is a succession one generation goes and another comes and so though the species continue the Individuals perish these seem to have the accurst Priviledge of propagating and not expiring and to have reconcil'd the procreativeness of corporeal with the duration of incorporeal Substances This is such an advantage toward their multiplication that we may grieve but cannot wonder to find them Swarm not like Bees to bring profit but like Locusts to devour every green thing in the land nor is it now in the power of all the Magicians of Aegypt to cast them out for were it possible ever to become Satans interest to suppress them he would certainly find himself in the case of one of his young Conjurers to have rais'd more spirits than he could lay Mens now irritated Passions and formed interests the great fomenters of disputes would prove too sturdy Devils even for Beelzebub himself to Exorcise BUT 't is too sure his Kingdom will never so divide against its self it suits not only with his Nature but with his Ends to perpetuate our Strifes and therefore as if our doctrinal debates were not enough to secure his purpose he has an auxiliary troop of ritual differences to attach us The Leprosie which infests the sollider parts of our Religion has past from the body to the very Garments the most exterior adherencies Habits Gestures Days every thing that has but the remotest subserviency to Piety are become the objects of fierce Contests and have so encreas'd the number and heat of our quarrels that 't is unnecessary perhaps impossible to add more if he can but keep up these as God knows he is too like to do his Kingdom will be competently guarded they being his greatest security against that power of Godliness that vital force of Christianity he so much dreads that they are so is obvious enough to him that takes but the grossest confus'd view of them But that we may better discern the degrees of his advantage and our own mischief 't will not be amiss to consider them more attentively make some distinct observations not of all for that were endless but of some of their most eminent Effects which we shall find so pernicious and destructive as sufficiently speak their relation and subserviency to the great Abaddon AND in the first place if we consider them only privatively as they supplant and justle out our greater concerns we shall find them sadly mischievous indeed to such a degree that were they not chargeable with any positive Ill they were by this their meer negative Force competent Instruments of our ruine Did they actually convey no venome yet while they substract our nourishment their effects will be sure to be deadly Grace as well as Nature being liable to be starv'd as well as poysoned Christianity is not a dull unactive but stirring busie State and therefore we still find it in the Gospel represented under the Metaphors which imply the greatest Industry and Activity t is a trade a watch a race a combat and it assigns us tasks enough to justifie the propriety of the Tropes And therefore as on the one hand the sleepy Professor will at last find he has but dreamt of those glorious Rewards he expects so on the other he that frames himself another Scheme that labours but not in Gods vineyard that busies himself in things extrinsick to that one great Sphere of motion the Evangelical Precepts will finally discern that he has but rolled Sysiphus his stone espous'd a toyle under which he may indeed be weary and heavy laden but will never find rest to his Soul AND then what can be more perfectly adapted to his aim who desires to propagate his own eternal restlesness unto us than thus to commute our tasks exchange these pleasant and gainful ones which God assigns us for those uneasie and fruitless we impose on our selves 'T is true we find too many of those unprofitable works of darkness to busie and employ us but I think no one nay I am apt to say not all others together have proved so effectual to his purpose as this of raising and maintaining parties in Religion 'T is too usual a policy of States to secure themselves from the fear of a potent Neighbour by fomenting a civil discord in his Kingdom Satan has in this instance found it a lucky Stratagem it having proved the most powerful revulsive of his danger I will not examine whether he borrowed it from or lent it to our Machavilions but sure he may from his own experience recommend it with the attestation of a Probatum est INDEED this art of diversion gives him a full security against all he fears in our Christianity for 't is not the title he envies to us or dreads himself we know he long since had courage to contemn the name even of Christ when invoked by those whose practices joyn'd with him in defying it while we are but Iewish Exorcists make no other use of Christ but to get us a reputation and a trade he can deal well enough with us Seven sons of Sceva are not half so terrible to him as one St. Paul 't is him only he fears that to the form has joyn'd the power of Godliness That Exorcisme he knows he cannot resist and therefore has very dexterously found a way to divert it by engaging us in those contentions which allow us not to think of the practical part of our profession By the confus'd noise of Battel quite drowning that voice behind us which says This is the way walk in it Nay by this subtilty he does not only divert but forestall also like the Philistines allows no Spear or Sword that may be us'd against him but takes up all those Instruments by which we should work the work of God We know to all affairs of Importance there are three necessary concurrents without which they can never be dispatcht Time Industry and Faculties and the more weighty and difficult the Business is the greater Degree of each of these is requisite Now certainly the interest of our Souls is not the slightest concern we have the avoiding eternal misery the acquiring endless bliss is not so trivial or so easie a matter as to be the Work of a moment the purchase of some few yawning wishes or volatile phancies He who is to dispense the Rewards has propos'd us other Conditions assign'd us Work which takes up no less time than that of our whole lives no less intention than of our whole powers And then if we suffer any thing else to interpose and defaulk what is thus entirely requisite if we cut new Channels for that which should run in this one full current 't is easie to divine what the Event will be For man being finite both in his nature and operations the time and attention he bestows on one thing must necessarily be substracted from another And therefore if our Disputes about Religion entertain and busie us they must unavoidably interrupt our
numerousness than purity of their Professors discerning how much the sensual part of mankind startle at the strictness of Gospel precepts are industrious to take off that discouragement not by convincing them of the real divine sweetness and pleasantness of them but by debasing and accommodating them more to the carnal appetite Yet here men proceed not all alike some use Christs yoke as Hananiah did that of Ieremy break it quite off others only essay to slacken and alleviate it that it may not pinch the lusts of libertine Proselytes Of the first sort are such as having made the adherence to their Party the infallible mark of Sanctification and that Sanctification of Election do from thence proclaim to all who are so qualified a general Jubile and manumission from the bond even of Christ's as well as Moses's Law or if some of them allow it to remain an impotent director yet while they affirm that God sees no sin in his Elect or if he do beholds them as a Father does the harmless falls of his Child rather with smiles than anger they make the violations of it so safe that they are too sure to be many and between abrogating and thus enervating a law the difference is meerly verbal OF the second sort are some who by indulgent and partial glosses seek to mollifie the severity of Christs commands That contrive for their Clients not the means of Obeying but the arts of Escaping them Like the unjust Steward teach their lords Debtors to write fifty in stead of a Hundred and decide Cases of conscience more according to the interests and passions of men than the will of Christ. There are a generation of men of whose Dexterity in this faculty the world has taken so much notice that I need not name them a sort of easie Casuists who seem to have erected a Court of Equity to relieve men against the rigor of divine Law and there is little doubt but they shall find enough ready to make such appeals Men love to be Christians as Cheap as they can and therefore will close with that party which offers the easiest terms And then while these spiritual Pioneers do thus enlarge the narrow way make it a road as well for the Beast as the Man the brutish sensual as well as rational divine Part of us no wonder though Shoals of Converts throng in to them But 't is to be consider'd that all this while this is winning Proselytes to themselves not to God the gaining them to a Sect not a religion at least not to that pure religion and undefiled which the grand Author of our Faith has both exemplified and propos'd to us for how much that suffers by this way of propugning private opinions is more than enough apparent Yet so ambitious are our prime leaders of such Trophies that in order to them some are said to ascend yet a step higher and besides this general encouragement they give to mens lusts by taking off Restraints do in some cases actually promote and excite them For when they see a licentious person whose acquest they judge beneficial to their cause they have artifices of fomenting his riots do not only take off the bridle but use the spur also hoping that at the rebound it may conduce to their End If any think it impossible it should do so let them consider that among our various Opinions some there are which sell heaven much cheaper than others dare that allow such easie attonements as the most habituated sinner need not despair of and then the most infallible means to ascertain such to that side is to make them too bad for any other For when a man is resolute to keep his sins while he lives and yet unwilling to relinquish all hopes when he dies 't is more than probable he will embrace that profession which bids fairest to the reconciling those so distant interests and therefore the greater malefactor he is the more sure he will be to fly to the horns of this Altar the nearer sinking the apter to catch at these reeds so that the Project is not impolitick though God knows so impious that 't is much fitter for the School of Machiavil than of Christ and seems to verifie that imputation as to a part of Christians which Iulian once as falsly as maliciously affixt upon the whole that their Church was an Asylum and sanctuary for the most flagitious offenders and protected those guilts to which no other religion allowed any Expiation 'T is indeed so horrid that I cannot think there are many consciences so cauteriz'd by this fiery zeal as to admit it yet that some have done it there is too much certainty and therefore 't is no improper instance in our present argument for if mens eagerness to support their several sides can transport them to such attempts as these 't is abundant Evidence how much Christianity loses by these contests of under factions which while they pretend to guard do indeed invade her under her own Colours BUT besides the faults men commit with this immediate avowed aspect upon their religion there are others which slily shroud themselves under the skirt of its mantle I mean those Sins of common life which though they pretend not to advance the cause yet when acted by a Zealot are thought to be overwhelm'd by his heroick Piety Indeed men who make themselves so much work about others faith are seldom at leisure to regulate their own practice and so have no way of stating their accounts with God but by balancing the excess of the one against the defects of the other How such reckonings will pass the grand Audit 't is I think not hard to divine but in the interim it keeps them very cheerful and secure teaches them a Receipt to retain all their Sins and yet lose none of their confidence so that when they have immerst themselves in all filthiness both of flesh and Spirit they can trust their zeal to refine them from all that Dross Nor does it only thus reconcile them to their own vices but to other mens also whose most brutish sensualities they can look on with perfect patience nay even Atheism its self can have fair Quarter They are not much discomposed to see men have no religion 't is only the having one different from their own that awakes their indignation then like Saul when seiz'd on by the evil spirit they cast about their Javelins think no rigor too great on such a provocation yet even here they have intervals and the very same persons who are thus at odds upon a religious can unite upon a vicious account Those who mutually denounce damnation to each other can with full accord combine in those practices which will ascertain it to them both as if they so much fear'd to have their predictions defeated that they would be each others convoy to the land of darkness Those that will by no means meet at the Church know not when to part at the
to the natural nor will the gnawing of the worm appear more intolerable to any than those who here make it their business to tye up its Iaws gag or stupifie that Conscience which would now admonish but will there torment And when to this is added the perpetuity of these pains that the worm shall never die the fire never be quencht certainly this puts such an edge upon the terror as may well make it in the Apostles phrase quick and powerful searching even to the dividing asunder of the Soul and Spirit the joynts and marrow When we are assur'd that the Axe is thus laid unto the root of the tree and that every tree that brings not forth good fruit must be hewn down and cast into the fire we shall sure be warn'd to bring forth meet fruits of repentance and fly from the wrath to come BUT because neither invitations nor threats can avail with those who are any way invincibly impeded to apply them to their benefit since the most glorious prize the most formidable danger is insignificant to him who wants power to run unto the one or from the other it has pleased God to inspirit and actuate all his Evangelical methods by a concurrence of supernatural strength makes it not only eligible but possible I may say easie and pleasant for us to do whatever he commands us and notwithstanding our natural debility makes us through Christ which strengthens us able to do all things by his Spirit he prevents assists restrains excites comforts convinces gives grace and adds to that the happier largess of a will to use it and knowledge to discern the want of more infusing to the Soul an ardent thirst of greater powers and readier means of service which the performance actuates to greater strengths and yet enflames to new desires and more importunate pursuits whilest God at once bestows and crowns his own donations still giving unto him that has till that at last he gives himself and grace is swallowed up in glory And to assure us of this aid he has been pleased to oblige himself descends to the solemnity of a Pact and Covenant has indented with us and constituted it a principle part of the new and everlasting Covenant made with mankind in the blood of the Son of God to send the comforter his Holy Spirit to be with us till the end of the world and do all this So that the Gospel is at once the assigner of our tasks and the Magazeen of our strength so much Spirit goes along with that Letter so much internal grace is annexed to its outward administration as will to all who do not resist it infallibly render it the power of God to salvation For 't is not the sole priviledge of a S. Paul but the common portion of all Christians That Gods grace shall be sufficient for them which is sure a more Gospel-like promise than that it should be too strong for them so violent and irresistible as to commit a rape upon their Spirits such a mighty wind as drives them headlong upon duty Indeed this competency is of all other proportions the most incentive to industry we see in Temporals too little makes men desperate and too much careless and certainly 't would be the same in Spirituals but now when we have stock enough to set up with and that too of so improvable a nature that is capable of infinite advancement and yet on the other side no less capable of total decay also it being given with this express condition that upon neglect it shall be withdrawn so that our own sloth may make us poor but nothing else can keep us from being abundantly rich what can be imagin'd more animating to diligence and endeavour And this being the condition wherein our Christianity has placed us added to the former considerations will beyond exception or subterfuge evince its perfect aptitude and fitness for the End to which it was aim'd the Planting and nourishing all true Vertue among men the introducing the tree of life into the world again and so forming us a Paradise even amidst the briers and thorns of our Exil'd state CHAP. II. The Character of Christian-mens Practice shewing their multiplied failance both from the rule of that holy profession and its genuine effect AND now who can suspect that a cause so rightly dispos'd should miss of its effect That this so auspicious Planet should be counter-influenc't by any malevolent Star Or that what has so many tenures in us should be finally disseis'd For admit we have not the Piety to be prevail'd upon by the reverence of the Author yet the excellency of its composition does so much recommend it to our reason that we must put off the best part of our Nature to evacuate the force of our Religion nay supposing us to have done that too to have struck our selves out of the list of Rationals yet if we keep but the rank of Animals if we have not extinguisht passion and sense it descends even to them addresses to our hopes and fears with most importunate solicitations and convincing motives So that unless we have the absurd ill luck to have much of the Stoick and nothing of the Philosopher 't will be impossible to resist its impressions and sure he that comtemplates this will be apt with some confidence to conclude Christendom to be the Goshen of the world not only in respect of its light but of its immunity from all those Locusts and Caterpillers those swarms of mean and sordid Vices which both cover and devour the rest of the Earth BUT this must be the inference of a meer contemplative a Recluse that converses only with his own meditations for let him be so much secular as once to look abroad the most transient glance will serve to unravel all this hopeful speculation shew him that Christendom may be as much Heathen as America whereas 't is usually said that ill Manners produce good Laws we have reverst the Aphorism and our good Law has introduc'd the most corrupt manners Our holy faith which like a foundation should support good works has like a gulf swallowed them up And so universal a depravation is there among us that we have scarce any thing left to distinguish us from the most barbarous people but a better name and worse vices AND here what terms of wonder or of grief can be significant enough to express or to bewail so strange and so perverse degeneration that the light of the world should thus darken it the salt of the Earth be the means of putrifying and corrupting it that those who were by God drawn out from the Heathen world should so outvie the Gentiles crimes as if they had forsaken them only because they were too innocent This indeed is one of Satans subtillest stratagems to fill Christ's Camp thus with his Souldiers by whose intestine treacheries he has been more triumphant than by all his open assaults and avowed hostilities What a
paid some part of gratitude to my Creator for my own being by making my self in my low sphere the giver or preserver of that life which he first breath'd into another This and this only is the way to raise a felicity out of wealth and surely since the attaining of happiness is the one grand pursuit of our Reason that must even before it has subjected its self to the Faith of Christ give assent to the Prudence of his Command in this as well as the former instances BUT there remains a Precept of our Saviours allied to this which seems by no means to comport and hold a correspondence with the dictates of right Reason the taking up the cross and suffering for righteousness sake which contradicts the fundamental law of self preservation and the great end of being felicity and happiness But this suggestion how specious soever it appear is utterly fallacious for 't is no good consequence that because Reason aims at our being happy therefore it forbids us all voluntary sufferings since that the case may be so set that such a suffering may be the fairest medium left us to our happiness 'T is a known rule that of two evils the least is to be chosen and the election of the lesser ill though it be no absolute yet is a comparative good and its attainment as far as the necessity of our affairs permit is our felicity and reason can provide no farther Now this is the estate of the present instance two evils are propos'd a Natural and a Moral the Natural though in its self to be averted yet much inferiour to the Moral and then Reason soon resolves the Dilemma that the Natural is to be chosen all that can be question'd in this affair is whether Reason define the moral evil to be the greater but this can bear no long dispute with any who consider but the Nature of Reason which being seated in the upper soul of a man is no way concern'd in those Ills which make their impression on the sensitive part but Moral ills strike higher invade the mind cloud the reason nay often depose it from its regiment as is too frequently exemplified in the force of vicious habits and therefore by how much our reason is superior to our sense so much are those to be accounted the greatest evils which assault that nobler part of us This certainly will now be the determination of Reason if she may be permitted the freedom of her vote for thus was it formerly where she bare the most sway and uncontrouled rule The wisest and best considering of humane as well as divine Authors having establisht it as an undoubted Aphorism that honest is to be preferr'd before both gainful and pleasant so that nothing renders a man so deplorable as that which violates his integrity nay they have generally gone higher exhorted men to become voluntiers in vertues warfare not to suspend their sufferings till they were forc't out by the competition of a crime but offer themselves free oblations Thus to suffer for ones Countrey or ones Friend was thought so worthy so heroick a thing that noble and ingenuous spirits were aemulous of it and it was so stated a case that Epictetus forbids a man on such an occasion to consult with the Oracle whether he should do it or no it being necessary to be done what ever ill success or ruine be predicted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and how serious they were in these perswasions some of them have practically evidenced as having suffered very inconsiderable pressures nay death its self rather than they would bow to the praedominant vices of their Age or omit the occasion of eminent vertue Aristides would be just in spight of Ostracism Regulus observant of his Oath made to a faithless Enemy though Death and Torment attended the Performance Lycurgus to perpetuate to his Citizens the benefit of his good Laws as subtly designs perpetual Banishment unto himself as others use to contrive for Honour and for Empire there Codrus redeems the safety of his Army with his own Death Curtius makes himself a Martyr for his Countrey and Socrates in the stricter sense becomes one for his God laid down his life in attestation of that most fundamental truth and leading article of Faith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the belief of one God And yet we find not that those Times which were so ill as to shed his Bloud were yet so bad as to defame his Memory he 's not recorded either as fool or hypocondriack nor have his sufferings struck him out of the list of Philosophers but he stands there the more conspicuously in those bloudy Characters and however the credit of the Oracle may be otherwise disparaged it never was on this account that it had declared Socrates to be the wisest of Men. And yet both he and the rest had either none or very imperfect confus'd apprehensions of a future reward when they engaged on present Suffering and death its self So that we might be tempted to imagine that some strange change and transmutation has now befaln Vertue that it has put on so much a distant appearance from its ancient self that the accession of new obligations and higher hopes should absolve avert and utterly dispirit us insomuch that what was Constancy in a Heathen should be Folly in a Christian. Certainly this is a Metamorphosis of our own making we look through deforming optick glasses such as our Avarice or effeminate Sensualities convey into our hands which give not only strange and gastly but withall ridiculous shapes but if we would consult our Reason that would shew us things in their proper forms Vertue and Reason are both the same they were so many hundred years ago and where the Object and the faculty admit of no mutation 't is impossible there should really be any such variable appearance If Socrates were so zealous for the one God that he chose rather to relinquish his life than to consent to or but connive at the profane rivalry of Polytheisme and yet be no Fool certainly we may as sucurely transcribe his copy and though the particular Article may not be the same yet if it be any thing wherein vertue is concern'd the cause is no less warrantable he that suffers for a practical Point is no more a prodigal of his pains than he that lays them out on the highest Speculative The Commandments may have as good Martyrs as the Creed for the same Authority has requir'd our Obedience to the one that exacts our Faith of the other Nor is there any necessity of Heathen or Iewish Tribunal to convert our sufferings to Martyrdom we may receive that crown from the hands of those that own the same faith with us Those that say with the most seeming vehemence let the Lord be glorified may yet hate and cast out their brethren for his name sake Isa. 66. 5. He that tells me I fear not God so much as he may yet persecute me
of the world and neither frighted nor flatter'd out of his duty And he that is thus fortified discourages and wearies out his Tempter deprives him not only of weapons but of heart too and drives even Satan himself to desperation and when the Enemy is thus beat out of the field there remains nothing but to enjoy the victory When that reluctance and resistance of the corrupt Appetite is so weakned and subdued that a man acts with freedom he acts with pleasure too A heart thus set at liberty alacriously runs the ways of Gods commandments it faring with it as with a Patient that is prescrib'd exercise for health who at first perhaps finds lassitude and trouble in it but when the obstructions are remov'd and nature disburthened of those noxious humors that encumbred her that which was at first his task becomes his recreation For we are not to think that it is any innate harshness in piety that renders the first essays of it unpleasant that is owing only to the indisposedness of our own Hearts We are in the Prophets phrase bullocks unaccustomed to the yoke and if we be galled and fretted by it 't is because of our impatient strivings and irregular motions under it the yoke is really no heavier than it is afterwards when it is more tamely born and yet the Ease is very different and unequal And this teaches us a short way to that felicity we now speak of to wit That we compose our selves to such a submiss and malleable temper that Christ may come only to govern us as sheep not to be put to tame us as Tigers let us withdraw all supplies from our lusts and not by any secret reserv'd affection give them clancular aids to maintain their Rebellion and then they will not be able long to make any vigorous opposition nor consequently much to disturb the tranquillity of those who have thus resign'd themselves to the government of the Prince of Peace and if this cannot be done in such an instant but that there will be some previous displacencies and uneasie struglings yet even those like the Scorpion carry Antidote against their stings when 't is consider'd that they are but the pangs of the new-birth they will become very supportable by the expectation of that Joy to which they tend An enslaved people think themselves fairly advanc'd to happiness if they can get but to make head against their oppressors though they must expect many sore conflicts and sharp engagements before they become Victors and certainly 't is matter of inestimable joy to him who has been under that sad spiritual slavery to be set thus upon even terms with his sword in his hand against those who once had him in such vassalage that he durst not lift up a thought against them but especially when 't is remembred with what invincible aids he is backt such as will ascertain him of victory if he do not treacherously defeat himself And surely he must be of a strange phlegmatick temper whom all these considerations will not enliven convey into him so much spirit as to make an attempt and engage him to do that upon so pressing so great a concern which meer curiosity prompts men daily to in common affairs And he that is not moulded of this cold and stubborn clay he that has not lost one of the elements of mans composition and has but a spark of fire in his temper will surely have some warmth towards this so inviting an experiment and when he has once made it I doubt not it will then joyn with the suffrages both of reason and conscience in approbation of Christs Laws and will with Solomon pronounce of this spiritual wisdom her ways are ways of pleasantness and all her paths are peace Prov. 3. 17. AND now it must be a strange Violence of impiety that must break this threefold cord that shall disannul the joint sentence of all that are competent Iudges in this matter This is not the strength of Samson that brake wit hs and cords but of the Legion that pull'd in pieces fetters and chains and though too many men make it their own work yet certainly 't is only the Devils Interest he aspires to the rule and government of us and to that end nothing can be more contributive than these prejudices we take up against Christs conduct A Soul like a Nation can neither bear two Legislators nor be without one And Satan having but that single competitor our quarrelling with Christs Laws is virtually an embracing of his When we send Christ that rebellious message Nolumus hunc regnare we say to the other as the Trees to the Bramble Jud. 9. 14. come thou and reign over us And to this defiance of the one and invitation of his opposite he very nearly approaches that thus defames Christs commands as irrational or severe The traducing of a government being we know the immediate praeludium to the casting it off libelling the forlorn-hope to rebellion But would God men would soberly weigh whither such a mutinous humor tends and when our outward Condition has given us so many pregnant and costly Proofs of its ruinous effects take caution that it make not the like wrack within us that we do not madly exchange Christs gentle service and glorious Rewards for Satans cruel bondage and crueller Wages the golden chains of the one which do more adorn than tie us for the Iron the Adamantine links of the other which bind us till they deliver us over to those Chains of darkness where our captivity shall be irreversible If this so reasonable so necessary a care may be admitted 't will certainly confute the profane sophistry of our Age silence our impious Cavils and instead of providing us of the colour of an austere Master to excuse our sloth will engage us to that diligence that shall supersede the use of such shifts and then we may hope to see Christianity have a Resurrection day again assume a Body somewhat of solidity and substance which now wanders about like a ghost or spectre a shade or vanishing apparition which leaves no footsteps behind it and to the re-union O let us all emulously contribute take up every one of us his dry Bones and bring it to the Prophet or rather to Him who spake by that Prophet to breath upon them till at last they be cemented and inspirited in active Duty to shew forth the Praises of that God who hath call'd us out of darkness into his marvellous light 1 Pet. 2. 9. CHAP. VI. A survey of the Mischiefs arising from Partial Obedience ANOTHER sort of preposterous Considerers there are by whom the power and force of Christianity is no less obstructed and those are they that contrive not how they may most comply with it but how they may best bend it to comport with them That rebate its edge or turn it only against such of their corruptions as they have least kindness for That weigh the Precepts with no
other design but that of taking the lightest those to which their constitutions or other circumstances carry least repugnance and come unto the Gospel not to as a law but to a Market cheapen what they best like and leave the rest for other customers THAT thus it is with many needs no other proof than the variety visible in the lives of several professors One man behaves himself modestly and tells you his religion commands him humility yet at the same time transgresses the as strict precept of Justice and will defraud him he bows to On the contrary another is Just but Insolent and though his Sentence do not bend expects his Clients should That man owns the purity of his religion in visiting the fatherless and widows yet disclaims it again by not keeping himself unspotted of the world This person is Abstemious but Uncharitable will drink no wine but thirsts for bloud He prays much yet curses more whilest he is meek but indevout Now while the Rule is one and the same how should it come that mens Practices should so vary were it not for the unequal Application did they take it entire though there might be difference in the degrees yet sure not in the kinds of their Vertues and as men would not differ so from one another so neither would they from themselves there would be then no such thing as a charitable Drunkard a devout Oppressor a chast Miser Monsters engendred by this unnatural commixture of light with darkness but Piety would be uniform and extensive and bring into captivity every thought unto the obedience of Christ 2 Cor. 10. 5. And till it be thus Christianity can never be thought to have atchiev'd any part of its design which was not aim'd against any one single limb but against the whole body of sin Alas 't is not the lopping off one of the remote members that will render the remaining ones any whit the less vital the having a part less to animate will rather serve to concenter the spirits and make them more active in the rest as we see the pruning of Trees makes them more prolifick And this effect is very obvious among men he who has no general dislike to vice if he repudiate one 't is commonly that he may cleave closer to another and what he defalks from some dry insipid sin is but to make up a Benjamin's Mess for some other more gustful If the Wanton be sober 't is odds he thinks excess a Rival to his lust if the Proud man be liberal 't is because covetousness is inglorious such unevennesses are caus'd not by an unkindness to any Sin unless possibly that aversion which natural constitution raises in some but by a partiality to one or more favourite Vices for whose better accommodation and securer reign not only Vertue but other Vices also must give place AND this 't is much to be fear'd will upon a true account be found to be the sum of many mens piety something they think they must pay to the importunity of their Religion which upbraids them so loudly that they are willing to stop its mouth but yet would do it with as much frugality and good managery as may be and so consider what 't is they can best spare what refuse Sin which brings them in little of satisfaction and is perhaps in competition with some other more agreeable and this they can be content to devote to the slaughter set it to receive all the impressions of the sword of the spirit and so use it as a buckler to their darling lusts to ward off those blows which must else fall heavy on them but alas this is not to obey but to delude to ransom a greater Sin with a less and to transcribe in this matter the Counsel of Caiphas to let one die for the People that the whole nation Perish not To make one forlorn guilt a Patriot to the rest whilest in the tempest which threatned a general shipwrack the precious wares are preserv'd by throwing the less valuable over board AND truly that is commonly the event men are so jolly and triumphant when they have worsted a trivial inconsiderable sin as if they had defeated the whole army this poor despicable spoil is set up as their Trophe and must they think witness for them both to God and man that they are good souldiers of Iesus Christ they can like Saul with full confidence meet the Prophet and tell him they have fulfilled the Commandment of the Lord 2 Sam. 15. 13. though Agag and the best cattle the reigning and fattest sins be spar'd and while they are thus secure their sins will certainly be so also have no disturbance or disquiet from them but lie at Ease and rest feed like Canibals upon their own kind be nourisht by the carkasses of those unlucky vices on whom the exterminating lot hapned to fall and by that means grow to a prodigious bulk and corpulency And upon these terms Satan himself will allow us to mortifie some sins nay will himself cast the first stone at them and like a rooking gamester purposely lose these petty stakes that he may afterwards sweep the board FOR if men should give themselves up universally to all sorts of Ill if they should set themselves in a total opposition to all the documents of their profession he would lose one of his most useful engins there could be no such thing as a false delusive hope they might possibly by obstinacy harden or by diversion gag Conscience but they could not bribe and corrupt it make it sit down well pleas'd and satisfied with its self For when the threats against disobedience shall occurr to the mind of one who has in all instances disobey'd 't is impossible he should find any salve any way of Evading the Threats they make so directly at him but he who can alledge for himself that he obeys in some things confronts that to all Objections and resolves he is not in the list of the disobedient One or two such comfortable instances are as mighty as God promis'd the Israelites should be Deut. 32. 30. one able to chase a thousand and two to put ten thousand to flight all fears and misgiving thoughts are dissipated and fled before them and as once the French King in his return to the numerous swelling titles of the Spaniard thought the bare repetition of France France France was a full ballance to them all so when whole files of great and scandalous Crimes present themselves one single vertue is thought a sufficient counterpoize He whose Conscience upbraids him with all Profaneness towards God and in Sobriety towards himself yet if he can but answer that he is just to his neighbour he thinks he has quit scores and fears no farther reckonings he who is immerst in all the filthiness both of flesh and spirit has abandon'd his Mind to pride and envie his Body to lust and intemperance and so sacrificed both those to Devils yet if he
he imagine that God sends forth an irresistible strength against some sins whilest in others he permits men a power of repelling his Grace That were to transcribe the Syrians absurd Phansie that he is a God of the hills and not of the valleys No certainly he who has his own unhappy experience to attest the possibility of frustrating the Divine succours in one particular has too sure grounds to infer the like in others Nay alas it does not only infer it by way of argument and deduction but it is very apt to produce it by way of cause and efficiency We gain a readiness to any thing by custom and assuefaction and he who has habitually oppos'd Grace in the defence of a Lust has deliver'd himself from that modesty which makes the first defiance uneasie and so runs on with ease and boldness to future resistance It faring with men in this violation of Gods grace as it does in that of his Patrimony the first Sacriledge is lookt on with some horrour and men are fain to devise arguments and colours to delude their relucting Consciences but when they have once made the breach their scrupulosity soon retires one draught of that impious gain has such a stupifying effect that they can without check swallow on till the Sin flame so fiercely that nothing but meer want of Matter can extinguish it But admit it were possible for a man to be secur'd of his own compliance with some parts of restraining grace whilest he impugnes it in others yet who shall ascertain him of that grace It being Gods implies 't is not in our power he may surely do what he will with his own and though his promise has made a sure entail of it to all those who humbly seek and diligently use it yet it no where engages that it shall be the portion of any other much less that it shall importunately and endlesly renew its assaults on those who have often repulst and put it to flight In that case Gods resolution concerning the old world becomes appliable My spirit shall not always strive with man and Christ who forbids us to cast our pearls before swine will certainly never prostitute what is infinitely more precious his Grace to those who have so long trampled it under their feet and so those must be concluded to have done who have persevered in any one sin for Grace is uniformly opposite to all and therefore the cleaving to any is defiance and affront to it But we need not the help of inferences and deduction the threats of God are express in this matter The Talent is decreed to be taken from the unprofitable servant who has not imployed it to the proper use and such infallibly is every man who has not actuated the Grace given him to the subduing of every reigning sin and the reprobate mind mention'd in Scripture as the most dismal of all Plagues the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which yields not to the melting and the purging force of Fire and therefore does consign to that of Hell is founded upon the voluntary rejection of God in particular instances Rom. 1. How then can he that in any one single thing so rejects him assure himself that shall not be the event of it That he who would not have Christ rule entirely in his heart shall at once be put out of his Government and protection have all those spiritual aids withdrawn which should either assist him to good or fortifie him against ill and like an outlaw'd person be expos'd to the outrage of all that will assault him AND now would God this might be sadly pondered that men would not be their own Sirens and entertain themselves with those deceitful melodies which will end in howlings and gnashings of teeth that they would not think their having some few vertues and but some few vices will serve to satisfie the design or procure them the rewards of their Christianity for if they should continue in this posture and not be tempted to grow worse they may certainly conclude 't is because Satan finds they need not And can they be proud of that Vertue which the Devil himself will allow them And think themselves good enough when they are as bad as he wishes them But even in this they have no other tenure than his Will When he pleases for his interest or even for his divertisement and recreation he may hurry them to all that is most enormous convert their Hypocrisie to profaneness their partial Piety to universal Ungodliness they have nothing to interpose in their own Defence not so much as a reasonable Argument to oppose to him they have made a voluntary sale of themselves for one or more beloved sin and now as his vassals he may impose on them what others he pleases and by their doting affection to their Rachel take advantage also to obtrude the despis'd Leah upon them And how wretched how deplorable is this state What a Piety is this that we must owe to the Devil while we can be no better than he will let us YET this is without Hyperbole the condition of every man that is not sincerely uniformly Christian every indulg'd sin gives Satan livery and seisin of his heart and a power to dispose of it as he please I know men are apt to flatter themselves with other hopes and think that those obediences they pay to God shall like a pre-ingagement disannul all after contracts made by guilt and put them into the possession of Him who is able to bind that strong man But God will not be accessary to such a fraud even towards the Devil while they keep the price enjoy that pleasure or profit wherewith he bought them God will never interpose to defeat him of his purchase AND as God will not thus forcibly wrest them out of his hands much less will he descend to a capitulation and composition with him God is a jealous God and what jealous husband did ever by compact divide his right with the Adulterer Where he finds a persevering disloyalty he gives a bill of divorce and disclaims his relation Yet so besotted are men as to hope God will ratifie that alienation they have made of one part of their heart and contentedly enjoy the rest and as competitors use sometimes to do share with his Rival But alas that immortal quarrel will not be thus taken up the difference between these irreconcilable Antagonists will not be so compremised God disdains such a Treaty nor will ever come so much as to an interview with his enemy within the lists and recesses of one Heart And while men labour such an accord they are but combining with Satan against God and their own Souls he knows well that while he holds any part God will have none and so the whole falls to him and then he may very safely be modest and demand but moderately and by that seeming difference and yielding gain more than by all his most eager contendings I suppose
contrives more compendious methods of destruction Frames such Engines as take off whole ranks nay troops compounds such active Poyson as like a Pestilence kills multitudes at once It is too trivial a Mischief to annoy the outward parts it is his Mastery to spread an unseen venome in the Bowels thence to diffuse its self through 't mix with the vital spirit and convert that kindly heat which should animate into those wild irregular flames which ravine and consume And this is done by that Pestilential spirit of division that heat of disputation which has for so many ages possest and wasted the Catholick Church and by an unhappy kind of Magick transform'd the zeal of Christian practice into an itch of unchristian Dispute made the questions about our Creed more numerous than the letters of it and by multitudes and contrariety of Paraphrases so confounded and obscur'd the Text that what was anciently the badge and tessera of Christian Communion serves us for no other purpose but as an occasion of breaking it SO long as the Church retain'd the simplicity of Christian doctrine lookt on her faith as the Foundation of her obedience and endeavour'd to propagate to her Children such an understanding of the one as was most apt to promote the other She happily made good the title Christ gives her Can. 6. of his love his dove his undefil'd one but when the Serpent had once got into this Paradise infus'd his subtilties and nice intricacies into mens Brains and least that should not be ruinous enough his venome also into their Hearts Then began all those unhappy Metamorphoses in comparison of which those of the Poets are as trivial as they are Fabulous then that faith which was once inseparably joyn'd with the patience of the Saints forsook that tame company and linkt its self with the most contrary qualities of wrath and bitterness and those whose Profession it was to resist unto blood striving against sin pursued to blood those that resisted them in any of their speculations Then that passive Valour which had rendred them so venerable to their Heathen Enemies converted some tired out others and amaz'd all sadly degenerated into that active malice which from persecuted Christians entituled them to that monstrous style of Christian persecutors And that ardent love which had offered up so many Holocausts to God was supplanted by that fiery hatred that made no less acceptable oblations to Satan THIS miserable and destructive change was so much the interest of the Enemy of Souls that we cannot wonder he should so studiously promote it and indeed never did he at once so approve his malice and subtilty I would I could not say success also as in this design in comparison whereof all his other Projects speak him but a Puny this is his one Goliah Stratagem which has serv'd him not only to defie but even defeat the Armies of the living God NOR is his Sagacity more observable in the choice and main drift of the Design than in the ways of Effecting it had he brought into the Primitive Church those large scrolls of disputable points wherewith he has fill'd the Modern that more charitable Age must needs have startled and discern'd that that seeming Iealousie for Truth was indeed nothing but a real design against Peace and would surely never have parted with that sacred depositum that precious legacy so lately bequeath'd by Christ for those vain janglings those School subtilties which now entertain the world But as he that would divert a man from the guard of some important Treasure alarms him in some other of his greatest interests so he at first raises up Heresies of the greatest magnitude whose blasphemous consequencies so shook the whole Fabrick of Religion that what was Uzzahs Rashness seemed then every man 's advised Duty to put his hand to the upholding of the tottering Ark. How could those who had been baptiz'd into the faith of the Blessed Trinity suffer the Arians to rob them of the Second Person the Macedonians of the Third the Valentinians and Manichees so to despise the First as to set up against him a Rival principle of being How could those who had so solemnly renounc'd the World the Flesh and the Devil see them all bowed to by the temporizing unclean idolatrous Gnosticks these were such invasions as seemed to commissionate all that could weild the sword of the Spirit to take it up and engage in this Warfare But all this while 't was a sad Dilemma to which the Church was driven if she gave countenance to these seducers she betrayed her faith if she entred the contest she violated her unity the one would undermine her foundation the other would make a breach in her walls AND the Devil was too old an Artist to lose the advantage he knew well that even a just and necessary defence does by giving men acquaintance with War take off somewhat from the abhorrence of it and insensibly dispose them to farther Hostilities and therefore he fail'd not to provide sparks for that matter which was now grown so combustible nor did he always send them from the bottomless pit but sometimes borrowed fire from the Altar to consume the Votaries and by the mutual collision of well meant zeal set even Orthodox Christian in flame A memorable instance of this was the dispute about Easter wherein while the veneration they had of the glorious Resurrection of Christ prompted them to commemorate it in the exactest manner they could the Serpent creeps into this Paradise and though they had the same common end yet on occasion of some little dissenting in the way the heat of devotion insensibly degenerated into that of contention and by being very tenacious of a circumstance of that celebration they lost the more essential requisite that of Charity kept the Feast indeed but with the leven of malice and absurdly commemorate the redintegration of his Natural Body by mutilating and dividing his Mystical So likewise in the business of Rebaptization while one side in a pious abhorrence of Heresie thought the stain like that of Original Sin could not be done away by any Purgation less solemn than that of Baptism and the other in a just reverence of ancient custom and jealousie of innovation opposed it the Dispute lasted till the Scene was changed and those who deliberated of the manner of receiving Hereticks into the Church were themselves as such turn'd out of it No less well meant were the Originals of the Novatian and Donatist Heresies as equally unhappy were their issues For in them all when bitter Zeal was once fermented through its aptitude to receive and the Devils vigilance to administer occasions the Orthodoxy or Heresie of lives soon became terms out-dated and men were measur'd only by opinions That sword of the spirit which was at first design'd against vicious practices had its edge turn'd against speculative notions in so much that at last like that of Ioab 2 Sam. 28. 8. it had