of poverty and riches of flattery and of frowns or friends and foes in our callings and in our divertisements are not all these enough to cool and dull us and keep us from serving God too much and being too careful and diligent for our souls but Preachers themselves must be our impediments and snares Now the Lord deliver our souls from such impediments and his Church from such unhappy guides 9. Consider whom thou imitatest in this Is it Christ or Satan Christ calleth men to strive to labour to seek first to watch to pray alwayes and not waxfaint Luk. 12. 24. John 6. 27. Mat. 6. 33. 25. 13. Luke 18. 1. The Apostles call men to be fervent in spirit serving the Lord to be a peculiar people zealous of good works to pray continually to be 〈◊〉 â—â—osen generation a royal Priesthood an holy Nation a peculiar People to shew forth the praises of him that hath called us and offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ 1 Pet. 2. 5 9. 1 Thes 5. 17. Tit. 2. 14. Rom. 12. 11. To fight the good fight of faith and lay hold upon eternal life 1 Tim. 6. 12. To serve God acceptably being as a consuming fire with reverence and godly fear Heb. 12. 28 29. To be stedfast unmoveable alwayes abounding in the work of the Lord forasmuch as we know that our labour is not in vain in the Lord 1 Cor. 15. 58. And dare you gainsay the Lord and his Apostles and concur with Satan and the Pharisees and enemies of Christ 10. You do your worst to make the sacred office of the Ministry to become contemptible as Eli's sons did Poor people that cannot sufficiently distinguish the Doctrine from the Application the office from the person the use fâ—â—â— the abuse will be tempted to run from the Ordinances of God and think the worse of others for your sakes and suspect all their food because you mix such poyson in it And the more Holy and Necessary the office and work is the greater is your sin in corrupting it or making it suspected or abhorr'd Consider soberly of these things and then go on and speak against a Life of Holy diligence if you dare I know you 'l say It is not Godliness but singularity or humour or disobedience or hypocrisie or faction that you oppose and perhaps you 'l instance in some that are guilty of some of these or seem so at the least But 1. I do here solomnly profess that I hate these crimes as well as you and that it is not any part of my intention to plead for intemperance disobedience in lawful things for schisms or faction or any irregularity And this I here put in against those that are disposed to misunderstand and misreport us and leave it as on record to prove them slanderers that shall accuse me of defending any such thing And I do protest against those on the other side that will fetch encouragement for any transgression from my necessary plea for the holy industry vigilancy of believers And moreover I do profess that it is only the opposers of Holiness that I mean in this Defence and have not the least intent to intimate that any others are guilty of that crime that are not But having premised this protestation to prevent mistakes and false reports I answer now to the guilty 2. If it be crimes only that you are against deliver your self so as may not lay reproach or suspicion on Godliness which is most opposite to all crimes Cannot you preach against divisions disobedience or any other sin without any scornful intimations or reflections against mens diligent serving of the Lord 3. Why do not you commend those that are not liable to your accusations and encourage them in holiness and draw others to imitate them And why do you not commend the Good where you discommend the evil that is commixt 4. Shall Health and Life be made a scorn because there are few but have some distemper or disease Shall Christianity and Holiness be secretly reproached because all Christians have some fault to be accused of If men be faulty you should perswade them to be more strict and diligent and not less It is for want of watchfulness and strictness that they sin Nothing is more contrary to their faults then Holiness There is no other way for their full reformation And therefore all true humbled Christians are ready to confess their faultiness themselves but so far are they from thinking the worse of piety for it that its one great reason that moveth them to go on and to read and hear and pray and meditate and do so much that they may get more strength against their faults Must they think ill of food and physick and exercise because they are infirm All faithful Ministers tell their people plainly of their sins so far as they are acquainted with them as well as you But they do it not in a way reproachful to their holy diligence They do not therefore call them off from Godliness nor tempt them to be less in the use of means but more by how much their need is greater A holy heart and a malignant heart will shew their difference in the reproving of the same fault The one layeth all the odium on the vice honoureth the holy obedience of the Saints The other fasteneth his sting upon the Godly and under pretence of dishonouring their faults doth seek to fasten-the dishonour on their holiness And those that are so minded will never want â—ccasion or pretence for the worst that Satan would have them say The Church will never be without some hypocrites and scandals nor the best without some faults and passions nor the holiest action without some mixture of humane frailty and infirmity nor will the very goodness and holiness of the act on be free from plausible calumnies and scorns while there is the wit and venom of the serpent in the heads and hearts of wicked men How easiâ— is it to put a name of ignominy upon every person and every duty To charge any man with Hypocrisie or Pride To take the wisest man for self-conceited because he is not of the accusers mind To call our obedience to God by the name of disobedience unto man when man forbids it as they used the three witnesses Dan. 3. and Daniel himself for praying in his house Dan. 6. though they confessed they had nothing else against him To call Gods Truth by the name of Heresie and Heresie by the name of Truth To charge all with Schism that dare not subject their souls to the usurpation and arrogant impositions of the sons of Pride that have neither Authority nor Ability to Govern us as the Papists deal by the greatest part of the Christian World To lay snares for mens Consciences and then accuse them for falling into those snares To make new Articles of faith till they have transcended the capaâ—ity of Divine and Rational belief
thankfulness to shew as well as the greatest mercies to receive and miserie to escape as those that believe that if sinners that without Christ had no hope shall now love their sins refuse to leave them and to repent and be converted and unthankfully reject the mercie of salvation so dearly bought and so freely offered them their damnation will be doubled as their sin is doubled Live but as men that have such Redemption to admire such mercie to entertain and such a salvation to attain and that are sure they can never scape if they continne to neglect so great salvation Heb. 2. 3. And is there any controversie among Christians in any of this There is not certainly 4. Live but as men that believe that the holy Ghost is given by Jesus Christ to convert to quicken to sanctifie all that he will save that except you be born of the Spirit you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven and that if any man have not the Spirit of Christ the same is none of his Joh. 3. 5 6. Rom. 8. 9. And that without this no patching or mending of your lives by any common principles wil serve the turn for your salvation or make you acceptable to God Heb. 11. 6. Live as men that believe that this Spirit is given by the hearing of the word of God and must be prayed for and obeyed not resisted quench'd and griev'd And is there any controversie among Christians in any of this Ask those that make a mock at Holinesse Sanctification and the Spirit whether they be not baptized into the Name of the Holy Ghost and profess to believe in him as their Sanctifier as well as in the Son as their Redeemer And then ask them whether it be not a thing that should make even a devil to tremble to come so near the blasphemy against the holy Ghost as to mock at his Office and Sanctifying work and at the holines without which no man shall see the Lord Heb. 12. 14. and this after they are baptized and profess to believe in the holy Ghost as their Sanctifier 5. Live but as men that believe that sin is the greatest evil the thing which the Holy Ghost abhorreth and then you will never make a mock of it as Solomon saith the foolish do Pro. 14. 9. nor say What harm is in it 6. Live but as men that believe no sin is pardoned without Repentance and that Repentance is the loathing and forsaking of sin and if that it be true it will not suffer you to live wilfully in any gross sin nor to desire to keep the least infirmity nor to be loth to know your unknown sins 7. Live as those that believe that you are to be members of the Holy Catholick Church and therein to hold the Communion of Saints And then you will know that it is not as a member of any Sect or Party but as a holy member of this holy Church that you must be saved and that it is the name of a Christian which is more honourable then the name of any division or sub-division among Christians whether Greek or Papist or Potestant or Prelatist or Presbyterian or Independent or Anabaptist It is easie to be of any one of these parties but to be a Christian which all pretend to is not so easie It is easie to have a burning zeal for any divided party or cause but the common zeal for Christian Religion is not so easie to be kindled or kept alive but requireth as much diligence to maintain it as dividing zeal requireth to quench it It is easie to love a party as a party but to keep up Catholick charity to all Christians to live in that holy love converse which is requisite to a Christian communion of Saints is not so easie Satan and corrupted nature befriend the love and zeal of faction which is confined to a party on a controverted cause but they are enemies to the love of Saints and to the zeal for holiness and to the chatholick charity which is from the spirit of Christ You see I call you not to division not to side with Sects but to live as members of a holy Catholick Church which consisteth of all that be holy in the world and to live as those that believe the Communion of Saints 8. Live as those that believe that there is a life everlasting where the Sanctified shall live in endless joy and the unsanctified in endless punishment and woe live but as men that verily believe a Heaven and a Hell and a day of Judgment in which all the actions of this life must be revised all men judged to their endless state Believe these things heartily and then think a holy diligence needless if you can Then be of the mind of the deriders enemies of godliness if you can If one sight of Heaven or Hell would serve without any more ado instead of other arguments to confute all the cavils of the distracted world to justifie the most diligent Saints in the judgment of those that now abhor them why should not a sound belief of the same thing in its measure do the same 9. Live but as those that believe this life is given us as the only Time to make preparation for eternal life and that all that ever shall be done for your salvation must be Now just Now before your time is ended Live as those that know and need not faith to tell them that this time is short and almost at an end already and stayeth for no man but as a post doth haste away It will not stay while you are trimming you or sporting you it will not stay while you are taken up in Stage-plays in complements in idleness or any impertinent needless thing It wil not tarry while you spend yet the other year or month or day in your worldliness or ambition or in your lusts and sensual delights put off your Repentance to another time O sirs for the Lords sake do but live as men that must shortly be buried in a grave their souls appear before the Lord and as men that have but this little Time to do all for their everlasting life that ever must be done O live as men that are sure to die and are not sure to live till to morrow And let not the noise of pleasure or wordly business or the chat or scorns of miserable fools bear down your reason and make you live as if you knew not what you know or as if there were any doubt about these things Who is the man and what is his name that dare contradict them and can make it good O do not sin against your knowledg do not stand still and see your glass running and Time making such hast and yet make no more haste your selves then if you were not concerned in it Do not O do not slumber when Time and Judgment never slumber nor sit still when you have
it then to hear and think that you lost wilfully lost such an opportunity Look about you then and see what is to be done Are there not Ale-houses to be supprest and drunkards riotous persons to be restrained Preaching and Piety to be promoted Do it with your might For it must be Now or Never 6. To come yet a little nearer you and speak of the work that is yet to be done in your own souls Are any of you yet in the state of unrenewed nature born only of the flesh and not of the Spirit Joh. 3. 3 5 6. minding the things of the flesh and not the things of the Spirit Rom. 8. 1 5 7 9 13. consequently yet in the power of Satan taken captive by him at his will Act. 26. 18. 2 Tim. 2. 26 27. Vp and be doing if thou love thy soul If thou care whether thou be in Joy or misery for ever bewail thy sin and spiritual distress Make out to Christ cry mightily to him for his renewing and reconciling pardoning grace plead his sactisfaction his merits his promises Away with thy rebellion thy beloved sin Deliver up thy soul entirely to Christ to be sanctified governed and saved by him Make no more demurs about it it is not a matter to be questioned or trifled in Let the earth be acquainted with thy bended knees and the air with thy complaints and cries men with thy confessions and enquiries after the way of life and heaven with thy sorrows desires and resolutions till thy soul be acquainted with the Spirit of Christ Rom. 8. 9. and with the new the holy and heavenly nature and thy heart have received the transcript of Gods Law the impress of the Gospel and so the Image of thy Creator and Redeemer Ply this work with all thy might For there is no Conversion Renovation or Repentance unto life in the grace whither thou goest It must be Now or Never And Never saved if Never sanctified Heb. 12. 14. 7. Hast thou any prevailing sin to mortifie that either reigneth in thee or woundeth thee and keepeth thy soul in darkness and unacquaintedness with God Assault it resolutely Reject it speedily Abhor the motions of it Turn away from the persons or things that would entice thee Hate the doors of the Harlot and of the Alehouse or the gaming house and go not as the Ox to the slaughter and as a bird to the fowlers snare and as a fool to the correction of the stocks as if thou knewest not that it is for thy life Prov. 7. 22 23. Why thou befooled stupid soul wilt thou be tasting of the poysoned cup wilt thou be glutting thee with the bait Hast thou no where to walk or play thee but at the brink of Hell Must not the flesh be crucified with its affections and lusts Gal. 5. 24. Must it not be tamed and mortified or thy soul condemned Rom. 8. 13. 1 Cor. 9. 27. Run not therefore as at uncertainty fight not as one that beats the air ver 26. seeing this must be done or thou art undone delay and dally with sin no longer Let this be the day resolve and resist it with thy might It must be Now or Never when death comes it is too late It will be then no reward to leave thy sinne which thou canst keep no longer No part of Holiness or happiness that thou art not drunk or proud or lustful in the grave or hell As thou art wise therefore know and take thy Time 8. Art thou in a declined lapsed state decayed in grace Hast thou lost thy first desires and love do thy first works and do them with thy might Delay not but remember from whence thou art fallen and what thou hast lost by it and into how sad a case thy folly and negligence hath brought thee say I will go and return to my first husband for then was it better with me then now Hos 2. 7. Cry out with Job 29. 2 3. 4 5. O that I were as in moneths past as in the dayes when God preserved me when his candle shined upon my head and when by his light I walked through darkness As I was in the dayes of my youth when the secret of God was on my Tabernacle when the Almighty was yet with me Return while thou hast day lest the night surprize thee Loyter and delay no more thou hast lost by it already thou art far behind hand Bestir thee therefore with all thy Might 9. Art thou in the darknesse of uncertainty concerning thy conversion and thy everlasting state Dost thou not know whether thou be in a state of life or death and what should become of thee if this were the day or hour of thy change If thou art careful about it and enquirest and usest the means that God hath appointed thee for assurance I have then no more to say to thee now but wait on God and thou shalt not be disappointed or ashamed Thou shalt have assurance in due time or be saved before thou wouldst believe thou should be saved Be patient and obedient and the light of Christ will shine upon thee and yet thou shalt see the days of peace But if thou art careless in thy uncertainty and mindest not so great a business be awakened and call thy soul to its account Search and examine thy heart and life Read and consider and take advice of faithful Guides Canst thou carelesly sleep and laugh and sport and follow thy lesser business as if thy Salvation were made sure when thou knowest not where thou must dwell for ever Examine your selves whether you be in the faith prove your selves know ye not your own selves that Christ is in you except you are reprobates 2 Cor. 13. 5. Give all diligence in time to make your calling and election sure 2 Pet. 1. 10. In the Grave and Hell there is no making sure of Heaven you are then past enquiries and self-examinations in order to any recovery or hope Another kind of tryal will finally resolve you Up therefore and diligently ply the work it must be Now or Never 10. In all the duties of thy Profession of Piety Justice or Charity to God thy self or others up and be doing with thy might Art thou seeking to inflame thy soul with love to God plunge thy self in the Ocean of his love admire his mercies gaze upon the representations of his transcendent goodness O taste and see that the Lord is gracious Remember that he must be loved with all thy heart and soul and might canst thou pour out thy love upon a creature and give but a few barren drops to God When thou art Fearing him let his Fear command thy soul and conquer all the fear of man When thou art Trusting him do it without distrust and cast all thy care and thy self upon him Trust him as a creature should trust his God and the members of Christ should trust their Head and dear Redeemer When thou
him And its diligent seeking him that they hate and set themselves aâ—gainst 4. Do not they not judge Heaven to be less worth then Earth when they will do less for it and would have others to do so too 5. They would have us all unchristen and unman our selves as if there were no life to come or as if our reason and all our faculties were given us in vain For if they are not given us for greater matters then all the honours and pleasures of the world they are in vain or worse and the life of man is but a dream and misery Were not a beast less miserable if this were all 6. How base a price do these Cainites set on the immortal soul of man that think it not worth so much ado as the careful obedience of the Laws of Christ Not worth so much as they do themselves for their filthy sins and perishing flesh But would have us so mad as to sell Heaven and our Souls for a little sinful sloath and ease 7. These enemies of holiness would have men take their Mercies for their Hurt and their greatest Blessings for a Burden or a Plague and to run into Hell to be delivered from them Why man dost thou know what Holiness is and what it is to have access to God I tell thee it is the foretaste of Heaven on Earth It is the highest Glory and sweetest delight and chiefest commodity to the soul And art thou afraid of having too much of this What thou that haste none which should make thee tremble art thou afraid of having too much Thou that never fearest too much money nor too much honour nor too much health art thou afraid of too much spiritual health and holiness what shall be thy desire if thou loath and fly from thy felicity 8. You that are loyal subjects take heed of these ungodly scorners For by consequence they would tempt you to despise your King and make a mock at the obeying of his Commands and Laws For if a man perswade you to despise a Judge he implieth that you may despise a Constable No King is so great in comparison of God as a fly or worm is to that King He therefore that would relax the Laws of God and make it seem a needlss thing to obey him diligently and exactly implieth that obedience to any of the sons of men is much more needless And you that are children or servants take heed of the doctrine of these men Masters admit it not into your Families If he be worthy to be scorned as a Puritan or Precisian that is careful to please and obey the Lord what scorn do your children and servants deserve if they will be obedient and pleasing to such as you 9. All you that are poor Tradesmen take heed of the consequences of the Cainitès scorns lest it make you give over the labours of your Calling and turn your selves and Families into beggery For if Heaven be not worth your greatest labour your bodies are not worth the least 10. These Cainites speak against the awakened Consciences and the confessions of all the world Whatsoever they may say in the dream of their blind presumption and security at last when Death hath opened their eyes they all cry O that we had been Saints O that we might die the death of the righteous and that our last end might be as his O that we had spent that Time and Care and Labour for our souls which we spent on that which now is gall to our remembrance And yet these men will take no warning but now oppose and deride that course that all the world do wish at last they had been as zealous for as any 11. The enemy himself hath a conscience within him that either grudgeth against his malicious impiety and witnesseth that he abuseth them that are far better then himself or at least will shortly call him to a reckoning and tell him better what he did and make him change his face and tune and wish himself in the case of those that he did oppose 12. To conclude the Cainite is of the wicked one 1 Joh. 3. 12. of his Father the Devil Joh. 8. 42 44. and is his walking speaking instrument on Earth saying what he himself would say He is the open enemy of God For who are his enemies but the Enemies of Holiness of his Laws of our Obedience of his Image and of his Saints And how will Christ deal at last with his Enemies Luk. 19. 27. O that they knew that foreseeing they might escape This is the true the ugly picture of a Cainite or Enemy of a holy life that reproacheth serious diligence as a precise and needless thing when God commandeth us and death and the Grave and Eternity admonish us to do his work with all our might Now consider this ye that forget God lest he tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver you Psal 50. 22. BUt of all the opposers of serious Holiness in the world there are none more unexcusable and deplorably miserable then those that profess themselves Ministers of Christ Would one believe that had not known them that there are such men in the world Alas there are too many Though Education and the Laws of the Land engage them to preach true doctrine yet are they false Teachers in the Application For they never well learned the holy and heavenly doctrine which they preach nor digested it or received the power and impress of it upon their hearts and therefore retaining their natural corruptions impiety and enmity to the Life and Power and practice of that Doctrine they indirectly destroy what directly they would seem to build and preach both for God and against him for Christ and the Holy Spirit and against them for Godliness and against it both in the same Sermon In General they must needs speak for the word of God and a holy life But when they come to the particulars they secretly reproach it and condemn the parts while they commend the whole In General they speak well of Religious Godly Holy people But when they meet with them they hate them and make them Precisians a Sect that is every where spoken against pestilent fellows and movers of sedition as the Apostles were accused Acts 24. 5. 28. 22. and any thing that malice can invent to make them odious And what they cannot prove they will closely intimate in the false application of their doctrines describing them so as may induce the hearers to believe that they are a company of self-conceited Hypocrites factious proud disobedient turbulent peevish affecting singularity desiring to ingross the reputation of Godliness to themselves but secretly as bad as others And when they have thus represented them to the ignorant sort of people they have made the way of Godliness odious and sufficiently furnished miserable souls with prejudice and dislike so that because the persons are thus made hateful to them all serous diligence
not The word that is not understood cannot sink into the heart and sanctifie it or if it be not well and soundlie understood it s easily stoln away by the tempter Mat. 13. 19 23. If understanding be necessarie in our common conversations much more in our holy addresses to the Almighty Prov. 17. 27. A man of understanding is of an excellent Spirit but God hath no pleasure in fools or in their Sacrifices Eceles 5. 1 4. nor is pleased with a Parrot-like lip-service which is not understood He saith in detestation of the Hypocrites This people draweth near unto me with their mouth and honoureth me with their lips but their heart is far from me Mat. 15. 8 9. I hope then when we call you to serve God in judgment with understanding we call you to nothing that a Christian should make question of 4. God is a Spirit and they that serve him must serve him in Spirit and in truth Joh. 4. 24. The Father seeketh such to worship him ver 23. He calleth for the heart he looketh for the inward desires of the soul He converseth with minds that are abstracted from vanity and are seriously taken up in attending him and are intent upon the work they do The carkass of a Prayer separated from the Life of it stinketh before the holy God As he will be loved so will he be served with all the heart and soul and might And do we call you then to any thing that is doubtful when we call you to the Spiritual worshipping of God 5. Yet we maintain that the body hath its part in the service of God as well as the soul and the body must expresse the inward reverence and devotion of the soul though not in a way of hypocritical ostentation yet in a way of serious adoration The bowing of the knee the uncovering of the head and reverent deportment and whatsoever nature or common use and holy institution hath made an expression of holy affections and a decent and grave behaviour of our selves should be carefully observed in the presence of the most High and the holy things of God more reverently to be respected then the presence of any mortal man And the rather because that a grave and reverent and holy manner of deportment in Gods worship reflecteth upon the heart and helpeth us in our inward and spiritual devotion it helpeth the beholders and awakeneth them to reverent thoughts of God and holy things which a regardless and common manner of deportment would extinguish And it s no dishonour to reverent behaviour that it is the use of Hypocrites but rather an honour to it For it is something that is good that the Hypocrite useth for the cloak of his secret emptiness or evil If there were nothing good in reverent behaviour before God it would not serve the Hypocrites turn As it is a commendation to long-prayer that the Pharisees made it their pretence for the devouring of widdows houses And those that call them hypocrites that are much in holy exercises and speeches should consider that if holy exercises and speeches were not good they were not fit for the hypocrites design evil will not be a fit cloak for evil that which the hypocrite thinks necessary to the covering of his sin we must think more necessary to the cure of our sin and the saving of our souls The way to avoid hypocrisie is not by running into impiety and prophaness we must do more then the hypocrite and not less else he will rise up in judgement against you and condemn you if he would do more to seem good then you will do to be good and to please your Maker if a Pharisee will pray longer to colour his oppression then you will do to attain salvation The mischief of hypocrisie is that the soul of Religion is wanting while the corps is present And will you cast away both soul and body both inside and outside in opposition to hypocrisie If others do seem to love God when they do not will you therefore not so much as seem to do it So here about reverence in the service of God The hypocrite should not exceed the sincere in any thing that is truly good This is the manner of Gods service that I perswade you to and to no other And is there any thing of controversie in this Prefer but the spiritual part and know but what that meaneth I will have mercy and not sacrifice that so you may not condemn the innocent and you shall never say that we will be more backward then you to decency and reverent behaviour in Gods service 6. God will be served in Purity and Holiness with cleansed hearts and hands and not with such as remain defiled with the guilt of any wilful sin He abhorreth the sacrifice of the wicked and disobedient He that turneth away his ear from hearing the Law his prayers are abominable Prov. 28. 9. and 15. 8. 21. 27. Isa 1. 13. Eccles 5. 1 2 3 4. To what purpose is the multitude of your Sacrifices unto me saith the Lord to oppressing wicked men Isa 1. 11. When you come to appear before me who hath required this at your hand to tread my Courts Bring no more vain oblations incense is an abomination to me the new Moons and Sabbaths the calling of Assemblies I cannot away with it is iniquity even the solemn meeting c. ver 12 13. And when you spread forth your hands I will hide mine eyes from you yea when you make many prayers I will not hear your hands are full of blood Wash you make you clean put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes cease to do evil learn to do well seek judgement relieve the oppressed judge the fatherless plead for the widdow Come now and let us reason together saith the Lord. To play the glutton or drunkard or filthy fornicator in the day time then to come to God at night as if it were to make him amends by an hypocritical prayer to blaspheme Gods Name and oppose his Kingdom and Government in your selves and others and to do your own will and hate and scorn them that do his will and study his will that they may do it and then to pray that Gods Name may be hallowed his Kingdom come and his Will be done is an abusing God and not a serving or pleasing him Live according to your prayers and let your lives shew as well as your words what it is that you desire This is the service of God that we call you to And can you say that there is any thing controvertible in all this Are there any men of any party among Christians or sober Infidels that dare contradict it 7. God will be served entirely and universally in all his Commands and with all your faculties in works of Piety Justice and Charity which must never be separated You must not pretend your Charity against duties of Piety for God is to