their lusts advance but their lusts are their plague and torment them and they extremely hate and curse those things which they do passionately desire Now that habitual Sinner his sins they are his emploiment his delight too he longs as those other but he satisfies also and finds pleasure in them and then if those others be fit company for the Devils onely canst thou believe thy self fit company for Christ that he should bid thee come to him No begin to act thy Hell a little sooner account them here thy torments hate them in time perceive them to be burdens while they may be laid down and then come unto Christ and he will give thee rest And evermore O Lord give us of thy rest a rest from sin here and a rest from misery eternally Yea O Lord give us to labor and to find trouble under that intolerable burden of our guilt that we may with eager hast fly to the refreshment that we perverse obdurate Sinners whom thy mercies cannot invite our own miseries may force to be happy and tho our wickednesses are multiplied into an infinite mass and weight yet despise us not when we fall under them for thou didst invite us to come and bring all that load to thee despise us not tho heavy laden for thou thy self didst bear this weight and didst die under it And O thou who didst thy self thus suffer by reason of this load pity us that labor with it ease us of the burden of our former guilt free us from the slavery of our iniquity from bearing any longer Sathan's loads then shall we at last sit down with thee in the Land of everlasting rest deliver'd from all weights but that eternal weight of glory and resting from all labors save that of praising thee and ascribing all Honor Power Praise Might Majesty and Dominion to Father Son and holy Ghost for evermore SERMON X. OF THE CHRISTIANS VICTORY Over Death Sin and the Law 1 Cor. 15. 57. Thanks be to God which giveth us the victory thro our Lord Jesus Christ. THE words are the close of an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Song of joy and triumph for a victory Now a victory supposeth Enimies and the verse before names them and the Text shews us the means that they art conquer'd by and who they are that are partakers of the Victory I shall declare and treat of both 1. The Enimies here mention'd and we may account them three if that which gives both aid and strength to fortifies our Enimy be so as sure it is 1. Here is Death which sin arms with a sting and do's envenome it 2. Sin it self empower'd and strengthned by the Law 3. That Law also In the second place here are the means by which the Victory is gotten and for whom us the victory thro Jesus In handling all which I shall shew First that the Law gives Sin all its strength and how it do's so 2ly That Sin is the sting of Death and how it is so 3ly That by Christ both the Law which is the strength of Sin is taken away and Sin which is the sting of Death pull'd out and so both Sin and Death so weaken'd that they cannot hurt now and they shall be swallowed up in perfect victory and who they are all this is don for Of these all in this order which I crave leave to speak to directly without any least diverting from the Text or Subject First I am to speak of the first preparations that are made against us in behalf of our Enimies and that is to shew you that the Law gives all the strength to Sin which it hath and how it do's so Sin hath its very being from Law it being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the transgression of the Law 1 John 3. 4. and Sin is not imputed where there is no Law Rom. 5. 13. yea where there is no Law there is no transgression c. 4. 15. But this is not all for in the Law besides the Precepts there is also Sanction and it lays a twofold obligation first to duty secondly upon transgression to punishment 1. To duty and that perfect and unsinning strict obedience for the terms are these Cursed is he that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the Law to do them And to this the whole man is oblig'd the soul as well as body caro spiritus Dei res est saith Tertull. God made the soul as well as body one 's his creature as much as the other and the one hath as much reason then to pay him honor and obedience as the other if indeed the spirit hath not much more to obey him in its own motions and actings than in those of the body which are onely under it and guided by it So that thoughts are criminal against this Law as well as doings by them the Soul fulfils its part of the transgression more it may be than its own share while it robs the Flesh seizes its satisfactions and makes them her own against her nature And indeed whatever part the Law is broken and transgrest by 't is transgression and sin still whether by the mind for lust when it hath conceived onely sin is then begotten James 1. 15. or by the tongue for of every idle word we must give an account at the day of Judgment Matth. 12. 36. and by thy words thou shalt be condemn'd Or lastly by the works So that according to the Tenor of this strict and severe Law whatever we can do or indeed whatever we do not is Sin besides commissions that are sinful there is still defect and so transgression in our thoughts our words and deeds even in the best and in not doing also there 's omission and so failing But besides this severe obligation of the Law to duty upon this our faileur there is a severer obligation 2. To punishment for every sin is cursed as we saw Upon this account the Law saith St Paul worketh wrath Rom. 4. 15. we are children of wrath Eph. 2. 3. whose inheritance is destruction and who are of right to possess onely the sad issues of God's indignation for to this the Law condemns us all by reason of our Sins and upon that account the Law is said to be the strength of Sin Because by force and vertue of this threatning of the Law we that have sinned are therefore liable and obnoxious to the condemnation of it And this I take to be the meaning of that place Rom. 7. 7 8 9 10. I had not known sin but by the law for I had not known concupiscence except the law had said thou shalt not covet But sin taking occasion by the commandment wrought in me all manner of concupiscence for without the law sin was dead but when the commandment came sin revived and I died and the commandment which was ordain'd to life I found to be unto death The Apostle's drift here is not to evince how the
by except we will walk on in darkness unto the land of utter darkness But as a lanthorn is no guidance to the blind and a light is of use only where there is an eye so Gods commandments can have no influence upon nor give direction or assistance to our waies except this eye of the mind be enlightned by them for it is Conscience that is the conveiance to all duty to the heart of man that cannot set up obedience but as the Conscience do's press it on it that conveys the immediate obligation My Conscience tells me this I must forbear that I must practise Yea where there was no law to give direction the eye of Conscience looking o're the frame of man a creature reasonable in his making could strait see a necessity of doing things agreable to right reason and viewing the materials of the pile saw he was built of Soul as well as body of of an immortal Spirit as well as a carnal part knew that his life was to be order'd to the uses of the Spirit as well as of the flesh and more indeed that being the better part and easily could gather hence that man was not to serve his lower brutish part the body so as to discompose his soul and when it did so did condemn him for the doing of it And upon this S. Paul affirms Rom. 2. 14 15. When the Gentiles that have not the Law do by nature the things contained in the Law they having not the Law are a Law unto themselves which shew the work of the Law written on their hearts their Conscience bearing them witness Which says that tho the rest of the world had not the Revelation of Gods will and Law as the Jews had yet from the dictats of their reason and the notions of good and evil implanted in them their conscience did oblige them unto the performance of such things as the Law required and upon such performance or omission without any other Law did either excuse them as men that did not culpably wander out of those paths which the light and Eye that God had planted in them did direct them in or else accuse them as transgressors and render them obnoxious to punishment And so it did before the Law So Rom. 5. 13 14. For until the Law sin was in the world but sin is not imputed where there is no Law Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adams transgressions First after Adams time till Moses before the giving of the Law men fin'd and tho it be true that sin is not charg'd to punishment but where there is a Law to forbid it under that penalty and therefore it might be thought that sin without the Law would not have brought death into the world yet from Adam till Moses death reign'd men died that had not sinn'd as Adam did against an express actual precept promulgated as his was and establish't with a positive threat of death but died because they had sinn'd against the laws of their nature the principles of duty that were put into their making which Conscience prest upon their practise and whose guidance they would not follow they pull'd death upon themselvs in the errors of their waies 'T was by the equity of this that when the wickedness of men grew great in the earth the floud grew so too an inundation of waters overspread it when sin had once don so and iniquity against the dictates of conscience struck all the world at once with death except eight persons Conscience therefore where there is law and also where there is none is the great director of our actions and to this I shall apply our Saviors discourse dividing not the Text but Conscience and in the several members verifying what our Savior he reaffirms 1. Conscience either respecteth actions to be don or actions already don First as it respecteth actions to be don telling us this we must do that we must forbear so first as it answers to the single Eye it denotes the pure Conscience the enlightned Eye of the mind as S. Paul calls it that is a truly well inform'd Conscience a Conscience that judges according to its rule and to this I shall first tell you what is the entire rule of conscience and consequently when it s dictates are right when it informs me truly this I must do that I must forbear 2. Prove to you that all our actions that are regulated by such a well inform'd conscience are good and honest so that if this eye be single the whole body shall be full of light If the conscience be pure the man's holy and so the first part of the text is proved 2. As it answers to the evil eye so it denotes an evil conscience a conscience that do's not give true judgment of duty ill inform'd And this either First wholly so and then 't is reprobate sense such as that of them that call good evil and evil good from which men are stil'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 4. 2. or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Phavorinus Rom. 1. 31. Or secondly but in part and then 't is either first an erring conscience or secondly a doubtful conscience or thirdly a scrupulous conscience to which also several others will fall in And I shall shew you how every of these do's mislead a man into the dark The scrupulous raiseth clouds and mists about him dark errors and discomforts too the doubtful do's instead of guiding leave him so puzl'd that he knows not which way to be-take himself and the erring conscience lights him into the pit takes him by the hand to thrust him down guides him into a necessity of sin and the no conscience the reprobate sense it is a darkness somwhat worse then that the blackness of Hell here All this I shall do in order Upon the other part conscience as it relates to actions already don so it do's testify and in so doing either excuse or accuse Rom. 2. 15. Now tho conscience in the other former respect hath indeed the greater influence upon our practise and so to it the text do's more directly answer yet this latter having some also in order to the making future actions holy by repentance for when once the soul hath shipwrack't on a sin and she is ready to sink and perish there is no plank on which she can escape but repentance Now 't is this Eye that must look out for that 't is an accusing conscience that must set him upon Repentance this hurry's him about and will not let him rest 'till he get upon the plank that 's fastned to the Anchor even the Anchor of hope by which until it be secur'd a good conscience never is at quiet Because I intend to say but little to this I shall dispatch it now And that in order to its actions excusing and accusing And first if conscience be the
of their faith and communion in Gods public worship among Christians as there is unity and communion between the several parts of one same person that their union in it should be so strict that all their assemblies for it should make but one body with one spirit so another end is to assure that as in one same body there are several parts for several uses without which it could not be an organiz'd complete animal body so in the one body of Christ the Church too there are several ministeries offices and powers some more noble others more inferior and the whole body may as well be all eie as each member in the Church a Seer every part be tongue as every man a Teacher St Paul from that Analogy deducing a necessity of several parts and their subordination also in that 1 Cor. 12. v. 28. and accordingly saith he God hath set several orders first Apostles after Prophets Teachers helps or ministerial offices and governments without which governments and which diversity 't is as impossible it can subsist as for a body to see without an eie or speak without a tongue consult direct and call it self without a brain or understanding Yet this same is exprest all in the other body of a building which my text relates to for Eph. 4. 11. Christ gave also some Apostles and some Prophets some Evangelists some Pastors and some Teachers for the perfecting the Saints compacting holding Christians together in assemblies for Gods public worship for the work of the ministry for the edifying or building up of the body of Christ. Now this embleme to the body of a building as the other is a type of Unity but yet of several and subordinate stations in the Churches unity For stones however excellently squar'd fitted are yet no parts of the structure till they be cemented to the rest that lean on the foundation the number possibly may make a heap but not a frame until they be dispos'd and order'd in their several stations for there are such in this body also every hewn stone cannot be a pinnacle nor corner stone so in the Church all are not capable of the same ministeries offices or powers And yet we may remember when it was so all assum'd all seiz'd the offices usurpt the powers executed all the ministeries all subordination was demolisht order broken Governments under foot the stones of the Sanctuary pour'd out in the top of every street as Jeremy laments the Vrim and the Thummim stones that gave the heavenly Oracles lost in ruins Now then God to make good the promis'd method of his Providential mercies when it was thus when these stones of Sion were in the dust the Ephod and the Priests thrown into it and the Priesthood and the Fathers of it the the whole life with all its offices and powers dying almost all that could continue it being laid in the dust and Sions Enimies expecting the expiring of the Order then the appointed time was come and God not onely did himself arise but made a resurrection of the Church too and from the dust these stones were again most miraculously built into a Spiritual House I cannot but acknowledg that the breaches which this desolation made were not wholly made up nor were well cemented and as uncemented breaches use to do decai'd more and more daily what arts were us'd to keep them open yea to widen them by whom for what ends too is so evident I shall not touch it But 't is sure we had not much face had no great appearance of the bodies that the Scripture represents the Church by for in those that were before broke off from her there was no subordination nor no order nor no unity every broken divided piece of ruin took upon it self to be the entire building the whole body every Faction was Christs Church each Assembly was his flock his Congregation when indeed it was onely a Spiritual riot And when things were dispos'd thus then at once to break down all the poor remainders he that takes his place to whom Christ said Thou art Peter and on this rock I will build my Church who yet as not content to thrust Christ out from being the alone foundation then which none can lay another true one 1 Cor. 3. 11. would be the chief head stone in the corner also on which whosoever should fall shall be broken but on whosoever it shall fall it will grind him to powder Matth. 21. 44. He I say in confifidence of that success attemts this on the Reformation and particularly on this as they thought tottering Church to lay her stones all in the dust And truly such the instruments emploi'd are that humanely speaking it must seem impossible to be avoided For in Gods name under the Autority of Religion with the greatest Sacredness that can be they contrive the bloudiest most irreligious most inhumane murders treasons assassinations imaginable make the holy Eucharist the bond of their confederacy in those so tremendous villanies Christ's bloud becomes the very obligation both to commit not confess them for which end they say and swear even at the point of death and upon their Salvation prov'd and confest falshoods Now what security or guard can mankind have against such whom no ties of Religion or humanity have any force on Whether these be the doctrines of their Church tho that be true in most part yet it matters not to them who are to be massacred if they be the constant practices and if they have such guides of conscience as can satisfy and thereupon engage the instruments that must effect them to those practices How they do that I must confess seems strange for they yet look upon those actions as for which they would have absolution therefore sins For tho there have bin dispensations sent from Rome permitting them to promise swear subscribe and do what else should be requir'd of them so as in mind they did continue firm and us'd their diligence to advance the Roman faith in secret yet such dispensations might be intercepted as those were in 1580. and brought to King James in Scotland and so might discover plots if they were us'd to give them in all such occasions besides that they would stare the head of that Church in the face betray his being privy to and abetting those designs of bloud which now if they miscarry they can cast at first upon some private Desperado's and then after lye laugh them out of mens belief Such dispensations therefore being not to be expected still they took other ways For seven years after Sextus V. offering by the Bishop of Dunblain to that King a marriage with the Infanta of Spaine if he would become a Catholic as he call'd it and join with them against the English and this being mightily resisted by the then Lord Chancellor which made that ineffectual and who was their constant adversary Father William Chrichton who had
Hope of a Christian is this Hope Fourthly how that Hope does set a man on purifying He that hath this Hope purifies himself For the first what it is to purify I shall onely name it is to cleanse from all mixture of pollution and how far it is to extend is set down by St Paul upon the very same grounds with those in the Text Having therefore these promises dearly beloved let us cleanse our selves from all filthiness both of the Flesh and Spirit and St James Cleanse your hands you sinners and purify your hearts you double-minded and they both mean thus much that for external actions Christian purity tho it will admit of slips and failings yet it is not consistent with continuance in any known sin And therefore David tho he were said to be a man after Gods own heart and that he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord the very description of pure yet it is added save in the matter of Vriah For first it never does admit any filthiness of Flesh but must be universal and it is in this true what St James saith c. 2. v. 10. Whosoever shall keep the whole law and yet offend in one point he is guilty of all God had before affirm'd the same expresly Ezek. 18. 10 11 12 13. If he beget a son that is a robber and that doth the like to any one of these things and hath defil'd his neighbours wife hath oppressed the poor and needy c. shall he then live he shall not live he hath don all these abominations he shall surely die So that in Gods sight he that hath don any one of these things he hath don all these abominations for it is plain that those he had not don he abstain'd not from because God had forbidden them for then he had abstain'd from that which he had don God had forbidden that so that his abstinences are not innocence but squeamishness or fear Either he does not like them or he dares not do them for some worldly reason and he does not onely let God see he can abstain for such considerations as these but will not for his Promises or his autority He values these below the mode or fashion of the world or his respect to some other person or any little interest or humor 2. Neither does this purity admit any filthiness of the Spirit we must purify our hearts and for internal purity the rule is that to abstain from outward actions of sin is not enough but the heart must be cleansed also this is proved already And indeed to deny my flesh the pleasures of the flesh and yet to let my mind dwell upon them and enjoy them not to commit them and yet suffer my soul to do it is to transplant the sin to make my soul act the deeds of the flesh and my very spirit become carnal This is at the best to give God the worst part of my services and the Devil the best my heart and soul the Devil enjoies God hath nothing but a few outward abstinences What a mixture is here how far from purity God and the Devil join'd together and the Devil having the upper hand the better portion Thus in general but to tell you what kind of purity we are to strive after I shall touch at some few Scripture wordings of it 1. Holiness For pure and holy are often join'd 2 Cor. 7. 1. Having these promises dearly beloved let us cleanse our selves from all filthiness both of flesh and spirit perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord. Now the true notion of holiness consists in a setting apart or discrimination from other things or persons And therefore holiness of life is the observing that peculiar different form of life which God hath commanded those whom he hath call'd not being conform'd to the fashion of the world As St James saith pure Religion not to live after the common manner of men common and holy being every where oppos'd so that when God is said to call us to holiness he requires us to consecrate our lives to his service to look upon our selves as things sacred Hence Christians are call'd living Sacrifices holy to God Rom. 12. 1. Temples of the Holy Ghost 1 Cor. 6. 19. and all names of Holiness are set upon them to shew how strict a necessity lies upon us to separate our selves from all carnal wordly uses and defilements 2. The Pure are exprest by Virgins 2 Cor. 11. 2. For I am jealous over you with a Godly jealousy that is as a strict careful Parent over his beloved maiden daughter so that I may present you as a chast Virgin to Christ. Every gross impurity deflowers the soul and when it sins it plays the strumpet And if a bride that on her wedding day should play the harlot and give away that Virginity which she had but then promised to her Husband would certainly not dare to stand the wrath of her furious Bridegroom that should catch her in her villany how wilt thou meet the jealousy of thy Spouse when as thou spread'st thy self to every temtation committest perpetual whoredoms with the World and flesh and doest continually act disloialty in the very eyes of his glory Certainly the same jealous care and earnest desires that are emploi'd in seeking a wife that is not vitiated this very expression of Virgin does direct us to make use of in watchfulness over our selves that sin do not devirginate us that we do not present a strumpet to Christ for his Spouse but that he may find us Virgins at the Marriage of the Lamb. Yea that we may see what kind of ones also St Paul expresseth their Purity Ephes. 5. 27. not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing but holy and without blemish For as every gross Sin does deflowr the Soul and make it no Virgin so every lighter fault is a spot upon the cheek a wrinkle in the forehead in Christs eyes And if chastity shall be severely guarded out of a respect to future hopes of marriages which there is no hopes to be successful in if that be blasted if to please a Suiter the glass shall be consulted with every stain shall be adorn'd cover'd made a beauty-spot and all methods sometimes more then honest us'd to keep the forehead smooth the cheek full and plain not content with the Lords workmanship upon them they will outdo their Maker and create to themselves beauties that God and Nature never did intend them if men do avoid wrinkles in a Bride as they would do a Deaths-head or memento mori in their bridal bed can we then think our selves whom every day bespots and stains every hour adds such wrinkles to whose souls have more of those furrows than our lives have minutes who are indeed onely bundles of deformities besides our gross whoredoms can we I say think our selves a fit Spouse for Christ Is he the onely Bridegroom to be thus provided for Can we have
let their strictnesses take in some temporal aim besides as Reputation with their Party or getting Praise or Wealth they serve Mammon or Fame with Gods Religion and make the very Worship of the Lord be the Idolatry of Covetousness or of Honour If Jehu in his Executions on Ahab and his Family intend the cutting off the Regal Line as well as Baals worship and with their Blood to purple his own Royalty though God did bid him shed that blood yet does it stain his Soul with crimson guilt and God will punish him for his Obedience I will visit the blood of Jezreel upon the House of Jehu Hos. i. 4. But he that lets a vicious aim mix with his Vertue and does good to an ill end addresses Gods Religion to the Devil and makes Christ minister to Belial he does sin multipliedly both in his vicious intention and in debauching Vertue to serve Vice and he might much more innocently not have been Pious Neither is that Vertue or Heart sincere whose intentions are not purely and meerly vertuous but intend to compass some Religious end by means that are not lawful For such intentions are not clean but mixt with Vice and 't is sure I cannot please God with such kind of holy meanings If Saul will sacrifice with the Sheep and Oxen he was bid to destroy his very worship loseth him the Throne of Israel Nor an I serve God with such Pieties God never does require an action which he sees I cannot compass without sin for he requires no man to sin for that were to command me to break his Commands and I were bound to disobey him in obedience to him Shall I speak wickedly for God saith Job and then shall I do so Such Religious intentions the justice of those ends will never qualifie me for Gods goodness when it but makes Damnation just to me for so S. Paul affirms Rom. iii. 5 6 7 8. In fine if there be any wickedness in the heart it gives so foul a tincture to whatever pious actions we perform that they become sin to us 'T is true Prayer is as the Incense David says and the lifting up of our hands is like the Evening Sacrifice but if the heart of him that Prays have any heats of Malice in it truly that man does light his Incense with strange fire kindles his sacrifice with the flames of Hell for so S. James does call those heats He that gives God any of his performances and hath a naughty Heart like Nadab and Abihu he presents his Offering in an unhallowed Censer and all his holy worship will get nothing else from Heaven for him but a consuming fire as theirs did He that will offer any thing to God must take a care it be not tainted with such mixtures which spoil all the Religion making it not sincere and also spoil the Heart by making it not clean and undefiled The last remaining sense A Clean and undefiled Heart Of those things which our Saviour says defile the man some are meerly sins of the Heart such as may be consummated within the Soul and for the perpetration of which a spirit is sufficient to it self such are Pride especially spiritual pride the sin of those that think none holy as themselves and cast the black doom of Reprobation upon all that do not comply with their Opinions and interests such also are uncontentedness with our estates inward repinings at the dispositions of Providence concerning us black malice bitter envyings Now in these as the mind does need no outward members to consummate them requires no accessary Organs to work them out so neither does it require any outward accessary guilt to make them liable to condemnation we know 't was one sin of the spirit onely that made Angels Devils If a foul body be abominable to the Lord shall a foul spirit be less odious he that defiles his Soul offends God in a much nearer concern of his because that speaks nearer relation to him than the Body this was only his workmanship made out of Earth the Spirit was created out of himself a foul body is but filthy Clay but he that does pollute his Soul does putresie the Breath of God and stains a beam of the Divinity The other sort of things that are said to come from the Heart and to Defile are those which S. Paul calls works of the Flesh such as if they be committed must be committed outwardly Murders Drunkenness Revellings Revenge Wrath and Contentions Seditions Factions Schisms all Vncleannesses c. In these indeed the Heart can be but partial Actor the utmost it can do is to desire and to intend them and to contrive and manage the designs of compassing them which yet Providence or the Innocence of others may put out of the reach of mans power or his own temporal fears may make him not dare to set upon them though he do cherish the desires Now if they be obstructed from committing most men use to conclude gently of their guilts while they do keep within the Heart the Execution of them is the onely thing that does look mortal and till the sin be perfected there is no death in it And truly I confess that as it happens many times on a sudden surprize of soul when a bright gilded temptation strikes the heart and dazles the mind we see that the Will rushes on it instantly consents and wishes heartily yet within a while the Spirit does recover out of the surprize puts by the thrusts of fancy and the stabs of the temptation and that Will languishes and dies like a velleity as if it had been nothing but a woulding and now the man would not by any means consent to the commission In this case though there be a guilt to be repented of and cleansed with many tears yet this is Innocence in the comparison but if the Will purpose contrive and do its utmost it is the same to the man as if he had committed 'T were easie to demonstrate this that whatsoever evil thing a man intends and does fixedly resolve he is guilty of though he do nothing or though the thing he chance to do be never so much lawful Those sayings of St. Paul I know and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus that there is no meat unclean of it self but to him that esteemeth any thing unclean to him it is unclean Rom. xiv 14. and he that doubteth is damned if he eat ver 23. These could have no truth in them unless the heart by choosing and pursuing to the utmost any thing that it does judg unlawful incurr'd the guilt of that unlawfulness even to Damnation and all that meerly by it self without the Action which in that case had nothing sinful in it A weight that is upheld by a mans hand and otherwise would rush down to the earth does surely gravitate as much it is as heavy though it do not fall quite down as if it did and were it let alone
Brutes when thou hast set us here to train and discipline our selves for a condition of such glorious Joys as are fit to entertain Souls of Reason with and to make them blessed which to enter upon our Bodies must drop from us our Souls must be clarified from Flesh and Flesh it self refined into Spirit that we should make our selves Antipodes to this walk contrary to all and so debase our spirits as that they are qualified for no other satisfaction but those of dull sense and carnality Adam fell his great Fall by Eating but ever since men fall further by riotous intemperate Eating He fell from Paradise and they from Reason the Man sinks into Beast and the Soul falls into very Flesh and hath no other faculties or appetites but fleshly ones Such people of all others are not to be raised up by Religion their fulness gives no place to that but does exclude it God did complain of this of old Deut. xxxii 15. Jesurun waxed fat and kicked that we may see they want to brutish quality who do allow themselves the appetite of Brutes they that pamper themselves like to fed Horses will also neigh like them and kick even him that fed them thou art waxen fat thou art covered with fatness then he forsook God that made him and lightly esteemed the Rock of his Salvation When they came once where they did suck honey cut of the Rock and Oyl out of the flinty Rock they could not mind the Rock of their Salvation Indeed this sensuality as it consumes Estates eats Time and all the faculties of the Mind so it devours all Religion too it hath not only a particular opposition to some one duty as the other Vices have but by a direct influence it destroys the whole foundation of Vertue and obedience to God I mean subordination of the lower appetite to Reason and Religion which it renverses quite and breeds an universal cachexy of the Soul as well as Body For ever since Adam did eat of the forbidden Fruit the carnal mind we know is neither subject to the Law of God neither indeed can be as S. Paul says Rom viii 7. because Gods Commands are restraints upon those things which Flesh desires eagerly Now therefore while that Mind is unsubdued it must needs lust against the Spirit for those things that are forbidden nor endure to be limited which he that feeds it is so far from working towards that he does give it still more provocation and more power and makes the Flesh more absolute for it is clear that Plenty does encrease all its desires and their unruliness it ministers both vigor to it by which it is enabled to fulfill its lusts and it ministers aptness and incitation also both by custom of satisfaction and by adding heat which makes it more prone to rebel and more impossible to be kept under The progress of this is apparent in the Scripture Exod. xxxii 6. The People sat down to Eat and Drink and rose up to Play Lusum non denotasset nisi impudicum he means to play the wantons But Jeremy is plainer Chap. v. 7 8. How shall I pardon thee for this thy Children have forsaken me when I had fed them to the full they then committed Adultery and assembled themselves by troops in Harlots houses Nor stays it there but does encrease as well as feed to an Excess we may discern that by the Wisemans Prayer xxiii Ecclesiast 6. O Lord Father and God of my Life Let not the greediness of the Belly not the lust of the Flesh take hold of me and give not over me thy Servant to an impudent mind Gyant-like he had called it in the Verse before and sure the Wiseman in the Proverbs apprehended it as such and dreaded it accordingly as if Bellies full gorg'd were those Mountainr which the Gyants cast up to storm Heaven on He look'd upon this Vice as that which would bid defiance to God and out him and therefore thinks it necessary to beseech the Lord not to afford him so much as would furnish Plenty Prov. xxx 8. Give me not Riches feed me with food convenient for me 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with an Allowance with no more than is sufficient for me lest I be full and deny thee and say who is the Lord. It seems such persons know no other God besides their Belly nor is it any wonder if a Soul made Flesh cannot well apprehend a Deity that is a Spirit or believe it but thinks all Notions of such beings to be contradiction when once by the suffusions of Carnality all the impressions of a Spirit are wrought out of it self And truly this is the most natural and certain way to become Atheists Whether this time that hath been almost always set aside for strict Severities and to work out Repentance and if it be not so intended now I know not what pretence did call us hither for though there be some relaxation of the severer Dyet of this time sure there is no indulgence of that Penitence which the strictness of this time design'd and let some men talk what they please of the Intention of their Statutes yet these Assemblies certainly were not intended for th◠increase of Cattel and advance of Fishing these were for higher aims of Piety Now whether we employ if so much towards this as to afflict our Souls i. e. our appetites and to revenge our superfluities upon our selves and to teach our desires to be denied Or whether we do teach the Dyet of this season to be but a variety of Luxury and if the Law did not command it and so make it Pressure by giving it the inconvenience and the uneasiness of being duty and obedience our selves could make it be one of the changes of our Vice only another course a diverse service of the same Riot and so defeat the Law by our obedience to it Or whether we do break the Law outright and to our superfluities add disobedience to Authority whether we do the one or other is not for me to say But if the Nation and we our selves have any sins to be repented of and we design this season for that use as sure some season must be so employed and why not this as well rather indeed than any other if we be not of those that would be glad to see all thrown again into Confusion glad to see a return of the same Vengeance as indeed a return of the same sins and the abuse of Mercies seem to call for it while men do live as if they thought God had wrought all these Miracles meerly to give them opportunity to serve their Vices or their other ends to put them in a way to get Places Estates and Dignities and by uncharitable gains hard-hearted griping yea by false unworthy treacherous Arts to heap up Wealth to raise their Families or feed their Lusts These these cry out to God to renew his Commission to the Sword to pass through all
the Land again and embowel it self in Church and State these call for it as loud as the hatangueing Prayers of Seditious Men and the Lord knows there are too many hands that would unsheath it if God do not interpose to hinder and well we have deserv'd he should But if we would endeavour to engage him by Repentance that will require the Afflicting of the Soul by some severities Do not mistake your selves Repentance as it cannot be wrought out amidst our courses that were contradiction to return and yet go on so also it will not be wrought out amidst the Comforts as we call the jollities of life Tertullian is very pleasant with those who did dislike that in their Penitencies they were by the Church prescrib'd to put off Mirth and put on Sackcloth and take Ashes for Bread Come says he reach that Bodkin there to braid my Hair and help me now to practise all those Arts that are in Mode to attire it give me the washes of that Glass the blushes of that Paper the foyles which that Box hath to beautifie and dress my Cheeks come and set out and dress my Table too let me have Fowl with costly forc'd and not a natural Fat or let me have cramb'd Fish and cram my Dishes also get me chearful Wine too and if any one ask why I do thus indulge my self Why I will tell him I have sin'd against my God and am in danger of Perdition and therefore I am in great trouble I macerate do you not see the signs of it and excruciate my self I take these fearful careful ways that I may reconcile God to me whom I have offended Alas to humble ones self thus in fulness and to afflict the Soul in chearful plenties is such a thing as none but he that sinks under the surfeit of those Plenties understands I 'm sure the Lord when he required his People to repent required them then to discipline and use severities upon themselves they were to fast or dye God took the execution for whatsoever Soul it be that shall not be Afflicted that same day shall be cut off from among his People Levit. xxiii 29. Even cut off by God himself And I do verily persuade my self that one great cause why men that have sometimes thought to reform their lives and do resolve against their Courses yet repent of their Repentance their resolutions untwist and become frail as threds of Cobweb the first assault of a temptation does break through them is they do not use mortifications to work their aversations high and strong against their sins and fix their resolutions The universal sense of the whole Primitive Church gives me confidence in this persuasion who for that very reason in their penitential Excommunications did inflict such severities as 't is almost incredible that Christians would submit to yet they beg'd to be censur'd into and those had S. Paul for their precedent But now Repentance are but dislikes little short unkindnesses at our sins and wouldings to do better On some moving occasion if Gods Hand or his Spirit lash it may be Tears will gush out of the Wound and we in angry sadness do intent against our Vices but when that fit is over and the Flesh by indulgences prepared to make or answer a temptation we fall again and then it may be shake the head and curse the sin but yet again commit it if the invitation be fair And then are very sorry account our selves unhappy who lie under such a violent infirmity but act it still Now if we consider how it comes to pass that we go round like men inchanted in a Circle of Repenting and of Sinning we shall find it is for want of Discipline upon our selves for had we strove to make our humiliations more low and full of pungent sorrow the Soul would start and fly at the first glance of that which cost it so much anguish but who would fear to act that sin which puts him to so little trouble to repent of as a sad thought a sigh a wish and a loose purpose thin intentions and that 's all Do not complain of the Infirmity of the Flesh for this and say thou wouldst live Spiritually but the frailty of thy sensual part betrays thee its stings and incitations make thee start from duty and goad and force thee into actions which otherwise thou neither shouldst or wouldst commit 'T is thou thy self that arm'st thy Flesh with all its stings thou givest it strengths whereby it does subdue the Spirit thou waterest thy desires with Wines thou feedest them with strong meat and teachest them to crave thou cocker'st them with thy indulgence and thou dost treat Temptations to sin dost invite wickedness and nourish the occasions of Ruin and then it is no wonder if thy resolutions be not strong enough there is no way but by Austerities to mortifie all inclinations that stir against the Spirit and by denying satisfactions to thy Appetite to calm and moderate thy affections to every thing below and then Temptations will have neither Aid nor Avenue But Secondly You shall Afflict your Souls cannot be meant only that ye shall Afflict your Bodies the Spirit also must be troubled and we must rent the Heart as well as Garments that is indeed a Sacrifice fit for a Propitiation day for it is such a one as God will not despise Psal. li. 17. and without which all others are but vain Oblations God may call fasting the Afflicting of the Soul because it is the most appropriate and natural means to work it but when he calls it so he does intend it should produce it Austerities are humilificandi hominis disciplina as Tertul. says Humiliation Discipline but yet they have not always that effect The Pharisee that fasted twice a week did not mortifie at all but his Humiliation made him lofty his emptiness filled him with wind and puft him up and the Publican was more justified than he And late experiences have taught us that Fasting does not always humble when it did gape for Sovereignty and did afflict then into Power only when there attended it a sacra fames an hunger after Holy things and such as all the relicts of old Sacriledg could not allay but it devoured Church and State and yet crav'd still And the throat of these fasting men was an open Sepulchre indeed open to bury and that could no more be satisfied than the Grave But 't is not only these demure impieties and those that are devout in wickedness and act it in Religion and the Fear of God I have to speak against But in the general If Fasting do not humble and those severities that wear the Flesh break not the heart too and make it contrite then they are lost upon us and do not profit us All these strictnesses of bodily and outward exercise as S. Paul calls it are acts of discipline prescribed to make the Sorrows of Repentance more severe and operative and so to
hold on any noble part take in some Nerve or Artery then he must cut the thread of Life that cuts it off So he must rent my heart indeed that tears my pleasures from me Life it self does seem to have so little salisfaction without them that it is a death to me to part with them Or else hath the Old Man no Soul is he all Flesh and hath Iniquity debas'd the whole of him so that his very Spirit is become Body of Sin so as that Wickedness should be our very Being be all one with us and I and my corruptions prove denominations of one importance signifie the very same so it is indeed Besides the carnal part that is sold under sin and consequently does deserve the Cross that punishment of Slaves the part also that is in the quite opposite extream that lusts against the flesh that must be made away Be ye 〈◊〉 ansform'd by the renewing of your mind Rom. xii 2. And if there be any sublimer and more deâ—â—â—cated past in that it must submit to the same Fate 〈…〉 in the spirit of your mind Ephes. iv 23. Corruption hath invaded that To 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the diviner ruling part is grown a slave to the Beast part of him it hath debauch'd its notions whereby it should discriminate good from evll so that now it can discern no natural difference between them but does measure both meerly by his present inclinations and concerns and the eternal Laws of Honesty are blotted our and principles of interest and irreligion rais'd there in the place and buttress'd by false reasonings and Discourses Now all these Fortresses of Vice that maintain and secure a man in sin must be demolish'd all such imaginations cast down and every high thing that exalteth it self against the knowledg of God and every thought brought into Captivity to the obedience of Christ That Spirit of the mind must be destroyed and we transformed into persons of new notions and reasonings But above all the remaining part of Man his own Will must be mortified which besides its natural 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by perverse inclinings to sollicitations of flesh is most corrupted and most dangerous in that which way soever it inclines it draws the whole Man after it If any thing in us be crucified in a Conformity to Christ it must be this for in that death wherein Christ offered up himself upon the Cross where although the Divine Nature gave the value 't was onely the Humane Nature made the Offering there it was the crucifying his own Will that above all other the ingredients made his Death a Sacrifice and the price of our Redemption God that had given him his Blood and Life might call for it again when and how he saw good and being due it was not properly a price that could be given him for sin but his free voluntary choice his being willing to endure the Agonies and Contempts of the Cross his stabbing his own natural desires with a resolute determination Not my will but thine be done This his own Will was his own Offering and such is ours if we be Crucified with Christ made conformable to his death if we present our selves a Sacrifice acceptable to the Lord for our will is not given up to him till it do perfectly comport with his but that it cannot do till we renounce our own desires till we have brought our selves to an indifference in outward things to such a resignation as she is storied to have had who being in her Sickness bid to choose whether she rather would have Health or Death made answer Vehementissimè desidero ut non facias voluntatem meam Domine this above all I desire that thou wilt not do my will I would have thee not do what I desire and would have So that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the whole of us the Spirit Soul and Flesh go to make up this Person and the body of Sin is the Old man entire I whole I am nothing but a mass of guilts my Senses are the bands of wickedness that procure for my evil inclinations my members are the weapons of unrighteousness my Body is a Body of Sin and Death and the affections of my Soul are Lusts its faculties are the powers of Sin yea and the Spirit of my mind that Breath of God is putrefied that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Angel-part of me is fall'n and turn'd Apostate and however I be partly Son of Man and partly Son of God yet I am wholly Child of Wrath and so fit to be Crucified Which calls me to the next Enquiry to the nature of the duty here intended I am Crucified What is design'd by it S. Paul does perfectly declare Rom. vi 6. Our old man is crucified with Christ that the body of Sin might be destroyed that we should no longer serve sin So that it means a through Repentance and abandoning of former evil Courses A Duty which there are few men but in some instants of their life think absolutely necessary and persuade themselves they do perform it At some time or other they are forc'd to recollect and grow displeas'd and angry at their sins and have some sad reflections on them beg for mercy and forgiveness and do think of leaving them and when they have return'd to them again they shake the head and chafe and curse at their own weakness and renew their purposes it may be and do this as oft as such a Season as this is or other like occasions suggest it to or move them And with this they satisfie themselves and hope if God do please to take them hence in some such muddy gloomy fit of their Repentance all 's well Now shall we call this being Crucified are there Racks and Tortures in this discipline hath a Spear prick'd them to the heart and no blood nor no water no tears gush out thence hath it made no issue for some hearty Sorrow to purle out Indeed I must confess the Scripture does sometimes word the performance of this Duty in expressions that are not so sower but of an easier importance as first put off the Old Man as if all were but Garment put it off I say not as they strip'd our Saviour in order to his Scourgings and his Cross but intimating to us what an easie thing it is to cast off Sin for them who do begin with it betimes before it get too close to the heart 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. saith Theophyl even as easie as putting off thy Cloaths and thy Repentance is but as thy Shift thy change of life like changing thy Apparel But alas for all the easiness which this expression hints where the sins also lie in the Attire as besides emulation pride vainglory great uncharitableness and inhumanity cruel injustice and oppression often do when many are undone through want of those dues which do furnish other men with the excesses of this
account of Christ or of Religion is most inconsistent with the Spirit of the Gospel For it was the Spirit of Elias who destroyed those whom the Magistrate did send that Christ opposes here the Spirit of the Gospel to in this severe rebuke ye know not what manner of Spirit ye are of The other warm Apostle meets a greater check in the like case S. Peter's zeal that they say made him chief of the Apostles as it made him promptest to confess the Lord so it did heat him to be readiest to defend him as fiery to use his Sword as his Tongue for his Master But his Master will not let a Sword be drawn in his own cause put up again thy Sword into his place The God of our Religion will not be defended by Treason and from Murder by the wounding of another nor will his Religion suffer a Sword out of the sheath against the Power of the Magistrate no not in behalf of Christ himself but goes beyond its proper bounds to threaten things that are not Gospel punishments even excision in this life to them that do attempt it They that take the Sword shall perish with the Sword Here the Gospel becomes Law and turns zealot for the Magistrate though persecuting Christ himself Our Saviour does not think it sharp enough to tell S. Peter that he did not know what Spirit he was of for when this Disciple would have kept these sufferings from his Master onely by his counsel he replies to him get thee behind me Satan He was then of that manner of Spirit therefore now that he does so much worse when he attempts to keep them from him with a Sword and drawn against the Power as if Christ did not know how to word what Spirit such attempts did savour of he does not check and rebuke now but threaten and denounce And 't is obvious to observe that this same Peter who would needs be fighting for his Master in few hours with most cursed imprecations forswears him And so irregular illegal violences for Religion usually flame out into direct opposition to that they are so zealous for fly in the face of that Religion they pretend to strive for to let us see they do not rise from Divine Zeal and from true Piety but from Hypocrisie Ambition Revenge or Interest and that warm shine that kindles there pretended Angels of Light is but a flash of Hell a glory about a fiend Therefore afterwards none was more forward than S. Peter was to press submission to the Magistrate though most unjustly persecuting for Religion talks of no Fire but the fiery trial then in Epist. 1. Cap. iv and If ye suffer for the Name of Christ the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you he knows what manner of Spirit such are of When they are in the place of Dragons then the Holy Ghost and God is with them when the darkness of the shadow of death is on their Souls even then the Spirit of glory resteth on them Accordingly the after-Fathers urge the same not onely towards Heathen Emperours but relaps'd Hereticks and Apostates As Julian and Constantius Valens Valentinian and upon the same account S. Ambrose says Spiritus Sanctus id locutus est in vobis Rogamus Auguste non Pugnamus The Holy Spirit spake these words in you we beg O Valentinian we oppose not And S. Greg. Nazianzen says to do so was the Christian Law most excellently ordained by the Spirit of God who knew best to temper his Law with the mixture of what is profitable to us and honest in it self They knew what manner of Spirit that of Christianity was It does assume no power to inflict it self 'T is not commission'd to plant it self with violence or destroy those that refuse or oppose it It wages War indeed with Vices not with men And in the Camp of our Religion as once in Israel there is no Sword found but with Saul and Jonathan his Son onely the Princes Sword Our Spirit is the Dove no Bird of prey that nor indeed of gall or passion If Christian Religion be to be writ in Blood 't is in that of its own confessors onely if mens false Opinions make no parties nor mischiefs in the State we are not to make them Martyrs to their false Opinions and if they be not so happy as to be Orthodox send them down to Hell directly tear out one anothers Souls to tear out that which we think an Errour Sure they must not root out smutted Corn that must not root out Poppy we may let that which is a little blasted grow if we must let the Tares and Darnel grow The Soldiers would not crucifie Christ's Coat nor make a rent there where they could find no seam But now men strive so for the Coat that they do rent his Flesh to catch it and to gain an inclosure of the name of Christians tear all other members from the Body of Christ care not to sacrifice a Nation to a supposed Errour will attempt to purge away what they call dross in a Furnace of consuming flame The Christian Spirit 's fiery Tongues must kindle no such heats but his effusions call'd Rivers came to quench such fires Effusions that were mistaken sor new wine indeed but never look'd like Blood Nor are they that retain to this Spirit those that have him call'd down on them in their Consecration impowered for such uses When Christ sent his Disciples to convert the World Behold saith he I send you forth as Lambs among Wolves And sure that does not sound like giving a Commission to tear and worry those that would not come into the Flock The Sheep were not by that impowered to devour the Wolves Our Lords directions to his Apostles when a City would not receive their Doctrine was shake off the dust of your feet let nothing of theirs cleave to you have no more to do with them cast off the very dust that setled on your Sandals as you pass'd their Streets And surely then we must be far from animating to give ruin to and seize the Sword the Scepter and the Thrones of Kings if they refuse to receive Christ or his Kingdom or his Reformation or his Vicar If I must not have the dust of any such upon my feet I must not have their Land in my possession their Crowns on my head their Wealth in my Coffers their Blood upon my hands nor their Souls upon my Sword It will be ill appearing so when we come to give an account how we have executed our Commission and shall be ask'd did I send you to inflict the Cross or preach it to save mens Souls or to destroy their lives yea and Souls too And when in those Myriads of Souls that have perish'd in the desolations which such occasions have wrought their Blood shall cry from under the Altar as being sacrific'd to that Duty and Religion which was the
of this World can entertain and slatter Thus they did and thus they did prevail For the first Ages of the Church were but so many Centuries of Men that entertained Christianity with the Contempt of the World and Life it self They knew that to put themselves into Christ's Service and Religion was the same thing as to set themselves aside for spoil and Rapine dedicate themselves to Poverty and Scorn to Racks and Tortutes and to Butchery it self Yet they enter'd into it did not onely renounce the Pomps and Vanities of the World in their Baptism when they were new born to God quench their affections to them in those waters but renounc'd them even to the death drown'd their affections to them in their own heart bloud ran from the World into flames and fled faster from the satisfactions and delights of Earth than those flames mounted to their own Element and Sphere In fine they became Christians so as if they had been Candidates of death and onely made themselves Apprentises of Martyrdom Now if it were not possible it should be otherwise than thus as the World stood then it was necessary that the Captain of Salvation should lead on go before this noble Army of Martyrs if it were necessary that they must leave all who followed him then it was not possible that he should be here in a state of Plenty Splendor and Magnificence but of Poverty and Meanness giving an Example to his followers whose condition could not but be such To give which Example was it seems of more necessity than by being born in Royal Purple to prevent the fall of many in Israel who for his condition despis'd him I am not so vain as to hope to persuade any from this great Example here to be in love with Poverty and with a low condition by telling them this Birth hath consecrated meanness that we must not scorn those things in which our God did chuse to be install'd that Humility is it seems the proper dress for Divinity to shew it self in But when we consider if this Child had been born in a condition of Wealth and Greatness the whole Nation of the Jews would have received him whereas that he chose prov'd an occasion of falling to them Yet that God should think it much more necessary to give us an Example of Humility and Poverty below expression then it was necessary that that whole Nation should believe on him When of all the Virgins of that People which God had to chuse one out to overshadow and impregnate with the Son of God he chose one of the meanest for he hath regarded the low estate of his Handmaiden said she and one of the poorest too for she had not a Lamb to offer but was purified in formâ pauperis When he would reveal this Birth also that was to be the joy of the whole Earth he did it to none of that Nation but a few poor Shepherds who were labouring with midnight-watches over their Flocks none of all the great Ones that were then at ease and lay in softs was thought worthy to have notice of it Lastly when the Angels make that poverty a sign to know the Saviour by This shall be a sign unto you You shall â—ind the Babe wrap'd in swadling cloaths and laid in a Manger As if the Manger were sufficient testimony to the Christ and this great meanness were an evidence 't was the Messiah From all these together we may easily discover what the temper is of Christianity You see here the Institution of your Order the First born of the Sons of God born but to such an Estate And what is so original to the Religion what was born and bred with it cannot easily be divided from it Generatio Christi generatio populi Christiani natalis Capitis natalis Corporis The Body and the Head have the same kind of Birth and to that which Christ is born to Christianity it self is born Neither can it ever otherwise be entertain'd in the heart of any man but with poverty of spirit with neglect of all the scorns and the Calamities yea and all the gaudy glories of this World with that unconcernedness for it that indifference and simple innocence that is in Children He that receiveth not the Kingdom of Heaven as a little Child cannot enter thereinto saith Christ True indeed when the Son of God must become a little Child that he may open the Kingdom of Heaven to Believers Would you see what Humility and lowliness becomes a Christian see the God of Christians on his Royal Birth-day A Person of the Trinity that he may take upon him our Religion takes upon him the form of a Servant and He that was equal with God must make himself of no Reputation if he mean to settle and be the Example of our Profession And then when will our high spirits those that value an huâ—â— of Reputation more than their own Souls and set it above God himself when will these become Christian Is there any more uncouth or detestable thing in the whole World than to see the great Lord of Heaven become a little one and Man that 's less than nothing magnifie himself to see Divinity empty it self and him that is a Worm swell and be puffed up to see the Son of God descend from Heaven and the Sons of Earth climbing on heaps of Wealth which they pile up as the old Gyants did Hills upon Hills as if they would invade that throne which he came down from and as if they also were set for the fall of many throwing every body down that but stands near them either in their way or prospect Would you see how little value all those interests that recommend this World are of to Christians see the Founder of them chuse the opposite extream Not onely to discover to us that these are no accessions to felicity This Child was the Son of God without them But to let us see that we must make the same choice too when ever any of those interests affront a Duty or solicite a good Conscience whensoever indeed they are not reconcilable with Innocence Sincerity and Ingenuity It was the want of this disposition and temper that did make the Jews reject our Saviour They could not endure to think of a Religion that would not promise them to fill their basket and to set them high above all Nations of the Earth and whose appearance was not great and splendid but look'd thin and maigre and whose Principles and Promises shew'd like the Curses of their Law call'd for sufferings and did promise persecution therefore they rejected him that brought it and so this Child was for the fall of many in Israel 2. This Child is for the fall of many by the holiness of his Religion while the strictness of the Doctrine which he brings by reason of mens great propensions to wickedness and their inability to resolve against their Vices
indulg'd license makes them too big and heady to be brought under discipline And is 't not so with us Among many of those that stay within the Church I know not whether I do well to say so when of these I mean there is little other Evidence of their doing so but this that they will swear and drink of the Churches side blessed Sons of a demolished Church who think to raise their Mother a Temple by throwing stones at her by reason of the late overthrow of Government and discipline and the consequent licences Vice hath been so nurst up not only by an universal barefac'd uncorrected practice but by principles of liberty that can dispute down all Ecclesiastical restraints and have set up the Religion of License that now sin is grown so outragious as to be too strong for discipline nay rather than it should be set up 't is to be feared they would endeavour to reverse all in the Church and enterprise as much in their vices quarrel as others have done for mistaken Religion And indeed to what purpose were the Censures whose first and medicinal effect is shame amongst men where 't is in very many instances the only shameful thing not to be vitious where men stand candidates for the reputation of glorious sinners take to themselves sins they have not committed that are not theirs and usurp Vice sins and damnations hypocrites What work is here for discipline But this state wants not precedents the censures of the Church were not only lay'd aside in the Vastations of the Arian heresie and persecution when the weapons of the Churches warfare were too weak to make defence against all their cruelties and impieties and before that in Diocletian's days against the Lapsi But we find also that Saint Paul is forc'd to break out only in a passionate wish 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I would they were even cut off that trouble you cut off by excommunication he means Gal. 5. 12. When he saw the ill humours were too spreading and too tough also Sedition and Sehisme wide and obstinate so that neither his authority could reach nor his methods cure but were more likely to exasperate them Then he does excommunicate them only in desire And again 2 Cor. 10. 6. And having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience when your obedience is fulfill'd It becomes therefore every one that hath good Will for Sion to labour to fulfill his own obedience that so the Church may be empower'd to use Christ's Method for reforming of the rest And thet that will not do so must know they shall not only answer for their sins but for refusing to be sav'd from them that they resist all medicine as men resolv'd that nothing shall be done towards their Cure as men that rather choose to perish and prefer destruction And for the seasons and degrees of putting this work into Execution Wisdom must be implor'd from that Spirit of Wisdom that calls unto this work The last Part Whereunto I have called them The Nature of the calling of the Holy Ghost is a Subject that would bear a full discourse But waving those pretensions which Necessity and inward incitation do make to be the Calls of the Holy Ghost I shall positively set down that the call of God and of the Holy Ghost to any Work or Office for I enquire not of his calling to a privilege or state of favour is his giving abilities and gifts qualifying for that Work or Office The call immediate when the gifts were so but mediate and ordinary when the abilities are given in his blessing on our ordinary labours 'T is so in every sort of things Exod. 31. 2. See I have call'd Bezaleel and I have fill'd him with the Spirit of God in Wisdom and in understanding and in knowledge and in all manner of Workmanship to devise cunning works and to work in all manner of Workmanship and behold I have given him Aholiab and in the hearts of all that are wise-hearted I have put Wisdom that they may make all that I have commanded thee And he repeats the same again Chap. 35. 30. adding that he hath put in his heart that he may teach both he and Aholiab so that giving this skill to work and teach is nam'd Gods calling So in another case the Lord does say of Cyrus I have call'd him Esay 48. 15. which he explains in the 49. I have holden him by my right hand to subdue Nations before him to loose the loyns of Kings I have girded him So when Isaiah saith the Lord hath call'd me from the Womb or rather says that of our Saviour Isa. 49. 1. he tells you how ver 5. he form'd me and prepared me from the Womb to be his servant to bring Jacob to him And throughout the New Testament as his Call to a privilege is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his grace in allowing such a state of favour so his calls to a Work are his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his gifts enabling for it The Gifts of these Apostles by which they were enabled for their Office and which made up their call are set down Those of Barnabas in the fore-cited 11 Act. He was a good man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost and Paul's call was a little Extraordinary If we look into times we shall find reason to believe those Revelations in 2 Cor. 12. were given to Paul a little before this consecration of him in the Text. That Epistle was writ saith Baronius in the second year of Nero and this separation was in the second of Claudius as may be gathered also in some measure from the famine mention'd in the 28th verse of the 11th chap. betwixt these two were fourteen years now saith Saint Paul when he wrote that he had his revelation somewhat above 14. years before a little therefore before this solemnity Here was a call indeed call'd up to the third heaven to receive instructions for his Office and for ought he did know call'd out of his own body too that he might be the fitter for it whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell God knows v. 2. and that again v. 3. They whom Gods Spirit qualifies for Consecration to separate to these diviner Offices may be stil'd Angels well when they are call'd from all regards or notices of any body that belongs to them their gifts and graces set them above the consideration of flesh In the entertainment of these qualifications the Soul is swallowed up so that it cannot take cognizance whether it have a body of its own and is not sensible of that deer partner of it self it is so onely sensible of this Employment 'T is not for an Apostle or for his Successor to think of things below with much complacency When these have all their uses all their glories on they but make pomp to dress the body which an Apostle does not design for nor knows whether he be concern'd at all
in vicious customes yet for the gross foul acts which men sometimes commit those unkind stabs and wounds to our own souls those cruel self-murders these all are to be daily mourn'd for Now I shall onely name a few reasons why we should mourn and so stir us up to it 1. Because onely in this and in relation to this is greif of any use at all God and Nature they say made nothing in vain now if it were not for our sins greif would be almost in vain a certain sign that this passion must be emploi'd upon our sins ut propter hujus tantum sublationem sit concessa saith St Chrysostom For does any man loose a child why if he greive to death will his mourning raise him Is thy Estate taken from thee why thou art sad upon it but will thy tears recover it But hast thou sin'd and dost thou truly mourn and greive for it why thy tears do wash away thy sin and blot out thine offence So that mourning being every where else preposterous and unprofitable was clearly intended to be spent upon our sins 2. What ingratitude is it to thy Savior not to find in thine heart to mourn for those sins for which he did die the Son of God did sweat and pray and cry and shed a torrent of bloud and water and suffer death for those very sins of thine and mine which we think so slightly of that we will not shed a tear for them O my Brethren if there is in us any love of that our Jesus or indeed of our selves we would now transplant the Agonies and make them ours and sweat out a few drops of sorrow to cure us of those feavors of our sins 3. Yea it is a very trouble to our God that we do not greive he mourns to see that we will not mourn Hosea 13. 14. when God had complain'd before of Ephraim what a foolish child it was that it did not repent he tells them there that if they had don so I would have ransom'd them from the power of the grave not I will for the very next verse contradicts that I would have redeem'd them from death O death I had bin thy grave O grave I had bin thy destruction but comfort is hid from mine eies repentance we read but the word bears and the sense requires comfort as if the eies of the Lord were therefore full of tears because Ephraim's were not and he could not receive comfort if Ephraim did not mourn and if we do not mourn God will comfort himself some other way concerning us to our greif Isaiah 1. 24. Therefore thus saith the Lord the Lord of Hosts the Mighty one of Israel ah I will ease me of mine adversaries 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the very word before I will be comforted by reason of mine adversaries how why I will avenge me of mine enimies Ah my Brethren when God is to be comforted by his vengeance upon us when he can find no ease but in our ruin and destruction and that he calls his comfort in relation to the non-mourning impenitent where shall we find ease and comfort then And then methinks this should scare us into the use of this fright us out of that stupid lethargy in sinning which does so dull us in it makes us so senseless of it and the danger we are in by reason of it that we cannot bestow one day in weeping mourning and fasting no nor indeed an hour of serious sadness upon an age of sin a whole life of iniquity the very next step of this into which we shall be sure to fall is the greatest sin and judgment in the world it is that spoken of as a character of the foulest Heathens Ephes. 4. 18. 19. Having their understandings darkned being alienated from the life of God thro the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness that is in their heart who being past feeling have given themselves over to lasciviousness to work all uncleaness with greediness rather because of the brawny hardness of their hearts which are become callous insensible of any admonitions stings and greif but dead to all sense of sin and having put off all fear of it and who these are he tells you in the next words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as when they do the foulest acts are not toucht with any greif for having don them but like dead members of the body that are forsaken by the vital spirits if you lash or prick or lance them they feel no pain even so these whose consciences are retir'd a sleep they do not mourn for any of their foulest actions which is the very height of impiety for such do strait give themselves over to all filthiness to work all uncleaness with greediness This is the effect of not mourning and then how do they deserve and provoke this judgment who if at any time their conscience begin to twinge them for any of their sins they presently divert their thoughts lest the mourning in the text should creep upon them and they should grow sad These men dread their virtue they are afraid of becoming pious and to avoid the way to heaven is their design and contrivance they come not so near duty as the wicked in hell have not so much repentance as the damned have for there is sorrow for their sins weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth I should 2dly encourage those that do thus mourn but the text does that sufficiently they are blessed and they shall be comforted First they are blest for this mourning it is the great effect and sign of this Spiritual life that man's sickness hath not yet kill'd him who is sensible of it who greives by reason of the anguish of it and he is not dead who feels the weight of it and mourns for it Secondly if it be true it draws such a train of virtues after it as it made St Paul rejoyce that he had made the Corinthians sad 2 Cor. 9 10 11. and then this very same verse will assure them of the comfort hereafter for all the Gospel-promises are assur'd upon the terms of repentance which this Godly sorrow is the first link of and does draw after it then if there be any comfort in the company of myriads of Saints and Angels if we dare take Christ's judgment if he had any tast who suffer'd so many mourning fits that liv'd a life of tears here that often wept but never laught yea a life of horrid suffering and yet thought those comforts a full glorious recompence to him for all those sufferings and therefore may well be to us for a few tears if there be any joy in the beatifical vision and in heaven they shall be comforted that mourn when as I told you out of Revelations all tears shall be wip'd from their eyes there shall be no more trouble nor sorrow nor crying nor pain And yet this is but the Negative part of their eternity of
next Enter thou into thy chambers Whence we did observe that in times of storm and calamity the onely way to withdraw our selves from the violences of discontents and troubles is to retire to Praiers and Closet exercises of Devotion If I should go to prove this I might read you the whole book of Psalms the Psalter being but Davids Liturgy in time of sadness the service and the refreshments of his sorrows To tell you that he says In my trouble I will go call upon the Lord Psal. 18. 6. and when I was in trouble I called upon the Lord Psal. 120. 1. or again for the love that I bear unto them they take now my contrary part but I give my self unto praier Psal. 109. 4. this would be to no purpose for the whole book is but doing this And indeed to do it is the best counsel God himself do's give 't is that he do's invite us to in such a discourse come my people enter And for the comforts of it I shall enclose them in the application which shall pass by that strange mistake that is in some men who seek to quench the sorrows of calamity by the entertainments of sin to divert sad thoughts by vicious company to refresh themselves with the jollities of iniquity to choak the remembrance of their afflictions with riot and drown it in excesses Alas 't is not go abroad unto the open lodgings of intemperance and to the Inns of pleasure but come and enter thou into thy chambers And secondly it shall omit that very near as great mistake of them who in times of impending calamity busy themselves with the cares of the world whose hearts are then especially set on thriving and they immerse themselves in the wayes of gain looking on that as the thing that is to be their great security and that they shall provide against all sad events by that Strange that in the time of pungent troubles when they are encompassed with misery to run into the thorns and briars as our Savior calls them should be our onely hopeful refuge and retiring place that men should be then most griping after that the cares of keeping which and the fears of loosing it are the onely great things that make calamity grievous He who then makes himself Master of possessions gives pledges to Affliction Shall I then put my self further out into the world when Gods discretion bids me enter thou into thy chambers But thirdly I apply directly to the calamitous however destitute and unhappy When thou art brought at once low enough for pity but so unhappy as to be scorn'd ruin'd and contemn'd too come here and pour out thy soul into the bosom of him who thou art sure will not refuse thee nor turn away his face from thee but stands here to invite thee with all the compellations of love Here thou mayst lay open thy case to him that had so much kindness to thee as to die for thee and mingle thy own tears with the bloud of God that was shed for thee To have any friend whom to impart thy griefs to is in good measure to unlade and emty thy self of them thou hast here the most faithful bosom of thy Savior whom thou mayst behold in the same postures of affliction that thou thy self art in out of affection to thee and suffering for thee in Agonies of one and the other sweating as much with heats of love to thee as of pain for thee hanging down his head upon the cross with languishments of kindness and of weakness and his arms stretch'd into the posture of receiving thee to his embraces and his side open'd not onely to shed bloud and water for thee but to receive thy tears and give thee passage to his very heart Come then my People come to me if thy sad expectations be like plummets at thy heart and weigh it down yet lift up thy heart together with thy hands in assur'd confidence that that kindness which did thus express it self will never fail thee If notwithstanding this the pressure make thy thoughts to sink and thy soul to grovel let it be but a bowing down in submission to my will who certainly know what is best for thee come then and give thy self up into my hands as into the hands of a faithful Redeemer Now the devout soul doing so by often betaking himself to God upon these occasions becomes acquainted with his Maker and in all discontents he will strait run to his Acquaintance there to disburden himself and in all fears thither he hasts for shelter with the very same complacencies that our Savior says the young one does to the wings of the hen at the approach of danger there the soul nestles and is hugely pleas'd with the apprehensions of its comfortable warm security By frequent converses of this kind and other practices of Devotion and Meditations on the mercies of his providence and his protecting kindnesses besides the glories of his Preparations towards his future Estate the soul mounts up to great degrees of confidence and familiaritie with God and God does use when a heart does thus ply and follow him and become intimate with him to reveal himself also to that heart in the midst of his devotions when he is conversing with the Lord he will breathe into him the inspirations of Heaven and with soft whispers speak peace close to his heart break in upon him with flashes of joy warm him with gleams of comfort which ravish the soul with delight in the emploiment Hence grow strange intercourses betwixt them the Lord pours in of his Holy Spirit that bond and ligament of God and the soul that maintains perpetual commerce between them they do nothing but close and mingle as it were till the heart mount up to those extasies that we read of in devout persons that entertain themselves to miracle in the enjoyment of those Contemplations which these exercises do afford them The heart then melts no longer in the tears and sorrows of affliction but with the dissolvings of love when thro excess of complacency in God and in his joys the soul hath a kind of impotency of Spirit so as it cannot contain it self within it self but as a liquid thing hath its overflowings and is poured out into the bosom of the beloved and by an outgoing faints from it self into an union with the Object of its affections And the Soul that by the practices of Devotion is brought to be thus affected hath not onely fulfill'd the counsel of the Text retir'd into his chambers but is also brought into Gods chambers so the Spouse in the Canticles expresses c. 1. 4. The King hath brought me into his chambers and c. 2. 4. He brought me into his banquetting house and his banner over me was love and in c. 3. 10. she describ'd the bed-chamber whether she was brought the midst whereof was pav'd with love and all this means but the entertainments of devout Contemplations And Christ in
guards that are set about them to preserve them and break thro the strengths of grace and conquer all the strivings of Almighty God's compassion and goodness to them and beat off the very victory that Christ hath gain'd for them refuse all the kind offers of the Law of grace and chuse sin with damnation they are safe There is now as St Paul saith by the Law no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus to them who walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit Rom. 8. 1. in which words we have both an assurance that the strengths of Sin are broken and the persons too are partakers of the Victory that are in Christ Jesus for as it is by him the Victory is gotten so it is in him that we must get an interest in it Now to be in Christ if as most certainly it doth it mean here as in other places where 't is said of Churches housholds and of single persons then it means the Christians so in Gal. 1. 22 the Churches of Judea that are in Christ i. e. that have received the Gospel and the Faith of Christ Rom. 16. 11. greet them that be of the houshold of Narcissus that are in the Lord i. e. that are Christians and the seventh verse who were in Christ before me i. e. were converted e're I was But it means Christians not in judgment and opinion onely but in life and practice such as are in Christ by St Pauls character and description of it in the 2 Cor. 5. 17. If any man be in Christ he is a new creature he lives the life of Christ as a member does the life of that of which it is a member and so he walks not after the Flesh but after the Spirit For as members live by the vertue of the influence of spirits from the head into them and walk after its directions so those that are in Christ his members they must walk live act and practise by the Spirit of Christ guided not by carnal appetite the lusts and the desires of the Flesh but by Christ's directions Such they are who have this Victory to whom there is no condemnation For as he adds Rom. 8. 2. The law of the Spirit of life that is in Christ Jesus sets us free from the law of sin and death and so there is thro him a Victory over the third last enimy Death in which freedom from Sin and Death two things are intimated 1. That Sin the sting of Death is taken away which being once removed Death is the softest thing that can be 't is but falling asleep so it is call'd v. 18. of this chapter faln asleep in Christ it is so far from being hurtful that it is the first great happiness that does befall us 2. That Death it self also shall be swallowed up in Victory that we shall be recovered from its powers and triumph over it in Immortality of blessed life For if we be in Christ his members and so live the life of Christ and consequently when we die die in the Lord then tho the body be dead and corruptible yet if the Spirit of life that is in Jesus be in us he that rais'd up Jesus from the dead shall also quicken our mortal bodies by his Spirit Rom. 8. 11. It is this life in him that verifies the saying of St Paul Eph. 2. 6. He hath raised us up and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ as sure as if we were already there for there we are already as his members in our head And to the full and personal enjoyment of the blessings of those heavenly places it is death that lets us in that vale of Achor is the door of hope and Canaan the grave the avenue to God's right hand that death 't is but the Pascha in St Bernard 't is our Passover a repast of bitter herbs indeed but at the going out of Egypt from the house of bondage And tho the body seem in death a piteous despicable thing sown in corruption dishonor as St Paul expresses yet death gives that a relation too to Christ the Prophet Isaiah brings in the Lord calling His dead 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cadaver they my dead body shall aris◠saith he c. 26. 19. So that the corps of a good person is so far a member that 't is call'd the very body of his Savior into such a title Death translates it to such not to live onely but to die is Christ. And sure if they that die in him did live in him as none can die there where they did not live at all that is live as his members they that die in Christ must die his members But in the expression of the Prophet they do also die himself and are Christ's own dead body Death to such is as it were transfiguration and do's not so much strip and make them naked as cloath them and that with glory the shrowd may seem but their white wedding linnen and their dress for the marriage of the Lamb. Whoever is a faithfull sincere Christian if Death seem to make approaches to him arm'd with all his instruments of cruelty and terror charge him as assuredly as a Prophet could to set his house in order for he must die if he can say with Hezekiah in Isaiah 38. 3. Remember now O Lord how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart and have don that which is good in thy sight then if he have not fifty years yet he shall have a numberless Eternity added to his life and notwithstanding the dark solitude of the Grave to which he is retiring he shall have that which will accompany him to his infinite joy when he is torn from friends and all his dearest things do leave him yet he shall not be alone his faith and piety his vertues all go along with him and appear for him at that tribunal on the Judgment day All his relations even his bosom-guest the other half of his own soul forsake him bring him it may be to the grave and tho they carry blacks upon them to refresh and keep alive the memory of him yet in a while take comfort and forget yet the true conjugal affections of an untainted undefiled bed shall go along present the Soul white as a Virgin that 's unspotted And after this 't is in vain to say his riches will forsake him they go not so far as the grave afford nothing of themselves but the price of a sheet and coffin But then Charities will mount Alms will ascend as fast as the Spirit the wealth one piously bestow'd will meet him he shall eternally possess that which he gave away and tho his place know him no more they shall receive him into everlasting habitations Wherefore my beloved Brethren be ye stedfast unmovable always abounding in the work of the Lord which is the real way of giving thanks to God who giveth us the Victory SERMON XI
as the Omniscience of his understanding perfect rectitude and purity of his will and not to enumerate particulars perpetual blessed infinite delight in the unwearied uninterrupted exercise of his understanding in the utmost latitude of its comprehensions and the undisturb'd enjoyment of his holy will in all things all this unchangeable because spiritual and immortal of all these so much as is communicable to a creature man shall then partake of be exalted into yea so far partake in all of it as he is exalted into an estate to see God as he is And this is certainly enough to make good David's expectations that when he shall awake up after God's likeness he shall be satisfied with it and truly 't were great simplicity to go about to prove so far as any one is like to him who is the Fountain of Eternal Blessedness and so far as himself is happy and unchangeably is so that he must needs be satisfied for it imports a contradiction at once to be happy and unsatisfied since so far as any person is unsatisfied wants any thing that he would have so far he is uneasy and not happy either sure unhappy in not having it or else most certainly unhappy in desiring it which cannot be in any one that is like God But King David seems wary in his expression here when I awake up after thy likeness I shall be satisfied with it as if he did not count them satisfactions at the present to the state and condition he was then in or at least the apprehensions he then had And indeed St Paul who tasted the joys of it says he knew not whether he were in the body or no so that it seems that half of him was not concern'd at all in those transports of those joys and it is no wonder therefore if most men that never had a tast of any thing but what is sensual and worldly have bin entertain'd onely with satisfactions of those appetites that rise from body have no apprehensions or at least no relish for those other which not onely to enjoy but understand men must be spiritual to some degree for they are spiritually discern'd saith the Apostle and the natural man that hath no other guide but sense or what is wholly founded upon sense and imagination cannot tast or fancy them with any life at all Yet notwithstanding this how dim soever and faint the images of those things were in David's time before the Sun of Righteousness was risen and had brought to light that blessed Immortality and Glory of that state the very expectation was so satisfying that it could ingage him to pursue them attemt to compass them that he might after he should be awak'd from death see God as he is and by consequence be like him he resolves he will behold his face in righteousness here in this life as being satisfied that in his presence there was fulness of joy and at his right hand pleasures for evermore When alas after all the advantages the force and beauty which the Gospel-revelations have enricht the draught of that state with yet now men do not apprehend any such satisfaction in it as can quicken an affection or endeavor after it they will not move a step nor a desire towards it And here as to this I will neither wonder at nor instance in the men whose minds the pomps the gauderies the heights the state and what do's furnish all the wealth and riches of this world have seized if such men be not taken off from the pursuit of these things by invisible Treasures and by spiritual Thrones and Scepters or if they whose souls have dwelt long in their dishes and their cups who drink to create thirst eate to hunger are not pleas'd much with a state whose happiness is said to be that men shall neither hunger nor thirst in it or if they whom all the pleasures of the flesh sawc'd with variety have made loose and dissolute will not be temted to restrain themselves in those bounds that are set to chast tongues chast eyes or chast bodies or tho they may be mov'd it may be to dismiss a while yet cannot be made willing to divorce their lusts by notions of an happiness for Spirits that have no sex where they neither marry nor are given in marriage but are like God I will not call in here for evidence that most men have no satisfying apprehensions of the Blessedness of that state since altho they had yet there are appetites in the constitution to those other satisfactions that are opposite to all these Blessednesses and these appetites are hot and fierce have bin long pamper'd and now will not be deni'd being grown too strong for any notions of the understanding to make head against them But here is one fatal instance that will certainly evince men have no pleasing sense of the condition of that after-state they do not fancy it with any takingness at all and it is this that in those duties of Religion which have nothing opposite to any carnal appetite which of themselves retrench not any of our sensual satisfactions yet most men have all unwillingnesses to them deadness in them To name one of them Praier for example which is rather priviledge than duty a most blessed merciful indulgence such as if God had not onely not commanded but not given us leave for we must have thought our selves most wretchedly unhappy since 't is but giving us leave to pour out all our wants into the bosom of our Father who is both Almighty and most Mercifull to beg those things which if we have not we are miserable here and everlastingly and which Christ's bloud that purchas'd them does joyn in intercession with us when we pray in earnest for them and our sighs mixe with his agonies and the merit of his dying groans to his and our Father for us Now there is not one appetite in our making that 's adverse to praying as there are many to strict virtues 't is not uneasy to the flesh nor yet repugnant to its satisfactions it is not possible to find a ground on which one can mislike it and then to see men backward to it languid and dead in it weary of it suffering little avocations to divert them at it wandring going from it while they are about it engag'd in it glad to make quick end of it seeking out occasions to pretermit it yea more out of an insensible stupidity long omitting not at all performing it as if that men had nothing at all to desire of God or at least nothing they desir'd so much that they will take the pains to ask in earnest for it Now 't is impossible to give an account of this there 's no imaginable reason but that men have no concern or value for nor apprehensions of the things they pray for 'T is plain men perform chearfully what tends to those things they affect and fancy especially if it be not
his Body and his Bloud is he himself Therefore thou didst receive him as verily as thou didst those and if the Sacramental food be thine then Christ is thine and thou maist say my God My Brethren it was the Bloud of Christ that purchased all the glorious mercies of the Gospel all the blessed expectations of a Christian that was the price of all the joys of Heaven that reconciled God to us bought us an interest in him and the happy enjoyments of himself for us and then if in the Sacrament Christ do give me his bloud when I can shew God that bring him the price of the remission of my sins the value of those glories even the bloud of Jesus come with the purchase-money in my hands that bought my interest in God cannot I say those are mine my Heaven and my God Yea when I can say O Lord Christ whom I have undertaken to obey my God whom I have vowed to serve and worship thou art even my flesh for there I ate thy flesh and thou becamest flesh of my flesh Thou art the portion of my cup when thy very bloud doth fill full my cup and so thou art my flesh and my bloud then surely I may say with Thomas here my Lord and my God O Holy and Eternal Savior who art made both Lord and Christ and by thy Resurrection didst manifest the Omnipotency of thy person the truth of thy Promises and open a way to the everlasting glory and salvation which thou hast prepared for them that give themselves up to serve and worship thee their Lord and God pour down that blessed influence of this thy Resurrection on our hearts in raising us from the death of sin to the life of Righteousness Be thou our Lord and Christ ruling us by thy laws saving us by thy grace and by thy Spirit applying the mercies of thy death and so making us partakers of thy Resurrection therein turning us from our iniquities hereafter in raising us to Glory O Lord we have this day made a Covenant of this with thee and signed the Articles of it in the bloud of our God swore to them at the Altar give us grace we beseech thee to use the strictest care and watchfulness in our endeavors to perform with thee Regard not how we have in times past onely mock'd thee sacredly in these performances O let it from this day be otherwise We have bin onely on a stage of Religion when we are at our devoutest performances and having turn'd our backs unto the Church turn'd them also to our duty put off the vizards of Religion and we untired our selves of all our Piety almost as soon as the exercises of it were don and howsoever we tied our selves our froward wills have bin too strong for all our obligations and burst out of them broke all thy bonds asunder and cast away thy cords from us altho we tied them with all things that were most solemn and most sacred vows and oaths and tied them before the body of our crucified Lord and Savior with the body and bloud of Christ in our hands as if we had no other desires no other cares that should do us good than as we were careful to keep those resolutions and vows and yet O Lord we did let them instantly loosen and slack pass by and fail Yea we did break them wilfully and would not be held in by thine or our own bonds O Lord if thou look upon us in this guilt sure thou wilt have no more to do with us such false and perjured vow-breakers But O look upon us in thine own bloud which thou hast bid us pour out still to establish and renew our Covenant with thee and let this Covenant wherein we have now taken thee to be our Lord and God and taken thee who art so in us remain inviolable be there then with thy Power and Autority subdue our hearts and our desires and bring them under the obedience of thy laws Thou that art God Almighty that didst conquer Death and Satan bring it to pass that none of them prevail against thee now in our Souls where thou art but use thy strength O Lord to drive their power thence that thy servants and thy people may not be enslaved to corruption and ruin nor thy Enimy gain souls from thee which thou hast purchased with thy bloud that we having attain'd thee for our Lord and God may claim the privileges of thy People here have the watches and cares and securities that thou laiest out upon thy Treasures and the Jewels of thy Crown and by thy body and thy bloud being made one with thee and thou being ours all things may be ours thy grace here and thy joys hereafter thy Spirit may be ours and thy Heaven ours and we in thee and thou in us may all enjoy thy Kingdom Power and Glory for ever SERMON XIII THE BELIEVERS CONCERN to pray for Faith Mark 9. 24. Lord I believe help thou my Vnbelief WHICH are the words of a poor parent passionately earnest and afflicted sadly for his child that from his infancy had bin tormented miserably by a Devil for which having sought help every way but finding none no not from Christ's Disciples at last he repairs to him himself beseeching him to have compassion on him and if he were able to relieve him To whom Christ replies that if he could believe then he could work the miracle and help his child all things being possible to be don for him that could believe but nothing otherwise whereupon strait way the father of the child cried out and said with tears Lord I believe help thou my unbelief In which words we have first the necessary Qualification that is to make all that had ever heard of Christ capable of having any benefit from Christ that is belief in him I believe And since Christ hath made this qualification absolutely necessary and by consequence must be suppos'd to have provided means sufficient to work in us that belief that he requires so peremtorily we shall then In the second place enquire how it comes to pass that they so often fail that men do either not believe or their Faith is so weak that much unbelief do's mix with it as in our Confessor here in the Text who tho he did profess he did believe yet withal acknowledges his unbelief And thirdly to prevent and remedy all that here is discovered whither we are to betake our selves for help and where alone 't is possible to find it and that is Christ himself who alone is able to repair in us whatever degree of true belief is wanting in us Lord help thou my unbelief and how he do's repair it And fourthly when it is repair'd to that due height what that degree is can make us capable of those benefits which he hath promis'd to bestow on true Believers and whether such believers can say with our man here I believe yet say too Help my unbelief First of
blasphemy and persecution tho 't was conscience guilts these of a bloudy and deep scarlet and this very conscientious man found cause to call himself the chief of Sinners v. 15. Howbeit secondly he tells us v. 16. for this cause I obtained mercy that in me first Jesus Christ might shew forth all long-suffering for a pattern to them that should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting that in me the worst of men might have example and encouragement to depend upon him for eternal mercies if they will but come in to him he was pleas'd to shew me mercy call me in the very flagrancy and execution of my crimes Whereupon as he says thirdly he not onely was not disobedient to the Heavenly Calling but as if by owning himself chief of Sinners he had set himself a standard for his service put upon himself an obligation to be chief of all Christ's Votaries he became more laborious in his duty than all others and particularly so sincere faithful resolute and constant as nothing could remove him neither opposition stop him nor temtation divert him Now it is this faithfulness this being honest-hearted to Almighty God 't is the firmness of this purpose to go thro with duty in a constant tenor of obedience in whatever circumstance we are plac'd whatever happens not to be allur'd nor frighted neither biass'd nor forc'd out of it with the consciencious pursuance of this resolution that particularly qualifies for this secure dependance upon God for success it does dispose a man for perfect resignation of himself and full assurance It was St Pauls case here for this I suffer saith he and indeed he liv'd almost in constant martyrdom yet all this does not in the least discourage me but by God's gracious assistance I will do my duty come what can come Now discerning himself thus resolv'd and thus assisted he concludes that he hath ground enough for trust for he that is thus faithful to him may trust on him then he says I know whom I have believed And that we may not think this is an instance solitary in the third of Daniel when Nebuchadnezzar told the three Children If ye worship not the Image I have set up ye shall be cast the same hour into the midst of a burning fiery furnace and who is that God that shall deliver you out of my hands Shadrach Meshach and Abednego answered and said to the King O Nebuchadnezzar we are not careful to answer thee in this matter if it be so our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace and he will deliver us out of thine hand O King but if not i. e. but if he would not be it known unto thee O King that we will not serve thy Gods nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up The being conscious to themselves that they were thus resolv'd in earnest not to offend against the Lord but to obey how dear soever their obedience cost them and so casting themselves on him to do what he would with them gave them confidence made them know and say he would deliver them and so he did It is according to the measures of discerning the integrity and faithfulness of our own hearts that we assure our hearts before him as St John expresseth 1 Epist. 3. 19. and then tells us if our heart condemn us God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things v. 20. If we find not that sincerity within if any thing be false there if our conscience accuse us our own hearts condemn us 't is most certain God will do so too because he knows all those things of us that we can know of our selves But if we truly cannot charge that insincerity upon our selves we need not fear that God will charge us with the things we are not guilty of No surely as he there goes on Beloved if our heart condemn us not then have we confidence towards God v. 21. And this is the confidence that we have towards him that if we ask any thing according to his will he heareth us and if we know that he hears us whatever we ask we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him c. 5. 14 15. And whatsoever we ask we receive of him c. 3. 22. Thus by assuring their own hearts to God they know this have this confidence towards him i. e. have the trust and the dependance in the Text which in what cases it admits this strong assurance that is here exprest by the word know is my next inquiry I know Now by the last words it should seem as if in every case in every thing that he can want or does desire the person that is qualified so had a ground to trust with full assurance We know saith St John that whatsoever we ask we receive of him and accordingly in all the Spiritual needs of the Thessalonians both in particular and as the Church St Paul when he had blest them and praied for them thus The very God of peace sanctify you wholly and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body may be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ 1 Thess. 5. 23. adds in the 24thâ—erse Faithful is he that calleth you who also will do it And here in this Epistle of himself he says The Lord shall deliver me from every evil work and will preserve me unto his Heavenly Kingdom 2 Tim. 4. 18. Nor did good men want this confidence as to the things of this life for in times of publick consternation in the want of all things Habbakuk does thus assure himself c. 3. 16 17 18. When I heard my belly trembled my lips quiver'd at the voice rottenness entred into my bones when he cometh up unto the people he will invade them with his troops but in that state he adds Altho the Fig-tree shall not blossom neither shall fruit be in the Vines the labor of the Olive shall fail and the fields shall yield no meat the flock shall be cut off from the fold and there shall be no herd in the stalls yet I will rejoice in the Lord I will joy in the God of my salvation The exstasy of trust the rapture is too elegant and gay too high and full of transport to admit of any descant Holy Job went yet a little farther Tho he slay me yet will I trust in him c. 13. 15. In a word at once in whatsoever God hath promis'd there the Faithful Christian hath a right to trust I will not be so rude as to suppose my Auditors so unacquainted with the rich and precious Promises those Christian Treasures which God's Book is the Repository of that I should need to mind them of them and indeed to do it were to read a very great part of that Book 'T is sure in every case of every whether publick or particular real just concern whether in temporal spiritual or eternal things in some indeed
other side if my ends be never so pious if I intend to compass them by unlawful means and do evil tho that good may come thereof what do's the justice of my ends do for me but only make damnation just to me Alas then in one word what is their doom who do by evil means intend to compass evil ends whose intentions are intirely singly wicked that design only the plesures or the profits of iniquity that level directly at sin both all the way and at the mark too whose aimes and whose contrivances are wickedness thy purpose such an evil action and care not by what means they compass it so they acquire their ends Our Savior had no way to express the condition fo these but that of an admiring question If the light that is in thee be darkness how great is that darkness The Sinner notwithstanding all his pomp of shine and splendor that he thinks himself cloth'd with drest up with guilded profits or with a glory of pleasures yet he is still in the dark his life is all night and that condition which three days made intolerable to Egypt is always on the Sinners soul he is envelop't in thick darkness like theirs that may be felt by any thing but by a soul of such stupidity as the sinners is a darkness such as Christ had not a fit word for nor did know how to phrase but by being astonish't at it How great is that darkness a state indeed that is most proper for his deeds and intentions of darkness that need a night to cover them a darkness that do's border on the regions of utter darkness that shall never have any dawne but such as flaming brimstone strikes into it and O How great is that darkness O blessed Savior who art the day spring from on high that came to visit us deliver us from those dark regions O thou Eternal Sun of righteousness that camest to enlighten the darknesses of the world by thy example and by thy doctrine and the illuminations of thy Holy Spirit let these thy methods shine powerfully upon our souls to scatter all the clouds and mists that dwell upon our hearts that we may have no misapprehensions of our duty that our intentions may be clear our affections pure and all our actions regular and holy Wee know O Lord we were created for thy glory and our own eternal happiness We beseech thee direct all the purposes of our minds the inclinations of our hearts and actions of our lives unto these blessed ends Teach us to mind thee in every thing we do that so whatever we shall do in our whole lives may work towards our future happy life Let no unholy aims mixe with any of our actions no forbidden contrivances or purposes creep into and make sinful our performancs Let not self-ends of pride vain-glory gain revenge or any vice make our Religion hypocrisy of sin nor any poor low ends of little pleasure or of profit rob the actions of our callings or recreations of that Religion which a good intention may put into them but make all our actions so orderly and temperate and so subordinate to holy ends that they may all turn into duty make us heartily intent on our Religious performances in their seasons and submitting all our other works to the occasions of Religion and making them serve and assist towards it and thereby become Religion that so our whole lives may be consecrated unto thee and our whole conversation become holy And do thou prevent us in all our doings with thy most gracious favor and further them with thy continual help that in all our works begun continued and ended in thee we may glorify thy holy name and after an age of doing so may be glorisied with thee in thy Kingdom thy power and thy glory for ever c. SERMON XIX THE LIGHT OF THE BODY is the Eye Matt. 6. 22 23. The light of the body is the eye if therefore thy eye be single thy whole body shall be full of light But if thine eye be evill thy whole body shall be full of darkness If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness how great is that darkness WHat is observ'd of the lights of our daies that they still abound in their senses will appear true of the light in the Text and indeed 't is but proper that it should have that most excellent quality of light still to communicate it self without decay to pour out fresh streams every moment and yet be still the same one of the rivulets we have exhausted in the last daies discourse and we shall also find that in another sense The light of the body is the eye Amongst the divers things to which the Eye in the Text may have Analogy and which may make Christs Aphorism here true in the spiritual sense as well as in the outward literal the second and indeed in my apprehension much more proper then that I have already given tho not so general is Conscience that Eye of the mind in order to practice from which alone and nothing else in matters of Religion the actions have all their direction and guidance and which so far as it is clear and well informed the actions that are regulated by it are all full of light and Piety and on the other side so far as the Conscience is amiss so far the mans deeds must of necessity be dark and evil And that I may now for all say without discussing every minute particular Analogy 't is for this that the expressions of blindness of mind understanding darkened and sins being call'd darkness and on the contrary holiness light and the Eye of the understanding enlightened are so frequent in the Scripture to let us see the whole comparison is good For to declare to you that the Conscience may be properly set out by the Analogy of an eye I need but tell you this eye of the mind is in the little world the frame of man the true deputy and Vicegerent of that universal and all seeing eye of Providence and inspection for as that eye of inspection spies all our waies watches over all a mans motions inclinations and thoughts and as the eye of Providence guides and directs every thing to its ends all this the Conscience do's in man 't is privy to every little rising of the appetite it knows each bending of the will There is not any closet no recess in the whole heart where the soul can retire to think of wish or design any thing but this same Eye of Conscience looks in beholds it all and lays it up And Conscience also is the under-Eye of Providence in man it prescribes to all our actions it leads the will that potentia caeca and gives directions to all that man attemts or do's in matter of Religion Thy word saith David is a lanthorn to my feet and light to my paths and it is certain Gods Commandments are the light we are to walk
for these do still put demurs and nothing but discomfort dwells upon my spirit A dark and ill state this and therefore 't is no wonder if the Spirit of darkness sheds it especially where he cannot draw in the soul to works of darkness if he cannot quench the heats of their devotion then he will strive to cool them by these arts which like little dashings of water thrown into the fire if they cannot put it out yet at least they darken the flame and change that which was pure and clear into thick fume and smother so do these raise smoak and cloud in the soul. If the Devil cannot betray the heart to downright vice but his suggestions are shut out and temtations scorn'd or at least avoided then he will trouble them in their duties he will suggest things that under the vizor of nicer and stricter Religious shall be let in and when they are in shall put the soul in little combustions and disturb all its performances Therefore these are to be combated with and the heart to be fortified against them as soon as ever we find these little spies and incendiaries of Satan stirring in the mind let us strait seize them and examin what they do there what account they can give of themselves Have they any ground or plea when a thought checks me with a sudden motion of heart least what I do may be amiss I will question instantly hath God said so any where is there any Law that forbids it If I cannot resolve my self I will call in counsel for if I be not ashamed to whisper the unhandsomnesses of nature to a Physician to betray uncomely infirmities shall the chearful quiet of my Soul and the comfortable progress of my Religion be less considerable to me and if by these means I cannot find God hath forbid it any way either directly or by consequence why then shall I do Satan's work for him help him to disquiet my own heart make the semblance of Religion hinder my Religion and with a pudder about duty keep my self from doing duty much more of which I might perform with less trouble than I do think of these things and with infinitely more comfort No sure I will make no sins to my self that God hath not made but in God's name with an upright heart set about my known duty in full assurance of faith But Secondly it will become us whosoever is at any time troubled with these to consider with our selves when we find scruples arise about things of very small concern to examin am I thus wary and thus nice in every peice of known duty have I as sharp checks there and is my conscience as stirring in every circumstance of sure Religion if a true object of charity pass by me or I hear of such an one whose real wants seem to call upon me for Christ's sake and I instead of satisfying his needs satisfy only the importunity of my own thoughts by some little excuse I have not about me or let others give that are more able or why should I give to every one that asks me In this case now is my heart restless and scrupulous least the real wants of the poor soul should make an alms duty unsatisfied till I either know that or till I do releive him If when Praiers call and at the same time either a trifle or something which I had time enough before to prevent and knew well enough the fit times of doing one and t'other yet seek to detain me have I scruples here and are they strong enough to throw aside the less concerns and will not let my heart rest till it brings me honestly and zealously to my devotions If some little slight injury or it may be inadvertency of another fret my mind and begin to swell me into a passion or thicken into a grudg and I am in present heat of words and remember him with a slight or a less esteem do scruples rise as fast as these heats and my heart become more troubled at it self than at the little conceiv'd injury and never well at ease till I am calm to him If it be not thus but we who strain at gnats and swallow camels we whose eies boggle at motes in the Sun can wink or suffer beams to hood-wink them we that scruple at things indifferent things of which we have no rule to judge them sins and are not nice at all in things of certain duty have no such scrupulous conscience in known faults or at least in much more concerning matters we may do well to consider whether our nicest carefulness in these do not betray that in such little things the main of our Religion lies our hearts lay their greatest stress upon these There are certain formalities of Religion things that speak people Professors distinctive characters of a Party professing Godliness little things by which they are discriminated as niceties in habits or gestures or modes or tones of speaking or forms of doing things in Religion or some strict forbearances of things that all the world beside themselves never imagin'd hurt in Now they that do make such to be the stamp and signature of a Professor it is no wonder if they be nice and scrupulous in them and truly to be scrupulous especially in such indifferencies do's dangerously look towards that 't is certain where the greatest care and watchfulness is laid there will the most and greatest scruples be apt to stir so that if these be most in such indifferencies either the heart hath entertain'd some end besides Religion the seeming strict or a Professor or else the heart hath bin betraied and by being bred up to strict cares especially in such things it hath let it self be besotted by those strict and handsom appearances and low spirited as it is hath rais'd no higher but set up his cheif rest there they think if they do these things they are religious There cannot be any other reason given of these different strictnesses this scrupulosity in little things and negligence in greater interests and therefore 't is worth the search in every heart in which examination whosoever shall find his scruples to be universal and proportion'd to the duty his heart watchful especially where the concern is greatest and there most careful where it most behoves him let that heart take comfort that quality is but the nicety the quickness of a clear pure eie that can endure no dust no soil upon it and such an eie shall lead a person thro the paths of God's word which is a light to the feet and a light unto the paths here to the Land of everlasting light and glory where in God's light he shall see light for evermore SERMON XXI THE LIGHT OF THE BODY is the Eye Matt. 6. 22 23. The light of the body is the eye if therefore thy eye be single thy whole body shall be full of light But if thine eye be evill thy whole body shall be full
to be abased and I know how to abound every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry both to abound and to suffer need I can do all things thro Christ which strengtheneth me Secondly he hath an evidence that he is freed from envy and those black disturbing passions that attend it For certainly he do's not envy other mens greater condition who willingly diminisheth his own I am not troubled others coffers are more full than mine when out of choice â—emty mine and rather chuse to lay up my revenues in the bowels of the poor I do not envy their richer furniture when I give mine away to furnish needy laboring families and change the clothings of my roomes into the clothing of the cold bare Christians and I can much more calmly see my chambers naked than Christ's members I have no emulations at the full plenties of other mens provisions for why should I when I send away my own provisions to chear the hungry to make the hearts of famishing souls rejoice If I have not so many plenties in my dining Room yet I make more feasts in the cottages where every alms is a feast 'T is certain he that will not use what he hath to his own interests and advantages but gives them to advantage others cannot envy the advantages of others so that he is free from envy that rottenness of the bones that consumtion of the soul and body too that which makes every other man's prosperity his own torment and tho he have a kind of malice wheresoere he sees any thing of flourish or of excellency yet by all those malices he only strives to vex himself from this the liberal heart is clear Thirdly from Covetousness also and all the griping and injurious passions that are in its train for it is certain he cannot be inclin'd to do ill to others for his own advantage who out of choice parts with his own advantages that he may do good to others And indeed I need not prove this for that a man should be bountiful-hearted and covetous-minded is a contradiction So that we see the man hath a certain Evidence of being of a contented spirit and being free from envy and from covetousness which to be free from will appear to be the great ingredients of a Christian when you shall see that those three qualities of discontent and envy and of covetousness are the fountains of all the most un-Christian vices of the soul which was the last Proposition from the later part of the words For if thine eie be evil thy whole body shall be full of darkness That as I prov'd do's signify if thy heart be discontented and unsatisfied in its own condition apt to envy another's prosperity and covetous of greater things than it possesses the whole life will be full of most un-Christian actions they will betray the man and fill him full of all inquity A subject this of a most vast extent and truly worth considering and staying on but I shall only point at things and shew you how they are so in a word for I will dwell no longer on this Theme First then discontent in ones condition is the Mother of many provocations of God for 1. It seems with many murmurs and rebellions of heart against the dispositions of God's Providence You must not think Beloved that a discontented Soul is only unwise tho truly so he be to great degrees He whom a tempest storms in open field on whom the rain beats and the wind is sure a fool if he sit down and cry at it and vex What relief is it to him to vie shours of tears with those the clouds drop to return the blasts of wind with sighs and murmurs and storm at the tempest Sure there is no one so unwise but would make hast and seek for shelter rather and not sit down to fret and weep at it And yet that is the fashion of the discontented heart if the least cross be upon their mind their sad and troubled thoughts make it look very big as thick and misty air do's make all objects they fancy it insufferable they look upon it as if God's indignation did lie hard upon them and he had vexed them with all his storms and in these storms why do they not flie to God for shelter nor run under the shadow of his wings for refuge but vex and cry at it yea murmur and repine And what an insolence is this to be angry at the Almighty because he do's not govern the world as they would have him to quarrel because his Providence disposeth of events otherwise than they think is for their interests Some are discontented when God takes from them any thing they did possess Now since neither health nor wealth nor any other good is thine or from thy self but only lent vouchsafed during his pleasure and discretion and whatsoever he takes from thee is only thy not enjoying any longer what is no way due to thee when he in his wisdom and in his love also to discipline thee calls for what he lent thee Is this occasion for a contest with the Lord Must he lend thee his mercies when his wisdom sees fit to do otherwise in order to the ends of Providence What irreligious Rebellion is this to have risings of heart against God's dispositions to fall out with their Maker if he will not lend them his mercies as long and in as great degrees as they would have him Others are discontented because they are not in a better higher or more plentiful condition and why do they not as well quarrel with God because he did not make them Angels for what they are is his mere gift and more than their deservings He was no more oblig'd to make thee what thou art than he was bound to make thee a Cherubim or an Archangel and must thou murmur at the Lord because thou hast not the disposal of his gifts to lay them out in what degrees thou pleasest It is the sin of both these discontents that they do not submit their hearts cheerfully to God's disposals They that do not so S. Peter saies are proud and such as God resists and fights against And surely then the discontented is a strange person that is proud towards God and an unhappy person whom God resists and fights against 2. He renounces his own Praiers he begs of God thy will be don and yet do's murmur that it is so and what a strange Petitioner is this who repines if he be heard and is vext that God do's grant his Praiers is angry with the Lord because he do's what he desires And then shall such a person ever hope that God should hear his Praiers at any time who is displeas'd because the Lord do's not deny him 3. All concupiscences are the effect of this for because they are not satisfied with their own condition they desire what is not their own and so the breach of the
uncouth till a man be experienced in them and also as it smooths the way for such beginnings do nurse up a Habit and prepare a Custom and make Vice very easie which at first it is not while the Appetite is modest and not able to digest full Doses till use enlarge and stretch it And now the Mind which by these means tasts diverse Pleasures and the Degrees of them and finds a gust in them yet not being satisfied in any one as 't is impossible it should be stirs up the Appetite to vary and proceed that that contentment which single pleasures could not afford diversified might make up Wretched Nature using that as an Attractive which should repell for who would hugg a Cloud embrace that which does not cannot satisfie but only Flesh which for that very reason hunts on and follows the scent And by doing so a while it brings upon it self Fourthly Something like a necessity of doing so Thus Continence would be some mens Disease and the Intemperate cannot live without his Vice but gapes as much as Thirst and Fever do and if he have not satisfaction suffers as many qualms and pangs as his Riot used to cause in the Apprentisage of his sin so that there is a kind of necessity of the practice and he wisely seeming to make a vertue of necessity begins to think them the only happiness at least of this life freely without reluctancy embracing them And now the Flesh is Callous and if you doubt how it could so harden it self as not to be pervious to any stings of Conscience but Proof against all Pricks though Experiment may persuade you yet I will shew you the Method As all Appetite you know is blind so the Guides also of Carnal appetite The senses are very short-sighted they cannot look forward to the next Life to the hopes of Heaven or the pains of Hell to bring them into the ballance with the present pleasure and see which does over-weigh The Flesh only lives extempore looks but upon that which is before it scarce on that We have sufficient experience of this for when one Vice will not look forwards a year or two to the penury and rottenness some courses do pull down And when another Vice as if it had learnt to fulfill our Saviours command and take no care for the morrow will not think of the next mornings pains and Headach Nay when the ambitious Usurper will not look just before him to see where he does place his steps on Precipices and Sword-points to note how the Pyramids he does climb are made slippery with blood Pyramids did I say pointed Reeds rather things that have not strength to bear but only sharpness to stab and where the man 's own weight makes his Upholders fail and wound him both together at once sink under him and pierce him thorough Nay we see many whose sins inflict themselves who may be truly said to bear their Iniquities yet chuse those sins that bring their Plauges along with them for we see men with most excessive difficulty practise a Vice only that they may have the Vice swallow sickness drink Convulsions and dead Paralyses foaming Epilepsies only that all this may be easie to them And this is but one instance of the many that might be made just as the King of Pontus that are Poison that so he might be used to it Strange that a man should torture himself with all those deadly symptoms that Poison racks the body with only that he might eat Poison yet just such is the Sinners Design and all the ease and pleasure he acquires at last in sinning is but familiarity of Poison custom of Danger and acquaintance of Ruine Good God! that men should train and exercise themselves so for perdition that they should go through a discipline of torments to get an Habit of destroying themselves that they should work out their own condemnation with hardships and agonies that as if 't were too easie to go down the hill to Hell the descent shall be made craggy and they force breaches into it and great headlong Precipices to make the way more painful and more dangerous to make the fall more wounding and more irrecoverable And what shall give a check where difficulty does provoke and torments do ingratiate Well But though Flesh be so short-sighted and inconsiderate the mind might trash it by suggesting other sorts of punishments that do await transgression Why truly if rude and unmannerly Conscience do sometimes thrust in the thoughts of Hell the Flesh which I told you is not terrified with any thing but what it feels now Conscience presents Hell as a thing of hereafter not till Death be past it satisfies Conscience with a Repentance of Hereafter before Death come I will be sorry for my sins and God is merciful Conscience being thus quieted and both Reins and Spur given to the Flesh it takes its full Carier and leaves behind all thoughts of Repentance and indeed of God or Heaven the hope and joys of which are the only possible method that is left to take off the Man from his eager pursuit or to divert him in his course But as to that also that I may shew you the next heat The Mind that is immerst in body and hath been long accustomed to tast no pleasure but the carnal ones its fancy fill'd with those Ideas it does imbibe such a tincture of sensuality receives such an infusion of Flesh and so impregnated with the fumes of Carnality which clog the Spirit that its complexion and temper is quite altered it is diluted and deprest and so grown stupid and unactive to all higher things Heaven and all after-things it may be are the prejudice of such persons not their persuasions some thin conceptions of such things have been thrown into them but never were improved for their Mind hath otherwise been employed and they can have no appetite to them because they have never had any tast or relish of any thing but sensual And indeed that both longings after and thoughts of a better Life should be altogether dead in the carnal man is but a natural and necessary effect of the verge of his Delights For what motive is there in Heaven to stir up his appetite to whom Heaven it self would not be a place of Joy For I am verily persuaded were the Carnal man in those Eternal Mansions compast with streams of Glory it were impossible for him to take delight in them and he would grope for Paradise in the midst of Heaven As much impossible as for the most unlearned Idiot to satisfie himself with the pleasures of a Mathematical demonstration Let him have the Hecatombe and let Pythâ—goras be an Epicure on the dimensions of a Triangle the other hath no palate for these pleasures and indeed how could the unclean lascivious please himself in the enjoyment of those Felicities that have no Sex Where they neither Marry nor are given in Marriage Or how the
to me rather than use a violence upon my self I must find out some salve now to quiet Conscience and yet keep the Vice And truly if it be but one thing that a man transgresses in he is apt to be gentle to himself and finds plump grounds to be so The best man hath his fault and this is his only in this the Good Lord pardon him in other things he will be strict but this is his particular infirmity to which his very making did dispose him having been poysoned by its Principles without his fault or conspiration 'T is true indeed men have some one or other sinful inclination which is a weight and violence upon them and which they did derive from Adam whose sin like an infection taken in by divers men breaks out in several Diseases according to variety of Constitutions But truly Adam gave them no ill Customs and they have no Original habits themselves did educate their inclinations into Vices and for those inclinations that are derived into them the water of their Baptism was therefore poured upon them to cool those inbred heats and quench those flashings out of Nature wash away those foul innate tendencies in that Laver of Regeneration which therefore they who spare and are tender to because they are original and natural they spare them for that very reason for which they there engaged to ruin them and do renounce their Baptism as to the aims and uses of it There thou didst list thy self a Soldier to fight against the Devil World and Flesh now whichsoere of these gets most into thee wilt thou think fit to spare thy Enemy because he is thy bosom one the Risque is greatest when the Foe is Rebel and Traytor too is got in thy own Quarters shuffled with thy own Forces entred thy Holds and thy Defences and mixes in thy Counsels does counterfeit thy Guard so that thou but command'st and leadst on thy own ruin Sure here is need of strictest care to rid thy self of so much treacherous danger so far is it from a defence to say this is the single force and bent of Nature in me that if I no not therefore most resist it I am perjuriously confederate with my Destruction and howsoever pure I keep my self from other Vices I am not clean David will tell me when I am Psalm xviii 23. I was uncorrupt before him and eschewed my own wickedness God hath not given us Authority to pick and choose our duties observe him where we like and leave the rest and when in the severe contritions of Repentance we come to judg our Lives we have no leave to spare a Vice because custom hath made it our Companion and Intimate or 't is as near to us as the close inclinations of our hearts He that does so although he live a careful life in other things yet all his Innocence is only this he hath a mind to but one sin and those he does not care for he forbears but that which pleaseth him that he commits And sure God is beholden to him that there is but one way of provoking which does take him and therefore must allow him what he hath an inclination to and pardon him because he does abstain from those he does not like I shall now only add that in this case St James's Aphorism holds that Whosoever shall keep the whole Law and yet offend in one point only he is guilty of all he that allows himself to break one Precept does keep none but shall be reckoned guilty of those things which he does not commit For whosoever keepeth the whole Law and yet thus offendeth in one point is guilty of all And then I need not prove such have no Title to the goodness of the Text but may conclude if God be good to Israel it is to such as are of a Clean Heart And so I fall upon the subject Heart And here I must first caution not to think the Heart is set as if it were the entire and only Principle by which a judgment might be past upon our doings as if our Actions so wholly deriv'd denomination from it that they were pure which came from a clean upright heart In opposition to which I shall not doubt to put That the external actions may have guilts peculiar to themselves such as are truly their own not shed into them by an evil mind and a man may be wicked in the uprightness of his heart when he does not intend any such thing but rather the clean contrary Our Saviour tells his Apostles The time will come that whosoever killeth you will think he doth God service John xvi 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he does offer an Oblation or Worship shall think his Murder Sacrifice that that would propitiate for other faults his Crime should seem Religion and attonement to him We have seen guilts put on such colours too and yet by these same actions which their hearts pursued with Holy aims out of a Zeal to God as S. Paul says Rom. x. 2. they sacrificed themselves and their Nation to Gods Vengeance Once more St. Paul does find reason to call himself the chief of Sinners 1 Tim. i. 15. for the commissions of that time of which he says that he served God with a pure Conscience ver 3. did what he was persuaded in his heart he ought to do pursued sincere intentions and after says he had lived in all good conscience before God until that day Acts xxiii 1. So that here was enough of the clean heart a good and a pure conscience and could his fiery persecutions by vertue of that flame within be Christned Holy Zeal Could his Pure Conscience make his Bloody hands undefil'd Oh no! 't was blasphemy and persecution and injury for all 't was Conscience for all his heart was clean from such intentions I was before a Blasphemer and a Persecuter and Injurious ver 13. We may not think to shroud foul actions under handsom Meanings and an Innocent Mind a Conscientious man may yet be chief of Sinners St. Paul was so he says and a clean Heart will not suffice alone Therefore Heart is put here accumulatively as that whose cleanness must be added to the purity of Conversation to compleat it and it implies what elsewhere he does set down more expresly Clean Hands and a Pure Heart all which a clean Heart may be set to signifie because under Gods Holy Spirit it is the principal and only safe agent in the effecting of the rest as that which only can make the other real valuable and lasting When a Disease hath once insinuated it self into the Vitals spread through the Marrow and seised the garrisons of Life the Souls strong holds and after fallies out into the outer parts in little pustles and unhandsome Ulcers they who make application only to those outward Ulcers may perchance smooth and cure the skin make the unhandsomness remove and shift its seat but all that while the man decays
it would A setled tendency a resolv'd inclination to sin that presseth with its utmost agitation is that weight which though it may perchance be stop'd in its career yet it tends to the Abysse its center and will not rest but in that Pit that hath nor rest nor bottom the Heart in this case is as liable as it can be because here it hath done its worst and such a Will shall be imputed to its self And now I need not tell those who are still designing sin or mischief in the heart although it never dares come out of those recesses how far they are removed from the goodness of God to Israel A Father finds a way to prove such souls have larger doses of Gods Vengeance who when he had asserted that the soul does not die with the body and then was ask'd what it did in that long interval for sure it is not reasonable that it should be affected with any anticipations of the future Judgment because the business of the day of Judgment should be reserved to its own day without all prelibation of the sentence and the restitution of the Flesh is to be waited for that so both soul and body may go hand in hand in their Recompences as they did in their demerits joynt Partners in the Wages as they were in the Works To this he answers The Soul does not divide all its operations with the Body some things it acts alone and if there were no other cause it were most just the Soul should there receive without the Body the dues of that which here it did commit without the Body That 's for the former sort of sins those meerly of the Heart And for the latter sort the Soul is first engaged in the commission that does conceive the sin lays the design of compassing and does contrive and carry on the machination and then why should not that be first in Punishment which is the first in the Offence Go now and reckon that thy outward gross Transgressions are the only dangerous and guilty ones and slight thy sins of Heart but know that while thy flesh is sleeping in the quiet Grave at rest and ease thy Spirit then 's in Torments sor thy Fleshes sins and feels a far severer Worm than that which gnaws thy Body Poor Soul Eternity of Hell from Resurrection to For-ever is not enough to punish it all that while it must suffer with the Body but it must have an age of Vengeance besides particularly for it self to plague it for those things it could not execute and punish it for what it did not really enjoy only because it did allow it self to desire and contrive them and it must be tormented for those unsatisfied desires And though indeed desires where they are violent if they be not allayed by satisfaction are but so much agony yet do they merit and pull on them more these Torments shall be plagued and the soul suffer for its very passion even from Death to the last Judgment and 't is but just that being it usurp'd upon the pleasures and the sins of Flesh it should also seize on and take possession of the Vengeance appointed for those sins it should invade and should usurp their condemnation But why do I stand pressing aggravations against uncleanness of Heart in an Age when God knows Vice hath not so much modesty or fear to keep within those close and dark restraints Instead of that same Cleanness which the Text requires we may find Purity indeed of several sorts but 't is either pure Fraud or pure Impiety the one of these does make a strange expression very proper pure Corruption for so it is sincere and without mixture nothing but it self no spots of Clean to chequer it but all stain The other is pure white indeed but it is that of whited Sepulcres a Life as clean as Light a bright pure Conversation but it shines with that light onely which Satan does put on when he transforms himself into an Angel of Light and it is but a glory about a fiend But yet this shines however whereas others do stand Candidates of Vice and would be glorious in wickedness and that is such a splendor as if Satan should dress himself with the shine of his own flaming Brimstone and make himself a glory with the streamings of his Lake of Fire And yet thus is the World we do not onely see men serve some one peculiar vicious inclination and cherish their own wickedness but they make every Vice their own as if the Root of bitterness branch'd out in each sort of Impiety in them such fertile soyls of sin they are here insincerity were to be wish'd and where there is not cleanness that there were a Mask that there were the Religion of Hypocrisie We may remember God was good to Israel of old by Obligation and performance the one as great as he could enter the other great to Miracle and astonishment when after seventy years Captivity and Desolation he did rebuild a Temple where there was no Monument of its Ruines and raised a Nation and Government of which there was no Reliques And yet at last when the Religion of some turned into Faction of others into Prophaneness when the strictest Sect of them the Pharisees became most holy outwardly to have the better means 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to mischief those that were not of their Party and got a great opinion of Sanctity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so as to be believed in whatsoever they did speak against the King or chief Priests and that so far as to be able openly to practise against both and raise Commotions They are Josephus's words of them and when another Sect the Zelots the most pernicious of all saith Bertram did commit Murders Sacriledg Prophanations and all kind of Villanies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with good Intentions saith the same Josephus and when those who did not separate into Sects but were the Church of Israel became lukewarm supine and negligent in their Profession yea and licentious and Prophane fit only to be joyned with Publicans in Christs expressions when sin grew generally Impudent when they did live as if they would be Scandalous as well as vicious as if they lov'd the guilt as much as the delights of sin and cared not to be wicked to themselves but must debauch as if they did enjoy the ruine of other persons sinning just as the Devil does who does not taste the sin but feasts upon the Sinners Condemnation Then did God execute a Vengeance whose prediction was fit to be mistaken for that of the Day of Judgment and whose event almost fulfill'd the terrors of that day I need not draw resemblances shew how Gods goodness to our Israel does equal that to them applying to our selves their Raptures how when the Lord turned the Captivity of our Sion we also were like them that dream surprized with Mercy Indeed as in a Dream Ideas
are not always well connected there is no chain or thred of fancies and the thoughts are not joynted regular and even but there are breaches and disorder in them still the Images of sleep being like Nebuchadnezzar's made of such things as do not well unite So there is something I confess like this in our condition for with our gold and silver our precious things that are restored there is Iron and Clay not onely meaner mixtures but such things as will not close or be soder'd but do incline to part asunder and would moulder and tend towards dissolution and just as in a Dream the composure of things is no so undisturb'd but that there is some confusedness neither our affections nor practices do perfectly cement but yet I hope it is no dream of mercy 't is not a Phantasm or an Apparition of Gods kindness but the Lord will be truly good to us Yet if we do proceed as Israel and equal it in provocations But I will make no parallels publique clamors do that too loud these do display the factions of iniquity among us and muster up the several parties of our Vices too and each man is as perfect in the guilts of all sides that he is not of as if their memories were the books that shall be opened at the Day of Judgment some men can point you out our Pharisees and Zelots others can shew you our prophane licentious Professors Lay and Clergy both and indeed we need not go far to seek any or all of these nor do we want our Sadduces Now if all this be true then as those were the signs of the Son of Man's coming to them in Judgment so we may fear they are his Harbingers to us If they be I am sure the only way to make his coming good to us is to prepare for it by cleansing from all filthiness and insincerity then though he come clothed with a Glory of flaming Vengeance yet will those streams of Fire find nothing to consume or wash away in us but through that flame the pure in heart shall see God so as that that sight shall be the Beatifick Vision Yea they shall see the Goodness of the Lord in the Land of the Living they shall see Jerusalem in prosperity all their life long and Peace here upon Israel and in his light hereafter in the Jerusalem that is above To the state of which glorious Light He bring us all who is the brightness of his Fathers Glory To whom be Glory and dominion for ever and ever Amen The Third SERMON Preached at WHITE-HALL Second Wednesday in Lent LEVIT XVI 31. Ye shall Afflict your Souls by a Statute for ever THE words are one Single Precept concerning one part of the Celebration of a Day I shall not take the Precept asunder into parts for it hath none but shall frame my Discourse to answer three Enquiries that naturally offer themselves to be consider'd from these words And they are 1. What the Importance of the thing commanded is What is required in this Injunction Ye shall afflict your Souls 2. What Usefulness and Efficacy this Duty had upon that time in which it was prescribed what the Afflicting of the Soul contributed to the work of that Day that it should be made so indispensable an ingredient of its performances tied to it by a Statute for ever 3. Whether that for ever do reach us which is the Application and brings all home to us First What the Import of the thing commanded the Afflicting of the Soul is The Arab. and Targum of Jerusalem Translate it Fasting yea and a Learned Rabbine says that wheresoever these two words are put together that is meant And indeed they are often joyned in Scripture to express it Psalm XXXV 13. I afflicted my Soul with Fasting And the Prophet Isaiah speaking of this Day in my Text says Is it such a Fast that I have chosen a day for a man to afflict his Soul Isa. lviii 5. Somewhat a strange expression it is for Fasting does afflict the Body properly and yet we find the like too in the other Extream We read of pampering the Soul Psalm lxxviii 18. They required 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 meat for their Souls not to supply the Hunger of their Body that they had before but to indulge the Lusts of their mind they did not want for food but variety Festival diet and a Table furnish'd they would have and this luxuriancy and wantonness of Meat the Scripture calls meat for the Soul Such as God says in other places the Soul lusteth after Indeed forc'd meats and things that please meerly by being rare and dear or by being extravagant these do not feed the Appetite but Opinion and the Mind it is the Soul that only hungers after these Thus when I look after Wine in the glass and make my Eye a Critique of its accidents and by the mode and fashion of it teach it to please or displease my judgment I do not thirst after the cool moysture of it but the sparkling flame and do not drink the Wine but the flavour and colour and this is all but Notion Now certainly these are not proper objects for our Appetites meat for the Body says the Scripture and it is the Stomach and not the Imagination that is hungry nor is it Fancy or the Soul that thirsts but 't is the Palate so that these are unnatural and monstrous satisfactions And yet to bring mens selves to this is one of the great masteries of Wit and Art to force themselves to find a relish in these things and then contrive them is a piece of Skill which the advantages of parts and fortune are desireable mostly as they are useful to And a well studied Epicure one expert in the mysteries of Eating is a singularly qualified and most grateful Person It were in vain to ask what else such men can be good for that being their Profession they are out at most other things Indeed the Soul that dwells in Dishes and is stew'd in its own Luxuries grows loose and does dissolve its sinews melt all its firmness of mind forsakes it the man is strong for nothing but for Lusts his faculties are choak'd and stifled they stagnate and are mir'd within him and there corrupt and putrefie And then what Cranes will force out thence and wind up such a Soul into the practices and expectations of Piety will make it mind and entertain the hopes and Duties of Religion what macerations what Chymistry will defecate a Spirit so incarnated and rectifie it into such a fineness as befits that state where all their blessedness have no sensual relish but are sublimed into Divine and purely Spiritual Lord God! that thou shouldst shed a rational Angelick Soul into us a thing next to the Being of thy Self to animate only the Organs of Intemperance and Gluttony and their appendant lusts Only inspire us how to be but more sagacious indeed but more luxurious
Bones Psal. Cix 17 18 19. And truly amongst those things which we did Curse there are that will fulfill all that most literally the Riots of thy gaudy bravery that make thee gripe extort spend thy own Wealth and other mens undo thy self and Creditors be sordid and in Debt meerly to furnish trappings to dress thy self for others eyes and may be sins these bring a Curse to cover thee as does thy Garment yea and they gird it to thee The draughts of thy Intemperance carry the malediction down into the Bowels like Water yea like the Wine into the very Spirits There is another of them too that will conveigh the Curse like Oil into the Bones till it eat out the marrow and leave nothing but it self to dwell within them yea till it putrefie the Bones till it prevent the Grave and Judgment too while the living Sinner invades the rottenness of the one and torments of the other and then the Lents and abstinencies that the sin prescribes shall be observed exactly onely to qualifie them for more sin and condemnation may be at the best but to recover them from what it hath inflicted when â—et alas they are too soft and tender the Lord knows to endure any â—rities to work out their Repentance and Atonement and yet sure â—se the Sinner does go through have nothing to commend them which these others do not much more abound with If those are not grievous to thee because they are so wholesom and though it be a miserable thing to go through all their painful squalid methods yet how disgustful soever by the benefit of their Cure they excuse their offensiveness and ingratiate the present injury they do the Flesh by the succeeding health they help thee to and by the Death they do secure thee from Why sure to omit that the other have all these advantages none have so calm and so establish'd health as the abstemious and continent and their mind is still serene their temper never clouded but besides this the Christians bitter Potions do purge away that sickness that would end in Death eternal his fastings starve that worm that otherwise would gnaw the Soul immortally his weepings quench the everlasting burnings yea there is chearful Pleasure in the midst of these severities when God breaks in in Comforts into them The Glory of the Lord appears in that Cloud too that is upon the penitent sad heart when he is drench'd in tears the Holy Ghost the Comforter does move upon those waters and breaths Life and Salvation into them and he who is the Vnction pours Oil into those wounds of the Spirit and we are never nearer Heaven than when we are thus prostrate in the lowest dust and when our Belly cleaveth unto the ground in humble penitence then we are at the very Throne of Grace And this our light afflicting of the Soul which is but for a moment does work for us a far more exceeding weight of Glory To which c. The Fourth SERMON Preached at WHITE-HALL October 12. 1662. JOHN XV. 14. Ye are my Friends if ye do whatsoever I Command you THE words are a conditional Assertion of Christ's concerning his Apostles and in them all Christians And they do easily divide themselves into two parts The First is a positive part wherein there is a state of great and Blessed advantage which they are declared to be in present possession of In these words Ye are my Friends In which there are two things that make up that advantage 1. A Relation 2. The Person related to Friends and My Friends The Second is a Conditional part wherein there are the terms upon which that Possession is made over and which preserve the Right and Title to them in these words If ye do whatsoever I command you in which there are two things required as Conditions I. Obedience If ye do what I command you II. That Obedience Universal If ye do whatsoever I command you The first thing that offers it self to our consideration is the Relation Friends It is a known common-place Truth that a Friend is the most useful thing that is in whatsoever state we are It is the Soul of life and of content If I be in prosperity We know abundance not enjoy'd is but like Jewels in the Cabinet useless while they are there It is indeed nothing but the opinion of Prosperity But 't is not possible to enjoy abundance otherwise than by communicating it a man possesseth plenty onely in his Friends and hath fruition of it meerly by bestowing it If I be in adversity to have a person whom I may intrust a trouble to whose bosom is as open and as faithful to me as 't is to his own thoughts to which I may commit a swelling secret this is in a good measure to unlade and to pour out my sorrow from me thus I divide my grievances which would be insupportable if I did not disburthen my self of some part of them Now there is no bosom so safe as that where friendship lodges take Gods Opinion in the case Deut. xiii 6. If thy Brother the Son of thy Mother or thy Son or thy Daughter or the Wife of thy bosom or thy Friend that is as thine own Soul This is the highest step in the Gradation And there is all the reason in the World for though Parent and Child are as near one to other as any thing can be to part of it self Husband and Wife are but two different names of the same one yet these may become bitter and unkind A Parent may grow cross or a Child refractory a Mother may be like the Ostrich in the Wilderness throw off her bowels with her burthen and an ungracious Son is constant pangs and travail to his Mother his whole life gives her after-throws which are most deadly Dislikes also may rest within the Marriage-Bed and lay their heads upon two wedded Pillows but none of these unkindnesses can untie the Relation that ends not where the bitterness begins he is a Parent still though froward and a Child though stubborn but a true Friend can be nothing but kind it does include a dearness in its essence which is so inseparable from it that they begin and end together A man may be an Husband without loving but cannot be a lover that is a Friend without loving And sure to have no one Friend in this Life no one that is concerned in any of my interests or me my self none that hath any cares or so much as good wishes for me is a state of a most uncomfortable prospect The Plague that keeps Friends at a distance from me while I live out of the sphere of my infection and after gives me Death hath yet less of Malignity than this that leaves me the Compassions the Prayers all the solitary Comforts all indeed but the outward entertainments of my Friends that though it shut the Door against all company yet puts a Lord have Mercy on the Door But this
and his Brother's blood upon his Soul to seize his Sentence Go ye Cursed into everlasting Fire 'T is plain against all Interests of this World and the World to come this man will dye And yet this is one of the laudable and generous Customs of the Age. Neither doth this man stand alone the desperate Rebel would come into the Induction that without any hopes sets all on fire to consume all here and to begin his Flames hereafter But I have said enough to prove the Resoluteness of a Sinners Will which is so great indeed that it is this especially which does enhance the guilt of sin into the merit of an endless punishment this persevering obstinacy does deserve Hell and make it just For whatsoever inequality there is betwixt the short-liv'd pleasures of a sin which dye while they are tasted and put out themselves and those eternal never-dying retributions of Vengeance As sure there is also betwixt the life of Man and several of those petty felonies that forfeit it yet the Law does not murder when it Executes I might have instanc'd in the gathering sticks upon the Sabbath day in Israel For since the preservation of publique safety and propriety is valuable with the lives of many men and to secure that and affright the Violation it was necessary to affix such punishments to such offences they that know the penalty and wilfully meerly to feed their other Vices run upon it justly suffer it So that Man might not rob himself of that Immortal Glory which God had ordain'd him when he did see it absolutely necessary thus to hedge Vice with Eternal Death And as he set Angels and Flaming Swords to keep him out of Paradise so to set Fiends and Flames to guard Hell from him and to entail those Torments on Man's sin which he had prepared for the Devil and sealed the Deed in the Blood of his Son If notwithstanding men renounce the blessedness and against all their Interests and Obligations in spight of all the Arts and Powers of Heaven they will have the Torments and what they never would attempt for Paradise invade those flames to get to Hell 't is very just that God should let them have it should not break his Decrees dispence with Holy Laws so confirm'd meerly to gratifie those that are obstinate for ruine and against his whole Gospel quench Hell fires because men are resolv'd to run into them This Will does as it were even the Scales betwixt the Sin and the Damnation equal the pleasure to the punishment and fill the distance from a moment to Eternity But though this Will do clear God's Justice yet it does not satisfie his Reason he seems astonish'd at the choice God himself cannot find a Ground for such a Resolution and therefore does enquire Why will ye dye Which is God's question and my second Part. It is the present pleasure sin does tempt your sensuality withal whose agitations are so quick and strong that they surprize or break the forces of your Reason and your Principles put the Mind in disorder and then seize it with such violence as to lead it captive to the Law of Sin and Death 'T is true indeed thus both of them had their original so they prevail'd in Paradise for when the Woman saw the Tree was good for food and pleasant to the eye and a Tree to be desired to make one wise she took thereof and she did eat although she knew that God had said In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely dye Gen. iii. But there was generous pleasure here such as tempted the Soul assaulted it with the appearances of Wisdom and divine Knowledg Ye shall be as Gods Gen. iii. 5. And sure 't is no great wonder if the proper pleasures of the mind ingage it therefore when God would give a Precept liable to a Temptation of being broke he laid it in the sphere of those things that delight the Soul of Knowledg but far be it that those of sensuality should ever have prevail'd Man may yield to the pleasure of being like God but for pleasure to make himself a Beast is contradiction to Nature For pleasure is but satisfaction of our appetites and the more natural the inclination is the higher and more powerful that Nature and the desire eagerer so much the more delightful is the satisfaction Now it is certain that the reasonable faculty the Soul or Spirit is the highest and most proper nature of a man In all the rest he 's not a step remov'd from Beasts unless it be in shape but in the accurateness of his senses is below them far and therefore must be so in sensual satisfactions but in his Soul he borders upon Angels and does come towards God Now then that Soul being mans peculiar nature the highest part of him It follows its delights Spiritual reasonable Joys must needs be the most natural and most proper for it most conform'd to it and therefore the most taking with it This may be cleared most irrefragably A Beast hath several ingredients of Nature in his making he is an heavy body and a Vegetable and he hath also Sense which is his highest nature Now though the onely inclination of heavy bodies be to fall down to the Earth and this be also natural to a Beast we do not find that 't is his greatest pleasure sure he had rather feed than tumble in the Pasture his chief delight lies in the satisfaction of his chiefest faculties wherein he does excel his Senses and as Beasts differ and transcend in these so do their pleasures also differ and exceed A man also as Aristotle says does live a threefold Life At first he is but a Plant-man a growing span of living Creature and he 's born only into Animality a Life of Sense and at last educated into reasonable Now the delights of his first Stages whilst onely Vegetation and Sense live although proportioned to those states yet have no savour to the mind he grows through Nuts and Rattles to the use of Reason and the pleasures of it also these must keep even with the growing faculties and become higher rational and manly Which if they do not but the man still dwell upon the satisfaction of sense he does confound the Stages contradict the progresses of Nature he hath the age and strength of Reason but to play the Child with to exert it in those things that are but a Man's Rattles hath the sagacity of an Intelligence meerly to find out how to be a brute with greater luxury and rellish Come therefore shew me now the sins which the delights of Reason do betray you to and I 'le admit the Plea But if you live your own reverse that you may dye renounce all your own pleasures first that so you may renounce the joys of God and Heaven and fall from Nature that you may fall into Hell this case hath no pretence and those pleasures cannot toll man on to
death which till the man be dead and the brute onely live within him cannot be his pleasures And it is plain they are not pleasures to a Sober man that lives the life of Reason not to say of Grace Nor are they such to any man till he have train'd and exercis'd himself into an habit of enduring them and by a discipline of Torment made himself experienc'd for Vice and for Damnation Nor is there ever any pleasure in some Vices What is there in the dismal Wishes of mans imprecating passion there cannot be musick in those harsh horrours and yet the Sinners will destruction so as that they call to God to pour it on them and tear it down from Heaven so that Pain and Disease seem to sauce those delights and Death to be the tempter to the pleasure 't is evident mens reasons and their Practices must be first debauch'd that they may count them Pleasures and therefore pleasure cannot be the first mover in the Sinners race to Death But I will grant that the Spirit and Flesh of Man by their so strait alliance and perpetual converse may grow to have the same likes and dislikes have but one appetite and this alas be that of flesh to whose onely satisfactions the man useth himself by long Custom of which the Soul doth so imbibe the Inclinations of the Body that nothing of another kind can possibly be relish'd In this case sensuality hath pleasures yet such as cannot answer Gods enquiry for do but consult mans other Choices and you find a present satisfaction cannot work his Resolutions to forego great after-hopes or run upon a foreseen ruine Who will exchange his right to the Reversion of a Crown which from his Father he shall certainly inherit and succeed to if he do out-live him for a present Scene of Royalty and choose a painted Coronet the pomps and adorations of a Stage and the applauses of a Croud before the real Glories of his Kingdom the love and the obedience of his Subjects And yet my Soul the disproportion of the Sinners terms is infinitely greater and there is no hazzard which to make his choice of present things more flattering the others hopes are liable to For that Heir of the Crown may die before the Crown fall to him but it is impossible that we should miss of ours except we put our selves by by such choices except we change it thus And on the other side we know men will adventure the Sentence of the Law by Robberies and murders to provide for Lusts while they hope to be undiscovered But sure a Prison made delightful by all arts of pleasure and all plenties of it will not hire a man to own those actions which shall forfeit him to certain shameful Execution the next Sessions and yet this is the Sinners state exactly he is ti'd and bound in the chain of his sins they are it may be chains of Gold and softned with delices but they reserve him to the Judgment of the great Assise And yet he chooses these and puts them on as Ensigns of delight and honour Once more Do not men choose a present Agony to keep off an afterevil they tear their bowels with a Vomit to prevent a Surfeit they cup and scarifie and with all artifice or pain upon themselves kill a Disease yea they are well content to prolong torment so they may but prolong life and though the preservation of it prove onely continued pangs and all they can effect is onely this that they are longer dying yet they are glad to be so in all cases except where the prescription is Virtue and the death prescribed against Eternal Now why do you choose thus onely in Sin and Hell 'T is clear the very pleasure you change Heaven for cannot invite you from this Life and then you that will suffer any thing rather than you will dye Why against all resistance will you dye for ever It is Secondly because you know not what it is to dye the second Death at least your notions of it are so slight and easie that they cannot fright you from a pleasure or cope with a temptation to it and so though present satisfactions are not able to engage you upon present ruin they can upon the after-death Indeed the Sinner would have reason if it meant no more than hath been taught of late by one that hath gained many Proselytes among the Virtuosi of Religion After the Resurrection the Reprobates shall be saith he in the state that Adam and his Posterity were in after his Sin i. e. the state we are now in Live as we do Marry and give in Marriage and cease to be when they have got some heirs to succeed them in Tophet Poor unhappy Souls these that never had any sin to merit being there nor any Sentence to condemn them thither but this mans Who must put them there successively one after other to find employment for Everlasting fire A Doctrine such as had an Angel Preach'd from Heaven by S. Paul's award he must have been Anathema when the Devil made Religions and Theology came from the bottomless Pit he never found out such an Engine to conveigh men into it as this pleasant notion of the punishment of sin therein as if Leviathan were made to take his pastime in that Lake also by such interpretations which surely were contrived to make out the Assertion of that Romish Priest who says that those in Hell love to be there nay more that 't was impossible for God to do a kinder thing for them than to put them there Doctrines to be abhorr'd as Hell it self and yet upon these grounds he builds their Church by demonstration so strong as that the Gates of Hell cannot prevail against it and in truth they have no reason to assault it on these terms But to pass by such dotages and frenzies you will be able sure to check all those presumptions which grow from sleight impressions of the second Death if you but take that prospect of it which the close of this time gives look forward through this season which is designed for you to prepare the way of the Lord to his Passion in and you shall see the Death that does await iniquity If you behold him coming to Jerusalem with Hosannas and Palms about him as if Death were his Triumph his Passion so desirable that he rode to meet it which he never did at any other time and then complaining he was straitned until it were accomplish'd as he had throws of Longing after it and singing when he went out to it you would believe the Sinner never chose his death sweetned by his most pleasant sin with a more chearful eagerness But then open the Garden and you see his apprehensions of it throw him on his Face to pray against it See how he sweats and begs his very Prayer is a Passion the zeal of it is Agony and canst thou choose that he so dreads
determination just and necessary But sure when God hath put other needs in my making and hath provided supplies for them those also are as just and necessary objects of desire while they are with and under him But yet he that had brought all his affections into Davids frame might well say he desired nothing upon Earth besides nothing with God for he had weaned his very Flesh and all the craving appetites of Sense from their own objects and had fix'd them upon God in all their strength and vigour My Soul saith he thirsteth for thee elsewhere my Soul gaspeth unto thee even as a thirsty Land and my flesh also longeth after thee Psalm lxiii 1. How My Soul thirsteth for thee with thee indeed is the Well of Life But Thirst is an Appetite gasping a consequent defailance and impatience of the Body to both which the Soul is a meer stranger as it is also to the ways by which the Body does desire â—or the Soul is drawn by moral engagements by persuasions and motives there is place for deliberation and Choice in her Desires she can demur in her pursuits divert her Inclinations and quench a Desire with a Consideration but the Flesh pursues in a more impulsive manner is drawn and spurr'd on by such impetuous propensions as are founded in matter You can no more persuade a thirsty Palate not to thirst than you can woo a falling Stone to stay its hast or invite it to turn aside from its direction to the Center Yea but the Soul also exerts it self in all these appetites of flesh and matter and with all their violence when it looks on God when we have once had a taste or when indeed we but discern our needs of him whether our Temporal or Spiritual those of the Soul or Flesh all the desires of both then fly at him and with a tendency most close and uncontrollable then nothing besides him For all the appetites of Body croud into the Soul that they may catch at God that Thirsts and Gaspes And the Soul does put on the violent impetuous agitations of the Bodies Appetites My Soul thirsteth for thee and my Flesh also longeth after thee What Longing is whether an Appetite or Passion of the Flesh or Mind whose signatures are more express indeed upon the Flesh than those of any other yet whose impulses are so quick and so surprizing as they were Spirit I shall not now enquire but sure if the Flesh long it should be for some carnal Object for that is proportion'd to it Flesh and the Creature use to close indeed and they imbibe each other as if they knew to fill and satisfie each other yea some there are that have brought down their Souls to the propensions of Flesh have given to their very Spirits an infusion of carnality for they mind onely fleshly things But by the rates of David's practice it should seem the pious man does the just contrary sublimes his Flesh into a Soul drains all the carnal Appetites out of it weans it from all its own desires and teacheth it those of the Spirit onely makes it long for God Now he whose flesh is defaecated thus and as it were inur'd to the condition which it shall put on when it awakes from its corruption as if it were already in that place whose happiness and desires have no use of Body and were in that state where their Bodies neither hunger or thirst for these he hath translated from his flesh 't is his Soul onely thirsts and that for God As if he were indeed like Angels now how can this man desire any thing on Earth besides the Lord who is and does already what they are and do in Heaven where we have nothing but thee But notwithstanding this exalted temper though we should arrive at this Seraphick constitution of desires and though God hath now made himself to us the proper object of these appetites for since God struck the Rock for us which Rock was Christ since the true Bread came down from Heaven if our Flesh long for God there is a satisfaction ready he hath made his Flesh be meat indeed if our Souls thirst for God he can furnish drink for a Soul the Blood of God But yet while this Soul sojourns in this earthly Tabernacle the man will still want other supplies and may be not desire them or can he choose indeed For they that tell us stories of some men whose hungers and thirsts after God as they devour'd all other desires in them so also gave themselves no other satisfaction but panem Dominum that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Supersubstantial daily Bread the Lord these men I say would find it hard to make out how bare Species could nourish and sustain a bodily life Yea Christ himself when he was upon the Earth did hunger and although it was his meat to do his Father's Will yet when he was an hungered Angels came and ministred unto him and then may not our earthly needs desire something besides him That while we are upon the Earth all those necessities are in our constitution is certain but that we need not desire for them or any thing besides Him is as certain Because to them that desire him all these things shall be added they are annex'd by Promise Matth vi 33. it is for such to be sollicitous who would have something they must have alone something that cannot come along with God But if I be assur'd that all my needs shall be supply'd in him I need desire nothing besides him now this Promise he must perform for he that when he put Man in a state of Immortality in Paradise provided him a Tree of Life that might for ever furnish and sustain him For that Age also that he does design a man a being for his Service here upon the Earth he must allow him necessaries for his being and his Service otherwise he can nor serve nor be And then if they be certain what need he desire them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Chrysostome These are not objects for our careful wishes but our trusts and confidences we may assure our selves of these if we have him these are his Appendages and then why should I put them with him into my Devotions when my Soul lies gasping towards God in Prayer my desires seizing on his Blessednesses to take them off from him and to make my desires turn aside to little earthly things and fix them there is to affront not my God onely but my Prayer too and when these things are sure seems to betray a mind too Earthly and too apprehensive of these needs Surely I were most strangely necessitous or strangely greedy if both God and that which shall be added to him were not enough for me More wretched or else more unsatisfied than Hell if the Almighty were not sufficient for me if he be my provision then I need desire nothing besides him But yet Necessities will crave Hunger
love and enjoys our first embraces from which it must be with great reluctancy that we are torn and whereas these impressions should be weakened and defac'd by the infusion of other Notions and Principles and the Soul should be weaned from too great liking of these sensitive satisfactions by the cares of those which should be as assistant souls to us denying us every thing that was not very requisite or very moderate that we might learn to want them and be taught not to desire them The contrary alas is practis'd every way as soon as e're the mind is capable of being trained into the World's snares we betray it into them we teach it how to understand and be affected with the bait and those pomps which we but just before made them renounce we make them before any things know and be pleas'd with and the first blossom of the mind wherein the Soul exerts it self for the most part is Pride And for the rest the old complaint is true ante palatum eorum quà m os instituimus we teach their Palates sooner than their Tongues and they can cry for what they cannot name and yet among their first half words they can name Dainties and what will he not lust for when he is grown up that is taught to desire provocatives e're he can chew them Thus we teach the gayeties and the delights of the World how to insinuate into and take the heart we water and keep warm the seeds of Worldly Inclinations that are there make them sprout and cherish them nurse up original propensions into temper And as Understanding grows up we impregnate it with Principles and arts of serving them turn Reason into a sagacity and skill of catering for those Inclinations making them like Aristotle's observation backwards educating them into Creatures of meer sense teaching them to be rational understanding Brutes Yet the World thinks sic fiunt homines this is call'd making them Men betimes And when they are thus made when the age of satisfying all their inclinations is come and when Temptations are understood and multiply by Conversation and the World hath Objects for them all at hand Objects that what ever way they turn their Eyes are still before them and thrust themselves into the mind and the advantages that do attend them and by constant importunacy stir and work desires and serve them too then we are in that state in which the World hath those advantages I told you of whereby it does not onely war against the Principles of Reason and Religion in us but it also leads the Will into Captivity and enslaves her to it self For it is plain the World hath got possession of the heart and hath a strong party of heady passions which whensoever a Temptation does alarm them presently are up raise a mutiny and with the heat of Fancy and commotion of affections they disorder the Understanding so that it cannot rally up considerations against the assault but either it concludes or disputes very faintly If it do make an effort and struggle it is but with a slender company of thin weak notions of things afar off which the man hath had no proof of nor hath any great confidence in which while it is in recollecting and enforcing the World hath its powers ready seizes on the Will by the means of a corrupted fancy that does give it earnest foretast even the possession of the well-known pleasures that it does invite to and so melts him down into the sin Now while the present Profits Pleasures Honours that I have from the World fill me while they feed and cloath me and provide me all that my necessity or wantonness can wish and furnish me in hand with whatsoever any of my natural or my forc'd Appetites do gape for and lull me with that constant variety of those delights which it procures the use of which hath so drunk up my Spirits and my Soul hath so imbib'd the joys that I know not how to retrench from them nor from that which is to furnish them Must I leave all these for things that I have had no taste nor rellish of leave all in present for some future hopes which I have no great confidence of compassing if I should try and which I also see that very few venture for Whereas Mankind is swallowed up in the pursuit of these and to be stor'd with them does not onely serve my needs and Luxuries but it is the onely state of Reputation and Honour 'T is not from a rich stock of vertuous qualifications nor from great and glorious Actions that Esteem and Dignities do generally grow but from worldly advantages these constitute conditions and these are their onely Characters And being it is so they that are in a Sphere above the ordinary ranks of people must contrive those things that are become essential to their condition and they must have worldly Pomps although with the expence of Piety or Charity and Justice yea of every Christian Duty of Morality indeed and Heathen vertue of Humanity it self They will extort be ravenous and cruel will be false and treacherous cheat and betray to get and purchase at the price of the most disingenuous sneaking and unmanly sins To undermine another they will dig to Hell as if they meant to give fire to their Mine with the flames of that place whence they have the malice and the arts to do it And as if they did not care to sink him thither who stands in their way to stop their rise they are content to dye their purple with their own most guilty blushes and the blood of any one that is their Rival or Competitor Add to this that when these pretences of Condition have got footing in the heart besides those passionate desires which they stir for themselves they work out most unquiet Emulations Envies Discontents at others In whatsoever any other does exceed me his Abundance is my want straight I am in necessity not from my own needs but from his possessions and I suffer his enjoyments I labour fret and sink under the burden of his Honours and his greatness is inflicted on me Nor can I ever be at rest till I am got from under the sad pressure of that deep necessity of having what I see another have And thus it will be till Ambition have no further Object till there be no greater heights to mount And now this Lust is in its pride and the victorious World in its Triumphal Chariot Not that I dare pretend that I have shewed you all the Chains by which it drags captive Souls after it or all the Arts of Tyranny that it does execute I could name many more but he alone is able to discover all that in the twinkling of an Eye did once shew all the Kingdoms of the World and all the beauty of them and who promised to bestow them all for but one single act of Worship and whose gift the Glories of it are for the
kind when the sins therefore lie in the Attire and they may put them off without a Metaphor yet it is so hard that it cannot be done sometimes the worth of a whole Province hangs upon a slender thread about a Neck a Patrimony thrust upon one joint of one least Finger and these warts of a Rock or a Shell-fish with the appendages eat out Estates and starve poor Creditors for whom indeed they should command these stones to be made bread but that 's a Miracle too stubborn for their Vertue And then how will they proceed to the next expression of this Duty Circumcise your selves to the Lord and take away the foreskin of your hearts Jer. iv 4. These are harder and more bloody words they differ in the pain and anguish that they put us to as much as to uncloath and flea would do It appears indeed this punishment of fleaing often went before the Cross. To 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Ctesias of one having his Skin pull'd off he was Crucified And the scourges in some measure did inflict this on our Saviour when they put off his Cloaths they strip'd his Skin also left him no covering but some rags of that which whipping had torn from his flesh Yet this expression sounds harsher when it bids us circumcise the foreskin of our hearts and tear it from thence flea that When long Conversation with the pleasures of a sin hath not onely given them Regallias but hath made them necessary to us so as that we cannot be without them when Custom craves with greater feaver than our thirst when if we want it we have qualms saintings of Soul as if the life were in that blood of the grape when men can part as easily with their own bowels as the Luxuries that feed them if you take away their Dishes then you take their Souls which dwell in them when the sins of the Bed are as neâ—dful and refreshing as the sleeps of it when to bid a man not look not satisfie his lustful eye is every jot as cruel as that other Iâ— thine eye offend thee pluck it out For if he must no more find pleasure in his sight he hath no use of it yea if this be indeed a kindness not to leave him Eyes to be to him the same as Appetite to Tantalus that which he must not satisfie and is his hell 'T is easie if the Lust be got no further than the Eye to pull them out together but if through that it shoot into the Blood and Spirits mix heats with those if it enwrap the heart twist with its strings and warm the Soul with its desires so that it Spirit all the motions all the thoughts and wishes of the heart when it is thus to make the heart to stifle its own motions stab its thoughts and strangle all its wishes to untwist and disentangle and to tear it thence if this be to be Circumcised with the Circumcision of Christ and he that hath not the sign of this the Seal of the New Covenant as he that in the Old had not the other was must be cut off our long habituated hardned Sinners must not think that there is any thing of true Repentance in their easie perfunctory sleight performances there is something like Death in the Duty which yet is required of us farther under variety of more severe expressions for we are bid thirdly to slay the Body of Sin Rom. vi 6. to mortifie our members Col. iii. 5. and to Crucifie Gal. vi 14. which how it may be done the next consideration of S. Paul's condition in the Text and my next part declare I am Crucified with Christ that is first as he was by being made conformable to his Death And truly should we trace him through all the stages of his Passion we should hardly find one passage but is made to be transcribed by us in dealing with our sins First he began it with Agony when his Soul was exceeding heavy for it labour'd with such weight of indignation as did make the Son of God to sink under the meer apprehension And he was sorrowful unto Death so as that his whole Body did weep Blood The Sinners passion his Repentance is exactly like it it begins always with grief and sense of weight whoever is regenerate was conceiv'd in sorrow and brought forth with pangs and the Child of God too is born weeping And for loads the Church when she does call us to shew forth this Death of Christ as if she did prescribe that very Agony requires that we should find that Garden at the Altar makes us say we are heartily sorry for our misdoings the remembrance of them is grievous unto us the burden of them is intolerable So that the Sinner's Soul must be exceeding heavy too Secondly There he is betrayed by his own domestick sold for the poorest Price imaginable as a Slave for thirty pieces of silver I shall not mind you what unworthy things the love of Money does engage men to to sell a Christ a Saviour and a God! and rather than stand out at such a base rate as we scorn to buy a sin at every single act 's engagement to Damnation costs more than the Ransom of the World is sold for and the Blood of God is purchas'd cheaper than any one opportunity of Vice does stand us in But I onely mind you here that he shall have a better hire that will but be a Judas to his own iniquities do but betray the Regent sins deliver them up and thou shalt have everlasting Heaven Thirdly We find him next carried before the High Priest And the strictest times of Christianity would serve their sins so to receive his doom upon them to be excommunicated into Reformation But I shall not urge how we can discover to a Physician our shames all our most putrid Guilts as well as Ulcers and make him our Confessor in our most secret sins neither will I be inquisitive why the Physicians of our souls are balk'd but will pass this part of the Conformity and follow Christ to Pontius Pilate And for this part we our selves are fitted the whole furniture of a Judicial Court all that makes up both Bench and Bar is born within us God hath given us a Conscience whereby we are a Law to our selves Rom. ii We have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Jews did want such evidence as is sufficient to condemn us the same Conscience that is privy to our doings and stands by our thoughts and sees through our intentions is a thousand witnesses And that there may be a Prosecutor our own thoughts accuse us saith S. Paul and if we will give them way will aggravate each Circumstance of guilt and danger bark and howl and cry as loud against us as the Jews did against Christ for Sin is of so murthering a guilt it will be sure to slay it self and that he may not want his deserved Ruin the Sinner makes his
encourage it sure Witches have no spirit but the Devil for familiar But the Church of England on the other side in her publique Doctrine set down in the Book of Homilies establish'd in the 39. Articles of her Religion says in express words that it is not lawful for Inferiours and Subjects in any case to resist and stand against the Superiour Powers that we must indeed believe undoubtedly that we may not obey Kings Magistrates or any other if they would command us to do any thing contrary to Gods Commands In such a case we ought to say with the Apostle we must rather obey God than Man But nevertheless in that case we may not in any wise withstand violently or Rebel against Rulers or make any Insurrection Sedition or Tumults either by force of Arms or otherwise against the Anointed of the Lord or any of his Officers 1 Book of Hom. 2 part of the Serm. of Obed. Not for Reformation of Religion for what a Religion 't is that such men by such means would restore may easily be judged even as good a Religion surely as Rebels be good men and obedient Subjects 2 Book of Hom. 4 part of the Serm. against wilful Rebellion The very same thing is defined in the first of the Constitutions and Canons Ecclesiastical of the year 1640. for Subjects to bear Arms against their King offensive or defensive upon any pretence whatever is at least to resist the Powers which are ordain'd of God and though they do not invade but onely resist S. Paul tells them plainly he that resists receives unto himself damnation This was the Doctrine of the Church in those her Constitutions and although there was no Parliament then sitting to enact these Canons into Laws yet since that time the Law of England is declar'd to say the same and we obliged by it to acknowledg that it is not Lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take up Arms against the King by this Parliament whose memory shall be for ever blessed And now it is not hard to know what manner of Spirit our Church is of even that Spirit that anoints the Lords Anointed that is which Commissions them Gods Spirit as we find it phras'd in Scripture And 't is obvious to each eye that there is much more resemblance betwixt present Rome and the Image of Babylon as S. John hath drawn it in the Revelations than there is of Babel and the Church of England as to those Confusions which seditious Doctrines make as the Romanists pourtrai'd her But far be it from me to conclude hence that all of their Communion do allow their Doctrines Though they stand on the same bottom that their Faith of half-Communion and Transubstantiation do even Acts of the same Councils yet I doubt not multitudes of loyal Souls of this our Nation do abhor the Tenents by what Rule of theirs I know not I confess Nor shall I enquire what Security a Prince can have of the Allegiance of those who by the most infallible Rules of their Religion can be loyal onely on Condition by the leave of those who are his Enemies on whose will and power all their Oaths and duty are depending If the most essential interest of Princes will not move them to consider this sure I am I shall not undertake it But I shall take the confidence out of the premises to infer that no Religion in the World does more provide for the security of Kings than the Christian as it is profess'd in our Church does And when we see the Interest of the Crown and Church were twisted by God in the preservations of this day nor could be separated in the late dismal Confusions but died and reviv'd together in the Resurrection they that hate the execrable mischiefs of those times or love the Crown or do not come to mock God when they come to give him thanks for his great glories of this day cannot choose but have good will for our Sion cannot have an unconcernedness for this Religion a cold indifference to it or any other which where-ere it is alas I fear betrays too openly indifference and unconcernedness for Religion it self For if I should appeal to our most Sceptick Statists and not beg one Principle of a Religion but take their own Religion was contriv'd they say by pretending to engage a God to uphold his Vicegerent and by putting after everlasting punishments before mens fears for they saw present ones restrained not Treason was contriv'd I say to uphold States Then that must be the best with them that best upholds and then I have evinc'd the Christian is secure as 't is prosess'd by our Church But then shame to those who to gratifie their lusts meerly labour to perswade themselves and others there is no such thing in earnest as a Resurrection to punishments who by publique raillery in sacred things and turning all to merriment endeavour to take off the sense of all Religion and have done it in great measure and so thrown down the best-Basis on which Government subsists which they themselves confess was necessary to be fram'd on purpose for it For if there be no after fears he that is stronger than to need to fear the present may rebel kill Kings These Atheists are Fanaticks I am sure in Politicks more traiterous than our mad Enthusiasts or than the Canons of the Popish Councils To these Sadduces in Christianity we may say ye know not what spirit ye are of who know not whether there be any Spirit But it is indeed because they are all flesh themselves But then if the works of the flesh be manifest Adultery Fornication Seditions Heresies Murders Drunkenness c. we know what manner of Spirit they are of even the spirit that did enter into the Swine the Legion indeed of Spirits one Spirit is not Devil enough to animate the flesh into so many of those works But the fruits of the Spirit that Gospel Spirit which we Christians are of are love peace long-suffering gentleness goodness faith meekness temperance joy in the Holy Ghost and they that do bring forth such fruits are baptised indeed with the Holy Ghost and if with fire fire that came down from Heaven too 't was onely to consume their dross that they may be pure mettal fit as for the King's Inscription meek Christians good Subjects so for Gods Image to be stamp'd upon that is renewed in Righteousness and true Holiness Fire this that will sublime our very flesh into spiritual body that we may begin here that incorruptible which our corruptible must put on when our vile Bodies shall be made like to the glorious Body of our Saviour To which state that Spirit which rais'd up Jesus from the dead bring us by quickning our mortal Bodies To whom c. The Eleventh SERMON Preached at CHRIST-CHURCH IN OXFORD Novemb. 8. 1665. Being the Monthly Fast-day for the Plague LUKE XVI 30 31. Nay Father Abraham but if one went unto
the practice of those men who minding Earthly things and all their wisdom lying as to them they therefore think themselves concern'd to represent the Doctrines of the Cross which does so contradict their wisdom as meer madness and the Cross it self as the Ensign of folly And accordingly they do treat it en ridicul and make the proper Doctrines of it the strict duties of Religion matter for their jests and bitter scoffs They character Religion as a worship that befits a God whose shape the Primitive persecutors painted Christ in Deus Onochaetes as if Christianity were proper Homage onely to an Asses person as Tertullian words it And the Votaries transform'd by this their service and made like the God they worship were what they were call'd then Asinarii creatures onely fit for burthen to bear what they magnifie a Cross and scorns No persecutions are so mortal as those that Murther the reputation of a thing or person not so much because when that is fallen once then they cannot hope to stand as because those murder after death and poison memory killing to immortality They were much more kind to Religion and more innocent that cloath'd the Christians in the skins of Bears and Tygers that so they might be worried into Martyrdom Than they that cloath their Christianity in fools Coat that so it may be laugh'd to death go out in ignominy and into contempt If to sport with things of sacred and Eternal consequence were to be forgiven yet to do it with the Cross of Christ Thus to set that out as foolishness which is the greatest mystery the Divine wisdom hath contriv'd to make mercy and truth meet together righteousness and peace kiss each other to make sin be punish'd yet the Sinner pardoned Thus to play and sin upon those dire expresses of Gods indignation against sin are things of such a sad and dangerous concern that S. Paul could not give a caution against them but with tears For many walk saith he of whom I have told you often and now tell you even weeping c. Which calls me to my last Consideration Indeed the Cross of Christ does represent Almighty God in so severe a shape and gives the lineaments of so fierce displeasures against sin as do exceed all comprehension There was a passion in Christs Prayer to prevent his Passion when he deprecated it with strong cries and tears yea when his whole body wept tears as of bloud to deprecate it and yet he cryed more dreadfully when he did suffer it The Nails that bor'd his Hands the Spear that pierc'd his Heart and made out-lets for his Bloud and Spirits did not wound him as that sting of death and torments sin did which made out-lets for God to forsake him and which drove away the Lord that was himself out of him Neither did his God forsake him only but his most Almighty attributes were engag'd against him Gods Holiness and Justice were resolv'd to make Christ an example of the sad demerit of Iniquity and his hatred of it Demerit so great as was valuable with the everlasting punishment of the World fal'n Angels and fal'n Men for to that did it make them liable Now that God might appear to hate it at the rate of its deservings it was very necessary that it should be punish'd if not by the execution of that sentence on Mankind as on the Devils yet by something that might be proportionable to it so to let us see the measures God abhors it by to what degrees the Lord is just and holy by those torments torments answerable to those attributes Now truly when we do reflect on this we cannot wonder if the Sinner be an enemy to the Cross and hate the prospect of it which does give him such a perfect copy of his expectations when our Saviours draught which he so trembled at shall be the everlasting portion of his Cup For if God did so plague the imputation of Iniquity how will he torment the wilful and impenitent commission of it But then when we consider those torments were the satisfaction for the sins of man methinks the Sinner should be otherwise affected to them Christ by bearing the Cross gave God such satisfaction as did move him in consideration thereof to dispence with that strict Law which having broken we were forfeit to eternal Death and to publish an act of Grace whereby he does admit all to pardon of sins past and to a right to everlasting Life that will believe on him forsake their sins and live true Christians He there appears the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the World for that he does as being a Lamb slain then he was our Sacrifice and that Cross the Altar And the humbled Sinner that repents for notwithstanding satisfaction God will not accept a Sinner that goes on by all those Agonies his holiness would not be justified if when he had forsaken and tormented his own Son for taking sin upon him he should yet receive into his favour and his Heaven Sinners that will not let go but will retain their sins but the penitent may plead this expiation Lo here I poor Soul prostrate at the footstool of the Cross lay hold upon the Altar here 's my Sacrifice on which my fins are to be charg'd and not on me although so foul I am I cannot pour out tears sufficient to cleanse me yet behold Lord and see if there ever were any Sorrow like the sorrow of thy Son wherewith thou didst afflict him for these sins of mine And here is Bloud also his Bloud to wash me in and that Bloud is within the Vail too now and that my Offering taken from the Cross up to thy Throne thou hast accepted it and canst not refuse it now my Advocate does plead it and claims for me the advantage of the Cross. Now that men should be Enemies to this and when they are forfeit to eternal Ruine hate that which is to redeem the forfeiture that they should trample on the Cross whereon their satisfactions were wrought tread down the Altar which they have but to lay hold on and be safe wage war with beat off and pursue a Lamb that Lamb of God that comes to take away their sins and make a spoil and slaughter of their Sacrifice hostilely spill upon the ground that Bloud that was appointed for their Bloud upon the Altar for their blood of sprinkling and was to appear in Heaven for them If men resolve to be on terms of Duel with their God and scorn that Satisfaction shall be made for them by any other way than by defiance and although their God do make the satisfactions for them to himself yet not endure it but chuse quarrel rather this is so perverse and fatal an hostility as no tears are sufficient to bewail But possibly men sleight these satisfactions because some terms are put upon them which they know not how to comport with the merits of the
their Bibles to be burnt in one Month 17000 were put to death And the Persecution lasted at that rate for ten years time so that in Egypt only it is said there were slain 144000 and 70000 banisht The Laity it seems were allowed Bibles then Or put the case higher in Adrian's or Trajan's time who both lived within an Hundred years of Christ who Martyr'd them 'till weariness slackned the Execution and they gave off onely as it were that so they might cease to persecute themselves and we have the Officers engaged attesting this all which must needs be as notorious as the Light Now Secondly 't is most impossible those so vast multitudes of every Nation should have met together forg'd a Code of Doctrines and agreed so uniformly in professing a Religion and in dying for it for we may as easily believe that there were never any men before this Age we live in but that these began the kind as that those of that Age began the Christian Religion Thirdly 't is as impossible that their immediate Ancestors who lived in the Apostles Age who heard their Preaching received their Writings saw the Miracles they did if they did any and many of them must have seen Christ also after he was risen if it were so yea multitudes of them were themselves parties in the gifts of Tongues and Miracles if there were any and so could not be impos'd on but must necessarily know whether they were truths or forgeries It is as Impossible I say so many should agree together to betray all their Posterity into the profession of a Religion from which they could look for no advantage but the certain total Ruin of themselves and their posterity it was not possible they could have done this if they had not thought all this was true and since they did know whether it were true or not if they thought it was true they did know it was and if they knew it was then it is certain that it was so and these Scriptures and the Doctrines Christians deliver so far as they have not varied since that time from these Authentical Records they have the Seal of God Miracles to attest they come from God I might have urged completion of Prophecies to prove the same First those in the Old Testament of the Messiah which so eminently came to pass in Christ that they sufficiently clear those Books to be Divine Next Christ's predictions in the New particularly those about Jerusalem which saith Eusebius He that will compare with what Josephus an eye-witness and no Christian writes of it or what our selves know of that Nation and that place indeed he must acknowledge the Divinity of his words But enough hath been said to prove they come from God and therefore we must so receive them as the Word of God with perfect resignation of our Souls and submission of our judgments denying every apprehension that would start aside from and not captivate it self to that prime truth which cannot be deceived nor lye and renounce all discourses Reason offers that resist such abnegation of it self and all our other faculties that is receive this word of the Kingdom as a little Child I do not here affirm by saying this that our Religion does disdain or keep distance from the service of any of Mans faculties for it sometimes admits them not as Ministers only but as Judges 'T is plain the senses were the first I do not say conveyance onely but Foundation of Faith which was built on the first believers eyes and ears they heard the Doctrine saw the Miracles were sure they saw and heard them and so supposing the signs sufficient to confirm the Doctrine to have come from God were certain of their truth without any Authority of a Church to influence that faith into divine And S. John therefore does not onely call in and admit and urge their testimony That which we have heard which we have seen with our Eyes which we have lookt upon and our hands have handled of the word of Life that declare we unto you But our Saviour in the highest point of Faith appeals directly to their Judgment Reach hither thy finger and behold my hands and reach hither thy hand and thrust it into my side and be not faithless but believing And S. Austin also gives them the decision of a point of Doctrine which of all others now troubles the Church most for speaking of the Eucharist he says that which you see is Bread and 't is a Cup it is that very thing which your eyes tell you ' t is Tertullian also long before that had appealed to them in that very cause And in an instance where their sentencè passes 't is not strange if Reason also take the Chair and do pretend to Judge And truly when the Scripture that does call those Elements Christs Body and his Blood does also call them after Consecration Bread and Wine and since they must be called one of them by a figure for they cannot be in Substance both and since that Scripture hath not told us where the Figure lies hath not expresly said 't is this but in resemblance that in Substance Here if Reason that hath Principles by which to judge of Bodies which are expos'd to all the notices and trials of our several faculties and to which a Trope is not a stranger it can judge of figurative speeches when it therefore finds if it admit the figure in that form This is my Body 'T is but just the same which was in the Jews Sacrament the Paschal Lamb which they call'd the Body of the Passover though it were but the memorial a figure which was always usual in Sacraments and is indeed essential to Sacraments And which is used in all things that are given by exhibitive signs But if it should resolve it to be Bread and Wine onely in a figure besides a most impossible acknowledged Consequence that a man can be nourisht by them which the Romanists dare not deny nor yet dare grant that men can feed upon a trope be nourish't with a figure besides this if reason shall resolve that it must judge against all Rules it hath of judging by and judge in contradiction to known Principles and trample on all Laws of sense and understanding which especially when the Scripture hath no where defined expresly must be most unreasonable yea most impossible to judge that true that is to say believe that thing which it sees is most irreconcileable with known truths Here therefore Reason is not insolent if it give verdict by its proper evidences men are not bound to swallow contradictions as they do the Wafer or receive as a little Child that discerns the Lords Body no more then it does the repugnancies that are consequent to their Hypothesis concerning it Or to make another instance when the Scripture says God is a Spirit yet does also give him hands and eyes
Trajan's time when St. John's date was almost out his life and his Commission expiring and the Churches of Asia to be provided with succession the Men were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signified by the Holy Ghost But the Chron. Alex. saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he went clean throughout Asia and the adjacent Regions constituting not only Bishops but others of inferiour Clergie And even in the lowest thus it was when the first Deacons were to be made Men full of the Holy Ghost and Wisdom were to be look'd out Act. 6. 3. But yet that did not authorize them the Holy Ghost and Wisdom did not make a Deacon For besides that the Apostles will appoint them over their business ibid. and they are brought to them and they do lay their hands upon them v. 6. Thus it was in those times of full effusion of the Holy Ghost Men always had to do in giving that Commission so that whoever pleads an Order of the Spirit for his Office although such a Commission of the Spirit if he had it would evidence it self and if it were it would appear for 't was the manifestation of the Spirit that was given to every man to profit withall yet if we yield him his pretensions and let his own incitations pass for inspirements and his strong fancie for the Holy Ghost if the Holy Ghost did call him who did separate him Whom the Holy Ghost calls he sends to his Officers to empower they both work He says do ye separate And here a Consideration offers it self unto those holy Fathers whom the Spirit makes his Associates in separating men to sacred Offices that when they set apart even to the lowest stalls of the Church they labour to perform it so that the Holy Ghost may be engag'd and act along with them in the performance Separate such as they may presume the Spirit hath call'd and will own He does not call the ignorant or appoint blind eyes for the Body of Christ or make men Seers to lead into the pit The Holy Spirit calls not the unclean or the intemperate we know it was another fort of Spirit that went into the swine nor does he ever say Separate me those who separate themselves the Schismaticks the Spirit calls not such as break the unity of the Spirit nor sets into the rank of higher members in Christs body those who tear that body and themselves from it the factious those that will not be bound neither in bonds of peace nor of obedience but break all holy tyes that make commotions and rave and foam sure 't is the Legion that sends them and not the Holy Ghost He whom the spirit will call must not be under the reputation of a Vice but should be of a good report lest he fall into reproach and so into the snare of the Devil 1 Tim. 3. 7. i. e. lest he fall into reproach and then his teaching do so too and men learn to slight or not heed the doctrines of such a one as is under scandal for his life and so the Devil get advantage over them and do ensnare them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For to be to any an occasion of falling is to be the Devils snare Now Christ's Fishers of men those whom the Holy Ghost appoints to spread nets for the catching Souls to God their lives must not lay snares for the Devil and entangle Souls in the toyls of perdition Those also that come to you out of Ambition or of greediness of gain the spirit calls not neither He calls we see 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to a work so that they who seek more then they can well attend the labour of or are qualified for the work of they are not of his sending But of all men the Holy Ghost will least deal with the Simoniacal that come not to a work but to a market that contract with Patrons for the spirits call or worse than their master Simon would hire the Holy Spirit himself to say Separate me them The Successors of the Apostles have a Canonical return to these Your money perish with you They whom the Holy Ghost does call must have his gifts and temper St. Paul hath set all down to Timothy and Titus and those who minister in this employment if they will be what he hath made them joynt Commissioners with him and his Co-workers they must order it so that he may work and act which he does not but where he calls nor does he call but those whom he hath qualified And 't is of those only whom he hath call'd that he says 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Separate The Third particular the thing enjoyn'd And the Holy Ghost said Separate The separateness of the Functions of the Clergy the incommunicableness of their Offices to persons not separated for them is so express a doctrine both of the Letter of the Text and of the Holy Ghost that sure I need not to say more though several heads of Probation offer themselves As first the condition of the Callings which does divide from the Community and sets them up above it And here I might tell you of bearing rule of thrones of stars and Angels and other words of as high sence and yet not go out of the Scripture bounds although the dignity did not die with the Scripture Age or expire with the Apostles the age as low as Photius words it thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That Apostolical and Divine Dignity which the chief Priests are acknowledged to be possest of by right of Succession Styles which I could derive yet lower and they are of a prouder sound than those the humble ears of this our age are so offended with But these heights it may be would give Ombrages although 't is strange that men should envy them to those who are only exalted to them that they may with the more advantage take them by the hands to lift them up to Heaven Those nearnesses to things above do but more qualifie them to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Theoph. and to draw near to God on your behalf that those your Angels also may see the face of your Father which is in Heaven and those stars are therefore set in Christ's right hand that they may shed a blessed influence on you from thence The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Work and labour of the work the one is the 〈◊〉 and the other Saint Paul's word require a whole man and therefore a man separate and if St. Paul one of our separated persons here who had the fulness of the Spirit and the fulness of Learning too that was brought up in the Schools and brought up in Paradise taught by the Doctors and taught by the mouth of the Lord in the third heaven snatcht from the feet of Gaâ—aliel to the presence of God to have a beatifical Vision of the Gospel if after
For them it is very necessary for persecution or despightful usage offending God as by a disobedience to his precept so also by the sufferings it does inflict on man to forgive or require which that man hath right God does not use to put the injur'd person by this right or by its paramont Authority assume to pardon the mans part of the wrong but does retain the sin till that either in deed or desire do satisfied for or remitted there being 'till then an obstruction to Gods forgiveness for 'till then the man hath not repented but when the fufferer does pray for him in doing so he pleads that that obstruction is remov'd that his part is remitted and so leaves no bar in the way to that pardon which he begs for him of God and which that bar being gone the Lord is us'd to grant with all advantage the prayers of our Martyr in the seventh of the Acts are a demonstration to which the Fathers say the Church did owe not only her deliverance from all the violent intentions of Saul but all that Christianity which St. Paul planted the dying voice of that petition Lord lay not this sin to their charge was answered by that voyce from Heaven which converted Saul in his career of fury One prayer for a persecutor puts an end to persecution si Stephanus non or asset Ecclesia non habuiesset Paulum Jobs miserable comforters whose visits prov'd afflictions to him could not a tone themselves to God by their burnt offerings but Job must pray for them 42. Chr. 8. seven Bullocks and seven Rams cannot expiate but one petition from the sufferer will do it for him I will accept saith God and he accepted him not for them only but for himself for the Lord turned the Captivity of Job when he prayed for them vers 10. These intercessions speed sooner then direct supplications and such a petition is heard to our selves when 't is made for others And reason good for such requests lay the condition of our pardon before God making evidence of our performance and they cry for we forgive and so call for pardon And to encourage this procedure our Saviour before he did commend his own spirit into the hand of his Father he commended his Executioners to the mercies of his Father Our Martyr did not so indeed but first pray'd for himself Lord Jesus receive my Spirit Acts. 7. 59. But though Heaven opening he saw that Jesus standing at the right hand of God as ready to receive it yet his spirit would not leave his body so yet made him live yet to endure more stoning from his persecutors for whom he had not pray'd yet but when he once fell on his knees not beaten down by their storm but his Charity and pray'd Lord lay not this sin to their charge when he had said so he fell asleep v. 60. his Spirit taken hence as it were osculo pacis though by the most violent death and he lies down in a perpetual rest and peace that thus lies down in Love These are requests to breath out a soul into heaven in and heaven it self did open to receive that soul that came so wafred And now we are at the top of Christ's Mount the highest and the steepest point of christianity which view with that â—o which our Martyrs Spirit did ascend For it makes perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect it sets our heads within those higher and untroubled Regions wherein there are no Meteor-fires the flame of Passion cannot wing it thither for he that is above the power of injury discontent cannot look up to him it is with him as in the upper Orbs where there is only harmony and shine all is peace and love the state of heaven it self Now as it does happen to them that look down from great heights every Object below is dwarf'd And if the distance of the prospect be as great as that from Heaven to Earth they tell us this whole Globe would be but like a spot all being swallowed in it self so if from this great height of duty we should look down upon the World of Christianity would it not almost wholly disappear and vanish Something like a dark spot of it you may perchance behold stain'd and discolour'd with the Blood of Christians which their constant quarrels shed Some it may be dye that Blood in colours of Religion their Animosity is christened Zeal they kill only for Sacrifice thus they interpret and fulfill Christs precepts this they call holy love as if Christ when he bid his Disciples take no Staves with them meant they should carry Swords as if the love he had commanded we should have for them that are in errour if our enemies be so indeed were but to murder them forsooth out of their errours Next for the kindnesses that Christians do to those that hate them or have disoblig'd them they are God knows so little that no perspective can shew them from this height we are upon And yet 't is not for want of light we cannot see them 't is very rare men do those things in the dark for if they do not blazon them themselves the enemy whom they oblige must do it The distance also is too great to hear the prayers that are made for those that treat men with despiteful usage perhaps it is because they are put up in secret bur then what means the yelling of those curses That ill Language that is banded to and fro While none will be behind in the returns of these how far soever we are off like Thunder these are heard And thence you may behold them also tearing Christs wounds wider to mouth their swelling passion We may see their anger redden with his Blood and themselves spitting out that Blood by imprecations at the face of him that did provoke them we may see them raking Hell to word these prayers sending themselves thither in wishes that they may express them with more horrour The Hatreds and Revenges which men act on them that have offended them hates that seldom ever dye 'till themselves do which the Frost of the Grave onely cools yea many times they are rak'd up and keep their heat in the ashes live in the grave and are as long liv'd as the families which for the most part is more careful and tenacious of them than of their Inheritance The executions of these are often writ in Characters legible at utmost distance in this Mount of the Lord they may be seen but where now are the Christians of my Text and of this day There 's no appearance of them in the face of the whole Globe of our Profession nay worse it is scarce possible they should appear the Duties of loving enemies of returning affronts with kindnesses these are banisht thence other virtues are practic'd down but these are scorn'd and quarrel'd down 'T is become a base thing and not to be endur'd to be a Christian