against will be Hell-fire in their Consciences for ever and the clearer light the hotter fire And the higher they have been lifted up by the opportunities of Grace towards Heaven the lower they will fall under the weight of Guilt and the rebukes of Conscience 2. They will suffer more than others from the Devil and his Angels For that they are the Executioners of God's wrath upon the wicked in this world is out of question and so some think they will be in the world to come but only as under God's Commission which they ground upon that Text Agree with thine Adversary quickly lest he deliver thee to the Judge and the Judge to the Tormentours c. by whom they understand Evil Spirits Matth. 18.34 3. Christ himself will appear in greatest severity against such He is said to be revealed in flames of fire against such that know not God and obey not the Gospel 2 Thess 1.8 By both which expressions are meant impenitent Sinners under the Gospel His first Coming was in a flame of Love to save Men but when Men are impenitent and reject his Salvation he will come next in flames of Wrath to take Vengeance And in the first place against these To the Jew before the Gentile Rom. 2.9 and to the impenitent Christian before both 4. Witnesses will rise up against these more than any other sinners The Heathen will come in against them as our Saviour speaks The men of Niniveh shall rise up against this generation and condemn it The Queen of the South shall rise up and condemn it Matth. 12.41 The Heathen who have gone further by the Light of Nature than many who have lived under the Light of the Gospel will come in as Witnesses against them The Jew may come in as a witness also who under the darker Light of the Law hath out-stripped many that were under a Gospel ministration The good Angels may come in as Witnesses who having been present in the Church-assemblies have heard the Calls there given to Sinners to repent The bad Angels may come in and plead against them that they never refused the Calls of the Gospel to believe and repent for they never had any Ministers may come in as Witnesses who spent their pains and strength upon them to invite and call them to Repentance but they would not hear Many of their Neighbours and Fellow-Christians may witness against them who did believe and repent under the same means whenas these did not All which will contribute to make their Damnation the more intolerable The APPLICATION Vse 1. We may hence learn what to judge of the Heathen who have not heard of Christ I shall not dispute whether any of them may be saved or not yet this I can say that their Damnation will be more tolerable than of many others Those that sinned without the Law shall have more favourable Judgment than those that sinn'd under the Law and those that detain'd only natural Truth in unrighteousness as the Heathen Rom 1.18 shall fare better than those that so detained Truth supernatural And among the Heathen Diogenes may fare better than Dionysius Cato than Cataline Vespasian than Dioclesian The last Judgment will be exactly righteous Vse 2. Hence it appears that what is in it self a great Favour and Priviledge to a People may be the occasion of the greatest Evil. As the Gospel is in it self yet will be an occasion to many of a Damnation that will be most inexcusable and most intolerable Christ was first preached to the Jews which was their priviledge but they rejecting him it brought sorer Calamities upon their Nation than ever before And wrath came upon them to the utmost And that Christ that is a Corner-stone to his Church they first stumbled at and then it fell upon them and did grind them to powder And how it will fare with them in the day of Judgment he tells them John 12.48 The words that I have spoken the same shall judge you at the last day And what Judgment will be more severe than theirs who have refused and rejected words that came immediately from the mouth of the Son of God Words so full of Grace and Mercy Truth and Faithfulness Wisdom and Understanding so that never any Man spake as this Man As the men of Bethshemesh rejoyced and offered Sacrifices of Thanksgiving at the Coming of the Ark to them but it proved an occasion of the destruction of many Thousands of them 1 Sam. 6.19 Vse 3. We may hence take notice how ineffectual the best outward Means are of themselves to bring a people to repentance Could any City have greater means for it than Capernaum Here Christ wrought Miracles that did amaze them and preach'd Doctrine that did astonish them but not bring them to repentance The Gospel doth sometimes make some impressions upon the Minds of people that may still continue impenitent in their sin Some when they have heard a Sermon will applaud it but not repent Whether it be from a Conforming or Non-conforming Minister yet by neither are brought to repentance John Baptist preached Repentance and Christ came and preached Repent and yet the Jews for the greatest part repented not by the one or the other Some are for Gospel-preaching some for preaching the Law and yet hold fast their sins under both Such is the stupidity that is fall'n upon Man and such deceitfulness in his Heart and is so fast bound by the Chains of his Sin Obj. But God can bring Man to Repentance if he will Ans God hath a twofold Power Potestas absoluta ordinata A Power that he exerts immediately or in the use of means God can by his absolute Power preserve Man's life without eating or drinking but he maintains it ordinarily in the use of means which Man is obliged to use and if he reject them will be guilty of his own death God affords Sinners means to bring them to repentance and if they reject them God is not obliged to work by his immediate Power Hereupon God is said to be willing that all should be saved and come to repentance 2 Pet. 3.9 by his calling them and affording means to repentance Q. But why doth God make these means effectual to some not to others by giving special Grace A. When he that makes this Question can resolve me why Christ wrought his mighty Works in Corazin and Bethsaida and not in Tire and Sidon when he foresaw that Tire and Sidon would thereupon repent in dust and ashes and Corazin and Bethsaida would not repent I shall then answer him in his Enquiry Secret things belong to God but tâ—ings revealed to us and our Children Let Sinners use the means and wait there for God's special Grace And can Sodom justly complain that Christ came not to do his mighty Works in it and brought not the Light of the Gospel to it when she offer'd such Violence to the common dictates of the Light and Law of Nature Vse 4.
and before God who feedeth them with Christ the Bread of Life especially every Sabbath day Were this or some such course taken from week to week would not this hook into your practice all the great Duties of Religion And so you would give a good account of your hearing but 3. My third Direction is this Do not only satisfie your selves but carry on your enquiry that it may thrô grace satisfie Christ My Text is a question proposed by Christ and to him must we give our answer You may give a plausible account to Ministers but 'pray ' remember you must give an account to Christ You may by leading questions mislead Ministers as persons that go to Law do their Lawyers and they lose their Cause by it but when by studied Hypocrisie you mislead Ministers to gratifie you with a mistaken judgment you lose your Souls by it 'T is Christ that asks the question not to be informed by you for he knows what is in man better than they themselves Christ would have you to be plain-hearted and ingenuous that wherein you see cause to complain he may help you When the trembling Soul after the hearing of such Ministers as would undeceive them is like Jeremy for his peoples being deceived by false Prophets (u) Jer. 23. ◠My heart within me is broken because of the Prophets all my bones shake I am like a drunken man and like a man whom wine hath overcome because of the Lord and because of the words of his Holiness q. d. Fear and trembling takes hold of me I am ashamed I am at my Wits end the word of God calls for so much Holiness and I have so little Thou enquirest Lord what I hear for I dare not say that my intentions and ends are so serious as they should be I am afraid to own any thing that is good Christ in a way of compassion is ready to encourage such a Soul Canst thou but sincerely say thou comest to meet Christ and to learn of Christ Jesus Christ welcomes such to him and they may answer him with comfort Under this head consider 1. Christ asks thee here in this World that thou mayst now be able to give such an answer as thou mayst stand by at the last day when there will be neither Hopes nor Time to rectifie it if it be insufficient 'T is in this something like our Pleadings in Courts of Judicature we must put in our Plea and stand to it Thou knowest Lord there is through Grace something of sincerity but for any thing else do thou Lord answe◠for me 'Pray ' mark this when once the Soul can bring the question back again to Christ thus Thou askest me what I come for Lord I come for thee to answer for me I can't satisfie my own Conscience 't is ready to fly in my Face much less can I satisfie my Jealous Master unless tho◠compassionately answer for me Lord thou usest to answer for thine own May we then suppose Christ thus to enquire Who shall lay any thing to the charge of any one who sincerely comes to wait for me in mine Ordinances Can we suppose any one to be so daring as to perk up and say I charge all these to be a company of proud conceited Hypocrites they 'll needs be wiser than their Neighbours they spend their time in running up and down to hear Sermons Christ doth as it were answer Dost thou make this a Crime What he did 't was out of Love to me and Obedience to me He hath chosen that good (w) Luk. 10.42 part which shall not be taken away from him and for you who are so ready to accuse others and excuse your selves for slighting or ill managing all the means offered for your Salvation (x) Mat. 22.13 Bind him hand and foot that he may make no resistance take him away that he may neither make an escape nor have any hopes of Mercy and cast him into outer darkness where shall be weeping and gnashing of Teeth 2. If you do not give Christ an answer which he will accept of 't is in vain to expect relief from any other If the Father be offended Christ interposeth himself bears the wrath of God and prevents it from us Christ is the days-man between God and us If the Spirit be grieved by our quenching his motions and striving against his striving with us to hear and obey the Lord Jesus provided that rise not to THE Sin against the Holy Ghost which the greatest part of trembling Christians often fear they have committed though by the way let me tell them that their fear they have committed it yields them sufficient assurance they have not committed it for this sin is always attended with such hardness of Heart that they sin without remorse So that while the Spirit overcomes their resistances and prevails with them to comply with Christ through Christ their sins against the Spirit shall be pardoned But (y) Exod. 23.20 21. when the Angel of the Covenant Jesus Christ was promised to be sent before the Israelites in the Wilderness to keep them in the way and to bring them into the place prepared for them they are expresly charged to beware of him and obey his voice provoke him not for he will not pardon your Transgressions but severely punish them Not that sins against Christ shall never be pardoned though repented of but to keep us from adventuring upon sin as if it should easily be pardoned whereas the Apostle tells us (z) Heb. 10.26 If we sin wilfully there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin i. e. Those that reject and renounce Christs Sacrifice for sin there 's no other Sacrifice can atone God for them I grant that this Text chiefly concerns the unpardonable sin But I pray you consider those that do not make it the main business of their Lives to give Christ such an account as he will accept of what improvement they have made of his Word if they live and dye in that neglect they shall as certainly perish as they who commit the sin against the Holy Ghost There are but very few can commit that sin but an incredible number commit this without considering the danger of it Now Christians is your time to make up such an account as you must stand or fall by to Eternity Oh that I had but one Minutes such conception of Eternity as 't is possible to be had in this World I reckon 't would influence my whole Life Christs Sentence at last will be according to 〈◊〉 account we give him here and if his Sentence ben't as you would have it there will be no altering of it Your Repentance then will be no small part of your Torment Object I can't think that Christ will be so sharp and severe This affrights me more than any thing This is the most terrible Consideration that ever I heard I expected relief from Christ at last and that Christ should hear me at my
low vallies that are most fruitfull (a) 1 Cor. 27.28 God hath chosen the foolish things of the world God picks up those that seem to others to be the Refuse of the World to confound the wise As Christ chose the poor Fisher-men to convince the most knowing part of the World God hath chosen the weak things of the world such Persons as seem most uncapable of understanding the Mysteries of the Gospel to confound the things that are mighty to put to silence those that are far above them And base things of the world and things which are despised God hath chosen Yea and things that are not to bring to nought things that are God by those who are as contemptible as if they had no Being to be taken notice of manifests the emptiness of those that seem most excellent Pray consider when the whole World was drown'd and when Sodom and the neighbour Cities were burn'd there was not one Servant saved But now under the Gospel (b) Tit. 2.10 they are in a special manner charged and honoured by the charge To adorn the Doctrine of God in all things and they stand upon even ground as to Spiritual Priviledges with any rank of men in the World There is (c) Col. 3.11 neither Greek nor Jew circumcision nor uncircumcision Barbarian Scythian bond nor free but Christ is all and in all It 's neither the Grecians being the most learned part of the World nor the Jews being the only National Church in the World 't is neither the observing the Ceremonial Law t is not the Barbarian that wants Accomplishments nor the Scythians who are of all Barbarians most barbarous t is not bond i. e. those who are in the worst of humane slavery nor free i. e. those who were never in bondage to any but Christ is all and in all i. e. He infinitely supplies all outward defects he 's infinitely better to them than all outward Priviledges so that you have comparatively nothing else to do but to clear up your Union with Jesus Christ 2. Practise what you know tho it be never so little improve what helps you have thô they be never so few 〈◊〉 your Graces will grow more than you are aware of (d) Mar. 4.26.27 So is the Kingdom of God as if a man should cast seed into the ground and should sleep and rise night and day and the seed should spring and grow up he knoweth not how Those that receive the good Seed of the Word into good honest hearts or the Word hath made 'em so it hath an insensible efficacy which produceth a gradual increase of Grace even beyond observation But you complain that you see no such thing in some respect I may say The less you take notice of your own Graces the better provided you do not bely the Spirit of God in overlooking and denying what he hath wrought Things necessary to Salvation are but few and plain easie to be thrô Grace sufficiently understood and practised thô there is not any thing so inconsiderable but may exercise the greatest Parts and Learning attainable in this life yet there is not any thing necessary to be known but Jesus Christ who is our Prophet to teach us will both give Instruction and Capacity to receive it to all his willing Disciples and Christ will require an Account for no more Talents than he gives 3. Endeavour to make a true Observation how those things which are in their own nature Hinderances to the Soul are graciously and powerfully governed by God for our Souls profiting by them that as the Apostle I would ye should understand (e) Phil. 1.12 brethren that the things which happened to me have fallen out rather to the furtherance of the Gospel When Paul was first taken off from preaching and cast into Prison who would not at first hearing be ready to cry Oh! many a poor Soul will rue this day this is the blackest Cloud that ever darkened our Gospel day The Apostle doth as it were tell 'em They are greatly mistaken at present the same of his Sufferings rung through Court City and Countrey and persons were so far from forsaking the Truth through discouragement that they boldly own the Gospel And now was he more at leisure to write those Epistles which would benefit the Church in future Ages But to bring this down to ordinary Christians You know that groundless fears and trembling mis-givings of heart are the ordinary diseases of a scrupulous Conscience these now dispirit us and hinder us from that chearful behaviour that might render Religion more amiable and so hinder the spreading of it And besides this Satan that subtile Angler for Souls strikes in with our Spiritual Diseases and plyes the Soul with next to overwhelming temptations and he never fails of success through want of skill or through want of industry But blessed be God for over-ruling all this God by but upholding the Soul under not delivering the Soul from its fears keeps it humble and makes it more usefull throughout the whole course of its Regeneration and as for the advantage that Satan takes God is pleased to give the poor trembling Soul those experiences that it is our sin not to take notice of them e. g. That Christian that is in his own eyes the poorest weakest filliest Sheep in Christs Fold shall out-wit Satan in all his Stratagems and over-power him in all his Assaults though he knows not how he does it Thus the poor Soul when he is hard beset retreats to Christ and though he dare not call his carriage an acting Faith upon Christ Christ will own it as such and reward it as such For how is it that such a poor Soul hath held out so many years under its own fears and Satans Temptations but that Christ upheld both it and its Faith Here 's Faith not discern'd yet victorious 4. Endeavour thankfully and impartially to take notice of the Advantages of your Condition Do not so much look at what you apprehend more desireable in anothers Condition as to know and consider the circumstances of your own Condition Anothers condition is better for them God sees your condition to be better for you 't is the station wherein God sets you (f) 1 Cor. 7.24 Brethren let every man wherein he is called therein abide with God your station in the World is not so high as others and your distractions in the World are not so great as others God hath not set you in his Church so high as others God doth not require so much of you as he doth of others But alas you have not the Graces that others have neither have you the temptations nor desertions that others have Those who have the largest measure and the highest degrees of Grace have always exercises suitable to their Receipts they have sometimes the sorest Tryals sometimes the greatest Corruptions and if not that yet you 'll find 't is such as Job and Asaph and Heman
Contempt is abominable Man can better bear to have his Power or Authority or Wisdom contemned than his Goodness Ingratitude is justly reputed among the worst of Vices and the Contempt of Goodness is the highest act of ingratitude And the higher the Goodness is that is Contemned the higher still is the Ingratitude and the more provoking 3. An higher Contempt of God's Threatnings God's Threatnings under the Law were for the most part of Temporal Evils but now under the Gospel the Threats rise higher and are more dreadful It is the damnation of Hell everlasting Fire utter darkness where there is weeping wailing and gnashing of teeth Everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and the glory of his power c. And great Men cannot well bear to have their Anger slighted and their Threats despised or derided But though the Lion roar and God's Threats are denounced and his Wrath revealed from Heaven against all unrighteousness of Men more than ever before yet the impenitent Sinner trembles not but goes on in his sin and saith he shall have Peace and so casts Contempt upon the severest Threatnings of God 4. This Impenitency is a disappointing God in his End It is a frustrating of his great design which is to recover lost Man to himself by Jesus Christ And Man is not recovered and brought back to God but by true repentance And it is his great End in sending his Gospel to a People to bring them to Repentance And this End of God is now made void when sinners repent not Men are sometimes grieved and sometimes angried when they are disappointed in their End so is God said to be He complains often of this in the Scriptures when he is disappointed in the End of his Corrections he complains Jer. 2.30 In vain have I smitten your Children they received no Correction And in the End of his shewing favour Isai 1.2 I have nourished and brought up Children and they have rebelled against me And complains of his Vineyard disappointing the End of his care and cost about it When I looked for Grapes it brought forth wild Grapes Isai 5.4 Our Saviour is said to rejoyce when Sinners were brought to repentance he now enjoy'd the End of his Coming Luke 10.21 But then at another time he grieved because of the hardness of mens hearts Mark 3.5 And there is still joy in Heaven when sinners repent And Christ's faithful Ministers rejoyce also when sinners repent for they now attain their End which they com◠upon and will give up their account with joy concerning such as they will do with grief concerning others Whereupon the Apostle as a Co-worker with God Heb. 13.17 beseecheth the Corinthians that they receive not the grace of God in vain 2 Cor. 6.1 That neither God nor himself may be disappointed in the end of their work being Co-workers And Grace is bestow'd in vain when it brings not Sinners to repentance and when men accept not of the reconciliation mention'd in the foregoing Chapter which Grace hath provided for them It was a sad complaint of the Prophet when he saith I have laboured in vain Isai 49.4 Much more for an Apostle and a Minister of the New Testament thus to complain And much more for Christ to complain thus as sometimes he did And most of all for God himself to complain as he doth in the case of Sinners impenitency So that Impenitency under the Gospel must needs be very sinful 5. This Impenitency hath much folly in it as well as sin For men to run themselves into the destruction which they might avoid and refuse the offers of God's mercy and grace in the Gospel is not this folly He is call'd a fool that hath a price in his hand and hath not an heart to use it Prov. 17.16 And the Virgins in the Parable that lost their Season of entring in with the Bridegroom are styled foolish Virgins Matth. 25. And are not Sinners that continue in their sin and impenitency under the Gospel thus foolish For they have set before them the fairest price and the richest seasons The Prodigal in the Parable when he came home to his Father is said to come to himself Luke 1◠So when a Sinner repents and comes home to God he now comes to himself as if his former life was folly and madness 6. Impenitency under the Gospel shews greater Wilfulness in sin As it argues great folly in the Mind so perverseness in the Will And the more there is of the Will in sin the more sinful it is As the Schoolmen say Bonitas malitia moralis sunt potissimùm in voluntate Paul could say it was not he that sinn'd when he did sin because his Will was against it Rom. 7.20 The Evil that I would not that I do And this God chiefly looks at in Actions both good and evil There seems to be more wilfulness in Impenitency under the Gospel than ever before The more Light and Knowledge men sin against the more Will there is in sin And the fairer offers are made to men of Heaven and Salvation the more wilful is the refusal And this is the case of Sinners under the Gospel They do not repent and they will not repent they do not hear and they will not hear they do not leave their sin and they will not leave it 7. Lastly Impenitency under the Gospel is attended with the greatest resistance of the Spirit Greater than in former time There is more of the Spirit goes along with the Gospel-ministration than with any before it And there cannot be a disobedience to the Gospel without resisting that Spirit that goes along with it Upon some the Spirit prevails and brings them to repentance and in others he is resisted And some resist to that degree that they are said to offer despight to the Spirit of Grace Heb. 10.29 And the sin that is accounted unpardonable is committed against the Holy Ghost and it 's Thought cannot be committed but under the Gospel whereby Sinners are brought by a sinful to a judicial Impenitency Heb. 6.6 So that by this time you may see the great sinfulness of Impenitency under the Gospel beyond what was or could be in Sodom whereby mens damnation will be more intolerable Now I come to the last Particular to shew wherein the greater intolerableness will consist 1. Such will suffer greater Torments from their own Consciences The worm of Conscience will gnaw them with greater pain The reflections of it upon the sinner will be with greater force and fury By how much Men have sinn'd against greater Light and Mercy by so much the remembrance of this will be the more afflictive It was some aggravation of Dives his Torments in Hell the remembrance of former good things enjoy'd Much more will the remembrance of a day of Salvation lost and of the refusal or neglect of Gospel-grace and mercy be afflictive to sinners in a state of Damnation The Light they have sinn'd
about the Person Natures and Offices of our Redeemer against all Hereticks both Old and New In short we agree in the same Creeds in all the Articles of the Christian Doctrine yea we agree in the Substance of the same Worsâ—â—â— and in the same Sacraments against both Papists Socinians and Quakers We have one Lord one Faith one Baptism And then in Civils we agree in our hearty Approbation of our Monarchy and in a dutifull Allegianâ—â— to our King and in refusing the Supremacy of any other at home or abroad And how many Particulars of the greatest weight are contain'd under these Heads wherein all we Protestants are agreed And if Unity in the Truth be any ground for Love and Charity it is incomprehensible that they who agree in all these things should be more inveterate against one another than against such as differ not toto Caelo but toto tartaro from them both But it is observed that the nearer some men are to a conjunction some difference remaining the greater is their hatred thus a Jew hates a Christian more than he doth a Pagan and a Papist hates a Protestant worse than he doth a Jew and a nominal Protestant hates a Puritan more than he doth a Papist as Dr. Featley notes The Contention of Brethren are like the Bars of a Castle Prov. 18.19 A most unreasonable though a very common thing 2. Consider the Imperfections of our humane Nature Our Understandings were sore wounded by the Fall of Adam and they are but imperfectly and unequally recovered by all the means which the Gospel affords Why should we condemn every one that is not endowed with our Abilities or advanced to our Capacity Do we fall out with one that is purblind because he cannot see so far nor so quick as we we should rather pity him and praise God who hath been kinder to us They that are most intelligent know but in part And if any man think that he knoweth any thing he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know 1 Cor. 8.2 That was therefore a good Answer which Melancthon made to those who objected to the Protestants their Divisions saith he The judicious agree in fundamentals but as in a great Army the skill or strength of all the Captains and of all the Soldiers is not equal but they all agree in their wills and honest designs to serve their Prince so all good men have not the like knowledge but all agree in their sincere love to goodness 3. Consider that you who are so violent do differ from others just as far as they differ from you Do you think that one kind of Government in the Church is best they do as verily think so of another do you hold such and such Ceremonies in Religion to be unlawful they are as confident of the lawfulness of them Do you conclude that all Private mens Opinions in such matters ought to be swallowed up and to acquiesce in the publick Determination they verily believe that the Church should leave them as the Apostles did in their first Indifference Now when such as do not otherwise forfeit their Veracity come and profess that they cannot for their Hearts think otherwise than they do you cannot yield to them they cannot comply with you what remedy then is so proper so Christian as Charity to each other relying upon that Promise Philip. 3.15 If in any thing ye be othâ—â—wise minded God shall reveal even this unto you 4. Consider that there have been greater Differences than Ours among those that were the true Members of Christ's Church Witness Act. 15.1 Certain men which came down from Judea taught the brethren Except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses ye cannot be saved A material Point and urged you see with great confidence and yet God forbid we should blot these out of the roll of true Christians How resolute were some Great Divines in the Church pro and con in the Case of Rebaptizing those that were lapsed in the Primitive times And what Heart can be so hard as to deny the Lutherans and Calvinists a place in the Church of Christ who yet differ in greater matters than ours Wherefore seeing their Differences were greater than ours we should not aggravate them against one another nor by our violence render them intolerable 5. Consider your own personal moral Failings Hath not each of us some right Eye are we perfectly good are not we all Men of like Passions What if our Judge shall say And why beholdest thou the more that is in thy brothers eye but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye thou Hypocrite c. Matth. 7.3 Alas if we were truly conscious of our own Neglects of many Duties whereof we have been convinced toward our God our Neighbour and our selves and of the many Transgressions and Faults which we frequently commit we should much abate our Rigour towards others and turn our Indignation against our selves How sad a business would it be if any of those who have censur'd and damn'd their Opposites for some dubious matters should prove Slaves to their own Lusts and be found at last to be wretched Hypocrites in the main things of Religion Vse 2. If Uncharitable Contentions do prepare for utter Destruction Then Woe be to the Instruments and Bellows of our Contentions If the Evil of them be so great if the Danger from them be so dreadful then most wicked and wretched are the promoters of them Wo to the World because of offences for it must needs be that offences come but Woe to that Man by whom the offence cometh Matth. 18.7 If those that set an House or Town on Fire be justly reckon'd and treated as Enemies to humane Society certainly they who inflame the Souls of Christians against one another to the ruine of a Church and Nation deserve the worst Character and the worst Punishment But as Ahasuerus once said to Esther c. 7. v. 5. Who is he and where is he that dare presume in his heart to do so And as she answer'd The Adversary and Enemy is this wicked Haman so I may answer 1. Our common Adversary and Enemy in this matter is Satan Our Contentions do plainly smell of fire and brimstone Legions of Devils though we cannot see them are employed herein He is the Old Accuser of the Brethren both to God and to one another that wicked Spirit is the truest Salamander that lives in the fire of Contention Divisions are the Devil's Musick but that which makes the Devil laugh should make us weep How often have there been Essayes and Endeavours to reconcile our unhappy Differences and this cunning and malicious Enemy hath defeated them all I have somewhere read of a Treaty between a former King of England and another of France which was held and concluded in an old Chappel while their several Armies stood ready expecting the issue The Kings agreed and coming out of the Chappel a Snake or Viper crept out of the
to think that I came not from thee who art the Mirrour of Wisdom and Love He imployed all his Sacred Breath to pluck men out of the power of the Devil the World and the Flesh to promote Faith Repentance and Holiness and to guide our feet into the way of peace And accordingly the Apostles tell us That the Kingdom of God is not meat and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost Let not us therefore dishonour our Redeemer let us not calculate a new Gospel let us not lay too great a stress on small matters let us not provoke men to think that our great Master came to tithe mint anyse and cummin who came about far other work and taught us far greater matters It is recorded of Alexander Severus an Heathen Emperour that seeing two Christians contending he forbad them to assume the name of Christians upon them for that by their quarrelling they disgraced their Master How many now by this Rule would be interdicted that worthy Name 4. These Uncharitable Contentions do grieve the Holy Spirit of God He descended like a Dove and cannot brook the gall of bitterness When therefore the Apostle had dehorted the Ephesians c. 4.30 from grieving the Holy Spirit of God he adds in the next verse Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamour and evil-speaking be put away from you with all malice and be ye kind one to another tender-hearted c. This sweet Dove will never lodge in a Vultures nest You heard the fruits of the Spirit are love joy peace c. And whatsoever pretences any may make to the Spirit if they do not verifie them by a meek loving and charitable behaviour to others they abuse the Holy Spirit and deceive others For as nothing is more grateful to this good Spirit than Love and Peace so nothing more distastfull than Wrath and Contention 5. These Contentions do stir up much Corruption both in the Aggressour and the Defendant There is a great deal of folly in the wisest and best of men and this either lurks in the habit or is produc'd into Act more or less as there is greater or lesser temptation Sin dwells in our Natures as the mud in the bottom of a glass of water when it is shaken it appears and stains the whole glass There is a world of pride anger envy and revenge in mens hearts and these Contentions draw them forth strengthen them and make them rampant Prov. 26.21 As Coals to burning Coals and wood to fire so is a contentious man to kindle strife So that the Wise Man concludes That he loveth transgression that loveth strife Prov. 19.19 And hereupon some have made observations upon the deaths of Bishop Ridley and Bishop Hooper that they suffered with more torture than others and that because of their Contentions together before 6. They do greatly hinder the Conversion of the Vngodly and the progress in Holiness of the Godly Whereas the great work of God's Ministers should be to instruct the ignorant to convince and reform the profane to build up God's Children in their Faith and Holiness this should be their study in private this their business in publick Now the ignorant and ungodly are left quiet in their sins the Sober and Pious are little improv'd in their Christian course and mens Talents of Time Parts and Pains are laid out in dry and unprofitable Controversies And then private persons who should imploy their converse together to their mutual edification they are perpetually irritating one another by these fruitless Contentions .. I have heard of a Monster born in Scotland in the Reign of James the Fourth with two Heads and one Body which two heads would be still arguing and knocking each other in eager disputes too fit an Emblem of this disputing Age But we that have but one Blessed Head yet the members are alwayes contending among themselves Instead of exhorting we are censuring instead of reproving we are reproaching instead of provoking to Love and good works we provoke one another to wrath and discontent And then for the devout use of Prayer doubtless these wrathfull Contentions must needs greatly disturb it For if Husband and Wife should maintain a constant amity that their Prayers be not hindred 1 Pet. 3.7 a continual contesting with our Brethren must greatly clog and damp them Whereupon Cyprian citing those words of our Saviour When two agree on Earth to ask c. hath this Observation Plus impetrari potest paucorum concordi prece quam discordi oratione multorum A few in concord shall obtain more than many in discord 7. These Contentions in Religion tempt men to be Atheists When they read and hear such unmercifull rage in Christians one against another and that they who profess agreement in nineteen things are ready to anathemize one another about the twentieth what a stumbling-block must it needs be unto weak and unresolved persons and tempt them to throw aside all Religion So Optatus observed of old in the like Case Vos dicitis Licet nos dicimus Non licet Inter licet vestrum non licet nostrum nâ—t ant animae populorum I say this tempts men but it is only a temptation For who that hath a present Journey to go for his Life will sullenly forbear to set forward because all his Friends in the Town are not agreed what a Clock it is at his setting out Every Man is bound upon peril of everlasting damnation to win Christ and be found in him to work out his own Salvation and to set about it without delay Now what a weak thing is it for any man to refuse or neglect this necessary work because some men are not agreed about a Gesture or a Ceremony Such fools shall dye in their sin but their blood shall be required at their hands who have been a scandal to them 8. These biting and devouring Contentions are Vncivil Inhumane and barbarous It hath been always reckoned for good Breeding not to be confident and peremptory in asserting any thing whereof any in the Company modestly doubts And on the other side if any cannot comply with the Sentiments of another to enter his dissent with all possible respect and without any reflexion or provocation We account it barbarous rudeness in discoursing yea or in discussing any point to signifie in civil company the least provoking gesture much more to fall into a rage or to express revenge And yet if you hear the Harangues and read the printed discourses of some Gentlemen you would conclude that they have but a small pittance either of good humour or of ingenious Education Man is a rational Creature and is not born with Teeth nor form'd with Sting or with Horns neither is he teachable or ductile by such boisterous methods When Love indites the reproof when that accompanies the argument it penetrates and prevails Dilige dic quod vis But there not only were Psal 52.2 but yet there are
articulately call to us to lay our quarrels to sleep and cordially to joyn our Prayers and Endeavours in our places to rescue our common Faith from so great a danger but yet we have been since that time biting and devouring one another as sharply as ever before And now once more we have a fair Call and each Party hath professed a serious Inclination to unite together against our common Adversaries God forbid that our Prejudices Humours or Interests should still hinder so great a Blessing I come now in the Third and Last place to direct the best Method to cure this great Evil and to prevent this great Danger And 1. Lament your own and others sin in this particular All sound Amendment begins in godly sorrow We are glowing hot in wrath and strife Tears are necessary to quench this Flame mourn for others fierceness and for your own For the Divisions of Reuben let there be great searchings of heart When we are once truly humbled and penitent before God our Brethren will have better quarter from us Consider how often you have added fewel to this fire how you have exasperated this burning Fever and how little you have done to asswage and mitigate it How easily you have been prejudiced how easily provok'd how hardly pacified If you should have met with such treatment from your Heavenly Father as your Brethren have had from you you had been devour'd and consum'd long ago .. Do not think that needless Divisions in Christs Church is so light a fault that reproaches and revilings are venial sins when Our Saviour hath assured us Matth. 18.6 That it were better for him that shall offend one of his little ones that believe in him to have a Milstone hanged about his Neck and be drowned in the depth of the Sea And how wittily soever it be exprest yet he that shall say to his Brother Thou fool shall be in danger of Hell-fire Mat. 5.22 Whatever uncharitable Reflexion therefore you have been guilty of repent of it speedily and also mourn for the miscarriages of others When we are a little melted for our own and others faults then we are fit for the healing mercy of God And the Lord turned the Captivity of Job when he prayed for his Friends Job 42.10 2. Learn Christian Wisdom Thereby you will be able to weigh and consider things and to look at them on every side What mischief hath Zeal without Wisdom done in the Church of God! A wise man will observe the weight and consequence of the things he undertakes to oppose and defend and then he will consider what are the most proper means to convince and to reduce his mistaken Adversary He that hath knowledge and a man of understanding is of an excellent that is a sedate calm and cool Spirit Prov. 17.27 A wise Man distinguisheth between tolerable mistakes and intolerable and proportions his zeal and the expressions thereof accordingly Whereas a fools lips enter into contention Prov. 18.6 He is hurried by his folly into all the terms moods and figures of Provocation And therefore the Apostle James calls for such wisdom upon this account Jam. 3.13 Who is a wise man and indued with knowledge among you Let him come with his meekness of wisdom As the deepest Rivers run most calmly so the wisest minds are ever most peaceable A wise Man will consider that it will be in the Church as it is in an House some Children do work and others make work some are for the School some for the Field some for the Cradle and yet all Children and thus God hath tempered the Body that there may be a various love among the Members in the strong to the weak a love of Care in the weak to the strong a love of Reverence Again a wise Man can govern his passions and not cast Fire-brands Arrows and Death and then say Am I not in sport Prov. 26.19 No he will make Controversies as few and then as short as he can and manage Sacred matters with a solid gravity And therefore get wisdom and with all your getting get understanding And to that end add to earnest Prayer reading in God's Book especially and as far as your Calling and Capacity will permit in the Histories of the Church and withall Observe and Digest those things which you have seen or heard or read so will you be able perhaps to make peace among others how ever to keep the peace your selves 3. Endeavour for a Catholick Spirit that is a due and tender respect to all the parts and members of the Christian Church For of that whole Mystical Body every true Christian is a Member For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one Body whether we be Jews or Gentiles whether we be bond or free and have been all made to drink into one Spirit Now ye are the Body of Christ and Members in particular 1 Corinth 12.13.27 Hereby we shall not suddenly un-Church others at home or abroad for some imperfections or corruptions for he is but meanly read in the Records of the Church that hath not observed manifold defects deformities and corruptions in all the Christian Societies which have been in the World and on the other side that some holy Persons in all Ages have in some thing or other dissented from the Common Opinions and that many weak and peevish people have and ever will exercise the Patience and Charity of the rest On the contrary a poor narrow spirit in many hath not been the least cause of our Contentions whereby they have confined the Grace Presence and Goodness of God to some few Persons or Societies that have been more strict and devout than others No godly People but they none godly Ministers but theirs And the Papists are notoriously culpable in this point while they would impropriate all Christianity to themselves not valuing any person how Learned and Holy soever who will not be of their Communion But a true Catholick though he be fully perswaded in his own Mind of his Principles and Practices yet he can wish well unto and think well of and cordially embrace all that are sound in the Fundamentals of Religion though in divers things they do err and go astray 4. Be cloathed with Humility For whatsoever Pleas and Pretences are hung out it is Pride within which hath an hand in the beginning and maintaining of our quarrels Prov. 22.10 Cast out the Scorner and Contention shall go out Yea strife and reproach shall cease Hereby we are wise in our own eyes we look not on others things but only on our own This makes the Superiour look upon the Inferiour that differs from him with great contempt and this prompts him that is on the lower ground to all the envious Reflections and constructions imaginable of him that is got above him Sayes the one Shall I give way or yield a jot to Men so ordinary for their Parts and so obnoxious for their Circumstances I that neither need them
rejoycing and yet neither ought our mourning to exclude a humble rejoycing in God nor our rejoycing shut out a holy mourning The Men of Issachar are recorded as famous on this account 1 Chron. 12.32 That they had understanding of the time to know what Israel ought to do And herein we are oftentimes at a great loss like those children Matth. 11.17 that complained of their fellows they had piped unto them and yet not been answer'd with dancing that they had mourned to them but they had not lamented Holy Wisdom would teach us to accommodate the present frame of our hearts to Gods present dispensations Providence does not teach us new duties but how to single out those that God has made our duties Secondly We need wisdom that we be not deluded with shadows instead of substances that we take not appearances for realities for want of which O how often are we cheated out of our interests our real concerns our integrity of heart and peace of Conscience We account him a weak and foolish Man who is imposed upon by Copper for Gold that would warm his hands by painted fire or hope to satisfie his craving appetite with painted food yet such are we who spend our mony for that which is not bread and our labor for that which profits us not Isa 55.2 who set our affections on those things that are not Prov. 23.5 Thirdly Another point of wisdom which we need to be instructed in is the worth of Time and what a weight of eternity depends on these short and flitting moments but we weak and silly ones count a day for no more than it stands for in the Calender an hour no more than so much time measured by the hourglass when one hour to repent in a moment to make our Calling and Election sure in may come to be more worth than all the World can be to us Fourthly Wisdom would teach us the due order and method of all things what first what last ought to be our study and our concern wisdom would teach us to seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness Matth. 6.33 And then if there be time to spare to bestow some small portion of it for those other things which God in his bounty will not deny and in his wisdom knows in what measure to bestow Fifthly Wisdom would teach us the true worth and value of all things to labour pray and strive for them proportionable to their true intrinsick dignities to think that Heaven cannot be too dear what-ever we pay for it nor Hell cheap how easily soever we come by it wisdom would instruct us that we cannot lay out too much of our time strength contrivance upon Eternals nor too little upon these perishing Temporals that Earth deserves very little of our Hand less of our Head and nothing at all of our Heart little of our pains less of our plotting and least of all of our love and affections III. Le ts pray and strive strive in the due and diligent use of § 3 means and pray for a blessing upon them that we may be filled with a spiritual understanding A carnal heart will carnalize the most spiritual Mercies and a carnal mind will debase the most spiritual Truths the Manna was design'd to feed the Souls as well as the Bodies of the Jews but they ate the spiritual meat and drank the spiritual drink 1 Cor. 10.23 with very carnal Heads and Hearts so that they needed the Spirit of God to instruct them in the right use of it Nehem. 9.10 Thou gavest thy good Spirit to instruct them and with-heldest not the Manna from their mouth They might then have eaten their own condemnation as well as we under the Gospel by that Symbol John 3.3 Christ had deliver'd a great and necessary Truth except a Man be born again he cannot see the Kingdom of Heaven but Nicodemus tho' a great Rabbi turns it into a gross and carnal interpretation How can a Man be born when he is old Can he enter the second time into his Mothers womb and be born again And at the same pass were his rude and carnal hearers John 6.51 I am the living bread says Christ that came down from Heaven if any Man eat of this bread he shall live for ever and the bread that I will give is my flesh that I will give for the life of the world but his Capernatical hearers conceive of nothing but a literal and oral Manducation of his natural flesh vers 52. The Jews therefore strove among themselves saying How can this Man give us his flesh to eat And yet Christ had said enough to obviate that gross mistake vers 35. I am the bread of life he that cometh to me shall never hunger and he that believeth on me shall never thirst One Man hears the great Duties of the Gospel pressed upon his Conscience and either sitting down despondeth at the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or else undertakes them in his own strength and the power of his free will not considering that there is Covenant grace to answer Covenant duties and Covenant pardon for those imperfections that attend them Another perhaps hears the curse thundred out against Every one that continues not in all things written in the Law to do them Gal. 3.10 he hears that the primitive end of the Law was to justifie a righteous person that had perfectly observed it and he falls upon the observation of that Law as the condition of the Covenant of works hoping to drudge out a righteousness thereby that shall present him blameless before God not knowing that Christ is the end of the Law for righteousness to every one that believeth Rom. 10.4 Let us therefore pray for a spiritual understanding that we may know every Truth as it is in Jesus Ephes 4.21 that every line every letter of the Old and New Testament has its center in a Redeemer § 4 IV. Let 's pray again and strive that we may walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing knowing that all our services all our sacrifices are nothing unless our God smell a sweet savour in them nor can we fill the sails of our Souls with a more noble and generous ambition than to be accepted of God This was the height of the Apostles ambition 2 Cor. 5.9 We labour that whether present or absent we may be accepted of him which was the glorious frame of our blessed Saviours heart John 8.29 That he always did the things that pleased his Father It s a common delusion of Professors that if they can get the work of their hands not to regard whether ever it comes upon Gods heart or no But what are our Prayers if God receives them not Our Praises if God accepts them not Our Obedience if God regards it not Now that we may reach this great end we must walk worthy of the Lord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There ought to be a suitableness between the frame of our hearts and
6.12 Ye are not straitned in me but ye are straitned in your own Bowels Our hearts are narrow towards Spiritual and Heavenly things because they are so enlarg'd towards earthly and visible things when the heart is enlarged as Hell and death that cannot be satisfied Hab. 2.5 For these perishing things no wonder if there be little room for the Graces of the Spirit This is therefore our great concern to pray that God would enlarge our desires that he may satisfie and fill them 4. We ought to pray and strive That all the Powers and Faculties of the whole man may be filled according to their measures There is much room in our Souls that is not furnish'd much waste ground there that is not cultivated and improved to its utmost We might have more light in the Understanding more tractableness in the Will more heat in our Love and a sharper edge set upon our Zeal And we have warrant to pray for this measure of the fulness of God 1 Thess 5.23 Now the God of peace sanctifie you wholly and I pray God your whole Spirit Soul and Body may be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ 5. Every gracious Soul ought to pray and strive for such a measure of Grace that he may be qualified for any Duty and Service that God shall call him to and engage him in The Hebrew word which we render Consecration or separation to an Office is Filling the hand Exod. 29.9 Consecrate ye Aaron and his Sons in the Hebrew Fill the hand of Aaron and his Sons Where God employs the hand he will fill the hand we have ground to believe that he will send us about no Errand but he will bear our Charges where-ever he gives a Commission he will bestow a competent qualification when we go about his Work we may expect his presence and assistance in the Work And Moses seems to stand upon these terms with God Exod. 33.15 If thy presence go not with me carry us not up hence As therefore there is great variety of Duties in our Christian Calling we may in Faith expect and from that believing expectation pray that we may be furnish'd with a suitable variety of Grace for the discharge of them 6. Every true Christian ought to pray strive for such a measure of Grace as may enable him to bear patiently chearfully and creditably those afflictions and sufferings which either God's good pleasure shall lay upon us or for his Names sake we may draw upon our selves We ought to pray that either he will lay no more upon us than our present strength can bear or if he encreases our trials he will encrease our Faith There 's no danger of excess in our Prayers when we confine them to the limits of his gracious promises Now here we have encouragement from his Word 1 Cor. 10.13 God is faithful who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able but will with the temptation make a way to escape that ye may be able to bear it 7. Every true Christian ought to pray and strive for such a measure of Grace as may bring the Soul to a settlement and stability that he be not soon shaken by the cross and adverse evils that he shall meet with in this Life And the Apostle Peter has gone before us in this Prayer 1 Pet. 5.10 The God of all grace who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus after that ye have suffered a while make you perfect stablish strengthen settle you And herein especially let us keep an eye upon these particulars § 1. Pray that God would so stablish you in the truth that ye may not be blown away with every wind of Doctrin A sorry trivial Error many times oversets and puzzles a weak Understanding Now 't is our great Interest to pray and strive that we may reach such a clear distinct coherent Light into the Doctrin of the Gospel that every small piece of Sophistry may not perplex and stagger our Belief of it So the Apostle Paul Eph. 4.14 would have Believers be no more Children tossed to and fro with every wind of Doctrine by the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive § 2. Pray also that God would so stablish you in the truth of the promises that your Faith may not be shaken with every wind of Providence We are apt to have our hearts tossed by contrary Dispensations So upon a rumour Isa 7.2 The heart of Asa was moved and the heart of his people as the trees of the wood are moved with the wind It argues great weakness of Faith that we cannot maintain an equality of mind under various Providences the only remedy of which evil is to pray that God would encrease and strengthen our Faith that we may be so firmly built upon the unmoveable rock that we may not be afraid of evil tidings having our hearts fixed trusting in the Lord Psal 112.7 And this was the glory of Job's Faith Job 13.15 That tho' God should slay him yet would he trust in him § 3. Let us pray and strive that God would so settle and stablish us in Love to himself that no blast of Afflictions from his hand may cool the fire of Divine Love in our hearts We want exceedingly the Faith that God carries on a design of Love under all his various and seemingly contrary dealings with us he can love and correct why then cannot we love a correcting God Whether he wounds or heals his love is the same and why not ours Can we not love God upon the security of Faith that he will do us good as well as upon the experience that he has done us good § 4. Pray we and strive that God would so settle and stablish us in our inward peace that no wind of temptation may overthrow it 'T is a slender and ill-made peace which every assault of the Tempter dissolves The Psalmist stood upon a firmer bottom when the terrifying Onsets from without made him fly more confidently to his God Psal 56.3 What time I am afraid I will put my trust in thee And we have Gods own promise to answer our Faith Isa 26.3 Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is staid on thee because he trusteth in thee And thus I have return'd some Answer to the second Branch of the Question What is the measure of the fulness of God with which every true Christian ought to pray and strive to be filled There will still remain an enquiry How we may reach to such a measure of the Divine fulness as has been described To which tho' the limits of this discourse will not allow a full and just Answer yet the importance of the Question will oblige me to point at some few things upon which your own Meditations may find matter of enlargement 1. And first it is necessary that we be convinced that we are very far short
importance of the Old yet the sincere ones who did believe the Prophets as the Apostles exhorted 1 Acts 26.27 John 20.31 they with Philip and Nathaneel Israelites indeed rejoyced they had found him of whom Moses has written in the Law 2 John 1.41 and whom the Prophet foretold should be the desire of all Nations 3 Hag. 2.7 a light to lighten the Gentiles and the glory of the people Israel Wherefore I may very fairly hence under this First Head in the explication deduce from my Text I. That the Holy Scriptures read preach'd and heard accompanied with Prayer and other institutions of Christ as the Seals of the new Covenant and the Ministry of Reconciliation are the Means of Grace ordained of God to bring Men and Women to repentance towards God and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ 4 Acts 20.21 That Men by the applying themselves sincerely to the use of these means which tho' they have no natural force in and of themselves to the effecting of a change may by the efficacy of the Spirit exerting insuperable Grace 4 John 15.3 17.17 Eph. 5.26 be cleansed 5 God the great Efficient may in these helps of his own ordaining reveal his own arm 6 Isa 53.1 draw them unto Christ 7 John 6.45 Rev. 1.16 make the Seed of the Word fruitful and putting forth his own Power bring them to salvation in the Heavenly Kingdom and rest sweetly in Abraham's Bosom where they shall not know trouble any more II. These are ordinary means according to the order established by the supream Ruler who knows what 's best for those under his Government in opposition to extraordinary which seldom happen upon some singular work of Judgment or Mercy to a Person or People 'T is true the most Sovereign Agent who is most free he may if he pleaseth without means by an immediate Impression of Light and infusion of Grace work on the Soul as he did on the Apostles and Paul 8 Acts 2.4 9.1 c. Gal. 1.12 but generally and for the most part God revealeth himself mediately by the ordinary means he hath setled to abide in his Church to the end there being an aptness and fitness in them under Divine Influence for converting the Soul 9 Psal 19.17 when Embassadors come in Christs stead beseeching men to be reconciled to God 10 2 Cor. 5.20 having a promise of his Presence with them to the end of the World 11 Mat. 28. ult in communicating of the mind of God by writing or speaking reading or interpreting exhorting and directing 12 2 Pet. 3.1 Acts 21.25 4.20 29. 15.21 8.30 35. 1 Cor. 12.30 Acts 15.32 1 Thess 2.11 every way preaching for the begetting of Faith 13 Ro. 10.13 15 when the advice of Gregory Nazianzen is observ'd namely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Pray and search having pray'd with David Open thou mine eyes or reveal 14 Psal 119.18 that I may behold wondrous things out of thy Law It concerns us to be much in meditating upon it 15 1.2 John 5.39 Gregory called the Great gives an account of an illiterate man who bought a Bible hired one to read to him out of it and thereby became a great Proficient in the School of Christianity Luther ‖ Melch. Adeon in vita by reading of it was turn'd from Popery so was John Hus by reading of our Wickliff's Books proving his Doctrin from it We know Augustine was converted by taking it up and reading * Confess l. 8. ch 8. § 2. Nicephor p. 5. 27. And 't is said Cyprian by reading the Prophet Jonas As Junius by the first Chapter of John's Gospel tho' t is supposed neither of them then had much skill in the Originals but were beholding to Translations Thus we see how the Scripture is the means and the ordinary means The next thing in the explication is to shew II. That this means becomes more certainly succesful or effectual Certainly is to be understood in opposition to that which happens uncertainly and peradventure Not as if every where that the Immortal Seed of the Word is sown Conversion did certainly and always follow it being but a subservient Instrument some Seed meets with bad ground 16 Mat. 13.4 5. some reject the Counsel of God against themselves 17 Luke 7.30 they put it from them judging themselves unworthy of eternal Life 18 Acts 13.46 i. e. by contradicting of the Word they do as evidently deprive themselves of eternal Life as if the Judge did pass that Sentence upon the Bench. So what is the Savour of Life to others becomes the Savour of Death to them 19 2 Cor. 2.16 The Rich-man as he is brought in here conceits after the mode of the Jews seeking for Signs 20 John 4.48 6.30 which Christ gave check to when by his accomplishment of the Prophecies he had demonstrated himself to be the Messiah and they would have him to be a Political or Temporal King 21 Mat. 12.39 that one rising miraculously from the dead and preaching would keep others from Hell But Abraham the Father of the Faithful who knew what it was to repent and believe and be converted was of another perswasion He bids hearken to the written word read and preached on which Faith and Repentance was to be grounded God's Providential Works how admirable soever not being the Rule for Men to go by but his Word It being no good sense that God's extraordinary actings should be our ordinary Rule He that would not Plow or Sow till Manna be rain'd from Heaven because it once did may expect Bread till he starve and so may he that looks to be fed with Ravens as Elias once was Man may be most certainly assured from God's Word what his Mind is God himself indeed doth principally make any means effectual or successful Paul's planting and Apollo 's watering comes to nothing without him his influence and blessing 22 1 Cor. 3.6 7. De Gratia Christi ch 24. Augustine said right Men may read and understand behold and confess not by the Law and Doctrin sounding outwardly but by the inward and hidden wonderful and ineffable power God doth not only work Divine true Revelations but also good Wills Yet from the external preaching of the Word of God as a means of his appointment there is a Godly Sorrow or a sorrowing after God wrought which worketh repentance to Salvation 23 2 Cor. 7.10 11. It proves successful to some who are not hearers only but doers of the Word 24 Jam. 1.22 It falls out prosperously and happily with them using of the means Solomon saith 1 Prov. 13.15 A good understanding giveth favour and success Be sure a good understanding of Gods mind from his Word becomes ordinarily more successful that the Soul may be in health and prosper 2 3 Epist John v. 1. than any expectation of that which can
only give an uncertain sound till evidenc'd to be from Heaven as the Word is 3. For Conversion i. e. From all sin to God which imports a thorow change of Heart and Life and that it is indeed from God the Author by his Spirit 3 2 Thess 2.13 Tit. 3.5 above the creatures power and activity 4 John 1.13 yet God useth Christs Embassadors in the Ministry of Reconciliation 5 2 Cor. 5.19 20 Acts 26.18 and those who are Instructors in him 6 Job 22.21 that we may be acquainted with God receive forgiveness and be built up 6 even an habitation of God through the Spirit upon the foundation doctrinal of the Prophets and Apostles Christ personally being the chief Corner-stone 7 Eph. 2.20 Wherefore Paul urgeth Timothy to read the Divinely inspired Scriptures in that they were able as an Instrument in God's hands to make him wise to Salvation 8 2 Tim. 3.15 as they were a ground of hope and comfort to others 9 Rom. 15.4 by means of which we are begotten or born again 10 Jam. 1.18 1 Pet. 1.23 yea and from God's appointment and ordination or as it were Common Law we are not only first converted from Sin to God but are carried on in a state of grace till we in exercising our selves unto Godliness are afterwards brought unto glory It remains before I leave the Explication that I touch upon 4. The Persons whom the Rich Man is here represented to desire to come from Heaven or Hell to give an Information to his Relatives how things go in those unchangeable States of Happiness or Misery are only brought in ex hypothesi upon supposition or condition granting it were so Not that there is a ground for the expectation of any new Messengers from the other World we may yield the thing possible tho not probable we are not to limit the Holy One who is most perfect he is not bounded as to his Omnipotency any more than his Omnisciency He could if he would reveal himself now as he did to John in the Isle of Patmos 11 Rev. 1.9 He might if he would in the dispensation of his Grace and Providence use the Ministration of Angels 12 Heb. 1.14 without giving any account of his matters 13 Job 33.12 13 and put them upon Obedience extraordinarily for those Heavenly Spirits must be at his Service in the affairs of his Kingdom 14 Rev. 22.9 Indeed the great instance of their Ministry was about the Person of Christ yet he did use them afterwards to reveal his mind 15 Rev 1.1 19.10 How far he is pleased to do it at this day in any rare instance is not for me to determine but some have pretended to have Revelations from Angels which have prov'd Delusions There is it 's true a Ministry of them in this Chapter where my Text is vers 22. to carry holy Souls to Abraham's bosom which is ordinary But we will suppose there should be any extraordinary yet that would not be any more if so much regarded than the ordinary means and we should through the Grace given be careful not to be wise above that which is written 16 Rom. 12.3 Having thus explained the sense of the Answer to the Case before me I hope according to the Explication given you will come to conclude with me that it doth clearly result from my Text and is proved thence II. The Second General is to shew How or upon what grounds the ordinary means of Grace are more certainly succefsful for Conversion than if Persons from Heaven or Hell should tell us what is done there as hath been explained That I may do this as well as I can in a little room I shall be concern'd like Bezaleel and Aholiab 17 Exod. 36.7 tho' not with the like Wisdom to lay by much of the good stuff would offer it self to me in this case Somewhat methinks I should premise in the General and then proceed to particular grounds 1. Let me premise in the general these two or three things 1. From my Text and in a Christian Congregation I am not necessitated in shewing how this comes about which I have deduced from it to prove Moses and the Prophets or which is all one for substance more largely the Holy Scriptures to be the Word of God That being the Hypothesis or what is presupposed and not Question'd in this Dialogue between the Richman and the Father of the Faithful as we find vers 29th as well as in the words compared with vers 16th of this Chapter The Jews did acknowledge it and never denyed it when our Saviour and his Apostles did ever and anon shew them how the Scriptures were fulfilled manifested and accomplish'd So that not to grant this were to take away the substratum or foundation of the Case Which the Jews frankly yielded 17 John 9.29 We know that God spake unto Moses indeed it was evident enough when he refuted any objection against it 18 Exod. 3.2 6 14 4.1 2 c. 14.31 20.1 c. Numb 11.17 comforting of them by shewing them that God was with him We find they did readily agree to it that God was the Author of the Old Testament Apollos we read 19 Acts 18.24 28. did mightily convince many of the Jews from the Scriptures i. e. those Books which they did own to be of Divine inspiration And by consequence if people be not worse than Jews the New Testament should be owned to be so too being the Old directs to it When Christ was transfigur'd Moses and Elias appear'd talking with him 20 Mat. 17.2 3 and so gave their Testimonies to the main subject and substance of the Gospel sith In Christ are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge 21 Col. 2.3 2. Man in his innocent state had an innate pure light consisting in the knowledge of God the Creator Lawgiver Governor and Rewarder presently enlarg'd by Revelation from without in the Sacramental precept of the Divine will under the first Covenant 22 Gen. 2.17 and from the consideration of Gods works which were all very good 23 Gen. 1.31 and this was necessary to that state But sith Man being mutable sought out many inventions 24 Eccles 7.27 and harken'd to the Serpents suggestion 1 Gen. 3.5 had obscur'd this light God of his infinite goodness pitying the vanity of faln Man as mortal not knowing how to deliver his Soul from the hand of the grave Ps2al. 89.47 48 2 did think it necessary to reveal himself and magnifie his grace in condescending to enter into a new Covenant with this faln creature giving his Word or first Promise that the seed of the Woman should bruise the Serpents head 3 Gen. 3.15 John 1.14 Herein Christ was promised and hence called the Word being He indeed concerning whom that saving Word of God or Word of Promise is made As we
10. Epist mox ipso tractu ut fieri solet diffundente se crimine c. Adversus gentes ipsa multitudine perturbatus the Proconsul in Bythinia employ'd by Trajan to root up Christianity which they accounted a Crime did acknowledg Tertullian and others prove the spreading of it in the Second and Third Centuries So mightily grew the Word of God and prevailed 25 Acts 19.20 in the primitive times ingenerating unconquer'd Constancy of Faith and Godliness in the minds of the Hearers and always victoriously triumphing over the Kingdom of Satan and false Religions In the beginning of the Reformation said Luther * Tom. 4.282 Ubique experimur in Templo in Rep. c. We do everywhere experience in the Church in the Commonwealth in the Family certain fruits of the Word which as Leaven doth spread it self into all the parts of the Commonwealth the Offices and all the States Afterwards we find how it did diffuse it self in England Scotland and Ireland c. ‖ See the Fulfilling of Scriptures p. 401 414. Is 46.10 John 10.35 Acts 1.16 Notwithstanding they of the Antichristian state have laboured to keep up their Superstition and Idolatry by feigned Apparitions as may be seen in later Collections of Popish Miracles the History of Jetzer c. 4. The Holy Bible being the appointed Instrument wherewith the Holy Spirit will work for the sanctification of the Soul 24 John 17.17 1 Pet. 1.22 it is indeed a surer word of prophecy which the Spirit of Christ that spake in the Prophets themselves did signifie 1 1 Pet. 1.11 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 than that which came from Heaven at the transfiguration 2 2 Pet. 1.18 19 Mat. 17.5 Not in regard of the truth for therein they were both equal but in regard that at the Transfiguration was more transient being heard but by a few this of the Scripture more firm and fixed being written for an unalterable Record just so as Holy Men had it brought to them at several times by the Holy Ghost it was not of any private Conception for it came not by the will of man but was brought into them by the will of God who hath strongly preserv'd it amongst his People notwithstanding the endeavours of Antiochus to destroy it under the Old Testament and afterwards when the Canon was compleated tho' several of the Roman Emperors used their utmost power to burn it * Euseb Eccles Hist l. 10. ch 3 4. 8.2 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. For rather than they whom the Spirit of God had wrought upon by it in the communication of Spiritual Light and Life would become Traditores such Traitors to God and their own Soul as to deliver it up to Dioclesian's Officers they in great numbers suffered themselves in Egypt to be bodily destroyed in humble confidence the Author of it would take their Souls into Abraham's Bosom to be for ever happy there So successful a means is the Word of God for the work of Grace in the Soul that no marvel upon the Rich man's speaking his own conceit or odd wish for some ones prodigious return from the other World as if a Preacher thence would bring his Brethren to return to God Father Abraham discovers himself to be of another mind as it were giving him a Reprimand shews that the Written Word giving more clear evidence of its really coming from above and so manifesting it self to be from God should rather do it as being the stated means which the Spirit useth in the conversion of others And therefore the hankering after Messengers to come anew from Heaven or Hell argues those who are so dispos'd to be such as our Saviour shewed in confuting the Sadduces who really know not the Scriptures nor the power of God therein 3 Mat. 22.29 For let us suppose one who had been dead and known to be so for several years should be wonderfully raised up by God to warn his known Friends here in this World to flee from the wrath to come and to return to God What new Arguments could He use that had not been used in the Ministration of the Word before sith therein he had been acquainted with the pure Precepts of the Divine Majesty and also his sure promises of Heaven to the Obedient with the certain threatnings of Hell to the Disobedient and the never-ceasing pains under the execution of them felt by him who in this Parable here would have warning given to his Brethren What can He suppos'd to come from the other World offer more to the serious consideration of his Relatives After a little startling of them who it may be would be somewhat concern'd a little while at the surprize as the Drunkard seeing his Pot-Companion fall down dead under the Table or others struck dead on every side in a dreadful Pestilence yet the Survivers remain unchang'd in their Minds Wills and Affections of Love and Hatred Hope and Fear all this while Tho' they have often heard the Ministers of the Word even in Christs stead laying cogent Arguments before them to gain their Assent powerful Motives to work upon their Wills and Affections from the sure Word universally suited to the Cases of their several Souls when it may be they had some common motions of the Spirit which they have quenched whereupon they may now be prone to doubt whether this suppos'd new and extraordinary Messenger be indeed Commission'd from God unless he produce his Credentials and these be attested to by the Spirit 4 Gal. 3.1 2. Lavater de Spectris For upon the appearance of an Angel there might well be a suspicion sith if a good one his Message would accord with God's Word if a bad one he would endeavour to deceive by his Lies When the Angel did instruct Joseph by a Vision he forthwith adjoin'd a Testimony from the Prophetical Scripture 5 Mat. 1.23 Isa 7.14 which Christ and his Apostles had respect to tho' they could work Miracles to confirm their Doctrin 5. God out of his infinit Wisdom hath given us his Oracles and sent his Embassadors in the ministry of reconciliation 4 2 Cor 5.19 20 men like to our selves as more suitable to us in houses of Clay than Angels which live out of the Sphere of our Commerce God might think now their Testimonies to his Church here below would not be so convenient for his Government and so consequently not so successful for the beginning of Conversion He could have had the use of the Noblest Spirits for his Errand and Embodied them if he would for expedition when he chose to employ Moses notwithstanding his excuses 5 Ex. 3.11 12. when the Promise of God's Presence with him on his Embassie might answer all 6 Ex. 4.10 12. so that he found be might say with converted Paul ‖ Phil. 4.13 He could do all things through Christ enstrengthning him Man is best drawn in such a
things which we comprehend not III. That which makes believing so difficult is the seeming contradictory acts of Faith it seems not to consist with it self Here I take Faith more generally as it has for its Object the whole Word of God the Law and the Gospel the special Object of Faith as Saving is the Promise Saving Faith seeks Life which is not to be found in Commandments and Threats but in a Promise of Mercy Faith acting upon the whole Word of God seems to contradict it self for Faith believes a Sinner is to die according to the Law and that he shall live according to the Gospel Faith has the Word of God for both both for the Death and Life of a Sinner and both are true the Law must be executed and the Promise must be performed but how to reconcile this is not so obvious and easie to every one Is the Law then against the Promises of God God forbid Gal. 3.21 't is impossible both should be accomplished in the Person of a Sinner he cannot die eternally and live eternally yet both are wonderfully brought about by Jesus Christ according to the manifold Wisdom of God without any Derogation to his Law and Justice God and his Law are satisfy'd and the Promise of Salvation made good to the Sinner and so both Law and Gospel have their ends not a tittle of either falls to the ground Heaven and Earth may sooner pass away than this can be O what a mistery is Christ Flesh and blood can't reveal this to us every believer assents to the truth of the Law as well as the Gospel he knows that both must have their full course the Law is fulfilled in inflicting Death the Gospel in giving Life the Law contributes nothing to the eternal Life of a sinner but kills him and leaves him weltering in his blood is no more concerned about him for ever if God will bring this dead sinner to life again he may dispose of him as he please the Law has done its utmost against him so the Law did against Christ spared him not but killed him out-right and left him for a time under the power of Death but having slain a Man who was God as well as Man Death was too weak to hold him he swallows up Death in victory he whom the Law slew as Man rises as God by the power of his godhead the Law contributed nothing to his Resurrection the Law had the chief hand in his Death but none in his Resurrection And here begins our eternal Life in the Resurrection of him who dies no more and is the Resurrection and Life to all who believe in him IV. The reigning unbelief that is among the generality of Men even among those who are of greatest reputation for Wisdom and Learning Ay and among those who carry the vogue for Zeal and Religion are counted the Head and Pillars of the Church Some pretending to Infallibility others set up themselves and are cryed up by many as such competent Judges in all matters of Faith that their judgment is not to be questioned but readily complied with by all who would not be counted singular and Schismatical So 't was in our Saviours time the Jews who had been the only Professors of the true Religion for many ages in opposition to all Idolatry and false Worship they stumble at the Gospel the Greeks who were the more Learned sort of the Heathen World they counted it foolishness And thus was the whole World set against Christ here was the greatest outward hinderance of the belief of the Gospel that could be imagined and add to this the indefatigable pains and industry of the Devil to keep out the light of the Gospel from shining in upon us he blinds the Eyes of Men by a cursed influence upon their corrupt minds that they should not believe Is it not a hard matter under all these discouragements to embrace the Gospel and declare our belief of it Have any of the Rulers or of the Pharisees believed on him But this people who know not the Law John 7.48 49. Why should any regard what a company of poor illiterate people do Their following Christ is rather an argument why we should not follow him they are all but fools and ideots that do so A cursed sort of people This is the judgement the Men of the World have of believers There is nothing among too many self-conceited Scepticks lies under a greater imputation of folly and madness than faith in the Lord Jesus Christ O what a pass are things come too that after so many hundred years profession of Christianity we should grow weary of Christ and the Gospel V. The notorious Apostacy of many Professors this day who have made Shipwrack of Faith and a good Conscience 1 Tim. 1.19 may convince you all that 't is no easie matter to believe so to believe as to persevere in the Faith VI. Believers themselves find it a difficult matter to act their Faith if their Lives lie upon it they cannot act it at their pleasure without the special aid and assistance of the Spirit 't is God must work in us both to will and to do of his good pleasure Believers are hardly put to it great is the labour and travel of their Souls in believing they meet with much opposition from flesh and blood in every act of Faith they put forth they are forced to cry out for help in the midst of an act of Faith lest they should fail in it I helieve Lord help my unbelief q. d. I am now under some light and power of Faith but I see I can't hold it if thou dost not help me I feel flesh and blood rising up against my Faith I begin to stagger already Lord help me that I may not be run down by my carnal Heart Temptations shake our Faith many times there is a perpetual conflict between Faith and Diffidence yet Faith fails not utterly there 't is still Psal 31.22 23. Psal 42.6 9. Faith upholds the Heart still Psal 116.7 Unbelievers they tremble and turn away from God but true believers in their greatest frights and fears do run to God Psal 56.3 make towards him still Were it an easie matter to believe such suddain fits of unbelief would not come so strongly upon believers themselves Secondly The Reson why many Professors count it an easie thing to Believe The main Reason is this and I will insist upon no other viz. Because they mistake a formal Profession of Faith for real believing this undo's thousands who because they are qualified as National Protestants for all worldly preferments here they rest and make no other use of their Religion as if the Articles of their Faith obliged them to nothing A formal Profession is general takes up Religion in gross but is not concerned in any one point of it But real Believing is particular brings down every Gospel Truth to our selves shews us our concernments in it Save thy self saith
standing principle of actual repentance and whereby it is both enabled and disposed to it Now this repentance being a grace of Gods Spirit and yet inherent in Man as to the habit and exercised by him as to its acts or which is the same being Gods work and yet Mans duty we are to consider what is Gods part in it and what is Mans. First Gods work is 1. To infuse the grace or principle repentance in the habit which constantly is ascribed to God in Scripture Acts 11.18 Granred repentance 2 Tim. 2.23 If God will give them repentance 2. To actuate and enliven that Principle when infused as he doth other Graces Phil. 2.13 not meerly in a moral way by suggesting such Reasons and Arguments as may excite and move the Will to the exercise of Repentance but by the powerful and efficacious Influence of his Grace drawing out the habit into that exercise or causing the Soul to act suitably to this Divine Principle infused into it Secondly Mans Duty is 1. To seek and labour after Repentance in the use of all means by which God is wont to work it in the hearts of Men such as diligent attendance on the Word Repentance no less than Faith comes by hearing Rom. 10.17 and what external means of Grace are appointed in it Intention of the Mind in that attendance on the means Mens applying the Truths delivered to themselves comparing their Cases with it examining themselves by it considering their ways c. which are but the actings of their reasonable Faculties and as much in their power as other moral Actions are and need not the Supernatural Influence of Divine Grace but only those common assistances God affords to Man in the ordinary actions of a rational Life and in a word these are but such kind of workings as shew them to be Men not to be Saints Isa 46.8 To these means in the use of which God is wont to work repentance I refer Prayer for it which though by an unregenerate Person it cannot be performed graciously and unto acceptance yet we may say it may be thus far performed successfully as that those Prayers may be heard and answered in relation to the Grace they seek and in the Elect of God they are heard tho' not with respect to the Persons which being graceless faithless cannot be accepted of God yet with respect to his own thoughts of Love towards them and his eternal purpose of conferring that Grace upon them 2. To excite and stir up in himself the Grace of Repentance when God hath wrought it in him for the putting forth Acts agreeable to the Principle he hath received and to which by that Principle he is both empowred and inclined unto the production of which Acts he is no more to question the concurrence of God's Special Grace than his common concurrence to the ordinary actings of his Reason and Will it being God's usual method to work with his Creatures according to their Natures and those Principles of Acting he hath put into them Though God quickens Grace as well as works it yet Man is to use those means for the quickning it in himself which God hath appointed and with which he is wont to work 2. The reasons of this Concession or which prove that a Death-bed Repentance may be sincere 1. It appears by the the instance of this Thief that a late Repentance and as late as one upon a Dying Bed hath been sincere and therefore the like may be again He did truly repent and therefore it is possible others may And that his Repentance was sincere we have sufficient Proof not only from Christs gracious acceptation of it manifested by the peremptory promise he gave him of admitting him into his Kingdom To day shalt thou be with me in Paradise But by the other Graces we here find him exercising in concurrence with his repentance I. Faith which is the Principle of Evangelical Repentance and which never fails to work it where it is it self sincere He owns Christ as a King when he mentions his Kingdom and prays him to remember him when he comes into it This likewise implies his belief of and confidence in the Grace and Love as well as Power of Christ when he commits his departing Soul into his hands expecting his Salvation from him And indeed his Faith was not only sincere but strong and vigorous God had put as much of the Spirit of Faith into a poor Novice in Religion at the very first as he doth into many an old Disciple at the last It is a good argument of a strong Faith when it bears up against great discouragements as we see in Abraham's Faith Rom. 4.19 20. and that of the Woman of Canaan Matth. 15. from v. 22. to 28. Two great discouragements the Thief had which yet could not hinder his Faith 1. The heinousness of his Sins aggravated by long impenitence and perseverance in them to the last hour in a manner of his Life Well might he fear that God was so provoked by the continual rebellion of his wicked Life as totally to reject him now at his Death 2. The low and despicable condition he saw Christ in condemned as well as himself and hanging upon a Cross as well as himself slighted and mocked at by so many he might look on as better and wiser than himself no less than the Governours of the Church v. 33. The Rulers derided him This might have made him think there was little hope of help from him What was there in a crucify'd dying Man that to an eye of reason could make him look like a Saviour Meer Nature would as soon have looked for Life in Death it self nay Heaven in Hell as eternal Salvation in one who not only had formerly been so mean but now seemed so miserable II. Several other Graces we find in him as the fruits at least the concomitants of his Repentance 1. A free ingenuous and open confession of his Sins in the face of the World and thereby giving glory to God v. 41. We indeed justly c. Nor can it be said that his Confession was extorted from him by the Torments he suffer'd when we see his Companion impenitent under the like 2. He owns the Justice that had brought him to that end We receive the due reward of our deeds He neither murmurs against God nor quarrels with Men. 3. He sharply taxeth the impiety and profaneness of his fellow Thief in reviling Christ as well as his still continuing obstinate and impenitent v. 40. Dost not thou fear God c. and hereby he shews his indignation against Sin when he so heinously resents it not only in himself but in another Like David he beholds a transgressor and is grieved Ps 119.158 4. He doth what he can to bring his Companion to repentance Dost not thou fear God The Reproof implies an Exhortation as well as Instruction Now the communicativeness of Grace is a good argument of the sincerity of it
controule the strongest temptations to sin against God A wicked believer is more guilty than a wicked infidel How could we conceive it possible were it not visible in their actions that Men who have judicative faculties to compare and distinguish things and accordingly be moved with desires or fears should with ardent affections pursue despicable vanities and neglect substantial happiness and be fearful of the shadows of dangers and intrepid in the midst of the truest dangers He is a desperate gamester that will venture a Crown at a throw against some petty advantage yet this is really done by sinners who hazard the loss of Heaven for this World they hang by slender strings a little breath that expires every moment over bottomless perdition and are insensible without any palpitation of Heart any sign of fear How strong is the delusion and concupiscence of the carnally minded The lusts of the flesh bribe and corrupt their understandings or diverts them from serious consideration of their ways and the issues of them From hence it is they are presently entangled and vanquisht by sensual temptations they are cozened by the colours of good and evil and Satan easily accomplishes his most pernicious and envious design to make Men miserable as himself How just is the reproach of Wisdom How long ye simple ones will ye love simplicity and fools hate knowledge The light of reason and revelation shines upon them they have not the excuse of ignorance but the righteous and heavy condemnation of those who love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil 'T is no mean degree of guilt to extenuate sin and make an apology for sinners The wisest of Men tells us Fools make a mock of sin they count it a fond niceness a silly preciseness to be fearful of offending God They boast of their deceitful arts and insinuations whereby they represent sin as a light matter to corrupt others But 't is infinitely better to be defective in the subtilty of the Serpent than in the innocence of the Dove A meer natural who is only capable of sensitive actions and is distinguisht from a Brute by his shape is not such a forlorn sot as the sinful fool What the Prophet Jeremy speaks of one who gets riches unjustly that he shall leave them and in the end die a fool will be verified of the wilful obstinate sinner in the end he shall by the terrible conviction of his own mind be found guilty of the most woful folly and how many have acknowledged in their last hours when usually Men speak with the most feeling and least affectation how have they in words of the Psalmist arraigned themselves So foolish have we been and like beasts before thee 2. From hence we may be instructed of the wonderful patience of God who bears with a World of sinners that are obnoxious to his justice and under his power every day If we consider the number and aggravations of Mens sins how many have out-told the hairs of their Heads in actual transgressions how mighty and manifest their sins are that the Deity and Providence are questioned for the suspending of vengeance and yet that God notwithstanding all their enormous injuries and violent provocations is patient towards sinners it cannot but fill us with admiration His Mercy like the cheerful light of the Sun visits us every Morning with its benign influences his Justice like Thunder rarely strikes the Wicked He affords not only the supports of life but many comforts and refreshments to the unthankful and rebellious 'T is not from any defect in his Power that they are not consum'd but from the abundance of his Mercy He made the World without any strain of his Power and can as easily destroy it he has an innumerable company of Angels attending his Commands and every Angel is an Army in strength one of them destroyed a hundred and fourscore and five thousand in a Night he can use the most despicable and weakest Creatures Frogs and Lice and Flies as instruments of vengeance to subdue the proudest Pharoah the most obstinate Rebels He sees sin where-ever it is and hates it where-ever he sees it yet his Patience endures thâ—â— crying sins and his long sufferance expects their repentance The Lord is not slack as some Men count slackness but he is long-suffering to us-ward not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance He spares sinners with such indulgence in order to their Salvation 'T is deservedly one of his Royal Titles the God of Patience Our fierce Spirits are apt to take fire and revenge for every injury real or suppos'd but the great God who is infinitely sensible of all the indignities offer'd to his Majesty defers his anger and loads them with his benefits every day What is more astonishing than the riches of his Goodness unless it be the perverse abuse of it by sinners to harden themselves in their impieties But altho his Clemency delays the punishment the sacredness and constancy of his Justice will not forget it when patience has had its perfect work Justice shall have a solemn triumph in the final destruction of impenitent unreformed sinners 3. The Consideration of the Evil of Sin so great in it self and pernicious to us hightens our Obligations to the Divine Mercy in saving us from our sins and an everlasting Hell the just Punishment of them Our Loss was unvaluable our Misery extream and without infinite Mercy we had been under an unremediable necessity of Sinning and Suffering for ever God saw us in this wretched and desperate State and his eye affected his heart in his pity he redeemed and restored us This is the clearest Testimony of pure Goodness for God did not want external Glory who is infinitely Happy in his own Perfections he could when Man revolted from his Duty have created a new World of Innocent Creatures for infinite Power is not spent nor lessened by finite Productions but his undeserved and undesired Mercy appeared in our Salvation The way of accomplishing it renâ—ers Mercy more Illustrious for to glorifie his Justice and preserve the Honour of his Holiness unblemish'd he laid upon his Son the Iniquity of us all This was Love that passeth all Understanding Our Saviour speaks of it with admiration God so loved the world and hated Sin that he gave his only begotten Son to dye for it that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life And how dear are our Engagements to Jesus Christ The Judge would not release the Guilty without a Ransom nor the Surety without Satisfaction and the Son of God most compassionately and willingly gave his precious Blood to obtain our Deliverance If his Perfections were not most aimable and ravishing yet that he died for us should infinitely endear him to us To those who believe he is precious to those who have felt their undone Condition and that by his Merits and Mediation are restored to the
what was spoken upon a very different account James iii. 5. Behold how great a matter a little spark kindled For by various steps the Conversion of Naaman was at last accomplished and considering his Character and Interest we may probably conjecture that his Example and Counsel might prevail with others also to turn from Idols and to serve the living and true God We cannot well pass by this strange and remarkable Instance without staying so long as to observe 1. That this little Girl appears to have been seasoned with the knowledge of the True God and to have been acted in what she said by a principle of Faith This she shewed by her confidence That God would work a miracle by his own Prophet and Servant Elisha for it was He whom she intended as the sequel discovers Samaria was then like Athens a City wholly given to Idolatry therein had Ahab built an Altar and an House for Baal and he had four hundred and fifty Priests to attend his Worship The Inhabitants may well be supposed to have been generally of the Court-Religion only some few resorted to Elisha and they it 's likely in a more private way We read of the good Woman of Shunem 2 King iv 22 23. that was one of his Disciples and this Girl seems to have been of that way Happy are those young ones upon whom the Fear of God makes early impressions 2. God opened the way to Naamans Conversion by a little Maid The weaker the Means the more is Gods Power glorified 3. A few good words dropt occasionally may operate very successfully especially when they are suitable and seasonable Prov. xxv 11. Let private Christians mind this 4. A poor little Maid carried into captivity opened the way to the Conversion of one of the greatest Personages in the Countrey It is very lamentable to hear so frequently of Men and Women Boys and Girls carried away captives by Turks and Tartars But who can tell whether God may not in his own good time by some or other of them convey the knowledge of Christ to some perishing Souls This may suffice touching the Example produced out of the Old Testament The Example out of the New Testament shall be of those who were driven out of Jerusalem in the persecution that followed the Martyrdom of Stephen of whom ye may read Acts viii 4. Therefore they who were scattered abroad went every where preaching the Word in the strange countries whither providence led them and a wonderful blessing went along with them as ye may see Acts xi 19 20 21. Now they who were scattered abroad upon the persecution that arose about Stephen travelled as far as Phenice Which when they were come to Antioch spake unto the Grecians preaching the Lord Jesus And the hand of the Lord was with them And a great multitude believed and turned unto the Lord. These were private Christians for any thing that appears to the contrary And what they did was no more than every private Christian Regularly may and in duty ought to do if the Criticism of the late learned Annotator be allowed who saith That tho 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do Materially signifie the same thing Yet perhaps they differ in the manner For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a work that lies in common any Christian may publish the glad tidings of the Gospel and give a Relation of our Lord Jesus Christ his Doctrine Miracles Sufferings Resurrection c. Which was permitted to be done by Women themselves But 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to proclaim the Gospel as Heraulds appointed and authorized thereunto by Jesus Christ This is proper to the Ministers of the Gospel and belongs to their Office Upon this I shall leave one Remark only That it were greatly to be wished that all such as for their adherence to the Gospel are by persecution driven from their Habitations and Countries were persons of the same Spirit with those who were scattered abroad from Jerusalem such as bring the Grace and word of God with them whithersoever they come so would they prove great Blessings to all that receive them This may suffice to have been spoken of the New-Testament instance To the examples taken out of the Holy Scriptures I shall subjoin two also out of Ecclesiastical History The one is related by Ruffinus who gives this account of the Conversion of the Kingdom of the Iberians to the Faith There was saith he a certain poor woman who had been taken Captive and lived among them She was at first taken notice of for her Sobriety and Modesty and then for her spending so much â—ime in Prayer These raised a great admiration of her in the minds of the Barbarians At last they brought to her a sick child which upon her prayers was restored to health This spread her fame abroad so that the Queen of the Country was brought to her and by her prayers recovered Whereupon the King and Kingdom were won over to Christ and the King sent to Constantine the Great for some to instruct them farther in the Christian Religion Ruffin Hist Eccl. l. 1. c. 10. The holy Conversation and the ardent Devotions of private Christians are excellent means to recommend the Gospel and to represent it as most amiable and desireable The other is of Frumentius Aedesius These being Christians were left young in one of the Kingdoms of the Inner India and were after some time for their excellent parts and unspotted life honoured and employed by the Queen of the Country during the Minority of her Son In process of time some Roman Merchants came to traffick among them Then Frumentius understanding that there were some Christians among them invited them to reside with him and provided a place for them where they might offer up their prayers to God after the Christian manner and himself having obtained leave of the Queen went to Athanasius in Alexandria requesting him to send some Bishop to that Kingdom to promote the farther entertainment of the Gospel among them to which they were well inclined and disposed for the reception of it Athanasius ordained Frumentius himself who returned and by Gods blessing met with wonderful Success Ruffin Hist Eccl. l. 1. c. 9. Socrat. Eccl. Hist l. 1. c. 15. Sozomen l. 2. c. 23. If providence shall bring these lines to the view of Christian Travellers Merchants and Mariners who come among the poor Heathen let the examples laid before them excite and encourage them to use their endeavours to bring them to the knowledge of Christ and the entertainment of the Gospel Thus much touching the case of those private Christians who occasionally or providentially may come to or be brought to those places where the Gospel is not entertained as yet 3. Such private Christians as live in a more setled way among the Indians and other Heathen Nations and were placed in the third rank or order come to have their case to be considered How they
address your selves in your Devotions to him serve him and walk before him trust him and depend upon him all that you are and have design and do let it be suited to and worthy of that Glorious and fearful Name the Lord Your God whose eminent and perfect Name you love so well Hebr. xii 28. i Thess ii 10-12 Rom. xii 1 2. Mat. v. 16. Joh. xv 8. i Pet. iv 11. away with such mean Things and Actions such flat Devotions and such tantum non offensive Conversations and such lean and stingy Offerings to God or actings for him as must put Charity upon the Rack to observers of you for to conclude or think you love him Mal. i. 13 14. ii Pet. iii. 11. i Cor. xv 58. nothing below that cluster in Phil. iv 8. and that in Tit. ii 10-14 can escape its Mene Tekel in this balance of the Sanctuary rich in Good Works i Tim. vi 18. and rich towards God Luk. xii 21. and fruitful in every good work Col. i. 10. actings continually towards God and for him facing the Eyes and Consciences of all Observers with such illustrious and large Characters and Signatures of this Divine Principle of Love as to convince even the most critical Observers of you and to extort Confessions from them that none could act and live as you do did they not love God dearly and most entirely and constantly live to him and upon him as their all i Pet. ii 12. and iv 16 Hebr. xi 13-16 for I take not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here to import what may be barely Good but something generous and fit to strike the Beholders Eye and Conscience with some astonishing Convictions that what you do for God looks too majestically great to come from any ordinary Principle yea from any thing below your God enthroned in your best affections Love is the very Soul of Godliness the very Heart of the new Man a Principle so impetuous and charming as that it scorns where it is Regent to be confined to or signalized by any thing mean or base Such objects and concerns in its most intimate and close embraces and in its stated prospect and yet act sparingly sordidly or sneakingly for God! Love burns and blushes at the thought And Heaven it self ere long will irritate exert and shew the Purity and generous Vigours of this Grace in such a stated and inviolable series of great and generous actions so full of God and every way so fully for him and so worthy of him as that the life of God in glory shall evidence the force and excellence of that spring and principle whence it proceeds and yet even here even in this its Infant and Imperfect State it groans and labours to have God's Will done on Earth as it is in Heaven Well in a word such must your Actions and your Conversations be as that whatever you are conversant about or with the temper of your Spirits and the fervours and vigours of your love to God his Image Interest Son Spirit Gospel and all that do profess and own respects hereto every step you take and every thing you do ought to be great and exemplary and impregnated with what may speak the greatness largeness chearfulness and energies of your enflamed exalted and invigorated Souls through love to God Christ Souls and Christianity O to be exemplary in all Conversation to live each other into awakened Considerations of Spiritual concerns to dart forth all those glorious rays of Christian Wisdom of which we are told in Jam. iii. 17 18. to make men feel as well as see the force and flames of Christian Love to charm Exasperated Passions down by all the sweetnesses of true Wisdom Patience Meekness Gentleness and every way endearing Conversation with them to have the Law of Kindness always in your Mouths the notices of true Friendliness in your Looks the gifts and proofs of generous Charity in your Hands in constant readiness to minister to the Necessities of the Saints as God shall prosper your Endeavours in your lawful and regularly managed Occupations and Employments to have your Dealings and Commerces each with other accurately and severely just and yet sufficiently securing the credit and concerns of Christianity And in a word to be blameless and harmless as the Sons of God without rebuke shining as lights and holding forth the Word of Life to Universal Satisfaction and Advantage wherever groundless prejudice and partiality do not prevail and govern and to fill up every relation step and station with the fruits of Goodness Righteousness and truth these are the good and generous Works of Love whereto we are to be provoked For thus we do not love in word and tongue but indeed and truth i Joh. iii. 28. 4. The Intenseness of the principle and vigor of the practice called here as the designed effect of the prescribed means 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Provocation the warmth and vigour wherewith Love and Good Works are as it were to be inspired Zealously affected in a good thing Gal. iv 18. zealous of good works Tit. ii 14. the Motive so effectually Cogent as to fix and fortifie the Principle and the Principle so powerful as to go thorow with its great enterprize and concern Principles are the Springs of Action and Love importeth intimacy it is a Principle rooted in the heart and it lays its beloved objects deep therein warmth it is essential to it and where it is perfect or considerably grown it is serious and fervent It is a commanding thing and affects Regency over all the Actions Faculties and Passions it is peremptory in its Precepts fixt in the Purposes and Concerns which it espouses it is powerful in its Influences pressing in its Claims diffusive of it self through all that is performed by us Impatient of Resistances Denials or Delays and moved to Jealousies Indignation and vigorous Contentions when any Injury Affront or Rape is threatned attempted or pursued that any way is prejudicial to its object and its concerns therewith it claims and pleads it urges and provokes to diligence and to all eager prosecutions of what it aims at and endears unto it self and it entirely reconciles the whole Man to all the cost and difficulties of its Divine pursuits 'T is never well but in its motions towards its actings for its conversation with and its reposes in its Pearl of Price and hence its actions are invigorated it gives no faint blows in its holy War it runs not in its Race it deals not triflingly in its Merchandize for God and Heaven it is all mettle fortitude patience action desire and delight in every thing relating to its grand Affair and Scope and it makes all its actions and performances to bear their Testimony to its own fortitude and fervours and this is the Paroxysm of Love and Good Works 2. The things provoking hereto And here behold a Troop as it was said of Gad Gen. xxx 11. How do inducements and incentments spring
up in manifold and mighty clusters What can we mention or fix our thoughts upon that may not kindle and increase this flame of Love and its Eruptions in Good Works The things which we might pertinently and copiously insist upon might be reduced to these Heads 1. The Objects of this Central Grace or Principle 1. Things in Heaven as God Christ the Spirit Angels the Spirits of Just Men there made perfect the glorious Furniture Laws and Orders the Visions Services Ministrations and Fruitions of that State all the Perfections Prerogatives and Employments of that blessed World above with all the accomplishments and accommodations which relate immediately thereto and all the Satisfactions and Advantages that result therefrom 2. Things from Heaven God manifest in the flesh i Tim. iii. 16. the Spirit Works and Word of God the great Provisions and Engagements of Divine Providence for us all that we are or have or meet with express of God's merciful regards to us and his compassionate concernedness for our universal welfare 3. Things for Heaven The Spirit of Grace the Word of Grace all the Ministers and means of Grace with all the Discipline and Encouragements which Providence sensibly affords us the Good and Evil things of time as ordered by God to fit us for and help us to the Glory which we look for The very Sons of men themselves considered in the relations which they bear to God and their expressiveness of his indearing Name and all those marks and notices which they bear and give us in the frame capacity and management of humane Nature of God's incomprehensible Wisdom Power Goodness c. O who can think hereon and yet be unprovoked to Love and to Good Works when as God is so eminently and endearingly discernible in all for God by all this courts our love And should I speak of the Sons of God and Heirs of Glory that Divine Workmanship which is in them and upon them the Impressions Reflections and Refractions of the Divine Nature and Life their capacity of growing up to all the fulness of God and to be eternally the beautiful and delightsome Temple of the Holy Ghost all their relations to the Holy Trinity with all their obligations to him their interest in him their business with him and for him and all their imitations and resemblances of him in their actual and possible motions and advances towards him and their Great Expectations from him Should I insist upon their membership with all the duties and advantages and pleasures which arise there from and pertinently illustrate and apply as I could easily and quickly do what doth so copiously occur in Eph. iv 4. 6. as the Central articles and holding bonds of Union and Endearments would you and I consider all these things and all the loveliness that would then be communicable or observable could our love want its provocation 2. The formal nature of this love 't is fit to be a provocation to itself i Joh. iv 16-21 7-12 This is the beauty health strength pleasure safety and renown of humane nature love is the aim and scope Knowledge the end of faith the Spirit of hope the life of practice and devotion and the bond of perfectness and the true transformation of the Soul into the image of its God No pleasing thoughts of God Christ Heaven or heavenly things no chearful motions towards eternity no foretasts of the highest bliss no warrantable claims thereto nor confident expectations of unseen realities No true and lasting bonds of friendliness in service and affections without this Spirit and state of love this only faces God in his own beautiful and delightful image this only turns the notions of divinity into substantial realities and so exalts the man above the pageantries of meer formal outside service and devotions and the truth is all that we say and do for God or with him and all our expectations from him are but the tricks and forgeries of deceitful and deceived fools and the most provoking Prophanation of the tremendous holy name of God and an abuse of holy things 3. The services which love must do and the fruits it must produce to God to Christ unto the Spirit unto our selves and others God himself must be reverenced addrest unto served and entertained like himself and walked with in all required and fit imitations of himself And all these cannot be without just valuings of and complacency in his eminent perfections near relations and the admirable constitutions and administrations of his Kingdom Christ must be duly thought on heartily entertained gratefully acknowledged and cheerfully obeyed submitted and improved unto the great and gracious purposes of his appearances performances and Kingdom and minded most delightfully in all the Grandeurs of his Grace and Throne the Holy Spirit must possess his Temple to his full Satisfaction and have the pure incense of his graces in their fragrant liberal and continual ascents Praying in the Holy Ghost Jude 20. And be feasted with the growthful and constant productions of his graces both in their blossoms and full fruits and we must be continually sowing to him if we hope to reap eternal life of him in Gal. vi 8. We must possess our selves in God and for him in our full devotedness and resignations of our entire selves to him pleasing our selves in this that we are not by far so much and so delightfully our own as his and that we cannot love our selves so well as when we find God infinitely dearer to us than we are to our selves And as for others much must we chearfully do and bear and be to bring poor Renegadoes back again to God to testify our great respects unto and pleasure in the grace of God in our fellow Christians to accommodate our selves to their edification concerns and to make our best advantage of every thing discernible in them Helping our selves and them in spirit speech and practice And can these things be brought to pass or our selves reconciled suited to all our Christian duties and interests without provoked love And for the solemnities transactions and results of the approaching day what is that day to those who have no love or very great declensions of it For all that come with Christ from Heaven come in the flames of love to God to godliness and Godly Ones and a Cold Heart will no way be endured there And as to fellow Christians the Duties and Counsels of the Text consideration adhering to the Assembling of our selves together mutual exhortations in the encouraging and quickning Prospect of this day can these things be without love III. The management of these provoking things And here let us follow the method of the Text it self Where we have these Topicks to insist upon 1. Persons must be considered each other and our selves 2. We are not to desert the Assemblings of our selves together as the manner of some is 3. We must exhort each other And so what one proposes the other must Consider
Entertain Accommodate and Improve to the great ends and benefit of the exhortation given 4. And the actuated knowledge of the approaching day must quicken us to and in the more serious and intense performance of these duties Exhorting by so much the more by how much the more as ye see the day approaching Let me but touch a little upon these things 1. Let us consider one another for this provoking work or in order to this Provocation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The word here in the Text imports strict observation of and great sollicitousness of thoughts about each other as to great matters for their Good So that we have 1. The Objects each other 2. The Act or Duty towards them Let us Consider 3. The end and scope To a provocation unto love and to Good works 1. The Objects One another 1. As to the great and Stated ends of our Creation and Redemption Such as the Divine nature and Life and Joy Gods image in us service from us and the delightful blissful and that eternal presence with us in the glorious discoveries and Communications of himself to us in heaven And as we are recovered redeemed by Jesus Christ So our loyalty gratitude and fruitfulness to him in all acknowledgements and improvements of his kind Conduct Government Providence and Grace unto the Fathers Glory through him As we are related to the Holy Ghost it is our correspondent Temper and Practice with Improvement of and our fit returns unto the Offered Accepted and Profest relations of the Spirit and his Communications to us his Operations in us and his Effects upon our Spirits that he might thereby suit us to the Concerns Priviledges of our Christian state and that we might be built up furnisht and possest as the Eternal Temple of the living God Linked and laid together and so related and obliged to each other dependant each on other and consequently useful and delightful in being heartily and practically faithful each to other unto the Edification of the whole in love that so God three in One may be eternally and evidently All to Universal Satisfaction For we were made and bought and are committed to the care of Christ and of the Spirit and we are accordingly entrusted with Gospel helps and means that we might hereby be the Mirrours of Divine Communicable excellencies and perfections the Monuments of prosperous and rich Grace and Instruments of special Service For these ends God Created and Redeemed us and in respect hereto are we to be considered each by other 2. As to our capacity of serving and reaching such Great Ends and Purposes The powers of our Souls the members of our Bodies and all our natural accommodations for these Ends. For we are men and so have faculties and powers naturally capable of and formed to a propenseness and appetite to the Supream Good and thereupon receptive of all the attractive influences of the first cause and were it not for our moral depravations and Corruptions and alienations of heart herefrom which we have sinfully contracted espoused and indulged considering Divine Discoveries Assistances and Encouragements procured for us and dispensed to us by Jesus Christ what hinders our return to God and unto those reciprocations of Endearments betwixt him and us to which by our rational Frame and Constitution we are so admirably suited Are we not capable of discerning what may excite enflame preserve and regulate our love and of the fixing and managing it accordingly We are capable of judgment choice and motion and reposes right objects being set before us in their apt illustrations and addresses So that we cannot speak to bruits and stones as we may do to men For nothing but sinful ignorance prejudice negligence and malignity or sad delusions and mistakes through inconsiderateness and unreasonable avocations and diversions can prevent the return of our first love and all these things may be redrest by our judicious well advised and warm discourses about these things duly attended to impartially considered and prudently and pertinently applied unto our selves Thus mistakes may be Rectified known Truths and Notions actuated Hearts affected Lives reformed and Love restored to its regular Fervours and Productions of Good works He that is capable of knowing what he is to do and why and of doing and being what most concerns and best becomes him deserves to be accordingly considered by us 3. As to our obligations and advantages as we are Creatures Subjects Favourites As we are redeemed to God by Christ so our obligations to the returns of Gratitude should be considered by us ii Cor. v. 14 15. We are Christs and Gods by him and so he must be glorified in the whole man i Cor. vi 20. And all the vast advantages of our Gospel day as they are talents and encouraging advantages put into our hands must be considered by us too and our selves and one another as Steward 's entrusted and accountable ii Pet. i. 3 4. i 4.11 So that we must regard each other as under ties and bonds to God and Christ and as greatly helped and furnished to be provoked thus if well considered and managed accordingly 4. As to our Spirits and behaviour according to our Christian Claims and Helps Relations Obligations and Professions Whether we foot it right or not Gal. ii 14. Whether professours value their Souls to their just worth or not in keeping them intent upon their great concern whether their furniture discipline temper and behaviour bear evidently their fit and full proportion hereunto How Gospel transforming and reforming work goes on with them Whether the Christian name and interest the Gospel and its Patron be credited and promoted or disgraced and hindred by us and whether our proficiency and improvements be answerable indeed to our advantages obligations and professions 5. Wherein our helps and hopefulness or our dangers mainly lye their Gifts and Graces and Encouragements and Advantages on the one hand Their Constitutions Customs Callings Company Temptations and secular Concerns and Hindrances on the other hand are all to be considered 2. The Act or Duty towards these Objects 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us Consider 1. Bend your minds to observation of one another that ye may understand how matters are with one another concern your selves about the right knowledge of the principles tempers actions circumstances and concerns of persons so far as your duty towards them calls you to it For this injunction doth not countenance what we find elsewhere forbidden ii Thes iii. 11 12. i Tim. v. 13. i Pet. iv 15. So far as you may do or get Good prevent redress or allay evil under such circumstances relations and advantages as may notify that God then calls you to it and so encourages your expectations and endeavours of doing Good or preventing the sin and mischief which God would have prevented by you So far may others be inspected enquired after and observed by you But when it is and evidently appears to be to
of Christ in himself and in the world Such an one as valued carnal things above spiritual earthly above heavenly and a small fleshly enjoyment above so great and advantageous a priviledge as the Primogeniture Secondly Prophaneness is attributed to things Thus in 1 Tim. 4.7 Refuse prophane and old Wives Fables by which we are according to learned men to understand either the absurd Jewish stories or some superstitious persons forbidding to marry and the use of sundry sorts of meats or those idle and foolish Doctrines which place the worship of God in such low and pittiful things as external sapless Rites and Ceremonies Forms Modes and Gestures But further those things are plainly and notoriously prophane which are sinful and wicked Debauchery is prophaneness in Grain a wicked life is a prophane life To Lye and Swear and Curse and Whore are acts of prophaneness for people to drive on their worldly Trades to buy and sell in Houses Shops or Streets upon the Sabbath-day are acts of prophaneness This is a prophaning of that day which God hath separated from the rest of the days and sanctified and set apart for holy use his own worship and service and the good of Souls In short all that which is contrary to the Divine Law those excellent and blessed Rules which God hath been pleased in his Word to give out unto us for the right management of our selves and ordering of our Lives and Conversations in the World all that I say is prophaneness whether it be Impiety or Immorality Our second work is to enquire what we are to understand by the suppressing of prophaneness To this I answer in general the suppressing of it doth signify the keeping of it under If prophaneness be not carefully look'd to but let alone it will quickly grow to an head and soon over-spread and over-top all It must therefore be kept down and if through the negligence of some and the impudence of others it be got to an height it must be knockt down Such tough humours in the body Politick need and call for strong Purges and Civil Magistrates who are the State-Physicians cannot be better imployed than about such works as that More particularly I shall mention two things which the suppression of prophaneness doth carry in it A prevention of 1. The acts of prophaneness 2. The growth of it First There must be a prevention of the Acts of prophaneness Prophane principles in the heart of a man lying still and as it were dormant not breaking forth are out of the reach of others Neither the Magistrates Sword be it never so long nor the Ministers Word if alone and unaccompanied with the Divine Spirit can reach it or prevail against it That is the mighty and glorious work of the great Jehovah who alone knoweth the Heart and searcheth it and can change alter and mend it None but he that made the heart at first can mould it anew None but he can cast Salt into that Spring none but he can graft such holy principles as to make a corrupt tree good But wicked and prophane practices in the lives of men as are the wretched products fruits and issues of base and cursed principles may be curb'd restrain'd and prevented So that though the wickedness of the wicked will not depart from him yet it shall not be committed with that frequency and boldness and openness as it hath been and to this very day is With shame and sorrow be it spoken In the Heb 12.15 Look diligently lest any man fail of the Grace of God lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you You may understand it both of unsound doctrine abominable practices but I am now only to deal with the latter Sin lust corruption in the heart is a root of bitterness yielding that which is bitter to God his Soul hates and abhors it And it is bitter to man in the sad direful consequences and effects of it which when the foolish self-humouring sinner comes to tast he will certainly find worse than Gall. Sin is his dainties he rolls it as a delicious morsel under his tongue but it will prove the poison of Aspes within him Now it nearly concerns every one to endeavour the pulling up of this root in his own heart let him set both his hands to the work let him lay the axe to it and call God in to his assistance It is ten thousand thousand times more desireable to have in you that root of the matter which holy Job spake of than to have this root of bitterness in you But then it ought to be the care of all specially Governours both in Families Churches Kingdoms and Nations they should look diligently to it that this root do not pullulare spring up if at any time it begins to peep and shew its head oppose it with might and main trample upon it with the foot of just indignation never suffer it to shoot up bud and bring forth Though men will not be so good as they should do not give them leave to be as bad as they would It is not in your power to dry up the fountain but it is a part of your duty to dam up the streams and though you cannot eradicate mens vitious habits yet you must restrain their outward acts 1 Timothy 1.20 Of whom are Hymeneus and Alexander whom I have delivered unto Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme A strange way of cure to prevent sin by giving men up to the Devil yet such as God prescrib'd and prosper'd After the same manner let flagitious Persons be delivered up to punishment that so though they will not virtutis amore for the love of virtue yet formidine poenae for fear of punishment they may learn to bridle themselves and not to do any more so wickedly as they have done One great end of punishment being the reclaiming and amending the offender if he be not past hope Secondly There must be a suppression of the growth and spreading of prophaneness I shall hereafter shew you a little more fully how that sin is like some unhappy weeds that if once they get into a ground and be not timely dealt with will in a little while run far and near and overspread the whole they do not need any encouragement it is enough for them to be let alone Of all Weeds this wickedness is the worst and most diffusive of itself a prophane wretch is like one that hath the plague he is indeed a pest or common plague in the place where he is his very breath and touch his discourses and actions are infectious he goeth up and down tainting those with whom he doth converse who are not of healthful constitutions of Souls and well antidoted with the fear and awe of God And this was one reason that the Apostle Paul gives in the forementioned Heb. 12. why he would have such special care taken to prevent the springing up of any root of bitterness lest thereby many
the World shall see that in due time he will overturn them all That yea that throne shall have fellowship with God which doth punish mischief by a Law We have had for some considerable time a great deal of discourse about Penal Laws and men have been much divided in their sentiments and apprehensions concerning them for my part I think that Nation is extreamly deficient which is altogether without them the Hedge of it is taken away the Wall of it is broken and it will easily be troden down But I heartily wish and pray that all Penal Laws may be framed according to the mind of the Supream Law-giver Let the ax be whetted as sharp as it should be so that its edge be once turn'd and always kept the right way Spare neither odious Idolatry nor unsociable Popery nor damnable Heresy nor destructive prophaneness but under your shadow let Religion Truth and the Power of godliness live and a Scriptural Reformation grow and be carried on towards its perfection Fourthly Let righteous and good Laws that are made have their free course and the Sword of Justice be drawn and not suffered to lye rusting in the Scabbard as it will certainly do when put into the hand of a careless Gallio or of persons that allow themselves in the Commission of those sins which the Law condemns or in the hand of those that have not something of courage and a greatness of Spirit Justice at all times is not to be expected from a wicked and debauched Person or a Coward A fearful Magistrate or Civil Officer in a City Town or Countrey is as bad and as great an absurdity as a timorous and white-liver'd Souldier in the Field for as the one will fly before a Bullet so will the other fall before a frown and so while his heart fails him the hand of justice grows feeble His fear will sometimes keep him from doing of that which is right and at other times it will put him upon the doing of that which is wrong This was the cause of Pilates miscarriage and made way for the unjust condemnation and Crucifixion of the best and holiest the greatest and most glorious person in the World our dear Lord Jesus The Jews indeed were madly set for his death but Pilates wife sent him this message Have thou nothing to do with that just man He himself said that he found no fault in him which he thrice repeated and when he saw the Jews were resolved he took water and washed his hands before the multitude if that would have done saying I am innocent of the blood of this just Man But when the people cried out If thou let this man go thou art not Caesars Friend he was afraid and delivered him up to sufferings But I am guilty of digressing That which we were speaking of is the execution of righteous Laws For to what purpose are they made Surely not only to be read or talked of and lye by or be set up as meer scare-crows in Trees to keep Birds from Cherries but to be made use of as occasion requires There must be not only speaking against sin but striking at it else it will not down In Rom. 13.4 The Apostle tells us that Rulers bear not the Sword in vain By the Sword he means that of Authority and Power good Laws together with all the means and instruments of punishment and they are not to bear this Sword in vain It must be brandished wielded and sheathed in the bowels of sin What are the best Laws but a Company of dead things unless Magistrates put life into them by a vigorous Execution And it is very sad at any time when there is cause given of saying there is a Law against prophaning of the Lords day a Law against Swearing a Law against Drunkenness and Whoredom but where is the man that doth put these Laws in Execution There are many wretches that break the Laws but where are those that will make them feel the Penalty This is the honour of a City and the comfort of a People when it may be said here is a good Law against such a vice and such a vice and here is a good Mayor a good Justice of Peace a good Constable that will execute it Good Laws without good Magistrates and Officers will never make a people happy But further As there must be an execution of righteous Laws so an impartiality in that execution Judgment should run down as Water and righteousness as a mighty stream Amos 5.24 In a constant current without interruption bearing down all before it all private and little considerations that would break it off As to those Justice ought to be blind not seeing nor taking notice of them And Laws ought not to be cobwebs that catch the little flies and let the great ones make their way thorough The greater the person is that offends the greater and more heinous upon that very account is the offence which he commits His greatness is an aggravation and renders his sin of a much deeper dye The nearer the offender is to the Magistrate the greater is the Magistrates honour in punishing him It was the honour of Levi and as such it is set and left upon record Deut. 33.9 That he said unto his Father and to his Mother I have not seen him neither did he acknowledge his Brethren nor knew his own Children for they have observed thy word and kept thy Covenant This refers to that Execution which had been by them done upon those who had worshipped the Golden Calf And as this is a great honour to the Magistrate so will it strike a great terrour upon by-standers Whereas that Officer who is known to pardon a Malefactor upon this or that or the other by-respect will not himself know how to punish it in another The very remembrance of that remissness and neglect would make his hand tremble when he draws his Warrant or makes his Mittimus Psal 106.3 Blessed are they that keep Judgment and he that doth righteousness at all times Non abreptus affectibus periculis spe lucri c. Not byast nor diverted by affections fear of danger hope of gain or any thing of like nature Fiat justitia ruat coelum Let who will be displeased and what will follow justice ought to be done For want of this prophaneness and all manner of abominations will greatly increase and abound according to that in Eccl. 8.11 Because sentence against an evil work is not speedily executed therefore the heart of the Sons of men is fully set in them to do evil They grow audacious and desperate they are resolved upon their way they go on with a full sail to the Commission of sin And if the meer deferring of judgment will produce so bad an effect what will not the total neglect of it or partiality in it do Fifthly An excellent way therefore for the attainment of this excellent end the suppression of prophaneness is the putting of the
is in our Streets All that know you may it please your most excellent Majesty know that you have a great deal of important and weighty work continually before you which must necessarily fill your Royal Head with Thoughts and your Heart with Cares that keeps your eyes waking while others sleep without Interruption or Disturbance There is abundant reason for us all to pity your burdens and to pray that you may be counselled by the God of Wisdom and supported by the God of Power and have the Arms of your Hands made strong by the Everlasting Arms of the God of Jacob but no reason for any Protestant among us to envy your Honour and other Prae-eminences which are just though too small recompences for the hazzards you have run and the Kindness you have shewn and the Thoughts Cares and Pains you have taken for the saving of a People looked upon as being within a very few steps of Ruine None knows the weight of a Crown but he that wears it While it glisters it sits heavy yet Great Sir among those other Affairs which do incessantly engage you let the promoting of Morality and Piety the beating down of Ungodliness and Prophaneness put in for and obtain a principal share for they do deserve it And oh that other Magistraâ—â—s would contribute what in them is to the promoting of the true Religion the Power of Godliness and a Scriptural Reformation together with an hearty and vigorous Suppression of Prophaneness remembring that it is the great and Holy God who hath by the hand of his Providence put into your hand the Sword of Justice which ought not to rust there you must not bear it in vain but draw it when and use it as need requires And if the making of good Laws and denouncing of Judgments in the penalties contained in them be not sufficient to curb vice and to keep men within compass lift up your selves as those that know it is your part As the Ministers of God to execute wrath upon them that do evil If menaces will not do there must be a proceeding to Execution and if shaking the Rod over the Head doth not reach the end there must be a laying of it upon the back only be sure that it is indeed upon the back of them that do evil And unto such it doth concern you to be a terrour for that is the Will of God as my Text tells you It must and will be readily granted that a pleasant and smiling aspect is very grateful because lovely and an affable obliging carriage doth exceedingly become and adorn great Ones but sometimes it is needful for them to cloath themselves with terrour that they might make the most stout-hearted Sinners to tremble Magistrates should not be like Jupiters blocks for Vermin to skip upon and play with An undue and foolish lenity will render them contemptible and the wicked more audacious so as to lift up their horn on high and declare their Sin as Sodom When Justice and Mercy are mingled with a judicious and skilful hand they will constitute a Government of a most excellent temper Vse 2. I shall also be free to speak a few words to my Reverend Fathers and Brethren in the Ministry of what Judgment and Perswasion soever they are about those things which have been and are matters of difference and controversie among us You would all of you be received honoured and attended unto as the Ministers of the Lord Jesus Christ My request unto you is that you would approve your selves and convince all that you are such by your preaching Christ up and Sin down all manner of Sin all sorts of Filthiness both of the Flesh and of the Spirit Spare none neither small nor great Be sure that what offends you doth offend God as well as you and then bend your Bow and level your Arrows at it But as for the over-grown prophaneness of the Age which you cannot but know doth so greatly abound in the midst of us set your selves with all your might not only to lop off it's luxuriant branches but if possible to pull it up by the very roots Do not in the bowels of love I beseech you do not rend and tare one another do not waste and spend your precious and swiftly flying time your heat and strength about those things which your Consciences tell you are Adiaphorous or Indifferent and some of you have by Word of Mouth and in your writings owned and acknowledged to be so and a zealous contending for them and stiff upholding of them will break the Peace both of Church and State as it hath done ever since the beginning of the Reformation but will never afford you solid Comfort and a well-grounded Peace when you come to lie upon a Death-bed and the King of Terrours with his grim and gastly countenance shall look you in the face But labour with might and main against that root of bitterness prophaneness which if you know any thing as you ought to know you cannot but know is of a damnable Nature and will if not prevented and heartily repented of cast and sink particular Persons into the bottomless pit of Eternal Perdition and also bring ruine upon an whole Nation so that though Noah Samuel and Job should stand before God and plead for them yet his mind could not be toward them Do not you admit to the Table of your Lord filthy Swine that wallow in the Mire of all prophaneness Swearers Drunkards and others of that black guard do not look like guests meet for such a Solemnity not like such as the Holy Jesus will bid welcome Do not you seal to them an Interest in all the Blessings of that Covenant which they wickedly violate nor in the saving benefits of that most precious Blood which was indeed shed for Sinners but is by them trampled under foot as if it were an unholy thing and had purchased for them a lawless Liberty or License to be Unholy Do not you receive them to a distinguishing Ordinance who run with the herd and are not by their lives and actions distinguished from the worst and vilest Remember that old saying and very good one Sancta Sanctis Holy things for holy Persons And consider what our Lord said to the Prophet Jer. 15.19 If thou take forth the precious from the vile thou shalt be as my mouth He will have his Servants sever the good and the bad giving his Promises and Seals to the former denying them to the latter He will have his Stewards to be faithful feasting his Children with the dainties of his House but not throwing them away to Dogs and those that do so He will own Thus do ye and by so doing you will come forth to the help of the civil Magistrate against those mighty abominations which Domineer and Reign among us Considering the place you are in and that solemn work you have engaged in one would expect that all of you should be holy not only by
Heaven above and blessings of the deep that lieth under blessings of the Breasts and of the Womb let his blessings prevail above the blessings of all his Progenitors unto the utmost bounds of the everlasting hills let them be upon his head and the head of his dearest Consort For I hope time will make it further evident that He is a singular Instrument raised up by God for the effecting of great and glorious things in the world and for the Church of Christ which hath been in so many Places for so many Years afflicted tossed with tempests and not comforted Yea that he is designed for an Avenger to execute wrath upon him and them who have been the Plague of the Christian World and have made it their work and delight to destroy the Earth and their design to erect to themselves a Monument of Glory out of the Ruins of Kingdoms and the Protestant Religion Secondly Let me desire you to facilitate the work of Magistrates and make it as easie to them as you can You that are Masters of Families having Children and Servants under you and understand your work and desire to go through with it find that you have enough to do in your narrow and little spheres your small Cock-boats call for much care and pains We that are Pastors of Churches have a great deal more e'en so much as makes our Heads and Hearts to ake and we cry out with holy Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who is sufficient for these things People do little think those many thoughts which gracious and faithful Ministers have both day and night the multitude of those cares which they take the burdens which often lie upon their Spirits and the many bitter sighs and groans which upon various accounts they do utter in their private recesses when they are alone with God But yet what is this all this to that load which lieth upon the shoulders of our Sovereign who sits as Pilot at the Helm of so great a Ship and upon whom cometh daily not only the care of Three Kingdoms but as doubtless I may safely add of the whole Protestant Interest which hath been so desperately struck at yea and of all the Churches who have felt the fury of Oppressors that have put yokes of iron upon their necks And not only the King whose Place is highest and Province hardest but others also who are employed by and under him do find they have enough to do The Lord Mayor the Justices of Peace the Petty Constables Beadles Watchmen have enough to do How many avocations have they from their own Callings and particular Affairs which for their own and Families good must be attended to and how many Troubles and Vexations have they in the management of their Places I would therefore prevail with you to pity them and to help them and to take off from their burden all that you can This will be an argument of your being acted by a Spirit truly Christian and it doth very well become all good Subjects When Jethro the Father-in-Law of Moses came to the Camp of Israel in the Wilderness and saw all that Moses did to the People He spake thus to him Exod. 18.8 Thou wilt surely wear away c. for the thing is too heavy for thee thou art not able to perform it thy self alone So I say Our King will wear away He is but a Man His Strength is not the strength of Stones nor is his Flesh of Brass He is made of flesh and blood as well as others and is subject to the same infirmities decays and strokes that others are and truly his life deserves to be exceeding precious in our eyes He is the breath of our Nostrils and our Life and Peace our Comfort and Happiness is very much bound up in him And therefore we have and I hope we shall more and more see that we have a great deal of reason to contribute all that we can to the lengthening out of his days and making his life comfortable But the weight of Government is too heavy for him I mean as good old Jethro did He is not able to perform it himself alone To deal with England's enraged Enemies abroad and with England's daring Sins at home is too much for him alone nay may I not go farther It is too much for his Privy Council and Parliament too yea and for all inferiour Magistrates and Officers too Take them altogether and it is too much for them alone I do therefore earnestly beseech you all to put your helping hand to the work and yield them all the assistance that you can We have as my Experience and constant Observation tells me a Spirit of discontent and complaining very busie and active though indeed often times not without too much cause And the Lord grant those who are now our Rulers may have such a Spirit of Wisdom and Government plentifully poured out from Heaven upon them that they may never give good Men any that those who have an Interest in God and will certainly be heard at the Throne of Grace may never be constrained to go with their just Complaints But how many are there that do without cause fill their mouths with Complaints and call those faults which are not and throw dirt in the faces of Persons in place But I will ask this one question what do these Complainers do in order to the amending of that which is amiss Our Streets would be clearer than they are if every one would sweep before his own Door And Reformation would happily become Universal if every one would be a Self-Reformer And oh that you would be so Oh that others would be so Oh that all would say what Elihu doth in Job tell us is meet to be said unto God What I know not teach thou me and if I have done iniquity I will do so no more I shall yet divide this my Exhortation into two branches First I shall speak unto those who are Governours of Families and have Children and Servants under their inspection apply to your Duty there Would you gladly see all things well abroad as far as you can every one of you take care that they be so at home You that are Parents must know and consider that that God who gave you Children hath committed to you the care and charge of their Souls And you that have Apprentices ought likewise to know and consider that the Souls as well as the Bodies of your Apprentices are committed to your care by their Parents or Friends and are your charge likewise And the same is true as to your other menial Servants so long as they shall continue under your Roof as such and accordingly you are under a strict Obligation for looking after them That is not a thing which you may do or leave undone as you please but you are bound to it You ought to be their keepers for you are responsible for them And if thorough your neglect and carelessness any
what there is in that prophaneness and numberless number of God-daring abominations which are to be found in the midst of us In short this is that which I propound and desire of you judge of sin by its utter contrariety to the great holy and ever blessed God and by the sufferings of Christ who was his peoples surety and died a Sacrifice the iniquities of them all being laid upon him and by the fatal consequences of sin upon men and Devils yea upon the whole world upon the face whereof it hath thrown dirt and deformity and in the bowels whereof it hath caused Afflictive Painful Agonies and Convulsions Secondly Be sure that all of you get your hearts filled and awed with the true fear of God In which you ought and are commanded to be all the day Prov. 23.17 Lye down at night in it awake and rise in the morning in it and so walk up and down in all Places and Companies and about all your businesses and affairs No persons in the world are so audaciously and impudently vile as those who have their hearts hardned from this fear That passage is very observable which you find in Psal 36.1 The transgression of the wicked saith within my heart there is no fear of God before his Eyes Sin hath a voice it cries aloud in the Ears of God and it speaks loud to men to the hearts of good men It speaks that which grieves and saddens them it speaks that which informs them So here The transgression of the wicked his visible and open transgression the life he leads which is flagitious the course he takes which is Leud the Villanies he commits these speak within my heart saith David they speak to my mind and understanding but what do they say Enough so much as amounts to a plain and full evidence so much as is to me a sufficient and firm foundation to build this conclusion upon that there is no fear of God before his Eyes Either he doth not believe that there is a God or else he believes that he is not a terrible God a Consuming Fire and Everlasting Burnings but such an one as himself Psal 50.21 A God not to be trembled before but to be trifled and plaid with One that did not mind what is done here below or that hath pleasure in wickedness as he hath himself What was the reason that Abraham though a good man eminently good and strong in faith yet was not willing to have it publickly known that Sarah was his Wife when he sojourned in Gerar You have the account thereof given in Gen. 20.12 I thought surely the fear of God is not in this place Here is not the worship of God therefore here is not the fear of God but what did he gather from thence What if there be not the fear of God Then there is the fear of nothing they will stick at nothing they will have their will they will stay me for my Wifes sake This is indeed a sweet Place a lovely and pleasant Countrey it wants for no earthly accommodations but as I Conjecture and that not without reason the best and principal thing is wanting here is none of the fear of God and where there is not that curb to restrain men they will certainly run wild and their impetuous lusts will hurry them into the vilest and most monstrous practices Vbi non est timor Dei ibi regnant omnia vitia All vices reign and rage in those places where the fear of God hath not a commanding power Whereas on the other side no persons do hate and oppose sin so much as those who do fear God most for this is that which doth teach men and that effectually to depart from evil Former Governours did so and so but said good Nehemiah so did not I because of the fear of God There was none like Job in all earth and it is said of him by the Lord himself that he feared God and eschewed evil He avoided and resisted it This fear will set the heart of a man against sin and constrain him to lift up his hand against it or his voice at least when there is not any power in his hand Wheresoever there is the fear of God as the greatest and best good there will inseparably accompany it the fear of sin as the basest and worst of evils and that person will be sure to make an universal opposition to it wheresoever it is to be found both in himself and in others at home and abroad in enemies and in Friends too yea in them most As a man that hath a natural antipathy to a Viper cannot endure it lying in his bosom nor lurking in his Chamber no nor creeping in the high-way Thirdly Pray that your Souls may be fill'd and fix'd with an holy zeal for God A zeal for his name and honour for his Law and Interest Cold Lukewarm and basely indifferent persons will never be famous and renowned upon the account of any vigorous appearings for God or against sin A sordid Spirit of indifferency greatly unworthy of every one that is honoured with the Christian name doth evermore carry along with it a Spirit of Slothfulness and Inactivity let the matter be never so important the concern never so great In Acts 18. you read that the blind and hardned Jews with one accord made insurrection against Paul and the Greeks took Sosthenes the Apostles Friend and Companion and beat him before the Judgment Seat but Gallio appear'd neither against the one nor the other He cared for none of those things He thought what were those things to him I believe this wretched Spirit influenceth and acts many a great many among us God is greatly dishonoured his name is taken in vain his precious Sabbaths are openly and wickedly prophaned Religion suffers in its honour and interest the Nation is indanger'd and exposed to the dismal effects of divine indignation young ones are corrupted perverted and drawn aside to their destruction and wrath is pulling down apace and who can tell how soon a holy jealous provoked God may unstop his vials and distribute sorrows in his anger But what is all this to them so long as they can follow their callings and enjoy themselves and gratify their proud vain wanton humours and go fine and fare well and lay up money and live in quiet and mirth and plenty But let me be believed by you whilest I tell you that if there were in you a zeal for the honour and interest of God you would judge and conclude that this is something to you and this concerns you and accordingly it would go to your very hearts and be as a Sword in your bones as it was in the holy Prophet's which extorted from him that passionate exclamation Is it not enough for you to weary men but you will weary my God aâ—so It was this holy zeal that put Eleazar upon that Heroick act of taking such speedy revenge as he did upon
this great World than to make the smallest Atome of it And God Redeemer saveth Mary Magdalens as well as Virgin Mary Very Sampson we are sure is in Heaven Heb. 11.32 But In respect of Things themselves and of their Appearances unto us all Effects be not of equal Facility nor all Events to be alike hoped for Much easier is the bending of a Green Twig than of an Old Oak More hopeful the cure of a Green Wound than of an Old putrifi'd Sore There is more to be done to Convert a Man of Belial than a Child of Belial and to Convert an Old Man than any other Man And we may justly expect better Success when we call unto God the Boys and Girls playing in the Streets than when we call Old Men and Women that can scarcely walk in them This I am desired to shew And I shall endeavour it in the best way unto the best end to wit the promoting of Early Piety I have fair and full occasion given me if I can take it from the Text which I therefore commend to your Observation ECCLES 12.1 Remember now thy Creator in the Days of thy Youth Or as some read it Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy Choice THE Words are a Stricture of an Excellent Sermon It was preached as mine is to be unto Childhood and Youth It begins at the Ninth Verse of the former Chapter and ends at the Eighth Verse of this The Spirit of God preached it by the Wisest of Men and not the least of Kings And hath thereby taught a pair of Truths that I must wish better learnt I. The God of Heaven takes great care of our Children and sends the Holy Ghost unto Young School-Boys as well as Old Church-Members We have him here in his Sacred Oracles preaching unto Boys and Girls Yea and Blessed Bishop Vsher was neither the first or the last that was Converted by him at Ten years of Age or earlier II. The greatest Doctors need not think scorn in Christ's School to be Vshers and to teach Children the A B C of Religion Solomon thought not himself undervalued by it And he that will look on it as a Work below him he ought to prove that a greater than Solomon is he Immortal Luther preferr'd his Catechism above all his Works But I return This Sermon forepraised consists of Two Parts 1. A Dehortation from sinful Passions and Pleasures Which is edged with a most emphatick Irony or Derision Pressed with a Threat of God's damnatorie Judgment And shut up with a cooling consideration of both the feathery Lightness and the winged Transitoriness of Youthful Enjoyments Eccles 11.9 10. 2. An Exhortation unto the Choice and Prosecution of saving Religion This is in my Text Wherein it is guarded with an admirable Prolepsis preventive of all shifts and procrastinations And in the next Words and Verses is reinforced with numerous Arguments Arguments as many as Old Age hath Maladies and as Vnprepared Death hath Terrors And these all cloathed with Language hardly to be matched in all the Sacred Writings But I must confine me to my Text Wherein are obvious 1. The Duty commanded to be done 2. The Parties commanded to do it 3. The Time wheâ—ein they are commanded to do it The Duty is Conversion unto God Inchoative and Progressive Conversing Entrance into Continuance and Progress in the State of Holiness The State of Reconciliation unto and Communion with God With God the Father Son and Spirit all joyntly as One God and each distinctly as Three Persons Learned Men do judge this latter to be here designed by the Plural Number of the Hebrew Word All Interpreters acknowledge that the required Remembrance imports no less than the foresaid Conversion And it will be evident if these things be consider'd Words of Knowledge Affection and Practice do ever connote one the other Because the Faculties of our Souls be like the Links of a Chain so united that they go all together Draw one all come Wherefore when the Holy Ghost summons all he useth to name but one of them He never commands us to Know Remember Love or Serve God but he commands us to do them all Now to do all these is to Convert unto God And to do less is not to Remember our Creator as he doth require Besides The Connexion of End and Means is indispensable Where any Means are required it is certain the End of these Means is also required And it is very plain that the meer Historical Remembrance of God is but a Mean Conversion foresaid is the end of it That End without which the Remembrance of God could only make us the more like unto the Devil Who indeed doth never Forget but doth still Hate his Creator And no mind can bear the thought of Gods requiring such a Remembrance It must therefore be one efficacious unto its End that is here meant Nor is it unworthy of our Notice That the word Creator here is big with Argument And such as carries Obligation unto the very utmost of the foresaid Conversion For it speaks God's Interest in us Were we made by him Then were we also made for him and are his and not our own It expresseth also his speciality of Interest in us being as we are elsewhere told he made us in his own Image If so he made us unquestionably for his especial Service It no less setteth forth his Preservation of us too for who but he who made us should have Power or Will to maintain us Briefly it manifests his Power to destroy us and his very good Reason so to do if we do less after our Apostacy and his Provision for our Recovery than thus Convert unto him The Parties here Commanded to Convert are the same as are nominated Eccl. 11.9 Possessors of Childhood and Youth Learned Mercer saith all in a word Totam aetatem storeatem compliciitur By Childhood and Youth the Holy Ghost intends the whole flourishing Age of Life The same Hebrew word signifying Youth and Choice we take them all to be comprehended who are yet in the best and most desirable forepart of their dayes All from them whose Morning doth but yet dawn to those whose Clock hath struck Twelve and with whom its Noon The little Creatures whose Twilight doth but just serve them to read the first Principles of Religion The bigger Children whose Sun is risen higher and who can see and are set to learn secular Arts and Trades and are capable of learning farther the Art of Living unto God The Youth eminently so called whose Day is come on and their Light Heat and Activity much exceed Childhood Nor exclude I them whose Sun is at hiâ—hest and who are as Men will speak in their Prime upon whom the Afternoon begins to draw apace though they yet retain Morning Vigour and preserve the Name of Young The Original words of Age are of so large signification And as on the other hand all the Periods of breaking
may not be expected to cleanse a Young Mans way nor any others Get a Promise from him to lend you his best Direction to thorough Conversion A Youth without a Pastor is a Child without a Nurse Direct 2. Vse him whom you chuse your Guide for your Soul and follow him as far as he follows Jesus Christ Hear him ordinarily a Child 's own Parents Milk is commonly best for it Write after him the Heads of his Sermon I mean and his Chief Notes Incomparable King Edward the Sixth used to write Sermon Notes Go often to his House and always to ask things worth his time and your own Little rest give him till Grace has blest his labors to fit you for the Lords Table Plainly tell him you shall count small good gotten by the Word till you are qualified for the Sacrament And that it is to you a dolorous thing to have but a Place in Gods House and no Room at his Table It looks as if you were but a Dog and not a Child Direct 3. Look alway and adhere closely unto God's Son and Spirit Without these the Holy Bible can no more make you wise unto Salvation than the Fables of Aesop that Papists dare compare it to The Word of Life is a Word of Death to you without these to make it beneficial These without whom you can expect no more Edification from the best Minister than from a blind Harper In all things ye want Jesus Christ for Acceptance in all you want the Holy Ghost for Assistance in all things and at all times Without right use of them no Soul can fetch a Breath of Divine Life or take a Step of Holy Walk Nature indeed shews you an Heavenly Father and ties all of you unto him But 't is only special Revelation Jupiter q. Juvani Pater reveals a Redeeming Son of God and an Holy Sanctifying Spirit of God And 't is much Grace and that much used too that can keep you close unto these VVithout which you may be great Socinians but no Christians Direct 4. Beware of setting against each other Gods Mercy Christs Merits Holy Faith and Good Works VVe cannot say to either of them we have no need of thee All are truly necessary and unspeakably But in the Countrey I saw it and in this City I see it most people do fix on some one of them and cry it up to the Exclusion of the rest To the virtual Exclusion Of so Epidemical and fatal a hindrance of Conversion beware you The Mercy of God! All the Rhetorick of Heaven cannot praise enough but wo be to you if you expect the Pardon of the least Sin by it otherwise than through Christs Merits The Merits of Christ These without question are infinite But you are undone if you dream you shall have the saving benefit of them Living and Dying without Marriage unto him by Faith Holy Faith Is a Grace most Precious by God most highly honoured and of all most honouring God Honouring him in some respects more than Adam's personal Obedience did before the Fall But mortally you erre if you look to put off God with it without Obedience And slight good VVorks as Supererogations Good Works Are the blessed Fruit of God's indwelling Spirit and the very end of our Election Redemption and Conversion But what then they be neither acceptable to God nor profitable to us but through the Gift of the Mercy the Purchase of the Merits and the Means of the Faith aforesaid If you rest on VVorks and imagine them otherwise good your Eternal Lodging will be among Evil-workers Young people make your Pastor set you well at rights about these things And let the Excellency Connexion Order and Necessity of them be judged worthy of your frequent and serious thoughts Direct 5. Be very Critical in the Choice of your Company Be sowre and unkind unto none Affable to all but pleased with Few to wit the Best Which are those that will either best teach you or best learn from you Companions of Fools are doomed to destruction But where ere you are walking with wise Men you are on your way to Heaven Prov. 13.20 Souls the most thoughtful of Eternity are still the most careful of their Company And it is certain the Company of your Choice in this World is both that which you would have and shall have in the next Direct 6. Besides the Holy Scriptures read ye such good Books as shall be commended to you by your Pastors 'T is not every good Book that is for you good Nor every one that will hereafter be good for you that is good Now. Your Pastors can judge best which are most sutable I think it Soul-Felony for you to be without the Westminster Assemblies Catechisms And I should think it as little needful to commend Mr. Baxter's Call or Mr. Alleyn's or Mr. How 's very Jewel of Yielding unto God or Mr. F. Fuller's Words to give Wisdom with his piece of Repentance and Faith or Mr. Lawson's Magna Charta England is blest with the best in this World and I do not light upon any that excel or equal them in England You must search farther than I have done young people if you find things better worth your most careful reading Books be dead things but God makes them oftentimes Lively Preachers These several last years many have acknowledged to me that they have been blessed Stars to lead them unto Christ Yet do not for your Lives ever neglect reading the Scriptures Take some portion of God's Word as daily as you eat of his Bread 'T is very honourably that I do remember a poor Soul who sometimes burned the Thatch of her House to read her Bible by the Light of it And no less a Saint than Mr. Richard Fairclough told me she died a glorious one It was Luther's saying The reading of the Scriptures is the terror of Devils Direct 7. Examine often the state of your Souls Scrupulousness it self is as much more safe as 't is less sweet than Audaciousness But humble and careful Inquisitiveness is sine naevo Venus as unspotted a Virtue as the state of Grace is adorned with Humility one calls the Violet of Graces of sweetest scent though lowest place And Care is the commanded Fear of falling short of Gods rest Heb. 4.1 The Exertion of humble Care in heart-searches doth answer many Gospel-precepts And when it is much and often it is not the least Evidence of truest grace For Bankrupts can no more endure much looking into their Count-books than sore Eyes can bear long beholding of Sun-shine And as impatient be Hypocrites of very much conning the Scriptures and their Hearts But I conclude Young people Mahomet gat the Turkish Empire by making extraordinary hast And Alexander Conquered the World by the same Policy Never Delaying Go you and out-do them Conquer VVorld Flesh and Devil And take by violence the Kingdom of Heaven by your hasting to Remember and Convert just now VVith great
necessary to our Common Weale Let us all cry Turn us O Lord and we shall or will be turned Frame your doings as men determined to turn unto the Lord. Set heartily to it with all your might for it 's hard work delay it not a moment Oh God bow our wills that the Land may jointly answer Lo we come unto thee Jer. 3.22 for thou art the Lord our God Can you pretend wherein shall we return Alas Mal. 3.7 wherein have we not departed from him All in a manner is out of frame every thing every person considerably needs amendment Let us all Unite in this and God will bless us with Light and Love for Union in other things This work needs all our hands let us make up that wherein others will be defective all striving to begin and outdo each other Oh that all emulation and strife were reduced to this which of us shall first and most Reform 3. If the generality will not be perswaded to repent of National Sins let not particular persons neglect it I am loath to descend so low yet this is better than none Who knows how many may be convinced by the Repentance of a few At least you may preserve your selves Ez. 9.4 6. and view the publick Calamity with more composure than other Men as having done your utmost to prevent them We know not but God may delay Judgments for the sake of a few remarkable Penitents though we may not commonly expect it Shall there be so great cause and none set themselves to it Hath God none among us that regard his loudest Calls Can there be so little Love to his Name and Honour in England that even a few will not afflict their Souls that he is so provoked that a few will not testifie against this common Apostacy Poor Nation that hast none that love thy wellfare that all will lose showers of Mercy for thee rather than sow in Righteousness Ezek. 22.30 Oh that some would resolve this day Let not God say I fought for a man but I found none Repent of your Personal Sins otherwise how can you repent of National Sins Examine thy self how far thou art infected with the National Provocations What hast thou contributed thereto Charge thy Soul therewith Say the measure is so much the fuller for my sake Bewail thy share mourn over the faults of others thou mayest grieve for what thou canst not reform but be sure to reform thy self to thy utmost reform thy Family yea set thy self to bring all thou art in thy place capable to amendment Do not judge of faults by the common Opinion let not the Example of others be thy Standard but set the Divine Rule before thee and review things thereby Resolve to stem the Tide and to judge and act in the face of it What though the multitude be against thee what though Bigots rail what though many Professors yea Men of thy own Party condemn thee All is nothing whiles God will accept and approve thee A Man must be singular that will reform himself in a degenerate Age he must be resolved that will attempt to reform others 2. Let us enquire whether we may expect National Mercies from our present frame and state I believe God will not forsake us but in time he will do us good But the Enquiry is meant thus Whether Mercy will be immediately enjoyed is the wrath of God turned away and will his progress in a way of Judgments be stopped Can we reasonably conclude though the Sword hath been furbished it shall not destroy Our Warfare is accomplished the Clouds are past the bitterness of Death is over Dare I say rejoyce O Land in the favour of a reconciled God For good only good shall presently be unto thee I shall by way of Objections give you what is matter of Hopes and in the Answer to those Objections give you the ground of my Fears and in the end declare my Thoughts Object 1. Are there not some Testimonies of National Repentance from whence we may hope Mercy is towards us As 1. Penal Laws against the Worship of God are as good as disannulled and Persecution is at a stop Answ 1. I wish the general remains of Malignity argue not a sorrow for that Liberty 2. I find most of them that were guilty of Persecution instead of repenting of it do justifie it as a just Prosecution though it was an Usurpation of the Rights of People as Men and as Christians 3. Are the Sacrament Test and Act of Uniformity removed 2. We had a publick Fast-day kept with outward Solemnity Answ I 'll judge of no Mans Heart yet I cannot but observe 1. The most polluting Sins of the Land were not solemnly owned much less bewailed Where was a publick acknowledgment of the sinful Silencing Two Thousand Ministers because they durst not profane their Office and plainly Lye and Perjure themselves I might name many such other sins alas general Confessions avail little 2. What publick Reformation in Life and Manners appears since that day What fewer Oaths Profaneness is no way abated Men are returned with the Dog to the vomit Now Fastings without amendment are but a mockery with God and profit not a people 3. Men are so far from Repentance that they cannot endure to be reproved for their sins They say you irritate if you mention their offences They like to hear others accused but abhor the least hint against their own faults Tell the imposer on the Church that uninstituted terms of Communion are sinful and rage is awakened Perswade the bitter Spirit to be Peaceable and his Tongue is soon envenomed and you shall be railed on as the great disturber Object 2. But a great part of the Land is innocent of some of the most notorious Crimes the sober Persons are many who share not in the Profaneness of the Land The persecuted and ejected cannot be guilty of the oppressions they were under and many of the Church of England never agreed thereto Answ 1. How little do such truly mourn for those sins of other Men How much more common is it to hear the better sort scoff and laugh at Profaneness than bewail it Persecutors are more railed at than mourned for By this we become guilty 2. Are not there iniquities with the soberer part of the Nation impenitently continued in to this day Do we see backslidings healed how much more Mortified Heavenly Circumspect Charitable or Fruitful are the hopefullest persons in the Land by all our Calls Yea our Complaints though so general little tend to alter us Isa 64.6 7. Our Righteousness is as filthy rags we fade as a leaf Object 3. But if we consider the Sovereign dealings of God with us may not we expect Mercy though we see not Repentance As 1. God hath lately wrought a great Deliverance when we were on the brink of ruin and that by a series of Miracles when we were as unworthy as we are now Answ