with the Godly so far as you confess you ought to do and would but Unite with us in faithfulness to the truths which you cannot deny I think it will be best to call you to the tryal in some particulars 1. I hope we are all Agreed that there is one only God that maâ—e us and preserveth us and Redeemed us and therefore that we are wholly his and should resign our selves and all that we have absolutely to him for his service He is not worthy the name of a man that denyeth this And shall we aâ—l Agree now in the Practice of this much Shall we wholly resign our selves and all that we have to God and labour to know what God would have us be and do and that let us resolve upon whatever the flesh or the world say to the contrary Were but this much well resolved on we were in a fair way to a full agreement 2. We are all Agreed in Opinion or Profession that this God is our only Happiness and his favour is better then all the world and that he is infinitely Wise and Good and Powerful and therefore that he must be Loved above all things whatsoever and must be most feared and served and trusted and depended on And shall we but Agree all in the Practice of this much O that you would but heartily consent and do it Did we but joyn together in Loving God above all and fearing and trusting and serving him before all we should quickly be of one heart and soul and in a very fair way to a perfect agreâ—ment 3. We are all Agreed that profess Christianity that sin hath made us miserable and brought us under the wrath and curse of God and that the Lord Jesus Christ having Redeemed us by his blood is the only Physitian and Remedy for our souls and having manifested such infinite Love in our Redemption and also purchased Dominion over us we are strongly bound to Rejoyce in his salvation and fly to him for Safety and rest upon him and live in the thankful admirations of his Love and in careful Obedience to his gracious Laws And shall we all Agree in the Practice of this much Will you fly to Christ with broken bleeding hearts for safety from sin and wrath and Hell and set more by him then by all the world Will you study with all Saints to comprehend his Love Eph. 3.18 19 and admire him and his mercies and devote your selves to him and be ruled by him O that we were but all agreed in this much 4. We are all agreed in Opinion or Profession that the Holy Ghost is the Sanctifier of Gods elect or of all that shall be saved and that except a man be born again by the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of heaven and that without holiness none shall see God and that no man is the Son of God that hath not in him the Spirit of his Son 1 Cor. 12.12 13. Eph. 4.5 Ioh. 3.5 6. Heb. 12.14 Rom. 8.9 Gal. 4.4 Were we but all such now as we are agreed we must be and would you but all Consent to this Sanctification and newness of life the great difference were healed and the work were done 5. Moreover we are all Agreed or seem to be so that the holy Scripture is the word of God and of infallible truth and therefore must be believed and made the Rule of our Judgements and our lives Shall we all agree now in the practice of this Will you appeal to the Scripture and shall it be our Rule If the flesh perswade you to another course and murmur at the strictness of Gods Word if custom be against it and the greater number be against it if your profits or pleasures or worldly honours be against it and your former opinions and practice have been against it will you yet believe the Scripture before all and be ruled by it above all the world You are agreed I hope that God is to be obeyed rather then men or then the flesh and the Devil Will you resolve that 〈◊〉 shall be so O if the Word of God might be the Rule how quickly should we be agreed For all the Popish cavils at its difficulty and mens divers expositions yet how soon should we be agreed 6. We are all agreed in Opinion or Profession that there is a heaven for the Sanctified even an endless unconceivable Glory with God in the seeing of his face and enjoying him in perfect Love and Joyes and that the seeking of this everlasting Glory should be the main and principal business of our lives which all things must give place to He that will deny this can have no pretence to call himself a Christian. O that we might but all agree in the practising of this and that the principal love and desire of our souls were set upon the Heavenly blessedness and the chiefest of our care and labour might be laid out for the obtaining of it Agree in this and all will be agreed at last 7. We are all Agreed in our profession that there is an Hell or state of endless torments where all the finally unsanctified and ungodly must be for ever But why do we not agree in the diligent avoiding of such a dreadful misery and using our best endeavours to escape it 8. We are all agreed in Profession that the flesh is our enemy and must be mortified But will you agree in the practice of this mortification We are agreed iâ— Profession that the world is our enemy and must be contemned and that it is a vain and worthless thing compared with the Glory that is to come But yet mâ—n 〈◊〉 not agree to renounce the world unfeignedly and to be stranger to it and part with all rather thâ—â— with God and a good Conscience but while men spâ—ak contemptuously of the world they seek 〈◊〉 far more eagerly then heaven We are agreed that the Devil is our enemy and yet men will not forsaâ—â— his service 9. We are all agreed in profession that sin is a most hateful thing hated of God condemned by his Word and the only cause of the damnation of souls And yet men love it and live in it with delight Shaâ—l we agree all to deal with sin as we speak of it Will Magistrates and Ministers and people joyn together to banish it out of Town and Countrey Particularly we are agreed I hope that whoredom and wantonness and gluttony and drunkenness and strife and envying and lying and deceit and cursing and swearing and railing and backbiting and speaking against an holy life are all groâ—s hateful damning sins which every Christian must abhor But why do you not agree in the hateing and forsaking and beating down of these sins But Town and Countrey swarmeth with them as a carkase doth with maggots or a stinking pond with frogs and toads So that Magistrates and Ministers punishments and perswasions the Laws of the Land and the Laws of God can do but little to
propoundeth Impossibilities to be agreed on is the enemy of agreement But it is impossible for us to come to you and so to Unite with you Thâ—s I now prove 1. â—t is Impossible to have any Vniversal Vnity but in an Vniversal Head and Center and that is only God the Father Son and Holy-Ghost As I told you the Army must Unite in the General the Kingdom in the Soveraign the Family in the Master the School in the School-master In order of Nature you must Unite with God in the Redeemer by the sanctifying Spirit before you can Unite with us But while you are unsanctified you are divided from God Do you not feel your minds strange to him your hearts draw back from him and find by his strangeness to you that there is a division It s impossible for us to be United to you till Christ be United to you For 1. It s against Nature seeing he is the Center and the Head and Fountain of Life And what good would it do you to be one with us and not with him 2. God is against any Unity without him If you will not begin with him he will take it but as a treasonable conspiracy and will break it We dare not go without him lest he be angry and destroy us Souldiers must not make either Peace or war not so much as treat without the General Do you not remember how Iehosaphat had like to have sped by a friendship and confederacy with Ahab 2. Moreover the Godly and ungodly are of contrary natures I told you God hath put an enmiâ—y between them You must chanâ—e your nature or we ouâ—s before we can Unite You may as well think else to Unite fire and water or to build in the air or to incorpoâ—â—â—â— fire and Gun-powder or to reconcile men and serpâ—nts and maâ—ry the dog and the bear together Sirs these â—hings are meer impossâ—bilities 2 Cor. 16.14 There is no agreement between Christ and Belial righteousness and unrighteousness light and darkness dâ—ath and life the members of Christ and the members of an harlot or a drunkard or such like We have contrary spirits how then can we be One One hath the Spirit of holiness and the other the Spirâ—â— of profaneness One is led by the Spirit of God and the oâ—her by the flesh We live not by one Law Gods will revealed in hâ—s Word is Our Law and the will of the flesh and the course of the world is your Law We live not on one sort of food how then can we accord together Christ and his heavenly truth and holy Spirit and Ordinances is the meat and drink of the Saints they cannot live without them And the world and fleshly delights are your food you cannot be without it Your food would be our poyson your worldly cares your drunkenness and profaneness would be a torment to an honest heart They cannot live without some Communion with God in Faith and Love by Prayer and â—editation and your heart is against it They have not the same â—nd as you have Their work is all for Heaven and yours is all principally for earth Their work and yours are contrary Thâ—y go one way and you another So that its Impossible to be United and agree till one side change And we cannot Possibly turn to you God holds us fast by his Love and Spirit and will not let us go nor suffer us ever to be willing to go Do you not read Christ â—elling you that its impossible to deceive the Elect that is so far as to turn them away from Christ. We are kept by the mighty power of God through faith to salvation 1 Pet. 1.5 And who can break away from the upholding arms of Almighty power Christ hath such hold of us that he is resolved none shall take us out of his hands Ioh. 10.28 So that we cannot come over again to you But you may come over to us if you will God calls you and Christ would welcome you and the Holy Ghost would hâ—â—p yâ—u the door is set open by the blâ—od of Christ the promise is â—o you and to your children that you may and shall have Christ and life if you will come in and accept the offer The Devil cannot hinder you against your wills he holds you but in the fetters of your own wilfulness by his meer deceits Seeing therefore that you may come over to the sanctified and they cannot possibly come to you let any reasonable man be judge on what terms we should unite and agree 2. Moreover if we Agree it must be on terms of wisdom and honesty A dishâ—nâ—st Agreement is not to be desired but abhorred For you to lâ—ave your ungodliness and turn to the Love and Fear of God is an honest coursâ— of Agreement for it is but to have dishonesty it selâ— and become honest I hope none of you dare charge the way of God and godliness with any dishonesty God calls you to nothing but what is holy and just and good and therefore Honesty requireth you to yield But for the sâ—nctified 〈◊〉 unsanctified for the 〈…〉 bâ—come ungodly to be one 〈◊〉 you this were the bâ—sâ—st dishâ—â—â—sty in the world We know your way to be of the Devil and 〈◊〉 flesh and is it honest then to joyn with you in it We have â—yed too long already in the dâ—â—es oâ— our ignorance and have found it dishonest and deceitful and would you have us go against our own experience We were once in the way that you are in and were forced to renounce it or else we had been undone body and soul for ever and should we â—â—ck up the vomit which we were forced to cast out we were once Agreed with you and God constrained us to break that Agreement and shall we renew it again Alas your way hath cost us dear Many a bitter repenting day and many a sad thought to the breaking of our hearts and the very sense of Gods displeasure a taste of Hell was cast into our consciences many a groan and â—ear and prayer it cost us before we could recover the hurt that we câ—tâ—ht in the way of ungodlinâ—ss and yet we have not fully recovered it to this day And would you have us stark mad to forget so soon our former sorrows and turn to a hâ—e that hath cost us so 〈◊〉 already No we have paid too dear for it and smarted too much for it to go that way any more It brought us to the very brink of Hell and if we had but dyed in that condition we had been damned at this hour And would you be so unreasonable as to wish us to go back again No by that time you know as much of an unsanctified state as we do you will run from it your selves as fast as you can run as â—he Israelites did from the cry of the company of Dathan and Abiram lest the earth should swallow them up also Numb 16.34 We are cerâ—â—in that the Lord
the Truths which they are acquainted with They hold it or imprison it in unrighteousness Rom. 1.18 and therefore is wrath revealed against them They like not to retain God in their knowledge and therefore God doth oft give them up to a reprobate mind Rom. 1.28 They receive not the truth in the love of it that they might be saved no wonder therefore if God give them up to strong delusions to believe a lye that all they might be damned that believed not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness 2 Thes. 2.10 11. When they know the Iudgement of God that they that do such things are worthy of death yet they do them and have pleasure in them that do them Rom. 1.32 We may well think that God will sooner reveal his Truth to them that will obey it then to them that will but bury it in the dunghil of a corrupted heart And that he will rather hold the candle to his servants that will work by it then to loyterers that will but play by it or thieves or fornicators that had rather it were put out or to enemies that would do mischief by it and will throw away the candlesticks the Ministers and put the candle into the thatch Is there not many an ungodly person that hears me this day that is convinced in his conscience that a holy life is best and yet will not follow it and obey his conscience Are there not convictions at the bottom that the diligent heavenly Christian whom thou reproachest is in a safer condition then thy self and yet thou wilt not imitate such Can you expect that God should acquaint such with his truth that are so false to it 22. If we were but all Agreed in true Holiness we should have the great advantage of a tender conscience together with an illuminated mind For spiritual wisdom with tenderness of conscience is a great part of sanctification And it is a great advantage in controversies and debates to be wise and tende-conscienced For wisdom makes men able to discern and a tender conscience will make them afraid of mistaking and contradicting the truth and will keep them from rashness and unadvisedness and levity so that such an one dare not venture so easily upon new conceits and will be more suspicious of himself and of any thing wherein himself is much concerned Especially if he see grâ—at probabilities against it or the judgment of the Universal Church or of many wise and godly men against it and see that its like to have ill effects in all such cases a godly man will be tender-conscienced and therefore cautelous But is it so with the ungodly no but clean contrary None so bold as the blind Solomons words describe them exactly Prov. 14.16 The fool rageth and is confident If he be in an error or entangled in any evil cause or way you know not what to say to him for his recovery The less he knows the more he despiseth knowledge and sets his face against his Teachers as if they were but fools to him and scorns to be Ruled by such as they whom God hath made his Rulers Will you go to dispute or debate the case with one of these why be sure of it they will put you down and have the day It would do a man good to dispute with a wise and learned or sober rational man and to be overcome by Reason and by Truth But no man will have so sure a conquest against you as he that hath the least of sense or reason He will go away and boast that you could not convince him As if a mad man should boast that the Physicians could not all of them cure him An obstreperous proud selfconceited fellow will never yield to the clearest reason nor never be put down We have a Proverb that Ther 's no gaping against an Oven especially if it be hot If he have passion as well as ignorance and a tongue he will have the best He that speaks nonsence sayth nothing while he seems to speak These men have the faculty of saying nothing an hour or two together in abundance of words And there 's no confuting a man that saith nothing Nonsence is unanswerable if there be but enough of it Who would dispute against a pair of bagpipes or against a company of boyes that whoote at him If you will make a match at barking or biteing a curre will be too hard for you And if you will try your skil or strength at kicking a horse will be too hard for you And if you will contend with multitude of words or by rage and confidence a fool will be too hard for you as you may see by Solomons descriptions and by daily experience But if you will dispute by equal sober Reasoning it is only a wiser man by evidence of Truth that can overcome you And to be thus overcome is better then to conquer For you have the better if Truth overcome you and you have the worse if you overcome the truth So that you may easily perceive what an exceeding hindrance to Unity and Peace it is to have to do with ungodly persons that are blind and proud and brazen-faced and of feared consciences that fear not God and therefore dare say anything as if they could out-face the truth and the God of Truth But the sanctified have Illuminated minds and therefore are the more capable of further information and they have tender consciences and therefore dare not be unadvised and contentious and strive against the light and therefore have great advantage for Agreement 23. And if all these Advantages should not yet so far prevail as to bring us up to a full Agreement yet if we be but united in the Spirit and a Holy life we should be the more easily able to bear with one another under all our lesser differences until the time of full Agreement come We should hold our differences as Brethren their diversity of statures and complexions or at least as common human frailties with Love and compassion and not with hatred and divisions We should Lovingly consult together upon Rules or terms on which we might manage our unavoidable differences to the least disadvantage to the cause of Christ and to the common Truths that we all maintain and to the work of God for other mens conversion and to the least advantage to sin and Satan and the malice of ungodly men And I think this is a fair Agreement for Imperfect persons short of Heaven to have Unity in the Spirit and Agreement in things of greatest weight and to bear with one another in smaller matters and manage our differences with meekness and with Peace 24. Lastly If all this be not enough there is yet more for our encouragement 1. If we are but once United in the Spirit and Agree in an Holy heart and life we have the infallible promise of God that we shall shortly all arrive in Heaven at the place and state of full