high displeasure of God come on it what will and resist the advice of their best and wisest and most impartial friends rather than they will so far deny themselves as to make such a free and faithful confession They are many of them so much for holy discipline that they are ready to fall out with Church and Ministers and to be gone to a purer society because it is not exercised But on whom On others only and not upon them When they need Discipline themselves how impatient are they of it and how do they abhor it and what a stir do they make before they will submit even more sometimes than a Drunkard or a Swearer so small is their Repentance and detestation of their sin whereby they shew that their zeal for Discipline and Reformation is much out of pride that others may be brought to stoop or be cast out from them and not out of a sincere desire to have the refineing and humbling benefit of it themselves And if any among them be either faulty or reported so to be who is forwarder than many Professors of Godliness to backbite them and speak of their faults when they cannot hear nor answer for themselves nor receive any benefit by it and if another that hates backbiting do but reprove them they 'l slander him also for a defender of mens sin But when they should go in Christs way and tell men of their faults and draw them to Repentance and if they hear not take two or three and speak to them again how hardly can you draw them to the performance of this duty What shifts and frivolous excuses have they then Nay they will reproach the Church or Minister for not casting such out or not keeping them from Communion before they have done or will be perswaded to do these duties that must go before Alas how little hearty love is there to Christ in his Members even in them that are confident they love the brethren How few will do or suffer much for them or relieve them in their want as suffering with them How small a matter a word a seeming wrong or disrespect will turn their love into estrangedness or bitterness If they be tryed by an ill word or a wrong how touchy and froward and impatient do they appear and it 's well if they prove not downright malicious or return not reviling for reviling Alas how much pride prevaileth with many that seem to go far in the way of Piety How wise are they in their own conceits How able to judg of controversies and how much wiser than their Teachers before they can give a good account of the Catechism or Fundamental truths How well do they think of themselves and their own parts and performances How ill do they bear dis-esteem or under valuing and needs they must be noted for some body in the world How worldly and close handed and eager of gain are many that say they despise the World and take it for their enemy If any duty be cross to their profit or credit with men how obstinate are they against it and such interest hath the flesh in them that they will hardly believe that it is their duty How censorious are they of others
to God He hath respect to the humble contrite soul. Isa. 57.15 and 66.2 Psal. 51.17 The hungry he filleth with good but the rich he sendeth empty away Luk. 1.53 He giveth more grace to the humble when the proud are abhorred by him 1 Pet. 5.5 The Church of Laodicea that said I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing was miserable and poor and blinde and naked Rev. 3.17 As many that are proud of their honour and birth run out of all by living above their estates when meaner persons grow rich because they are still gathering and make much of every little So proud Professors of Religion are in a Consumption of the Grace they have while the humble increase by making much of every little help which is sleighted and neglected by the proud and by shunning all those spending courses which the proud are plunged in Be sure to keep mean thoughts of your selves of your knowledg and parts and grace and duties and be content to be mean in the esteem of others if you would not be worse than mean in the esteem of God DIRECT V. Exercise your selves daily in a life of Faith upon Jesus Christ as your Saviour your Teacher your Mediator and your King as your Example your Wisdom your Righteousness and your Hope ALL other studies and knowledg must be meerly subservient to the study and knowledg of Christ 1 Cor. 2.2 That vain kind of Philosophy which St. Paul so much cautioneth Christians against is so far yet from being accounted vain that by many called Christians it is preferred before Christianity it self and to shew that it is Vain while they overvalue it they can shew no solid worth or vertue which they have got by it but only a tumified mind and an idle tongue like a tinkling Cymbal 1 Cor. 13.1 and 12.31 and 2.4.14 15 16. and 1.18 19 20 21 23 24 27. Col. 2.8 9. We are compleat in Christ in whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily ver 10. No study in the World will so much lead you up to God and acquaint you with him especially in his Love and Goodness as the study of Christ his Person his Office his Doctrine his Example his Kingdom and his benefits As the Deity is your ultimate end to which all things else are but helps and means so Christ is that great and principal means by whom all other means are animated Remember that you are in continual need of him for direction intercession pardon sanctification for support and comfort and for peace with God Let no thoughts therefore be so sweet and frequent in your hearts nor any discourse so ready in your mouths next to the excellencies of the eternal Godhead as this of the design of mans Redemption Let Christ be to your Souls as the Air the Earth the Sun and your Food are to your bodies without which your life would presently fail As you had never come home to the Father but by him so without him you cannot a moment continue in the Fathers love nor be accepted in one duty nor be protected from one danger nor be supplyed in any want For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell Col. 1.18 19. And by him it is that being justified by Faith we have peace with God and have access by Faith unto this Grace wherein we stand and rejoyce in hope of the Glory of God Rom. â— 1 2. And it is in him the Head that we must grow up in all things from whom the whole body doth receive it's increase Ephes. 4.15 16. You grow no more in Grace than you grow in the true knowledg and daily use of Jesus Christ. But of this I will say no more because I have said so much in my Directions for a sound Conversion DIRECT VI. Let the Knowledg and Love of God and your obedience to him be the Works of your Religion and the everlasting fruition of him in Heaven be the continual end and ruling Motive of your Hearts and Lives that your very Conversation may be with God in Heaven YOu are so far HOLY as you are DIVINE and HEAVENLY A Christian indeed in casting up his accounts being certain that this World doth make no man happy hath been led up by Christ to seek a Happiness with God above If you live not for this everlasting happiness if you trade not for this if this be not your treasure your hope and home the chief matter of your desires love and joy and if all things be not prest to serve it and despised when they stand against it you live not indeed a Christian life GOD and HEAVEN or GOD in HEAVEN is the Life and Soul the beginning and the end the Sum the All of true Religion And therefore it is that we are directed to lift up our Heads and Hearts and begin our Prayers with Our Father which art in Heaven and end them with ascribing to Him the Kingdom the Power and the Glory for ever It is not the Creatures but God the Creator that is the Father the Guide and the felicity of Souls and therefore the ultimate end and object of all Religious actions and affections Dwell still upon God and dwell in Heaven if you would understand the nature and design of Christianity Take God for all that is for God Study after the knowledg of him in all his Works Study him in his Word Study him in Christ And never study him barely to know him but to know him that you may love him Take your selves as dead when you live not in the Love of God Keep still upon your hearts a lively sense of the infinite difference between him and the Creature Look on all the World as a shadow and on God as the substance Take the very worst that man can do to be in comparison of the punishments of God but as a Flea-biting to the sorest death And take all the dreaming pleasures of the World to be less in comparison with the joyes of Heaven than one lick of honey is to a thousand years possession of all the felicities on earth Think not all the pleasures honours or riches of the world to be worthy to be named in comparison of Heaven nor the Greatest of Men to be worthy to be once thought on in comparison of God As one straw or feather won or lost would neither much rejoyce or trouble you if all the City or land were yours So live as men whose eyes are open and who discern a greater disproportion between the portion of a worldling and a Saint Let God be your King your Father your master your friend your wealth your joy your All. Let not a day go over your heads in which your hearts have no converse with God in Heaven when any trouble overtaketh you on Earth look up to Heaven and remember that it is there that Rest and Joy are prepared for believers When you are under any want or cross or
sorrow fetch not your comfort from any hopes of deliverance here on Earth but from the place of your final full deliverance If you feel any strangeness and backwardness on your minds to Heavenly contemplations do not make light of them but presently by Faith get up to Christ who must make your thoughts of Heaven familiar and seek remedy before your estrangedness increase The soul is in a sad condition when it cannot fetch comfort and encouragement from Heaven for then it must have none or worse than none When the thoughts of Heaven will not sweeten all your crosses and relieve your minds against all the encombrances of earth your souls are not in a healthful state It 's time then to search out the cause and seek a cure before it come to worse There are three great causes of this dark and dangerous state of soul which make the thoughts of Heaven uneffectual and uncomfortable to us which therefore must be overcome with the daily care and diligence of your whole lives 1. Unbelief which maketh you look towards the life to come with doubting and uncertainty And this is the most common radical powerful and pernicious impediment to a heavenly life The second is the Love of present things which being the vanity of a poor low fleshly mind the reviving of Reason may do much to overcome it but it 's the sound Belief of the life to come that must indeed prevail The third is the inordinate Fear of Death which hath so great advantage in the constitution of our nature that it is commonly the last enemy which we overcome as Death it self is the last enemy which Christ overcometh for us Bend all your strength and spend your daies in striving against these three great impediments of a heavenly conversation And remember that so far as you suffer your heart to retire from Heaven so far they retire from a life of Christianity and peace DIRECT VII In the work of Mortification let SELF-DENYAL be the First and Last of all your study care and diligence UNderstand how much of the fallen depraved state of man consisteth in the sin of SELFISHNESS How he is sunk into Himself in his fall from the Love of God and of his Neighbour of the publick or private good of others And how this inordinate Self-love is now the grand enemy of all true Love to God or Man and the root and heart of Covetousness Pride Voluptuousness and all iniquity Let it be your work therefore all your dayes to mortifie it and watch against it When you feel your selves partial in your own cause and apt to be drawing from others to your selves in point of reputation precedency or gain and apt to make too great a matter of every word that is spoken against you or every little wrong that is done you observe then the pernicious root of Selfishness from whence all this mischief doth proceed Read more of this in my Treatise of Self-denyal DIRECT VIII Take your corrupted fleshly Desires for the greatest enemy of your Souls and let it be every day your constant work to mortify the Flesh and to keep a watch upon your lusts and appetite and every sense REmember that our senses were not made to govern themselves but to be governed by right Reason And that God made them at the first to be the ordinary passage of his Love and mercy to our hearts by the means of the Creatures which represent or manifest him unto us But now in the depraved state of man the Senses have cast off the Government of Reason and are become the Ruling power and so man is become like the Beasts that perish Remember then that to be sensual is to be bruitish And though Grace doth not destroy the appetite and sense yet it subjecteth it to God and Reason Therefore let your appetite be pleased in nothing but by the allowance of right Reason And think not that you have reason to take any meats or drink or sport meerly because your flesh desireth it but consider whether it will do you good or hurt and how it conduceth to your ultimate end It is a base and sinful state to be in servitude to your appetite and sense When by using to please it you have so increased its desires that now you know not how to deny it and displease it When you have taught it to be like a hungry dog or swine that will never be quiet till his hunger be satisfied Whereas a well-governed appetite and sense is easily quieted with a rational denyal Rom. 8.1 6 7 8 13. and 13.13 14. 1 Pet. 2.11 1 Johnâ— 16 DIRECT IX Take heed lest you fall in love with the World or any thing therein and lest your thoughts of any place or condition which you either possess or hope for do grow too sweet and pleasing to you FOr there is no one perisheth but for loving some Creature more than God And complacency is the formal act of Love Love not the World nor the things that are in the World for if any man love the World the love of the Father is not in him 1 John 2.15 Value all earthly things as they conduce to your Masters Service or to your Salvation and not as they tend to the pleasing of your Flesh It is the commonest and most dangerous folly in the World to be eager to have our houses and lands and provisions and every thing about us in the most pleasing and amiable state when as this is the acknowledged way to Hell and the only poyson of the Soul Are you not in more danger of overloving a pleasing and prosperous condition than a bitter and vexatious state and of overloving Riches honour and sensual fulness and delights rather than Poverty reproach and mortification And do you not know that if ever you be damned it will be for loving the World too much and God too little Is it for nothing that Christ describeth a Saint to you as a Lazarus in poverty and sores and a damned wretch as one that was clothed in Purple and Silk and fared sumptuously every day Luke 16. Did not Christ know what he did when he put the rich man upon this tryal to part with all his worldly riches and follow Christ for a treasure in heaven Luke 18.22 13. All things must be esteemed as loss and dung for the knowledg of Christ and the hopes of heaven if ever you will be saved Phil. 3.6 7 8. You must so live by Faith and not by sight as not to look at the temporal things that are seen but at the things eternal which are unseen 2 Cor. 4.17 18. and 5.7 8. And one that is running in a race for his life would not so much as turn his head to look back on any one that called to him to stay or to look aside to any one that would speak with him in his way Thus must we forget the things that are behind as counting them not worthy a thought
his hand or the Fornicator to cure his lust than to put out his eyes it were a cheap remedy A cheap and easy superficial Repentance may skin over the sore and deceive an Hypocrite but he that would be sure of pardon and free from fear must go to the bottom DIRECT XX. Live as with Death continually in your eye and spend every day in serious preparation for it that when it cometh you may find your work dispatcht and may not then cry out in vain to God to try you once again PRomise not your selves long life Think not of death as at many years distance but as hard at hand Think what will then be needful to your peace and comfort and order all your life accordingly and prepare that now which will be needful then Live now while you have time as you will resolve and promise God to live when on your death-bed you are praying for a little time of tryal more It is a great work to die in a joyful assurance and hope of everlasting life and with a longing desire to depart and be with Christ as best of all Phil. 1.21 23. O then what a burden and terror it will be to have an unbelieving or a worldly heart or a guilty Conscience Now therefore use all possible diligence to strengthen Faith to increase love to be acquit from guilt to be above the World to have the mind set free from the Captivity of the flesh to walk with God and to obtain the deepest most delectable apprehensions of his love in Christ and of the heavenly blessedness which you expect Do you feel any doubts of the state of immortality or staggering at the Promise of God through unbelief Presently do all you can to conquer them and get a clear resolution to your souls and leave it not all to do at the time of sickness Are the thoughts or God and Heaven unpleasant or terrible to you Presently search out the cause of all and labour in the cure of it as for your lives Is there any former or present sin which is a burden or terror to your Consciences Presently seek out to Christ for a Cure by Faith and true Repentance and do that to disburden your Consciences now which you would do on a sick-bed and leave not so great and necessary a 〈◊〉 to so uncertain and short and unfit a time Is there any thing in this World that is swâ—â—tâ—r tâ— your thoughts than God and Heaven 〈◊〉 which you cannot willingly let go Mâ—rtiâ—iâ— it without delay consider of its vanity compare it with Heaven Crucifie it by the Cross of Christ cease not till you account it loss and â—â—ung for the excellent knowledg of Christ and life eternal Phil. 3.7 8 9. Let not death surprize you as a thing that you never seriously expected Can you do no more in preparation for it than you do If no why do you wish a death to be tryed once again and why are you troubled that you lived no better But if you can when think you should it be done Is the time of uncertain painful sickness better than this O how doth sensuality besot the World and inconsiderateness deprive them of the benefit of their reason O Sirs if you know indeed that you must shortly die live then as dying men should live Choose your condition in the World and manage it as men that must shortly dye Use your Power and Command and Honour and use all your Neighbours and especially use the Cause and Servants of Christ as men should do that must shortly die Build and plant and buy and sell and use your Riches as those that must die remembring that the fashion of all these things is passing away 1 Cor. 7.29 30. Yea pray and read and hear and meditate as those that must die Seeing you are as sure of it as if it were this hour in the name of God delay not your preparations It is a terrible thing for an immortal Soul to pass out of the body in a carnal unregenerate unprepared state and to leave a World which they loved and were familiar with and go to a World which they neither know nor love and where they have neither heart nor treasure Matth. 6.19 20 31. The measure of Faith which may help you to bear an easie cross is not sufficient to fortifie and encourage your souls to enter upon so great a change So also bear all your wants and crosses as men that must shortly die Fear the cruelties of men but as beseemeth those that are ready to die He that can die well can do any thing or suffer any thing And he that is unready to die is unfit for a fruitful and comfortable life What can rationally rejoyce that man who is sure to die and unready to dye and is yet unfurnished of dying comforts Let nothing be now sweet to you which will be bitter to your dying thoughts Let nothing be much desired now which will be unprofitable and uncomfortable then Let nothing seem very heavy or grievous now which will be light and easy then Let nothing now seem honourable which will then seem despicable and vile Consider of every thing as it will look at death that when the day shall come which endeth all the joyes of the ungodly you may look up with joy and say Welcome Heaven This is tho day which I so long expected which all my dayes were spent in preparation for which shall end my fears and begin my felicity and put me into possession of all that I desired and prayed and laboured for when my Soul shall see its glorified Lord For he hath said John 12.26 If any man serve me let him follow me and where I am there shall also my servant be If any man serve me him will my Father honour Even so Lord Jesus remember me now thou art in thy Kingdom and let me be with thee in Paradise Luke 23.42 43. O thou that spakest those words so full of unexpressible comfort to a sinful woman in the first speech after thy blessed Resurrection Joh. 20.17 GO TO MY BRETHREN AND SAY VNTO THEM I ASCEND UNTO MY FATHER AND YOUR FATHER AND TO MY GOD AND YOVR GOD. Take up now this Soul that is thine own that it may see the Glory given thee with the Father Joh. 17.24 and instead of this life of temptation trouble darkness distance and sinful imperfection I may delightfully Behold and Love and Praise thy Father and my Father and thy God and my God Lord now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace Lord Jesus receive my Spirit Luke 2.29 Acts 7.59 And now I have given you all these Directions I shall only request you in the close that you will set your very hearts to the daily serious practise of them For there is no other way for a ripe confirmed state of Grace And as ever you regard the glory of God the honour of your Religion the welfare of the Church and those
irrational creatures but at least it much imitateth Nature as it is found in Rational creatures where the Inclination is necessary but the Operations free and subject to Reason It is a spiritual appetite in the Rational appetite even the will and a spiritual visive disposition in the understanding Not a faculty in a faculty but the right disposition of the faculties to their highest objects to which they are by corruption made unsuitable So that it is neither a proper power in the Natural sense nor a meer act but neerest to the nature of a seminal disposition or habit It is the health and rectitude of the faculties of the Soul Even as Nature hath made the understanding disposed to Truth in generall and the will disposed or inclined to Good in generall and to self-preservation and felicity in particular so the Spirit of Christ doth dispose the understanding to spiritual truth to know God and the matters of salvation and doth incline the will to God and Holiness not blindly as they are unknown but to love and serve a known God So that whether this be properly or only analogically called A Nature or rather should be called a Habit I determine not but certainly it is a fixed Disposition and Inclination which Scripture calleth the Divine Nature 2 Pet. 1.4 and the seed of God abiding in us 1 Joh. 3.9 But most usually it is called the Spirit of God or of Christ in us Rom. 8.9 If any man have not the Spirit of Christ the same is none of his 1 Cor. 12.13 By one Spirit we are all baptized into one body Therefore we are said to be in the Spirit and walk after the Spirit and by the Spirit to mortifie the deeds of the Body Rom. 8.1.9 13. And it is called the Spirit of the Son and the Spirit of Adoption whereby we cry Abba Father or are inclined to God as Children to their Father and the Spirit of grace and supplication Rom. 8.15.23.26 Gal. 4.6 5.17 18. Eph. 2.18 22. 4.3 4. Phil. 1.27 2.1 Zech. 12.10 From this Spirit and the fruits of it we are called New Creatures and quickened and made alive to God 2 Cor. 5.17 Eph. 2.15 Rom. 6.11 13. It is a great controversie whether this Holy disposition and inclination was Natural to Adam or not and consequently whether it be a restored nature in us or not It was so natural to him as Health is natural to the body but not so natural as to be a Necessitating Principle nor so as to be inseparable and unlosable 2. This same Spirit and holy inclination is in the weakest Christian also but in a small degree and remisly operating so as that the fleshly inclination oft seemeth to be the stronger when he judgeth by its passionate struglings within him Though indeed the Spirit of life doth not only strive but conquer in the main even in the weakest Christians Rom. 8 9. Gal. 5.17 18 19 20 21. 3. The seeming Christian hath only the uneffectual motions of the Spirit to a Holy Life and effectual motions and inward dispositions to some common duties of Religion And from these with the natural principles of self-love and common honesty with the outward perswasions of company and advantages his Religion is maintained without the Regeneration of the Spirit Joh. 3.6 V. From hence it followeth 1. That a Christian indeed doth not serve God for fear only but for love even for love both of himself and of his holy work and service Yea the strong Christians Love to God and Holiness is not only greater than his Love to Creatures but greater than his fear of wrath and punishment The Love of God constraineth him to duty 2 Cor. 5.14 Love is the fulfilling of the Law Rom. 13.10 therefore the Gospel cannot be obeyed without it He saith not O that this were no duty and O that this forbidden thing were lawfull Though his Flesh say so the Spirit which is the predominant part doth not But he saith O how I love thy Law O that my wayes were so directed that I might keep thy statutes Psal. 119.5 For the spirit is willing even when the flesh is weak He serveth not God against his will but his will is to serve him more and better than he doth He longeth to be perfect and perfectly to do the will of God and taketh the remnant of his sinfull infirmities to be a kind of bondage to him which he groaneth to be delivered from To will even perfection is present with him though not perfectly and though he do not all that he willeth And this is the true meaning of Pauls complaints Rom. 7. Because the flesh warreth against the Spirit he cannot do the good that he would that is he cannot be perfect for so he would be Gal. 5.17 His love and will excells his practice 2. The weak Christian also hath more love to God and holiness than to the world and fleshly pleasure But yet his fear of punishment is greater than his Love to God and Holiness To have no Love to God is inconsistent with a state of Grace and so it is to have less love to God than to the world and less love to holiness than to sin But to have more Fear than Love is consistent with sincerity of Grace Yea the weak Christians love to God and Holiness is joyned with so much backwardness and aversness and interrupted with weariness and with the carnall allurements and diversions of the Creature that he cannot certainly perceive whether his love and willingness be sincere or not He goeth on in a course of duty but so heavily that he scarce knoweth whether his love or loathing of it be the greater He goeth to it as a sick man to his meat or labour All that he doth is with so much pain or undisposedness that to his feeling his aversness seemeth greater than his willingness were it not that necessity maketh him willing For the habitual love and complacency which he hath towards God and Duty is so oppressed by fear and by aversness that it is not so much felt in act as they 3. A seeming Christian hath no true Love of God and Holiness at all but some uneffectual liking and wishes which are overborn by a greater backwardness and by a greater love to earthly things so that Fear alone without any true effectual Love is the spring and principle of his Religion and obedience God hath not his heart when he draweth near him with his lips He doth more than he would do if he were not forced by Necessity and Fear and had rather be excused and lead another kind of life Mat. 15.8 Isa. 29.13 Though Necessity and fear are very helpfull to the most sincere yet Fear alone without Love or Willingness is a graceless state VI. 1. A Christian indeed doth love God in these three gradations He loveth him much for his mercy to himself and for that Goodness which consisteth in benignity to himself But he
friend who dealeth freely with him and is the greatest enemy to his faults And a flatterer he taketh but for the most dangerous insinuating kind of foe 2. But the weak Christian though he hate his sin and love reformation and loveth the most searching Books and Preachers and loveth a gentle kind of reproof yet hath so much pride and selfishness remaining that any reproof that seemeth disgracefull to him goeth very hardly down with him like a bitter medicine to a queasie stomack If you reprove him before others or if your reproof be not very carefully sugured and minced so that it rather extenuate than aggravate his fault he will be ready to cast it up into your face and with retortions to tell you of some faults of your own or some way shew you how little he loveth it and how little thanks he giveth you for it If you will not let him alone with his infirmities he will distaste you if not fall out with you and let you know by his smart and impatience that you have touched him in the sore and galled place He must be a man of very great skill in managing a Reproof that shall not somewhat provoke him to distaste 3. And for the seeming Christian this is his condemnation that Light is come into the world and he loveth darkness rather than light because his deeds are evil He cometh not to the light lest his deeds should be discovered and reproved Joh. 3.19 20 21. He liketh a searching Preacher for others and loveth to hear their sins laid open if it no way reflect upon himself But for himself he liketh best a General or a smoothing Preacher and he flyeth from a quick and searching ministry lest he should be proved and convinced to be in a state of sin and misery Guilt maketh him fear or hate a lively searching Preacher even as the guilty prisoner hateth the Judge He loveth no company so well as that which thinketh highly of him and applaudeth and commendeth him and neither by their reproofes nor stricter lives will trouble his conscience with the remembrance of his sin or the knowledge of his misery He will take you for his enemy for telling him the truth if you go about to convince him of his undone condition and tell him of his beloved sin Sin is taken to be as himself It is He that doth evil and not only sin that dwelleth in him And therefore all that you say against his sin he taketh it as spoken against himself and he will defend his sin as he would defend himself He will hear you till you come to touch himself as the Jews did by Stephen Act. 7.51 54. when they heard him call them stiffnecked resisters of God and persecutors then they were cut to the heart and grind their teeth at him And as they did by Paul Act. 22.22 They gave audience to this word and then lift up their voices and said away with such a fellow from the earth for it is not fit that he should live Gal. 4.16 Joh 9.40 Mat. 21.45 The priests and pharisees would have laid hands on Christ when they perceived that he spake of them And Ahab hated Michaiah because he did not prophesie good of him but evil 1 King 22.8 Deservedly do they perish in their sin and misery that hate him that would deliver them and refuse the remedy Prov. 12.1 Whose loveth instruction loveth knowledge but he that hateth reproof is bruitish Prov. 29.1 He that being often reproved hardneth his neck shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy XII 1. A Christian indeed is one that unfeignedly desireth to attain to the highest degree of holiness and to be perfectly freed from every thing that is sin He desireth perfection though not with a perfect desire He sitteth not down contentedly in any low degree of grace He looketh on the holiest how poor soever with much more reverence and esteem than on the most rich and honourable in the world And he had far rather be one of the most holy than one of the most prosperous and great He had rather be a Paul or Timothy than a Caesar or an Alexander He complaineth of nothing with so much sorrow as that he can Know and Love his God no more How happy an exchange would he count it if he had more of the Knowledge and Love of God though he lost all his wealth and honour in the world His smallest sins are a greater burden to him than his greatest corporal wants and sufferings As Paul who because he could not perfectly fulfill Gods Law and be as good as he would be crieth out as in bondage O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of death Rom. 7.27 2. And for the weak Christian though he is habitually and resolvedly of the same mind yet alas his desires after perfection are much more languid in him And he hath too much patience and reconciledness to some of his sins and sometimes taketh them to be sweet So that his enmity to his Pride or Coveteousness or passion is much abated and suffereth his sin to wast his grace and wound his conscience and hinder much of his communion with God He seeth not the odiousness of sin nor the beauty of Holiness with so clear a fight as the confirmed Christian doth He hateth sin more for the ill effects of it than for its malignant hateful nature He seeth not clearly the intrinsick evil that is in sin which maketh it deserve the pains of hell Nor doth he discern the difference between a holy and an unholy soul so clearly as the stronger Christian doth 1 Cor. 3.2 3. Heb. 12.1 3. And as for the seeming Christian though he may approve of perfect holiness in another and may wish for it himself when he thinketh of it but in the general and not as it is exclusive and destructive of his beloved sin yet when it cometh to particulars he cannot away with it He is so far from desiring it that he will not endure it The name of holiness he liketh and that preservation from Hell which is the consequent of it But when he understandeth what it is he hath no mind of it That holiness which should cure his ambition and pride and make him contented with a low condition he doth not like He loveth not that holiness which would deprive him of his coveteousness his intemperance in pleasant meats and drinks his fleshly lusts and inordinate pleasures Nor doth he desire that holiness should employ his soul in the Love of God and in daily prayer and meditating on his word and raise him to a heavenly life on earth XIII 1. A Christian indeed is one that maketh God and Heaven the End Reward and Motive of his Life And liveth not in the world for any thing in the world but for that endless happiness which the next world only can afford The Reasons which actuate his thoughts and choice and all his life are
eternal deity and foresee the Joyes which he shall have for ever He sticketh not in superficial formalitie but breaking the shell doth feed upon the kernell It is not bare external duty which he is taken up with nor any meer creature that is his content but it is God in creatures and ordinances that he seeketh and liveth upon and therefore it is that Religion is so pleasant to him He would not change his Heavenly delights which he findeth in the exercise of faith and hope and love to God for all the carnal pleasures of this world he had rather be a door keeper in the house of God than to dwell in the tents or palaces of wickedness A day in Gods court is better to him than a thousand in the court of the greatest Prince on earth He is not a stranger to the joy in the Holy Ghost in which the Kingdom of God doth in part consist Rom. 14.17 Psal. 84.10.2 65.4 In the multitude of his thoughts within him the comforts of God do delight his soul. Psal. 94.19 His meditation of God is sweet and he is glad in the Lord. Psal. 104.34 The freest and sweetest of his thoughts and words run out upon God and the matters of salvation The word of God is sweeter to him than hony and better than thousands of Gold and Silver Psal. 119.72 119.103 19.10 Prov. 16.24 And because his delight is in the law of the Lord therefore doth he meditate in it day and night Psal. 1.2 He seeth great reason for all those commands Rejoyce ever more 1 Thes. 5.16 Let the righteous be glad let them rejoyce before God yea let them exceedingly rejoyce Psal. 68.3.4 64.10 31.1 32.11 Be glad in the Lord and rejoyce ye righteous and shout for joy all that are upright in heart He is sorry for the poor unhappy world that have no better things than meat and drink and cloaths and house and land and mony and lust and play and domineering over others to rejoyce in And heartily he wisheth that they had but a taste of the Saints delights that it might make them spit out their luscious unclean unwholesome pleasures One look to Christ one promise of the Gospel one serious thought of the life which he must live with God for ever doth afford his soul more solid comfort than all the kingdoms on earth can afford And though he live not continually in these high delights yet peace with God and peace of conscience and some delight in God and godliness is the ordinary temperature of his soul and higher degrees are given him in season for his cordials and his feasts 2. But the weak Christian hath little of these spiritual delights his ordinary temper is to apprehend that God and his wayes are indeed most delectable his very heart acknowledgeth that they are worthiest and fittest to be the matter of his delights And if he could attain assurance of his special interest in the love of God and his part in Christ and life eternal he would then rejoyce in them indeed and would be gladder than if he were Lord of all the world But in the mean time either his fears and doubts are damping his delights or else which is much worse his appetite is dull and God and holiness relish not with him half so sweetly as they do with the confirmed Christian and he is too busie in tasting of fleshly and forbidden pleasures which yet more deprave his appetite and dull his desires to the things of God so that though in his Estimation choice resolution and endeavour he much preferreth God before the world yet as to any delightful sweetness in him it is but little that he tasteth He loveth God with a Desiring Love and with a Seeking Love but with very little of a Delighting Love The remnant of corrupt and alien affections do weaken his affections to the things above and his infant measure of spiritual life conjunct with many troublesome diseases allow him very little of the joy of the Holy Ghost Nay perhaps he hath more grief and fear and doubts and trouble and perplexity of mind than ever he had before he turned unto God and perhaps he hath yet less pleasure in God than he had before in sin and sensuality Because he had his sin in a state of fruition but he hath God only in a seeking hoping state he had the best of sin and all that ever it will afford him but he hath yet none of the full felicity which he expecteth in God The fruition of him is yet but in the prospect of hope His sensual sinfull life was in its maturity and the object present in its most alluring state but his spiritual life of faith and love is but yet in its weak beginnings and the object absent from our sight He is so busie at first in blowing up his little spark not knowing whether the fire will kindle or go out that he hath little of the use or pleasure either of its light or warmth Infants come crying into the world and afterwards oftner cry than laugh Their senses and reason are not yet perfected or exercised to partake of the pleasures of life And when they do come to know what a laughter is they will laugh and cry almost in a breath And those weak Christians that do come to taste of joy and pleasure in their religious state it is commonly but as a flash of lightning which leaveth them as dark as they were before Sometimes in the beginning upon their first apprehensions of the love of God in Christ and of the pardon of their sins and the priviledges of their new condition and the hopes of everlasting joy their hearts are transported with unspeakable delight which is partly from the newness of the thing and partly because God will let them have some encouraging tast to draw them further and to convince them of the difference between the pleasures of sin and the comforts of believing But these first rejoycings soon abate and turn into a life of doubts and fears and griefs and care till they are grown to greater understanding experience and setledness in the things of God The root must grow greater and deeper before it will bear a greater top Those Christians that in the weakness of grace have frequent joys are usually persons whose weak and passionate nature doth occasion it some women especially that have strong phantasies and passions are alwaies passionately affected with whatsoever they apprehend And these are like a ship that is tossed in a tempest that is one while lifted up as to the clouds and presently cast down as into an infernal gulf There one day in great joy and quickly after in as great perplexity and sorrow Because their comforts or sorrows do follow their present feeling or mutable apprehensions But when they come to be confirmed Christians they will keep a more constant judgement of themselves and their own condition and constantly see their
abatement of his love And weak Christians are usually the most censorious because they have the smallest degree of Love which covereth faults and thinketh no evil and is not suspicious but ever apt to judge the best till the worst be evident 1 Cor. 13.4 5. It beareth all things believeth all things that are credible hopeth all things endureth all things v. 7. But it is no wonder to see children fall out even about their childish toyes and trifles And what the dissentions of the children of the Church have done against themselves in these Kingdoms I need not I delight not to record See 1 Cor. 3.1 2 3 4. And I brethren could not speak unto you as unto spiritual but as unto carnal even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk and not with meat for hitherto ye were not able to bear it neither yet now are ye able For ye are yet carnall for whereas there is among you envying and strife and divisions are you not carnall and walk as men 3. The seeming Christian may have some love to reall Christian even for their goodness sake But it is a Love subservient to his carnal self-love And therefore it shall not cost him much As he hath some Love to Christ so he may have some Love to Christians but he hath more to the world and fleshly pleasures And therefore all his Love to Christ or Christians will not make him leave his worldly happiness for them And therefore Christ at the day of Judgement will not enquire after empty barren love but after that love which visited and relieved suffering Saints An hypocrite can allow both Christ and Christians such a cheap superficial kind of love as will cost him little He will bid them lovingly Depart in peace be you warmed and filled Jam. 2.15 16 17. But still the World is most beloved XLIV 1. A Christian indeed doth love his enemies and forgive those that injure him and this out of a thankfull sense of that grace which forgave him a farr greater debt Not that he thinketh it unlawfull to make use of the Justice of the Government which he is under for his necessary protection or for the restraint of mens abuse and violence Nor is he bound to love the malice or injury though he must love the man Nor can he forgive a crime as it is against God or the common good or against another though he can forgive an injury or debt that is his own Nor is he bound to forgive every debt though he is bound so farre to forgive every wrong as heartily to desire the good of him that did it Even Gods Enemies he so farre loveth as to desire God to convert and pardon them while he hateth their sin and hateth them as Gods enemies and desireth their restraint Psal. 139.21 22. 101.3 119.4 68.1 21.8 But those that hate and curse and persecute himself he can unfeignedly love and bless and pray for Matth. 5.43 44 45 46 47 48. For he knoweth that else he cannot be a child of God v. 45. And that to love those that love him is not much praise-worthy being no more than Heathens and wicked men can do v. 46 47. He is so deeply sensible of that wondrous love which so dearly redeemed him and saved him from Hell and forgave him a thousandfold worse than the worst that ever was done against himself that Thankfulness and Imitation or Conformity to Christ in his great compassions do overcome his desires of revenge and make him willing to do good to his most cruel enemies and pray for them as Christ and Stephen did at their deaths Luk. 23.34 Acts 7.60 And he knoweth that he is so inconsiderable a worm that a wrong done to him as such is the less considerable And he knoweth that he daily wrongeth God more than any man can wrong him and that he can hope for pardon but on condition that he himself forgive Matth. 6.12 14 15. 18.34 35. And that he is far more hurtfull to himself than any other can be to him 2. And the weakest Christian can truely love an enemy and forgive a wrong but he doth it not so easily and so fully as the other But it is with much striving and some unwillingness and aversness and there remaineth some grudge or strangeness upon the minde He doth not sufficiently forget the wrong which he doth forgive Indeed his forgiving is very imperfect like himself Matth. 18.21 Luk. 9.54 55. not with that freeness and readiness required Eph. 4.2 With all lowliness and meekness with long-suffering forbearing one another in love Col. 3.12 13. Put on therefore as the Elect of God holy and beloved bowels of mercies kindness humbleness of minde meekness long-suffering forbearing one another and forgiving one another even as Christ forgave you so also do ye Rom. 12.14 19. Avenge not your selves c. 3. As for the seeming Christian he can seem to forgive wrongs for the sake of Christ but if he do it indeed it is for his own sake As because it is for his honour or because the person hath humbled himself to him or his commodity requireth it or he can make use of his love and service for his advantage or some one hath interposed for reconciliation who must not be denyed or the like But to love an enemy indeed and to love that man be he never so good who standeth in the way of his preferment honour or commodity in the world he never doth it from his heart whatever he may seem to doe Matth. 6.14 15. 18.27 30 32. The Love of Christ doth not constrain him XLV 1. A Christian indeed is as precise in the Justice of his dealings with men as in acts of piety to God For he knoweth that God requireth this as strictly at his hands 1 Thess. 4.6 That no man go beyond or defraud his Brother in any matter for the Lord is the avenger of all such as we also have forewarned and testified He is one that walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness and speaketh the truth in his heart that backbiteth not with his tongue nor doth evil to his neighbour nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour If he swear to his own hurt he changeth not He putteth not out his money to unjust or unmercifull Vsury nor taketh reward against the innocent Psal. 15. He obeyeth that Lev. 19.13 Thou shalt not defraud thy neighbour neither rob him the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night untill the morning He can say as Samuel 1 Sam. 12. Whose Oxe or Asse have I taken or whom have I defrauded whom have I oppressed or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blinde mine eyes therewith and I will restore it And they said Thou hast not defrauded us nor oppressed us neither hast thou taken ought of any mans hand And if heretofore he was ever guilty of defrauding any he is willing to his
predominant in him But alas he is too easily tempted into Religious passions discontents contentious disputations quarrelsome and opprobrious words and his judgement lamentably darkened and perverted whenever contentious zeal prevaileth and passions do perturb the quiet and orderly operations of his soul. He wanteth both the knowledge and the experience and the mellowness of spirit which riper Christians have attained He hath a less degree of Charity and is less acquainted with the mischiefs of unpeaceableness And therefore it is the common course of young professors to be easily tempted into unpeaceable waies and when they have long tryed them if they prove not Hypocrites to come off at last upon experience of the evils of them and so the young Christians conjunct with some hypocrites make up the rigorous fierce contentious and vexatious party and the aged riper Christians make up the holy moderate healing party that groan and pray for the Churches peace and mourn in secret both for the ungodliness and violence which they cannot heal Yea the difference is much apparent in the Books and Sermons which each of them is best pleased with The ripe experienced Christian loveth those Sermons that kindle Love and tend to Peace and love such healing Books as do narrow differences and tend to reconcile and heal such as Bishop Halls Peace-maker and Pax terris and all his writings and Bishop Davenants Bishop Mortons and Bishop Hall's Pacificatory Epistles to Duraeus and Mr. Burroughs's Irenicon Ludov. Crocius Amyraldus Junius Paraeus's and many other Irenicons written by forein Divines to say nothing of those that are upon single controversies But the younger sowre uncharitable Christians are better pleased with such Books and Sermons as call them aloud to be very zealous for this or that controverted point of Doctrine or for or against some circumstance of worship or Church discipline or about some fashions or customs or indifferent things as if the Kingdom of God were in them Rom. 14.1 2 15 16. 3. But the seeming Christian is either a meer temporizer that will be of that Religion whatever it be which is most in fashion or which the higher powers are of or which will cost him least Or else he will run into the other extream and lift up himself by affected singularities and by making a bustle and stir in the world about some small and controverted point and careth not to sacrifice the peace and safety of the Church to the honour of his own opinions And as small as the Christian Church is he must be of a smaller society than it that he may be sure to be amongst the best while indeed he hath no sincerity at all but placeth his hopes in being of the right Church or Party or Opinion And for his Party or Church he burneth with a feverish kind of zeal and is ready to call for fire from Heaven and to decieve him the Devil sendeth him some from Hell to consume those that are not of his mind Yet doth he bring it as an Angel of light to defend the Truth and Church of Christ And indeed when the Devil will be the Defender of Truth or of the Church or of Peace or Order or Piety he doth it with the most burning zeal You may know him by the means he useth He defendeth the Church by forbidding the people to read the Scriptures in a known tongue and by imprisoning and burning the soundest and holiest members of it and abusing the most learned faithfull Pastors and defendeth the flock by casting out the Shepherds and such like means as the murders of the Waldenses and the Massacres of France and Ireland and the Spanish Inquisition and Queen Maries Bonefires and the Powder-plot yea and the Munster and the English rage and phrensies may give you fuller notice of He that hath no Holiness nor Charity to be zealous for will be zealous for his Church or Sect or Customs or Opinions And then this zeal must be the evidence of his piety and so the Inquisitors have thought they have religiously served God by murdering his servants and it is the badge of their honour to be the Devils hang-men to execute his malice on the members of Christ and all this is done in zeal for Religion by irreligious Hypocrites There is no standing before the malicious zeal of a graceless Pharisee when it riseth up for his carnal interest or the honour and traditions and customs of his Sect Luk. 6.7 And they were filled with madness and communed with one another what they might do to Jesus Luke 4.28 Acts 5.17 13.45 John 16.2 Rom. 10 2. Phil. 3.6 Acts 36.10 11. The zeal of a true Christian consumeth himself with grief to see the madness of the wicked But the zeal of the Hypocrite consumeth others that by the light of the fire his Religiousness may be seen You may see the Christians fervent Love of God by the fervent flames which he can suffer for his sake And you may see the fervent Love of the Hypocrite by the flames which he kindleth for others By these he cryeth with Jehu Come and see my zeal for the Lord 2 King 10.16 2 Sam. 21.2 LV. 1. A Christian indeed is one that most highly esteemeth and regardeth the interest of God and mens salvation in the world and taketh all things else to be inconsiderable in comparison of these The interest of Great men and Nobles and Commanders yea and his own in corporal respects as riches honour health and life he taketh to be things unworthy to be named in competition with the interest of Christ and Souls The thing that his heart is most set upon in the world is that God be glorified and that the world acknowledge him their King and that his Laws be obeyed and that darkness and infidelity and ungodliness may be cast out and that pride and worldliness and fleshly lusts may not hurry the miserable world unto perdition It is one of the saddest and most amazing thoughts that ever entreth into his heart to consider how much of the world is overwhelmed in ignorance and wickedness and how great the Kingdom of the Devil is in comparison of the Kingdom of Christ that God should forsake so much of his Creation that Christianity should not be owned in above the sixth part of the world and Popish pride and ignorance with the corruptions of many other Sects and the worldly carnal minds of Hypocrites should rob Christ of so much of this little part and leave him so small a flock of holy ones that must possess the Kingdom His soul consenteth to the Method of the Lords Prayer as prescribing us the order of our Desires And in his prayers he seeketh first in order of estimation and intention the Hallowing of Gods name and the coming of his Kingdom and the doing of his Will on Earth as it is done in Heaven before his daily bread or the pardon of his sins or the deliverance of his own soul from temptations