and Confidence in God upon whom its Being and Happiness depends AND therefore the Gospel to render our future Happiness compleat endeavours to train us up before-hand to a firm and perfect Confidence in God by making it an essential part of our duty to commit the keeping of our souls to God in well-doing 1 Pet. iv 19 to trust in the living God who gives us all things richly to enjoy 1 Tim. vi 17 not to trust in our selves but in God who raiseth the dead 2 Cor. i. 9 to believe in God and not be troubled at any Events which happen to us in this world John xiv 1 and not to cast away our confidence Heb. x. 35 and the like the Sense of all which is to press and engage us to a constant and chearful Relyance upon God and to endeavour to affect our minds with a deep sense of his over-ruling Providence and a full Assurance of the Goodness of all those great Designs he is driving on in the World and accordingly to acquiesce in and embrace all Events as the tokens of his Love and Favour and always to live upon this Persuasion that it is infinitely better for us to be in Gods hands than in our own and that he knows much better how to dispose of us and our affairs than we do and that he will take care to dispose of them as much to our advantage as we our selves should if we knew as much as he doth Now though by reason of those strong Impressions which sensible things in this Life of Sense make upon us we should not always be able so firmly to rely upon and repose our selves in Gods invisible Power as not to be at all disquieted about the Issues and Events of things yet if by frequent acts of Trust and Relyance on him we have so disposed our minds to confide in him as that by looking up to his over-ruling Providence we can ordinarily stay and support our selves amidst the Changes and Revolutions of this world if when a storm of Adversity hangs lowring over or showers down upon us we can flie to God for shelter and promise our selves Safety and Protection under the out-stretched wings of his Providence in a word if when we smart we can ordinarily hope in him and rest persuaded that under his gracious Conduct and Disposal all things shall work together for our good this our imperfect wavering Hope and Dependance shall in the other life be immediately ripened into a most perfect Confidence and Assurance For there we shall be wholly removed from this Life of Sense by which our Trust in Gods invisible Providence is very much weakned and distracted and besides we shall have much quicker and clearer apprehensions of his Nature and of the infinite Reasons we have to confide in him And then when after all the threats of a tempestuous Voyage we shall find our selves landed in a blessed World and possessed of all its promised Glories this mighty Experiment of Gods Fidelity and Goodness will immediately settle our predisposed minds into such an immovable Confidence in him as that from thenceforth no Fear or Distrust will ever find the least access to our thoughts but we shall be so perfectly assured of his Truth and Goodness that though we shall feel our selves sustained and blest every moment by the arbitrary Influences of his Benignity and Power yet we shall be as confident for ever of the continuance of our bliss as we could be if we did self-exist and held the eternity of our Being and Happiness as independently as God doth his For though our Condition will be ever dependent yet'twill be ever dependent upon such a foundation as can no more fail than Gods own Life and Being viz. upon his Veracity and Goodness both which are so essential to him as that he cannot exist without them And knowing our selves so firmly secured in this our dependent State as that we can never sink unless God himself sink under us we shall be to all Eternity not only as safe but as satisfied in it as if we were every one a God to himself and in this blessed Security we shall quietly enjoy God and our selves for ever So that our Trust and Confidence in God will crown the Pleasure of all our other Virtues by giving us full Security of an everlasting Fruition of it For now the ravished mind will have no fear or distrust to cramp or arrest it in its blessed operations no anxious Thoughts of a sad futurity to sower its present enjoyments but 't will enjoy all Heaven every moment in a fearless Security of enjoying it all for ever And when it shall perfectly love contemplate and adore God with a sure and certain Confidence of contemplating loving and adoring him perfectly for ever O! how unspeakably will this enhance the Pleasure of those beatifical Acts For now in every moment of all our blessed Eternity we shall still have the Joy of a blessed Eternity to come and besides all those Pleasures which each present moment of our heavenly Life shall abound with we shall still have the Pleasure of a Prospect of infinite Ages of Pleasure And thus the blessed mind you see by its perfect Dependance upon God consummates its own Heaven and secures it self for ever in a most quiet and undisturbed Enjoyment of it BY all which I think it sufficiently appears how much each of these Divine Virtues which as rational Creatures we are obliged to exert and exercise upon God contributes to our heavenly Happiness and consequently how indispensably necessary our present Practice of them is to dispose and capacitate us to enjoy it SECT III. Concerning the Social Virtues shewing that these also are included in the Heavenly Part of the Christian Life and that in their Natures they very much contribute to our Heavenly Happiness MAN of all sublunary Creatures is the most adapted for Society For though the greatest part of other Creatures do covet Society as well as he yet he alone is furnished with that gift of Nature which renders Society most pleasant and useful and that is the gift of Speech By means of which we can express our Thoughts and maintain a mutual Intelligence of Minds with one another and thereby divert our Sorrows mingle our Mirth impart our Secrets communicate our Counsels and make mutual Compacts and Agreements to supply and assist each other And in these things consists the greatest Vse and Pleasure of Society And as of all Creatures we are the best fitted for Society so we stand in the greatest need of it For as for other Creatures after they come into the World they are much sooner able to help themselves than we and after we are most able to help our selves there are a world of Necessaries and Conveniences without which we cannot be happy and with which we cannot be supplied without each others aid and assistance which in an unsociable State of Life we should of all Creatures in the World be
each new satisfaction shall immediately spring a new desire and each new desire immediately terminate in a new satisfaction And now O happy mind what tongue can express thy joys and raptures that being thus in conjunction with God art always filled with glorious Ideas and compassed round with the wonders of his perfection so that at every glance thou seest some new Charm and with every thought makest some vast Discovery O the transporting pleasure of that blessed Vision which now I can hardly think of without an ecstasie when my poor longing Mind which here gropes about for truth in a dark dungeon of Errour and Ignorance shall be let forth into the heavenly light to see as it is seen and know as it is known how will it fix its greedy eyes upon God of whose acquaintance it is now so desirous With what infinite delight will its winged and active thoughts hover in the light of his Countenance which through every moment of Eternity will be still revealing new Beauties to us such as will not only for ever employ but for ever inflame our Meditations II. AS we are Rational Creatures related to God we are obliged humbly to Worship and Adore him that is that out of a most awful esteem and profound reverence of his super-excellent Majesty and boundless Perfections we should bow down our Souls before him and address our selves to him by Invocation and Prayer by Praise and Thanksgiving as to the Alsufficient Independent and sole disposer of every good and perfect gift and that in these our Addresses we should outwardly express this our reverential Esteem of him by such humble gestures of Body as are most apt to testifie it to others For all this is but a just and due acknowledgment of what he is in himself and to us and all his Creation The profoundest Reverence and Veneration we can pay him is but a just Acknowledgment of his Infinite Majesty and Power the most fervent Invocations and Prayers we can offer him are but a due owning of him to be what he is the supream Disposer and Author of all things the most ample and glorious Praises we can give him are incomparably short of what is owing to his infinite Excellencies and Perfections the most thankful Acknowledgments we can make him are but poor compositions for those vast sums which we owe to his Bounty and Liberality So that all our Worship is a most just Due arising from what he is in himself and from what he doth to us and to all his Creatures And till we are made throughly sensible of both we are utterly incapable of eternal Happiness which consisting as I shewed you before in the vigorous exercise of our Rational Faculties upon God doth necessarily require that we should be duely affected with his Perfections and Actions For unless we are so we shall never be able to engage our Faculties vigorously to employ and exercise themselves about him unless our minds be over-awed with an habitual sense of his infinite Majesty and Power we shall be apt to negglect him as an object too mean for our great Faculties to converse with unless our minds be strongly disposed to esteem and admire his Glory and Excellencies we shall never be able to excite our Understanding and Will to act upon him with any life and vigour in a word unless we are possessed with a constant sense that he is the Spring of all those goods which we enjoy or hope for we shall be apt to look upon him as one with whom we are very little concerned and so to neglect and disregard him So that unless we do now acquire an habitual Devotion of mind toward God when we go from hence into the other world we shall find our faculties so averse and listless to all that heavenly Motion and Exercise wherein the Happiness above consists that we shall be utterly incapable to tast and enjoy it For in eternity our Souls will run according to the prevailing byass which they carry thither with them but 't is impossible they should run towards God with life and freedom unless they are constantly drawn and inclined to him by a devout veneration of his Majesty and admiration of his Glory and Perfection And hence it is that the Gospel doth so strictly oblige us to adore and worship God Rev. xxii 9 to worship him in spirit and in truth Joh. iv 24 to pray without ceasing 1 Thes. v. 17 and pray always with all prayer and supplication that is earnestly to supplicate God upon every fit opportunity and time of need Ephes. vi 18 in a word to offer to God the sacrifice of praise that is the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name Heb. xiii 15 and to thank God without ceasing 1 Thes. ii 13 The meaning of all which is that out of a deep and quick sense of the infinite Majesty and Power Alsufficience and Beneficence of God we should be frequently bowing our selves before him and offering up our Prayers and Praises and Thanksgivings to him And in the constant practice of these we shall be growing up by degrees to that blissful state of Heaven For all these acts of divine Worship being immediate addresses of our minds to God do so unite us to him that in every hearty Prayer Praise or Thanksgiving we do in a manner touch 〈…〉 him So while we humbly adore 〈…〉 we are sensibly struck with the rays of it while we earnestly invocate his Goodness and Mercy we are touched with a strong attractive virtue from him whereby we plainly feel our selves drawn up to him and rapt into a real enjoyment of him in a word while we are offering our hearty Praises and Thanksgivings to him we are under a captivating sense of his infinite Gloy and Beneficence and with a sensible touch of this his heavenly fire our hearts are kindled and inflamed Insomuch that while we are upon our knees in a warmth and fervour of Devotion our minds have many times as quick a perception as strong and lively a relish of God as ever our bodily palate had of the most gustful meats or liquors So that by frequently repeating these our devotions we frequently repeat these our sensations of God which being often renewed will grow more vigorous and constant and so at last improve into an active permanent and habitual sense of him And having thus acquired by our frequent and devout Worship a lively constant feeling and perception of the Majesty and Glory of the Bounty and Benignity of God when ever we go into eternity this like a vital spring will give a perpetual motion to our Faculties and vigorously exert and employ them upon God for ever The quick and lively sense we shall have of his infinite Majesty and Power will for ever aw our Understandings and Wills into a strict attention and submission to him and have such a commanding power over us as will even constrain us to regard him with the profoundest
if we ever mean to wage War with it with Success it is necessary we should acquire before-hand a through sense and feeling of the Evil of it that we should chastise our souls with some degree of that bitter Sorrow and Regret it deserves and inflict upon our selves some part of that Hell of infinite Horror and Anguish that is ingendring in its Womb that so being the more sensible of its Malignity we may be the more enraged against it and enter the Lists with it with the greater Resolution and Animosity For our Sorrow and Remorse for our Sins if it be serious and hearty will convert into Hatred and Indignation against them and that Hatred will animate us in all our Conflicts with them and render us more obstinate against their Terrors and Alurements So that when in the aftercourse of our Warfare against them we are tempted afresh to yield and comply with them the Remembrance of the past Shame and Sorrow Remorse and Confusion we have undergone for their sakes will render us far more deaf and inexorable than otherwise we should be to their Solicitations IF therefore we would ingage in this spiritual Warfare with Success we must be often reflecting upon our past Sins and representing them to our selves in all their aggravating Circumstances And when we have surveyed them round about and considered them in all their natural Turpitude Disingenuity and Indecency and applied them to our selves with all their appendant Stings shameful Effects and dismal Circumstances so that our hearts begin to feel them and to smart and bleed under the dolorous Sense of them then must we pour them out before God in sad and mournful Confessions For the very Confession of our Sins before so pure and great a Being is in it self an effectual Means to increase our Shame and Sorrow for them and he must have a very hard Heart that can ingenuously and without any Reserve lay open his crimes before the God of Heaven and Earth in all their black Aggravations without being stung with a sensible Regret and Confusion especially if he frequently repeat his Confessions as he ought to do V. TO our successful Beginning of this our Christian Warfare it is also necessary that we earnestly implore the divine Aid and Assistance to enable us to go through with it For God knowing how unable we are of our selves to ingage in this great Enterprize with that good Conduct that is necessary to give us any probability of Success hath promised us his own Presence and Assistance even from the Beginning to the End of it and if in any part of it his Assistance be necessary 't is doubtless in the Entrance which as I shall shew you by and by is by far the most difficult and hazardous If therefore we presume to enter upon it without supplicating God to second us with his Grace and Assistance we shall quickly find our selves shamefully foiled and defeated For though he hath promised to assist us yet 't is upon Condition that we earnestly beg and seek him he will give his Spirit but it is to those that ask it Luke xi 13 he will draw near unto us but first we must draw near unto him James iv 8 and we are assured that we shall have if we ask that we shall find if we seek and that it shall be opened unto us if we knock Mat. vii 7 And therefore we are bid to go boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help us in the time of need Heb. iv 16 and not only to pray without ceasing 1 Thess. v. 17 but in every thing by prayer and supplication to let our requests be made known unto God Philip. iv 6 and if in every thing we ought to make known our Wants to him then much more in this great and difficult Undertaking in which it will be impossible for us to succeed without his heavenly Aid and Assistance WHEREFORE as we hope for Victory in this our spiritual Warfare we must earnestly implore his Concurrence with us and beseech him to second us in all our weak Efforts and Endeavours We must lay open our woful Case before him and remonstrate to him that we are heartily willing to do what we are able but that without him we are abundantly sensible all will be in vain We must tell him that our Dependance is upon him and that all our Hope of Success is in him and that we dare not stir one step without him and beseech him that he will not stand by and see us spend our selves in ineffectual Struglings but that he will graciously stretch forth his helping Hand to us and not suffer us to miscarry for want of his necessary Assistance Which if we do we may assure our selves that the merciful God who is the Father of our Spirits will never abandon his own off-spring whilst it cries out to him and with pitiful and bemoaning Looks implores his Aid and gracious Co-operation WHILST therefore we are thus endeavouring to prepare our selves for our spiritual Warfare we ought in every act of Preparation to look up to God and earnestly supplicate the Concurrence of his Grace and Spirit While we are endeavouring to believe we must beg him to help our Vnbelief to remove all Prejudices from our minds and present the Evidences of our Religion to our Understandings in a clear and convincing Light When we are setting our selves to a serious Consideration we must beseech him to fix our Thoughts to suggest to and repeat his heavenly Motives and Arguments so fast and thick upon our Minds that no sinful or worldly Thought may be able to crowd in to disturb or divert our Meditations When we are labouring to persuade our selves of our Need and the Reality of our Saviours Mediation we must earnestly intreat him to open our eyes and convince us effectually of the horrible Danger of our sin and of the infallible Efficacy of that blessed Remedy When we are attempting to affect our selves with the bitter Sense of our past Transgressions we must implore him to strike in with us and to inspire our Minds with such piercing and powerful Convictions of the infinite Shame Baseness and Danger of them as may sting our brawny Consciences to the quick and dissolve our frozen Souls into a sorrowful Repentance that so when we enter the lists and proceed to Resolution which is the Beginning of our spiritual Warfare we may be armed against our Sins with such a lively Faith such puissant Considerations such Horror and Animosity against them and such an assured Hope of being rescued from the fatal Issues and Effects of them as that we may be able to promise our selves a happy Success in the ensuing Course of our Warfare against them And having thus fitted and accoutred our selves for this great and momentous Enterprize VI. WE are to enter into a serious and solemn Resolution of Amendment of forsaking and renouncing all our Sins and
for ever in a glorious Place which separated from all the rest of Heaven would be but a poor and hungry kind of Happiness For Life is no otherwise a Happiness than as it is the Principle of all our pleasant and grateful Perceptions and if we could live for ever without perceiving it would be the same thing to us as if we were nothing but a Company of everlasting Stones and Trees and what great matter would it signifie to live for ever in a glorious Place unless we could be for ever affected by it with a delightful sense and perception which is impossible because all delightful sense as hath already been proved arises out of the vigorous exercise of our Faculties about such Objects as are suitable to them but what can there be in the most glorious Place so suitable to a Rational Mind and Will as to keep them for ever vigorously employed and exercised about it It may indeed for a while employ the Mind in an eager Contemplation of its new and surprizing Beauties but how soon would the Mind dis-relish it were it to be its only Entertainment for Eternity And as for the Will what would a fine Place signifie to it if it were not replenished with such Objects as are suitable to its own Options And indeed there is nothing that can everlastingly gratifie a Rational Mind and Will but what has in it such an Infinity of Truth as is everlastingly Knowable and such an Infinity of Goodness as is everlastingly Desireable or which is the same thing nothing but what hath Truth enough in it for the one to be vigorously contemplating for ever and nothing but what hath Goodness enough in it for the other to be as vigorously loving adoring and imitating for ever And such an Infinitude of Truth and Goodness is no where to be found but in God But God as well as the Place and Duration of Heaven being an Object that is external to us neither is nor can be a Happiness to us unless we act upon him and freely exercise our Faculties about him unless we Know him and Love him c. So that that which Felicitates all is our own Internal Act 't is by this that we enjoy Heaven and perceive all the Pleasures of it 'T is not by being in Heaven that men are constituted Happy but by vigorously exerting their Faculties upon the Heavenly Objects For without this to be in Heaven or out of it would be altogether indifferent to us The Happiness of Heaven therefore consists in a State of Heavenly Action in being so attempered and connaturaliz'd to the Objects of Heaven as to be always acting upon and chearfully employing our Faculties about them For as there is no Pleasure in Acting coldly upon suitable Objects so there is Pain and Trouble in acting vigorously upon unsuitable ones And therefore to make Heaven it self a Happiness to us t is necessary not only that we should act vigorously upon the Objects of it but that we should so act from a suitableness of Temper to them That we should contemplate God submit to his Will adore and imitate his Perfections from a God-like Temper and Disposition For otherwise these Acts will be Penances instead of Pleasures to us and the more intensely we exert them the more painful they will be And if we were in Heaven all that Heavenly Exercise in which the Happiness of it consists would be but a Torment and Vexation to us unless we had a Heavenly Temper For as the Parts of Matter can never rest but do move about in a perpetual Whirl-pool till they are hit into a place or Interstice that is of the same Form and Figure with them so there is nothing can rest in Heaven but what is Heavenly All that is otherwise rebounds and flyes off of its own accord and can never acquiesce there till 't is of the same Form and Temper and Disposition with it From hence therefore it 's evident that the Happiness of a Man in Heaven consists not so much in the outward Glory of the Place as in the inward State of his own Mind which from a suitableness of Temper to the Heavenly Objects doth always freely employ and exercise its Faculties about them II. THAT the Heavenly State is nothing else but the Perfection of all Heavenly Vertue For it hath been already proved That Heaven consists in a clear and intimate Knowledge and a free and uncontested Choice of God and of those Blessed Beings that resemble him and these Two comprehend all Heavenly Virtue So that the difference between the state of Grace and Glory is not in Kind but in Degree For Grace is the Seed of Glory and Glory is the Maturity of Grace 'T is Knowledge exalted above all Error and Prejudice above all Difficulty or Obscurity of Apprehension 't is Love strained from all repugnancies of Flesh and Spirit and refined into a pure Celestial flame t is Obedience to and Imitation of God perfectly separated from all sinful Defects and freed from the Clog of counter-striving Principles 't is Adoration of and Dependency upon him without the least degree of Indisposition or Despondency in a word 't is a free and uncontrolled Motion of all the Heavenly Virtues together in which they are every one most vigorously exerted without the least Check or Impediment This therefore being the State of Heaven as is evident from what hath been discoursed it hence follows that the main difference between Virtue and Heaven is only Gradual that Virtue is the Beginning of Heaven and Heaven is the Perfection of Virtue And if so then as the lowest Degree of true Virtue is a step Heaven-wards so every farther Degree is a nearer Approach towards the Heavenly state So that as we grow in Grace and proceed from one Degree of Virtue to another we draw nearer and nearer to that blessed Condition in which we shall be all pure Virtue without any sinful Alloy or Intermixture And this is the true State and Condition of HEAVEN CHAP. II. Concerning the Means by which this Great End of the Christian Life is to be attained IT is to be considered that the great Design of Christianity being to advance our Natures to such a sublime Degree of Purity and Perfection as is requisite to capacitate us for the Enjoyment of a Heavenly Bliss it was necessitated in order hereunto to strain our Duty to a greater Height than any preceding Law had done before it For the End of all Gods Laws is the Happiness of his Subjects and therefore that they may be effectual Means to promote this End it 's necessary that the Duties they enjoyn should be such as the Nature of our Happiness requires Now in the first state of our Nature which was that of Innocence we seem to have been design'd only for a Terrestrial Paradise that is to enjoy a Sensual Animal Happiness in a state of Earthly Immortality And to serve and promote this end God gave us
by passing out of one world into another And therefore as in this world it is Likeness that does congregate and associate Beings together so doubtless it is in the other too So that if we carry with us thither our wicked and devillish dispositions as we shall doubtless do unless we subdue and mortifie them here there will be no Company fit for us to associate with but only the devillish and damned Ghosts of wicked men with whom our wretched Spirits being already joined by a likeness of Nature will mingle themselves as soon as ever they are excommunicated from the society of Mortals For whither should they flock but to the Birds of their own Feather with whom should they associate but with those malignant Spirits to whom they are already joined by a Community of Nature So that supposing that when they land in Eternity it were left to their own Liberty to go to Heaven or Hell into the society of the Blessed or the Damned it is plain that Heaven would be no Place for them that the Air of that bright Region of eternal Day would never agree with their black and hellish Natures For alas what should they do among those Blessed Beings that inhabit it to whose God-like Natures Divine Contemplations and Heavenly Employments they have so great a Repugnancy and Aversation So that besides the having a Right to Heaven it is necessary to our enjoying it that we shoule be antecedently disposed and qualified for it And it being thus God hath been graciously pleased to to make those very Virtues the Conditions of our Right to Heaven which are the proper Dispositions and Qualifications of our Spirits for it that so with one and the same Labour we might entitle our selves to and qualifie our selves to enjoy it NOW as we shewed you before the Condition of our Right to Heaven is our practising those Heavenly Virtues which are implied in the Religion of the End and as the Religion of the Means no further entitles us to Heaven than as it produces and promotes in us those Heavenly Virtues so it no further qualifies us for it For when the Soul goes into Eternity it leaves the Religion of the Means behind it and carries nothing with it but only those Heavenly Virtues and Dispositions which it here acquired by those Means For as for Faith and Consideration Hearing of Gods Word and Receiving of Sacraments c. they are all but Scaffolds to that Heavenly Building of inward Purity and Goodness and when this is once finished for Eternity then must those Scaffolds all go down as things of no further Use or Necessity But as for the Graces of the Mind they are to stand for ever to be the Receptacles and Habitations of all Heavenly Pleasure And hence the Apostle tells us that of those three Christian Graces Faith Hope and Charity Charity which in the largest sense of it comprehends all Heavenly Virtue is the greatest because the Two former being but Means of Charity shall cease in Heaven and be swallowed up for ever in Vision and Enjoyment but Charity saith he never faileth 1 Cor. xii 13 BY all which it is apparent that the Religion of the Means is no further useful to us than as it is apt to produce and promote in us those Heavenly Virtues the practice of which is the most direct and immediate Means to the ultimate End of a Christian. Wherefore as a man may knock and file and yet be no Mechanick though the Hammer and File with which he does it are very useful Tools to the making of any curious Machine so a man may pray and hear and receive Sacraments c. and yet be a very Bungler in the blessed Trade of a Heavenly Life For though it is true these are excellent Means of Heavenly Living yet as the Art of the Mechanick consists not barely in using his Tools but in using them in such a manner as is necessary to the perfecting and accomplishing his Work So the Art of one that pretends to the Heavenly Life consists not barely in praying and hearing c. but in using these Means with that Religious Skill and Artifice which is necessary to render them effectually subservient to the Ends of Piety and Virtue AND thus I have given a general Account of the Means which are necessary to our obtaining of Heaven and which as I have shewed are either such as tend more directly and immediately to it or such as more remotely respect it The first is the Practice of those Heavenly Virtues in the Perfection whereof the Happiness of Heaven consists the second is the Practising of those Duties which are necessary to our acquiring and perfecting those Heavenly Virtues And of these two Parts consists the whole Christian Life which takes in not only all those Virtues that are to be practised by us in Heaven but also all those Duties by which we are to overcome the Difficulty of those Virtues and to acquire and perfect them The first of these for Distinction sake we will call the Heavenly Part of the Christian Life it being that part of it which we shall lead in Heaven after we have learnt it here upon Earth The second I shall call the Warfaring or Militant Part of the Christian Life which is peculiar to our Earthly State wherein we are to contend and strive with the manifold Difficulties which attend us in the Exercise of those Heavenly Virtues Both which I conceive are implied in those words of the Apostle Phil. i. 27 Only let your Conversation be as becometh the Gospel where the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we render Let your Conversation be strictly signifies behaving our selves as Citizens or which if we may have leave to coin a word may be fitly rendered Citizen it as becomes the Gospel For the word implies that those of whom he speaks were Denizens of some Free City for so the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Phil. iii. 20 is rendered Conversation strictly denotes a Citizenship from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Citizens and is of the same Import with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Acts xxii 28 is translatee a Freedom i. e. of the City of Rome which denotes the State and Condition of those who though they dwelt out of that City and sometimes remote from it had yet the Jus Civitatis Romanae the Privileges of it belonging to them For thus Cicero describes it Omnibus Municipibus duas esse Tatrias unam Naturae alteram Juris Catonis Exemplo qui Tusculi natus in Populi Romani Societaem susceptus est i. e. All such as are made free of the City have two Countries one of Nature the other of Law As Cato for instance who was born at Tusculum and afterwards admitted a Citizen of Rome Which exactly agrees with the Nature of this Heavenly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Citizenship which the Apostle here attributes to Christians who though they belong at present to another
Reverence and Veneration For there we shall have far greater and clearer apprehensions of his Majesty than ever we had in this imperfect state which will improve our pre-acquired sense of it to such a degree of Respect and Veneration as will for ever over-rule our Faculties and keep our Understandings Wills and Affections in close and strict attendance to him And as our sense of his Majesty will sweetly command so our sense of his infinite Beauty and Beneficence will invincibly allure us to exert and exercise our faculties upon him For he that hath an affectionate sense of the Beauty and Goodness and Bounty of God hath a heart ready tuned for the Musick of heaven ready set and composed for everlasting Praises and Halelujahs So that when he goes away from hence into the other world and is there admitted to a more intimate view of the perfections and a more abundant participation of the blessings of God than ever his predisposed mind will immediately be seized with such a strong pathetick sense of both as that he will not be able to withhold expressing and venting it in the most rapturous strains of Admiration and Praise and Thanksgiving And this will be his business and employment for ever to admire and extoll the Perfections of God of which he will every moment make new and glorious Discoveries and to celebrate with grateful acknowledgments the infinite riches of his Bounty of which he will every moment have fresh and sweet experiences So that whilst by continual acts of Praise and Thanksgiving we endeavour to affect our minds with a due sense of the Goodness and Bounty of God we are practising before-hand the Musick of Heaven and taking out the Songs of Zion that so when we go from hence we may be qualified and prepared to bear a part in the Celestial Choir So that true devotion you see which consists in a quick and lively sense of the infinite Majesty Beauty and Benignity of God doth most effectually dispose the mind to all those divine and heavenly exercises wherein the state of heaven consists III. AS we are rational Creatures related to God we are obliged to an unfeigned love of and complacency in him And that both upon the account of what he is in himself as he is the most lovely and amiable of beings in whom there is an harmonious concurrence of all imaginable Beauties and Perfections of Wisdom and Goodness of Justice and Mercy and every other amiable thing that can claim or attract a reasonable Affection all which in infinite degrees are contempered together in his nature and also upon the account of his infinite Kindness and Beneficence to us For besides that he hath compassed us round like so many fortunate Islands with a vast Ocean of external Blessings in which there is all that is either necessary convenient or pleasant for our bodily use and enjoyment besides that he hath inspired us with immortal Minds and stamped them with those fair impresses of his own Divinity the knowledge of Truth and the love of Goodness which are both of them very forward capacities of the highest Perfection and most exalted Happiness in a word besides that to supply and gratifie these our noble Capacities he hath prepared for us an immortal Heaven and furnisht it with all the Pleasures and and Delights that a Heaven-born Mind can desire or enjoy besides all this I say he hath sent his own Son from heaven to reveal to us the Way thither and to encourage us to return into it by dying for our sins and thereby obtaining for us a publick Grant and Charter of Mercy and Pardon upon Condition of our return yea and as if all this were too little he hath sent his Spirit to us in the room of his Son to abide amongst us and as his Vicegerent to drive on this vast design of his love to us to excite and persuade us to return into that sure way to heaven which he hath described to us and to assist us all along in our travel thither So wondrous careful hath he been not to be defeated of this his kind intention to make us everlastingly happy And now what Heart can be so hard and impenetrable as to resist such powerful Charms and Endearments Methinks if we had but the common Sense and Ingenuity of men in us it would be impossible for us to reflect upon such miracles of Beauty and Love as these are without being intimately touched and affected with them But till we are so it will be impossible for us to enjoy Heaven for how can we freely exert our Faculties upon an Object that we do not love and if we cannot how can we without loving God enjoy Heaven which consists in the free and cheerful out-goings of all our Faculties upon him For if when we go into Eternity we love him not either he will be indifferent or hateful to us if the former we shall altogether neglect and take no notice of him if the latter we shall either flie away from him and banish our selves from his presence or be forced to abide and endure it with extream regret and torment For whilst our minds are averse and repugnant to him whatsoever we see in him will but the more enrage and canker our malice against him and even the sight of those his glorious Perfections which so enravish the hearts of the blessed inhabitants of Heaven will only provoke and boil up our Dislike of him to a higher degree of Hatred and Aversation For so we find by experience in this life that while our minds are unreconciled to God it is a Pennance to us to come near him to admit any Thoughts of or Conversation with him And this is the reason why we take so much pains as we do to misrepresent him to our selves to draw such Pictures and Ideas of him upon our Minds as best correspond with our own Tempers that so having thus transformed the Notion of him into the Image of our selves Narcissus-like we may fall in love with him or at least more easily endure his blessed Presence and Conversation When therefore we shall go into the other world where all these Disguises of the divine Idea shall be taken off and we shall see him as he is circled about with his own Rays of unstained and immaculate Glory we shall never be able to abide him but being all affrighted and confounded at the Glory of his Presence we shall be forced to run away and if possible to hide our selves from him in everlasting Darkness and Despair For our Wills being poisoned and infected with an habitual Enmity against him it must needs be torment to us to see him because we must always see him happy which is so great an eye-sore to those damned Spirits that hate him that I am apt to think that next to being delivered out of their own Misery the chiefest Good they desire or wish for is to be delivered from the tormenting Sense of
Natures that they will by no means hearken to a Submission but in despight of their own Dread and Horrour do still persist in an open Defiance to their Almighty Enemy and so tremble and sin and sin and tremble for ever And so shall we if we go into the other World habitual Rebels to God our deep and inveterate malice against him will still hurry us on to incense and provoke him and then our natural Dread of his Power and Majesty will break into frightful and horrible Thoughts and so be continually revenging upon us those our continual provocations of him For then our soul will be nakedly exposed to the lash of its own furious thoughts and have no shield to defend it self against the terrours of its guilty Conscience which being rouzed up and kept awake by the unintermitting Sense of our misery will be always clamouring upon us and continually torturing us with black and horrid Reflections So that whilst we are wandering among wretched Ghosts through those dismal shades below we shall be perpetually meditating Horrours and never leave lashing our selves with our own sharp and terrible thoughts till we have chased our selves into Furies and boiled up our self-condemning Rage into an everlasting Madness Thus as our sense of our unlikeness to God will ever fill us with Shame and Confusion so will the sense of our Rebellion against him continually strike us into Fear and Amazement TO prevent which our holy Religion which doth so industriously consult our Happiness requires us now to submit our selves to God James iv 7 to live to God Gal. ii 19 to present our selves living sacrifices holy and acceptable to God Rom. xii 1 to yield our selves unto God and our members as instruments of righteousness unto God Rom. vi 13 the sense of all which is that we should endeavour so to affect our Minds with the sense of Gods Authority over us and with the manifold Reasons of our obedience to him as to be firmly and constantly resolved within our selves neither to chuse any thing that he forbids nor to refuse any thing that he commands that we should set him up a Throne in our Hearts a fixt and prevailing Resolution of Obedience that therein he may sit and reign and have the absolute Empire and Command of all our inward Motions and outward Actions in a word that we should acquire such an habitual Respect to and Reverence of his sovereign Authority that no temptation from within or without us may be able to countermand it or to seduce us from our duty into any wilful course of Rebellion against him And when once we have framed our minds into this obediential Temper we are in a forward preparation for Heaven And though by reason of those Remains and Reliques of corrupt Nature that are in us which are here continually excited by the many Temptations among which we live we may find reluctant and counter-striving Principles within us a stubborn Appetite contending against an obedient Will and sometimes upon Surprize or Inadvertence over-powering it yet if we heartily bewail this as our Unhappiness and if when we thus fall we weep and rise again and take more care of our steps for the future we shall carry with us when we go from hence into the other World a Will that is habitually resigned to God and so being there removed from all the Temptations that were wont to excite in us those contrary Appetites and Inclinations we shall immediately become all Duty and Obedience and freely give up our selves to God without the least shadow of Contest or Reluctancy And in this blessed State we shall continue for ever so intirely devoted to God that between him and us there shall ever be one common Will and End and Interest and our Hearts which before were in a great measure set and tuned to the Heart of God will be instantly such perfect Vnisons with it that whensoever or whatsoever he speaks we shall still resound and eccho to him from our inmost bowels with unspeakable Chearfulness and Alacrity AND being thus reduced to a perfect Submission to the Will of God we shall therein find our selves incomparably happy For now our Wills being always determined by the Will of God we shall be perfectly eased of all the Trouble and Distraction of chusing Now our Minds will no longer hover in Suspence nor be divided between contrary Reasons but all its thoughts will glide gently on in a calm and even Current without ever being tossed and bandied to and fro by cross and opposite Deliberations For now it no sooner knows the Will of God but it rests in it immediately with a free Assent and uncontrolled Approbation so that upon new Occasions it's free from the trouble of forming new Choices and Resolutions being already fixt under all Events to one steady Course of Motion and immovably resolved whatever befals ever to do what God would have it And its will thus perfectly acquiescing in God as in its proper Place and Element it will no longer dispute as it was wont to do no longer waver between two Loadstones but always obey upon the first Motion and follow him for ever without Deliberation In which happy state we shall be no longer ground between those coutermoving Milstones the law in our Minds and the law in our Members but being intirely resigned to God we shall ever obey him secundo flumine with a full Current of Inclination and Nature And what a mighty Ease must this be to the Soul especially considering that by being thus entirely subject to God it will not only be released from the Trouble of chusing and deliberating but also throughly warranted of the Goodness and Rectitude of its own Choices For so far as we are subject unto God our Wills are his and so are our Actions too and whilst they are so we can have no reason to mistrust either that they are bad in themselves or that he is angry and displeased at them For his Will we know is governed by his Nature which is the Standard of Good and Evil the Law and Measure of Right and Wrong so that while we will and act as he would have us we have a sufficient warrant for what we do a warrant that will for ever bear us out and justifie us to our own Minds and always render us abundantly satisfied with our selves so that we shall not only always acquit but always reverence our selves and our Conscience will not only cease to shame us but be continually applauding and smiling upon us and instead of those importunate Clamours with which it was wont to entertain us it s constant eccho to all our actions will be well done good and profitable servant So that being entirely determined by the Will of God which never varies from the Law of his Nature we shall be perfectly satisfied with our selves and for ever chuse and act without the least Mistrust or Hesitance And then our Wills being perfectly subject to
you come there Since therefore this may happen to ye and is not altogether unlikely it concerns ye as ye hope for Heaven to fore-arm and prepare your selves against it So that our Christian Warfare exposing us as it doth to so many certain and probable Difficulties it is not without reason that the Apostle exhorts us to be stedfast and immovable always abounding in the work of the Lord forasmuch as we know that our labour shall not be in vain in the Lord. II. TO the Course and Progress of our Christian Warfare it is necessary that we propose to our selves the most excellent Examples For Experience tells us that good Example hath a stronger Influence upon men than good Precepts or Counsels and the reason is plain because he that only gives others good Advices or Instructions doth not give them that Security that he believes himself as he that seconds his Counsel with his own Example For they who are instructed do in a great measure depend upon the Judgment and Authority of their Teachers and therefore must have a reasonable Security that their Teachers do believe themselves before they will be induced to believe and comply with what they are taught and such a Security is not to be fetcht so much from their Words as from their Actions But when by their Examples they transcribe their own Doctrines it is visible they are in earnest and that is a probable Argument to their Disciples that their Doctrine is true So that good Example teaches with greater Force and Authority than good Doctrine can do because it more sensibly confirms what it teaches and doth at the same time direct us what to do and by a very popular Argument prove that we ought to do it Besides when the matter which the Teacher advises or enjoins is hard and difficult he ought for the Encouragement of those whom he teaches to give them a full Assurance that 't is practicable which no Argument will so effectually do as his own Example For when they see that he himself practises what he teaches that is an ocular Demonstration to them that 't is practicable So that good Example carries in it this strong Encouragement to Goodness that there is nothing in it but what is possible and that the greatest Difficulties that attend it are such as may be conquered by Diligence and sincere Endeavour And as it gives us the most sensible Direction and Encouragement to Virtue so it also represents it to us to the greatest Advantage For whereas Precepts and Discourses of Virtue are only the Pictures and artificial Descriptions of it a virtuous Example is Virtue animated and exposed to our view in all its living Charms and Attractions And therefore by how much Nature exceeds Art and the most accomplished Beauties excel their Statues and Pictures by so much is Virtue in Examples more amiable and attractive than in Precepts and Discourses Since therefore in good Examples we see Virtue alive and in motion exerting it self in the most comely Actions and graceful Gestures this must much more effectually recommend and indear it to our Minds and Affections than the most pressing Discourses or lively Descriptions of it THIS therefore is one of those great means of holy living which the Gospel hath prescribed us viz. that we should propose to our selves the best and most excellent Examples that we should be followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises Heb. vi 12 and that we should be followers of the Apostles and Leaders of the Flock of Christ as they were of Christ himself 1 Cor. xi 1 But because the Examples of the best of Men have a great many imperfections in them and are very often intermixt either with Excesses or Defects and tainted with Superstition or Enthusiasm by reason whereof they frequently mislead those that tread too close upon the heels of them therefore we are more particularly directed to the Example of the great Master of our Religion which though it consists of an unspotted Innocence and perfect Virtue yet is every way accommodated to the State and Condition of humane Nature and Conversation For he conversed among men with a modest Virtue and such as was every way consistent with an ordinary Course of life His Piety was even and constant and unblameable but such as fairly complied with civil Society and a secular Conversation It affected not high Transports and Raptures of Devotion but was such as was both fit and easie for Mortals to imitate His Virtue consisted not in prodigious Fastings or sour and unpracticable Abstractions from Sense but in a life of Justice and Temperance of Humility and Charity and Patience and the like that is in such a life as is not only proper but possible for us to transcribe So that in his glorious Example he hath transmitted to us an imitable Virtue for he took care not to out-run the Capacities of Men in inimitable Expressions of Sanctity and Virtue but so far as he could innocently complied with our Weakness and kept pace with our Strength that so he might entertain us all along with the Comforts of his Company and the Influence of a perpetual Guide And as that Rule of Faith which he hath propounded to us is fitted to our Understandings being very short easie and intelligible so as an excellent Writer of our own hath observed that Copy of Manners which he hath set before us is not only fitted with Excellencies worthy but also with Compliances possible to be imitated by us AND as his Example is all imitable so it is all throughout substantially good For it consisted in a modest Piety a simple and unaffected Goodness His Devotions to God never affected the Stage nor did they ever evaporate in enthusiastick Rants or unaccountable Raptures of Passion but were always secret and serious calm and manly animated with a seraphick Fervour and yet conducted with Reason and Sobriety His Government of himself was exact and regular his Affections were always fixt to their proper Objects and never exceeded the just Limits of Reason and his Appetites were always moderated by his Vnderstanding and never transgressed the bounds of Temperance and Nature His Conversation among men was most innocent and candid free and ingenuous neither vain nor morose haughty nor sordid but equally poised between all Extremes He was just without Partiality humble without Affectation charitable and beneficent without Noise or Respect of Persons His Zeal was wise temperate and substantial such as did not spend it self in a furious Contention for or Opposition to things of an indifferent Nature but it quietly submitted to the Customs of his Countrey and of the Church in which he was born and educated and all his Invectives were against Hypocrisie and Immorality which were the only things to which his noble and generous Temper could never be reconciled In a word his whole Religion was modest and serious and affected rather to be seen than to be heard
and unite them in one Center and not to suffer himself to be tossed hither and thither by independent Designs and Intentions because this will unavoidably distract him in his prosecutions and so divide and weaken his Principles of Action that he will be able to do nothing to any Purpose God therefore being the great Object of Religion it is necessary in order to our progress therein that we should as much as in us lies respect and aim at him in the whole Course of our Actions that we should continually look up to him as to the directing Star by which we are to steer our Motions and conduct our whole Lives under a fixt Intention to obey his Will and imitate his Nature AND indeed unless we do this we are not good Men in the Sense and Judgment of Religion For Religion as such is a Rule of divine Worship and under this Notion the Christian Religion in particular enjoins all its Duties viz. of Homage and Worship to God For it requires us to do all as unto God Col. iii. 23 and to do all to the glory of God 1 Cor. x. 31 that is to do all in Obedience to him and Imitation of him from a sincere Acknowledgment of the Perfections of his Nature of his sovereign Authority over us and immutable Right to rule and command us Not that an actual explicite Intention of obeying or imitating God is necessary to every good Action for our Occasions of doing good being so infinite and so often occurring in our secular Affairs and our Minds being so incapable as they are of attending many things at once it is impossible for us actually to intend Obedience to God in every good thing we perform but that in the general we should heartily intend it is indispensibly necessary to the consecrating our best Actions and adopting them into the Family of Religion For that we must obey God is the fundamental Law of Religion from whence all the particular Commands and Prohibitions of it do receive their Force and Obligation So that unless we do what he commands with a general Intention of Mind to obey him we do not act upon a religious Obligation and consequently though our Actions should be materially good yet are they not formally religious NOW to the fixing and setling such a general Intention in our Minds it is necessary that in the particular Exercises of our Religion we should so far as we are able actually intend and aim at God that we should throw by all other Ends so far as we are able and refer our Actions directly and immediately to him in a word that we should formally devote and dedicate them to his blessed Will and Pleasure so as to be able to say this and this I do purely to please God with a single Intention of Soul to resemble and please him to transcribe his Nature and comply with his Will For which end we must take care as oft as we can to perform our religious Actions in such a manner as that no secular Ends may interpose between God and our Intentions to be as private and as modest as we can in our Religion and not expose it any more than needs must to the eye of the World lest Applause and Reputation should intrude themselves upon us and carry away our Intention from God For thus our Saviour advises in the Case of Charity and Prayer Mat. vi 1 7. that we should not do our alms before men to be seen of them nor sound a trumpet before them to make the Streets ring of our Charity nay if possible that we should not let our left hand know what our right hand doth but that our Alms should be secret and known only to God and our selves and that when we pray we should not affect to make a pompous shew of it in the Synagogues and corners of the streets but that we should enter into our closets and shut our door and in the most private manner unbosom our Souls to God the sense of all which is that should we endeavour so far as in us lies so to circumstantiate our Charity and Devotion as not to give any Opportunity to secular Ends and Aims to obtrude themselves upon us to mingle with our pious Intentions and deflower the Purity of them NOT that I think it unlawful for a man to intend any thing but God in the discharge of his Duty or that our Intention is bad when it immediately respects any worldly End such as Pleasure or Profit or Honour which are proposed by God himself as Arguments to persuade men to their Duty and what hurt can it be for men to aim at that in the discharge of their Duty which God hath proposed to them as an Encouragement to it 'T is true if worldly Advantage be the only or chief End we aim at our Intention is naught and so are all the Actions thence proceeding but if together with that we do so heartily intend and aim to please God and conform our selves to his blessed Will and Nature as to continue on in the path of our Duty to him not only when we have no prospect of outward Advantage to induce us to it but when outward Evils and Inconveniences lie in our way we need not doubt but our Intention is truly good and sincere notwithstanding those immediate Respects which it many times hath to secular Ends and Inducements But yet it is certain that the more it respects these the more imperfect it is and the more liable to be vanquished by outward Temptations For it 's a plain sign that 't is conscious of its own Weakness when it dares not stand alone but is fain to call in to it the Assistance of these worldly Ends to support and defend it and the less of worldly Aim there is in our religious Intention to be sure the more pure and simple it is and the more of substantial Piety there is in it and though it may be truly sincere notwithstanding its being compounded with secular Aims and Respects yet the more of these there is in it the weaker and more instable it must necessarily be For our Mind being finite cannot possibly intend many things with equal Strength and Vigour as it can do one and when its Intention is dispersed among various Objects it must necessarily be more languid than when 't is collected united and fixt upon one and consequently the more a mans Intention respects the World the less in proportion it must respect God and so on the contrary And then the less a man respects God in his Duty and the more he respects the World the more liable he will be to the Temptations of worldly Loss or Advantage For when those Advantages which he so much respects lie on the opposite side to his Duty to be sure he will be so much the more inclined to desert it and as often as Fortune shifts sides and carries with it the Advantages of Pleasure Profit or Honour
piercing sense of my Sins as may cause the floods of unfeigned Grief and Contrition to gush forth from it Cause me to bleed for my sins now that I may not bleed for them for ever and that having felt the Smart and Anguish of them I may utterly detest and abhor them and never be reconciled to them more Thus do thou assist me O good God in the Exercise of all these Duties till thou hast throughly conquered my Will by them and prepared it for a firm Resolution to forsake all ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live soberly righteously and godly in this present world And now that I am going into the world among those very Temptations that have hitherto so miserably captivated and inslaved me O let thy blessed Spirit be present with me to keep my drousie Conscience awake and arm me against them with his holy Inspirations that so those good Thoughts and Desires which thou hast at present excited in me may stick fast upon my Soul in the midst of my worldly Occasions and never cease importuning my Conscience Will and Affections till they have produc'd in me the happy Effect of a serious and hearty Repentance All which I most earnestly beseech of thee even for pity sake to a poor perishing Soul and for Jesus Christ his sake in whose name and words I farther pray Our Father c. In the Evening when you find your self most sit for serious Thoughts go into your Closet again and consider cooly with your self whether you are heartily willing to part with every Sin and particularly with your beloved Sin and to submit to every Duty and even to those that are most contrary to your vicious Inclination if you are not as it 's very probable you will not for some time or if you find the least reason to suspect you are not press your self anew with such divine Reasons as are most apt to affect you with the Hope of Heaven and the Fear of Hell with the love of God and of your Saviour represent your Obstinacy to your self with all its Baseness and Disingenuity Madness and Folly till you find your self affected with a sorrowful Sense of it and then offer up this following Prayer O Father of Mercies and God of all Grace and Consolation who art a ready help in time of need look down upon me I beseech thee a miserable and forlorn Wretch that have wilfully sold my self Captive to the Devil and am now strugling to get loose from this my wretched Bondage into the glorious Liberty of the Sons of God I know O Lord that I am striving for my immortal Life and accordingly as I succeed I expect to be happy or miserable for ever I have seriously considered the Reasons on both sides and am fully satisfied in my mind that there is infinitely more Force in thy Promises and Threats than in all the Difficulties of my Duty and the Pleasures of my sin But after all this I find a law in my Members warring against the law in my Mind a perverse Will that rejects the counsels of my Reason that makes obstinate Reservations of some beloved Sins and Exceptions to some particular Duties in despite of all the persuasion of my Reason and Religion So that after all my Endeavours I am still detain'd in Captivity to the law of sin that is in my Members and am not able to incline my self to an intire Resolution of Amendment O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of Sin and Death I know O Lord though I am weak and impotent and of my self unable to shake off the Chains and Fetters of my Lusts yet thy Grace is abundantly sufficient to rescue and deliver me from them and thou hast promised to assist with it my honest Endeavours and crown them with a blessed Success Wherefore for thy Truth and Mercies sake suffer not thy poor Creature who with pitiful and bemoaning Looks cries out for help to thee to spend himself in weary and fruitless Struglings against this violent Torrent of my sinful Nature which without thy aid will quickly overcome my poor Endeavours and drive me down into eternal Perdition My sole Dependence is upon thee my Hope of Success is wholly in thee help Lord help or else I perish stretch forth thy powerful Arm to my sinking Soul and let not this Deep swallow me up but do thou so quicken my faint Endeavours so strengthen my weak and doubting Faith so enliven my cold and languid Considerations so clear up my Convictions of my need of a Saviour and of the Danger and Odiousness of my Sins and thereby so increase my penitential Sorrows and Remorses as that by all these means together my obstinate Will may at last be conquered and effectually persuaded to part with every Sin be it never so dear to me and to comply with every Duty be it never so cross to my vile Inclinations Then shall I freely resign up my self unto thee and with a firm Resolution devote all my Powers to thy Service And that I may do so and by so doing be reconciled to thee O my offended God before I go hence and be no more seen receive me I beseech thee into thy protection this Night that I may yet see the light of another Day and have a longer space to finish my Repentance All which I humbly implore even for Jesus Christ his sake in whose name and words I farther pray Our Father c. If upon searching your own Heart you find that after you have fairly represented to your self what sinful Pleasures you must part with what Duties you must submit to and what Difficulties you must ingage with you are willing without any Reserve or Exception to submit your self to God beware you be not too hasty to form your Resolution but take some little time to try your self see whether you will continue to morrow of the same mind you are in now and if then you perceive you have reason to suspect your self try a little longer and at the present indeavour as much as in you lies to confirm and settle your self in the good Mind you are in by pressing and urging your self with all those Arguments of your Religion by which you have been thus far convinced and persuaded and while you are thus trying your self instead of the former let this be your Evening Prayer O Blessed Lord and most merciful Father thou art a God hearing Prayer and to thee shall all flesh come I admire thy Goodness I adore thy Grace that after so many heinous provocations I have given thee for which thou mightest have justly shut thine ears against me for ever thou hast heard my Cries and pitied my Misery and thus far contributed towards my Recovery I acknowledg 't is by thy Grace that I am what I am that this stubborn Heart begins at last to relent this perverse Will to bow and stoop these lewd Affections to hunger and thirst after
Mind hast strengthened my Resolution and rendred it so successful and victorious 'T is to thy Grace that I owe all the good I have done and 't is by thy Aid that I have escap'd all the evils I have been tempted to wherefore not unto me O Lord not unto my Strength or Endeavours but unto thy Name be all the Glory and Praise of this days Deliverance and Preservation O never let the Remembrance of this thy Goodness towards me depart from my Mind but let it kindle in me such a grateful Sense as may more and more incite me to love and obey thee and depend upon thee for the future And as thou hast been pleased to conduct me safely by thy Grace through all the Dangers and Temptations of the Day so do thou take me into thy Care and Protection this Night and grant that I may awake in the Morning with a Heart so inflamed with the Remembrance of thy Goodness and so incourag'd with this Days success and so indeared to the Practice of Vertue by the growing Delights and Pleasures of it as that I may persist in my religious Course with greater Courage and Alacrity and this I humbly beg for Jesus Christs sake in whose name and words I farther pray Our Father c. If upon Enquiry you find that you have been failing in your Duty or that you have done any evil Action through meer Heedlessness or Surprize indeavour to affect your self with a sorrowful Sense of your own Folly Weakness and Carelesness and then conclude with this Form of Humiliation O Most blessed Lord God who art infinitely glorious in thy own Righteousness and Holiness and doest for ever will and act according to thy own Nature which is the most perfect Law and Pattern of Goodness To thy spotless Nature no Evil can approach who art of purer Eyes than to behold Iniquity with what Confidence then can such a polluted Creature as I am appear in thy Presence how can I lift up my guilty Eyes to thy Throne who to my past Rebellions which have been more in number than the hairs on my Head have this day added so many sinful Failings and Defects that shouldest thou be severe to mark what I do amiss were sufficient to kindle thy Displeasure against me 'T was but this Morning that I ingag'd my self to thee not only to abstain from all wilful and deliberate Sins but also to set a watch upon my Mouth and Actions that I might not offend thee unawares but to my Shame I must acknowledg I have been wofully careless and remiss having this Day suffered my self through my own Inadvertency to be surprized into such Actions as nothing can render pittiable or excusable in thy Sight but the miserable Frailty and Weakness of my Nature What shall I say unto thee O thou Judg of all the Earth I am guilty I am guilty and have nothing to plead for my self but the Blood of Jesus that all-sufficient Propitiation for the Sins of the whole World O Lord I do earnestly repent and am heartily sorry for these my Misdoings the Remembrance of them is grievous unto me the Burthen of them is intolerable have mercy upon me have mercy upon me most merciful Father and for Jesus Christ his sake forgive me all that is past and grant that the Sense of these my Miscarriages may render me more careful and vigilant for the future And let thy blessed Spirit be always present with my Mind to recollect my Distractions and awake my Considerations and warn me of my Dangers that I may no more be surprized by sudden Temptations nor hurried into evil Actions by unexpected Hopes or Fears but do thou so subdue my lower Appetites to my Will my Will to my Vnderstanding and my Vnderstanding to thy Spirit as that under his blessed Conduct I may for the future be prepared against all Temptations and furnish'd to every good work And now O Lord let not the Failings I have been guilty of this Day deprive me of thy gracious Protection this Night but grant that after a safe and comfortable Repose I may awake in the Morning with such a sorrowful Sense of them as may for the future oblige me to be more watchful and resolute against them All which I beg for Jesus Christ his sake with whose Prayer I conclude this my evening Sacrifice Our Father c. If upon Enquiry it appear that you have commited any wilful deliberate Sin indeavour to affect your self with Horror Shame and Compunction for it by representing to your Conscience the monstrous Foulness and Ingratitude the deep Malignity and desperate Madness of your own Action and then conclude with this Form of particular Repentance O Thou most dreadful Majesty of Heaven and Earth who hatest Iniquity and hast proclaimed from Heaven thy fierce Indignation against all Vnrighteousness and Vngodliness of men look down I beseech thee upon me a vile and guilty Wretch who stand here arraigned at thy Tribunal by my own Conscience and am so confounded with the sense of my Sin and of thy just Displeasure against me that I tremble to draw near unto thee and yet I dare not stay from thee I acknowledg my self unworthy infinitely unworthy to come before thee and am prompted by my own Horror and Shame to hide my self from thee but yet I know I must come or I must perish And therefore here O Lord I cast my self at thy Feet and if thou shalt think meet to tread upon me and to spurn me from thy Presence for ever I must own that thou art just and righteous in all thy Ways For thou hast been wonderfully good beyond what I could modestly have wisht or am able to express thou tookest pity upon me when I was all wounded and polluted and weltring in my Blood when I was sleeping securely upon the brink of Perdition and had scarce any Sense or Feeling of my Guilt and Misery in this woful plight didst thou visit my poor Soul and with thy preventing Grace awake me to a sense of my Danger and effectually warn me to flee from the wrath to come And now when thou hadst brought me to my self and to a through Resolution of Amendment and my Soul was in a fair way of Recovery like an ungrateful Wretch as I am I have flown in the Face of my Physitian I have abused his Goodness and baffled his Grace and wilfully and deliberately torn open my Wounds again And this I have done most treacherously as well as ungratefully not only against all the Obligations of thy Goodness but also against my own repeated Vows and Engagements For 't was but this Morning that I solemnly renewed to thee my Promise of Obedience and therein vow'd not to offend thee wilfully upon any Temptation whatsoever but O vile Traytor that I am both to thee and to my own Soul I have by most base basely falsified this my Engagement and this I did with the most unpardonable Circumstance even
his Happiness For what greater torment can our Mind endure than to be an everlasting Spectator of the Bliss and Happiness of one whom it hates How then will it fret and gall our meagre and envious Spirits to see that blessed Being whom we cannot endure surrounded with an infinite Happiness with a Happiness so vast as that it can admit of no Increase and yet so secure as that it can never suffer a Diminution So that 't is impossible you see for the Mind of Man to live happily upon God in the other life unless it be inspired before-hand with an hearty Love and Affection to him AND hence it is that our holy Religion doth so strictly require us to love the Lord our God with all our heart with all our soul and with all our mind Mat. xxii 37 to love him because he loved us first to delight our selves in the Lord Psal. xxxvii 4 and to rejoice in the Lord Phil. iii. 1 and to rejoice in the Lord always Phil. iv 4 i. e. to be habitually complacent or well pleased with the infinite Beauty Goodness and Perfection of the divine Nature Nay of such vast import is the Love of God in the account of the Gospel that 't is there recommended as the proper Principle of Christian Life For so Rom. xiii 10 we are told that love is the fulfilling of the law that is the adequate Principle of all Christian Obedience and Gal. v. 6 we are told that neither Circumcision nor uncircumcision availeth any thing in Christ Jesus but faith which worketh by love that is there is nothing of any account with Christ buch such a Belief of the Gospel as begets in us a hearty Love to God and doth thereby work and exert it self as by that which is the only genuine Principle of Christian Life and Action 'T is true beside this principle of Love the Gospel acts us both by our Fear and Hope exciting the one by Threatnings of the greatest Evils and animating the other with Promises of the greatest Goods but yet it is certain that neither these nor any other Principles of religious Action can be acceptable to God whilst they are totally separated from Love to him For there is no Principle of Obedience can be acceptable to God that is not a Principle of Universal Obedience but to love God being a great and main instance of Obedience that can be no principle of Universal Obedience which doth not effectually excite us to love him 'T IS true the Religion of most men begins upon the Principles of Hope and Fear and it cannot be denied but these are good Beginnings but yet till by these we are excited to love God as well as to do the other Parts of our Duty our Obedience is lame and partial and consequently unacceptable So that though Hope and Fear are good Ingredients to compound an acceptable Principle of Obedience yet without an Intermixture of Love they are by no means sufficient There may be indeed and at first there generally is much less of Love in this internal spring of our Obedience than of Hope or Fear whilst yet the whole Composition is truly pleasing and acceptable to God For the lowest degree of cordial Love intermixed with our Hope and Fear is sufficient to leaven and consecrate them into an acceptable Principle of Obedience but still the less of Love there is in it the more weak and languid and imperfect it is and in all its progresses towards Perfection its ripeness and maturity is to be measured by the degrees of Love that are in it And till our Love is arrived to that degree of Fervour and Ardency as to become the predominant Motive and Master Ingredient of this our compounded Principle of Obedience our state in Goodness is very low and imperfect So that in short the Principle that acts and moves us in Religion is still more and more perfect the more of Love there is in it and the less of Hope and Fear and when Hope and Fear are both swallowed up in Love and this is become the sole Spring of Action in us then 't is the Principle of Heaven the Soul that acts and animates the Religion of just men made perfect SO that if ever we design to grow up to their blessed State we must endeavour to kindle and blow up the Love of God in our Hearts And in order hereunto we must be frequently representing to our own Minds the infinite Reasons we have to love him and pressing our selves with the vast Obligations he hath laid upon us spreading them fairly before our Thoughts in all their endearing Circumstances We must ever and anon set our cold and frozen Souls before those melting Flames of his Love and Beauty and never leave chafing them at 'em urging and pressing them with the Consideration of them till we feel the heavenly Fire begin to kindle in our Bosoms And above all things we must take care by the constant Practice of what is agreeable to Gods Nature to reconcile our Minds and Tempers to him for till this is done we can never be habitually pleased or delighted in him but when once by the Practice of those eternal Rules of Goodness that are founded in his blessed Nature we have so far reconciled our Natures to him as that our Hearts and his stand bent the same way and are for the main alike inclined and disposed then we are prepared for and made proper and convenient Fuel to receive this heavenly Flame of Love to him and when this is once so throughly kindled in our Hearts as that we are habitually well pleased and delighted in him so as to rejoice in his Happiness acquiesce in his Will and meditate on his Beauty and Goodness with an unfeigned complacency of Soul we are then in the same State that is in Kind though not in Degree with the blessed People of Heaven And though in this Life we may not be able to raise our selves to that Height of Love as we desire and much less as that blessed Object deserves our present Knowlege being short our Thoughts unsteady and our Affections entangled in Sense and sensual things yet when we go from hence into the other World and are there admitted to a more intimate View of his Nature Works and Perfections our imperfect Love will be immediately improved into an high Seraphick Flame For now we shall not only know him better having him always in our View and continually shining full in our Eyes but we shall be removed from all other Objects that are apt to divert our Thoughts or divide our Affections from him So that now our Love being kindled and fed with the purest Light with the ever out-streaming Rays of the most perfect Beauty and Goodness will always exert its utmost Vigour and spend it self without Decay in one continued everlasting Rapture AND then how unconceivably happy will our State be when we shall always live in view of the most lovely
Thoughts and Reflections But so long as we keep within the Bounds of Sobriety and do not sally out into malicious or scurrilous or prophane Jesting our Religion doth not only connive at our Mirth but commend and approve it and so remote is it from cramping those Strings and Sinews of the Mind Chearfulness and Action that it recollects their scatterd Vigour and winds up their Slackness to a true Harmony FOR it requires that our speech should be alway with grace Col. iv 6 i. e. as some Expositors understand the Phrase that it should not be whining and melancholy but sprightly and chearful it bids us rejoice evermore 1 Thes. v. 16 and rejoice in the Lord alway and again rejoice Phil. iv 4 that is to indeaver to be chearful in all Conditions and to bear all Events with a serene and lightsome mind And therefore the Apostle reckons this among the blessed Fruits and Effects of that Divine Spirit which accompanies and animates Christianity viz. Joy or Chearfulness Gal v. 22 and this is one of the Particulars in which the same Apostle makes the Christian Laws to consist as they stand opposed to the Ritual Laws of the Jews the Kingdom of Heaven i. e. the Laws of the Christian Church is not meat and drink i. e. consist not of Injunctions or Prohibitions of things that are of a Ritual or indifferent Nature but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost Rom. xiv 17 which three Particulars being opposed to things that are unnecessary must by the Law of Oppositions denote things that are necessary and therefore as by Righteousness and Peace must be meant Justice and Peaceableness so by Joy in the Holy Ghost must be meant Chearfulness and Alacrity in doing the will of God because Joy can be in no other Sense Matter of Necessary Duty By all which its evident that Chearfulness of Temper is so far from being discountenanced by our Religion that 't is required and injoined by it so far as 't is in our Power and Choice And indeed it highly becomes us who serve so good a Master to be free and chearful and thereby to express a grateful sense of his Goodness and of those glorious Rewards which we expect from his inexhaustible Bounty but as for a gloomy Look and dejected Countenance it better beseems a Gally-slave than a Servant of God And as Chearfulness is a Duty that very well becomes our State so it is highly necessary to support and carry us on in our Christian Warfare FOR Chearfulness is Natures best Friend it removes its Oppressions enlivens its Faculties and keeps its Spirits in a brisk and regular Motion and hereby renders it easie to it self and useful and serviceable to God and Man It dispels Clouds from the Mind and Fears from the Heart and kindles and Cherishes in us brave and generous Affections and composes our Natures into such a regular temper as is of all others the most fit to receive religious Impressions and the breathings of the Spirit of God For what the Jews do observe of the Spirit of Prophesie is as true of the Spirit of Holiness that it dwells not with Sadness but with Chearfulness that being it self of a calm and gentle Nature it loves not to reside with black and melancholy Passions but requires a composed and serene Temper to act upon And hence Tertul. in his de Spectac Deus praecepit Spiritum sanctum utpote pro Naturae suae bono tenerum delicatum Tranquillitate Lenitate Quiete Pace tractare non Furore non Bile non Ira non Dolore inquietare i. e. God hath commanded that the holy Spirit who is of a tender and delicate Nature should be entertained by us with Tranquility and Mildness with Quietness and Peace and that we should take care not to disturb him with Fury and Choler or with Anger and Grief And indeed Melancholy naturally infests the holy Spirit and disturbs him in all his operations it overwhelms the Fancy with black Reeks and Vapours and thereby clouds and darkens the Understanding and intercepts the holy Spirits Illuminations and like red coloured Glass before the eye causes the most lovely and attractive Objects to look bloody and terrible It distracts the Thoughts and renders them wild roving and incoherent and thereby utterly indisposes them to Prayer and Consideration and renders them deaf and unattentive to all good Motions and Inspirations It freezes up the Heart with dispairing Fears and Despondencies and represents easie things as difficult to us and difficult as impossible and thereby discourages us from all those vertuous Attempts to which the blessed Spirit doth so importunately excite and provoke us In a word it naturally benums and stupifies the Soul obstructs its Motions and makes it listless and unactive and so by indisposing it to co-operate with the holy Spirit renders it an incapable Subject of his divine Grace and Influence Thus melancholy you see by its sullen and malevolent Aspects doth obstinately resist and counter-influence the holy Spirit without whose Aid and Assistance we can never hope to prosper in our spiritual Warfare WHEREFORE if we mean to succeed in this great Affair it concerns us to use all honest and innocent Means to dispel this black and mischievous Humour and to beget and maintain in our Minds a constant Serenity and Chearfulness of Temper and when ever our Spirits begin to droop and languish to betake our selves to such natural Remedies such harmless Diversions Refreshments and Recreations as are fit and proper to raise them up again and not to suffer them to sink into a Bog of Melancholly Humours whilst 't is in our Power by any honest Art or Invention to support them Which if we can but effect will be of vast Advantage to us in the whole Course of our Religion For in an even Chearfulness of Temper our Spirits will be always lively strong and active and fit for the best and noblest Operations they will give Light to our Understandings Courage to our Hearts and Wings to our Affections so that we shall be able more clearly to discern divine and heavenly things more resolutely to practise and more vehemently to aspire after them and our Considerations will be more fixt our Devotions more intent and all our spiritual Endeavours more active and vivacious For a chearful Temper will represent every thing chearfully to us 't will represent God so lovely Religion so attractive the Rewards of it so immense and the Difficulties of it so inconsiderable and thereby inspire us with so much Life and Courage as that none of all those spiritual Enemies we war and contend against will be able to withstand our Resolution X. TO our Course and Progress in this our spiritual Warfare it is also necessary that we maintain in our Minds a constant Sense and Expectation of Heaven that since the things of the other World are future and invisible and consequently less apt to touch and affect us
than these worldly things which are continually pressing upon our Senses we should as oft as we have Opportunity withdraw our Thoughts from these sensible Objects and retire into the immaterial World and there entertain our selves with the close View and Contemplation of the Joys and Glories it abounds with For we are a sort of Beings that being compounded of Flesh and Spirit are by these opposite Principles of our Nature ally'd to two opposite Worlds and placed in the middle between Heaven and Earth as the common Center wherein those distant Regions meet By our spiritual Nature we hold Communion with the spiritual World and by our corporeal with this earthly and sensible one whose Objects being always present with us and striking as they do immediately upon our Senses we lye much more bare and open to them than to those of the spiritual World So that unless we now and then withdraw our selves from these sensible things which hang like a Cloud between we can never have a free Prospect into that clear Heaven above them And hence it becomes necessary that we should now and then make a solemn Retirement of our Thoughts from earthly Objects and Enjoyments that so we may approach near enough to Heaven to touch and feel the Joys and Pleasures of it which while we transiently behold in this Croud of worldly Objects is plac'd at such a Distance from us that it looks like a thin blew Landskip next to nothing and hath not apparent Reality enough in it to raise our Desires and Expectations AND hence we are commanded to set our affections upon or as it is in the original to mind those things that are above Col. iii. 2 and that by these things above he means the Enjoyments of Heaven it 's plain from v. 1. where he expresly tells us that by the above in which these things are he means Heaven where Christ sits at the right hand of God So that the Sence of the Precept is this that we should fix in our Minds such lively Representations of the Glory and Reality of the Celestial State as may raise in our Hearts a longing Desire and earnest Expectation of being made partakers of it Which Hope and Expectation he elsewhere injoyns us to put on for an Helmet i. e. for a necessary Piece of defensive Armour against the Difficulties and Discouragements of our Christian Warfare 1 Thes. v. 8 and Heb. vi xix this hope which enters into that within the veil i. e. into Heaven is said to be the Anchor of the soul both sure and stedfast i. e. 't is that which stayes and secures the Soul in the midst of those many Storms of Temptation it meets withall in its Voyage to Heaven and it being so we are bid to look to and imitate our Blessed Lord who for the joy that was set before him endured the Cross despising the shame and is now sat down at the right hand of God Heb. xii 2 The meaning of all which is that we should earnestly indeavour to fix in our minds a vigorous Sense and Expectation of that immortal Happiness with which God hath promised to crown all that come off Conquerors from this spiritual Warfare that all along as we march we should keep Heaven in our Eye and incourage our selves with the Hope of it to charge through all those Difficulties and Temptations that oppose us in the way in a word that we should frequently awaken in our minds the glorious Thoughts of a blessed Immortality and possess our selves with a lively Expectation of injoying it if we hold out to the End WHICH is a Duty of a vast Consequence to us in the Course of our spiritual Warfare For Heaven being the End and Reward of our Warfare must needs be the grand Encouragement thereunto and consequently if once we lose Sight of Heaven and suffer earthly things to interpose and eclipse the Glory and Reality of it our Courage will never be able to bear up against those manifold Temptations that do continually assault us But whilst we continue under a lively Sense of that blessed Recompence of Reward that will so spirit and invigorate our Resolution that nothing will be able to withstand it and all the Terrors and Allurements that Sin can propose will be forced to fly before it and to retreat like so many impotent Waves that dash against a Rock of Adamant For while we are under a lively Sense and Expectance of the Happiness above we live as it were in the Mid-way between Heaven and Earth where we have an open Prospect of the Glories of both and do plainly see how faint and dim those below are in comparison with those above how they are forced to sneak and disappear in the presence of those eternal Splendors and to shroud their vanquisht Beauties as the Stars do when the Sun appears And whilst we interchangeably turn our eyes from one to t'other how fruitlesly do the Pleasures Profits and Honours below importune us to abandon the Joys and Glories above and with what Indignation do we listen to the proposals of such a senseless and ridiculous Exchange And could we but always keep our selves at this stand we should be so fortified with the Sight of those happy Regions above that no Temptation from below would ever be able to approach us and the sense that we are going on to that blessed State would carry us through all the weary Stages of our Duty with an indefatigable Vigour For what may a man not do with Heaven in his Eye with that potent I had almost said Omnipotent Encouragement before him To pull out a right Eye to cut off a right hand to tear a darling Lust from his Heart even when 't is wrapt about it and twisted with its Strings what an easie Atchievement is it to a man that hath a Heaven of immortal Glories in his View The Hope of which is enough to recommend even Racks Torments and turn the Flames of martyrdom into a Bed of Roses For 't was this blessed Prospect that inabled the Good old martyrs to triumph so gloriously as they did in the midst of their Sufferings they knew that a few Moments would put an End to their Miseries and that when once they had weather'd those short storms they should arive at a most blessed Harbour and be crowned at their landing and that from thence they should look back with infinite Joy and Delight upon the dangerous Sea they had escaped and for ever bless those Storms and Winds that drave them to that happy Ports for as the Author to the Hebrews tells us they sought a heavenly Countrey Heb. xi 14.16 XI AND lastly To the successful Progress of our Christian Warfare it is also necessary that we should live in the frequent use of the publick Ordinances and Institutions of our Religion namely in the religious Observation of the Lords Day and in frequent Communion with one another in the Holy Sacrament both which
what kinds of Means are necessary to obtain it how naturally all the Vertues of Religion do raise up mens Souls to Heaven and how all the contrary Vices do as naturally sink and press them down to Hell it is to be hop'd he will be fully persuaded of the indispensible Necessity of entering into the Christian Life which if he be I would advise him 2. Seriously to read over and consider the first and second Sections of the fourth Chapter wherein are contained the several Duties which are proper to his State of Entrance into the Christian Life and also proper Arguments and Motives to ingage him to the Practice of them which if he would read to good Effect he must by no means content himself with a single Perusal but read them over at least once a week whilst he continues in that State till he fully comprehends the Meaning and Use of all those Duties and the Force and Cogency of those Arguments which if he do it is to be hop'd he will at last be reduced to a through and wel-weighed Resolution of forsaking his Sins and actually ingaging in the Christian Life Which being done I would advise him 3. With the same Care and Frequency to peruse the third and fourth Sections of the fourth Chapter wherein are contained all the several Duties proper to this second State of actual Engagement in the Christian Life as also sundry Arguments or Motives to press and inforce them and when by the Assistance of these Duties he hath continued for some time faithful and constant to his good Resolution 4. Together with the third and fourth Section let him often peruse and consider the fifth and sixth wherein are contained the Duties appertaining to the third State of Emprovement and Perseverance in the Christian Life together with some Considerations to inforce the Practice of them All which I would earnestly persuade the pious Reader to read and consider over and over again till his Mind is fully instructed in the Nature and Vse of each Duty and hath throughly digested the Force and Evidence of every Argument And this may suffice for the first thing proposed concerning the profitable Method of reading this practical Treatise II. AS for the second Part of it which is that which I mainly design in this Chapter viz. the Rules and Directions for the private Exercise of our Religion in each State of the Christian Life together with the Forms of private Prayer fitted for each take them in their following Order Directions for the more profitable Exercise of our private Religion in the State of our Entrance into the Christian Life In the Morning before you go into the World enter into your Closet and there consider with your self a while the miserable State you have reduc'd your self to by your past sinful Courses the absolute Necessity of your forsaking them and the possibility of your Recovery if your heartily indeavour it and then adress your self to God in this following Prayer O Most glorious and eternal God thou art the fountain of Beings the Father of Angels and Men the righteous and almighty Governour of Heaven and Earth from thy Throne thou beholdest all the Children of men and their most secret Actions are open and naked to thy alseeing Eye and such is the Purity of thy Nature that thou lovest Righteousness and hatest Iniquity wheresoever thou beholdest it with what Face then can I a most miserable polluted Wretch appear in thy presence who by the past course of my Wickedness and Rebellion against thee have not only rendered my self guilty and justly obnoxious to thy eternal Displeasure but have also contracted such obstinate Dispositions and Inclinations to sin on as without thy Grace and Assistance I shall never be able to conquer O desperate vile and ungrateful Wretch that I have been I have renounced the God of my Being and the Fountain of my Mercies I have despised thy Goodness trampled upon thy Authority mock'd and abused thy Patience and long suffering and in Particular I must confess to my own Shame and Confusion I have been wofully guilty of And now by these my manifold Abominations I have utterly undone my self unless thou take pity upon me I confess I have forfeited my soul into thy hands and if thou so pleasest thou mayest justly cast me away from thy Presence and make me a dire Example of thy Vengeance for ever But I know O Lord that thou desirest not the Death of a Sinner but rather that he should repent and live and upon the Propitiation of thine own Sons blood thou hast declared thy self willing to receive returning Prodigals and to be heartily reconciled to them notwithstanding all their past Provocations O that I could return that I could but shake off those corrupt Inclinations which detain my wretched soul in Captivity I am willing to contribute towards it whatsoever I am able but alass without thee all that I can do will be utterly ineffectual Wherefore for thy tender Mercies sake for thy dear Sons and my Saviours sake have pity upon a miserable Wretch that without thy helping hand is lost for ever And since thou hast given me thy Gospel as an outward means to save and recover me O do thou inable me by thy blessed Spirit heartily to believe and throughly to consider it For which end I beseech thee to remove all sinful Prejudices from my Mind that so I may impartially weigh those Evidences thou hast given me of the Truth of it and do thou suggest them to my Mind with such a clear and convincing Light as that they may at last conquer my Infidelity and beget in me a firm and lively Faith And forasmuch as my mind is vain and roving and utterly averse to all serious Considerations O do thou who art the Father of Spirits and canst turn the Hearts of men which way thou pleasest inspire good Thoughts into me and imprint them upon me with such a Power and Efficacy as that my wandring Mind may be reduced by them to a through Consideration and my stubborn Will to a firm Resolution of Amendment Particularly I beseech thee to give me a right understanding of the urgent need I have of a Saviour and of all those things which he hath done and suffered and is still doing at thy right hand in order to the cleansing my guilty and polluted Nature and restoring me to thy Grace and Favour that so hereby I may be fully convinced how odious my Sins are in thy sight how base and vile they have rendered me and at what a mighty Distance they have set me from thee and that being convinced of this I may put on a holy Shame and Confusion and abhor my self in dust and ashes before thee Thou knowest O Lord it is not in my power to soften this hard and unrelenting Heart and affect it with that Godly sorrow which is requisite to work a true Repentance O do thou smite it with such a sharp and