his soul And now Sirs I must let go this subject as to you that have heard it preacht for we must not be always on one thing but I am exceedingly afraid lest I have lost my labour with most of you and shall leave you as selfish as I found you because sad experience tells me that it is so natural and obstinate an enemy that I have discovered and that you have now to set your selves against I have done my work but self hath not done but is still at work in you I cannot now go home with every one of you but self will go home with you I cannot be at hand with every one of you when the next temptation comes but self will be at hand to draw you to entertain it When you are next tempted to error to pride to lust to contention with your brethren by words or real injuries what will you do then and how will you stand against this enemy If God be not your Interest and the dearest to your souls and you see not with his light and will not by his Will and self-denial be not become as it were your nature you will never stand after all this that I have said but self will be your undoing for ever If you have not somewhat within you as selfishness is within you to be always at hand as it is and ready and constant and powerful to overcome it it will be your ruine after all the warnings that have been given you And this preserving Principle must be the Spirit of God by causing you to Deny your selves Believe in Christ and Love God above all I say again that you may think on it and live upon it The sum of all your Religion or saving grace is in these three Faith Self-denial and the Love of God Departing from Carnal-self Returning home to God by Love and this by faith in the Redeemer is the true Christianity and the Life that leadeth to everlasting life FINIS A DIALOGUE OF Self-denial Flesh Spirit Flesh WHat become Nothing ne're perswade me to it God made me Something and I 'le not undo it Spirit Thy Something is not thine but his that gave it Resign it to him if thou mean to save it Flesh God gave me Life and shall I choose to die Before my time or pine in miserie Spirit God is thy Life If then thou fearest death Let him be all thy soul thy pulse and breath Flesh What! must I hate my self when as my brother Must love me d I may not hate another Spirit Loath what is loathsom Love God in the rest He truly love's himself that love 's God best Flesh Doth God our ease and pleasure to us grudge Or doth Religion make a man a drudge Spirit That is thy Poyson which thou callest Pleasure And that thy drudgery which thou count'st thy treasure lFesh Who can eudure to be thus mewed up And under Laws for every bit and cup Spirit Gods Cage is better than the Wilderness When Winter comes Liberty brings distress Flesh Pleasure 's mans Happiness The Will 's not free To choose our misery This cannot be Spirit God is mans End with him are highest joyes Sensual pleasures are but dreams and toyes Should sin seem sweet Is Satan turn'd thy friend Will not thy sweet prove bitter in the end Hast thou found sweeter pleasures than Gods Love Is a fools laughter like the joyes above Beauty surpasseth all deceitful paints What 's empty mirth to the delights of Saints God would not have thee have less joy but more And therefore shew's thee the eternal store Flesh Who can love baseness poverty and want And under pining sickness be content Spirit He that hath laid his treasure up above And plac'd his portion only in Gods love That waits for Glory when his life is done This man will be content with God alone Flesh What good will sorrow do us Is not mirth Fitter to warm a cold heart here on earth Troubles will come whether we will or no I 'le never banish pleasure and choose wo. Spirit Then choose not sin touch not forbidden things Taste not the sweet that endless sorrow brings If thou love pleasure take in God thy fill Look not for lasting joyes in doing ill Flesh Affliction 's bitter life will soon be done Pleasure shall be my part ere all be gone Spirit Prosperity is barren all men say The soyl is best where there 's the deepest way Life is for work and not to spend in play Now sow thy seed labour while it is day The Huntsman seeks his game in barren plains Dirty land answers best the Plowmans pains Passengers care not so the way be fair Husbandmen would have the best ground and air First think what 's safe and fruitful There 's no pleasure Like the beholding of thy chiefest treasure Flesh Nature made me a man and gave me sonse Changing of Nature is a vain pretense It taught me to love women honour ease And every thing that doth my senses please Spirit Nature hath made thee Rational and Reason Must rule the sense in ends degrees and season Reason's the Rider sense is but the Horse Which then is fittest to direct thy course Give up the reins and thou becom'st a beast Thy fall at death will sadly end thy feast Flesh Religion is a dull and heavy thing Whereas a merry cup will make me sing Love's entertainments warm both heart and brain And wind my fancy to the highest strain Spirit Cupid hath stuck a feather in thy cap And lull'd thee dead asleep on Venus's lap Thy brains are tipled with some wantons eyes Thy Reason is become Lust's sacrifice Playing a game at Folly thou hast lost Thy wit and soul and winnest to thy cost Thy soul now in a filthy channel lies While fancy seems to sore above the skies Beauty will soon be stinking loathsome earth Sickness and death mar all the wantons mirth It is not all the pleasure thou canst find Will contervail the sting that 's left behind Blind brutish souls that cannot love their God! And yet can dote on a defiled clod Flesh Why should I think of what will be to morrow An ounce of mirth is worth a pound of sorrow Spirit But where 's that mirth when sorrows overtake thee Will it then hold when life and God forsake thee Forgetting Death or Hell will not prevent it Now lose thy day thou 'lt then too late repent it Flesh Must I be pain'd and wronged and not feel As if my heart were made of flint or steel Spirit Dost thou delight to feel thy hurt and smart Would not an Antidote preserve thy heart Impatience is but Self-tormenting folly Patience is cordial easie sweet and holy Is not that better which turns grief to peace Than that which doth thy misery encrease Flesh When sport and wine and beauty do invite Who is it whom such baits will not incite Spirit He that perceives the look and sees the end Whither it is that
that use it not for the fashion of this world passeth away 1 Cor. 7. 29 30 31. And when the soul of the worldly fool is required of him then whose shall all their Dignities and Honours and Riches be In the mean time God judgeth not by outward appearance as man judgeth nor honoureth any for being honoured of men Solus honor merito qui datur ille datur These Truths well known to you I thought meet here to set before your eyes not knowing whether I shall any more converse with you in the flesh and also to desire you seriously to read over these popular Sermons perswaded to the Press by the importunity of some faithful Brethren that love a mean Discourse on so necessary a subject Watch and pray that you enter not into temptation I rest Your Friend Richard Baxter Sept 12. 1659. THE PRFFACE Readers I Here present to your serious consideration a Subject of such Necessity and Consequence that the Peace and safety of Churches Nations Families and souls do lie upon it The Eternal God was the Beginning and the End the Interest the attractive the confidence the desire the delight the All of man in his upright uncorrupted State Though the Creator planted in mans Nature the principle of Natural Self-love as the spring of his endeavours for Self-preservation and a notable part of the engine by which he governeth the world yet were the parts subservient to the Whole and the whole to God And Self-love did subserve the Love of the Universe and of God and man desired his own Preservation for these higher Ends. When sia stept in it broke this order and taking advantage from the natural innocent principle of Self-love it turned man from the Love of God and much abated his Love to his neighbour and the publick good and turned him to Himself by an inordinate self-love which terminateth in himself and principally in his Carnal-self instead of God and the Common good so that Self is become All to Corrupted nature as God was All to Nature in its integrity Selfishness is the souls Idolatry and Adultery the sum of its Original and increased Pravity the Beginning and End the life and strength of actual sin even as the Love of God is the Rectitude and Fidelity of the soul and the sum of all our special Grace and the Heart of the new Creature and the life and strength of actual holiness Selfishness in one word expresseth all our Aversion Positively as the want of the Love of God expresseth it Privatively and all our sin is summarily in these two Even as all our Holiness is summarily in the Love of God and in self-denial It is the work of the Holy Ghost by sanctifying grace to bring off the soul again from Self to God Self-denial therefore is half the essence of Sanctification No man hath any more Holiness than he hath Self-denial And therefore the Law which the Sanctifying Spirit writeth on the heart doth set up God in the first Table and our neighbour in the second against the usurpation and encroachment of this Self It saith nothing of Love or Duty to our selves as such expresly In seeking the Honour and Pleasing of God and the Good of our neighbour we shall most certainly find our own Felicity which nature teacheth us to desire So that all the Law is Fulfilled in Love which includeth Self-denial as Light includeth the expulsion of darkness oâ— rather as Loyalty includeth a Cessation of Rebellion and a rejection of the Leaders of it and as conjugal fidelity includeth the rejection of Harlots The very meaning of the first Commandment is Thou shalt Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart c. which is the sum of the first Table and the Commandment that animateth all the rest The very meaning of the last Commandment is Thou shalt Love thy neighbour as thy self which is the summary of the second Table and in General forbiddeth all particular injuries to others not enumerated in the fore-going precepts and secondarily animateth the four antecedent precepts The fifth Commandment looking to both Tables and conjoyning them commandeth us to Honour our Superiours in Authority both as they are the Officers of God and so paticipatively Divine and as they are the Heads of humane Societies and our subjection necessary to Common good so that self-denial is principally required in the first Commandment that is The denying of self as opposite to God and his Interest And self-denial is required in the Last Commandment that is The denying of self as it is an enemy to our neighbours Right and welfare and would draw from him unto our selves Self-love and self-seeking as opposite to our neighbours good is the thing forbidden in that Commandment and Charity or Loving our neighbour as our selves and desiring his Welfare as our own is the thing commanded Self-denial is required in the fifth Commandment in a double respect according to the double respect of the Commandment 1. In respect to God whose Governing Authority is exercised by Governours their Power being a beam of his Majesty the fifth Commandment requireth us to deny our selves by due subjection and by honouring our Superiours that is to deny our own aspiring desires and our refractory minds and disobedient self-willedness and to take heed that we suffer not within us any proud or rebellious dispositions or thoughts that would lift us up above our Rulers or exempt us from subjection to them 2. In respect to humane Societies for whose Good Authority and Government is appointed the fifth Commandment obligeth us to deny our Private interest and in all competitions to prefer the publick good and maketh a promise of temporal peace and welfare in a special manner to those that in obedience to this Law do prefer the Honour of Government and the Publick Peace and welfare before their Own Thus Charity as opposed to selfishness and including self-denial is the very sum and fulfilling of the Law And selfishness is the radical comprehensive sin containing uncharitableness which breaks it all And as the Law so also the Redeemer in his Example and his Doctrine doth teach us and that more plainly and urgently this lesson of self-denial The life of Christ is the pattern which the Church must labour to imitate And Love and self-denial were the summary of his life Though yet he had no sinful self to deny but only natural self He denyed himself in avoiding sin but we must deny our selves in returning from it He loved not his Life in comparison of his love to his Father and to his Church He appeared without desirable form or comeliness He was despised and rejected of men a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief he bore our griefs and carryed our sorrows and was esteemed stricken smitten of God and afflicted he was wounded for our transgressions he was bruised for our iniquities the chastisement of our peace was laid upon him the Lord laid upon him the iniquity of
How shall he cloath you with his righteousness while self keeps on your own defiled rotten rags Down therefore with self that Christ may be exalted Away with your own conceited righteousness that he may be your righteousness down with your Selfish foolish wisdom that the supposed foolishness of God may be your wisdom Level this mountain which Satan hath built up in enmity against the holy mountain of the Lord. 5. Moreover Self must be denyed as it is the great resister of the Holy Ghost The sanctifying spirit hath no greater enemy at least except the Devil himself One half of the work of sanctification is to destroy this Carnal self And therefore no wonder if hence it find the chief resistance Not an holy motion can be made to the soul but self is against it No work hath the spirit to do upon us but self is ready to gainsay it and contradict it and work against it when ever therefore this mortal Principle is contending against the spirit of God dishonouring holiness disswading you from duty perswading you to sin down with it and deny it as you would be true to the spirit and your selves 6. Moreover self must be denyed as it traiterously complyeth with the enemies of Christ and your own salvation when it takes part with Satan and pleads for sin and saith as wicked men say and entreth a conspiracy with all that would undo you and all this under pretence of your own good When ever it speaks for sin you may be sure it speaks against God and you and therefore it 's reason you should deny it Self also must be denied when it riseth up against the supposed tediousness or difficulty of duty when it grudgeth at an holy life saith What a stir is here what a weary life is this what do I get by serving God Now self is playing the traitor against God and you and therefore deny it 7. Moreover when self doth rise up against sufferings and make you believe that they are intolerable and that it is unreasonable for a man to forsake all that he hath for fear of a sinful word or deed when we sin every day when we have done our best it 's time now to stop the mouth of self for it plays the Devils game against God and you and would perswade you to prefer a short uncertain miserable life before eternal life and to give up your self to wilful sin because God beareth with the sins of mens infirmity It 's reason that you should deny so unreasonable an enemy to God you 8. Moreover self must be denyed when it stands up against the Ordinances of God When it pleadeth against the arguments of the word and findeth fault with the Law that it should obey and quarrelleth with prayer and all holy duties and would make all instituted means uneffectual for your saving good it 's time now that you deny it 9. When self doth rise up against the Officers of Christ and would make you believe your teachers fools and you are wise that they are beside the truth and you are in the right or that they speak against you out of malice or singularity or some such distemper and so would deprive you of the saving benefit of their Doctrine and Office it 's time now to deny self if you know but what belongeth to your peace And though I grant that you must not follow a Teacher into a certain sin and error yet when it is not God but self that riseth up against your Teachers and possesseth you with a spirit of bitterness disobedience contradiction and malignity this self must be denyed 10. Lastly as self is against the good of our neighbour or humane Societies it must be denyed For we must love our Neighbour as our selves that is both self and neighbour must be loved in a due subordination to God as means to his Glory and in this notion of a means the Love should be equal though there is also a Natural Love in order to self-preservation put into us by the Creator which our Love to every Neighbour is not to equal in degree yet our love to Societies should exceed it and our Love to a Neighbour should come so near it that we should diligere proximum proxima delictione love him as a second self and so study his welfare as to promote it to our power and not to covet or draw from him for our selves nor do him any wrong This is the sense of the tenth Commandement and sum of the second Table CHAP. XIII 1. Selfish Dispositions must be denyed and 1. Self-love HAving seen in what respects and upon what accounts it is that self must be denyed I am next to tell you the particulars of that selfish interest that must be denyed and the parts that are contained in this needful work And here you must remember what saving faith is that seeing how self opposeth it you may know wherein it must be denyed Saving faith is such a Belief in Christ for Reconciliation with God and the everlasting fruition of him in Glory as makes us for sake all the things of this world and give up our selves to the conduct of the word and spirit for the obtaining of it When a man can strip himself of all the pleasures and profits and honours of this world first in his estimation and love and resolution and then in the actual forsaking of them at the Call of God because of the firm belief and hope that he hath of the fruition of God in Glory as purchased and promised by Jesus Christ this is a Christian a Disciple of Christ a true believer and none but this And as I have told you as God in Unity and Father Son and Holy Ghost in Trinity is the Object of our saving faith so Carnal Self in unity and Pleasure Profits and Honours in trinity must be renounced and denied by all true Christians as being that which we turn from when we turn to God So that in brief to deny your selves doth generally consist in denying all your own Dispositions and Interests whatsoever as they are against God the Father Son or Spirit or stand not in a due subserviency to him And this Interest which you must deny consisteth in your Pleasures Profits and Honour Of these therefore I shall speak distinctly though but briefly I. You must begin at the denial and mortification of your Corrupt and selfish Disposition or else you can never well deny your selfish interest It is not enough to keep under this selfishness by denying it somewhat that it would have but the selfish Inclination or Nature it self must be so far mortified and destroyed that it shall not reign as formerly it did For this which we call selfishness is not your very Persons nor any spiritual or right natural desire of your owngood But it is the inordinate adhering of the soul to your selves by departing from God to whom you should adhere and so a carrying over Gods
sometime all is comprehended in the term world and selfishness in the word flesh the world being that harlot with which the flesh commits adultery So 1 Joh. 2. 15 16. Love not the world nor the things that are in the world If any man Love the world the Love of the Father is not in him For all that is in the world the Lust of the flesh the Lust of the eyes and the Pride of Life is not of the Father but is of the world and the world passeth away and the Lust thereof but he that doth th will of God abideth for ever To these three heads therefore we shall reduce all that we have to say of this matter I. The selfish fleshy Pleasure that must be denied consisteth in these particulars following which I shall but briefly touch because they are so many 1. One Principal part of Sensuality or Self-interest consisteth in meats and drinks to please the Appetite So far as these are taken to fit us for Gods service and used to his Glory so far they are sanctified as before was said but when they are meerly to please the appetite they are offered to an enemy and are the fuel of lust Do you see any thing that your Appetite desireth whether meats or drinks whether for quality or quantity Take it not touch it not meerly upon that account but enquire whether it tend to the strengthning and fitting your bodies or minds for the service of God and if so take it if not let alone If your appetite had rather have Wine than Beer or strong Beer than small take it not meerly upon that account If your appetite would fain have one cup more when nature hath as much as is profitable deny that appetite If your appetite would fain be tasting of any thing that is not for your health deny that appetite If it would fain have one bit more when you have as much before as is wholesom or useful to you deny that appetite Or else you are guilty of flesh pleasing and plain Gluttony Quest But is it not lawful at a feast to taste of another dish or eat another bit when I think that nature needs no more what perplexities then will you cast men into to know just how many morsels they may eat Answ It is gluttony and no beter to take the creatures of God in vain and sacrifice them to a devouring throat which should be used only for his service That which is a mans ultimate end is his God What would you have plainer than express words of Scripture that tell you that whether you eat or drink it must be all to the glory of God 1 Cor. 10. 31. and that the fleshly do make their bellies their Gods Phil. 3. 18. And therefore when you have taken as much as suiteth with your end the service and glory of God you must not take more for another end the pleasing of your fleshly desires But for the scruples that you mention about the just proportion we need not be disquieted with them For God hath given us sufficient means to direct us to know what is for our good and what is superfluous and it is our duty in an even and constant way to use our Reason and keep as near the due proportion as we can and when we know that this is our desire and endeavour it were a sin against God to trouble our selves with continual or causless scruples or fears lest we do exceed or miss the rule For what can we do more than go according to the best skill we have and if for want of skill we should a little mistake it is pardoned with the rest of our daily infirmities and to trouble and distract our selves with causeless fears would more unfit us for Gods service than some degree of mistake in the proportion would do and so would be as great a sin as that which we feared And therefore our way is quietly and comfortably without distracting fears or scruples to do our best and use our prudence with self-denial and remember that we have to do with a Father that knows the flesh is weak when the spirit is willing But yet wilfully to cast away one cup or one morsel on the pleasing of our appetites when it no way fits us for the service of God and will do us no other good this is not self-denial but sensuality Quest But nature knows best what 's good for it self and therefore that which it desireth is to be judged best A Beast liveth as healthfully as a man that obeyeth his appetite only Is it not lawful to take either meat or drink on this account that the Appetite is pleased with it Answ 1. Some Beasts would presently kill themselves in pleasing their appetites if man that is Rational did not rule restrain and moderate them A Swine will burst himself with whey in half an hour A Beast in new after-grass will surfeit if he be suffered No Beast knows poyson from food but would soon perish by it in obeying his appetite 2. And yet as a Bâ—â—st hath no Reason so he is better provided to live without Reason than man is His appetite is not so corrupted by sin as ours is Original sin hath depraved and enraged our appetites And if man had not more use for his reason than a Beast even in ordering his natural actions God would not have given him reason to rule his appetite and commanded him to use it herein And who knows not that if a man did follow his appetite alone as Beasts do he were like to murder himself the next day or week or at least in a very little space The appetite would presently carry us to that for quality or quantity or both that would cast us into mortal diseases and soon make an end of us And in those diseases the pleasing it usually would be certain death And indeed this is a beastly doctrine that man that hath reason to rule his sensual inclinations should lay it by and please his appetite without it like a brute what more do all Gluttons Drunkards and Whoremongers but follow ther fleshly desires And if the desires of the flesh might be followed who would not be such as they in some measure That which is no sin in a Beast is a hainous sin in a man because man hath reason to rule his appetite and a Beast hath none and therefore is not capable of sin And for the body it 's certain that most of the diseases in the world are bred and fed by the pleasing of the appetite and I think that there 's few that are laid in their graves but this was the cause of it though the ignorant know it not and the sensual are loth to believe it And for the question whether we may not take any meat or drink purposely to please the appetite I answer yes as a means to fit us for duty but not as your chief end 1. Sometimes especially in weak bodies the
Officer trouble them and no neighbour accuse them this is their Liberty To game and roar and revel and have no body say to them Why do you so is part of their Liberty To have leave without Restraint to make all others as bad as themselves and if they are Infidels or Hereticks to perswade other men to it If they hold any opinion against the God that made them against Christ against the Spirit of God against the Word and Laws of God against his Ministers his Church his Ordinances against any necessary point of Faith or if they have any false conceit that leads straight to Hell that they may have full power license and authority to bring as many as they can to be of the same mind that they may not be unprofitable servants to the Devil nor go to Hell alone this is a great part of their impious Liberty And because the name of Conscience is become honourable they call this by the name of Liberty of Conscience when indeed it is Liberty of Practice that they mean and not Liberty of Conscience For their Conscience cannot be altered by force nor touched by the Sword It 's they that deprive men of the Liberty of their Consciences whilst by false teaching they put out the eye of conscience enslave it to sinful false conceits And Conscience is science and Error is not science but ignorance And therefore as Error is not Conscience but the destruction of Conscience so Liberty to error is no Liberty of Conscience but a Liberty to destroy Conscience Much less is it Liberty of Conscience to sin against God and draw others from Conscience into error and poyson mens souls and hinder the Gospel and promote the work and Kingdom of the Devil And many of our miserable sottish people take it for a part of their desired Liberty to be free from Ministers Spiritual Oversight and Government not to be Carechised or called to an account or examined about the state of their souls nor questioned about their lives but that they may do what they will and have Sacraments and all Ordinances on what terms and in what manner they will and to have Ministers bow their Judgments to theirs and lay their Consciences at the feet of every carnal ignorant wretch and be but their servants to do what they would have them this is the Liberty that Satans servants do desire And withall that they may be free from necessary payments for the safety of the Commonwealth and from the necessary retribution to God for the Church and poor yea from giving but the Ministers their own all this they take for part of their liberty But they are all such liberties as Christ never purchased and the Gospel never bestowed and never made the Owners happy It is a liberty to starve their own souls and go quietly to everlasting torment and not be molested by Preachers and Puritans but to sin against God and damn themselves and be let alone and have no body tell them of it or ask them Why will you do so In a word it is that liberty that Christ died to save his people from and which the Gospel would take down and the spirit ministry and Ordinances would overthrow and which no wise or good man hath reason to desire it is that liberty which God will save all those from whom he will save from the flames of hell III. The third sort of Liberty is that which is in it self Indifferent or to be reckoned among the common transitory benefits of this life which with Gods blessing is a mercy and well used may do good but otherwise is hurtful or little worth This Liberty is not the Natural Liberty of the will which in regard of its own elicite Acts is nothing but the power of self-determination and in regard of internal imperate acts is nothing but a power or freedom to do what we will For these are so our own if not our selves that no man can take them from us at least the first Nor is it the Ethical Liberty of the soul from sin by gracious Habits for this is ever good as was said before Nor is it a Political Liberty from those tyrannous Laws or practices of men that would root out the Gospel and pull down the Kingdom of Christ and set up iniquity This Liberty must be desired and not denied even when we submit our selves to persecution but it is 1. The Civil Liberty of being from under the Government of others and of having a hand in Government our selves 2. The Liberty of being from under the Government of Strangers Conquerors or enemies 3. The Liberty of choosing our own Governors and having them not by other mens election set over us 4. A Liberty from burdensom payments taxes which are of no necessity to our good 5. A liberty from arbitrary Government and from being liable to the meer will and passions of men 6. A protection from the abuses and injuries of others 7. And a liberty for o foolish conceits that makes imprisonment so grievous to the most It is the same earth that they tread on and the same air that they breath in as before The great trouble is that they have not their wills for when their own wills do as much confine them it is then no trouble I can confine my self to one room to one chair the far greatest part of the year for my studies and why should I not bear as well to be so confined by another if my own will could but comply with it Never grudge at restraint or imprisonment then but find out some imployment in it whereby you may be serviceable to God or at least serve him by your sufferings and then rejoyce in it and bring your minds to your condition and so you may set your selves at liberty in spite of the greatest Tyrant in the world Imprisonment is but a penal restraint and if it be not Involuntary it 's scarcely penal it is therefore in your power whether you will be Prisoners or not because it is in your power whether it shall be involuntary or not Be but willing of your confinement and you are at liberty and though you are not out of the place you are out of the prison The same room that is a prison to the rest is none to the keper that guards them because apprehending it to be for his commodity he is willing of it and their prison is his home And if you do but apprehend how you are called from temptations and have an opportunity of honouring God or at least of being more humbled and mortified and so bring your mind to consent to your habitation it 's become your home and place of freedom however he is unworthy of the liberty of the Saints that cannot deny the liberty of his habitation or bodily abode for the attaining of it And for thethings that men make such a stir about in the world under the name of their â—â—â—il liberties
the more you should desire to be there where there is no strangeness This is not the time or place of most intimate acquaintance If you would be acquainted you should draw nearer and not draw back It 's death that must open you the door into that presence where strangeness will be no more And if it be the doubts of your interest in Christ and life that makes you shrink and loth to die Consider that to refuse to die for Christ is the way above all to increase those doubts but to give up your lives for him or chearfully to surrender your souls to him at his call is the readiest surest way in the world to prove you at present in a state of grace besides that you will be hastened into a state of glory where you shall be quickly and fully past all doubts of your state of former grace In a word as all the fears and sorrows of this life will then be at an end so with the rest will our fears of death And therefore death should be the more welcome because it is the end as of all other troubles so of these disturbing fears 14. Consider also what a multitude have trod this bloody way before you Almost all that ever were born have died and are now in the world that you are passing to You are not the first that entred at this narrow gate The dearest Saints of God have died If Abraham Moses Joshua David Peter and Paul could not escape the stroak of death what are you that you should murmur to follow such and so many that have gone before you You need not fear being solitary in heaven There are millions and millions more of Saints than there are on earth Many that you knew and millions more that will then be as dear to you as if you had known them Is it not better be among innocent souls than a defiled guilty world Is it not better be where no sin entreth and never a hâ—st or passion comes than to live as among Wild beasts with furious unreasonable sinners Is it not better be where Light is perfect and all your doubts are fully resolved than in darkness and perplexity and among an ignorant blind generation that are enemies to the light which you desire Is it not better be where is nothing but the perfect love of the Infinite God in perfect Saints and blessed Angels than to live among perverse ungodly men that make you almost weary of your lives If it be a delight to us to read the writings of the illuminated Saints of God and we think them such Jewels and Ornaments in our Libraries what a pleasure would it be to converse with them that wrote these Books and that in their celestial perfection where they have attained a thousand times more light than before they had and where all the doubts are resolved which their books could not resolve O blessed Society in comparison of that we now converse with 15. Nay more lest the bloody way of death should seem too strange and terrible to us the Lord Jesus our Head hath trod that path and that of purpose to conquer death by taking away the sting and principal cause of terrors and making that a passage to felicity that was a passage to everlasting misery So that ever since Christ hath gone this way there is no such danger in it to his followers Where the Captain of our salvation goeth his Souldiers may boldly follow him For asmuch as the children were partakers of flesh and blood he also himself likewise took part with them that he might destroy by death him that had the power of death that is the Devil and might deliver them that through fear of death were all their life time subject to bondage Heb. 2. 14 15. He hath cleared our way and taken out of it the forest thorns and hath prepared us an habitation with himself And shall we fear to go the way that Christ hath gone and purposely gone to clear it for us 16. Moreover Consider that the Celestial inhabitants have purposely made themselves familiar with us in this lower world that they might acquaint us with themselves and lead us upto their blessed habitation and fit us for it No man of common reason can doubt but that those more capacious glorious parts of the Universe are stored with inhabitants answerable to their glory when we see every corner of the lower world to be replenished with inhabitants And Scripture and some experience tells us that those Angels of God are conversant here about us men They bear us up in their hands that we dash not our foot against a stone they pitch their tents and encamp about us as an appointed guard for our security It is their very office for what are they but ministring spirits sent forth to minister for them that shall be heirs of salvation Heb. 1. 14. They converse with us though we see them not and are about us night and day They are among us in our holy assemblies observing our behaviour before the Lord 1 Cor. 11. 10. and they are witnesses of our good and evil Eccles 5. 6. From them as the Servants of God was the Law received Acts 7. 53. Gal. 3. 19. Heb. 2. 2. They read our books and study with us the Mysteries of the Gospel 1 Pet. 1. 12. And as near as they are to God they are glad to make the Church their book in which to read his manifold wisdom and know it by beholding it in us as in a glass Ephes 3. 10. The Nations have their Angels The Churches have their Angels and the particular Saints also have their Angels Dan. 10. 13 20 21 Rev. 1. 20. Acts 12. 15. Mat. 18. 10. They are not strangers with us but have charge of us to keep us in all our ways Psal 91. 10 11 12. They rejoyce in our conversion Luke 15. 10. They are part of the heavenly Society that we are already listed in Heb. 12. 22. They ascend and descend as ordinary passengers between heaven and earth Gen. 28. 12. They are round about us and we live as in their Camp Psal 34. 7. Before them we must be confessed or denied Luke 12. 8 9. They convoy our departed souls to Christ Luke 16. 22. They shall attend Christ at his second coming as they prcolaimed his first and attended him on earth Matth. 25. 31. Mar. 8. 38. They shall be his Heralds to call up the dead to judgement Mat. 13. 39 49. 24. 31. And at last we shall be their companions and equal to them Luke 20. 36. So that you see we have the same Society invisible which we shall have in heaven Yea and sometime when God is pleased they manifest their presence by visible or audible apparitions And shall we fear to remove into the presence of these blessed spirits that now attend us and are still about us and the instruments of so much of our good Yea the Lord Jesus Christ came
or within them as to see that which may take them down from being proud of any comeliness of the flesh One would think this should be so easie a part of self-denial as any graceless one might reach by a little use of the Reason that is left them CHAP. XLV Strength and Valour to be denied 5. ANother piece of Vain-glory to be Denied is in the Reputation of strength and valour The witless part of men especially in their procacious humours do use to be carried away with this as witless women with the former Hence commonly are their matches of Running and Wrestling and many exercises of activity and strength yea and hence commonly are their duels and murders It seems such a dishonourable thing to them to be thought a Coward or unable to defend themselves and to be crow'd over by their enemy that they will venture body and soul upon it rather than they will put up such indignities or lie under the dishonour of being Cowards Yea and would one think it some Jesuits are such Carnal Doctors that they teâ—ch men that if they be challenged and their honour lie upon it they may meet the challenger there in a defensive posture and fight with him to defend their honour yea and in many other cases they may kill another for their Honour seeing their honour is more to them than their lives O miserable Teachers and miserable souls that do obey them Christ hath taught you another lesson even to despise the shame Heb. 12. 2 3. â—nd to humble your selves intimateth that such cannot be believers which receive honour of one another and seek not the honour that cometh from God only Joh. 5. 44. It 's more Honor to obey God in suffering than be so valiant as to murder another man The day is near when he will appear the Honourable man that was likest to Jesus Christ that when he was reviled reviled not again when he suffered he threatned not but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously 1 Pet. 2. 23. Blind sinners do you think it more honourable to do hurt than to suffer hurt yea to be like the Devil who is a murderer than to Christ that was a sufferer and came not to destroy mens lives but to save them and lay down his own Can any thing be more Honourable than to be the children of the heavenly Father and if you be such you must Love your enemies bless them that curse you do good to them that hate you and pray for them that despightfully use you and persecute you Mat. 5. 44. What a Case are those mens understandings in that think it their Honour to revenge themselves when God hath so forbidden it Rom. 12. 19. CHAP. XLVI Wisdom and Learning to be denied 6. ANother piece of Vain-glory to be denied is in the Reputation of Wisdom and Learning The things themselves are very excellent and to be desired and much sought after but not for our own Honour but the Service and Honour of the Lord. And the greater is the worth of the thing the greater is the temptation to vain-glory in them that have it and the harder it is to deny themselves herein This part of self-denial consisteth not in a contempt of Learning or Wisdom nor a neglect of it for this were a sin but in a neglect of self that would make an advantage of it for its own carnal exaltation and in a contempt of the Honour and vain-glory which may redound by it to our selves further than such honour is serviceable to God O how sinful and miserable a liâ—e do abundance of Learned men live in the world Their whole life is but one continued vice and that a sin of a most hainous nature even the exercise of Pride and Self-seeking when yet they take themselves for Saints because they are not such as are accounted scandalous sinners in the world They sacrifice their precious time and studies to their Pride Phansies and not to God Too many hours and years are spent to gain the Reputation of being Learned men Too many disputations are managed yea odious sacriledge too many Sermons are preached and too many learned Books are written to gain the Reputation of being Learned men Ah miserable low unworthy studies Prophane Sermons ungodly labours and poor reward O how it netleth some Proud spirits if they hear that they are taken to be no Scholars And how many take their University Degrees to be meerly the wings of this part of their vain-glory Learning and Degrees and the Reputation of it are all good if they be valued and used but for God But they are so much the worse when they are sacrificed to self and and made the food and fuel of Pride Learn therefore this part of self-denial CHAP. XLVII Reputation of Gifts and spiritual Abilities c. 7. ANother piece of vain-glory to be denied is The Reputation of our Gifts and spiritual Abilities I mean such as Praying and Preaching and Disputing and good Conference to have readiness for words and liveliness of expression and exactness of method to be esteemed in all these a very able man by others is an high part of self-interest to be denied The duties themselves must be denied by none for they are the service of God commanded us by his word But it is the Honour that self presumeth to hunt after in these holy things And it is a double sin here to seek our selves when we are specially commanded to seek God! and where the work is instituted for that end and when we pretend to seek God and to deny our selves The greater are our abilities to do God service the more resolutely and thankfully we should improve them in his service But we must remember that they are given us to save others by our improvement and not to destroy our selves by our Pride Get as great abilities as you can and when you have them thank God for them and use them for him to the uttermost of your Power but take heed lest Pride should sacrifice them to your selves and pervert them from your Masters service The persons that have most need of this advice are especially these following 1. Young unexperienced Professors that are but lately turned to a Profession of a Godly life that have so much illumination as sheweth them much that before they knew not and raiseth them above the vulgar measure but yet hath made them but smatterers and half-knowing men These are they that the Apostle requireth should not be made Bishops or Pastors of the Church because of their pronenefs to this very sin that now we are speaking of 1 Tim. 3. 6. Not a Novice lest being lifted up with Pride he fall into the condemnation of the Devil the spirit of God here intimateth to us that Novices are the likest to be lifted up with Pride and that this Pride is the way to the Condemnation of the Devil 2. And men of great abilities natural or acquired that have
Commonweal or the good of all Now selfishness is contrary to this common good which is the End of all Societies Every selfish person is his Own End and cares not to hinder the common good if he do but think it will promote his own And how is that Family Church or Commonwealth like to prosper where most alas most indeed have an End of their own that is set up against the End and being of the Society For though the real good of particular persons is usually comprehended in the common good yet that is but in subserviency to the publick good and is not observed usually by these persons who principally look at themselves And it commonly falls out that the publick welfare cannot be obtained but by such self-denial of the Members which these men will not submit to though they incur a greater hurt by their selfishness Little do they think of the common good it is their own matters that they regard and mind So it go well with them let Church and Commonwealth do what it will They can bear any ones trouble or losses save their own They are every man as a Church as a Commonwealth as a world to themselves If they be well all is well with them If they prosper they think it 's a good world what ever others undergo If they be poor or sick or under any other suffering it is all one to them as if calamity had covered the earth and if they see that they must die they take it as if it were the dissolution of the world unless as they leave either name or posterity behind them in which a shadow of them may survive And therefore they use to say when I am gone all the world is gone with me 2. Moreover selfishness is contrary to that Disposition and spirit that every Member of a Society should be possessed with The publick good will not be attained without a Publick spirit to which a Private spirit is contrary Men must be disposed to the work that they must be imployed in The work of every Member of a Society is such as Mordecai is approved for Esther 10. 3. seeking the wealth of his people and speaking peace to all his seed Every true Member of the Church must have such a spirit as Nehemiah that in the midst of his own prosperity and honours is cast down in fasting tears and Prayers when he heareth of the affliction reproach and ruines of Jerusalem and saith Why should not my countenance be sad when the City the place of my fathers sepulchres lieth waste Neh. 1. 3. 2. 3 4. And as the captivated Jews Psal 137. that lay by all their mirth and musick and sit down and weep at the remembrance of Zion A private selfish disposition is quite contrary to this and is busie about his own matters and principally looketh to his own ends and interests what ever come of the Church and falls under the reproof that Baruch had from God Jer. 45. 4 5. Behold that which I have built will I break down and that which I have planted I will pluck up even this whole Land and seekest thou great things for thy self seek them not This Private disposition makes men so foolish as to lose themselves by seeking themselves looking to their own goods or cabbins when the ship is sinking in which they are and to their own rooms when the House is all on fire But a Publick Spirit saith If I forget thee O Jerusalem let my right hand forget her cunning If I do not remember thee let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief Joy Psal 137. 5 6. His love is to the Church as the Spouse of Christ and as to the body of which he is himself a member and his Prayers and endeavours are for its prosperity and peace Psal 122. 6 7 8 9. Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem they shall prosper that love thee Peace be within thy walls and prosperity within thy Palaces For my Brethren and companions sake I will now say Peace be within thee because of the house of the Lord our God I will seek thy good The body of Christ is all animated by one spirit that it might aim at one end and it is so tempered by God that there should be no Schism in it but that the members should have the same care one for another that if one member suffer all the members should suffer with it or if one member be honoured all should rejoyce with it 1 Cor. 12. 13 24 25 26 27. There is no serving Publick ends with a Private selfish spirit 3. Moreover sefishness is an Enemy to the Laws of Societies whether it be the Laws of God or man For it would have them all bended to their private interest and fitted to their selfish disposition And therefore for the immutable Laws of God which they cannot change they corrupt them by misinterpretations expounding them according to the dictates of the flesh and putting such a sence on all as self can bear with And what they cannot misinterpret they murmur at and disobey And for the Laws of men where selfish persons are the makers of them you shall perceive by the warping of them who they were made for Hence it is that Princes and Parliaments have lookt at the Laws and Church and Ministers of Christ with an eye of Jealousie as if they had been some enemies that they stood in danger of and all for fear lest the personal selfish fleshly interest of Noblemen and Gentlemen and others should be incroacht upon by the Laws and Government of Christ And hence it is that so much endeavours and hopes of a Reformation have been so long frustrated and even among wise and Pious Law-makers there hath been so much pains to keep Ministers from doing their duty in Governing the Churches and laying such restrictions on them that Pastors might be no Pastors that is no Guides and Overseers of the Church in the worship of God And when good Laws are made they have as many enemies as selfish men If the Law were not hated the execution of it would not be hated so much 4. Also selfishness is an enemy to the very being of Magistracy and to all publick Officers and their work For the very End of the Magistracy is the Publick benefit as I said before of the end of a Commonwealth and therefore this selfishness is contrary to this end and such men will not value a Magistrate as a publick Officer but only as one that is able to help them or to hurt them which is but to fear him as a potent enemy and not to love or honour him as a Ruler They look at Magistrates as at Tyrants that are too strong for them and as a Cur will crouch to a Mastiff Dog so they will crouch to them to save themselves and this is their love and honour and obedience even such as Hobbs hath taught them