in his 45 Epistle encourageth a chaste Married Couple to persist unalterably in their Holy Intention of abstaining by urging to them some great Examples and telling them that Wedlock may still be maintained without Carnality by preserving entire the affection of the mind Since then those Marriages are to be Esteemed most Chast which come nearest to a Single Life Single Life and allow most time for Devotion and since also there are none in a Married State so pure as to propose nothing else by Marriage but the having of Children and bringing them up in the fear of God and so filling Heaven with immortal Souls without any mixture of gross sensual Pleasure and Carnal Satisfaction to themselves and that many times beyond the bounds fixed and allowed by almighty God who ordained Man and Wife to be helps to one another chiefly in spirituals it must be granted in favour of those few few Comparatively speaking who in Colleges Inns-of-Court and the like make choice of a Single Life that such a manner of Life when truly Vertuous hath the Preheminence of the Married State ordinarily speaking even in its greatest purity For 1st though the Married-bed be undefiled i. e. with sin yet is the Virgins Bed more undefiled more Angel-like in respect of Corporeal purity Luk. 20.35 And therefore hereafter not to Marry nor be given in Marriage but to be like the Angels of God is reckoned as a thing more Honourable for the body Concupiscence indeed hath a share in the Single Life as well as in the Married But before the fall there was no such thing in humane Nature as Concupiscence and since the fall it is manifest the Single Life aims at a higher Degree of that Primogeneral Virginal purity that was in Man in the State of Innocency What else can be the meaning of that Expression of St. Paul 1 Cor. 7.34 The Virgin careth c. that she may be holy both in Body and Spirit Holy that is certainly more holy and more pure than she could have been in a Married state 2ly The Single Life is freeâ— from Distractions Worldly Cares and Impediments than the Married Life can be When a Man hath double Obligations relating to this World and the next and both of them require the greatest part of his time he is as it were divided between two and knows not which to attend to first or how to quit his Obligations to one without incurring the displeasure of the other Whereas if a Man have his Liberty which when we can have we are rather to use it 1 Cor. 7.21 and is not entangled with the present World hath no Wife or Family and none to take care of but himself what can hinder him from Dedicating himself his time and all that he can do or suffer to the Glory and Service of God I would have you saith the Holy Spirit by St. Paul to his Corinthians be as much as may be without carefulness 1 Bor. 7.32 especially the Pastors and Watchmen of Gods Church who are to give an account of the Souls committed to their charge Heb. 13.17 And it follows in the same Verse He that is unmarried careth for the things of the Lord how he may please the Lord but he that is Married careth for the things of the Woâ—ld how he may please his Wife and so she that is Married how she may please her Husband And yet the Married both Men and Women must endeavour also to please the Lord who hath an absolute power over them precedent to all others and so are divided in their thoughts and cannot attend upon the Lord in Prayer and other holy Duties without great distraction and solicitude For indeed nothing can be more contrary to Spiritual Exercises such as Prayer Fasting and the like than Carnal Pleasures which by the very Excesses they feed upon and are therewith kept alive discompose our Temper and divide and divert our Love and Affections to the Creature which are always best spent upon and consecrated to the Creator himself The Prophet Elijah who was the first that set up the Standard of Virginity upon Mount Carmel was also himself a true Emblem of it as being all Fire and Zeal for the service of God Prophesying and Preaching the Truth boldly even at Court without having any regard either to worldly interest or his own safety And therefore after a Pure Virginal Angelical Life here God Translated him by an extraordinary manner that he should not see Death 2 King 2.11 Gen. 5.22 24. Which indeed happened also to Enoch a Married Person for his walking with God and giving a good Example in those early days of Religion before the World was come to such perfection as to know the Excellency of Virginity and the Single Life and besides that good Patriarchs Family being then perhaps the only Church of God he might justly think the encreasing of it to be then of absolute necessity Especially since even in our times there are not wanting some Eminent Persons who Marry for no other end than to raise up Godly Families that shall imitate themselves in Piety and Devotion and in walking like Enoch with God Which nevertheless tho' it be the most perfect Scope of Marriage yet comes not up to the Purity and Perfection of Virginity and the Single Life that is always sitting at the feet of Jesus and incessantly attending on the service of God It is upon this very account that St. Paul in his comparing these two States together in his 1st Epistle to the Corinthians 1 Cor. 7.38 gives the preference to a single Life before Marriage He that giveth her in Marriage doth well but he that giveth her not in Marriage doth better And so of a Widow Vers 40. the same Apostle pronounceth her happier in his Judgment if she so abide Better and happier then is the Single Life to those that can live continently and who ever used the means of Fasting Prayer frequent Communicating avoiding Occasions c. with sincerity and failed because such being freed from Worldly cares which occasion distractions their Affections and Understanding are better disposed for meditating and contemplating on Divine things and for receiving more and more Gifts and Graces of the Holy Spirit and so may be said to live more sensible of the Presence as well as the Blessing of Almighty God which is the only happiness in this vale of miseries of humane life And such Single Persons as are of meaner Understandings and so not capable of these higher matters have yet by living Single more leisure for Works of Charity towards their Neighbour which are altogether as acceptable to God but yet not without the other necessary Duties even of the most ignorant Christians such as daily Prayers frequenting the Blessed Sacrament Spiritual Pastours c. which ought not to be omitted upon any even pious Pretence whatsoever The Encomiums of a Single Life are endless St. Paul recommends it to all
written and allowed of by the Ancient Fathers and the whole Church of God in all Ages And then as to the necessity of Prayer if we consider our many wants Temporal and Spiritual to be relieved many sins wherein we still offend God to be pardoned many Temptations and Dangers from which to be preserved many Benefits and Assistances received and all these with a respect also to our Fellow Christians we cannot but acknowledge every moment of our Lives had we no other necessary Duties too little to be spent in this one Great Duty of Continual Prayer 1 Thess 5.17 Our good Lord assist us by his Holy Spirit in the diligent and sincere performance thereof The other Chief Means of our obtaining Divine Assistances against our Lusts is 2ly Frequen Communicating as many good Christians now do and the Primitive Christians did almost every day I do not intend here to treat largely of this Holy Sacrament there being many good Books Written designedly on that Subject but only recommend to the Reader without medling with God's power therein which transcends all Humane Conception and Comprehension the Immense Benefit of this Holy Mystery to each worthy Communicant in reference to his particular Necessities For obtaining Remission of this or that Sin a Remedy of this or that Infirmity a Deliverance from this or that Affliction for receiving a Benefit or giving thanks for a Benefit received for helping our Neighbour for encreasing the Holy Spirit and Love of God in us Because as by one Spirit in Baptism We are made one Mystical Body of Christ 1 Cor. 12.13 so likewise in the Eucharist are we made to drink into the partaking of one Spirit The Blessed Eucharist being as necessary for the continuing and encreasing as Baptism for the first receiving the Holy Spirit Because also this is that particular Nourishment instituted by Christ for the preserving our Body and Soul to Everlasting Life that particular Pledge and Assurance of our Resurrection that true Bread from Heaven which mystically also Incorporates us into Christ and makes us continue and grow up into perfect Members of his Body that so thus partaking of the Nature and Spirit of the Second Adam the Heir of all things we may become with him Sons of God Heirs of Eternal Life as we were by the First Adam of Eternal Death That true Heavenly Bread lastly so Exalting and Assimulating our Nature into Christ when worthily Communicating as to make us one with him as he and the Father are one According to our Saviour's Prayer when he was Instituting this Blessed Sacrament I pray thee Father John 17. that they may be one as we are one O Blessed Union between poor Man and his Maker O happy those Souls who here worthily feed on this Heavenly Bread the only true Nourishment of the Life of Grace enabling them in the Strength thereof to walk even to the Mount of God the Life of Glory The Conclusion THE Summ of this Discourse is The Sins of the Flesh are most dangerous because most natural to us And by reason of their filthiness most loathsome to Almighty God and most severely punished by him For not only those of the greater magnitude Fornication Adultery Incest Sodomy Beastiality are followed with God's most Tremendous Judgments but also we find in Scripture Vncleanness and Laciviousness Gal. 5.19 Eph. 5.3 destinct from the foregoing and of a less denomination every where joyned with such Sins as exclude the Practisers thereof from the Kingdom of Heaven The way to prevent such Sins and to avoid the punishment of them is To mortify our Passions our Memory and Imagination to beware of impure Suggestions cheirsh Holy Inspirations and avoid all the occasions of such Sins to Improve lastly the Grace of God in us by Assiduous Prayer daily Examination of our selves perfect Repentance frequent Communicating and all other holy means pressing still farther to higher and higher Gifts particularly to the attaining that most excellent Gift of Charity which makes us love God above all things and our Neighbour as our selves hate even our own Lives for love of Him who first loved us undergoing the the greatest sufferings with Thankfulness and Complacency performing all our Actions on purpose to please him referring them to his Honour offering them up to his Praise and Glory To whom Father Son and Holy Ghost be all Honour Praise and Glory to all Eternity Amen God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and in Truth Joh. 4.24 Grace and Truth i. e. means of Salvation came by Jesus Christ Joh. 1.17 God sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts that they that live should not henceforth live unto themselves but to him who dyed for them Gal. 4.6 2 Cor. 5.15 Wretched is that man who is all for the good things of this Life a good House good Apparel good Provision c. and is content to have a bad Soul Int. Christ Some Short Directions and Heads of Meditation for the Persons Concerned in the Preceeding Discourse CHAP. I. Of Meditation it's Requisites and how it differs from Contemplation MEditation is called the first Essential part of Prayer leading to Contemplation Thanksgiving Petition c. in which all the Principal Faculties of the Soul the Memory Vnderstanding Will and Affections are severally employed The Memory recollects the matter to be Meditated upon and also placeth the Soul in the Divine Presence The Vnderstanding judgeth of the Subject and its Vertues and accordingly proposeth it to the Will The Will excites in us divers Acts and Affections either of Love Affiance Gratitude c. towards God Or of Hatred Compunction desire of doing better c. towards our selves which is indeed the main Scope and end of Meditation Then follows our Praying and representing to Almighty God our Miseries Necessities Temptations which we most earnestly beg him to redress for his own Love and Compassion's sake and the Merits of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ But when the Faculties of the Soul are unactive or slow in their Operations as it often happens they are to be excited by the help of good Books which ought always to be at hand when we Meditate and in all such holy exercise we are to approach the Divine Presence with our greatest Reverence and Humiliation And it is also necessary before every Meditation to make a strict Examen of Conscience 1. What Benefits we have received that day from Almighty God for which we are to return Thanks 2. What Sins we have that day committed running through every hour in thought word and deed for which we are to beg pardon 3. We are to resolve upon an amendment in every particular by the Grace of God After such strict Examination of all our Thoughts Desires Words and Works judging our selves that we be not judged of the Lord and Confessing our Sins in the bitterness of our Soul as the Church requires and taking also
Virgins that they more especially care for the things of the Lord how to please him in every thing and so become Holy both in Body and in Spirit yet are Married People also as the Circumstances of their Stations will permit obliged to care for the things of the Lord above all other things for the Spouse of Christ the Church being a chast Virgin as St. Paul calls her we that profess ourselves Members of that spotless Church 2 Cor. 11.2 whether we be married or unmarried ought also to be chast and neither in action or thought make the Members of Christ the members of an Harlot The same Apostle in his first Epistle to the Corinthians Argues still more against Fornication 1 Cor. 6.18 Fly Fornication saith he and why so For every other Sin that a Man doth is without the Body i. e. doth not so immediately touch the body with any proper Infamy or so entirely remove it from under the power of our Lord But he that committeth Fornication and much more if Adultery c. sinneth against his own body i. e. dishonours it the most he can by degrading himself to so base an Alliance as to become one and the same with that vile nasty Creature with whom he sinneth and so from a pure Member of Christ he renders himself the filthy Member of an Infamous Harlot or something worse I here add that this sin offers also the greatest Indignity to the Incarnation of the Son of God imaginable who did therefore take upon him our Flesh to exalt it into his own nature his Heavenly Image that no such filthiness might any longer inhabit in it To prevent which vileness in us the same Apostle also peculiarly concerning this sin or any filthy Discourse tending towards it gives charge that it should not be so much as named amongst such as would pass for Christians But Fornication saith he to the Ephesians and all Vncleanness Eph. 5.3 4. c. let it not be so much as once named amongst you as becometh Saints Nor Filthiness nor Foolish Talking nor Jesting which are not Convenient And the Apostle there assures us that no Whoremonger or unclean Person hath any Inheritance in the Kingdom of Christ and of God Besides the Seal of the Covenant of Grace with Abraham was it not ordered by God to be so particularly placed upon all the Faithful as to become in a manner a punishment of their Lusts And is there not a Natural shame upon every man in the committing of those sins or any thing like them tho' lawful So as that the light of the Sun the sight of a pious Picture the coming in of a little Child or almost any of God's Creatures even a pious thought which proceeds also from God is sufficient sometimes to overawe prevent and put by the most hardned Sinner from embracing the Temptation And is it not a burning shame that the presence of Almighty God and His. Holy Angels who with perfect hatred of all Impurities are continually looking upon us and disswading us to the contrary should not be much more prevalent with us against such enormous wickedness But yet so strong are the habits of such Sins as in a manner to dispoil us of all shamefacedness and wholly to alter and corrupt the Nature and Reason of those Persons in which they are insomuch that the Practisers but of one Species of them are called in the Revelations by the name of Dogs Rev. 22.15 Phil. 3.2 and so are the Gnosticks by St. Paul for their being guilty of some such like impurities As if the Custom and Beastliness of such sins did utterly depose men from their manhood and change them into Dogs And lastly not to omit the greatest Argument of all of the Deformity and Filthiness of the sins of the Flesh Rom. 1.16 we find in the Epistle to the Romans when God had abandoned those Heathens that had first forsaken him to follow their own Imaginations since they would not hearken to his Commands which were Holy Just and Good they committed such monstrous unnatural Lusts that were the greatest disgrace to Humane Nature that possibly could be Men with Men and so Women also committing those things that were unseemly and unbefitting rational Creatures God grant that we be not so left to our selves so given over to our own hearts Lusts a certain sign of God's highest displeasure and a fore-runner of his heaviest Judgments CHAP. III. Of the punishments of such Sins TO those dissolute unthinking Wretches who will not by the preceeding Arguments be prevailed on to leave their lewd unmanly Course of Life I shall propose in the second place the Terrors of the Lord to perswade them the severe Punishments which inevitably attend such sins that the Practisers thereof may most rightly measure the greatness of their faults which they make Natural and for that reason excusable by the great revenge God himself takes of them Thus St. Paul warns his Thessalonians to abstain from the Fornication of the Gentiles 1 Thess 4.6 7. the defrauding our Brother of his Wife c And what is the reason because the Lord saith he is the avenger of all such all manner of Lusts even those commited only in the heart And so in his Epistle to the Hebrews he pronounceth the same thing Heb. 13.4 Marriage is Honourable and the bed undefiled but Whoremongers and Adulterers God will Judge And in detestation of such unlawful Lusts the Lord appointed under Moses's Law That a Bastard should not enter into the Congregation of the Lord Deut. 23.2 until the tenth Generation And does not the Prophet Jeremiah most particularly threaten in God's Name such Sinners for their Assembling in Troops into Harlots Houses and running like fed Horses after their Neighbours Wives Shall I not Visit for these things saith the Lord Jer. 5.7 and shall not my Soul be avenged of such a Nation as this Those Expressions The Lord is the Avenger God will Judge the Lord appointed shall I not visit plainly show that God taketh the punishing all such abominations into his own hands that they may be sure not to go unpunished even in this Life But this is not all we find in Sacred Scripture God inflicting on these sins not ordinary punishments but such fearful Judgments to which none other can be compared The drowning of the whole World about a Thousand Years after its Creation when all Flesh excepting some very few Persons had corrupted their ways was it not to wash away its pollution from these sins with a Flood And how many thousand Souls better than our selves perished in that Deluge The dreadful Raining of Fire and Brimstone from Heaven upon those miserable brutish Cities Sodom and Gomorrha and the Cities about them which yet perhaps were not so bad as some Cities even now-a-days amongst us was it not to purifie their Land which was once a Paradise upon Earth from those loathsome sins by Fire The
the Earth and Sea giving up their Dead and a particular Examination of them according to God's unerring Books which will then be opened Consider 4. The Difference that will then be between the Good and Bad. The Good having Co-operated with God's Grace shall be Cloathed with Glorious Bodies and placed on Christ's Right Hand The Bad not Co-operating with God's Spirit Cloathed with Corruption and placed on Christ's Left Hand And the Consciences and Thoughts of all hearts will be then laid open Reflect What shame confusion will it then be to the Impenitent when out of their own Mouths and Consciences they will be both Accused and Condemned Consider 5. How astonishing it will be to the Wicked to hear the Sentence of the Judge Go ye Cursed into everlasting Fire And how joyful to the Righteous to hear Come ye blessed possess the Kingdom prepared for you c. Reflect Make firm Purposes to live well and in vertuous Circumstances and intreat the Judge to be propitious to you and that you may always bear in mind this terrible Judgment and Sentence to escape it which is said to have occasioned the Institution of the severest Order of Christians in the World Saturday Of Hell Consider 1. What a Punishment it would be to be bound Hand and Foot and cast into a hot fiery Furnace there to remain burning and unconsumed tho but for a short time And as every Member of the Body so every Power and Faculty of the Soul receive its peculiar Torment Consider 2. How hard and unsupportable it must needs be to be Slaves to the Devils and Companions of the damned amidst the most exquisit Tortures and incessant Blasphemies and Cursings of Allmighty God Consider 3. How long these Torments will last If after some Thousands of Years there were to be an end it would somewhat lessen them But after an Hundred thousand Years succeeds an Eternity that cannot be measured Reflect How foolish is it to chuse such endless Torments for a transitory Pleasure Endure any Punishments here to avoid them Here cut here burn but save me in the World to come was St. Austin's Prayer Entreat Almighty God that you may be so awed by them whilst living that you may not deserve to experience them when dead Sunday Of the Joys of Heaven Consider 1. The Place and the Company How great Joy it must needs be to inhabit in the City of God the heavenly Jerusalem and converse with the holy Angels and all the Saints which have been from the beginning of the World Who having the same Charity one for another being all filled with the same holy Spirit rejoyce in every ones Good as if it were their own Consider 2. The greatness of the Reward The Body it self will be spiritualized and all its Senses and Powers exalted and adorned with most admirable Gifts And the Soul enabled to see and know God as he is and to love and enjoy him to all Eternity which is the only true Blessedness And though there be far different degrees of Glory yet no Envy but on the contrary Rejoycing See the preceeding Discourse Reflect Give God thanks who hath given you to hope for and made you capable of this Glory and humbly implore him mercifully to preserve you though ungrateful in true Vertue and holy Living that you may at length come to that glorious Place and there praise and magnify him to all Eternity CHAP. III. Heads of Meditation for the Second Third and Fourth Weeks Second Week MOnday Of the Incarnation of our Saviour His leaving the Bosom of his Father and taking upon him Humane Nature Voluntarily and yet by consent of the whole Trinity A Mercy denied to the fallen Angels And a Mystery which the good Angels desired to look into Tuesday Of the Visitation of the ever-Blessed Virgin and the Salutation of the Angel Hail c. Wednesday Of the Nativity of our Lord in a Stable yet honoured with Miracles Thursday Of the Shepherd's Vision the Angels Hymn the coming of the Three Kings by the Guidance of a Star or Angel Friday Of the Offering up of our Saviour in the Temple The Humility of the Mother of our Lord being not obliged to any such Oblation Old Simeon's Prayer Lord now lettest c. He could not die till he had seen the Lords Christ Saturday Our Saviour's Baptism and the Testimony the Father and the Holy Spirit then gave of his Divinity Sunday Of our Lord's Transfiguration and the Consolation the Three Disciples also took therein It is good for us to be here c. The Third Week MOnday Of the Eight Beatitudes the Sum of Christian Perfection placing happiness in things seemingly most contrary to it such as Poverty Persecution c. But yet the true and only way to Blessedness declared to be so by him who is Wisdom it self and who himself also became our Example in sufferings Tuesday Of the Lord's Prayer containing all the good things we are to pray for and all the evils we are to pray against Wednesday Of the Rich Glutton and the ten Virgins The difference between Dives and Lazarus both in this World and the other And between the ten Virgins in the other World notwithstanding their seeming equality in this Thursday Of the Conversion of Mary Magdalene and the Woman of Samaria Both of them great Sinners The former possessed with seven Devils and the latter lived in Fornication But their Repentance was as remarkable as their Sins And their after life as Vertuous as their former had been Vicious Friday Of the Paralytick at the Pool of Bethesda and of the Man born blind Both cured by our Saviour And both afterwards openly Confessed him To leave our sins and follow Christ takes away the Cause of Sin For there is a Lameness and Blindness also in the Soul Saturday Of the Prodigal Son and the Man that fell among Thieves The Prodigal was received by his Father upon his returning and repenting The poor Man fell among Thieves by his leaving his right way Jerusalem for Jericho God for his pleasure the Church for the Company of Thieves and Robbers Reflect Conversion to God's Church and Repentance the only Remedy Sunday Of our Saviour's raising from the Dead Lazarus the Son of the Woman of Naim the Daughter of Jairus One of them was newly dead the second carried out the third three days buried The newly dead immediately upon our Saviour's speaking rose and walked was perfectly cured the rest not so soon Reflect So it fairs with Sinners More difficulty for habituated Sinners to rise to a Life of Grace The Fourth Week MOnday Of the Institution of the Blessed Eucharist He that Eats worthily of this Bread shall live for ever shall overcome his Lusts be filled with Celestial Joys c. But he that Eats unworthily eats his own Damnation if he dies in that condition not discerning the Lord's Body Tuesday Of our Saviour's Passion in General Who it was that suffered The Son of
live without Care or any sort of Seriousness keep what the World calls the best Company have their choice of Women and Wine and deny themselves nothing of Sensuality And all this as the World now goes without running any great Hazard of losing their Reputation but not of losing their immortal Souls which sure ought most to be regarded by them To these supine Christians and Slaves to their own Lusts who know better but yet as it were in their own Defence take the Liberty not only of living Counter to but also of drolling upon all that is serious or sacred even the Holy Scriptures and our blessed Saviour himself rather than be stopp'd or check'd in their Career or in the leastwise hindred the following the full Swinge of their own unbridled Appetites and ungovernable Wits I can only propose First The Impurity and Filthiness of such Sins and Secondly The severe Punishments that inseparably attend them CHAP. II. Of the Impurity and Filthiness of such Sins PAssions Frailties and Infirmities are the common Plea and Pretence of Sinners Whereas the defect and proneness of our Nature to sin is in it self no Sin so long as not compli'd withall and besides is abundantly repaired and supernatural Assistance recovered by the Incarnation of our Saviour and the Means he hath afforded us to a holy Life if we are not wanting in the Application The loss of our Innocency hath not deprived us of any of our Faculties Our Understanding and Will are still the same and we have the same freedom to chuse the Good and reject the Evil nor is the divine Assistance God be thanked denied to any that seek it So that the Commission of Sin is entirely from our selves Perditio tua ex te Thy Destruction is from thy self Hos 13.9 says the Prophet and the preventing of it wholly in our own power And one would think we should not readily fall in love with so great deformity My present Subject however is those grosser Sins the Sins of the Flesh as being most rise amongst us and such as destroy all seriousness the foulness and filthiness whereof appears 1st From the great offence they give to God's own Holiness and Purity To which every evil even in Thought is opposite Sanctity being his great and most proper Attribute than which the Seraphims could find none greater when they sung Holy Holy Holy Lord God of Sabbaoth Besides the Divine Nature being absolute Purity without any Mixture or Composition whatsoever and being also absolute Perfection so that no defect or want of any good thing is in him it must needs be that what is contrary to those as is all imperfection and evilness must also be opposite to him Which speaking according to the manner of men is to be displeasing to be grievous to be loathsome and odious to him but most of all these grosser sins And this we know also from God's putting all along in Scripture a particular mark of his displeasure upon them setting them in the front as the Captains and Ring-leaders of the rest These are the members we are to mortify upon Earth Col. 3.5 Fornication Vncleanness inordinate Affection evil Concupiscence c. So again 1 Cor. 6.9 be not deceived neither Fornicators c. nor Adulterers Rom. 1 24 c. Thess 4.5 Eph. 4.1 nor Effeminate Persons nor Abusers of themselves with Mankind c. shall inherit the Kingdom of God These are the sins with which the Gentiles when they offended God most of all before the light of the Gospel shone amongst them stand every where in Scripture principally charged Nay so great an offence are these sins to the Holiness of Almighty God that he seems to equal them to the greatest sin of all 1 Cor. 6.9 Rev. 22.15 Col. 3.5 And therefore in Holy Write we find them ordinarily linked together with the sin of Idolatry And sometimes also with Covetousness taken in its largest sence for Coveting either Persons or Riches which last is said also to be Idolatry And the former may be called so too for the same reason because it is hard to say which of the two Harlots or Money is most powerful and most idolized in this lower World The Impurity and filthiness of Fornication and other grosser sins of the Flesh appears yet farther from their oppositeness to that Holiness and Cleanness which ought to be in the Body as well as in the Soul of all those who profess themselves Members of Christ Not that this filthiness of the Flesh is any External Deformity in the Body or any Diseases Ulcers or Sores For we find Job Lazarus and many other great Saints who had been well pleasing in God's sight were before men very loathsom Persons But it is a real defilement of the Body as the Body is the honourable Instrument and Associate of the Soul and ought by it to be employed to a more noble end even together with the Soul to be employed to the Glorifying God and one day also to be presented with it before him in his Heavenly Tabernacle 1 Thess 4.4 This is the will of God saith St. Paul even your Sanctification that you should abstain from Fornication that every one of you should know how to possess his Vessel i. e. his body in Sanctification and Honour Vers 7. not in Lust of Concupiscence for God hath called us not to uncleanness but unto holiness And the same Apostle in his first Epistle to the Corinthians 1 Cor. 6.20 addresses himself to the Men of this Age as well as those of all others after a most prevailing manner Know you not that your body is the Temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you and not your own or at your own disposing for ye are bought with a price the precious Blood of our Lord to be also his Spouse and his Members therefore ought to glorifie God both in Body and Soul which are God's And is there not good reason that after being purchased even our body as well as soul at so dear a rate as the Inestimable Blood of our Lord we should at least in gratitude sanctifie and devote our selves wholly to his honour and service But to compell us to it unless we will deny our selves to be Men and rational Creatures the Apostle's Argument here and in his other Epistles runs thus The Church is the Spouse of Christ Eph. 5.29 30 c. 1 Cor. 6.17.6 13. whom he bought and purchased to himself with his own Blood and Life whom he Cherisheth also with the like care as the same Flesh and Bone and the same Spirit with himself And for the same reason is now our Body as wel as our Soul for the Lord and the Lord for the Body If therefore the Wife have not power over her own Body but the Husband no more hath Christ's Spouse the Church or we her Members 1 Cor. 7.34 power over our selves but Christ And tho' it be said only of
Death of Christ 1 Cor. 15.3 2ly That to the applying the Merits of Christ's Passion to us there are required some Conditions on our part Phil. 2.12 namely our Assenting and Co-operating with God's Grace 3ly That by such Application not only our sins are remitted Eph. 2.5.4.25 but we receive the Grace of Regeneration changing us in our minds implanting us into Christ enabling us to good works Rom. 2.13 Joh. 1.12 to become doers of the Law Sons of God c. The manner of such our Regeneration and of the Divine Assistance is thus First Mat. 28.19 Eph. 5.26 When we are Baptized into Christs Church not only past sins are washed away supposing us rightly disposed thereunto but also a new Power and Ability Supernatural of Living holily for the future is conferr'd and superadded Tit. 3.5 c. Acts 11.16 The Holy Ghost being then personally given us and God's Grace Efficaciously planted in us for newness of Life Rom. 6.4.7.6 and bringing forth Good Works By the Assistance of this Grace therefore our corrupt Nature is so perfectly restored and made capable of all Vertue that we may and are obliged also therewith totally to subdue our Lusts so as to live free from the habit even of unclean thoughts Gal. 5.24 and from the commission of all unclean Acts at least of those greater before mentioned which we are sure from God's own Word exclude the Kingdom of Heaven By this new principle of Grace Eph. 5.5 which worketh with us and without which our working signifies nothing a real Holiness Facility to Good is conveyed into our Souls our Understanding is Illuminated so as readily to embrace the Holy Mysteries of Christ's Religion which are above it above it 's natural Knowledge and Reach and past it s ever finding out but by Revelation Our Will from time to time inspired with new and divine Affections and at length influenced at least in some Persons with an impatient Love of God above all other things And the same Holy Spirit which thus Acts and Assists within us interceeds also for us Rom. 8.26 with groans which cannot be uttered groans irresistably prevalent at the Throne of Grace To the first Grace therefore given us at our Baptism if we make a right use of it more and more is added to every one that hath improved his one Talent more shall be given Mat. 25.29 and he shall have abundance And sometimes to the same well-disposed Person are conferred several Talents several different Gifts for God's greater glory of the same Holy Spirit but yet the most excellent Grace which we are above all to covet 1 Cor. 12.31 as being that without which all other Graces signify nothing to us is 1 Cor. 13.13 Charity or the Love of God Which is the most effectual remedy of all our Lusts or false Loves and when once obtained does in a manner the whole work of a Christian it felf because by its secret Energy it centers all our Affections in our Lord so as sweetly to compell us to seek in all things a punctual Observance and conformity to his holy Will and in nothing to displease him with whom our Soul being ravished is sick of love for him and languisheth with a perpetual desire Cant. 5.8 either 1st of suffering for him thereby at once to shew the Truth of our love and to purify us as Gold in a burning Furnace Or 2ly of praying to Him the only way of Conversing with him upon Earth Or 3ly Of fully enjoying him in Heaven even though it were through Martyrdom it self Which great Vertue shined most Eminently in St. Mary Magdalen whose sins which were many were therefore forgiven her because she loved much And her chosing to sit at the feet of Jesus to hear his words our Saviour himself calls the unum necessarium the better and sublimer part of a Christian which nothing can take away And albeit this love of God inferrs and comprehends the love of our Neighbour and of our selves and of all things that belong to God yet these not after the fashion of the World but only as consistent with and much encreasing and enflaming our love of God So that by shewing our love to God as we are obliged all the ways that we can we are continually enlivening and augmenting it and still think it little and unworthy of eternal life and that it is want of our Endeavours and not of God's Grace which hinders us from attaining still higher Spiritual Gifts and a more intense love of our Lord every little Inclination in us to any thing else if not throughly mortifyed being enough to retard our progress in this true way to perfection This one thing I do says St. Paul to his Philippians forgeting those things which are behind already obtained and reaching forward to those things which are before not yet obtained I press toward the Mark for the price of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus Phil. 3.13 And if so great an Apostle when he had so far attained as perhaps none farther in the Love of God and Self-mortifications witness his Watchings 2 Cor. 6.5.11.23 Fastings Labours Stripes Imprisonments Deaths was still pressing forward much more ought we to mend our pace who are so far behind so far from perfect Charity and perfect Chastity as to be still wallowing in our â—usts still hankering after the Gratifications of Sense We ought not only to be mindful of the powerful Assistances God hath afforded us to Purity and Holiness but also actually to make use of them for that very end and purpose those Assistances of the Holy Spirit being such as continually war against the Flesh Col. 3.1 stirring us up to seek those things that are above and supernatural and so after an ineffable manner if we endeavour to correspond to them unite us to Christ and God and bring down Heaven into our Souls quenching in us the thirst to all sensual Pleasures making them by degrees seem more and more contemptible to us and at length odious Quas sordes quae dedecora c. what filthiness did they Suggest what disgrace and dishonour says St. Austin in his Confessions concerning his formerly beloved but then much more hated Lusts The way therefore to experience the good of Christianity is resolutely to enter upon practising Christian Vertue by a more strict observance of Gods Laws and purging our selves from the contrary Vices For none how learned soever can truly know God but they that serve him And a poor Shepherd that faithfully serves him will by experience know more of God in his chiefest Excellencies than a Doctor of the Chair that does only talk of him And as the Grace of God is the principal Instrument of a good Christian Life so the next to that is frequent examining our Consciences once or twice a day that so we may learn to know by little and little how to
God God himself Innocent c. What and how grievous things he suffered So many griefs So great Ignominy He hath born our griefs Behold the Man Behold and see were there ever sufferings like his And all this for his Enemies ungrateful sinners and me in particular to Reconcile them to God Reflect Oh the Obedience Humility Patience Perseverance Charity of his sufferings Wednesday What passed in the Garden His Agony His Soul was heavy even to Death He sweat drops of Blood He Prayed against the bitter Cup but with a Resignation to his Fathers Will. Thy will not mine be done And soon after with unparallell'd Fortitude surrendred himself If you seek me let these go their ways desiring to tread the Wine-press of God's Wrath alone Thursday Our Saviour's Vsage before Annas Caiphas Herod and Pilate Before Annas Questioned for his Doctrine In Caiphas's house false Witnesses were brought against him He was kept Prisoner there all Night Mockt by the Souldiers and others Denyed by Peter Before Herod despised Before Pilate first declared Innocent but afterwards Condemned by him for Treason to please the People and secure his own Interest with them St. Peter's Repentance very speedy But the Obstinacy of the Jews continues to this very day Friday Our Saviour's Vsage at the Pillar his Crown of Thorns his Journey to Mount Calvary bearing his Cross his barbarous Crucifixion the Wounds he received the sweet words he uttered Father forgive them c. yet the Rocks were more Compassionate than the Jews and We. Saturday Of our Saviours Burial Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea his Blessed Mother and St. Mary Magdalene and some other Honourable and Holy Persons were concerned in it They wash'd his Wounds with their holy Tears and Embalmed his Body with their Sighs and Prayers and Richest Odours He made his Sepulcher with the Rich and Honourable but yet the malicious Jews sealed the Stone and set a Watch to prevent if possible his rising again to Glory Sunday Of our Saviour's Resurrection Ascension and sending of the Holy Ghost 1. The manner of his Resurrection His Conversing Fourty days upon Earth Comforting his Freinds Strengthening his Disciples and giving them charge over his Flock 2. his Ascention into Heaven siting on the right hand of God that our Hearts and Affections might thither also ascend 3. His sending the Holy Ghost on the Day of Pentecost his Disciples having Fasted Watch'd and Pray'd continually day and night for ten days before Reflect His Resurrection the first Fruits and earnest of ours His Ascension to draw us and our affections after him His sending the Holy Ghost that the same Spirit that raised up him the Head might also quicken us his Members CHAP. IV. Meditations for the fifth Week MOnday Of the Nobility of the Soul 1. Created by God after his own Image 2. God giveth his Angels Charge over it As the Hills stand about Jerusalem so standeth the Lord round about them that fear him 3. Of so great value is the Soul that our Saviour left the Bosom of his Father to redeem it even with the price of his Blood Tuesday Of a pure Conscience a right Faith and doing all things for God's Honour These Three constitute the good Christian for the Life we now live is by Faith And the pure in heart shall see God shall have a clear and more naked perception of him even in this Life No Image or Idea can represent a Spirit such as God is He is Purity it self perceptible only to the pure in Heart after an ineffable manner and void of all sensible Idea's Reflect The purging therefore our Consciences is to be carefully minded Wednesday Of the Presence of God With the thoughts of this so great Presence many holy Persons have preserv'd themselves from sin Enoch walked with God and was translated Abraham walked before God and was perfect King David set God always before him that he should not sin So Elijah and Elisha God liveth in whose sight and presence I stand And nothing more certain than that God filleth and worketh in all his Creatures In him we live and move and have our being and all things subsist and are upheld by his immediate hand But he more nearly dwells and inhabits in every good Man and directs him by the Interiour Language of his Inspirations and gives him leave also to Communicate to him as to a most faithful Freind all his Wants Desires Resolutions Infirmities Temptations c. And the oftner he recollects his Faculties from external objects and retireth into himself to God so much the better and his progress in holiness greater and more easy Reflect How great a folly therefore is it to live insensible of the Assistance of so great a presence so near us even within us Thursday Of the Conjunction of the Soul with God Which consists in a Conformity of our Will to the Divine We must Will the same thing with God and the same means to it My Son give me thy heart says God by Solomon It is good for me to cleave to God says David And St. Paul nothing could separate from Christ Neither Life nor Death c. 2. Such a Person is always Examining his Conscience Keep 's a strict guard that his thoughts wander not abroad or be over long busied in outward Affairs for fear of losing that presence that Consolation he always carries about with him in his Soul Prayers Meditation Contemplation Recollection the Holy Sacraments are in a manner the entertainment of his whole Life Reflect All these things are irksome and nauseous to the Carnal Worldly Man Friday Of Humility 1. The Humble man retains a true sence of God's Favours What great things he hath both done and suffered for him and that out of a free and most amazingly generous Goodness without any the least merit on his side And on the contrary what returns he hath made how many and how great wickednesses committed against that good God So that he knows not which way to turn himself Thinks no place vile enough for him who for his sins deserves the greatest Afflictions the greatest Torments He hath no way but to humble himself before God with Confusion of Face and Offer and Resign himself wholly to his boundless Mercy to deal with him as his Compassion pleases 2. The true Humble Man is Servant of all Especially his lawful Governours and Teachers to whose wiser Judgment he readily submits his own less wise As knowing they have more ability to judge than himself and more assistance also promised not to mistake To these therefore he submits as to Christ himself being commanded so to do Ezek. 33.7 8. Heb. 13.17 3ly Being contemned he rejoiceth being honoured he referrs the honour to God and so all other Benefits he receives But the shame of his sins he takes to himself and confesses with the poor Publican that he is not worthy to lift up his eyes to Heaven 4ly What humilty can equal that of our Lord in all