Hell as he thinks preparing for him and yet have calm and quiet thoughts It must needs fill him with horror and confusion it must needs eclipse his Reason and put all his Apprehensions into an inexpressible ferment to see himself so like to perish He can mind nothing else nor think of nothing else but his danger and his misery this always returns this always perplexes and overwhelms him I have met but with one that ever handled this Question and because of his Judgment his Learning and the good report that he has in the Churches of Christ I will give you the substance of his Answer 1. This may be for the good of others Is there not many a lesson that such as are not so afflicted may learn from so sad a Providence May not they learn more to admire the Goodness and the Mercy of God to them that they are not in the like case And it is so far good to the person himself tho he discern it not that he is used as an Instrument to promote the Glory of God 2. It may as he says do him the same good as Death will i. e. deliver him from the evil to come from the beholding of such Sorrows on the Church or on his Friends as would have been a daily torment to him and on which being deprived of the use of his Reason he cannot reflect with so great a grief as otherwise he would have done Or 3. By this means the Wise God may have prevented his falling into many such Sins and Temptations as might have been very hurtful to others and have more defiled his own Soul And who knows but this may be the case of the distracted Person See Mr. Richard Allen 's Godly man's Portion p. 62 63. Thus Reader we have been travelling as through a Wilderness of Fiery Serpents You have as I may so say born me company whilst I have been shewing you how God leads his Children through a Desart and the House of Bondage And I hope it has not been without some profit to some poor Troubled Souls for whose sakes especially I have so long insisted on this Subject In the following Part shall with God's Assistance lead you to the brighter side of the Cloud where you will not meet with things very Doleful but very Pleasant A DISCOURSE Concerning TROUBLE of MIND AND THE DISEASE of MELANCHOLY PART II. PSAL. XXX 5. In his favour is Life CHAP. I. Of the several sorts of Life that we enjoy by God's favour and in what conditions of our present Pilgrimage it doth more especially revive us 1. IN God's favour is our Natural life We are the work of his hands and his kindness and bounty does continually maintain what he at first created his Providence secures us from innumerable dangers he gives us meat and drink and health and strength but his displeasure does quickly deprive us of all these 'T is said of all the creatures Psal 104.28 29. What thou givest them they gather thou openest thy hand they are filled with good Thou hidest thy face they are troubled thou takest away their breath they dye and return to the dust 'T is this great God to whom we owe our peace and plenty our liberties and all the comforts we enjoy he saves our Bodies from Plague and long sickness and pining wasting sorrows all the delight we have in our Friends in our Families or in our Relations flows from his goodness and his meer mercy and 't is he that saves our Houses from Fire our Estates from Robbers and our Country from desolating Wars Ps 30.7 Lord by thy favour thou hast made my mountain to stand strong Man being the noblest creature and the most dignified in all this lower World God has appointed the lower creatures to Minister to his use and his delight The Air as one observes is his Aviary the Sea and Rivers his Fishponds the Vallies his Granary the Mountains his Magazine The first affords Man creatures for nourishment the other Metals for perfection The Animals were created for the support of the Life of Man the Herbs the Dews and Rains for the same purpose there is not the most despicable thing in the whole creation but is endowed with a nature to contribute something for our welfare either as food to nourish us when we are healthful or as Medicine to cure us when we are distempered or as a Garment to cloath us when we are naked and arm us against the cold of the season or as a refreshment when we are weary or as a delight when we are sad all serve for necessity or ornament either to spread our Table beautify our Dwellings furnish our Closets or store our VVardrobes The whole earth is full of his Riches Psal 104.24 2. Spiritual Life is in his favour 'T is he that draws the first lineaments of the new creature and his hand that brings it to perfection he first infuses a vital principle into the soul that is dead in sin and that maintains it afterwards against all the powerful motions of sin and against all the stratagems and tentations of the Devil from his own Grace he did elect his people to Salvation and gives them in time his word and his spirit to quicken them together with all those other blessings of Adoption and Justification and Sanctification which are the product and the fruit of his Electing Love The first quickning and those exercises of Life afterwards which his chosen do perform the first motion and the renewed strength which they receive to enable them to walk in his ways is his own gift 't is his pardon that bestows upon his Servants a new Life when they were dead in Law and could see nothing to ensue but a terrible execution 'T is his favour that contrived the way of our escape from death through the Blood of Christ and that was pleased to accept of the sufferings of that Holy person in our stead That Faith is of his own operation which unites us to his Son the fountain of Life and conveys quickening influences to us Joh. 5.24 He that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not enter into condemnation but is passed from death to life This Faith is of his bestowing which enables us to be moderate in our prosperity and to bear the Cross when we are afflicted All those acts that are the fruit of the New Birth as well as the New birth it self are the work of his own hands for he gives both to will and to do he teaches us to fight against our spiritual enemies and his power being employed for us causes us to get the Victory When we are bewildred his Word is our guide to direct us and when we are fainting we have many great and precious Promises to revive our spirits when we are in darkness and when we are in danger he is both our Sun and Shield his Wind blows upon our Gardens and causes
sentiments of Life and the apprehensions of Death What dryness what hardness comes upon our hearts How little Life or Enlargement or Comfort have we in duty when the Spirit of God is withdrawn from us All our endeavours all our strivings with our selves do not warm our Spirits as he used to do How little delight have we in Prayer And how loth are we to pray And we know how lame and defective our Petitions and Desires are And we are at as great a loss as Job when he said chap. 23.3 4. Oh that I knew where I might find him that I might come even to his seat And v. 8. I go forward but he is not there and backward but I cannot perceive him c. Inf. 8thly and Lastly Hence you see the reason why the Servants of God do so earnestly beg this favour and are so deeply troubled when it is removed It is their life their portion their all Every thing is strangely changed all its Comeliness and Beauty and Glory vanishes when the Life is gone Life is the pleasant thing 't is sweet and comfortable but Death with its pale attendants raises an horror and aversion to it every where The Saints of God dread the removal of his favour and the hidings of his face and when it is hid a faintness and a cold amazement and fear seizes upon every part and they feel strange bitterness and anguish and tribulation which makes their joints to tremble and is to them as the very pangs of death Psal 22.14 15. I am poured out like water and all my hones are out of joint my heart is like wax it is melted in the midst of my bowels my strength is dried up like a potsherd and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws and thou hast brought me into the dust of death Psal 38.2 3 6 8 9 10. And Job 23.8 9. Psal 13.1 3 4. Psal 27.9 Hide not thy face from me put not thy servant away in anger thou hast been my help leave me not neither forsake me O God Psal 69.17 Hide not thy face from thy servant for I am in trouble hear me speedily Psal 4.6 There be many that say Who will shew us any good Lord lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us CHAP. III. Shewing that the Favour of God is diligently to be sought and what is to be done that we may obtain it 1. SEeing in the Favour of God is Life seek it earnestly If I were to bid you to take care of your Lives or your Estates you would quickly think it a needless Request because your own safety and interest would prompt you to it but if we bid you to take care of your Souls there indeed you can hear one Sermon after another one Exhortation after another and still be as secure and careless as before VVe hear many People wishing for other things and very few that are desiring this VVe hear the Poor say Oh that I were rich The Sick Oh that I were well And the Prisoner sighing for his liberty the Trader busily concerned for his gain and the Merchant for good returns but oh how few are there that are saying Oh that I might find grace in the sight of God! Oh that I might be his and he mine Many have their eyes fixed upon the World admiring and doating on it though they daily see how vain it is and how its fashion passes away but oh how few are there whose eyes are fixed on Heaven and whose hearts are panting after the Living God! If I could teach you a way to be the Favourites of the King or of some Powerful or Great Men you would think to derive great Advantages from such a Privilege and quickly strive to get it but here is a greater than they even the King of kings whose Favour is tendred to your acceptance and your choice his Throne is accessible tho his Majesty might confound you yet his Goodness bids you welcome to his presence Seek and you shall find knock and it shall be opened unto you And methinks every Soul here should rejoice even to know that it is possible for him to have God to be his own God That how abject how sinful soever he may have been yet he may be advanced and honour'd by the Lord of glory if he do but return and when he bids us seek his face we should answer Thy face Lord will we seek Psal 27.8 and seek it presently while he may be found lest Sickness and Death and Judgment should prevent us and lest grieved with our delays he should cover himself from us by an Eternal Separation and we should seek him and not find him and because we did not hear his Calls he should shut out all our cryes And laugh when our calamity comes like an armed man Prov. 1.28 If you have no need of him to forgive your Sins to heal your Souls to protect you from danger or to bring you to Salvation then let this Work alone then be unconcerned whether you seek his favour or disesteem it whether he be your Friend or your Enemy but if you have need of God as I am sure you have then pour out your supplications to him for his Grace and say O Lord I have been dead in sin but I know that nothing is impossible to thee Thou openest the Graves and makest even the Dead to live Let my Soul feel thy Almighty power and have a share in the first Resurrection that over me the second Death may not prevail O let me be one of thy Children one of thy blessed Family one whom thou lovest and whom thou wilt love for ever thou hast pardoned many who were once as guilty as I have been O magnify the Riches of thy Grace in blotting out mine Iniquities Thou hast quickned many that were once dead Let me also be quickened by the vital influences of thy Spirit Many Prodigals hast thou received Let me not be thrown off Many hast thou blessed many Blessings hast thou in store Therefore bless me even me also I pray thee O my God 2. Joyn Endeavours to your Prayers and use all the means of grace with conscionable diligence 2 Cor. 5.9 We labour that whether present or absent we may be accepted of him Psal 119.58 Oh do not mock him with a meer form of words but let your affections and your words be joined together be as the Hart that when it pants for the Waterbrooks runs with all the speed it can thither when your Souls are once warmed with a sense of God use all the care you can to maintain the sacred and the comfortable Flame lest by your neglect it be extinguish'd and go out again For a man to wish that he had the favour of God and not to use all his prescribed means is foolish and ineffectual as if a Traveller should sit in a lazy posture without any motion in the Road and yet wish to be at his Journeys end as if a man
the Spices to flow forth he excites and quickens our Graces when they begin to languish and when we are lukewarm and cold he makes us to be lively and fervent in the performance of our holy Duties for as one says what the Soul is to the Body to move it to natural things to breathe to eat to walk and the like the same is the Spirit of God in our Souls to move us to spiritual actions as the fear of God love to him and trust in him and all the works of Righteousness Charity Humility Patience and Sobriety that are the motions of the new creature so that we may say of this Spirit that he is the Soul of our Souls and take away this Spirit and the Soul resembles a dead Body it has no zeal for God no compunction no tenderness When we are disconsolate one kind look from God makes us to be of good chear When our hearts are benumb'd and our Eyes are dry he melts them into tears with his Love When we are unfruitful he sends his Dew upon our branches that makes us to flourish in his Courts and to look fresh and green and when we are under Spiritual decays he causes us to thrive when we backslide he heals our backslidings he brings us through the great Mediator into a nearness to and acquaintance with himself For as far as we are distant from him so far are we removed from true and real Life When we wander he recals us he sends us fresh influences and establishes our goings when our motions are like those of a wounded body very faint and tottering 3. Eternal Life is in his favour Hence it is said That Eternal life is the gift of God Rom. 6.23 Psal 16.11 Thou wilt shew me the path of life in thy presence it fulness of joy at thy right hand are pleasures for evermore It is there that they are said to see God for the sight of his face is that which makes it to be such a glorious and delightful place His Wrath is that which kindles Hell the withholding of his Favour makes it to be such a dark and gloomy Dungeon and the clear manifestation of it does make all the Glories of the Coelestial Paradise And therefore Jacob when he had a Vision of God's Favour to him said This place is no other than the gate of Heaven Gen. 29.17 Frame not to your selves a gross and a material Happiness 't is all in the Love and Favour of God To see him fills all the Souls above with ineffable delight to be deprived of this blessed privilege fills all the Souls in misery with Mourning and Lamentation To his Saints God will be all in all his Communications will be entire and full there Lettres de Monsieur Claude p. 10. †As the Creatures are of divers orders every one receives its portion of Divine Favour different from that of others He communicates himself otherwise to the Heavens than to the Earth otherwise to an Angel than to a Man The Earth hath an Image of his firmness the Sun hath an image of his beauty the Heaven an image of his immensity and so in others but there is no Creature that has assembled in it self all the beams of the Communications of God It shall be otherwise in Paradise God shall be all things in the Saints and they shall be filled with his Favour And as he further says God is not so all in all in the Faithful here the troubles of our Conscience the weakness of our Faith the languors of our Devotion the shadows of our Knowledge our Sins our Miseries our Sickness and our Death are the fruits of the Fall and of the Malice of the Devil But in that Felicity there shall be nothing of US in us nothing of the Impression of the Devil All shall be of God our Shadows shall be swallowed up by his Light and our Weakness by his power It is a state of Glory and Glory is a mixture of all the Blessings of God in a degree Sovereignly perfect That Country that is above is indeed the Land of the Living they Live and shall never Dye But this Earth is a Region and a place of Death For beside that which is Natural the most part of men are dead in Sin and truly even those that are alive have but a weak and a fainting Life There it is that that the Saints shall be admirers of the Grace and Favour of God That after various difficulties and innumerable temptations and overwhelming fears did at last bring them to that happy Place For the poor trembling Saint that thought himself cast off and forsaken of God to find himself in his Arms in his Presence in his Heaven how great will his joy and praise be How will he ascribe all his life there to the meer Favour and Grace of God that shall set him at liberty when by his many Sins he had deserved to be bound in Eternal Chains That shall cause him to sing Hallelujahs when others weep and wail for ever How will he admire that Grace that has placed him in Heaven when so many others are in Hell And the more admire when he shall consider that this distinction of States was freely made That that Crown which will adorn his Head was freely given How will every look on God fill his Soul with a wondring Joy because he freely gave his Son How will every view of Christ encrease his wonder When he shall consider that he freely undertook the kind work of his Redemption that he freely shed his Blood and paid the debt which the Sinner himself could never pay and that he freely gave the Spirit and offered that Salvation upon easy terms without money and without price which cost him very dear All the Saints above will continually adore the Riches of his Grace that admitted them to Glory when they deserved to be shut out as well as others That they were deformed till he put his comeliness upon them That they were liable to Death till he justified them and polluted in their Natures till he renewed them and dying till he made them to live That they learned nothing but what he taught them had nothing but what he gave them did nothing but what he enabled them to do So that all must be wonderful in their Eyes from the beginning of God's design for their Salvation to the conclusion of it And when it is all finished they must with loud Praises sing Grace Grace By Grace ye are saved through faith and that not of your selves it is the Gift of God Eph. 2.8 First No common Mercy yields any Comfort without the Favour and Love of God His loving-kindness is better than life Psal 63.3 If a man have all that he can wish every thing that is splendid and delightful every thing that may please his Eye or gratify his Appetite if he have not this with the Love of God he is a Miserable man For this will mingle