immediately before Christs ascension All power is given to me in heaven and in earth Goe yee therefore and teach all nations teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you and loe I am with you always even unto the end of the world First Christ declared his own commission all power is given him into his hand he was now made King of all the creatures and Prince of the Catholick Church and therefore as it concerned his care and providence to look to his cure and flock so he had power to make deputations accordingly Goe yee therefore implying that the sending them to this purupose was an issue of hispower either because the authorizing certain persons was an act of power or else because the making them doctors of the Church and teachers of the Nations was a placing them in an eminency above their scholars and converts and so also was an emanation of that power which derived upon Christ from his Father from him descended upon the Apostles And the wiser persons of the world have always understood that a power of teaching was a presidency and authority for sinco all dominion is naturally founded in the understanding although civill government accidentally and by inevitable publick necessity relies upon other titles yet where the greatest understanding and power of teaching is there is a naturall preheminence and superiority eatenus that is according to the proportion of the excellency and therefore in the instance of S Paul we are taught the style of the court and Disciples sit at the feet of their Masters as he did at the feet of his Tutor Gamaliel which implies duty submission and subordination and indeed it is the highest of any kinde not onely because it is founded upon nature but because it is a submission of the most imperious faculty we have even of that faculty which when we are removed from our Tutors is submitted to none but God for no man hath power over the understanding faculty and therefore so long as we are under Tutors and instructors we give to them that duty in the succession of which claim none can succeed but God himself because none else can satisfie the understanding but he Now then because the Apostles were created Doctors of all the world hoc ipso they had power given them over the understandings of their disciples and they were therefore fitted with an infallible spirit and grew to be so authentick that their determination was the last addresse of all inquiries in questions of Christianity and although they were not absolute Lords of their faith and understandings as their Lord was yet they had under God a supreme care and presidency to order to guide to instruct and to satisfie their understandings and those whom they sent out upon the same errand according to the proportion and excellency of their spirit had also a degree of superiority and eminency and therefore they who were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Labourers in the word and doctrine were also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Presbyters that were Presidents and Rulers of the Church and this eminency is for ever to be retained according as the unskilfulnesse of the Disciple retains him in the forme of Catechumens or as the excellency of the instructor still keeps the distance or else as the office of teaching being orderly and regularly assigned makes a legall politicall and positive authority to which all those persons are for orders sake to submit who possibly in respect of their personall abilities might be exempt from that authority Upon this ground it is that learning amongst wise persons is esteemed a title of nobility and secular eminency Ego enim quid aliud munificentiae adhibere potui ut studia ut sic dixerim in umbr a educata è quibus claritudo venit said Seneca to Nero. And Aristotle and A. Gellius affirme that not onely excellency of extraction or great fortunes but learning also makes noble circumundique sedentibus multis doctrinâ aut genere aut fortunâ nobilibus viris and therefore the Lawyers say that if a legacy be given pauperi nobili the executors if they please may give it to a Doctor I onely make this use of it that they who are by publick designation appointed to teach are also appointed in some sense to governe them and if learning it self be a faire title to secular opinion and advantages of honour then they who are professors of learning and appointed to be publick teachers are also set above their disciples as farre as the chair is above the Area or floor that is in that very relation of teachers and scholars and therefore among the heathen the Priests who were to answer de mysteriis sometimes bore a scepter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Upon which verse of Homer Eustathius observes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The scepter was not onely an ensigne of a King but of a Judge and of a Prophet it signified a power of answering in judgment and wise sentences This discourse was occasioned by our blessed Saviours illative All power is given me goe yee therefore and teach and it concludes that the authority of Preaching is more then the faculty that it includes power and presidency that therefore a separation of persons is ex abundanti inferred unlesse order and authority be also casuall and that all men also may be Governours as well as Preachers Now that here was a plain separation of some persons for this ministery I shall not need to prove by any other argument besides the words of the Commission save onely that this may be added that here was more necessary then a commission great abilities speciall assistances extraordinary and divine knowledge and understanding the mysteries of the kingdome so that these abilities were separations enough of the persons and designation of the officers But this may possibly become the difficulty of the question For when the Apostles had filled the world with the Sermons of the Gospel and that the holy Ghost descended in a plentifull manner then was the prophecy of Joel fulfilled Old men dreamed dreams and young men saw visions and sons and daughters did prophecy now the case was altered and the disciples themselves start up doctors and women prayed and prophecied and Priscilla sate in the chaire with her husband Aquila and Apollos sat at their feet and now all was common again and therefore although the commission went out first to the Apostles yet when by miracle God dispensed great gifts to the Laity and to women he gave probation that he intended that all should prophecy and preach lest those gifts should be to no purpose This must be considered 1. These gifts were miraculous verifications of the great promise of the Father of sending the holy Ghost and that all persons were capable of that blessing in their severall proportions and that Christianity did descend from God were ex abundanti proved by those extraregular dispensations so that
God for vengeance scarce two are noted by the publick eye and chastis'd by the hand of Justice it must follow from hence that it is but reasonable for the interest of vertue and the necessities of the world that the private should be judg'd and vertue should be tyed upon the spirit and the poor should be relieved and the oppressed should appeal and the noise of Widows should be heard and the Saints should stand upright and the Cause that was ill judged should be judged over again and Tyrants should be call'd to account and our thoughts should be examined and our secret actions view'd on all sides and the infinite number of sins which escape here should not escape finally and therefore God hath so ordained it that there shall be a day of doom wherein all that are let alone by men shall be question'd by God and every word and every action shall receive its just recompence of reward For we must all appear before the Judgement seat of Christ that every one may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done whether it be good or bad 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so it is in the best copies not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The things done in the body so we commonly read it the things proper or due to the body so the expression is more apt and proper for not only what is done 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the body but even the acts of abstracted understanding and volition the acts of reflexion and choice acts of self-love and admiration and what ever else can be supposed the proper and peculiar act of the soul or of the spirit is to be accounted for at the day of Judgement and even these may be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because these are the acts of the man in the state of conjunction with the body The words have in them no other difficulty or variety but contain a great truth of the biggest interest and one of the most materiall constitutive Articles of the whole Religion and the greatest endearment of our duty in the whole world Things are so ordered by the great Lord of all the creatures that whatsoever we do or suffer shall be call'd to account and this account shall be exact and the sentence shall be just and the reward shall be great all the evils of the world shall be amended and the injustices shall be repaid and the divine Providence shall be vindicated and Vertue and Vice shall for ever be remark'd by their separate dwellings and rewards This is that which the Apostle in the next verse cals the terror of the Lord it is his terror because himself shall appear in his dresse of Majesty and robes of Justice and it is his terror because it is of all the things in the World the most formidable in it self and it is most fearfull to us where shall be acted the interest and finall sentence of eternity and because it is so intended I shall all the way represent it as the Lords terror that we may be afraid of sin for the destruction of which this terror is intended 1. Therefore we will consider the persons that are to be judged with the circumstances of our advantages or our sorrowes We must all appear 2. The Judge and his Judgement seat before the Judgment seat of Christ. 3. The sentence that they are to receive the things due to the body good or bad according as we now please but then cannot alter Every one of these are dressed with circumstances of affliction and afrightment to those to whom such terrors shall appertain as a portion of their inheritance 1. The persons who are to be judged even you and I and all the world Kings and Priests Nobles and Learned the Crafty and the Easie the Wise and the Foolish the Rich and the Poor the prevailing Tyrant and the oppressed Party shall all appear to receive ther Symbol and this is so farre from abating any thing of its terror and our dear concernment that it much increases it for although concerning Precepts and Discourses we are apt to neglect in particular what is recommended in generall and in incidencies of Mortality and sad events the singularity of the chance heightens the apprehension of the evill yet it is so by accident and only in regard of our imperfection it being an effect of self-love or some little creeping envie which adheres too often to the infortunate and miserable or else because the sorrow is apt to increase by being apprehended to be a rare case and a singular unworthinesse in him who is afflicted otherwise then is common to the sons of men companions of his sin and brethren of his nature and partners of his usuall accidents yet in finall and extreme events the multitude of sufferers does not lessen but increase the sufferings and when the first day of Judgement happen'd that I mean of the universall deluge of waters upon the old World the calamity swell'd like the floud and every man saw his friend perish and the neighbours of his dwelling and the relatives of his house and the sharers of his joyes and yesterdaies bride and the new born heir the Priest of the Family and the honour of the Kindred all dying or dead drench'd in water and the divine vengeance and then they had no place to flee unto no man cared for their souls they had none to goe unto for counsell no sanctuary high enough to keep them from the vengeance that rain'd down from heaven and so it shall be at the day of Judgement when that world and this and all that shall be born hereafter shall passe through the same Red sea and be all baptized with the same fire and be involv'd in the same cloud in which shall be thundrings and terrors infinite every Mans fear shall be increased by his neighbours shriekes and the amazement that all the world shall be in shall unite as the sparks of a raging furnace into a globe of fire and roul upon its own principle and increase by direct appearances and intolerable reflexions He that stands in a Church-yard in the time of a great plague and hears the Passing-bell perpetually telling the sad stories of death and sees crowds of infected bodies pressing to their Graves and others sick and tremulous and Death dress'd up in all the images of sorrow round about him is not supported in his spirit by the variety of his sorrow and at Dooms-day when the terrors are universall besides that it is in it self so much greater because it can affright the whole world it is also made greater by communication and a sorrowfull influence Grief being then strongly infectious when there is no variety of state but an intire Kingdome of fear and amazement is the King of all our passions and all the world its subjects and that shricke must needs be terrible when millions of Men and Women at the same instant shall fearfully cry
speaks one thing and our heart means another and we are hardly brought to say our prayers or to undertake a fasting day or to celebrate a Communion and if we remember that all these are holy actions and that we have many opportunities of doing them all and yet doe them very seldome and then very coldly it will be found at the foot of the account that our flesh and our naturall weaknesse prevailes oftner then our spirituall strengths 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they that are bound long in chains feel such a lamenesse in the first restitutions of their liberty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by reason of the long accustomed chain and pressure that they must stay till Nature hath set them free and the disease be taken off as well as the chain and when the soul is got free from her actuall pressure of sins still the wound remaines and a long habitude and longing after it a looking back and upon the presenting the old object the same company or the remembrance of the delight the fancy strikes and the heart fails and the temptations returne and stand dressed in form and circumstances and ten to one but the man dies again 4. Some men are wise and know their weaknesses and to prevent their startings back will make fierce and strong resolutions and bind up their gaps with thornes and make a new hedge about their spirits and what then this shews indeed that the spirit is willing but the storm arises and windes blow and rain descends and presently the earth trembles and the whole fabrick falls into ruine and disorder A resolution such as we usually make is nothing but a little trench which every childe can step over and there is no civill man that commits a willing sin but he does it against his resolution and what Christian lives that will not say and think that he hath repented in some degree and yet still they commit sin that is they break all their holy purposes as readily as they lose a dream and so great is our weaknesse that to most men the strength of a resolution is just such a restraint as he suffers who is imprisoned in a curtain and secured with dores and bars of the finest linnen for though the spirit be strong to resolve the flesh is weak to keep it 5. But when they have felt their follies and see the linnen vail â—ent some that are desirous to please God back their resolutions with vows and then the spirit is fortified and the flesh may tempt and call but the soul cannot come forth and therefore it triumphs and acts its interest easily and certainly and then the flesh is mortified It may be so But doe not many of us inquire after a vow And we consider it may be it was rash or it was an impossible matter or without just consideration and weighing of circumstances or the case is alter'd and there is a new emergent necessity or a vow is no more then a resolution made in matter of duty both are made for God and in his eye and witnesse or if nothing will doe it men grow sad and weary and despaire and are impatient and bite the knot in pieces with their teeth which they cannot by disputing and the arts of the tongue A vow will not secure our duty because it is not stronger then our appetite and the spirit of man is weaker then the habits and superinduced nature of the flesh but by little and little it falls off like the finest thread twisted upon the traces of a chariot it cannot hold long 6. Beyond all this some choose excellent guides and stand within the restraints of modesty and a severe Monitor and the Spirit of God hath put a veile upon our spirits and by modesty in women and young persons by reputation in the more aged and by honour in the more noble and by conscience in all have fortified the spirit of Man that men dare not prevaricate their duty though they be tempted strongly and invited perpetually and this is a partition wall that separates the spirit from the flesh and keeps it in its proper strengths and retirements But here the spirit of man for all that it is assisted strongly breaks from the inclosure and runnes into societies of flesh and sometimes despises reputation and sometimes supplies it with little arts of flattery and self-love and is modest as long as it can be secret and when it is discovered it growes impudent and a man shelters himselfe in crouds and heaps of sinners and beleeves that it is no worse with him then with other mighty criminals and publick persons who bring sin into credit amongst fooles and vicious persons or else men take false measures of fame or publick honesty and the world being broken into so many parts of disunion and agreeing in nothing but in confederate vices and grown so remisse in governments and severe accounts every thing is left so loose that honour and publick fame modesty and shame are now so slender guards to the spirit that the flesh breaks in and makes most men more bold against God then against men and against the laws of Religion then of the Common-wealth 7. When the spirit is made willing by the grace of God the flesh interposes in deceptions and false principles If you tempt some man to a notorious sin as to rebellion to deceive his trust or to be drunk he will answer he had rather die then doe it But put the sin civilly to him and let it be disguised with little excuses such things which indeed are trifles but yet they are colours fair enough to make a weak pretence and the spirit yeelds instantly Most men choose the sin if it be once disputable whether it be a sin or no If they can but make an excuse or a colour so that it shall not rudely dash against the conscience with an open professed name of Sin they suffer the temptation to doe its worst If you tempt a man you must tell him 't is no sin or it is excusable this is not rebellion but necessity and selfe-defence it is not against my allegiance but is a performing of my trust I doe it for my friend not against my Superiour I doe it for a good end and for his advantage this is not drunkennesse but free mirth and fair society it is refreshment and entertainment of some supernumerary hours but it is not a throwing away my time or neglecting a day of salvation and if there be any thing more to say for it though it be no more then Adams fig-leaves or the excuses of children and truants it shall be enough to make the flesh prevail and the spirit not to be troubled for so great is our folly that the flesh always carries the cause if the spirit can be cousen'd 8. The flesh is so mingled with the spirit that we are forced to make distinctions in our appetite to reconcile our affections to God and Religion lest it
and all is well till the next generation but if the evill of his death and the change of his present prosperity for an intolerable danger of an uncertain eternity does not sowre his full chalice yet if his children prove vicious or degenerous cursed or unprosperous we account the man miserable and his grave to be strewed with sorrowes and dishonours The wise and valiant Chabrias grew miserable by the folly of his son Ctesippus and the reputation of brave Germanicus began to be ashamed when the base Caligula entred upon his scene of dishonourable crimes Commodus the wanton and feminine son of wise Antoninus gave a check to the great name of his Father and when the son of Hortensius Corbius was prostitute and the heir of Q. Fabius Maximus was disinherited by the sentence of the city Praetor as being unworthy to enter into the fields of his glorious Father and young Scipio the son of Africanus was a fool and a prodigall posterity did weep afresh over the monuments of their brave progenitors and found that infelicity can pursue a man and overtake him in his grave This is a great calamity when it fals upon innocent persons and that Moses died upon Mount Nebo in the sight of Canaan was not so great an evill as that his sons Eliezer and Gersom were unworthy to succeed him but that Priesthood was devolv'd to his Brother and the Principality to his servant And to Samuel that his sons prov'd corrupt and were exauthorated for their unworthinesse was an allay to his honour and his joyes and such as proclaims to all the world that the measures of our felicity are not to be taken by the lines of our own person but of our relations too and he that is cursed in his children cannot be reckoned among the fortunate This which I have discoursed concerning families in generall is most remarkable in the retinue and family of sin for it keeps a good house and is full of company and servants it is served by the possessions of the world it is courted by the unhappy flatter'd by fools taken into the bosome by the effeminate made the end of humane designs and feasted all the way of its progresse wars are made for its interest and men give or venture their lives that their sin may be prosperous all the outward senses are its handmaids and the inward senses are of its privie chamber the understanding is its counsellour the will its friend riches are its ministers nature holds up its train and art is its emissary to promote its interest and affairs abroad and upon this account all the world is inrolled in its taxing tables and are subjects or friends of its kingdome or are so kinde to it as to make too often visits and to lodge in its borders because all men stare upon its pleasures and are intic'd to tast of its wanton delicacies But then if we look what are the children of this splendid family and see what issue sinne produces 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it may help to unite the charme Sin and concupiscence marry together and riot and feast it high but their fruits the children and production of their filthy union are ugly and deform'd foolish and ill natur'd and the Apostles cals them by their names shame and death These are the fruits of Sin the apples of Sodom fair outsides but if you touch them they turn to ashes and a stink and if you will nurse these children and give them whatsoever is dear to you then you may be admitted into the house of feasting and chambers of riot where sin dwels but if you will have the mother you must have the daughters the tree and the fruits go together and there is none of you all that ever enter'd into this house of pleasure but he left the skirts of his garment in the hands of shame and had his name roll'd in the chambers of death What fruit had ye then That 's the Question In answer to which question we are to consider 1. What is the summe totall of the pleasure of sin 2. What fruits and relishes it leaves behinde by its naturall efficiency 3. What are its consequents by its demerit and the infliction of the superadded wrath of God which it hath deserved Of the first St. Paul gives no account but by way of upbraiding asks what they had that is nothing that they dare own nothing that remains and where is it shew it what 's become of it Of the second he gives the summe totall all its naturall effects are shame and its appendages The third or the superinduc'd evils by the just wrath of God he cals death the worst name in it self and the greatest of evils that can happen 1. Let us consider what pleasures there are in sin most of them are very punishments I will not reckon nor consider concerning envie which one in Stobaeus cals 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the basest spirit and yet very just because it punishes the delinquent in the very act of sin doing as Aelian saies of the Polypus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when he wants his prey he devours his own armes and the leannesse and the secret pangs and the perpetuall restlesnesse of an envious man feed upon his own heart and drink down his spirits unlesse he can ruine or observe the fall of the fairest fortunes of his neighbour The fruit of this tree are mingled and sowre and not to be indured in the very eating Neither will I reck on the horrid afrightments and amazements of murder nor the uneasinesse of impatience which doubles every evill that it feels and makes it a sin and makes it intolerable nor the secret grievings and continuall troubles of peevishnesse which makes a man uncapable of receiving good or delighting in beauties and fair intreaties in the mercies of God and charities of men It were easie to make a catalogue of sins every one of which is a disease a trouble in it's very constitution and its nature such are loathing of spirituall things bitternesse of spirit rage greedinesse confusion of minde and irresolution cruelty and despite slothfulnesse and distrust unquietnesse and anger effeminacy and nicenesse prating and sloth ignorance and inconstancy incogitancy and cursing malignity and fear forgetfulnesse and rashnesse pusillanimity and despair rancour and superstition if a man were to curse his enemy he could not wish him a greater evill then these and yet these are severall kinds of sin which men choose and give all their hopes of heaven in exchange for one of these diseases Is it not a fearfull consideration that a man should rather choose eternally to perish then to say his prayers heartily and affectionately But so it is with very many men they are driven to their devotions by custome and shame and reputation and civill compliances they sigh and look sowre when they are called to it and abide there as a man under the Chirurgeons hands smarting and fretting all the while or else he
care but in the whole circle of sins there is not one wise proposition by which a man may conduct his affairs or himself become instructed to felicity This is the first naturall fruit of sin It makes a man a fool and this hurt sin does to the understanding and this is shame enough to that in which men are most apt to glory Sin naturally makes a man weak that is unapt to do noble things by which I do not understand a naturall disability for it is equally ready for a man to will good as evill and as much in the power of his hands to be lifted up in prayer to God as against his Brother in a quarrell and between a vertuous object and his faculties there is a more apt proportion then between his spirit and a vice and every act of grace does more please the minde then an act of sin does delight the sense and every crime does greater violence to the better part of man then mortification does to the lower and often times a duty consists in a negative as not to be drunk not to swear and it is not to be understood that a man hath naturally no power not to do if there be a naturall disability it is to action not to rest or ceasing and therefore in this case we cannot reasonably nor justly accuse our Nature but we have reason to blame our manners which have introduced upon us a morall disability that is not that the faculty is impotent and disabled but that the whole man is for the will in many cases desires to do good and the understanding is convinced and consents and the hand can obey and the passions can be directed and be instrumentall to Gods service but because they are not used to it the will finds a difficulty to do them so much violence and the understanding consents to their lower reasonings and the desires of the lower man do will stronger and then the whole man cannot do the duty that is expected There is a law in the members and he that gave that law is a tyrant and the subjects of that law are slaves and oftentimes their ear is bored and they love their fetters and desire to continue that bondage for ever The law is the law of sin the Devill is the tyrant custome is the sanction or the firmament of the law and every vicious man is a slave and chooses the vilest master and the basest of services and the most contemptible rewards Lex enim peccati est violentia consuetudinis quâ trahitur tenetur animus etiam invitus eo merito quo in eam volens illabitur said St. Austin The law of sin is the violence of custome which keep a mans minde against his minde because he entred willingly and gave up his own interest which he ought to have secur'd for his own felicity and for his service who gave for it an invaluable price And indeed in questions of vertue and vice there is no such thing as Nature or it is so inconsiderable that it hath in it nothing beyond an inclination which may be reverted and very often not so much nothing but a perfect indifferency we may if we will or we may choose but custome brings in a new nature and makes a Biass in every faculty To a vicious man some sins become necessary Temperance makes him sick severity is death to him it destroys his chearfulnesse and activity it is as his nature and the desire dwels for ever with him and his reasonings are framed for it and his fancy and in all he is helped by example by company by folly and inconsideration and all these are a faction and a confederacy against the honour and service of God And in this Philosophy is at a stand nothing can give an account of it but experience and sorrowfull instances for it is infinitely unreasonable that when you have discoursed wisely against unchastity and told that we are separated from it by a circumvallation of Lawes of God and man that it dishonours the body and makes the spirit caitive that it is fought against by arguments sent from all the corners of reason and religion and the man knows all this and beleeves it and prayes against his sin and hates himself for it and curses the actions of it yet oppose against all this but a fable or a merry story a proverb or a silly saying the sight of his mistresse or any thing but to lessen any one of the arguments brought against it and that man shall as certainly and clearly be determined to that sin as if he had on his side all the reason of the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Custome does as much as Nature can doe it does sometimes more and superinduces a disposition contrary to our naturall temper Eudemus had so used his stomach to so unnaturall drinks that as himself tels the story he took in one day two and twenty potions in which Hellebore was infused and rose at noon and supp'd at night and felt no change So are those that are corrupted with evill customes nothing will purge them if you discourse wittily they hear you not or if they do they have twenty wayes to answer and twice twenty to neglect it if you perswade them to promise to leave their sin they do but shew their folly at the next temptation and tell that they did not mean it and if you take them at an advantage when their hearts are softned with a judgement or a fear with a shame or an indignation and then put the bars and locks of vowes upon them it is all one one vow shall hinder but one action and the appetite shall be doubled by the restraint and the next opportunity shall make an amends for the first omission or else the sin shall enter by parts the vow shall only put the understanding to make a distinction or to change the circumstance and under that colour the crime shall be admitted because the man is resolved to suppose the matter so dressed was not vowed against But then when that is done the understanding shall open that eye that did but wink before and see that it was the same thing and secretly rejoyce that it was so cousened for now the lock is open'd and the vow was broken against his will and the man is at liberty again because he did the thing at unawares 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 still he is willing to beleeve the sin was not formall vow-breach but now he sees he broke it materially and because the band is broken the yoke is in pieces therefore the next action shall go on upon the same stock of a single in quity without being afrighted in his conscience at the noise of perjury I wish we were all so innocent as not to understand the discourse but it uses to be otherwise Nam si discedas laqueo tenet ambitiost Consuetudo mali in agro corde senescit Custome hath waxen old in his
us free then are we free indeed 3. Sin does naturally introduce a great basenesse upon the spirit expressed in Scripture in some cases by the Devils entring into a man as it was in the case of Judas after he had taken the sop Satan entred into him and St. Cyprian speaking of them that after Baptisme lapsed into foul crimes he affirms that spiritu immundo quasi redeunte quatiuntur ut manifestum sit Diabolum in baptismo fide credentis excludi si fides postmodum defecerit regredi Faith and the grace of Baptisme turns the Devill out of possession but when faith fails and we loose the bands of Religion then the Devill returns that is the man is devolved into such sins of which there can be no reason given which no excuse can lessen which are set off with no pleasure advanced by no temptations which deceive by no allurements and flattering pretences such things which have a proper and direct contrariety to the good Spirit and such as are not restrained by humane laws because they are states of evill rather then evill actions principles of mischief rather then direct emanations such as are unthankfulnesse impiety giving a secret blow fawning hypocrisie detraction impudence forgetfulnesse of the dead and forgetting to do that in their absence which we promised to them in presence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Concerning which sorts of unworthinesse it is certain they argue a most degenerous spirit and they are the effect the naturall effect of malice and despair an unwholesome ill natur'd soul a soul corrupted in its whole constitution I remember that in the Apologues of Phaedrus it is told concerning an ill natured fellow that he refused to pay his Symbol which himself and all the company had agreed should be given for every disease that each man had he denying his itch to be a disease but the company taking off the refusers hat for a pledge found that he had a scal'd head and so demanded the money double which he pertinaciously resisting they threw him down and then discovered he was broken bellied and justly condemned him to pay three Philippicles Quae fuerat fabula poena fuit One disease discovers it self by the hiding of another and that being open'd discovers a third He that is almost taken in a fault tels a lye to escape and to protect that lye he forswears himself and that he may not be suspected of perjury he growes impudent and that sin may not shame him he will glory in it like the slave in the Comedy who being torn with whips grinn'd and forc'd an ugly smile that it might not seem to smart * There are some sins which a man that is newly fallen cannot entertain There is no crime made ready for a young sinner but that which nature prompts him to Naturall inclination is the first tempter then compliance then custome but this being helped by a consequent folly dismantles the soul making it to hate God to despise Religion to laugh at severity to deride sober counsels to flie from repentance to resolve against it to delight in sin without abatement of spirit or purposes For it is an intolerable thing for a man to be tormented in his conscience for every sin he acts that must not be he must have his sin and his peace too or else he can have neither long and because true peace cannot come for there is no peace saith my God to the wicked therefore they must make a phantastick peace by a studied cousening of themselves by false propositions by carelesnesse by stupidity by impudence by sufferance and habit by conversation and daily acquaintances by doing some things as Absalom did when he lay with his fathers concubines to make it impossible for him to repent or to be forgiven something to secure him in the possession of hell Tute hoc intristi quod tibi exedendum est the man must thorough it now and this is it that makes men fall into all basenesse of spirituall sins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when a man is come to the bottome of his wickednsse he despises all such as malice and despite rancor and impudence malicious studied ignorance voluntary contempt of all Religion hating of good men and good counsels and taking every wise man and wise action to be his enemy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And this is that basenesse of sin which Plato so much detested that he said he should blush to be guilty of though he knew God would pardon him and that men should never know it propter solam peccati turpitudinem for the very basenesse that is in it A man that is false to God will also if an evill temptation overtakes him betray his friend and it is notorious in the covetous and ambitious 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They are an unthankfull generation and to please the people or to serve their interest will hurt their friends That man hath so lost himself to all sweetnesse and excellency of spirit that is gone thus farre in sin that he looks like a condemned man or is like the accursed spirits preserved in chains of darknesse and impieties unto the Judgement of the great Day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this man can be nothing but evill for these inclinations and evill forwardnesses this dyscrasie and gangren'd disposition does alwaies suppose a long or a base sin for their parent and the product of these is a wretchlesse spirit that is an aptnesse to any unworthinesse and an unwillingnesse to resist any temptation a perseverance in basenesse and a consignation to all damnation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If men do evill things evill things shall be their reward If they obey the evill spirit an evill spirit shall be their portion and the Devill shall enter into them as he entred into Judas and fill them full of iniquity SERMON XXI Part III. 4. ALthough these are shamefull effects of sin and a man need no greater dishonour then to be a fool and a slave and a base person all which sin infallibly makes him yet there are some sins which are directly shamefull in their nature and proper disreputation and a very great many sins are the worst and basest in severall respects that is every of them hath a venomous quality of its own whereby it is marked and appropriated to a peculiar evill spirit The Devils sin was the worst because it came from the greatest malice Adams was the worst because it was of most universall efficacy and dissemination Judas sin the worst of men because against the most excellent person and the relapses of the godly are the worst by reason they were the most obliged persons But the ignorance of the Law is the greatest of evils if we consider its danger but covetousnesse is worse then it if we regard its incurable and growing nature luxury is most alien from spirituall things
Give glory to the Lord your God before he cause darknesse and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains and while ye look for light or lest while ye look for light he shall turn it into the shadow of death and make it grosse darknesse Sermon 7. 8. The deceitfulnesse of the heart fol. 80. 92. Jerem. 17. 9. The heart is deceitfull above all things and desperately wicked who can know it Sermon 9. 10. 11. The faith and patience of the Saints Or the righteous cause oppressed fol. 104. 119. 133. 1 Pet. 4. 17. For the time is come that judgement must begin at the house of God and if it first begin at us what shall the end be of them that obey not the Gospel of God 18. And if the righteous scarcely be saved where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear Sermon 12. 13. The mercy of the Divine judgements or Gods method in curing sinners fol. 146. 159. Romans 2. 4. Despisest thou the riches of his goodnesse and forbearance and long-suffering not knowing that the goodnesse of God leadeth thee to repentance Sermon 14. 15. Of groweth in grace with its proper instruments and signes fol. 172. 183. 2 Pet. 3. 18. But grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ to whom be glory both now and for ever Amen Sermon 16. 17. Of groweth in sin or the severall states and degrees of sinners with the manner how they are to be treated fol. 197. 210. Jude Epist ver 22 23. And of some have compassion making a difference * And others save with fear pulling them out of the fire Sermon 18. 19. The foolish exchange sol 224. 237. Matth. 16. ver 26. For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul Sermon 20 21. 22. The Serpent and the Dove or a discourse of Christian Prudence fol. 251. 263. 274. Matth. 10. latter part of ver 16. Be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmlesse as doves Sermon 23. 24. Of Christian simplicity 289. 301. Matth. 10. latter part of ver 16. And harmlesse as doves Sermon 25. 26. 27. The miracles of the Divine Mercy fol. 313. 327. 340. Psal. 86. 5. For thou Lord art good and ready to forgive and plenteous in mercy to all them that call upon thee A Funerall Sermon preached at the Obsequies of the Right Honourable the Countesse of Carbery fol. 357. 2 Sam. 14. 14. For we must needs die and are as water spilt on the ground which cannot be gathered up again neither doth God respect any person yet doth he devise means that his banished be not expelled from him A Discourse of the Divine Institution necessity sacrednesse and separation of the Office Ministeriall Sermon I. VVHITSVNDAY OF THE SPIRIT OF GRACE 8. Romans v. 9. 10. But ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his And if Christ be in you the body is dead because of sin but the Spirit is life because of righteousnesse THe day in which the Church commemorates the descent of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles was the first beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This was the first day that the Religion was professed now the Apostles first open'd their commission and read it to all the people The Lord gave his Spirit or the Lord gave his word and great was the company of the Preachers For so I make bold to render that prophesie of David Christ was the word of God verbum aeternum but the Spirit was the word of God verbum Patefactum Christ was the word manifested in the flesh the Spirit was the word manifested to flesh and set in dominion over and in hostility against the flesh The Gospel and the Spirit are the same thing not in substance but the manifestation of the Spirit is the Gospel of Jesus Christ and because he was this day manifested the Gospel was this day first preached and it became a law to us called the law of the Spirit of life that is a law taught us by the Spirit leading us to life eternal But the Gospel is called the Spirit 1. Because it contains in it such glorious mysteries which were revealed by the immediate inspirations of the Spirit not onely in the matter it self but also in the manner and powers to apprehend them For what power of humane understanding could have found out the incarnation of a God that two natures a finite and an infinite could have been concentred into one hypostasis or person that a virgin should be a Mother that dead men should live again that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the ashes of dissolved bones should become bright as the Sun blessed as Angels swift in motion as thought clear as the purest Noone that God should so love us as to be willing to be reconcil'd to us and yet that himself must dye that he might pardon us that Gods most Holy Son should give us his body to eat and his bloud to crown our chalices and his Spirit to sanctifie our souls to turn our bodies into temperance our souls into mindes our mindes into Spirit our Spirit into glory that he who can give us all things who is Lord of Men and Angels and King of all the Creatures should pray to God for us without intermission that he who reigns over all the world should at the day of judgement give up the Kingdom to God the Father and yet after this resignation himself and we with him should for ever reign the more gloriously that we should be justified by Faith in Christ and that charity should be a part of faith and that both should work as acts of duty and as acts of relation that God should Crown the imperfect endeavours of his Saints with glory and that a humane act should be rewarded with an eternal inheritance that the wicked for the transient pleasure of a few minutes should be tormented with an absolute eternity of pains that the waters of baptisme when they are hallowed by the Spirit shall purge the soul from sin and that the Spirit of a man shall be nourished with the consecrated and mysterious elements and that any such nourishment should bring a man up to heaven and after all this that all Christian People all that will be saved must be partakers of the Divine nature of the Nature the infinite nature of God and must dwell in Christ and Christ must dwell in them and they must be in the Spirit and the Spirit must be for ever in them these are articles of so mysterious a Philosophy that we could have inferred them from no premises discours'd them upon the stock of no naturall or scientificall principles nothing but God and Gods spirit could have taught them to us and therefore the Gospel is Spiritus
be certain that it shall prevail Such a praying with the spirit when our prayers are the voices of our spirits and our spirits are first taught then sanctified by Gods spirit shall never fail of its effect because then it is that the spirit himself maketh intercession for us that is hath enabled us to do it upon his strengths we speak his sense we live his life we breath his accents we desire in order to his purposes and our persons are Gracious by his Holinesse and are accepted by his interpellation and intercession in the act and offices of Christ. This is praying with the spirit To which by way of explication I adde these two annexes of holy prayer in respect of which also every good man prayes with the spirit 5. The spirit gives us great relish and appetite to our prayers and this Saint Paul calls serving of God in his spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is with a willing minde not as Jonas did his errand but as Christ did die for us he was straimed till he had accomplished it And they that say their prayers out of custome onely or to comply with external circumstances or collateral advantages or pray with trouble and unwillingnesse give a very great testimony that they have not the spirit of Christ within them that spirit which maketh intercession for the Saints but he that delighteth in his prayers not by a sensible or phantastic pleasure but whose choice dwells in his prayers and whose conversation is with God in holy living and praying accordingly that man hath the spirit of Christ and therfore belongs to Christ for by this spirit it is that Christ prayes in Heaven for us and if we do not pray on earth in the same manner according to our measures we had as good hold our peace our prayers are an abominable sacrifice and send up to God no better a perfume then if wee burned assa faetida or the raw flesh of a murdered man upon the altar of incense 6. The spirit of Christ and of prayer helps our infirmities by giving us confidence and importunity I put them together For as our faith is and our trust in God so is our hope and so is our prayer weary or lasting long or short not in words but in works and in desires For the words of prayer are no part of the spirit of prayer words may be the body of it but the spirit of prayer alwayes consists in holinesse that is in holy desires and holy actions words are not properly capable of being holy all words are in themselves servants of things and the holinesse of a prayer is not at all concerned in the manner of its expression but in the spirit of it that is in the violence of its desires and the innocence of its ends and the continuence of its imployment this is the verification of that great Prophecie which Christ made that in all the world the true worshippers should worship in spirit and in truth that is with a pure minde with holy desires for spiritual things according to the minde of the spirit in imitation of Christs intercession with perseverance with charity or love That is the spirit of God and these are the spiritualities of the Gospel and the formalities of prayer as they are Christian and Evangelicall 7. Some men have thought of a seventh way and explicate our praying in the spirit by a mere volubilty of language which indeed is a direct undervaluing the spirit of God and of Christ the spirit of manifestation and intercession it is to return to the materiality and imperfection of the law it is to worship God in outward forms and to think that Gods service consists in shels and rinds in lips and voices in shadows and images of things it is to retire from Christ to Moses and at the best it is a going from real graces to imaginary gifts and when praying with the spirit hath in it so many excellencies and consists of so many parts of holinesse and sanctification and is an act of the inner man we shall be infinitely mistaken if we let go this substance and catch at a shadow and sit down and rest in the imagination of an improbable unnecessary uselesse gift of speaking to which the nature of many men and the art of all learned men and the very use and confidence of ignorant men is too abundantly sufficient Let us not so despise the spirit of Christ as to make it no other then the breath of our lungs * For though it might be possible that at the first and when formes of prayer were few and seldome the spirit of God might dictatethe very words to the Apostles and first Christians yet it follows not that therfore he does so still to all that pretend praying with the spirit For if he did not then at the first dictate words as we know not whether he did or no why shall he be suppos'd to do so now If he did then it follows that he does not now because his doing it then was sufficient for all men since for so the formes taught by the spirit were paternes for others to imitate in all the deseending ages of the Church There was once an occasion so great that the spirit of God did think it a work fit for him to teach a man to weave silke or embroider gold or woke in brasse as it happened to Besaleel and Aholiab But then every weaver or worker in brasse may by the same reason pretend that he works by the spirit as that he prayes by the spirit if by prayer he means forming the words For although in the case of working it was certain that the spirit did teach in the case of inditing or forming the words it is not certain whether he did or no yet because in both it was extraordinary if it was at all and ever since in both it is infinitely needlesse to pretend the Spirit in forms of every mans making even though they be of contrary religions and pray one against the other it may serve an end of a phantastic and hypochondriacal religion or a secret ambition but not the ends of God or the honour of the Spirit The Jews in their declensions to folly and idolatry did worship the stone of imagination that is certain smooth images in which by art magic pictures and little faces were represented declaring hidden things and stoln goods and God severely forbad this basenesse but we also have taken up this folly and worship the stone of imagination we beget imperfect phantasmes and speculative images in our phansy and we fall down and worship them never considering that the spirit of God never appears through such spectres Prayer is one of the noblest exercises of Christian religion or rather is it that duty in which all graces are concentred Prayer is charity it is faith it is a conformity to Gods will a desiring according to the desires of Heaven an imitation of Christs
deceive you The man deceives because he is false and the staffe because it is weak and the heart because it is both So that it is deceitful above all things that is failing and disabled to support us in many things but in other things where it can it is false and desperately wicked The first sort of deceitfulnesse is its calamitie and the second is its iniquity and that is the worst Calamitie of the two 1. The heart is deceitfull in its strength and when we have the groweth of a Man we have the weaknesses of a childe nay more yet and it is a sad consideration the more we are in age the weaker in our courage It appears in the heats and forwardnesses of new converts which are like to the great emissions of Lightning or like huge fires which flame and burn without measure even all that they can till from flames they descend to still fires from thence to smoak from smoak to embers from thence to ashes cold and pale like ghosts or the phantastick images of Death And the primitive Church were zealous in their Religion up to the degree of Cherubins and would run as greedily to the sword of the hangman to die for the cause of God as we do now to the greatest joy and entertainment of a Christian spirit even to the receiving of the holy Sacrament A man would think it reasonable that the first infancy of Christianity should according to the nature of first beginnings have been remisse gentle and unactive and that according us the object or evidence of faith grew which in every Age hath a great degree of Argument superadded to its confirmation so should the habit also and the grace the longer it lasts the more obiections it runs through it still should shew a brighter and more certain light to discover the divinity of its principle and that after the more examples and new accidents and strangenesses of providence and daily experience and the multitude of miracles still the Christian should grow more certain in his faith more refreshed in his hope and warm in his charity the very nature of these graces increasing and swelling upon the very nourishment of experience and the multiplication of their own acts And yet because the heart of man is false it suffers the fires of the Altar to go out and the flames lessen by the multitude of fuel But indeed it is because we put on strange fire put out the fire upon our hearths by letting in a glaring Sun beam the fire of lust or the heates of an angry spirit to quench the fires of God and suppresse the sweet cloud of incense The heart of man hath not strength enough to think one good thought of itself it cannot command its own attention to a prayer of ten lines long but before its end it shall wander after some thing that is to no purpose and no wonder then that it grows weary of a holy religion which consists of so many parts as make the businesse of a whole life And there is no greater argument in the world of our spiritual weaknesse and falsnesse of our hearts in the matters of religion then the backwardnesse which most men have alwayes and all men have somtimes to say their prayers so weary of their length so glad when they are done so wittie to excuse and frustrate an opportunity and yet there is no manner of trouble in the duty no wearinesse of bones no violent labours nothing but begging a blessing and receiving it nothing but doing our selves the greatest honour of speaking to the greatest person and greatest king of the world and that we should be unwilling to do this so unable to continue in it so backward to return to it so without gust and relish in the doing it can have no visible reason in the nature of the thing but something within us a strange sicknesse in the heart a spiritual nauseating or loathing of Manna something that hath no name but we are sure it comes from a weake a faint and false heart And yet this weak heart is strong in passions violent in desires unresistable in its appetites impatient in its lust furious in anger here are strengths enough one would think But so have I seen a man in a feaver sick and distempered unable to walk lesse able to speak sence or to do an act of counsel and yet when his feaver hath boild up to a delirium he was strong enough to beat his nurse keeper and his doctor too and to resist the loving violence of all his friends who would faine binde him down to reason and his bed And yet we still say he is weak and sick to death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for these strengths of madnesse are not health but furiousnesse and disease 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is weaknesse another way And so are the strengths of a mans heart they are fetters and manacles strong but they are the cordage of imprisonment so strong that the heart is not able to stir And yet it cannot but be a huge sadnesse that the heart shall pursue a temporal interest with wit and diligence and an unwearied industry and shall not have strength enough in a matter that concerns its Eternal interest to answer one obiection to resist one assault to defeate one art of the divel but shall certainly and infallibly fall when ever it is tempted to a pleasure This if it be examined will prove to be a deceit indeed a pretence rather then true upon a just cause that is it is not a natural but a moral a vicious weaknesse and we may try it in one or two familiar instances One of the great strengths shall I call it or weaknesses of the heart is that it is strong violent and passionate in its lusts and weak and deceitful to resist any Tell the tempted person that if he act his lust he dishonours his body makes himself a servant to follie and one flesh with a harlot he defiles the Temple of God and him that defiles a Temple will God destroy Tell him that the Angels who love to be present in the nastinesse and filth of prisons that they may comfort and assist chast souls and holy persons there abiding yet they are impatient to behold or come neer the filthynesse of a lustful person Tell him that this sin is so ugly that the divels who are spirits yet they delight to counterfeit the acting of this crime and descend unto the daughters or sons of men that they may rather lose their natures then not help to set a lust forward Tell them these and ten thousand things more you move them no more then if you should read one of Tullies orations to a mule for the truth is they have no power to resist it much lesse to master it their heart fails them when they meet their Mistresse and they are driven like a fool to the stocks or a Bull to the slaughter-house And
if he shall dash against the wall because it showes him his face just as it is his face is not so ugly as his manners And yet our heart is so impatient of seeing its own staines that like the Elephant it tramples in the pure streames and first troubles them then stoops and drinks when he can least see his huge deformitie 2. In order to this we heap up teachers of our own and they guide us not whither but which way they please for we are curious to go our own way and carelesse of our Hospitall or Inne at night A faire way and a merry company and a pleasant easie guide will entice us into the Enemies quarters and such guides we cannot want Improbitati occasio nunquam defuit If we have a minde to be wicked we shall want no prompters and false teachers at first creeping in unawares have now so filled the pavement of the Church that you can scarce set your foot on the ground but you tread upon a snake Cicero l. 7. ad Atticum undertakes to bargain with them that kept the Sybils books that for a sum of money they shall expound to him what he please and to be sure ut quidvis potius quam Regem proferrent They shall declare against the government of kings say that the Gods will endure any thing rather then Monarchy in their beloved republick And the same mischief God complains of to be among the Jews the Prophets prophecie lies and my people love to have it so and what will the end of these things be even the same that Cicero complain'd of Ad opinionem imperitorum fictas esse Religiones Men shall have what Religion they please and God shall be intitled to all the quarrels of covetous and Ambitious persons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Demosthenes wittily complained of the Oracle An answer shall be drawn out of Scripture to countenance the designe God made to Rebel against his own Ordinances And then we are zealous for the Lord God of Hosts and will live and die in that quarrel But is it not a strange cozenage that our hearts shall be the main wheel in the engine and shall set all the rest on working The heart shall first put his own candle out then put out the eye of reason then remove the Land-mark and dig down the causeywayes and then either hire a blinde guide or make him so and all these Arts to get ignorance that they may secure impiety At first man lost his innocence onely in hope to get a little knowledge and ever since then lest knowledge should discover his errour and make him returne to innocence we are content to part with that now and to kow nothing that may discover or discountenance our sins or discompose our secular designe And as God made great revelations and furnished out a wise Religion and sent his spirit to give the gift of Faith to his Church that upon the foundation of Faith he might build a holy life now our hearts love to retire into Blindnesse sneak under the covert of False principles and run to a cheape religion and an unactive discipline and make a faith of our own that we may build upon it ease and ambition and a tall fortune and the pleasures of revenge and do what we have a minde to scarce once in seven years denying a strong and an unruly appetite upon the interest of a just conscience and holy religion This is such a desperate method of impiety so certain arts and apt instruments for the Divel that it does his work intirley and produces an infallible damnation 3. But the heart of man hath yet another stratagem to secure its iniquity by the means of ignorance and that is Incogitancy or Inconsideration For there is wrought upon the spirits of many men great impression by education by a modest and temperate nature by humane Laws and the customes severities of sober persons and the fears of religion and the awfulnesse of a reverend man and the several arguments and endearments of vertue And it is not in the nature of some men to do an act in despite of reason and Religion and arguments and Reverence and modesty and fear But men are forced from their sin by the violence of the grace of God when they heare it speak But so a Roman Gentleman kept off a whole band of souldiers who were sent to murther him and his eloquence was stronger then their anger and designe But suddenly a rude trooper rushed upon him who neither had nor would heare him speak and he thrust his spear into that throat whose musick had charmed all his fellows into peace and gentlenesse So do we The Grace of God is Armour and defence enough against the most violent incursion of the spirits and the works of darknesse but then we must hear its excellent charms and consider its reasons and remember its precepts and dwell with its discourses But this the heart of man loves not If I be tempted to uncleannesse or to an act of oppression instantly the grace of God represents to me that the pleasure of the sin is transient and vain unsatisfying and empty That I shall die and then I shall wish too late that I had never done it It tells me that I displease God who made me who feeds me who blesses me who fain would save me It represents to me all the joyes of Heaven and the horrours and amazements of a sad eternity And if I will stay and heare them ten thousand excellent things besides fit to be twisted about my understanding for ever But here the heart of man shuffles all these discourses into disorder and will not be put to the trouble of answering the objections but by a meer wildenesse of purpose and rudnesse of resolution ventures super totam materiam at all and does the thing not because it thinks it fit to do so but because it will not consider whether it be or no it is enough that it pleases a present appetite and if such incogitancy comes to be habitual as it is in very many men first by resisting the motions of the holy spirit then by quenching him we shall find the consequents to be first an Indifferencie then a dulnesse then a Lethargie then a direct Hating the wayes of God and it commonly ends in a wretchlessenesse of spirit to be manifested on our death-bed when the man shall passe hence not like the shadow but like the dog that departeth without sence or interest or apprehension or real concernment in the considerations of eternity and t is but just when we will not heare our king speak and plead not to save himself but us to speak for our peace and innocency and Salvation to prevent our ruine and our intolerable calamity certainly we are much in love with the wages of death when we cannot endure to heare God cal us back and stop our ears against the voice of the charmer charme
he never so wisely Nay further yet we suffer the Arguments of Religion to have so little impression upon our spirits that they operate but like the discourses of childhood or the Problems of uncertain Philosophy A man talks of Religion but as of a dream and from thence he awakens into the Businesses of the world and acts them deliberately with perfect Action and full Resolution and contrives and considers and lives in them But when he falls asleep again or is taken from the Scene of his own employment and choice then he dreams again and Religion makes such Impressions as is the conversation of a Dreamer and he acts accordingly Theocritus tells of a Fisherman that dreamed he had taken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Fish of gold upon which being over-joyed he made a vow that he would never fish more But when he waked he soon declared his vow to be null because he found his golden Fish was scaped away through the holes of his eyes when he first opened them Just so we do in the purposes of Religion sometimes in a good mood we seem to see Heaven opened and all the streets of Heavenly Jerusalem paved with gold and precious stones and we are ravished with spirituall apprehensions and resolve never to return to the low affections of the world and the impure adherencies of sin but when this flash of lightning is gone and we converse again with the Inclinations and habituall desires of our false hearts those other desires and fine considerations disband and the Resolutions taken in that pious fit melt into Indifferency and old Customes He was prettily and fantastically troubled who having used to put his trust in Dreams one night dreamed that all dreams were vain For he considered If so then This was vain and then dreams might be true for all this But if they might be true then this dream might be so upon equall reason And then dreams were vain because This dream which told him so was true and so round again In the same Circle runs the Heart of man All his cogitations are vain and yet he makes especiall use of this that that Thought which thinks so That is vain and if That be vain then his other Thoughts which are vainly declared so may be Reall and Relied upon And so we do Those religious thoughts which are sent into us to condemne and disrepute the thoughts of sin and vanity are esteemed the onely dreams And so all those Instruments which the grace of God hath invented for the destruction of Impiety are rendred ineffectuall either by our direct opposing them or which happens most commonly by our want of considering them The effect of all is this That we are ignorant of the things of God we make Religion to be the work of a few hours in the whole yeer we are without fancy or affection to the severities of holy Living we reduce Religion to the Beleeving of a few Articles and doing nothing that is considerable we Pray seldome and then but very coldly and indifferently we Communicate not so often as the Sun salutes both the Tropicks we professe Christ but dare not die for him we are factious for a Religion and will not live according to its precepts we call our selves Christians and love to be ignorant of many of the Lawes of Christ lest our knowledge should force us into shame or into the troubles of a holy Life All the mischiefs that you can suppose to happen to a furious inconsiderate person running after the wilde-fires of the night over Rivers and Rocks and Precipices without Sun or starre or Angel or Man to guide him All that and ten thousand times worse may you suppose to be the certain Lot of him who gives himself up to the conduct of a passionate blinde Heart whom no fire can warm and no Sun enlighten who hates light and loves to dwell in the Regions of darknesse That 's the first generall mischief of the Heart It is possessed with Blindnesse wilfull and voluntary 2. But the Heart is Hard too Not onely Folly but Mischief also is bound up in the Heart of man If God strives to soften it with sorrow and sad Accidents it is like an Ox it grows callow and hard Such a heart was Pharaohs When God makes the clouds to gather round about us we wrap our heads in the clouds and like the male-contents in Galba's time Tristitiam simulamus Contumaciae propiores We seem sad and troubled but it is doggednesse and murmur Or else if our fears be pregnant and the heart yeelding it sinks low into pusillanimity and superstition and our hearts are so childish so timerous or so impatient in a sadnesse that God is weary of making us and we are glad of it And yet when the Sun shines upon us our hearts are hardned with that too and God 〈◊〉 to be at a losse as if he knew not what to do to us Warre undoes us and makes us violent Peace undoes us and makes us wanton Prosperity makes us Proud Adversity renders us Impatient Plenty dissolves us and makes us Tyrants Want makes us greedy liars and rapacious 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 No fortune can save that City to whom neither Peace nor Warre can do advantage And what is there left for God to mollifie our hearts whose temper is like both to wax and durt whom fire hardens and cold hardens and contradictory Accidents produce no change save that the heart growes worse and more obdurate for every change of Providence But here also I must descend to particulars 1. The Heart of man is strangely Proud If men commend us we think we have reason to distinguish our selves from others since the voice of discerning men hath already made the separation If men do not commend us we think they are stupid and understand us not or envious and hold their tongues in spite If we are praised by many then Vox populi vox Dei Fame is the voice of God If we be praised but by few then Satis unus satis nullus We cry these are wise and one wise man is worth a whole herd of the People But if we be praised by none at all we resolve to be even with all the world and speak well of no body and think well onely of our selves And then we have such beggerly Arts such tricks to cheat for praise we inquire after our faults and failings onely to be told we have none but did excellently and then we are pleased we rail upon our actions onely to be chidden for so doing and then he is our friend who chides us into a good opinion of our selves which however all the world cannot make us part with Nay Humility it self makes us proud so false so base is the the Heart of man For Humility is so noble a vertue that even Pride it self puts on its upper Garment And we do like those who cannot endure to look upon an
pleasure illiberalis ingratae voluptatis causa as Plutarch calls it for illiberal and ungratefull pleasure in which when a man hath entred he loses the rights and priviledges and honours of a good man and gets nothing that is profitable and useful to holy purposes or necessary to any but is already in a state so hateful and miserable that he needs neither God nor man to be a revenger having already under his splendid robe miseries enough to punish and betray this hypocrisy of his condition being troubled with the memory of what is past distrustful of the present suspicious of the future vitious in their lives and full of pageantry and out-sides but in their death miserable with calamities real eternal and insupportable and if it could be other wise vertue it self would be reproached with the calamity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I end with the advice of Saint Paul In nothing be terrified of your adversaries which to them is an evident token of perdition but to you of salvation and that of God Sermon XI The Faith and Patience of the SAINTS OR The righteous cause oppressed Part III. BUt now that the persecuted may at least be pitied and assisted in that of which they are capable I shall propound some rules by which they may learn to gather grapes from their thorns and figs from their thistles crowns from the crosse glory from dishonour As long as they belong to God it is necessary that they suffer persecution or sorrow no rules can teach them to avoid that but the evil of the suffering and the danger must be declined and we must use such spirituall arts as are apt to turn them into health and medicine For it were a hard thing first to be scourged and then to be crucified to suffer here and to perish hereafter through the fiery triall and purging fire of afflictions to passe into hell that is intollerable and to be prevented with the following cautions least a man suffers like a fool and a malefactour or inherits damnation for the reward of his imprudent suffering 1. They that suffer any thing for Christ and are ready to die for him let them do nothing against him For certainly they think too highly of martyrdom who beleeve it able to excuse all the evils of a wicked life A man may give his body to be burned and yet have no charity and he that dies without charity dies without God for God is love And when those who fought in the dayes of the Maccabees for the defence of true Religion and were killed in those holy warres yet being dead were found having about their necks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or pendants consecrated to idols of the Jamnenses it much allayed the hope which by their dying in so good a cause was entertained concerning their beatificall resurrection He that overcomes his fear of death does well but if he hath not also overcome his lust or his anger his baptisme of blood will not wash him clean Many things may make a man willing to die in a good cause Publike reputation hope of reward gallantry of spirit a confident resolution and a masculine courage or a man may be vexed into a stubborn and unrelenting suffering But nothing can make a man live well but the grace and the love of God But those persons are infinitely condemned by their last act who professe their religion to be worth dying for and yet are so unworthy as not to live according to its institution It were a rare felicity if every good cause could be mannaged by good men onely but we have found that evil men have spoiled a good cause but never that a good cause made those evil men good and holy If the Governour of Samaria had crucified Simon Magus for receiving Christian Baptisme he had no more died a martyr then he lived a saint For dying is not enough and dying in a good cause is not enough but then onely we receive the crown of martyrdom when our death is the seal of our life and our life is a continuall testimony of our duty and both give testimony to the excellencies of the religion and glorifie the grace of God If a man be gold the fire purges him but it burns him if he be like stubble cheap light and uselesse For martyrdom is the consummation of love But then it must be supposed that this grace must have had its beginning and its severall stages and periods and must have passed thorow labour to zeal thorow all the regions of duty to the perfections of sufferings and therefore it is a sad thing to observe how some empty souls will please themselves with being of such a religion or such a cause and though they dishonour their religion or weigh down the cause with the prejudice of sin beleeve all is swallowed up by one honourable name or the appellative of one vertue If God had forbid nothing but heresie and treason then to have been a loyall man or of a good beleef had been enough but he that forbad rebellion forbids also swearing and covetousnesse rapine and oppression lying and cruelty And it is a sad thing to see a man not onely to spend his time and his wealth and his money and his friends upon his lust but to spend his sufferings too to let the canker-worm of a deadly sin devour his Martyrdom He therefore that suffers in a good cause let him be sure to walk worthy of that honour to which God hath called him Let him first deny his sins and then deny himself and then he may take up his crosse and follow Christ ever remembring that no man pleases God in his death who hath walked perversely in his life 2. He that suffers in a cause of God must be indifferent what the instance be so that he may serve God I say he must be indifferent in the cause so it be a cause of God and indifferent in the suffering so it be of Gods appointment For some men have a naturall aversation to some vices or vertues and a naturall affection to others One man will die for his friend and another will die for his money Some men hate to be a rebell and will die for their Prince but tempt them to suffer for the cause of the Church in which they were baptized and in whose communion they look for heaven and then they are tempted and fall away Or if God hath chosen the cause for them and they have accepted it yet themselves will choose the suffering Right or wrong some men will not endure a prison and some that can yet choose the heaviest part of the burden the pollution and stain of a sin rather then lose their money and some had rather die twice then lose their estates once In this our rule is easie Let
how ever we esteem it is the greatest instance of the divine long sufferance that is in the world After these instruments we may consider the end the strand upon which these land us the purpose of this variety of these laborious and admirable arts with which God so studies and contrives the happinesse and salvation of man it is onely that man may be brought by these meanes unto repentance and by repentance may be brought to eternall life This is the treasure of the Divine goodnesse the great and admirable efflux of the eternal beneficence the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the riches of his goodnesse which whosoever despises despises himself and the great interest of his own felicity he shall die in his impenitence and perish in his folly 1. The first great instrument that God chooses to bring us to him is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 profit or benefit and this must needs be first for those instruments whereby we have a being are so great mercies that besides that they are such which give us the capacities of all other mercies they are the advances of us in the greatest instances of promotion in the world For from nothing to something is an infinite space and a man must have a measure of infinite passed upon him Before he can perceive himself to be either happy or miserable he is not able to give God thanks for one blessing untill he hath received many But then God intends we should enter upon his service at the beginning of our dayes because even then he is before-hand with us and hath already given us great instances of his goodnesse What a prodigy of favour is it to us that he hath passed by so many formes of his creatures and hath not set us down in the rank of any of them till we came to be paul◠minores angelis a little lower then the angels and yet from the meanest of them God can perfect his own praise The deeps and the snows the hail and the rain the birds of the air and the fishes of the sea they can and do glorifie God and give him praise in their capacity and yet he gave them no speech no reason no immortall spirit or capacity of eternall blessednesse but he hath distinguished us from them by the absolute issues of his predestination and hath given us a lasting and eternall spirit excellent organs of perception and wonderfull instruments of expression that we may joyn in consort with the morning star and bear a part in the Chorus with the Angels of light to sing Alleluiah to the great Father of men and Angels But was it not a huge chain of mercies that we were not strangled in the regions of our own naturall impurities but were sustained by the breath of God from perishing in the womb where God formed us in secreto terrae told our bones and kept the order of nature and the miracles of creation and we lived upon that which in the next minute after we were born would strangle us if it were not removed but then God took care of us and his hands of providence clothed us and fed us But why do I reckon the mercies of production which in every minute of our being are alike and continued and are miracles in all senses but that they are common and usuall I onely desire you to remember that God made all the works of his hands to serve him and indeed this mercy of creating us such as we are was not to lead us to repentance but was a designe of innocence he intended we should serve him as the Sun and the Moon do as fire and water do never to prevaricate the laws he fixed to us that we might have needed no repentance But since we did degenerate and being by God made better and more noble creatures then all the inhabitants of the air the water and the earth besides we made our selves baser and more ignoble then any For no dog crocodile or swine was ever Gods enemy as we made our selves yet then from thence forward God began his work of leading us to repentance by the riches of his goodnesse He causeth us to be born of Christian parents under whom we were taught the mysteriousnesse of its goodnesse and designes for the redemption of man And by the designe of which religion repentance was taught to mankind and an excellent law given for distinction of good and evil and this is a blessing which though possibly we do not often put into our eucharisticall Letanies to give God thanks for yet if we sadly consider what had become of us if we had been born under the dominion of a Turkish Lord or in America where no Christians do inhabite where they worship the Devil where witches are their priests their prophets their phisitians and their Oracles can we choose but apprehend a visible notorious necessity of perishing in those sins which we then should not have understood by the glasse of a divine law to have declined nor by a revelation have been taught to repent of But since the best of men does in the midst of all the great advantages of lawes and examples and promises and threatnings do many things he ought to be ashamed of and needs to repent of we can understand the riches of the Divine goodnesse best by considering that the very designe of our birth and education in the Christian religion is that we may recover of and cure our follies by the antidote of repentance which is preached to us as a doctrine and propounded as a favour which was put into a law and purchased for us by a great expence which God does not more command to us as a duty then he gives us a blessing For now that we shall not perish for our first follies but be admitted to new conditions to be repaired by second thoughts to have our infirmities excused and our sins forgiven our habits lessened and our malice cured after we were wounded and sick and dead and buried and in the possession of the Devil this was such a blessing so great riches of the Divine goodnesse that as it was taught to no religion but the Christian revealed by no law-giver but Christ so it was a favour greater then ever God gave to the Angels and Devils for although God was rich in the effusion of his goodnesse towards them yet they were not admitted to the condition of second thoughts Christ never shed one drop of blood for them his goodnesse did not lead them to repentance but to us it was that he made this largesse of his goodnesse to us to whom he made himself a brother and sucked the paps of our mother he paid the scores of our sin and shame and death onely that we might be admitted to repent and that this repentance might be effectuall to the great purposes of felicity and salvation And if we would consider this sadly it might make us better to understand our madnesse and folly in refusing to
in a persecution to perjuries and Apostacy and unhandsome compliances and hypocricy and irreligion and many men are brought to vertue and to God and to felicity by being persecuted and made unprosperous and these are effects of a more absolute and irrespective predestination but when the grace of God is great and prudent and masculine and well grown it is unalter'd in all changes save onely that every accident that is new and violent brings him neerer to God and makes him with greater caution and severity to dwell in vertue 11. Lastly some there are who are firme in all great and foresoen changes and have laid up in the store-houses of the spirit reason and religion arguments and discourses enough to defend them against all violencies and stand at watch so much that they are safe where they can consider and deliberate but there may be something wanting yet and in the direct line in the strait progresse to heaven I call that an infallible signe of a great grace and indeed the greatest degree of a great grace when a man is prepared against sudden invasions of the spirit surreptions and extemporary assaults Many a valiant person dares sight a battle who yet will be timorous and surprised in a mid-night alarme or if he falls into a river And how many discreet persons are there who if you offer them a sin and give them time to consider and tell them of it before hand will rather die then be perjured or tell a deliberate lie or break a promise who it may be tell many sudden lies and excuse themselves and break their promises and yet think themselves safe enough and sleep without either affrightments or any apprehension of dishonour done to their persons or their religion Every man is not armed for all sudden arrests of passions few men have cast such fetters upon their lusts and have their passions in so strict confinement that they may not be over run with a midnight flood or an unlooked for inundation He that does not start when he is smitten suddenly is a constant person and that is it which I intend in this instance that he is a perfect man and well grown in grace who hath so habitual a resolution and so unhasty and wary a spirit as that he decrees upon no act before he hath considered maturely and changed the sudden occasion into a sober counsel David by chance spied Bathsheba washing her self and being surprised gave his heart away before he could consider and when it was once gone it was hard to recover it and sometimes a man is betrayed by a sudden opportunity and all things fitted for his sin ready at the door the act stands in all its dresse and will not stay for an answear and incosideration is the defence and guard of the sin and makes that his conscience can the more easily swallow it what shall the man do then unlesse he be strong by his old strengths by a great grace by an habitual vertue and a sober unmoved spirit he falls and dies in the death and hath no new strengths but such as are to be imployed for his recovery none for his present guard unlesse upon the old stock and if he be a well grown Christian. These are the parts acts and offices of our growing in grace and yet I have sometimes called them signes but they are signes as eating and drinking are signes of life they are signes so as also they are parts of life and these are parts of our growth in grace so that a man can grow in grace to no other purpose but to these or the like improvements Concerning which I have a caution or two to interpose 1. The growth of grace is to be estimated as other morall things are not according to the growth of things naturall Grace does not grow by observation and a continuall efflux and a constant proportion and a man cannot call himself to the account for the growth of every day or week or moneth but in the greater portions of our life in which we have had many occasions and instances to exercise and improve our vertues we may call our selves to account but it is a snare to our consciences to be examined in the growth of grace in every short resolution of solemn duty as against every Communion or great Festivall 2. Growth in grace is not alwayes to be discerned either in single instances or in single graces Not in single instances for every time we are to exercise a vertue we are not in the same naturall dispositions nor do we meet with the same circumstances and it is not alwayes necessary that the next act should be more earnest and intence then the former all single acts are to be done after the manner of men and therefore are not alwayes capable of increasing and they have their termes beyond which easily they cannot swell and therefore if it be a good act and zealous it may proceed from a well grown grace and yet a younger and weaker person may do some acts as great and as religious as it But neither do single graces alwayes affoord a regular and certain judgement in this affair for some persons at the first had rather die then be unchast or perjured and greater love then this no man hath that he lay down his life for God he cannot easily grow in the substance of that act and if other persons or himself in processe of time do it more cheerfully or with fewer fears it is not alwayes a signe of a greater grace but some times of greater collaterall assistances or a better habit of body or more fortunate circumstances for he that goes to the block tremblingly for Christ and yet endures his death certainly and endures his trembling too and runs through all his infirmities and the bigger temptations looks not so well many times in the eyes of men but suffers more for God then those confident Martyrs that courted death in the primitive Church and therefore may be much dearer in the eyes of God But that which I say in this particular is that a smallnesse in one is not an argument of the imperfection of the whole estate Because God does not alwayes give to every man occasions to exercise and therefore not to improve every grace and the passive vertues of a Christian are not to be expected to grow so fast in prosperous as in suffering Christians but in this case we are to take accounts of our selves by the improvement of those graces which God makes to happen often in our lives such as are charity and temperance in young men liberality and religion in aged persons ingenuity and humility in schollers justice in merchants and artificers forgivenesse of injuries in great men and persons tempted by law-suits for since vertues grow like other morall habits by use diligence and assiduity there where God hath appointed our work and in our instances there we must consider concerning our growth in grace in other things
great experience and a strict observation and good company all which being either wholly or in part out of our power may be expected as free gifts but cannot be imposed as commandments To this I answer That Christian prudence is in very many instances a direct duty in some an instance and advice in order to degrees and advantages where it is a duty it is put into every mans power where it is an advice it is onely expected according to what a man hath and not according to what he hath not and even here although the events of prudence are out of our power yet the endeavours and the observation the diligence and caution the moral part of it and the plain conduct of our necessary duty which are portions of this grace are such things which God will demand in proportion to the talent which he hath intrusted into our Banks There are in indeed some Christians very unwary and unwise in the conduct of their religion and they cannot all help it at least not in all degrees but yet they may be taught to do prudent things though not to be prudent persons if they have not the prudence of advice and conduct yet they may have the prudence of obedience and of disciples and the event is this without prudence their vertue is unsafe and their persons defenselesse and their interest is unguarded for prudence is a hand-maid waiting at the production and birth of vertue It is a nurse to it in its infancy its patron an assaults its guide in temptations its security in all portions of chance and contingency And he that is imprudent if he have many accidents and varieties is in great danger of being none at all or if he be at the best he is but a weak and an unprofitable servant uselesse to his neighbour vain in himself and as to God the least in the kingdom his vertue is contingent and by chance not proportioned to the reward of wisdom and the election of a wise religion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 No purchase no wealth no advantage is great enough to be compared to a wise soul and a prudent spirit and he that wants it hath a lesse vertue and a defenselesse minde and will suffer a mighty hazard in the interest of eternity Its parts and proper acts consist in the following particulars 1. It is the duty of Christian prudence to choose the end of a Christian that which is perfective of a man satisfactory to reason the rest of a Christian and the beatification of his spirit and that is to choose and desire and propound to himself heaven and the fruition of God as the end of all his acts and arts his designes and purposes For in the nature of things that is most eligible and most to be pursued which is most perfective of our nature and is the acquiescence the satisfaction and proper rest of our most reasonable appetites Now the things of this world are difficult and uneasie full of thornes and empty of pleasures they fill a diseased faculty or an abused sense but are an infinite dissatisfaction to reason and the appetites of the soul they are short and transient and they never abide unlesse sorrow like a chain be bound about their leg and then they never stir till the grace of God and religion breaks it or else that the rust of time eats the chain in pieces they are dangerous and doubtfull few and difficult sordid and particular not onely not communicable to a multitude but not diffusive upon the whole man there being no one pleasure or object in this world that delights all the parts of man and after all this they are originally from earth and from the creatures onely that they oftentimes contract alliances with hell and the grave with shame and sorrow and all these put together make no great amability or proportion to a wise mans choice But on the other side the things of God are the noblest satisfactions to those desires which ought to be cherished and swelled up to infinite their deliciousnesse is vast and full of relish and their very appendant thorns are to be chosen for they are gilded they are safe and medicinall they heal the wound they make and bring forth fruit of a blessed and a holy life The things of God and of religion are easie and sweet they bear entertainments in their hand and reward at their back their good is certain and perpetual and they make us cheerfull to day and pleasant to morrow and spiritual songs end not in a sigh and a groan neither like unwholesome physick do they let loose a present humour and introduce an habitual indisposition But they bring us to the felicity of God the same yesterday and to day and for ever they do not give a private and particular delight but their benefit is publike like the incense of the altar it sends up a sweet smell to heaven and makes atonement for the religious man that kindled it and delights all the standers by and makes the very air wholesome there is no blessed soul goes to heaven but he makes a generall joy in all the mansions where the Saints do dwell and in all the chappels where the Angels sing and the joyes of religion are not univocal but productive of rare and accidental and praeternatural pleasures for the musick of holy hymnes delights the ear and refreshes the spirit and makes the very bones of the Saint to rejoyce and charity or the giving alms to the poor does not onely ease the poverty of the receiver but makes the giver rich and heals his sicknesse and delivers from death and temperance though it be in the matter of meat and drink and pleasures yet hath an effect upon the understanding and makes the reason sober and his will orderly and his affections regular and does things beside and beyond their natural and proper efficacy for all the parts of our duty are watered with the showers of blessing and bring forth fruit according to the influence of heaven and beyond the capacities of nature And now let the voluptuous person go and try whether putting his wanton hand to the bosome of his Mistris will get half such honour as Scaevola put upon his head when he put his hand into the fire Let him see whether a drunken meeting will cure a fever or make him wise A hearty and a persevering prayer will Let him tell me if spending great summes of money upon his lusts will make him sleep soundly or be rich Charity will Alms will increase his fortune and a good conscience shall charme all his cares and sorrows into a most delicious slumber well may a full goblet wet the drunkards tongue and then the heat rising from the stomack will dry the spunge and heat it into the scorchings and little images of hell and the follies of a wanton bed will turn the itch into a smart and empty the reins of all their
and though I cannot think that Nature was so sacramentall as to point out the holy and mysterious Trinity by the triangle of the heart yet it is certain that the heart of man is Gods speciall portion and every angle ought to point out towards him directly that is the soul of man ought to be presented to God and given to him as an oblation to the interest of his service 1. For to worship God with our souls consesses one of his glorious ateributes it declares him to be the searcher of hearts and that he reads the secret purposes and beholds the smallest arrests of fancy and bends in all the flexures and intriques of crafty people and searches out every plot and trifling conspiracy against him and against our selves and against our brethren 2. It advances the powers and concernments of his providence and confesses all the affairs of men all their cabinets and their nightly counsels their snares and two-edged mischiefs to be over-rul'd by him for what he sees he judges and what he judges he rules and what he rules must turn to his glory and of this glory he reflects rayes and influences upon his servants and it shall also turn to their good 3. This service distinguishes our duty towards God from all our conversation with man and separates the divine commandements from the imperfect decrees of Princes and Republiques for these are satisfied by the outward work and cannot take any other cognisance of the heart and the will of man but as himself is pleased to signifie He that wishes the fiscus empty and that all the revenues of the Crown were in his counting-house cannot be punished by the Lawes unlesse himself become his own traytor and accuser and therefore what man cannot discern he must not judge and must not require but God sees it and judges it and requires it and therefore reserves this as his own portion and the chiefest feudall right of his Crown 4. He that secures the heart secures all the rest because this is the principle of all the moral actions of the whole man the hand obeys this and the feet walk by its prescriptions we eat and drink by measures which the soul desires and limits and though the naturall actions of man are not subject to choice rule yet the animal actions are under discipline and although it cannot be helped but we shall desire yet our desires can receive measures and the lawes of circumstances and be reduced to order and nature be changed into grace and the actions animall such as are eating drinking laughing weeping c. shall become actions of Religion and those that are simply naturall such as being hungry and thirsty shall be adopted into the retinue of religion and become religious by being order'd or chastis'd or suffered or directed and therefore God requires the heart because he requires all and all cannot be secured without the principle be inclosed But he that seals up a fountain may drink up all the waters alone and may best appoint the channels where it shall run and what grounds it shall refresh 5. That I may summe up many reasons in one God by requiring the heart secures the perpetuity and perseverance of our duty and its sincerity and its integrity and its perfection for so also God takes account of little things it being all one in the heart of man whether maliciously it omits a duty in a small instance or in a great for although the expression hath variety and degrees in it in relation to those purposes of usefulnesse and charity whither God designs it yet the obedience and disobedience is all one and shall be equally accounted for and therefore the Jew Tryphon disputed against Justin that the precepts of the Gospell were impossible to be kept because it also requiring the heart of man did stop every egression of disorders for making the root holy and healthfull as the Balsame of Judaea or the drops of Manna in the evening of the sabbath it also causes that nothing spring thence but gummes sit for incense and oblations for the Altar of proposition and a cloud of perfume fit to make atonement for our sins and being united to the great sacrifice of the world to reconcile God and man together Upon these reasons you see it is highly fit that God should require it and that we should pay the sacrifice of our hearts and not at all think that God is satisfied with the work of the hands when the affections of the heart are absent He that prayes because he would be quiet and would fain be quit of it and communicates for fear of the lawes and comes to Church to avoid shame and gives almes to be eased of an importunate begger or relieves his old parents because they will not dye in their time and provides for his children lest he be compeld by Lawes and shame but yet complains of the charge of Gods blessings this man is a servant of the eyes of men and offers parchment or a white skin in sacrifice but the flesh and the inwards he leaves to be consumed by a stranger fire And therefore this is a deceit that robs God of the best and leaves that for religion which men pare off It is sacriledge and brings a double curse 2. He that serves God with the soule without the body when both can be conjoyned doth the work of the Lord deceitfully Paphnutius whose knees were cut for the testimony of Jesus was not obliged to worship with the humble flexures of the bending penitents and blinde Bartimeus could not read the holy lines of the Law and therefore that part of the work was not his duty and God shall not call Lazarus to account for not giving almes nor St. Peter and St. John for not giving silver and gold to the lame man nor Epaphroditus for not keeping his fasting dayes when he had his sicknesse But when God hath made the body an apt minister to the soul and hath given money for almes and power to protect the oppressed and knees to serve in prayer and hands to serve our needs then the soul alone is not to work but as Rachel gave her maid to Jacob and she bore children to her Lord upon her Mistresse knees and the children were reckoned to them both because the one had fruitfull desires and the other a fruitfull wombe so must the body serve the needs of the spirit that what the one desires the other may effect and the conceptions of the soul may be the productions of the body and the body must bow when the soul worships and the hand must help when the soul pities and both together do the work of a holy Religion the body alone can never serve God without the conjunction and preceding act of the soul and sometimes the soul without the body is imperfect and vain for in some actions there is a body and a spirit a materiall and a spirituall part and when the action
hath the same constitution that a man hath without the act of both it is as imperfect as a dead man the soul cannot produce the body of some actions any more then the body can put life into it and therefore an ineffective pity and a lazie counsell an empty blessing and gay words are but deceitfull charity Quod peto da Caï non peto consiliam He that gave his friend counsell to study the Law when he desired to borrow 20 l. was not so friendly in his counsell as he was uselesse in his charity spirituall acts can cure a spirituall malady but if my body needs relief because you cannot feed me with Diagrams or cloath me with Euclids elements you must minister a reall supply by a corporall charity to my corporall necessity This proposition is not only usefull in the doctrine of charity and the vertue of religion but in the professions of faith and requires that it be publick open and ingenuous In matters of necessary duty it is not sufficient to have it to our selves but we must also have it to God and all the world and as in the heart we beleeve so by the mouth we confesse unto salvation he is an ill man that is only a Christian in his heart and is not so in his professions and publications and as your heart must not be wanting in any good profession and pretences so neither must publick profession be wanting in every good and necessary perswasion The faith and the cause of God must be owned publiquely for if it be the cause of God it will never bring us to shame I do not say what ever we think we must tell it to all the world much lesse at all times and in all circumstances but we must never deny that which we beleeve to be the cause of God in such circumstances in which we can and ought to glorifie him But this extends also to other instances He that swears a false oath with his lips and unswears it with his heart hath deceived one more then he thinks for himself is the most abused person and when my action is contrary to men they will reprove me but when it is against my own perswasion I cannot but reprove my self and am witnesse and accuser and party and guilty and then God is the Judge and his anger will be a fierce executioner because we do the Lords work deceitfully 3. They are deceitfull in the Lords work that reserve one faculty for sin or one sin for themselves or one action to please their appetite and many for Religion Rabbt Kimchi taught his Scholars Cogitationem pravam Deus non habet vice facti nisi concepta fuerit in Dei sidem Religionem that God is never angry with an evill thought unlesse it be a thought of Apostasie from the Jewes religion and therefore provided that men be severe and close in their sect and party they might roll in lustfull thoughts and the torches they light up in the Temple might smoke with anger at one end and lust at the other so they did not flame out in egressions of violence and injustice in adulteries and fouler complications nay they would give leave to some degrees of evill actions for R. Moses and Selomoh taught that if the most part of a mans actions were holy and just though in one he sinned often yet the greater ingredient should prevail and the number of good works should outweigh the lesser account of evill things and this Pharisaicall righteousnesse is too frequent even amongst Christians For who almost is there that does not count fairly concerning himself if he reckons many vertues upon the stock of his Religion and but one vice upon the stock of his infirmity half a dozen to God and one for his company or his friend his education or his appetite and if he hath parted from his folly yet he will remember the fleshpots and please himself with a phantastick sin and call it home through the gates of his memory and place it at the door of fancy that there he may behold it and consider concerning what he hath parted withall out of the fears and terrors of religion and a necessary unavoidable conscience Do not many men go from sin to sin even in their repentance they go backward from sin to sin and change their crime as a man changes his uneasie load and shakes it off from one shoulder to support it with the other How many severe persons virgins and widows are so pleased with their chastity and their abstinence even from lawfull mixtures that by this means they fall into a worse pride insomuch that I remember St. Austin said Audco dicere superbis continentibus expedit cadere they that are chaste and proud it is sometimes a remedy for them to fall into sin and by the shame of lust to cure the devill of pride and by the sin of the body to cure the worser evils of the spirit and therefore he addes that he did beleeve God in a severe mercy did permit the barbarous nations breaking in upon the Roman Empire to violate many virgins professed in Cloisters and religious Families to be as a mortification of their pride lest the accidentall advantages of a continent life should bring them into the certain miseries of a spirituall death by taking away their humility which was more necessary then their virgin state It is not a cure that men may use but God permits it sometimes with greater safety through his wise conduct and over-ruling providence St. Peter was safer by his fall as it fell out in the event of things then by his former confidence Man must never cure a sin by a sin but he that brings good out of our evill he can when he please But I speak it to represent how deceitfully many times we do the work of the Lord. We reprove a sinning Brother but do it with a pompous spirit we separate from scandall and do it with glory and a gaudy heart we are charitable to the poor but will not forgive our unkinde enemies or we powre relief into their bags but we please our selves and drink drunk and hope to commute with God giving the fruit of our labours or effluxes of money for the sin of our souls And upon this account it is that two of the noblest graces of a Christian are to very many persons made a savour of death though they were intended for the beginning and the promotion of an eternal life and those are faith and charity some men think if they have faith it is enough to answer all the accusations of sin which our consciences or the Devils make against us If I be a wanton person yet my faith shall hide it and faith shall cover the follies of drunkennesse and I may all my life relye upon faith at last to quit my scores For he that is most carefull is not innocent but must be saved by faith and he that is least carefull may