This is true Faith. 2. Where is the solace and delight of thy soul Is it in things and persons of Christs delight The things of the spirit and the excellent persons upon earth Rom. 8.5 Psal 16.3 Rom. 5 1. is thy soul at rest and under holy quiet because in some measure satisfied that thou art at peace with God. This will breed true joy for peace is the alma parens the happy Mother of joy Whereas contention and grief quarrel in the yoke together Now when the storms of Gods wrath are calmed by the sprinkling of Christs precious blood upon the Mercy-Seat there will gradually follow joy unspeakable and sull of glory And where this peace is there 's true Faith be sure 3. By the souls continuance in the daily actings of faithful recumbency whereby the habit is fortified Yet always remember to add thereto a continuance in well-doing Stedfast Christians are perserverers The Stony-ground brought forth spâ—eâ—ily Rom. 2.7 and that with joy at the first hearing it was but flashy and endured not having no firm root the rock lying too near under it but the good ground brought forth fruit with patience Luk. 8.15 continuing under winters frost and summers he at till the joyful day of harvest This is true Faith Indeed and commended by our Lord himself CHAP III The least or lowest Degree of FAITH HAving Discoursed of some various Expressions of Scripture painting out the true Nature of Faith to the life Let us now proceed further in our design to comfort shaken and contrite Spirits To which end since we find Scripture mentioning some persons as strong in Faith giving glory to God and others but infirm and weak accosted with this compellation O ye of little Faith why do ye doubt and fear the Faith of the former being very visible and apparent to themselves and others Mat. 6.30 8.26 the latter tho true Believers yet exceedingly fill'd with fears sorrows and jealousies over their own hearts It would be expedient for their erection and comfort to considâ—r what may be the Criterions or tokens of a true Faith tho in the lowest degree and upon that account to dilate a little on these two Branches 1. What may be accounted the lowest meanest weakest estate of new Converts or young beginners in the School of Christ And 2. To how low an Ebb secure souls may be reduced in time of desertion An answer to either of these may yield mutual satisfaction to both Le ts begin with the first Q 1. What may we enstate and determine to be a critical token of a true Believer in his meanest acts of Faith A. In Answer to this lets consider First in general that the commencement or beginning of this grace is sometimes represented by conception or quickning of a Câ—ild in the Womb Eph. 2.2 John 3.3 sometimes by the new birth or visible appearance in the light of this World. Sometimes the work of regeneration and therein Faith its principal ingredient is resembled to the wind in its invisible original from mineral Exhalations out of the bowels of the Earth and Sea Mark 4.27 Luk. 13.2 to its motion and progress in the air Otherwise 't is likened to a grain of Mustard-seed the least of all oleracious Seeds that grow to so great an extension at last It s likeâ—ed also to a little leaven that ferments and works it self into the whole mass To Seed-Corn under the glebe or mould that swells by the impregnation of nitrous Rain and sulphurious Earth concurring to their germination first chits and breaks the membranes and then sprouts above the ground Or it may be compared to the budding and flowring of Trees in the Spring or to the grafting of a Cyon into the cleft or a Bud inoculated into the bark of a Tree which by degrees conceives both by the warmth and moisture of the Stock But still the precise time or modus of the curious transactions in the vegetable Kingdom the secret transfusion or percolation of Liquors and Spirits is not easily discerned or accounted for by the most accurate Naturalists Yea when all is done and written by Roger Bacon of Oxford or Sir Francis of Verulam or the Learned Harvy or any of the new Philosophers of Brittain France or Germany or Borrichius that Learned Dane there 's none in the whole quire can yet determine the admirable mysteries of Generation None can fathom the works of God in wise productions and the various textures and needle-works of his diving power as the Psalmist hath exprest it But much more abstruse intricate and unfathomable is it in spiritual cases Psal 139.15 Opere Phrgianico For how and at what time grace is inspired or sown in the heart and how it works ferments and by warm influences becomes like a Spiritus intus agens an inward working Spirit it s neither discerned by persons themselves much less by others sometimes during the space of several years For it grows we know not how nor can delineate the motion of its growth Gen. 2 6 Col. 2.19 but being watered from heaven by a living mist sent by God upon this happy Plant in the Eden of a gracious soul it encreases with the encrease of God. Hence it follows that 't is impossible for thousands to fix the time of these first heavenly workings or irritations these irradiations or impregnations of the Spirit of God. Neither needs it sufficient it is to discern it when sprouted a little from its seminal Principles Wherefore to urge the preciseness of time as to regeneration in persons that draw near to Ordinances is timerarious and rash and he is too busie a person that strictly requires it of tender Consciences and makes it an inflexible rule of Communion I may then say of this more than of all other works of divine Wisdom and Power in this lower Orb that the eye of the Vulture hath not searcht it out it is too high and too wonderful for us Job 28 77 Psal 139.6 As holy David having treated of his being secretly fearfully and wonderfully made as to the curious fabrick of his body in all its vessels ligaments veins arteries nerves and juices in all the repositaries sings in harmony and consort to heaven how vastly melodious beyond the hymn of Galen and stands at length upon the brink of an Ocean of Extasies as to the precious thought ver 17. that God had to and in his soul I shall therefore not venture into these Arcana Imperii and Magniala Dei these stupendious secrets of divine wisdom and mercy nor sail too far in deep waters near this terra incognita nor treat too close of the first initial formation of grace and faith in the heart by the operation of the spirit of God. A labour wherein we may sweat and toil till faint and dive so long till the damps in these golden mines extinguish our Spirits I shall then only for some comfort to sincere
soul and weeps in secret and often bewailes it before the throne of God. 4. There is also found within it a secret joy in the discovery of light It takes inward pleasure in the launcing of the tumors of pride to lâ—t out the corruption of nature The lamp of Gods word is more precious and joyful to it than the dawnings of a Spring-morning out of the East It 's a sign of an unsanctified heart and a very proud spirit to snuff and snarl at godly reproof But this is a certain note of grace begun when no corruption is too dear no secret sin so delectable but it will part with it at the conviction of the Spirit Yea and the more searching any Ministry is the more it delights to sit under it dares not call that a legal preaching which drives men out of the School of the Law into the Temple of Christ 5. Besides the tender soul grieves under its fears of the want of true Faith and is never quiet till it gain some lively hope of its implantation into Christ which it cherishes and nourishes by the application of promises But till then it wrings its hands runs up and down mournfully through all the Streets of New Jerusalem being desolate in spirit as not having a comforting sense of any faith at all It cries lamentably from watch-man to watch-man bears many affronts and injuries in the tearing of her vail and smiting upon her bead Song 5.7 till at last she finds her beloved embraces him in the armes of Faith. Then the soul continues in the use of all prescribed means to attain the vision of his divine love in the glass of affiance 6. Again This troubled soul flies far from the land of excuses hates palliations and self-conceited applauses and layes all the fault upon it self heaps accusations and layes snares and tentations for its own feet and so great that the holyest minister and one skilful in cases of conscience can hardly sometimes answer and resolve Whereas the hypocritical Pharisee is commonly full of talk hath little or no solidity is confident and boasts of experiences with a false tongue and a deceitful heart But our gracious young convert is as sensible of the least sin as the tenderest hand hath a quick and immediate sense of the sitting of a flye or the gentle breathings of a Western Air. It laments over In-dwelling sin bewails its residence and sounds continual alarums against it For it cannot bear the domination of that proud Vice-roy of Satan to fullfil it in any lusts thereof If it prevail though but a little the soul triumphs as if its conquering flag were entring the gates of heaven For although its motions and impulses against unholiness be yet but weak tender and low yet are they the fruits of integrity and grow forward in Strength This is a true sign of grace and that the new life is in good earnest begun in that heart for it finds repentance towards God and true sorrow for sin conjoyned with real inclinations resolutions and workings in its gradual turning from it and an holy hatred of all thoughts of reversion to it 7. The soul feels within it self an holy inclination to sincerity in all its actions which like a fragrant perfume in every chamber of all its powers and faculties gives a grateful scent in every duty Psal 139.23 and delights to be unfeigned in every good word and work It hates painted garments of hypocrisie and therefore with great humility requests of God to search its heart and begs to be what God would have it and prays withal Psal 143 2â— 130.3 that he would not enter into a severe judgment and mark what 's done amiss with an urgent scrut iny for then no flesh can stand in his sight but intreats forgiveness of God that so he may be feared and worshipped From hence springs that solid sweet and comfortable doctrine of the Reformed Churches That the true desire of grace is true grace On which Basis sound consolation will stand inviolably when all the proud towers of Pelagius and Arminius shall moulder into dust at the fall of Babylon For now the soul in this humble and holy frame lies at the foot of God mourns for sin as committed against God thirsts after the righteousness of Christ alone and praves for the spirit of God to allure and draw it into fuller communion having taken God in the new covenant for its God alone 8. Lastly it studies the increase of holiness by all holy means and methods in meditation self-examining and conversing with old disciples and experienced believers For in such-like God communicates his gracious presence â— cor 7 1. and in these mountains of Zion commands the blessing and life for evermore In these and such particulars if serious Christians would please to go down the stairs of humility Psal 133.3 into the closet of their own heart and ponder more upon what they read with holy meditation they might better observe the motus primo primi the first infant motions of their hearts towards God and heavenly objects but cursory reading spoils all Some indeed advise an hours meditation to an hours reading I think a set quantity of time is not necessary but so much as may cleare and warm the motion upon the heart By experience it will be found that the spirit of God works by vacious methods and very different yet so that by one or other token any poor broken trembling soul may in some measure be comforted as to a true work begun in the heart Psal 51.6 and may learn to know divine wisdom in its secret formations of grace within its utmost recesses and retirements To conclude I take this to be one of the lowest sentiments of a true work when there are found continually secret inclinations motions thirstings and desires after God and holiness which by strict and careful observation may be perceived to grow and increase year by year and this note is common to all believers though in their weakest estate who would not change their slender hopes for all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them This work flows from the first breathings of the spirit of God and may be discerned as to truth and sincerity by these two notes 1. If conjoyned with patient continuance in well-doing Rom. 2.7 though weakly yet with the face toward Zion 2. If growing in spiritual strength tho' at present by small degrees and for a while scarce discernable 2 Pet 3.18 like the growth of a child or the augmentation of a plant or the motion of a shadow of the Style upon the Sun-Dial But so much of the first Let 's treat a while on the second branch of the chapter about a deserted soul and then come to an end 2. Of the lowest acts of grace in a deserted Soul. Here such as are inwardly for the main work truly gracious yet through vain walking and too
God permit And likewise the fifth about Entring into Covenant by Faith and shall now proceed to the sixth Chapter neither shall I handle that in the full Latitude I had prepared but speak more succinctly in some things under that Head for the same Reasons CHAP VI. The necessary and inseparable connexion between Sanctification and true FAITH WHat I may at present exhibit on this Subject may be comprized under these Heads 1. Let 's treat a little of the nature of Sanctification 2. Shew the undivided connexion between that and Faith. 3. Intermix some complaints about formal Professors 4. Answer a Case or two and end As to the first we may peremptoryly determine the point that wherever true Faith dwells there must and will be true holiness both in heart and life and where it is not that person who pretends to Faith without it is a self-deceiver and in his attendance upon Ordinances without life-obedience is but the servant of base hypocrisie Hei. 1.12 c Will any dare to tread Gods Courts on sacred dayes and lift up crimson hands in prayer that are full of blood and stain'd with bribery and oppression God loathes to smell any perfumes in such assemblies mixt with the unsavoury stench of their defiled bodies and putrid lives True Sanctification does not lie in outward solemnities and the gaudery of Temple-worship Jer. 7.22 as the Prophet treats the Jews in the Name of God that he commanded them not concerning Burnt offerings and Sacrifices or the Incense of Sheba 6.20 or the sweet Cane of Arabia that is comparatively no nor principally as he did moral duties of piety and honesty To obey is better than sacrifice 1 Sam. 15.22 and to hearken than the fat of Rams Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of fed Beasts Mich. 6.7 or ten thousand Rivers of Oyl or the children of our bowels to smoke upon his Altar no no! But to to do justly love mercy Psal 50.17 and to walk humbly with God this O Man is good in his sight Will God eat the flesh of Bulls Psal 69.31 or drink the blood of Goats no! he requires the offerings of praise and thanksgiving this will please him better than an Oxe that hath young horns and hoofs Hos 6.6 Jos 5.7 10 Amos 5.25 Act. 7.42 Mat. 12.7.9 13. Mnrk. 12.33 Eph. 4.24 Col. 3.10 and therefore in cases of mercy God dispenses with Ordinances as he did with Israel in the Wilderness both as to Circumcision and the Passeover for about forty years together but with Moral duties never Our Lord bids us therefore to go and learn this point more diligently For a Pharisee may be huge ceremonius with his white linnen about a platter but yet neglect the weighty matters of the Law Justice and Judgment and Mercy Whereas true Sanctification is a work of Gods Spirit renewing the whole man after the image of God in righteousness and true holiness whereby he is instructed and inabled in all wayes of Scripture obedience to mind the weighty and principal things of love to God and our Neighbour and not leave undone those lesser points which belong to any institution of God and not of man. By this inward work upon the heart the sanctified person immediately begins the practice of Mortification in dying to sin and of rising to newness of life but yet this work is not perfectly and compleatly wrought in any person during this life therefore we must interpret the Apostle in his prayer 1 Thess 5.23 that the Thessalonians might be sanctified throughout not in the highest pitch of degrees but of soundness and sincerity in every part 1 Cor. 6.17 and member of the new Adam There is a habit of holiness infused and wrought in the heart by the holy spirit of promise by which means we are joyned to the Lord and become one spirit with him We do not of our selves first believe and so receive the spirit of God this were to ascribe the actings of faith to the power of man before the infusion of grace but first the inspiring and inclining motions of the spirit descend into us â—oâ— 3.3 Eph. 2.22 whereby we are enabled to believe on the Son and to become by one Spirit united to him as our head All habitual graces are wrought in us feminally at first and at one time yea Faith it self as to the order of time is infused together with the rest in the same moment of our regeneration and sincere conversion to God. Habitual holiness therefore in the production of its blessed fruits and faith among the rest does antedate all the particular acts of Faith or other Graces As in natural Generation all the powers of life are in semine concepto animato formed at once Aristot d. gen animal l. Pecquet de venis lacteis but the heart having implanted within it the true sanguifying virtue becomes the primum vivens movens the first living and moving principle which is discerned by its pulsation like the desires of the Soul in the beginnings of Faith yet all sensation attraction digestion excretion sanguification formation of nervous juices and spirits with locomotion and the rest are all settled at once but display their operations afterward at the command of the rational soul Much like hereunto is the work of the new conception formation and exertion of spiritual and vital acts In the first actings of the Spirit we are passive being found of him after whom we sought not at first but after Isa 65.1 that by a connexed power and concourse of the holy spirit we act and rely on Christ in the promise of life Eph. 4 16 Col. 2.9 10 and receive all the supplies of nourishment from the glorious head of influence thru ' the spirit Even as the head of the natural body conveys the animal spirits thru ' the several conjugations of the nerves into all parts of the body to manage both sensation and motion Isal 44.3 Mat. 3.11 1 Cor. 6.11 As the Scripture expresses it we are sanctified in the â—ame and power of the Lord Jesus by the Spirit of our GOD. As to the Author of Sanctification it is no other than in all gracious works even God essential and the spirit of God in his more particular Operations and Applications As for preparations to grace in any spiritual way before the influences of the spirit Eph 2 1. they are insignificant and unsavoury notions for by nature we are dead in sins and trespasses T is the same holy Spirit who inclines at first to the use of means and warms the heart in and by them as appointed and sanctified of God. There are 't is true various degrees in moral habits and their actings by the common work of the Spirit in his ordinary efficacy but in many moral persons in the state of nature these moralities produce as of old in the Scribes and Pharisees strong and very
vigorous resistance against the more spiritual operations of the holy Spirit of God. 2. I proceed now to the second point premised which is to shew that Faith and Holiness are inseparable companions like Jonathan and David native twins coming up from the washing of regeneration both together which may be evident as follows 1. Because Faith is a part of holiness or the new creature in the renovation of the image of God whom to believe on his Word was the duty of Adam in Innocency and is indeed a branch of the first Commandment and part of that blessed pourtraicture is restored again by Christ under the new Covnant By nature since the fall 't is true we incline to distrust God and believe Satan before him and in not obeying him in trusting to his Son upon his Word we give God the un truth as to the method of salvation by anothers righteousness But indeed Faith is a prime part of our holiness whereby we trust God as to his promise of eternal life by his blessed Son Jer 17 7 Act. 26.18.15.19 and is the very critical and discerning character between a true convert and a carnal man We are said therefore to be sanctified by Faith in Christ and the heart to be purified by Faith not from it self as an efficient cause of holiness but as it daily fetches and derives holiness from him as head of the Church Gal. 5.6 So that Faith in sanctifying us after the first infusion of grace is a power or vertue co-operating with the spirit of God and enjoys a constant concourse of the same holy Spirit in all our spiritual actions 2. Another ground may be taken from the conjunct work of the spirit John 3. who in his very first impulse and motion to true and saving conversion at his coming down into our hearts for that purpose works both Faith and Holiness at the same moment 3. Because our blessed Lord came into the World 't is the end of his advent to us not only to be the object of our Faith but to save us from our sins Mat. 1.21 Tit. 2.14 1 John 3. â— and Faith must act upon him for that end to purifie and deliver us from our iniquities not only for salvation from hell or wrath to come but also from the guilt and filth of sin For we are chosen in him to be holy and created in Christ unto good works Christ gave himself to redeem us from all iniquity Eph. 1.4 2.10 Tit 2.14 to purifie us for a peculiar people zealous of good works I where we may observe justification and sancttification riding together in the same Chariot If then all gracious habits be wrought at once the too much nicety of arguing about the precedency of this or that grace is to be rejected as not agreeing to the uniform work of the new nature nor the inward experience of saints whose graces work according to influence opportunity of providence 1 Cor. 12 11 the good pleasure of the spirit in his assistances who divideth to every one severally as he will. We may admit somewhat as to congruity of the seeming order of nature or time but not press such conceptions over strictly for various experiences will contradict the curiosity of such notions But we may firmly determine that the understanding cannot spiritually discern the excellencies of Christ 1 Cor 2 14 nor the will of man stedfastly believe in him nor the affections savingly embrace him till we are first regenerated by Gods most holy Spirit who is powred out into every faculty and power of the soul at the very first initials of Conversion 4. Because the Commandments of holiness are part of the object of our Faith in its doctrinal foundation Rom. 7.12 Therefore Paul in his conflict sets down this as a maxim that the Law is holy and the Commandment holy just and good 5. Besides the truth of our Faith is demonstrable by holiness as its genuine effect It s vain for persons to pretend to Faith where this is wanting tho' it may not appear so evidently at the first Jam. 2.17 The Apostle James spends a large discourse upon this Argument to prove that Faith without the works of holiness is but a dead Faith. Indeed our holiness being imperfect does not justifie the person before God but it justifies the faith of the person to be true and the Apostle Paul conjoynes Faith and Holiness together and thence proves our eternal life 2 Thess 2.13 Blessing God for having chosen the Thessalonians to glory and proves it because they were sanctified by the Spirit and did believe the truth of the Gospel 6. Lastly Because the application of Faith or the working or actuating of our Faith upon Christ in the promise doth not only sweetly and clearly manifest our being justified but assists us also in the obtaining and increasing of holiness 2 Cor. 7.1 They walk and work together For how do the precious promises of the covenant purge us from sin and all filthiness of flesh and spirit but by the acting faith in Christ and so do embrace Christ for our sanctification 1 Cor. â— 30. and in his name and power derive holiness from those precious promises which are the golden Pipes or nerves that convey it from our glorious head Whence it comes that our belief of the inheritance promised and of Heavens aimiableness revealed by the Word and ratified on and by the verity of God helps us daily to walk more holily and to be made more meet for that Kingdom with the Saints in light And thus it is Act. 15.7 Lev. 4 20 33. that Faith purifies both the heart and life for glory Even as under the Levitical Law the action of the Priest in his offering the Bullock and sprinkling the blood before the Lord is said to purge away sin Rainold praelect vol. 1. p. 123. or make attonement for their sins that is instrumentally So may Faith be an instrument in deriving the sense of our justification and the sweet influences of our sanctification from our blessed Lord in believing the sanctifying promises made in his Name and actuated by virtue of his holy Spirit Now then according to that common and useful sentiment there be two works that attend Sanctity the first is to mortifie sin and the second to vivifie and quicken Grace Pet. 3.11 that we may be holy in all manner of conversation and this not of our own power either to begin carry on or finish but wholly by the work of the Spirit at first and then by his gracious concourse with every holy action of the new creature to the last being carried on by the power of God thru ' Faith to Salvation This is so great a Scripture truth that t is to be admired that the impugners of it who stand upon their own power so much both as to conversion and as to perseverance should be so noted for looseness
suffer great pains travel dust smoke and swelter in their fiery furnaces and though they attain not the great Arcana yeâ— often meet with curious rarities which sufficiently reward their diligence 2 pet 1.5 10. Assurance usually comes in upon our diligent use of prayer meditation and holy walking in some time after several plunges fears and sorrows Though indeed somtimes the wayes of God prove unsearchable and sometimes he is pleased to bestow this favour on a sudden to such as are gracious from their childhood tractable and ingenuous at the calls of God as young Samuel when he understood it by the instruction of an elder Saint and when such have not been defiled by any great staines and blotches in their youth nor caused the ways of God to be evil spoken of by any scandalous sin Quest If now you ask how to preserve it when you have received it in an answer to your earnest prayer Psal 25.7 A. I answer Conservatur qua quaeritur T is preserved by the very same methods 6. Call to mind what former experiences you have enjoyed Having once seen the Kings face it will for ever enlighten yours former mountain-visions makes a Saints heart to shine as bright as Moses's face Psal 34.5 and reflects upon the heart gloriously in the vally of desert once haviâ—g câ—eared up the love of God to you then may you return to that experiment As a fountain shewn by the Angel of the Covenant at Beersheba the well of the sacred â—ath of God Gen 21.14 Rom. 11.29 Heb. 3.14 10.35 Phil. 1.6 It will never dry up it fears no scorching summers For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance Caâ—r not away then the beginnings of your confidence For he will perfect what he hath begun till the day of Christ 7. Cherish the sacred motions of the Spirit of God for he takes of the things of Christ not from us our merits faith or holiness for they are of no value but of his blood to comfort us John 16.15 therefore hearken to his affectionate breathings If thou at any time fall thru ' infirmity this holy Spirit helps thee to mourn under the sight of displeased love If thy faith seem to muddle and grope in the dark he will shine upon thy paâ—h again If grace like the sensible plant shrink up by the touch of some rough hand of tentation it will open and expand its branches again by this Suns warm and sweet influences If then the joy of Assurance spring again if the glories of heaven be described as in a lively Landskarp before thine eyes written as it were with bright illuminated letters E capite mortuo sanguinis vel urinae 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Song 4. Jerom. bless the Spirit of grace and cry out with the Spouse in the book of Songs Be gone O chill and blasting north and come O fruitful cherisâ—ing distilling south upon the garden of my Soul that the spices thereof may flow forth that my beloved may come and eat his pleasant fruits 8. Be careful in the constant use of Ordinances and pure worship and especiaâ—ly the Lords Supper and considering the times of trouble as frequent as thou canst but woe to them that are obstructers and remember when God opens the doors of his Sanctuary that thou behave with all holy reverence endeavouring to enjoy it in its purity and power There the King sits at his Table Song 1 1â— and the Spiknard fends forth its fragrâ—ant smell At this banquet Faith helps to assure us that we shall as certainly sit with Christ in glory as we now partake of the seals in grace Here Christ is received by the hand of a true believer here we eat drink Christ into our souls As we take the bread and wine into our bodies so by Faith we take his most precious body and blood which being digested with an holy heart is turned into the nerves and spirits of Assurance That thou mayst now sing the holy hymn of praise with a loud voice This is my Lord and my God he will come and save us Let not go this your holy confidence but hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ 1 Pet. 1.13 Lastly look dilgently to the holiness of your ways and with it be careful of a humble resigning interpretation of the ways of God towards you that you be never too much elevated or high-crested in prosperity nor in time of adversity despise his corrections Heb. 12.5 Souls conflict p. 321. Rom. 8.28 or faint under them It is a never-sailing rule said holy Sibbs to discern a mans state in grace when he finds every condition draw him nearer to God and when all things work together for his good As the flesh of vipers I may add and other poysons compounded and corrected into Antidotes and mixt well together prevail against contagious diseases so do corrections sanctified sweat out the poyson of fin that it shall never fatally touch the heart and vitals of such as truly love God and are called according to his purpose I shall now conclude this long but sweet Chapter with Mr. Scudders Testimony of the work of Grace Walk p. 555 Lond 8. 1674. The Question being put about Assurance he there asserts that whoso can answer affirmatively to these following queries which I may contract may be assured of Gods peace and love and of his own salvation what ever fears or feelings may seem to happen to the contrary Quest 1 How stand you affected to sin are you afraid to offend God and dare not sin wittingly is it your grief and burden that you cannot abstain it nor get out of it as soon as you would Quest 2. How are you affected to holiness and the power of godliness To know Gods will and do it to fear and please him is it your grief when you fail and your joy when you do well Quest 3. How to the Church of God are you glad when it goes well and grieved when it goes ill and sit trembling with Ely to hear how it goes with the Ark of God however it be with your own particular Quest 4. How towards men do you dislike wicked men and love those that fear the Lord because they are good Quest 5. Can you endure your soul to be ript up and your beloved sin to be smitten by a searching Minister and like him the rather and can yield an obedient ear to such a wise reproof Quest 6. Tho you have not Evidence alwayes or can scarce tell whether you ever had it yet resolve or desire and will as you are able to cleave to God in Christ for salvation by Faith and to trust in no other person nor by no other means to be saved If you can answer Yea to all or Any of these assure your self you are in God 's favour and state of grace and that you sin
of my own deficiency and intreat a candid Reader to pardon what is here done out of a great thirst and desire to cast in some mites for initiated believers as may help I hope and add to their faith or the joy of faith and supply something of what is yet lacking in the faith of some weaker christians with whom we converse in Ordinances Divinity is an Ocean that hath neither shoares nor bottom there is room enough without envy for every one to spread new Sails and in continual travelling we may still see more wonders of God in these Deeps But yet not to prescind and cut off all proper method and genuine handling of this subject I shall first set down the true nature and essence of this grace of saving faith and then proceed to the rest of the chapters in their prescribed order Now since it hath pleased the goodness of God to give spiritual life to many thousands in these British Isles that have and do believe by the instrumentality of several burning and shining lights ever since the latter end of the Reign of Tiberius Gildas deexciâ— Britan. when the Gospel began first to shine among our praecessors whom God hath raised from age to age out of his infinite mercy as serviceable under his divine commission to open and apply the holy Scriptures from Joseph of Arimathea and his companions at Glastenbury as our Ancestors do generally determine it and have handed it through dark and gloomy times Spelman concil Tom. 1. till its brightness recovered again by the industry of German of Auxere and Lupus of Troyes their disputation at Vepulam against Pelagius his errors and heresies Nay through his divine goodness there never wanted some worthy patrons of the truth under British Saxon and Nerman Governments till the days of Wicklif that great Luminary whose rayes shone into Bohemia Helvâ—tia and thence into Poland as a late worthy Rector of Lesna an university in that Kingdom sometimes since did acquaint me that they own it And after him still sprang up more and more illustrious persons till the restauration from Popery Since which the doctrines of holy â—aith derived from Scripture have been set forth by the Reformed in several Nations and called a Body of confessions printed in quarto But to let them pass I shall for the maine follow that Type of truth which our own teachers have gather out of those sacred pages In the first place then the church of England having exhibited the main doctrines consonant to the holy Scriptures in their Articles Catechism and Homilies I shall name some particulars to our purpose about Faith. In the eleventh Article we have this clause That we are justified by faith only is a most wholsome doctrine and very full of comfort See Nowels Catechism Homilies edit Lond. 1635. Fol. p. 22. Homily of â—alvation or justification part 1. p. 14. as is more largly expressed in the homily of Justification of which more fully in the confession of Faith and the defence of it by Bishop Jewel some hints see in the Catechism but especially the Homilies In the fourteenth Homily thus Lively Faith is a true trust and confidence of the mercy of God through our Lord Jesus Christ and farther that this true and lively faith is not ours but by Gods working in us and again p. 17. 'T is not the act of faith that justifies that were by some act or vertue that is within our selves c and again p. 18. By Faith given us of God we embrace the promise of Gods mercy and of the remission of our sins and yet still more fully in the third part p. 20. True christian faith is c to have a sure trust and confidence in Gods merciful promises to be saved from everlasting damnation by Christ whereof doth follow a loving heart to obey his Commandments In the little Catechism there are hints to the same purpose as that in the answer about Baptism there is required Faith Whereby they stedfastly believe the promises of God. But le ts proceed to others The Assembly of Divines in their Confession of Faith after some previous Discourse about it expresly thus The principal act of saving Faith are accepting receiving and resting upon Christ alone for Justification Sanctification and eternal life by vertue of the covenant of Grace There 's also much to the same effect amplified in the larger and contracted in the shorter Catethism The Declaration of the Faith and Order of the Congregational Churches in England met at the Savoy in London by the Elders and Messengers Octob. 12. 1658. express it in the very same words Chap. 14. Sect. 2. Page 24. which are before rehearsed out of the confession of the Assembly of Divines at Westminster All these Societies then for substance do most harmoniously agree in the same Doctrine of Faith exclusive of works in the point of Justification And oh that they would also once agree to live quietly and peaceably by each other as becomes Professors of the same holy Faith washt in the same holy Baptism and called in one hope of the same calling and as becomes the worshippers of one Lord and one God and Father of all Eph. 4.5 who is above all and through all and in all that truly believe We agree in Judgment as to the great points of Salvation and why not affection and brotherly love and peace forbearing one another in little matters not introduced into the primitive Churches before the declension and apostacy began I am sure the Church of England teaches other Doctrine in the second and third part of the ☞ Sermon of Faith. Well then we are at amity in this great particular That Faith is the gracious acting of the whole soul or heart of a sincere Christian whereby he rests and relies upon a crucified Saviour for remission of sins and eternal life grounded on the precious promises of God which is infused and wrought there by the holy Spirit at our new birth and convertion from sin to holiness In this Declaration of the nature of Faith we may for distinction sake take more especial notice of the succeeding particulars in peculiar Sections SECT I. 1. FIrst We may enquire where this Grace of Faith is subjected and that 's exprest to be in the whole man. The Subject of its inherence is not this or that particular faculty but the whole Soul or heart of Man as the Scripture often expresses it and we may observe that some times the Heart is put for the a 1 King. 3.9 understanding sometimes for the b Act. 7.39 will other times for c 1 Cor. 7.37 purpose for the affection of d Mat. 6.21 love for inordinate e Rom. 1.24 lusts in their seat for f Eccl 6.7 desire and for the g Luk. 1.16 21.14 Acts 8 37 Luk. 24 Rom. 10.9 Prov 3 5 memory Now that Faith is scituate first in geral in the heart and then in
the spirits instigation and inflexion then does God impute the righteousness of his beloved Son to that soul being now become a true believer and by inward intire love in the heart espoused to him Hence it follows that whatever the son hath the Father makes over to a Saint who by vertue of those espousals enters into a right and title to Christ Wisdom â— cor 1.30 righteousness sanctification and redemption and becomes a co-heir with Christ of the same inheritance in the kingdom of glory and as it is here in the kingdom of grace so much more in heaven above fulget radiis mariti the Church shineth not by reflected but by infused or implanted rayes of her husbands glory being one with Christ in mystical union the same spirit and the same glory being in them as our Lord sets it out I in them and thou in me John 17.22 23. Ezek. 16.14 John 1.12 and the glory which thou gavest me have I given them that they may be one even as we are one In his comliness we are made perfect For on them that receive him the Father bestoweth a powerful and magnificent priviledge to become the adopted sons of God. Having discoursed a little largely with thanks to the stronger christians for their leave and candid forbearance of time as to the weaker Saints about the nature of the will as being the principal seat of Faith and the seminary of its fruitful effects Let us now proceed In the third place to the affections of the soul which are indeed but several emanations or streams from the Will and may be compared to semidiametral lines that flow from this center and run out into the spacious circumference of actions For when the heart or will inclines this or that way or to their opposites it then shines forth in those extensive eradiations by the passions and several affections of the Soul. As for instance Isa 26. the church of God in the Prophet cries out with my soul have I desired thee in the night season So in respect to fear holy persons are said to fear God in the singleness of heart Col. 3.22 Dâ—ut 13.3 Judg. 16 152. Song 1 4 7 and others are recounted to love and trust in the Lord with all their hearts and love is stated to be from the heart In this love of our hearts to Christ lies the quintescence of our union and thence a spouse like reverence and a sweet holy fear to offend or displease him in the least Eph. 5.33 The like whereof is commanded in Scripture to be the holy deportment of all Wives to their Husbands Let the Wife sâ—e or look to it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that she fear or reverence her Husband Insomuch that Solomon brings in the Spouse with such a reverent care when her bridegroom was asleep that she charges all persons in and about the place to make no noise that may disturb or awake her beloved till he please â—ong 2.3 She is filled with an heart-ravishing joy in communion with him though here but through the lattesse of Ordinances takes sweet complacency in an holy rest in his fellowship â—ong 2.5 and feels a delicious faintness in the sick agonies of love is always satiated in his society but never satisfied always filled to the brim with pleasure and running over in his praise to the daughters of Jerusalem while the fountain of love pours out of the heart of Christ into the bosome of a Saint by a true perpetual motion this glorious person 〈◊〉 5.7 delighting in his goodness and rejoycing over us with singing These and many more are the pure unstained sanctified motions of the will so far as renewed rectified by grace and acting towards its native and genuine objects at first concreated with it as fit proper and qualified for it 'T is the will then â—sal 42.1 8.25 which desires loves thirsts longs and pants after the living God and is never quiet or settles its full complacency on any person or thing besides God alone but there 't is satiated with all manner of delight and joy for evermore 4. In the next place conscience comes in to act its part and having lookt round about upon all the pre-actings of the soul subscribes to the new creation with this eulogy Behold all the work of God is very good It is a mixt act of the soul flowing from the understanding and will together and proceeds from an inward work Simplicius as a philosopher expresses it if I remember right When the soul makes dialogues within it self It is the reflexion of the soul upon all its precedent acts whether radical or deduced wherein conviction is mainely concerned As the Evangelist speaks of some Pharisees that they were convinced of their own consciences John 8.9 which do accuse or excuse according to the nature of the light and integrity within and so helps the soul to assurance by a diligent intuition into the actings of Faith. Conscience is the souls looking-glass Rom. 2.15 wherein it beholds all the red flashings upon its face when others talk behind them at a distance This inward redness more especially rises from the immediate rebukes of this vicegerent and happy are such who have their hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience nil conscire sibi Heb. 10.22 nullaque aubescere onlpa To be conscious of no guilt and to have no faults staining vermilion upon the cheeks of conscience I might enlarge in the next place upon the power of fancy and imagination that anvill and hammer of thoughts in the work-house of the brain But I rather proceed to the last that I shall touch upon and that 's the Memory that wonderful faculty which Austin in his confessions does so extreamly and deservedly admire and the Platonists are so deeply affected with it that they thought the souls science to be little else then reminiscence or a recognition of what it had before its delapse from heaven into the body Memory is the souls christal cabinet replenisht with diamond cells or Loculi so termod by Tully wherein things heard and learned are safely retained and who is able to expound the reason of its rehearsals It is the recollection of the soul upon it self acting over and reviewing every thing at its pleasure and thereby hath a great influence upon the affections to excite them with delight or dolour meminisse juvabit dolehit When we lay up memorials in our hearts the end is to bring them forth of the treasury of a good and honest breast Luk. â— 66 Psal 139.18 63.6 like wise Scribes fitted for the Kingdom of God. Thus David remembers God sometimes to his comfort and when awake was still with God. At other times he remembred God and was troubled comparing his present dolesome state with his former more delicious times This faculty so we may term it Galen being a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a faciendi
potestas a power in the Soul to do something peculiar in calling things to remembrance carries a flaming Torch in its hand over all the chambers of the Soul â—nuert Instit and by Physitians and Philosophers is reckoned one of the three inferior senses Now in this as in all other powers Faith hath its residence and acts in and from them upon its most noble and spiritual objects I shall not recount many Scriptures Some trust in Horses and some in Chariots Psal 20 7â— but we will remember the Name of the Lord our God even what he hath done for us of old and trust him still Saints use to call to mind former mercâ—ies to encourage Faith I will remember thee from the land of Jordan Psal 42.6 and of the Hermonites from the hill Mizzar the little hill Mizoar before Zoar. In which and the like places David escaped the violence of Saul Memory helps Faith in a gracious person recalling the ancient benefits of God to his Church and his wonders of old Help a Holy mans Memory as to former actings of Faith in his straits and you comfort him presently with the sweet hope of continued deliverances till he arise to the great deliverance in the Heaven of glory But lest I be tedious I shall prosecute no more but descend to the second Section of this Chapter SECT II. Of the Primary Efficient Cause of FAITH AS to the efficient Cause Author or Worker of Faith in the heart we know that every good gift comes down from Heaven And hence Faith is sometime ascribed to the donation of God essential being called the gift of God the Faith of the operation of God. Again Jam. 1.17 Eph 2.2 Col. 2.2 Phil. 1.29 â— Thess 1.11 Phil. 2.13 t is said to be given to the Saints to believe and the work of Faith is said to be the effect of his mighty power In which and in all other heavenly gifts and graces to will and to do are both wrought of God. As t is in true repentance a grace that 's alwayes conjoyned with Faith and leads out of our selves by the hand of Faith into Christ the former being given of God so is Faith. â— Cor. 3.5 All our sufficiency to think but a good thought slides down from Heaven Q. If you ask then How thoughts come into the heart A. I Answer They flow into the head or heart by the power of imagination thru the windows of the senses or from concreated ideas or by some instillations and special infusions from God as it is in all curious Arts and Sciences Prev 8.12 He is the finder out of all witty Inventions as we read in the case of Bezaleel for the Tabernacle and in Hiram for Temple works If you ask whence holy thoughts come I answer from the infusion of the Spirit Gen. 1.2 and his warming the waters of the Soul as it is exprest by Moses in the first Creation so it is in the new Creation from the breathings of the Spirit on the garden of spices which â—e himself hath planted in our hearts Isa 26.12 Psal 33 22 1 Chro. 29 18 1 Joh 2 27 So it is in the work of Faith as the Church expresses it Thou hast wrought all our works in us and for us he causeth us to trust or hope in his Word He begins and inspires good thoughts into us and keeps them in the imagination of our hearts He teaches and anoints us with the oil of the Spirit He makes all new within us and puts hearts of flesh into us Jer. 31 18 Ezek. 36 26 and turns us unto himself because he is the Lord our God having accepted us into covenant relation with himself Sometimes the work of Faith is ascribed to the Father as in that to the Ephesians Eph 1 19 20 we are made to believe by the exceeding grâ—atness of the mighty power of the Father even the same power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead Joh. 6 4â— And otherwhere it is said that no man can come to the Son that is by Faith except the Father draw him by the golden chain of his electing love and teaches him from his chair in Heaven Besides the work is oftentimes ascribed to Christ who is said to be the Author and Finisher of our Faith and that he is exalted to give repentance and forgiveness of sins Heb 12.2 Act 5.31 both which are intimately connexed with Faith as in the case of the Father of the tormented Child Mark 9.24 praying to Christ to help his unbelief But more especially and immediately it s attributed to the holy Spirit who works in our understandings to think of heavenly things and puts holy motions into our hearts which are the original of those sudden thoughts by darting of Scriptures and precious Promises into our memories Rom. 8.5 9. â— John 14.26 and kindling sparks of light and comfort in our hearts yea the witnessing of our spirits to him are wrought by him He inclines our wills to embrace himself and Christ our Lord. For if we have not the spirit of Christ Rom 8.9 we are none of his Yea Faith it self even as all other graces are given by one and the same spirit Again one of the fruits of the Spirit is recorded to be Faith 1 cor 12 9 and to speak with reverence it is from his implantation and inoculation in the new paradise of the Soul. Gal 5.22 Yea and after that we have believed we are also sealed up in the Faith by this holy spirit of promises He seals all his own gracious workings upon our hearts Sometimes Believers are said to receive the Holy Ghost presently upon the first work which evidently shews the connexion of Faith and holiness by the same spirit Eph 1.13.13 19.3 16 17 Hence t is observable that tho Prophecies be never so perspicuously and radiantly fulfilled and tho admirable miracles were performed to illustrate the presence of the Deity yet they wrought not the least grain of Faith without the energy of the spirit he must add thereto an inward miracle upon the heart Thus it befel the Israelites in the Arabian Desart Deut. 29.3 4. For God sayes Moses gave them not a heart to perceive unto that day Just so the Capernaites they saw Christs blessed person and his eminent Miracles but believed not as not being given to them by the Father Joh 6.36 37. John 12.37 and so it was with the Pharisees and other Jews tho he had done such great works before their eyes yet they believed not on him There must be therefore a working power of the spirit concomitant with the Ministry of the outward call of the Word else none shall believe the report of Christ by Isaiah Isa 53.1 unless the arm of the Lord be revealed within Hence it is that some have professed to have heard a kind of voice at their
heirship and all the priviledges and liberties of the children of God Sanctification to mortifie the power and dominion of sin and to quicken our graces and duties to support us against and under all fiery tentations to eularge and fortifie our spirits under dificult services and to persevere to the end Phil. 1.6 1â— that at last we may attain the redemption of our bodies from the dust and the resurrection to glory But these resort more properly under the tenth and last chapter and therefore here I forbear 7. The next place sets forth Faith by our cleaving to the Lord with full purpose of heart Aâ—s 11 23. Isai 28.16 When the soul is glewed by an holy love to the mercies and goodness of God it will then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 stedfastly abide with him It makes not haste out of the mountains of Zion as if full of bogs and quakemires Deut. 10.20 Josh 2â— 8 1 Cor. 1.17 2 Cor. 11 2 but as being setled on the strong and lofty rock of ages This closing of the soul with God is often set down in Scripture by that trust and assiance which a true believer hath in God adhering on cleaving to God is a term also which sometimes attends upon conjugal relation wherby true and faithful persons having the yoke of that union lined with the soft velvet of love 1 Cor. 6.17 become one as in person by the law so much more in spirit and delight To the same purpose the Apostle affirms that true believers being united to Christ by a true and lively faith become one spirit with the Lord and long daily to be more sully espoused by larger affections of the unction of Christs spirit in order to the solemnity of that glorious marriage-day of the Lamb. Rom. 7.4 Rev 19 7 Phil 3 20 And this is true faith indeed when persons long for the appearance of Christ in glory 8. Next follows that term of embracing of Christ as the Saints of old being first perswaded of the truth and goodness of the promises Heb 1â— 13 then at length embraced them utrispue ulnis with all affection and what are the promises but the precious fine linnen wherein Christ our sacrifice was involved after his death at his funeral which is the principal object of our saith even Christ in his sufferings This act of embracing notes our ardent affection to him delight in him and heavenly communion begun betwixt Christ and the heart of a believer Love is Faiths Agent and factor Faith worketh by love a true lover of Christ is certainly a true believer in him and this love increases by faith and faith by love For the soul determines it The more I know of his Excellencies the more I believe in him Rom. 5.4 5 and I love him more because I have the experience of Christs love to me In this very state of the valley there is a mixing of hearts and spirits but in heaven the soul is swallowed up in his love for ever 9. In the ninth place a Believer arrives at this reverent freedom with the Lord in all its streights and dificulties to cast its cares and burdens upon him being both commanded and encouraged by him to do it Whenever I am afraid saith David Psal 56.3 He trust in thee If the heart safely trust in a friend Prov. 31 11. there follows a mutual unvailing and disclosing of the most secret and bosome counsels Psal 71.3 Jer 20.12 Psal 142 2 So does the soul pour out its sorrows and open its whole cause before God. Three things make a friend or relation desirable power to protect wisdom to advise and love to comfort and mingle joys sorrows together All these are eminently and transcendently found in heaven There 's a heart large enough to entertain thy moans Jam 1â— wise enough to guide thee in the dark turns of Providence and so good as not to upbraid thee and can command Legions of Angels at a beck for protection â— Pet. 5 7. Let us therefore cast our care upon him for he careth for us and 't is worth notice what the Apostle terms thy care the Psalmist terms thy burden promising that the Lord will sustain thee to shew that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dividing cares Psal 55.22 heart-rending cares are great burdens But divine sustentation and support of the soul in trouble plainly shews that God takes a fatherly care of thee and will not suffer thee finally to be moved as Davids song in the end of that Psalm since thou art a righteous man and hast cast all thy soul-battering cares upon Gods promise which are but so many tentations to try thy faith and trust in him Besides this trust is exprest by casting anchor within the vail Heb 6 19 When the ship of the soul being turned up-side down as to the world though too near the earth in this bodily estate yet in spirit sails above the firmament and makes all its sails upward still Rev 11.19 and if any storm arises it then rides at Anchor upon the Ark in heaven within the vail beyond the starry Canopy as upon the rock of life the Lord Christ himself 10 In the tenth and last place faith acts by Resignation giving up all its comforts into his heavenly hand when a true believer both living and dying commends his spirit into his divine manutenency during this frail life in all the mighty turns circles or helixes of providence full of intricate meanders and mazes past finding out is led by a hand coming down from heaven So that all ends well with a Saint his stormy dayes do always end in a sun-shine evening He gives up himself to the guidance of his counsel and as to death both for time place way and method yields up all to his safe conduct and yet sometimes breaths out with a most humble and reverent motion his soul still lying in the dust of submission before him to grant him an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or an easy departure out of this life if it may be his holy pleasure and still quietly hoping and waiting for his salvation Thus Jacob in the Old Testament in the midst of his last languishments cries out I have waited for that Salvation O Lord gen 59.18 Luke 2.30 23 46. and good old Simeon in the New Let thy Servant depart in peace for mine eyes have seen and mine arms embraced my Saviour and thy Salvation This did our most blessed Lord Father into thy hands I commend my spirit and so did blessed Stephen Lord Jesus receive my spirit testifying to the Deity of Christ Acts 7.59 the immortality of his soul and the resurrection of his body in the same prayer of resignation There may be found in Scripture some other passages exhibiting the nature of Faith and Trust as fixing the heart choosing of Christ waiting for his coming and expecting the blessed day much to the same effect
Lordship and drunk down the royalty of fishing in many Rivers As 't is easy to see in the turns of estates from the old to new upstart races in the antiquities of many counties described by diligent men of late But what is worst of all they are ready to sink into everlasting burnings in flaming pitch and brimstone in that direful and bottomless lake Quest 2. If true holiness be so rare a Jewel and always connexed with true Faith then help us to know whether we are indeed truly sanctified Answ 1. I answer we may know that we are truly sanctified if we have been exercised in godly sorrow and repentance for sin joyned with an holy hatred against it True penitent tears like salt-waters do purge and cleanse the soul Bitter sorrows and an inward sense ef Gods wrath with an holy awe of Gods precepts and threatnings Zâ—ch 12 10. and a sincere desire of a mendment fit the souls pallace for the carrying on of grace Holiness of life and reformation of our ways does alway follow inward and sincere Repentance 2. An inward satisfaction with and some delight from the heart in a convincing Preacher that searches his heart to the bottom and le ts out the old corruption and then pours in the Samaritan Oyle of the Gospel upon the acute wine of the Law yea he reverences and loves him for his work sake and faithfulness to his Patient Obj But may not an unfanctified person shew outward holiness and have some inward dogmatical Faith as Herod and others A. Their Obedience is neither universal nor permanent Luk. 8.13 Heb. 6.4 10.24 2 Pet. 2.20 and their Faith not rooted in an unfeigned love to Christ No more here to this intending a further measure in the eighth Chapter To conclude about Sanctification with the words of that holy and reverend Person Bp. Vsher in his little sheet about the two Witnesses Being askt by a Lady of Honour what Sanctification was after some modest diversion brake out into this expression That it was the offering up tho whole will to God See Brit. Divinâ— at Dort. p. 11â— which was more than all burnt offerings and Sacrifices To which I may subjoyn that none need to dread or fly back from the flames of affection in this free-will Offering tho' it be difficult to â—â—esh and blood for t is perfumed with the Frankincense of our Lords passion-offering at the brazen Altar and the fragrant mingled Incense of his intercession at the golden Altar So that in conclusion all the holy wayes of wisdom are pleasantness and all her paths are peace Thus much at present to explain a little the nature of holiness in this Chapter together with a sad lamentation dropt upon the Herse of vain Professors in these dayes But le ts add Let him that stands take heed lest he falls be not high-minded but fear for thou standest by Faith Rom. 11 20. 1 Cor. 4.7 and that grace of God alone makes thee to differ Let us now finish this excellent and useful Subject of Holiness tho' mixt with some warm reflections for the good of souls and come to a very comfortable Subject about the Beauty and joy of Faith in the Throne of assurance tho' I should interweave a shorter Chapter about the infirmities of Believers to prevent stumbling at the threshold of Assurance and now I hope somewhat to change my voice in more sweet lessons of comfort for the use of broken and mournful Saints The Foundation indeed is laid in the Doctrines of Faith and holiness if faithful Souls will diligently build gold and precious stones upon it they may erect the most stately and Imperial Temple in the whole World not like the Pygmy Pyramids of Egypt up to the Clouds and Vapors but like the Cedar-Temple of the second Solomon all wrought with Saints and Cherubims whose Pinacles reach within the highest Heavens nec habent umbras all shadows and mists are flâ—d away Still remember that all must pass thru ' the Temple of vertue and grace before they can enter the Temple of heavenly glory CHAP VII THis Chapter about the infirmities of Believers for the same fore-written causes I lay aside at present and proceed to the Eighth about the Doctrine of Assurance CHAP. VIII Of the Assurance of FAITH THe nature of Assurance and Method to attain it is the Subject of this Chapter In former times Faith was represented under the notion of assurance or a Saints particular certainty that Christ died for his own soul among the rest of Believers Like to that special priviledg to which Paul prescribes Gaâ— 2. â—0 that Christ loved him and died for him But now more diligent observation of Holy Scripture and experience hath cleared up this point that assurance is the belief Rom. 5.1 that we are justified by Faith in Christ and so have peace with God. It is the application of Faith or a perswasion of our hearts concerning the love of God. Joh. 3.19 When the Spirit of God sets his seal upon our hearts with the impression of the image of Christ as in wax or as the Antients graved the effigies of their Princes on a Cornelian or Opal or such precious Stones Eph. 3.12 Joh. 14.23 It produces a confidence of access by Faith in Christ and is daily more and more evidenced by the abode of both Father and Son with us when the ripe Grapes of Eshcol are cast into our bosoms and Christ himself comes in to sup with us Rev. 3.20 Assurance shines by a reflex beam of the souls eye upon it self When a Saint sitting down in the closet of his own heart takes a clear view of his face in the glass of Faith. I may term it a Saints belief of his own Faith. Assurance is the cream of Faith when t is settled it s the joy of Faith springing in the Soul from the warm healing beams of the Sun of righteousness rising upon its humble valleys Some take Faith to be a trust on the promise for remission of our own sins in particular or conjoyned with reliance dependance adherence and affiance When having cast all our hope and expectation of heaven and happiness into the arms of Christ alone and thence infer the promise to have been made to us in particular by an immediate consequence drawn from our special and personal application of the indefinite or more general promise and taking it as a divine Oracle to us in particular and therefore call it special Faith the promise being thereby assigned to me immediately as certainly as to any in the world because I have set to my seal that God is truth and accepted him upon his Word When this is done to wait with joyful expectation that God will perform it at the day of Christ But what is all this any more than Faith and assurance tied up together in a bundle of sweet smelling Myrrhe Psal 1.6 drest up in various words to
this work and grant this mercy to such petitioners at the throne of grace Perhaps thou wilt answer All this I find even sweet inclinations in me by grace to accept Mat 8.3 embrace and perform But oh blessed Lord I beg that I might be cleansed from the leprosy of sin oh that I might be holy To this I rejoyn a question Art thou willing to be holy according to the Gospel rules to accept the proffers of mercy as both pardoning and purging to be holy as well as happy in Christs method that is to use sincere endeavours after that holiness which thou declarest to thirst for if thou upon calling in the power of his might with integrity of heart doest really intend and set about it to use purging graces and ordinances and wait with perseverance for the manifestation and aid of the Spirit of grace whereof beneath I may then be humbly bold to say to thee though as yet but low it may be in the state of grace Luk. 19.5 yet oh thou little but zealous Zacheus come down and Christ may dine at thine house this day 1 cor 3.22 I may then say The Covenant is yours Christ is yours God is yours life and death and all is yours and ye are Christs and Christ is Gods. Stretch out in the blessed name of the Son of God and in his power and at his command the hand of your longing thirsting hungring panting hastning Will to the Lord of life and the great work is done and thou art happy I confess I need say no more but that I desire to enlarge upon this so desirable a Theam considering that one thing may be sanctified to take with one Spirit that may not with another but le ts ever remember the connexion of holiness with Faith in the sixth chapter Col. 2.2 if you would obtain to be the heirs of clear full and strong Assurance to the acknowledgment of the mystery of God and the Father and of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to a spiritual acquaintance with God as a gracious Father in Christ John 17.3 This is life eternal to know thee the only true God in and together with Christ as a Father to dwell abide withus But le ts proceed to a second means of applicaâ—ion 2. Particular promises made in ancient times concern every particular believer in all succeeding ages For whatsoever was written aforetime was writ for our learning Rom. 15.4 that we might have hope As all the precepts concern us and we concern our selves in duty and obedience to them then why not interested in the promises unless there be some special reason assignable to the contrary 1 cor 10.11 Heb. 13.5 Rom. 4 24. We may observe also that all the examples of unbelief and Gods displeasure to ancient Israel and the particulars unto some persons among them were set forth for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come to us that live in the ends of the earth or ages of the world Joshuahs Faith and Courage is recorded for us The Faith of Abraham is recited not for his sake alone but ours also to whom it shall bâ— imputed if we believe on him that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead The Apostle having inrolled the memorials of many famous Patriarks before our Lords time Heb. 11.40.13.8 concludes that they without us shall not be made perfect Whose Faith let us follow since Christ is the same yesterday in Joshaah's time to day in Pauls and for ever throâ—gh all generations All the sheep of Christ drink of the same River of life the same streams of the promise that runs through paradise in â—mne volubilis aevum It comes originally from the secret channels of the Ocean of divine and eternal love and breaks or springs forth out of the rocky mountain of Zion and the various sources of its Ordinances So that every Saint may sing with David Psal 87.7 All my springs are in thee O Zion in thee O God of Zion All the promises are in and thru ' Christ the Prince of Zion 2 Cor. 1.20 Yea and Amen even certain inviolable and unchangeable 3. If thou wouldest successfully apply the promises labour to strengthen the habit of Faith by frequent actings of it upon Christ in the Promise Remember to be every day ejaculating up to heaven and casting the eye of Faith upon a Saviour in glory Rev. 506. a Lamb as it had been slain and standing in the midst of the Elders by the Throne of God. This is a sweet method to breed love to Christ and love will raise thee up to some assurance and confidence in his love God is love and his mercy to sinners in misery is the fruit of his love and love springs out of the original goodness in the nature of God who delights in them Psal 33.18.147.11 that hope in his mercy and trust in his love and when the love of God to us begins to warm our hearts with the inward feeling and tast of it as the foretast of the Wine of the Kingdom it encreases Faith and experience of it advances us into higher degrees of love Then this sweet sense of divine eternal electing love brought into our hearts by Faith leads us at last into the pleasant fields of Assurance 4. That so we may particularly apply the promises call to mind and ruminate upon the qualifications mentioned in the promises and if you can find such gracious inclinations wrought in you by the Spirit of God then may you humbly determine your selves to be heirs of the promises I would not strain hard in the examination of many great things required in the promises but if thou canst by a sincere search find in thee a humble broken-hearted frame it is a covenant frame if thou find in thee a penitent fear to sin a holy trembling at Gods Word a thirsting after Christ with some sparks of true love to him Psal 147.3 Isai 66.2 tho thou mayest seem to faint under the sense of wrath sometimes yet if thou resolve in his strength still to thirst after him and his pardoning love and to hope for it in his promise yea and if thou perish and thy heart-strings break yet to gasp out thy last at his foot Thou art the desirable person the Daniel the man of desires the Samuel the asked of God the Nathanael the gift of God without guile the beloved the acceptable person that shall be taken into his bosom for ever Only and alwayes remember and perfectly conâ— this lesson I intreat thee in the Lord that these actings must alwayes be connexed with holiness as 't is expresly determined Chapt. 6. and which I do so often recal to mind and the Lord by his powerful grace enable us to do it then may est thou draw forth a perfect lot for thy self out of our Joshuah's Book of the Land of Canaan which is above all heavens Thus
Tokens sent before Marriage and to be sure God will not lose his earnest nor be defeated of the fore tokens of his contract of love to souls sometimes the Spirit is compared to fire and yields both the light of joy the heat of love and influences or quicknings for service And 't is this lively Faith which works by love effectually thru ' the Spirit But I would speak a little more distinctly for the observation and the experience of holy men hath set to their seals that they do find and feel sometimes a most illustrious irradiation upon their hearts from the Spirit of God which I take to be of two sorts The 1. We may call an irradiation of concurse with our spirits The 2. An irradiation of incidence upon our spirits Give leave to use the terms and explain them to the meanest The First or the irradiation of concurse is then dispensed when he shines upon our Argumentation when we have laboured with our spirits used scripture mediums and upon examination suited them to our hearts in their most inward sincere and humble searches then comes the spirit of God and witnesses with our spirits that we are the children of God. When we have toiled and sweat many a time in our closets and brought things as we hope some times to a pritty good issue then thru ' one tentation or another our unbelieving hearts fly off from the Conclusion and all our comfort vanishes But now when our arguings by evident Scripture tokens are finisht over and over and yet still we demurre to lay hold on the Tree of life and while we stick in the mire of fear doubtings and hesitancies and wander under dark clouds in the depth of midnight then comes in the spirit of God Rom. 8.16 as the Morning Star glittering over the Horizon and clears all This is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the co-witness of the Spirit of God. 2. The other is that which I beg leave from a term in Opticks to call the irradiation of incidence and is then illustriously performed when the Spirit of God in his most free and glorious agency is pleased to shine personally upon our spirits without and apart from all argumentation whatsoever This comunion with the spirit draws nigh to that of Angelical intuition where by acts of volition and luminous emanation they converse mutually together in a higher degree than we do here by ratiocination with mediums and consequences This is the point we are now upon to shew that the Spirit of God when he pleases without any previous foregoing arguments doth testifie by a secret still heart-ravishing voice Acts 2.2 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and doth sweetly and suddenly as 't is said in the Acts dart in a ray perswading and satisfying the soul in an instant that thou art a Child of God that sin is pardoned and that thou shalt be saved page 147. Which I reâ—ember the British Divines at Dort call the â—pirits speaking to the heart and even in darker times there were some of the Ilâ—uminate both of Spain and Germany and France that had to do I am perswaded with many distrssed souls in their secret confessions were acquainted with great worâ—nigs in the hearts of penitents but few of â—hem had skill to manage those inward methods Of which things we may find some â—otable footsteps in Bonaventure Gerson Thanlerus and sundry others So that of this inwaâ—d clear and bright perswasion of Gods love to the heart we have no solid reason to doubt but that some holy persons have enjoyed it Austin at his conversion in the garden at Millain had a voice though he had no vision as Paul had in the fields by Damascus I shall be sparing and touch but an instance or two Dr. Manton spake it in my hearing at Oxon of one that being in conflict in prayer had a beam shining into the chamber and being desired by him to have a care of delusion answered O Mr. Manton little do you know what God may do for his poor distressed children or very like words But the caution was wise and grave I know one also who being for almost a week deeply distressed about Eternity had an impression as like a voice within as if he heard it comforting in these words I will give thee rest and so iâ— followed speedily and joyfully and at another time I will not leave thee noâ— forsake thee I might also hint at the beam upon the wall in prayer to Dr. Winter in his life and the voices of Angels to Mr. Patrick Simpson I must confess they are great priviledges and sweetnesses which God may it his divine good plâ—asure and I am perswadâ—d doth sometimes instil and drop in to gracious when timorous hearts anâ— whose constitutions the great former oâ— hearts and spirits knows full well to bâ— naturally over subject to fears and inwarâ— commotions he like a most gracious and Tender Father full of pity and bowels discerns our frames See Mr. Maâ—hers prevalency of prayer Psal 103. p 17.14 at the end of his Tract of N. E. troubles Psal 40.17 By his loving eye and remembring that we are dust is mindfull of us in our low condition whereas many proud and disdainful persons set light by the inward sorrows of broken and contrite souls And are like lamps despised in the thought of him that is at ease But says David though I am poor and needy yet the Lord thinketh upon me and with how many precious thoughts his goodness is pleased to embroider and enamel upon the hearts of his holy humble meek and trembling children For your high exalted boasting persons tho' it may be have some few grains of grace at bottom are seldom visited with these inward joyes But the meek will he teach his ways Such blessed thoughts of grace David could not number Ps 139.17 18 they were more than the Sands of the Sea or the stars of heaven for multitude But now if these or such like lines should fall under the view or knowledge of any prophane or scoffing Ishmael that may vilifie the works of God and like bruits speak ignorantly of what they know not would advise them to forbear presumptious speeches 2 Pet. 2 12. Jude 10. lest their bonds be made strong lest the Terrors horrors of the almighty should one day drink up their spirits So that when Gods Servants shall rejoyce and sing for joy of heart they shall cry for sorrow of heart and howl for vexation of spirit Isal 65.14 But yet because there may be such things as Enthusiasines and transformation of Angels of darkness among some that call themselves Sweet-singers and among others that have more need to mourn over their follies and delusions in the dust of shame I would speak somewhat to that question of an humble Soul. Quest How may I comfort my heart that this irradiation you speak of is a true and immediate work of the Spirit of God and
ΧαÏα ' τηζ Πιζεωζ THE Joy of Faith OR A TREATISE Opening the true Nature of FAITH its lowest Stature and Distinction from Assurance wiâ—â— a Scripture Method to attain both by the Influence and Aid of Divine Gâ—â—â—â— with a preliminary Tract evidencing the â—â—â—ing and actings of FAITH the Deâ—ty 〈◊〉 Christ and the Divinity of the Sacred SCRIPTURES 2 Cor. 1.24 We have no dominion over your Faith but are helpers of your JOY for by Faith ye stand Phil. 1. â—5 I know that I shall abide and continue with you all for your furtherance and JOY of Faith c. Augustin Confess L. 6. C. 4. De Deo Medicamenta fidei confecisti aspersisti super moâ—bos orbis terrarum By Samuel Lee. M. A. Sometime Fellow of Wadham Colledge Oxon. Bosâ—on Printed by 〈…〉 To his highly Honoured Friend Sir John Thomson Knight and Baronet and his most pious and vertuous Consort the Honourable Lady the Lady Frances Grace and Peace Honoured Sir IT pleased the Lord in his holy Wisdom to afflict me with a Fever in the moneths of July and August 1684. and in his own due time to command its departure As an offering of praise and thankfulness to the Majesty and Mercy of God I thought of composing this Tract though under the remaining weakness derived from an autumnal distemper yet thereby I humbly hope some benefit may arrive to broken and tempted Spirits For though my mouth be shut and silent as to Publick Service yet I should greatly rejoice if my heart could be opened in Print to help and towards heaven The Dedication is proper to your most noble person if you please to accept what would be an infringement of dutâ— not to present to you who have so often refreshed me and mine in my privacies and retirements kindnesses not to be burâ—ed in the grave of ingratitude but to be acknowledged before the Sun. Your Library was also most kindly opened to my use wherein stands many an ancâ—ent Author calling aloud for converse and reaching out his auxiliary hand and pointing at the state of Câ—ristianâ—tâ— in former and purer ages There did I first consider of the consignation of the Canon of Scripture which is toucht upon in these Papers but might be much more amplified and adorned had I more constancy of abode and supplies of the yet remaining Records of the first five hundred years that have happily survived the flaming fury and rage of the barbarous Goths and Vandals and other wasters of both the East and Western Empire which might have conduced to the compleating of such a work But we must wait the times of Divine Wisdom in appointment of any such happy seasons to view those desirable monuments But why print and why on such a subject and why now I answer to the first and third because being interrupted in my greatest work I would gladly be some way useful in my generation It may be some that mourn in secret and others that are as yet not called but under the Election of Grace may attenâ—d and meditate on these things Tho Preaching or Printing prevail but little with this degenerate age Jer 6.29 though the Bellowes be burnt in the fire and the lead consumed which was appointed to purify the drossy Oare yet with Jeremy and Esay and Pau we must in our several ages keep on where God opens the door of opportunity for us tho Israel be not gathered let the Labour of faithful Workmen wait for its reward from the Lord of the Harvest Tho we for our Labour of love be accounted as the shavings and off-sconrings of all things to this day t is but for this life 1 Cor 4.13 tho all the filth and garbage of the tongues in the streets of Ashdod be flung into our Carts we must carry away the burden patiently and meekly wipe off the soile from our names and faces Tho our presence be a burden to many houses and our testimony less minded than the piping of Children in a Market place Luk 7.32 yet our Lord commands us to persist till he relieves us But that which I must every where own Worthy Sir give me the favour I pray and leave to testifie that your reverence in hearing and accepting of their messages as of the Lord's Embassadors hath been alwayes very exemplary and I hope will return into your bosom with a Prophets reward who have been an Obadiah to them in the time of spiritual Famine But Secondly Why on such a Subject I Answer Tho many have written yet t is inexhaustible besides methods may vary and variety breeds delight if joyn'd with brevity If I have laid the foundation of such a Discourse in the beginning a little deeper than usual upon the Divinity of Scripture and the Deity of our blessed Lord I hope and beg that the Learned Wise and Pious would not count that or any part a digression too improper heartily wishing it may succeed like Austin's going providentially out of his way in a Sermon and beyond his intention Posidonius in ult Augustin Cap. 15. p. 869. Tom. 1. as if he were sent on purpose to find out and convert Firmus from the Manichees as it proved There be many that understand not the nature of Faith tho so often writ upon still afflicting their Spirits as not having that Grace because they feel no assurance To such I principally direct and bend my stile hoping and praâ—ing that no Soul toucht with inward sincere remorse for sin but reading and ruminating on so many dâ—rect and positive promises both to beginners and back-sliders Isai 57.18 will dare to despond but come in freely to lay hold on the golden Scepter of mercy and thereby of eternal life As for the Basilisk of Envy I commend it to the piercing eâ—e of Heaven under whose protection I wrote these lines Plin. l. 29. c. 4. And now worthy Sir not to be prolix I most huâ—â—bly beg all the mercies of the new Covenant to be your portion and that the noble vine on your house side may spread Branches like Josephs Gen. 49.22 Ps 128.3 by the well run over the wall that your Sons may be as Olive plants grown up in their Youth Psal 144 12 that your Daughters may be as those Marble corner Stones polisht after the similitude of Solomon's Palace That you may see your Childrens Children walking in the Truth and peace upon Israel 2 Ep. Joh. 4. and after these daâ—es in the valle be received to the mount of transfiguration in Glory So Prayes Honoured Sir Yours in all Gospel Service Samuel Lee. Abbots Langly Jan. 16. 1685. The Preface HAving Observed that many Christians spend their Dayes in the Valley of Sorrow and walking up and down very pensive being full of Fears and Doubts about their eternal Estate can perform no chearful Service to God bring litâ—le honour to their Profession or comfort to their Relations or any sweet quiet to their own spirit I often pondered what should be the
bitter root of all this Wormwood and Gall and being very desirous to deal in compassion as having been under some tentations I spake with several and found upon conference these following to be the principal causes of this Bondage of Spirit The 1. Was great ignorance of the true nature of Faith and of the main fundamental Truths of the Gospel which did amaze me to find upon search in so many glittering talking but indeed shallow Professors 2. Another was the great Levity Vanity and Laxness of their lives trifling out their precious time in fidling querks tales and jests to please some whose Trenchers they hang upon like the Parasites in Theophrastus not liâ—e the blessed People of the former age who far outshined us in the purity of Conversation and therefore in the brightness of their assurance 3. Others I observed to be of a froward perverse ill-natur'd ill-conditioned sower humor full of prate and unprofitable multiplicity of words censures backbitings hollowness of true friendship often murmuring at God and quarrelling with their Superiors 4. Others I perceived to be naturally of a fearful timorous wavering inconstant suspitious spirit ever learning and never coming to the knowledg of the Truth 5. And to end most people extream worldly couvetous full of sordid over-reaching tricks and cunning cheats in dealing and unless for a show basely backward to any excellent works of charity and strict in examining the poor to find an evasion which Jerom so complains of in some of his age Such as these eat out the very power of godliness and rob themselves of the season of meditation Periclitatur religio in negotiis Piety is lost in a crowd of worldly business with these and the rest I must declare that the holy Spirit of God delights not to hold communion as being fiery or miry Spirits Hereupon in my retirements I hope by the Grace of God I pitcht my thoughts when I could not be so publickly useful as formerly upon the composing a small Treatise of the genuine nature of Faith and in a peculiar Chapter to shew the individual connexion of Sanctification of heart and life in every gracious Believer In the management whereof I thought it might not be inexpedient to lay its foundation upon the Doctrine of the verity of the Scriptures in one Chapter and of the Deity of our blessed Lord in a second after the Preface the former being the Doctrinal object of Faith the latter the personal Now forasmuch that in all Sciences there be certain Principles on which their Theoremes and Maximes are built we may consider of the like in Divinity that the Holy Scriptures 2 Tim. 3.15 16. being able to make us wise to Salvation are the only true Basis and Foundation on which all the great Doctrines of Holiness and Happiness do most firmly insist In particular that great point of Faith which bears it self on the new Covenant of Grace revealed in those sacred Pages I thought meet therefore briefly to endeavour the proof of this high point that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament are the undoubted Word of the living God and thereby to be received with all veneration imaginable as the solid fundamental of true Christianity in special of the weighty Doctrine of Faith And this I have the more willingly performed at the entrance of this Tract that good Christians may not I hope need to go otherwhere to draw but have sufficient to settle their Faith on this Foundation tho it be more amply enlarged upon abroad Now whereas it may be said that Principles are indemonstrable as in Mathematicks and other Sciences Suarez 5 to Mettaph L. C. we must understand that Maxim of the Principles of Essence and not of cognition or knowledg It is so as to the verity of Holy Scriptures we cannot demonstrate them any further and t is enough than that they are founded on the glorious Authority of the infinitely wise true and most holy God as consentanious to the verity and excellency of his nature and published by his injunction as the rule of life and means of communion with himself in eternal happiness The Lord hath spoken and who shall not tremble Amos 3.8 Oh that Majestick stile Ezek 14.4 c. Thus saith the LORD makes Men and Devils to quake and rottenness to enter into their Spirits when God sets it home upon their Consciences My Design then is to shew that at the Revelation and Exhibition of the holy volumes that I may both satisfie and confirm weak Believers and convince if possible scoffing Atheists that there were such mighty Testimonies of their divine original attending the dispensing of them to the Church and the World that may convince all of their Heavenly Off-spring if persons put not on the veil of wilful ignorance 2 Cor. 3.15 detaining the truth in unrighteousness And in the close it will appear that Hystorical Faith well grounded is useful to true and saving Faith. There are then two principal points which did await their sliding down from Heaven into the hearts of the illuminated Pen-men inspired by the Holy Ghost and the uttering of them to the People in their distinct Ages which may be comprehended in the first Chapter 1. The wonderful Oracles and Prophecies mentioned in those sacred leaves which have been punctually fulfilled in the several Generations of the Church 2. The Divine Miracles above and beyond the power of nature exhibited at those two great junctures the delivery of the Law by Moses and the promulgation of the Gospel at Mount Zion In the conclusion of this first Chapter I intend God willing to treat somewhat of the consignation of the Canon of Holy Scripture a Point much desired by some and may be of use to others In the second Chapter let us speak to the Deity of our blessed Lord which indeed is the grand point of Christian Religion the very Foundation of the Church of God as Nicephorus Callistus reports a Story of a deep Cave discovered at Jerusalem under the ruines of the old Temple when the Jews by the permission and instigation of Julian to contradict the Prophecy of our Lord would needs attempt to build it again but were beaten off by Thunder and Lightning where they found within it upon a Stone Pillar the Gospel of the Apostle John fairly laid and preserved Let the Patriarch protect the truth of the story I mention it allusively to this great Truth that lies at the Foundation of the true Church that the Deity of Christ the principal design of John's Gospel is the only Rock laid by the Father in Zion Isai 28.16 without which our Faith sinks and all our hopes vanish If that be a nullity all is gone Christianity is a vain Profession and our Bibles as to Christ and the new Covenant of Grace of no value Wherefore O Professors of this true Religion hold these two points inviolable as your lives The verity of the Scriptures and the Deity of
the learned judg in answer to Anacreon in the 32 verse of his atheistical rhyme much like Horace and other Epicurean Ballad makers who often push at one another with scoffs and jeers Nay far better men then they some of the good fathers of the primitive times in the Apologies made in defence of the christian-church bring in multitudes of Testimonies out of Heathen writers against their Pagan Idolatries Superstitions Atheisms Persecutions and the vain boasts of the antiquity of their shamefull dunghil Deities which matter is obvious in the writings of Origen against Celsus Clemens Alexandrinus in his stromata Minutius Faelix Arnokius against the Gentiles Austin in his book of the city of God and Learned Jerâ—m in many of his Epistles and commentaries Let us then determine this point from what proceeds in the arguments assâ—meâ— from Oracles and Miracles Gelas Cizenes hist Niceâ— council nnd many other grounds briefly touched above that they are the very Word of God but particularly by their converting power upon the Soul commanding reverence and trembling and horror into the conscience both of men and Devils as they did upon the Spirit of that Petulant Philosopher in the council of Nice Nay so terrible is the weight of these Truths upon the Souls of some fleering atheists that they are forced sometimes to Hobbianize that is tremble to be in the darkâ— as he did at the Lord of Devonshires being afraid to walk abroad without Mastiffs or Pistols and how much more was he appaled at the approach of death Whereas on the other side how often have we seen with joy and delight this blessed Word of God to have comforted many a soul in the greatest conflicts and agonies of death whence it follows that these effects must be the issue of divine power that these writings are indeed the very Word of the holy God since no other books or preachings do or can so rouze and startle the proud conscience of man. Insomuch that else we might justly wonder what the man ails that is so tormented his heart raging like the troubled Sea till the Allablaster box of fragrant oyntment be opened out of the promises and the balsome when poured into a scalded and wounded spirit immediately asswages its pain and sinks the blisters which all the Divines and holy Orators in the world could never do till the presence of God stampt idea's of mercy and comfort speaking peace to the Soul. Whence we may sweetly infer that no other books can be received with any powerful convictive authority but where in they agree with the tenor and canon of holy Scriptures so that whoever walks according to this rule Gal. 6.16 peace shall be on him mercy as on the Israel of God. I shall then finish this first Chapter with that inference for which those mediums were brought That since Faith in Christ Jesus is the very scope and design the very sum and substance of the whole Scripture it follows that the acting of Faith upon them as the Doctrinal Object of such divine original is grounded on the holiness and truth of the omnipotent and eternal God. Wherein it is impossible for him to deceive us in not fulfilling his gracious promises Heb. 6.18 to humble contrite and broken spirits that â—rust in his mercy In like manner Eph. 2.20 the acting of our Faith on the Lord Jesus as its personal object for our Justification is built on the foundation of the holy Apostles and Prophets Christ himself being the chief corner-stone Psal 87.1 laid by the Father in the holy mountains Whoever then believes not God on his Word and Promise makes him a Lyar as far as in his power which every one should Tremble to think on 1 Ioh. 5.10 because they believe not the record that God hath given of his Son. Which pertinently leads me into the second chapter about the Deity of our blessed Lord the natural and eternal Son of God. Which Doctrine being evicted and manifested layes a most sure ground for Faith to erect the Temple of Glory and will secure our tenure of Salvation inviolable like a House built upon the Rock of Ages that will endure to all Eternity CHAP. II. Of the Deity of Christ TO Prove the Doctrines of Christ to be true and perfect we must demonstrate his person to be infallible and to prove his sufferings to be satisfactory to Divine Justice there must be an infinite value in that glorious person who was graciously pleased to suffer for the sins of the Elect. If this be clear then Faith builds upon a Foundation as firm as the Being Fidelity and Constancy of a holy and gracious God This can't be better fixed but by manifesting the Deity of Christ in the glorious Messiah who appeared upon Earth in the dayes of Augustus Caesar Now if Christ be God even the natural Son of God then the most precious Blood of his sufferings by communication of idioms or properties between the two natures may be called the blood of God Acts 20.28 Heb 1.3 9 12 Rev. 1. â— 8 Hornbeck Mareius Calovius c. as it is in the Holy Scriptures For the Proof of the Deity of Christ I intend no great Enlargement but refer to those who write directly against the Socinian Heresie it concerns us only to argue a little upon this point and deduce some intermixed consequencies As to this great Subject having already accounted for the Divinity of the Scriptures we may now take leave to use them as Testimonies sent from heaven and left upon Record in the Church to prove this Truth On which very score it s commonly received from the Antients that the Apostle John wrote his Gospel against Cerinthus and other primitive Hereticks by the instigation of the Asian Churches But most certainly by the inspiration of the spirit of God. After him Athanasius of Egypt Hillary of France and Fulgentius of Africa and several others have largly and nervously handled the sword of the spirit against the Arians Let us however touch a few arguments in the case 1. The first argument may be taken from the Eternity of Christ no Being can be eternal but must be God. Our Lord was in Being from all Eternity and therefore must needs be God he had a glory with the Father before the world was Ioh. 17 5â— but let us joyn it with eternal sonship and infer that if he were the eternal son of God then he must be true God in Essence Heb. 1.3 for he must be every way the character of his Hypostasis or as we translate it the express image of his Person This Argument of Christs being God because he was the eternal son of God. The Jews very well understood its force and therefore presently argued against him of Blasphemy in assuming the honour of being God. Iohn 5.18 For to be the eternal Son of God he must be coessential with God which confession that Christ was the
the word therefore which is translated by Faith is a conjugate from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 verity or truth For as much as Truth is the peculiar object of trust and whence some think the word Trust to be derived 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and therefore judg that all lyars promise-breakers and false witnesses are unfit to be trusted with persons or matters of the very least importance and should be thrust out of all good mens houses and all civil society Psal 101.7 and should be forced to live among beasts or such as are like themselves which is worse and there cheat and abuse one another till their mutual extirpation or rather by godly and wise Magistrates be made to suffer the penalty prescribed by a wise and holy God Deut. 19.19 22 19. according to what their lies and false witness might have injured their brother whether in life member good name or estate they should suffer exactly the same punishment their eye should not spare nor pity according to the Lex Talionis or else the world will never be at rest nor quiet from wicked wretches But were this Law of God made the Law of Nations his blessing would follow it with more peace and tranquility then yet the world hath seen Well then as Truth is a most radiant attribute of God and dwells in his nature as he is Ens primum simplicesimum the eternal and uncompounded Being Job 4.18 And if Angels whom he charges with folly in comparison with himself do not raciocinari reason by mediums but act by intuiâ—ion how much more does that most abstruse and immense being the Father of lights both in his cognition of all things at once and according to the purpose of his own will act in expressing and manifesting what he pleases to his creatures and shining upon that manifestation with such a glorious ray of truth that were it not from the darkness of our lapsed estate we should without any dispute or hesitation immediately imbrace it for the highest and unquestionable verity Hence it is that in whatever he speaks from his most holy mouth by Oracles or Prophets ratified in their authority from him must be judged a great presumption and impiety to call for a reason of any of his words or actions by bold and daring and impudent creatures For from the raies of truth streaming from the immense and soul-dazling sun of his verity flows all the certainty and stabiliment in the spirits of angels or men to fix and settle us in our belief and obedience Whoever then does believe sets his seal to the Word that God is true and he that doth not believe as far as in him lies would seem to induce John 3.33 that the holy and true God should be a lyar and deceiver and not to be trusted Such is the most horrible consequent of unb lief Though I am well satisfied that there are some trembling fouls that either from natural timerous tempers or some other dark incidencies upon their spirits do not come up to clear and comfortable actings of Faith The Lady Thomson late of Osterley park but now in heaven that abhorr the very thoughts of not trusting God upon his word of Promise and are truly gracious at bottom though cannot discern and know it As I knew not long since a gracious Person when discoursing of the work of God upon her heart â— John 5.10 6.29 said that she trembled at that Scripture in John of making God a lyar and that the deep pondring upon it was the beginning of her conversion One is apt to think it were a very easy thing to believe the holy God upon his Word Eph. 1 19 2 Thes 1.11 Eph. 3.16 17. 1 Tim. 1.15 but indeed renewed and sanctified persons have found it one of the most difficult works in the whole world because its contrary to nature to found our salvation upon anothers righteousness therefore needs a miraculous work from God to effect it in us It 's true that the doctrine of the Gospel is a most faithful saying that is a most certain and undoubted assertion full of grace and truth and worthy of all acceptation or embracing utrique ulnis in utraque cordis camera in our most intimate bosomes that Christ came into the world to save sinners But it requires almighty power of the spirit of Christ to bring us to the obedience of faith But of this more God granting in the sequel Now I 'le proceed about some things in the nature of Faith to which end I may recount that good old saying of Austin cited by some Accipe signas receive it that is believe it and thou fealest to the truth of God. Thus Sarah acting by Faith judged him faithful who had promised and attained the end of her particular trust in the case whereunto God had spoken But not to dilate in generals I might proceed to the hononymy of the term and the various Synonymous expressions of it found in Scripture I might from fathers and schoolmen from confessions of the Reformed Churches and their commentaries common places and Systemes from controversial writings between us and the Romanists and from the many holy practical writers of our own on this very subject raise a great pile or mass of discourse and therein but actum agere over and over with the same in some little varieties But I forbear since my chief end and scope is principally to erect and comfort broken languishing spirits that hang in suspence as it were between the hopes of heaven and the fears of hell I would gladly put a Scripture staff even one of the staves of the Ark within the Sanctuary into the hands of every weary and heavy laden soul I shall not then be nice or over-curious in handling this point under the distinct heads of definition or description or in distinguishing it into several sorts and so proceed to examine all the causes effects properties adjuncts contraries and the several corollaries deducible from all or the cases of conscience doubts and objections afflicting troubled spirits for they are innumerable but only treat upon some particulars most practical and useful either past by or but lightly touched by others As Doctor Boodt that learned Physitian and of great request with the Reverend Bishop Vsher was more pleased to write de affectibus ommisses of cases not handled then to trouble the world with large bodies of Phisick over and over So should all endeavour not to burden the church of God with swelling discourses wrought up into a cumbersome Tympany out of others preceding who have done worthily in their generations but should either add quid novi or quid noviter either something new that may increase christians knowledg and grace or after a concise and clear method that may raise the fancy sortifie memory and take with such as are out of the church to help on their conversion Though I am sensible
the particular faculties let us further manifest it and begin with that of Philip to the Eunuch of Ethiopia If thou believest with all thine heart thou mayest he baptized so our Lord to the two Disciples O foolish and slow of heart to believe Again in the Epistle to the Romans If thou shalt believe in thy heart thou shalt be saved For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness and we are commanded to trust in the Lord with all our heart And again Christ is said to dwell in our hearts by Faith and on the other side unbelief is fixed also Eph 3 17. Heb 3 12 or seated in the heart Take heed lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief I might multiply but its obvious in Scripture The Jewish Rabbins or Philosophers such as they are use to place the Soul and its understanding faulty in the heart Job 38 36 according to that in Job Barthol Anat. Hag. 165◠8 d. Cartesius l 3 c 6. p 336 Fromond de anima Who gives understanding to the heart but the Greek Schools in the head or brain where some Anatomists have found out a chamber of presence and therein the Glandula pinealis where this Empress sits in state and commands the little world or Empire of man. The Peripateticks give the Soul a Forest-range through the whole body others as Tremember conceit that it swims in the blood and flies up and down in the spirits c. and make a great stir about the fibula animae the button or bond that ties or links the rational and animal soul together and when they come to the powers and faculties of the Soul they make great distinction and from thence their notions are derived and mixed with many subtleties among the school Divines in the dark times before the Reformation appeared Whose works though in some things may be of good use to fix terms and distinctions yet ordinarily their niceties have eaten out the heart of solid Divinity till the happy dayes of the restauration of the Gospel As to what we are upon Durandus Q Scaliger c. I think with some of the School men and several other Learned men of late that there is no sound foundation in reason for this variety of faculties specifically distinct as some would have it yet having asserted that Faith is subjected in the whole Soul that I may conform to the received and used Opinion I would shew how Faith resides and acts in every reputed faculty and thence by induction of particulars in the whole Soul. That Faith is seated in the understanding is undoubted because it is a rational act of the soul being resolved into the divine authority of God who is insallible Since also our reason is finite corrupt and obnoxious to many impostures from satan I take him for the wisest and most rational person who in the deep and profound mysteries of Christian Religion 2 Coe 4 4 acts his reason by Faith in this life and waits for fuller Revelation when he comes to glory Here we see that is understand but in part but there we shall know even as we are known 1 Cor 13 12 In the work of Grace the understanding is first enlightned to know the truth called the opening of the heart in Lydia Acts 16 14 Joh 4 10 our blessed Lord tells the woman of Sichem if thou knewest the gift of God thou wouldest have asked him for living water There 's a thick massy wall broken through by the hammer of Gods word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 within the stony heart 2 Cor 10 4. and a clear christal window placed in the breach that the light of the glorious Gospel may shine into the mind 2 cor 4 4. which before was blinded by the God of this world that they should not believe the truth Eph 5 6 Ye were darkness it self sayes Paul more than Egyptian or Cymbrian this being the darkness of the bottomless pit but now are light in the Lord. This illumination from Heaven fetches off the scales as from the eyes of Paul and teaches us all to have a prospect of an Ocean of wonders in Gods Law and of deep mysteries in the promises yea to apprehend and apply them aright Isa 53 11 Therefore Faith is sometimes set out by knowledg Joh 10 38 by his Knowledg objectively shall my righteous servant justifie many Our Lord also proving his Deity by his Miracles 17 3 bids them if they will not credit his words yet believe his works that ye may know sayes our Lord and believe that the Father is in me and I in him Where knowledg and Faith are explicitly connexed together 14 20 Again This is life eternal to know thee and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent It was to that purpose our Lord made himself known and manifest to all his Disciples in the glory of his Deity Yea our Faith on him as God-man is wrought in us by revelation from the Spirit the eyes of our understanding being enligtned by him Eph 1 17 So that we have both the object and Organ illustrated at once Christ set forrh in the Gospel and our understanding shone upon by the Spirit and at length from the first degree of light the Saints proceed from Faith to Faith Rom 1 17 Col. 2.2 1 12 2 Tim 4 8 and then by holy Meditation with deligence arrive to that acknowledgment of the mystery of God and of the Father and of Christ Nay to such sweet and full assurance at last that with holy Paul they come to know whom they have believed and wait for the Crown of Righteousness at his appearance and Kingdom From all this we may conclude that a true Believer takes Christ for his Saviour and Ruler with a clear and irrefragable Judgment 2. The second particular work in the order of nature tho conjoynt in time as to conversion is the inclination of the will to receive Christ Now because the Scripture delights exceedingly to set forth our Relation to Christ by Marriage union Eph 5 32 Song of Solom I shall a little insist upon it We say then in such covenants that 't is the Will that makes the Match T is not the saying a few words in the Chancel out of a Book by inforcement of Parents or Friends instigation against their own wills and minds such Marriages are but bruitish conjunctions when persons marry meerly for Money or outward Preferments not unfained love which God never ordained or appointed to be the ends of that blessed union but with the heart and sincere affection Promises are but dipt in falshoods and lies and often managed by some subtle false Judas for base ends where the sweet unforced inclinations of the will is not present which will after a while vent it self in captious perverse suspitions and unnatural reflections and seldom ends but in gall and bitterness
conversion as holy Austin declares expresly concerning himself under a fig tree in the Garden at Millain Confes l 8. c 1â— not difformous from that of the Prophet Isa 30.21 They shall hear a voice behind them saying this is the way walk ye in it Q. But some may say If Faith be wrought by the Holy Ghost Gal. 3.2 how is it said that we receive the Holy Ghost by Faith A. I Answer Tho the Holy Ghost work Faith in us at first that Faith which was wrought in us by him is further augmented and increased in us by the fame holy spirit and acts together with him in prayer for a further addition of his gifts and graces Besides in the primitive times it was the method of mercy that when persons had declared their Faith upon that they received the Holy Ghost in his dona ministrantia or gifts for good of the Church I might treat further of the adjuvant suborninate and instrumental causes the various and wonderful methods the seasons and times of divine working As Naaman was excited by a poor captive Maid at home and by his Servants abroad to believe God for his cure by the Prophet it is in thousands of cases and notable circumstances wherein God produces this blessed work but I must surcease and end with a deduction that since the work of Faith is supernatural and our conversion birth from the spirit then are we not the sons of God begotten by the will of man Joh 3 6 Joh 1 12. but of God and are breathed upon with the breath of spiritual life by that free agent the spirit of God. Not where and when the heady list and free will of man pleases that great Idol of a perishing World Act 18 29 Prov. 1.19 Eph 2 1 rejecting the free grace of God. Faith is of Grace There 's no power in nature to believe nay the very preparation of the heart is from the Lord. We are by nature dead in sins and trespasses and can no more believe than the old feigned Atlas can support the heavens or an inconsiderable fly with her impetuous hummings can shove a Mountain into the Sea. But I pass to the six Sections belonging to this Chapter whereof briefly hasten-to the Chapters I chiefly aim at SECTION 3. The next thing to have toucht was the more immediate and peculiar Object of Eaith and that 's no more than the person of our blessed Lord in his sufferings our beloved Saviour on the Cross viz. to believe on his Name to look up to the Antitype of the brazen Serpent John 1 12 Act 16.31 Rom 5 11 3 25 when lifted up upon the pole of the Gospel As Paul told the Jaylor If we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved a Lord to Rule a Jesus to Save and a Christ to Anoint us and so we shall receive the attonement For God hath set him forth for a Propitiation through Faith in his blood without blood there is no remission Heb 9 22 and without blood of an infinite value there can be no expiation to infinite Justice Now if any be so bold as to dispute with their Maker why this way and no other I Answer Rom 9 20 Who art thou that repliest unto God being thy self but a defiled shiver of a pitiful Earthen Vessel ready to be dasht in pieces every moment I shall rather turn off to answer the caril of a Jew who being askt how they can expect now to be saved since their magnificent Temple and the brazen Altar of Sacrifice lie in the dust whereas they are commanded not to presume upon Sacrifice but in that place at Jerusalem since also they can legally pretend to no pardon without blood and yet will rest upon that place misinterpreted of a poor mans Offering of a handful of fine Flower Lev. 5.12 and Moses his saying from the Lord that his sin should he forgiven him To which may be answered that the Temple was dâ—dicated and the Priest and the Altar were Consecrated with blood Mat 23 19 which gave a vertue to all the Sacrifices and offerings but I rather reply that this handful was to be offered 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not as we translate it according but upon the Offerings of the Lord made by fire This being joyned with the Lords Flower which was continually burnt with the Lords Lamb of the morning or evening Sacrifice and so had its vertue from that bloody offering But alas there 's now no place to offer either Lamb or Incense or Wine or Oyl or fine Flower according to Gods Institution since the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus and Hadrian the Roman Emperors Let us pray therefore that the poor Jews might be enlightned to come to theâ— blessed Altar of the Cross of Christ and to this Priest of the Tribe of Judah Heb. 7 28 who is Consecrated for evermore But le ts remove to the fourth SECT 4. The fourth section should exhibit wherein the true and genuine essence of Faith consists The formalis ratio or that which gives to it the force and power to unite us to Christ and thereby to receive influences from him Of this having said somewhat already in this Chapter and intending God willing to dilate upon it in the next and shew that it lies in recumbency or relying upon the Lord Jesus Christ as he is set forth in the Gospel promises I shall strike off to the fifth SECTION 5. 5. The fifth particular concerns the great ends of Faith. The first and more immediate is the forgiveness of sin and justification of our persons by the imputation of the meritorious Blood of Christ Acts 13.38 39 As Paul in his Sermon at Antioch in Pisidia preacht the forgiveness of sins and that all which believed in him were justified from all things as to which they could not be by the law of Moses according as the Evangelist exprest it Mat. 1.21 He came to save his people from their sins A second is the Salvation of our souls according to Peter receiving the end of your Faith the salvation of your souls 1 Pet 1.9 The last and ultimate end as of all both persons and things is the glory of the wisdom justice and mercy of an infinitely holy God. Rom. 4.20 Johc 17.23 For he that believes on the son glorifies the Father also As Abraham being strong in Faith gave glory to God so Christ professes in prayer that he was glorified in his believing Disciples and when all the Saints shall triumph together in heaven their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or song of victory will be with blessing and honour and glory and power to him that sitteth on the Throne Rev 5.13 and to the Lamb for ever and ever even the Lamb that was slain even the same that taketh away the sins of the believing world SECTION 6. In the sixth place it 's of great use to amplifie
upon the foundation or ground-work of our encouragement in the management of this great affair aright by the strength and co-operation of the spirit and that 's no other than by the divine promises laid up in the covenant of grace 'T is the promise allures us the voice of the word calls us the faithfulness of God secures us the motion of the spirit prompts incites and hastens us to come to Christ who most graciously accepts us kisses us and lays us down to rest in his most fragrant bosom And here it is worth our time if every minute were more precious than the whole universe turned into a massy diamond to expatiate upon the freeness the unsought and unforethought love of God in making them the certainty of their accomplishment as built on the essence and veracity of God their riches and preciousness as being equivalent to the Crown of glory encompassed with the golden ring of eternity When we have obtained like precious Faith we shall be made partakers of like precious promises 2 Pet. 1.1 4. Heb. 13.7 6.12 as if we follow the Faith of Saints we shall at last with them inherit the same promised Kingdom In the seventh Place I might trace a little the time of Faiths first infusion SECT 7. and first operation in the heart which is undoubtedly at the new birth when ever it is But how to prescribe and when precisely to determine that in the soul of a Believer is more difficult than to state the quickening or animation of an embrio in the womb of her that is with child or for any Naturallist so set the moment of the first separation of night from day at the initiating crepusculum or ascent of the first attom of the morning raies of the Suns body or the primogenial fermentation of the vegetative soul in the seed Corn in the Earth when it begins to chit or the first vapors in Mineral beds that procreare Mercury into a running liquid body which afterward is congealed by Sulphur into Gold. Its much more difficult to set down the first punctual workings of the Spirit in our hearts Q. But you may ask me Cui Bono To what end were it to be so accurate if it were possible A. I Answer In all humility tho we never attain the precise and nicest time yet as far as we may and with what holy modesty we can attain to dive into these heavenly secrets the sooner we discern the work by so much the sooner may our spiritual joy spring which animates our services and anoints the wheels of our Souls to become like the Chariots of Aminadab For which purpose I refer my Discourse to the third Chapter of this Treatise SECT 8. In the eighth Place I might shew the inseparable union and connexion between Faith and Holiness they are individui comites sweet companions never divided but delighted in each others smiles lovely twins brought forth by grace The heart of a Believer is purified by Faith and his life most orient and beautiful in holiness Act. 15 9 Whoso then pretends to be a Believer and walks not in holiness of life is a self-deceiver and wrongs his own soul But le ts reserve this to a peculiar Chapter below Chap. 6. I should now issue this Chapter but that I desire in the close of every one to answer one or more practical Questions for our spiritual improvement referring to what precedes in the same Chapter Q. 1. If any trembling soul should ask Have I this sound Faith of Gods Elect I should Answer briefly 1. Christ is precious to every one that believes 1 Pet. 2.7 the joy of his heart and delight of his soul when but under this sweet hope and when a little quickened and enlivened in communion I sat under his shadow with great delight Song 2.3 Faith and Love alwayes ride together in Solomons Chariot which is paved with love for the Daughters of Jerusalem 3.10 2. The promises of the Covenant are precious to such a soul they are ornaments of grace about his neck and aetherial Cordials in all its fainting Fits I had fainted Psal 27.13 sayes David had I not believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living It values them above a Kingdom Q. 2. If we fear our state how may we gain Faith Rom. 10. I Answer briefly 1. By diligent attendance on the Word of God Faith cometh by hearing 2. By hearkening to the inward motions of Gods Spirit in hearing the Word Luke 24.31 When thy heart is warmed by some passage in a Sermon take special notice of that particular point It s a sign Christ is conferring with thy heart as with the two Disciples near Emmaus whose hearts burned while he opened the Scriptures 3. Ponder and meditate deeply upon that which warmed thy heart to bring Christs counsel into a resolution for obedience 4. Sacrifice these intentions upon the Altar of Prayer in the Name of Jesus Chrâ—st unto the Father But these things requiring little tracts Gerson Bonaventur Scala I le conclude with that of Gerson the Chancellor of Paris who treating of Meditation states that for the sweetest when the soul opens it self towards Heaven receiving in its precious dewes Psal 85.8 without forced and artificial methods as David I le hearken what God the Lord will say for he will speak peace to my soul Ariani perilpl mar Ery thraeâ— Benjamin itinerar which is like the mother shell of the Oriental Pearl at Baharem which Naturalists relate conceives those precious unions by the dew of Heaven But I must now retire to the second Chapter and t is more than time only I dilated upon this a little the more as being a substantial head in respect to the essential nature of Faith. CHAP II. Various Expressions in Scripture setting forth the Nature of FAITH THe beginning and carrying on of the work of Faith in the heart is set forth in holy Scripture by many pertinent and sweet expressions which tend to enlighten and comfort the souls of dark drooping and weak believers and helping them to discern the inherence of this grace in their hearts Metaphors Parables and Allâ—geries many times teach us when direct Precepts will not do the work Vpon some whereof I shall endeavour to treat in this Chapter and present them as a climax or a Jacobs Ladder whereby to scale the Palaces of eternal joy 1. In the first place Rev. 24.6 22.17 We find this grace set forth by thirsting and hungring after Christ and his righteousness which are strong and vehement appetitions after supply of proper food and moisture to refresh the Spirits and to preserve natural vigoâ— Which if not timely satisfied produce pantings faintness swoundings Psal 42.1 and at last convulsive motions the very harbingers of death Thus did holy David pant after God as the hunted Hart having lickt up a fiery Serpent pants after
the water-brooks Psal 27.13 And at other times he had totally fainted had not Faith fed his hope with a seeing of God in the land of the living The promises of mercy are made to such thirstings and strong desires after God. Isai 55.1 2. 26.8 9 12. Psal 97 12. The desire of our soul sayes the Church is to thy Name and at the remembrance of thine holiness do we rejoyce Again with my soul have I desired thee in the night when others are folded in the arms of the deepest sleep I am musing with deep meditation and am still awake with thee Then follows that holy confidence dropt in from heaven Lord thou wilt ordain peace for us for thou also hast wrought all our works in us whence it follows that when the breathings of the soul are inspired by God thâ—n his ordinance of peace shall issue from the throne of grace Besides The thirst of the soul through defect of the dewes of Zion sometimes proves so extream that it falls into a flaming Fever and lies tossing and tumbling and feeling after cool places Song 2.4 but finds no rest till it comes to the chambers of Christ and then with holy longings and bitter ejaculations cries out My heart and my flesh faileth Oh when shall I come and appear before him when shall I see bis face enjoy his love and rest in his bosom This is a sure act of Faith when the soul prises Christ above all delights in none but him as the incomparable object of his souls satisfaction if it take any comfort in sublunary things t is but in ordine ad Christum in subordination to him and in order to his glory The soul doth anhelare breath and thirst more after him than all the pleasures and treasures of Egypt the Gums of Arabia the Spices of India the Diamonds of Golcondah or the peculiar riches of Princes nay than the fragrant Rivers of Balsam in heaven it self besides him as the holy Psalmist flames it out Whom have I in heaven but thee and whom in earth in comparison with thee Psal 73.25 2. Sometimes Faith is represented by looking up to Christ with a stedfast eye and an earnful countenance till all the visive spirits pass the optick nerve and land in his bosom All the bowels of the Soul are wrackt and torn with convulsive motions and iliack passions the heart faint and sick with many a swounding fit the vital moisture having spent it self at the eyes Psal 38 10. Lam 2.11 is almost blind with the saltness of her tears and ready to give up the ghost in deep sighs and profound palpitations of heart â—ong 1 7. has only a few minutes wherein to cry out O thou whom my soul loveth hungers longs and pants after and being now set down under a Palm in the vally of tears and terrors sinks down and yet looks towards him when flying away like a young Hart upon the Mountains of Lebanon and leaving it in a desolate case forlorn and exposed to the mercy of Tigres and young Leopards Yet the Soul cries out as long as breath and life remains will I look to the place where thine honour dwells as the only one of my soul my Lord and Maker who hast commanded me to look towards thee and be saved Thy Word says Behold me behold me Isai 17.7 45.22 and my heart in obedience replies Thus will I spend my dayes and end my life This Looking to Christ is sometimes shadowed by the stung Israelites looking up to the brazen Serpent Joh. 3.14 In imitation whereof t is thought the Gentiles composed their Talismanical figures whereof the Learned often treat But letting them pass let us call to mind that Israel after their many murmurs in the Wilderness and refractary deportments toward the Rock of ages felt at length the dreadful wrath of God in sending upon them those Alati Serpentes the fiery flying Serpents of Arabia Plin. Epiyhan those angry venomous creatures which having once fastened their needle teeth and dropt their yellow poyson into the wound the stung persons tanquam a dipsade percussi were painted as said of some with various spots of the colour of Serpents and swelld immensely died with an insatiable thirst as in the deadly Calenture at Sea. But such as lookt up to the copper Serpent made at Punon Phâ—nnâ—sia metal la in Arabia and set on a Pole presently received cure as if the flesh of the adder had been laid to the wounds to extract the malignant venom Had they lookt any whither else but to this type of our Saviour all was in vain Had their eye been upon Moses in the moral Law or on Aaron in the ceremonial observances it would have performed no cure it was Christ alone who overcame the great Serpent of the bottomless pit and was lifted up on the cross for this blessed view of Faith. 3. This work of Faith is set forth by coming to Christ at his call Mat. 11.28 according to that sweet invitation of his Come unto me all ye that are weary and heavy laden c. For the burden of sin the Law Gods wrath hell and eternity lie very heavy upon conscience and will prove unsupportable unless eased by his bosom When the soul is ready to starve pines away and lockes black with famine John 6.35 then to hear that blessed voice Whoso cometh to me shall never hunger and he that believeth on me shall never thirst Where our holy Lord himself explains coming by believing pedibus fidei with the feâ—t of faith and affections 44 45 46 we come to him for salvation and so 't is used in the neighbour verses Psal 63.8 Sometimes 't is exprest by the souls following hard after God hebr cleaving that is following so closely as if it held him by the garment and drag'd after him In the times of fear and desertion it runs after God Song 1. â— 4. Bern being allured and drawn by the perfumed ointments of his name the rich odours of the promises as powerful attractives to needy and distressed persons othertimes this work is exhibited by the flying of guilty persons in old time to the city of refuge Thus David points at God as his refuge and high rock to fly to and be safe Of ancient times t is reported that the gatâ—s of these cities stood continually open that all the ways were made plain and even that every stumbling block was removed and the passages maintained with accurate care above all the high-ways in Canaan Isa 57.14 and some of the cities might be sâ—ated in plains as Bezer was that difficult ascent might not retard the speed of the flâ—er that so the soul guilty of bloody crimes Deut. 4 43. Numb 35 12 might scape the dreadful avenger that holy Law of God and having retired to the city of Christ might there continue so long as this Eternal High-priest after the order
of Melchizedeck shall continue in being and that 's according to the Law of an endless life for evermore Hâ—h 7.6.28 4 This acting of Faith is shadowed forth by our receiving of Christ and therefore must be an act of the will and affections when being sensible and convinced of his being the most adequate good for the soul stretches forth its hand like a ragged indigent beggar after a bag of gold when frankly held to him by some munificent prince or as a drooping sinking languishing patient holds out his cup for a physitians cordial For to as many as will receive him he gives out the right and priviledge of adoption to a glorious inheritance above the starry heavens John 1.12 Col. 2 6. John 17.24 Rev. 3.21 O Blessed Saviour wilt thou give thy heaven thy glory thy joy thy crown thy throne by mystical union to as many as do but accept of this motion of mercy grot de jure c. Will acceptation bring us into acquisition and a just perception of all the territories of this vast immense and eternal patrimony Who would not open his arms his heart the penetralia cordis the most intimate chambers of his soul according to all thy tenders in all thine offices and to all thy blessed purposes and cry out with vehement and ardent moans Are not the doors wide open come bright morning star come Lord Jesus come quickly True Prov. 22 16. Son. â— 5 Faith indeed is but the hand that turns the lock of the souls closet to entertain her blessed Lord But 't is the spirit of Christ who lays his powerful hand upon the hand of Faith else would continue shut and never open But this instrument of instruments as the Philosopher calls the hand acts and works in the power of that great efficient the spirit of God and is co-operative in him with him and by him Yea the spirit hath a co-essential communion with Christ himself who stands at the door and knocks by the call of his Ministers and leaves sweet smelling myrrh dropping upon the handles of the lock which like the famed oil of Lunaria beare with the comparison will eat throrow all and make the iron bolts to fly in sunder O then my soul since the Lord of glory is come to these everlasting gates take heed of a third knock lest he take unkindly depart and leave thee in the dark night of desertion 5. Another medium to set forth the actings of Faith is laying hold of him and his most blessed covenant This is called Isa 56.4.27 5. Isa 27.5.56.2 6. taking hold of Gods strength that is the ark of his strength that so we may make peace with him that dwells between the Cherubims The fame with laying hold on Gods righteousness and salvation in flying to the horns of the Altar of propitiation viz. the brazen by blood and the golden by incense Levlt 19.30 Isa 56 6.58.13 It is further deciphered by loving the name of the Lord Jehovah wherein is everlasting strength and in keeping the Sabbath from being polluted which is a special part of Gods covenant and a true token of a gracious and godly man in this his laying hold of God. Nay we find that the Lord complains of the church that few or none did lay hands on him a kind of holy violence in fervent prayers and Faith mixt with ardent desires and coming to him with earnest resolves to hang upon him as Mary did on Christ at his resurrection The Lord knew the soul of Mary would be clinging upon him and therefore with a gracious requital manifests himself to her and sends her with an errand of love to his Disciples There is a sort of holy violence and gracious impudence to be used in those cases as Chrysostome expresses it of the woman of Canaan that would have no denyal When we seek the kingdom of God Mat. 11.12 we must seek it with vehemence and take it by violence We are commanded to lay hold on eternal Iâ—se in allusion to the swift courses at the Olympick stadium in Greece 1 Tim. 6 12. who coming near the prize or garland stretcht out the hands and leapt up with some violence to take hold of the crown of victory 1 Tim 6.12 Heb 6 18 So the Apostle exhorts us lay hold on the hope that is set before us as Jacob held the Angel fast and would not let him go before he was blest Yea the Spouse in the song having found whom her soul loved Song 3.4 held him close and let him go no more 6. In the sixth place When we are now come to him and have laid hold of his strength and are sweetly solaced with his favour then begin we to relie Prov. 325 leane and rest upon him with some holy confidence For leaning and trusting are in Solomons language terms equivalent A posture this is of great sweetness and satiates the soul that it seeks no further All sublunary relations and enjoyments leaves a windy emptiness in the soul but here 's Jacobs enough which indeed contains all things and so indeed should be translated Jer 33 11. Song 8.5 Such high contentment of spirit fills the soul in her walking out of the wilderness towards Canaan leaning upon her Beloved The same posture we find the beloved disciple in John 21 20 Psal 37.5 22.8 leaning upon the bosom of our blessed Lord Thus are we encouraged in our streights to rowl our selves and our affairs upon the Almighty revolve te tua Vsher Divin p. 161. Lond. 1677. To the same purpose that holy man Bishop Vsher is much pleased with the term of the souls hanging upon Christ for life and salvation when he is setting out the nature of Faith Isai 10.20 Sometimes the Scripture useth the expression of the souls staying it self upon the Lord the Holy One of Israel in allusion to the support of a staff imployed by weak or aged persons to preserve from stumbling and falling Accordingly they find a holy rest and repose of spirit with a sweet recollection from the trembling of heart and quivering limbs by an happy settlement in his arms Yea when the feet have been swelled and blistred with rambling up and down in a weary and thirsty land Dan 8 4 here they find the shadow of a high rock with pleasant chrystal streams powring out of its cavernes to revive the faint and recal their flying spirits But now le ts search what are the great ends of the souls recumbency innitency resting and quiet reposing it self on this blessed Lord in the Arhâ—retum sacrum or paradise of his love why certainly such things that asswage its vehement thirst quell and subdue its fears compose its trem blings and allure its confidences and are no other than these following viz. Remission of all sin Justification by free grace peace of conscience when sprinkled with the blood of atonement adoption into Sonship
of life which shews the secret tremendous judgment of God that such as too much neglect the righteousness of God Mr. Hickman Hist of Arminianism p. 396. should many times have so little of their own as t is observed by a Learned Writer in a short History of such points Having thus treated a little about the necessary conjunction of holiness with Faith le ts exhibit its beautiful face in the following chrystal Glass of Holy Scripture 1. It principally consists in the inward frame of the heart according to the Will of God when the image of God does most illustriously shine into it True Religion and Holiness are fundamentally seated in the heart all other is but painted false and hipocritical Bell-Religion is but mocking of God when lewd men and women run to the Assembly to shew their clothes stare upon their goatish paramours Prov 7 14 and like the strange woman in the Proverbs pay their peny at the Temple and then with an impudent face deck their Bed with Tapistry and perfume it with Spices ver 16 17 But true inward holiness excites and instigates persons constantly upon the taming and subduing rather than bridling only their fierce and sensual lusts and to crown right reason with full power and dominion over their inferior beastly appetites which is and may be performed genuinely and successfully alone by true grace 2. Holiness consists in studying and observing the purity of Gods Worship prescribed in his Word according to his Will. For what communion can we have with so holy a God Heb. 12 9. Exod 20.24.25.22.29 42. Numb 6.24 in methods formed besides and contrary to his appointment If earthly Princes will not receive Addresses but according to their own prescriptions and appoint Masters to order those solemnities why not much rather be subject to the King of Kings that Father of Spirits and live when God had set down all the Ordinances of his Worship to Moses then adds there will I come unto you and bless you 3. In sobriety and chastity towards our own bodies 1 Thess 4.4 Tit. 2.12 possessing those noble vessels wherein our souls those Lamps of life shine so radiantly in Sanctification and Honour 4. In a vigilant care of Justice and Righteousness between man and man setting before our eyes that golden rule Mat. 7 12. of doing to others as we would others should do to us Whoever then upon the high testimony given to Faith in Scripture shall wax wanton with Grace Rom. 6.1 and fancy they are set at liberty to live as they list such do but trifle with God and impose upon the purity of his Precepts in the end will deceive themselves if repent not fall into the precipice of eternal Damnation Which point is faithfully determined in the Homilies of England concerning Faith Chap. 4. P. 23. and more copiously in the second part about Faith Page 24. where they declare Faith to be a working grace and again Page 28. citing the Apostle Peter where we translate the words 2 Pet. 1.5 Add to your Faith vertue they read it Minister or declare vertue in or by your Faith. that is shew forth the force power or vertue of your Faith in all your other graces and in the holiness of your lives by the effects and fruits of a true and living Faith. Let us now consider one or two questions and finish this Chapter at present Quest 1. What means may we use to attain and increase true holiness Answ 1. I answer Study thine own heart keep it with all diligence especially from your own iniquities Prov. 4.23 and your own special tentations by a wakeful guard both in prayer and watchfulness Observe who comes in and goes out Examine thy self more frequently and meditate deeply and seriously to give a wise and deliberate answer to these three questions in the Catechism of conscience 1. Whence came I what 's my original State. 2. Where am I what and whose work am I doing 3. Whether go I after this life is ended Give a satisfying answer according to Gods Word to these questions and scrutinies of an enlightened conscience and this will comfort you upon a dying pillow When all the world is not worth the tip of an atome to you You will need no longer Catechisms but as to dependent explications upon these heads For if your peace be made with God on this score you are out of gun-shot But ever remember Josephs question about the Eye and Presence of God in all places saying gea 39.9 How can I commit this great wickedness and sin against God. Especially consider his flaming Eye to awe you from secret sins which are all in the light of his countenance Psal 90.8 when no other eye is upon you and be ashamed to commit those things under his eye which you would blush to commit before a little child and are in a fright at the turn of every door lest a child should come in to observe you and tell tales of you when faithful Relations out of Town return again O the hellish practical Atheism that lurks in the hearts of professing hypocrites that write Sermons only to accuse them at the day of Judgment and to be a pile of papers to burn them in hell unless they repent O set your ways before the eyes of the Lord Prov. 5.21 who pondereth all your goings That 's like an Isaack in the field a Joseph in an empty house or a pious Nathanael under the Fig-tree alone John 1.48 2. Study an exact imitation of the Saints in glory that are now enjoying the promises whose faith follow If vain persons would ensnare by their scoffs or inticements remember they are but the wiles of the Devil Lustful villains dare not stand the repulse of a brave and virtuous spirit casta est quam nemo rogavit They shrink and sink with shame into the Devils bosome when the glory of an holy life chaftizes them into horror and strangling Ponder the path of thy feet and walk in the way of good men Prov. 4 20 25. 2.20 5 6. and the righteous that are the excellent upon the earth let be thy companions Aiery persons so called are fit for no company but the prince of the power of the Air that ruleth and rageth in the children of disobedience Eph. 2.2 the Sons and Daughters of Belial that shall be damned When sinners intice consent thou not A man is discerned by his companion and a woman by her Gallant as the infatuated world shamefully Italianizes but a wound and dishonour shall he get and his reproach shall not be wiped away keep thou in the path of the Just that shines more and more nill the perfect day Prov. 6.33 Mark the perfect and behold the upright the end of that man is peace Follow their grace Psal 37.37 and their glory will follow you Shining beams stream from their paths to enlighten
combustible matter and purifie the Air. Artificial implements as Locks Saws and Handles c. are made brighter by mutual affrication attrition and use So do the chariot-wheeles of the soul kindle fire by swift rotation and motion in the ways of holiness and run flaming towards heaven 4. We may argue it from the good-will of God towards us according to that in the Angelical Song peace on earth and good-will towards men peace of conscience on scripture-ground is a certain token of Gods good-will towards us Luke 2.14 But if you ask But will God pardon me in particular I Answer 2 Cor. 5 20. John 3.33 why doubt it When as God exhorts commands and sâ—nds his Embassadors to beseech us to believe him and rest upon his promise and not to make him seem to be a deceiver by our unbelief Nay thou and I and every one to whom the Word of Life doth come are commanded in particular to believe Obj. I but says the timorous soul how can I know that be means the promise of life to me Answ I Answer if thou trust him it will certainly prove so For thy accepting and then relying and resting on him to perform his promise makes up the agreement between God and thee More of this anon God willing 5. An interest in the prayer of Christ is an assured help to evidence that we are in Covenant and under electing love To clear up this we must take our Lords own reasoning before the Father I have given them the words thou gavest me John 17.8.6 verse 14. and they have received them and have kept thy word and they are hated of the world because they are not of it So that if we keep the words or commandments of Christ and are therefore hated by the world we may conclude we are his verse 9. and under the efficacy of his divine prayer He prayes for them whom the Father gave him out of the world and not for the world And lest we might say this concerned the Apostles only our Lord subjoyns I pray for them also that shall believe on me through their word verse 24. Wence we may inferr that all true believers in Christ upon the hearing the word of Apostolical Doctrine are the Subjects of Christs prayer The great end of all is that at last we may be with him and see his glory 6. Learn the blessed art of applying promises this is a sure and certain way to argue out the point of Faith and to infer assurance He that can spiritually apply a promise has the Spirit of God and acts in and by his vertue and influence A promise in the reading sparkles and shines but a promise applyed comforts and warmes Some noble cordial as Alchermes or that of Tycho or some great Elixir if charily set up in a closet or a cabinet of chrystal is an help to the thoughts but drunk or taken down in a proper vehicle makes it by divine blessing to become actually restorative Could we repeat all the promises in the Bible forward and backward and reduce them upon occasion to proper heads and use and service yet 't is special application gives the signative vertue and therefore I shall endeavour by the help of grace to give in a little aid to this purpose First Vniversals contain particulars of the same kind Indefinite and unlimited promises are equivalent to universal in a necessary matter Gods invitation is universal his proclamation extensive to all quarters of the world to all Regions and Ages 2 Pet. 3.9 Mark â—0 49.16.15 col â— 23 Isa 55.1 Rev. 22.17 John 3.16.2.37 1 cor 5 2 cor 6 17. John 6.37 God would have none to perish Ho every one that thirsteth and whosoever will let him take of the water of life freely and whosoever believeth shall not perish Wherever the sound of this Gospel-Trumpet rings Into whosoever's ears this blessed news descends from heaven he is the person invited The Lord excepts no person in the proclamation that will but receive the promise of life and although a God yet beseeches us to come to him and hath promised if we will come to accept and receive us I will receive you saith the Lord if you will come out from among them If you l come to me I will in no wise cast you out No time quality number or other circumstance of sins set barrs to free-grace The promulgation declares the mind and good-will of God and that if thou in particular accept the proffer of mercy thou mayst conclude it to be thine Because the inclination of thy will within comes down from God out of heaven and plainly determines that he is willing to save thee because thou art willing to close with his grace upon Gospel-terms of holiness and new-obedience Luke 2.14 Thy will is the effect and therefore the token and evidence of his will to thee good-will towards men Whence thou mayst collect that thy name is written within the parchments and coverings of the general promises which when thus accepted they are then particularly applyed Obj. If any inwardly object their own unworthiness Answ I answer it is a most frivolous and impertinent cavil against thy self For Christ came to save not the worthy Pharisee but the miserable sinful and unworthy Publican Rev. 3.17 Rom. 7.8.11 The Sick need the Physitian and not the whole and therefore come the rather because poor miserable blind and naked Sin took occasion by the commandment to slay thee do thou take occasion by sin to run to the promise Therefore come to Christ because lame tattered torn and wounded and sick and creeping by the hedg-side The more miserable the more acceptable when under the sense of misery thou comest to so merciful an High-priest and Saviour The promises of the Gospel are made to no other if thy case were not miserable thy coming were to no purpose The very reason which thou objectest is the only reason why thou shouldst be encouraged to come to run and flie to this bosome of mercy God has made his promises without any previous foresight of any holiness Ezek. 36.32 grace or Faith. It is for his own sake alone that he blots out our iniquities not for yours Indeed he sends his Son Word Ministers and his Spirit along with them He is graciously pleased to call invite beseech and command us to believe he promises rewards threatens punishments proffers the use and help of all imaginable means proper to this end He also by his holy Spirit moves upon our wills softens turns and bends them as he pleases and by his quickning work stirs up and guides our consciences in all its offices So that I may say Acts 13.26 as the Apostle to some of old To you is the Word of this Salvation sent O languishing trembling soul wouldst thou gladly â—embrace the promises and implore his help to do it What canst thou desire more finceâ— 't is his promise to do
when thou hast wisely and deliberately weighed the various phrases in the promises then examine the frame of thy heart and if finding them suit in some sweet measure tho not so clearly as thou longest to have it yet fear not delay not to joyn thy heart and the promise together And this moreover I 'll say to thee for thy comfort that tho the hand of thy Faith should shake with some tremblings at present be not dismayed Mat 9.2 Mark 2.5 our blessed Lord who spake to the palsie man both can and will in due time for thy inward hope is an evidence of it speak that great strengthening word to the relaxed nerves and sinews of thy Faith Son be of good cheer 2 Tim. 2.13 thy sins be forgiven thee for if thou hold but the head nay if touch but the hem of his garment virtue will proceed and thou l't perceive it by some sweet settling quietings of Spirit as when the dew of heaven falls in a still evening For he will abide faithful tho we do not in so full and triumphant a manner act Faith upon him Psal 149.4.50.23 yet he will continue to be gracious and will shortly beautifie the meek with salvation If you order your conversation aright he will shew and make to shine the face of your Saviour and the Sun of his salvation upon you his beloved ones That person may certainly conclude himself to be in Christ who walketh in this World as he did all to our proportion and continue in acts of contemplation and adherence 1 Tim. 4.8 Heb. 12.6 embracing the promises Hitherto I have spoken somewhat to the application of the promises whereby we may argue true Faith and thence lay a strong foundation for assurance but before I relinquish this Subject I would touch upon the several Arguments used by the Apostle John which he insists upon in his Epistles written on purpose foâ— the comfort of Bâ—lievers 1 Joh. 1.4 5.13 1 John 3.23 that their joy may be full and that we may know that we have eternal life To which end it is Gods Commandment to believe in the Son and to love one another Let us then mention the chief in Order 1. The first evidence of eternal life is drawn from our walking in the Light that is of holiness 1 John 1.6 2 29. 3.6 9. walking in the truth Epist 3.3 in obedience to his Commandments 1 John 2.3 5 3.24 5.2 3. Epistle 2.6 In imitation of Christs holy walking 1 John 2.6 4.17 and in purifying of our selves according to his pattern 1 John 3.3 and yet all this must be qualified in respect to our infirmities and weaknesses 1 John 1.8 9 10. 2.1 2. 2. The second Argument to prove the truth of grace and assure our selves before God is love to the Brethren 1 John 2.9 10 and chap. 3.11 14. 4.7 12 20. and in his Gospel Joh. 13 35. 3. The third Argument is from our not loving the World nor the things thereof 1 Joh. 2.15 as the lust of the flesh the lust of the eyes or the pride of life ver 16. That is 1. Pleasures of all sorts as luxury in Diet Habit Houses Gardens rambling about the World without special ends and all inordinacy and intemperateness in the body as Jerom uses to express it iâ— ventre sub ventre For they that love Pleasures and Riotings shall not be rich in purse sayes Solomon nor in grace Prov. 21.17 sayes the whole current of Scripture 2. The lust of the eye which is as to all sorts of covetousness to get and retain by right or by wrong in an excessive appetition of the things of this World which must be left behind us and do not can not fill the heart of man no nor the eye with satisfaction Eccles 5.11 Nor 3. the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the Pride of Ambition Fastuousness Honour and advancement into great places and to be alone in the Earth These things eagerly pursued eat out the heart and power of godliness 4. The fourth Argument is assumed from the anointings of their Spirit 1 Joh. 2 20 27 3.24 4.13 whereof more by and by God willing 5. The fifth Argument is taken from a holy and reverent hearing of Gods Ministers 1 John 4.6 we may know what spirit we are of by this if we receive Christ as Hilary expresses it Qualis ab Apostolis praedicatus est as he was preached by the Apostles and submit to him in all his Offices and Ordinances such a one belongs to the spirit that is of God that keeps the Doctrine of Christ as the Apostle expounds himself Epistle 2. ver 9. 6. The last Argument arises from our love to Christ 1 Iohn 5.1 and in him to the Father Now if these things be found in us we shall then overcome the World 1 Ioh. 5.4 and shall not be touched virulently or fatally by Satan 1 Iohn 5.18 shall have access to God in prayer 1 Iohn 5.14 and shall have boldness in the day of Judgment 1 Iohn 4.17 and this will so settle our sense of the love of God to us that it will by degrees cast out the torment of fear For it will allure us to a holy familiarity with divine love 1 Iohn 4.18 and so sweeten our thoughts and affections of and to him that we may begin to enjoy a kind of heaven upon earth which the Father of his great mercy in Christ grant unto us by the Spirit Having hitherto treated about Argumentation I proceed now to the second Head about attaining Assurance which is by the irradiation of the Spirit of God upon the hearts of Believers For all is in vain as to gaining of solid and permanent comfort unless the Spirit of God come in and confirm us against the innumerable doubts and cavils that will arise upon us under all our Arguings because of the subtlety of satan the natural diffidence of our own hearts and the clouds that arise from the unholiness of our lives and the dread of eternity I design therefore to treat a little while about the witness of the spirit his immediate breathings his bright shinings and as it were speakings within our hearts when a holy soul hath this witness in himself 1 Iohn 5.10 2 Cor. 1.3 Act. 10.44 For in and upon believing the Father of Lights and of all consolations sends in his own due time this his holy spirit like a dove of peace into our hearts who helps us to discern the truth of the work of grace After ye believed sayes the Apostle ye were sealed with the holy spirit of promise Eph 1 13. He is sometimes set forth by a Seal and a Witness to the bond of the Covenant by a Seal and an Earnest to the contract about the inheritance 2 Cor. 1.22 by a Seal and a Love-Token or an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a word used of old to note
precepts and the promises being the rule of asking We have a most free access to plead the promises both of this and the life to come Eph. 3.12 Heb. 4.16 1 Tim. 4 8. so that by holy degrees and steps we may arrive to further humble confidence of divine mercy 4. When we feel some gracious risings of love to God as pardoning our iniquities for Christs sake and tho we do not so fully and sweetly feel it as we would yet our hearts do pant and long after it This is a true sign of Love. But yet to clear it a little the humble soul will ask Quest How shall I know that I love God Ans I answer Of all the affections that spring and bubble out of the will this is most easily to bediscerned and known Do you know the Sun when you see him walk in brightness do you know that you live by the actings of the senses and the pulsation of your arteries or do you know that you walk when you move your feet and feel your motions from place to place you may as certainly know your affections and the workings of your Soul This distinguishes men from Bruits in the acting of their reason upon all they do and in managing ends and means The affections spiritually beating are the pulsations of the regenerate heart Observe then your Objects if you love the things above better than all below Col. 3.2 Isal 73.25 in your choice and preference tho sometimes under some ebbs and eclipses yet still you find an inward regard to God and his glory and that you perform every action in ordine ad Deum and love all as to the inward sincerity of your heart 1 Cor. 10.31 and enjoy every relation with some desire to work up your mercies towards God in thankfulness and usefulness These are good tokens that you are risen with Christ by Faith and that your life is hid with God in him and that by continued degrees of Sanctification you shall at last arrive to this even to appear with him in Glory 4. But that I may at length wind out of this delightful Labyrinth in discoursing about Assurance Let us hearken to the second Question wherein the Soul being somewhat revived does now start the fourth Particular at the beginning and that is Quest 2. How may I preserve and retain Assurance when it is gained Ans The reason of this Question arises not only from hence because the sweet sense of divine love is a most desirable frame of Spirit and fills the soul to the brim with joy and peace in the Holy Ghost and besides renders persons very serviceable and greatly honours Religion But also because 1. Many gracious persons that have true Faith yet labour under deep fears of Hypocrisie arising from their pious Education not answered by proportionable holiness It puts great jealousies in their hearts that all they have done is but a forced work and a habit of formality attracted from the precepts of godly Ministers and Parents instilling into an inlightned conscience the frightful form of an outward conversation consonant and therefore fear at a strange rate that their diamonds are but as it were from the soft Rock of St. Vincent their Gold but Alchymy their Faith but fained and temporary But be not discouraged For that Faith is true and unfeigned which proceeds from a pure heart 1 Tim. 1.5 19. and a good conscience that is without fraud and guile in setting it naked and open before God Act. 24.16 in labouring and exercising to keep a good conscience in sight of God and Men. You may then rejoyce in the testimony of such a conscience having been upright before him in the main bent of the soul Psal 18.23 and in keeping from your own iniquity What tho thou didst not come in with such remarkable pangs no more did Zacheus nor Lydia T is not the manner but the truth of our coming in to Christ is the great point if thou constantly adhere to the Lord with full purpose of heart Nay what if there were some errors at first Act. 11.23 this puts no bar if the root of the matter be in thee The Apostles followed our Lord at first in some hopes of preferment in the temporal Kingdom of the Messiah but at length understood the Doctrine of the Crosse better which God in great tenderness is pleased to vail from young converts at first or at least preserve them from suffering till they are strengthened and then like the Apostles they still cleave to and continue with the Lord under all trials by the exceeding power of his might And thus as I remember Dr. Crakenthorp in defending of Cyprian and Jerom against some pontificians imputing some errors to them Crakenthorp of the sixth Council P. the better to vindicate their Liberius answers that if they did erre they did it not willingly but were ready to reform upon the first approach of Scripture light and conviction T is so in our case they are ready with that holy man to pray what I see not teach thou me Job 34.32 The mind and will of God is the perfect square rule canon and compass of all their actions and tho they may fail threu ' weakness yet never thru ' wilfulness Wherefore be not out of heart O tender and trembling soul let not go your hope and confidence because you have not had so long and such bitter pangs in the new birth that makes the work the harder but not the truer A child may be born sometimes with greater ease and speed Great horrors may attend great sinners and yet after all their heavy convictions may stick in the birth and never be truly converted till they are truly and perseveringly reformed which indeed cuts the work short and makes the evidence clear If thou hast been under a gentler hand from God bless him with louder Songs of praise For the shorter and sweeter the method the greater is the mercy and as one said A young Saint may make as old Angel. 2. This question begs a full answer because though want of Assurance does not denote an unbeliever yet it keeps a true believer under the dark shades of fear and sorrow Assurance besides in the best of Saints is but an imperfect work because our Faith it self is but imperfect we see but in part because we do but trust in part If our Faith do at any time waver and stagger â—ol 2.2 assurance must needs qviver and shake It 's true there 's mention made of the riches of full Assurance but that 's comparative in respect to some Saints and mentioned as attainnable with full sweetness and may possibly for the main continue pretty constant especially in very active and suffering Saints yet 't is not without ebbs and buâ—â—etings in the best There are but few that walk in the mountain of Sun-shine all their lives as 't is said of Zabarel the Philosopher when one day
not with allowance it is adherence Thus far that holy man. I like well that saying of his Or any of these for so should Signs and marks be framed by Divines for examination of distressed souls that the meanest and lowest Form of Christians may reap true comfort by their laborious gleanings when a higher and more experienced Christian may possibly carry more sheaves of this joyful harvest in the bosom of his soul Now tho I have been larger than ordinary in this Chapter out of tender regard to troubled and darkned Spirits yet I hope the multiplicity and variety of expressions which to the Learned in Christs School may seem somewhat long may beg and obtain their loving and candid excuse since I hope thru ' grace I may say with some graines of integrity that I have endeavoured to manage my words with some care and circumspection in the main that so if possible I might with divine assistance and blessing help to draw some out of the pit where no water is and that I might not grieve no not one soul of the generation of the Just but to be a helper of their Faith Joy. If any think I have been too copious I beg their copious pardon Dulce est ex magno tollere acervo It s comfortable gathering for an exilâ—d Ruth and upon Boaz his leave order to ramble all the Field over to glâ—an where and what she pleases The Lord increase our Faith and give leave to our Joy to go up with a Pipe into the house of the Lord as in the solemn Feasts Isai 30.26 and sing the Songs of Assurance in the heights of Zion Which conducts me into the view of the next Chapter to set forth the danger of unbelief and exhibit some preventives against the rising of that sore sin That the Lord may be graciously intreated to advance the work of Faith with power and fulfil all the good pleasure of his goodness â— Thess 1.11 that the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in us and we in him CHAP. IX X. THe ninth Chapter about the grand danger of Vnbelief and some methods to avoid the sunk Rocks in that dead Sea and likewise the tenth about the choice blessings and inestimable benefits that flow from saving Faith how thereby a good Christian by the grace of God may live a joyful life in the midst of all his troubles and ride in one of our second Solomons Chariots over the Kidron of death unto the Mount Olivet of Ascention into glory but what I said before upon the titles of the 4th and 5th Chapters crave also a Super-sedeas or a Writ of Ease for these tho I am somewhat unwilling to omit them especially the 7th about the infirmities of sorrowful and deserted souls If the published papers find acceptance with the pious it may encourage the others to appear in Gods due time as a second part of this Tract if they may be thought useful but at present they are left to some other providential opportunity if the Lord permit and prosper it which I humbly give up to the divine conduct in sparing of life and shining upon the seasons of his holy Will and Pleasure if otherwise I hope the Lord will stir up some to perform the like with more usefulness and success in advancing the poor in spirit toward the Kingdom of heaven then any of these mean helps could have effected and so I leave this and all the labours of any of His faithful Servants with the great Lord of the Vineyard and conclude this Tract with the Epilogue to the whole which I had prepared THE Epilogue Or Conclusion in some Corollaries or Deductions from the precedent Discourse tho cut short in a great measure contrary to my desire and intention THe main Body of this Treatise being finished I thought meet to draw some useful deductions for profit and delight 1. The first that may arise is That if true Faith be the only means to Salvation thru ' Christ then natural reason is insufficient to guid us in the way to Heaven Not that the true use of reason should be laid aside in drawing Logical or Rational consequences from Scripture Assertions but we must not use it to lay down Principles and Axioms founded and grounded only upon the light of nature which is not furnisht with ability to dive into the wonders of Gods love or the deep mysteries of his Gospel in order to Salvation If it were since the Ship-wrack of humane nature capable to work such effects what then needed the Revelation of a Saviour and why hath the Church of God thought meet to comprehend the Doctrine of life in Creeds or short Systems of points purely and meerly to be believed Farewell all Articles and Confessions of Faith and in truth all our Bibles if reason were the only Cynosure or Polestar to direct us to the haven of happiness But blessed be God he hath infused better thoughts into us and bestowed better things upon us and which do accompany true salvation Vpon many accounts therefore do we reject humane reason in the sense forementioned as a true means to discover God in the new Covenant or to open a way for reconciliation to him and peace with him or to hold any saving communion with him in grace and glory 1. Because natural reason as such in its noblest and most sublime estate is but a finite Agent and therefore cannot drink in things of infinite depth There 's no proportion between finite and infinite the organ and the object John 3.11 The cockleshell of mans brain cannot contain the immense and superlative knowledg of heavenly things who can expound the Trinity the union of the two natures the incarnation of our Lord from a Virgin the union of the Members of the mystical body by the spirit the resurrection of the dead and the true nature of Eternity and several other It s therefore necessary to act Faith upon the Doctrines revealed by God in holy Scripture Nay how can Naturallists with any face hope to measure these deep counsels and wayes of God when there are so many things both in Mathematicks and natural Philosophy and Physick that pose the most acute Philosophers in the world and set them together by the ears and so are like to the end of the world As about the progression of two parallel lines Mr. Boyle in a late Tract in 8 vo 1685. the quadrature of the circle the extimous convexity of the heavens the wonderful motion of the fixed Stars that a fixt Star should move in the aequator 52555 miles in a minute that one of the first magnitude is a hundred times bigger than the Earth and that so many thousands of them keep their constant mutual distance since the Creation and yet move in a liquid aether Who can determine the motion of Mars or the Moon exactly or expound the Load-stone in all its variations or clearly reason out all difficulties
crucifie them to the world more and more You begin to grow up and some into years It s high time as the Apostle exhorts to put on the Lord Jesus and to make no provision more for the flesh and the lusts thereof Rom. 13.14 5. Fifthly The Doctrine of Faith infers it to be great wisdom and duty to keep your consciences undefiled For the mystery of Faith is held and preserved in a pure clean and serene conscience 1 Tim. 3.9 like a chrystal Venice-glass tipt with gold 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that runs like a clear sweet stream not conscious of any sin wilfully committed 1 Tim. 1.19 It s sometime termed a good conscience whereof wilful sins make sorrowful ship-wracks A good conscience is a continual feast gave Paul a Banquet every night and composed him to a better rest 2 Cor. 1.12 than in a bed of Roses But why is a good conscience such a golden vial for Faith Because holiness of life feeds conscience with joy and thereby testifies and comforts about the truth of Faith. 6. Sixthly We may observe from the former tract that Faith is an excellent engine to discern and observe the wise Government of God in the World and in the Church It s a Telescope to discern afar off in the heavens and a Microscope to pry into minuter accidents in the earth Had we no other Argument Heb. 11.3 yet by Faith we may know it and that more fully and punctually how the worlds were framed and by Faith we understand the divine dominion and management of the world by Spirits He maketh his Angels Spirits Psal 104.4 his Ministers a flaming fire of some whereof le ts speak in order 1. First God manages many things by the ministration of Angels They are the seven eyes of God that joy to see the plummet in the hand of Zerubbabel for rebuilding the Temple Heb. 1.7 Zech. 4.10 Dan. 9.21.10 13 20. Gen. 19.1 2 Kin. 1.9 15. Deut. 32.8 We read in Scripture of the Prince of Persia and Graecia of Michael and Gabriel tho the third is judged to be meant of Christ the other of created Angels which were imployed in divine works and messages and what were the Chariots of Mahanaim and near Samaria and at Elijah's rapture and other times but the holy Angels of God. There is also a place in Deuteronomy which the Septuagint read thus When the most High divided the inheritance to the Nations when he separated the Sons of Adam he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the Angels of God. Tho I do not justifie the Translation yet it shews that this notion was current among the antient Jews And altho the Pseudodionysius in his Hierarchy of Angels sets down many frivolous fancies and curiosities about their orders yet that God is pleased to execute his pleasure by the administration of good and sometimes evil Angels is consonant to holy Scripture As in the Psalmist Psal 78.49 he sent evil Angels among the Egyptians and so made a way to his anger whom some interpreters judg to be good Angels but called so from the evil of punishment which as instruments they inflicted However that be yet t is a Scripture truth and an object of Faith and known by experience in several ages And altho the methods be unknown yet the matter is certain and indeed may be joy and comfort to Saints to know that they encamp about them that fear him and are the valiant ones about their beds by night Psal 34 7 they are the holy Watchers in Daniel and the comforters and aiders of Saints by day and why may not they suggest some heavenly ill apses as well as evil Spirits tempt when God permits It s ground of sweet joy and praise for the Saints to have such society and communion with these holy Sons of God these Morning Stars that sang before him Ioh 38 7 Zech 6 8 It s said of them that they quieted the Spirit of God in the North Countrey that is Gods wrath was satiated by the execution of justice upon Babylon in the ministry of these holy Angels They fought against the Assyrian in Sennacharibs Camp 2 King 19 35 Zech 1 8 2 Chro. 35.21 they were in Battel aray against Babylon among the Myrtle Trees What may we divine of the visions to Pharaoh Necho when commanded to go up against Carckemish the Cercusium in Ammiano or of that to Alexander in Josephus or of that voice to Totilas commanding him to go against Italy and making him the flagellum Dei Gods Scourge to the Nations were not they secret impulses and instigations of Angels upon their Spirits to do the work of God 2. Sometimes by the spirits of men God turned the Egyptians hearts to hate his people and deal subtilly with his Servants after a while Ps 105.29.37 Eâ—od 12.36 he gives them favour in the sight of the same nation so that they lent them what they required both Jewels of gold silver and raiment sometimes a Pharaoh that dealt kindly with them all the days of Joseph and then other Pharaohs that were very harsh and cruel to them Sometimes a Grecian Alexander shall favour them and after him Antiochus one of his Successors deal barbarously with them When Israel was come into their own land God promised to restrain the Spirits of the Neighbouring Heathens at the three times a year when they went up to worship yea to bridle the inward desires of the adjacent nations Exod. 34.24 that not a man of them should so much as desire their Land. In after-ages the Prophet Daniel treating of the times of the silver breast Dan. 11.27 Prophesies there should arise two Princes scil Antiochus Epiphanes and Ptolomaeus Philometor who should speak lies at one table but it should not prosper that is make feigned shews of amity when they feasted together but it should not avail them To name no more there is a wonderful Praediction in Ezekiel that in the latter days not yet fulfilled things shall then come into the mind of Gogâ— that is the Turk or Tartars as the learned judg He shall think an evil thought Ezek. 38.10 even to come into the Land of Israel ver 18. ver 22. after the Jews are re-entred into it But the Lord will plead against him to his utter destruction and he shall be finally ruined when the Lord will raise up the Sons of Zion against the Sons of Greece Zech. 14.3.9.13 that is against the Turk or Tartarian in that day having fixed his seat at Constantinople in the old Imperial Pallace of the Graecian or Eastern Empire and being the Successor of the Graecian Alexander in his East Dominions 3. Sometimes by the heavenly bodies and their influences by the spirits of meteors and many other natural exhalations out of the sea and bowels of the earth as from Vesuvius Aetna Hecla and the Vulcanian Islands How did the Stars in their courses fight against Sisera Judg. 5.20 causing great inundations in the
River Kishon that ancient River or River of Antiquities or great battels of old but now swelling to a great overflow swept away the Host of the Canaanites How did the Lord tame the pride of Egypt by locusts hail fire and frogs and darkness that might be felt thick fogs as black as pitch and many other ways How did God subdue the proud Pope Hadrian by a fly c. There 's no age but ecchoes and cries aloud to all people to prove and make all to acknowledg the Soveraign Dominion of the Lord of Hosts in the Heavens Earth and Seas and over all Creatures nay under the earth in Mineral Caverns if Paracelsus and the Learned Agricola write true stories of multitudes of Spirits and living creatures in the bowels of the earth All testimonies trumpeting aloud how God at times arms what of his Hosts he pleases for the protection of his Church and the ruine of his enemies Famous is that memorial of the cloud which presented its dark side to the Egyptians but gave light to Israel when the Red-sea stood up in heaps and the depths were congealed or frozen in the heart or midst of that sea Exod. 15.8.14.22 so that the waters became as a wall to his people which the Egyptians essaying to pass thorough were drowned Nay the wonderful motion of the tides which is so great a mystery Heb. 11.29 Exod. 15.10 Psal 147.18 is managed by Gods Wisdom and the inconsiderable sands are a boundary to the Ocean determining how far his waves shall toss themselves and go no further Jer. 5.12 They have their stated and fixed limits by the laws of Creation which has settled their channels into which they shall subside at his command Some there be to mention it a little that would inferr the sea to be higher than the earth from such a Text. But 't is a mistake and misapply of Scripture Jonah 1. Exod. 20.4 Psal 24.2 Psal 107.23 which expresly sets the waters under the earth and that it is establisht upon the floods and mentions mens going down to the sea in ships If the sea were not lower comparatively to the ordinary surface and globe of the earth besides the mountains how can all the Rivers râ—n down into the sea if the earth out of which they spring Psal 42.10 Eccles 1.7 Jer. 51.42 were not higher wherefore the Prophet alluding to the natural situation foretells that the sea should come up upon Babylon and more to that purpose But this belongs not properly to our present work only so far as to shew that God rules the raging seas and the stormy winds fullfil his pleasure Let 's step to Land and end our voyage with one note more Psal 1â—8 8 to observe how that God injoyned Israel to plow and sow for six years but must trust him for the seventh and part of the eighth till the harvest came living for the while on the blessed providence of God sending them the greater plenty in the foregoing years 4. Fourthly and Lastly le ts touch a little upon the mysterious government of the Church by his most Holy Spirit swaying his golden scepter in the hearts of Converts and ruling them by his rod out of Zion But this refers to that great point of communion with the Spirit of God Psal 110 2. which this treatise only considers in the doctrine of assurance Chapter 8th and in one further consequence following which is the seventh 7. We may learn from the preceding tract that the knowledg of our Faith and the attainment of assurance flow principally from the influences of the Spirit of God. He is the profound teacher of all mysteries and the worker of Faith and therefore gives the clearest evidence without the necessity of arguing when he is pleased to speak to the heart Joh 16.13 He shall teach you all things our Lord promises and guide into all truth He glorifies the Son receives of his shews it to us and manifests things to come Where he teaches any doctrine he works the knowledg and sense of it into the heart and causes us to believe He is the former of faith he commands and inclines us to trust and imprints the image of Christ upon us Epist Gassendi de motu impresso c as the vis impressa sends out a power from the hand or instrument upon the ball arrow or bullet which together with the air that 's gathered by the force into an impulsive vortex behind the body as in the ignis lambens carries on the motion to the end of its vigor 'T is more abundantly here when the spirit becomes the arm of God to break the stone in the heart he moves works in the most intimate recesses of the soul he shapes and forms the new Adam within us and inspires it with fire from the throne between the wheels of the cherubims Ezek. 10.7 He is the skilful architect of the Temple of the Church cementing the living stones together which were cut out of the mountain of the divine Decrees to make a glorious Habitation for God by the Spirit Eph. 2.22 Let 's then never forget to be earnest in prayer for the gift of the spirit since the influx of all grace and the beautiful enamel of our hearts with heavenly gifts flows from this holy spirit of Vrim and Thummim And the truths in Scripture can only be settled and confirmed upon our hearts by him He is like the master of Assemblies that fastens the nail in a sure place Eccles 12.11 like the great shepherd that knock's in the paxilli in caula the stakes about the hurdles of the sheep-cotes to keep the harmless creatures from the Wolves close and warm together in a dark and stormy night 8. Another deduction from the former treatise may be that the number of true believers is very small for the generality of the world knows not God in Christ The Turks indeed own him for a great Prophet but disdain his banner The Jews confess there was such a person at Jerusalem but contradict his message blaspheme his Deity and stumble at his sufferings Among the various nations bearing the name of Christian what wild confusions and absurdities are practised in Muscovy by the testimony of the ingenious Olearius Marriage and what rude mixtures and barbarities are found among the Abyssins south of Egypt as we are taught by that learned Writer Ludolphus or what ignorances blind Customs and perverse worshippings are notified among the Armenians Ludolph Edit 1684. Fol. Maronites or Thoma-Indians as are related by Breerwood Paget and in the collections of travels in Purchas and several others What shall we say to the corruptions among the Pontificians nay in the Reformed Churches of God in the world and how are the lives of most grown degenerate and prophane insomuch that one has adventured to pronounce that 't is hazardable whether above one in a million may be saved I remember also to have read somewhere Dr. Mouliâ— that Chrysostome should say to
the people of Antioch that among so many thousands in that great City that scarce an hundred would be saved and he doubted of that too When we ruminate and consider of the pride vanity luxury wantonness excess and rioting pleasure and vain-glory envy backbiting and variance both among Ministers and people neglect of holy duties love of the world and the perishing trash and trifles therein The contempt of the Gospel and faithful Ministers we must subscribe to that of our Lord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Fear not little yea very little or diminutive flock when not only all the wild beasts and wolves but the goats also are separated For it is your Fathers good pleasure to give to you a Kingdom Luk. 12.32 Since the number then comparatively is so very small and the danger of miscarrying so very great oh how does it stand us in stead to make the things of Eternity establisht and sure which ushers in the next corollary 9. That the knowledge of our sincerity and integrity is of great use to gain both peace and joy in believing which is a principal aim in the foregoing treatise For though the want of Assurance doth not prove us to be under the power of unbelief yet this defect shews the weakness of our Faith and keeps the yoke of bondage in manifold fears and torments too strait and pinching upon the necks of some that are truly gracious It is thy greatest interest then to clear the case and to state thine evidences by answering to the questions at the end of each chapter or to the whole in general or by any sound way and method to manifest a work of true grace and faith in thy heart Phrase things term or call them how thou wilt but be sure the work be right between God and thee Sincerity will clear up all under various misprisions and accusations of undiscerning friends who usually insult upon persons in adversity not for want of censorious pride and folly which they seldom come to own and behold but in the glass of their own calamities yet holy Job stood his ground and which was bitter indeed to conflict with their severe animosities when under a cloud from God yet still held fast his integrity before the Lord. This is such a strong pillar that a Christian may lean the whole strength and stress of his soul upon it in the name and power of God. A dear and intimate conjugal relation who is mentioned before chapter 8 would sometimes be upon this point But am I right indeed am I sincere in my heart and love to Christ if I could but prove that clearly I know all were well I answered how do you know or can prove the truth of your love in the relation wherein you stand but by descending into your heart and examining the inward honest inclinations and readiness of spirit to any kindness and labour of love For any one may assuredly know that they have true love or any other natural affection within their bowels unless their senses and brains be deficient We may tell whether we mean honestly and truly in what we profess and do Whether our tongues agree with our hearts or whether there be found a secret aversation and loathing within or not It is so verily in the case between Christ and us ask your soul the question and answer it from the integrity of your conscience and then pronounce with the Spouse so often mentioned Song 2.16 I am my Beloveds and my Beloved is mine for he feedeth among the Lillies and Spice-beds of graces in my heart There are manifold signs of true grace set down by some most whereof might be spared being but like pitch or birdlime to entangle discouraging Spirits use but few and those very pertinent if thou find a true one truly wrought in thee t is enough for then all are there in semine in the seed-plot tho under ground As suppose unfained love to the Brethren or constant pantings after God and delight in secret communion or the like Be but sure of its true being within you it will do your buisiness by serious pondering and rumination upon it with the aid of Gods Spirit Some are over-free in multiplying tokens it shews a popular invention but not very logical and rational because usually co-incident and but little comfort rather sorrow and perplexity arises thence to mourning souls under the absence of God and therefore be advised to forbear because they will not agree to the various forms especially the lowest state of Christians and then there 's wise work for tentations when you grieve the generation of the just whom God would not have grieved Psal 73.15 If then all your multiplied signs do not comfortably agree with thy strict and impartial search Be not cast down For an honest heart having true love to Christ tho mixt with failings yet all lamented and none allowed Rom. 7.5 but hated and striven against with an inward content of soul and joy that it can bear up against the stream of corruption and with all its care towes the boat up the River toward the Spring of its happiness and tho it find much unholiness ye◠melts and grieves over it studies amendment in what the word and conscience smites upon and that with some improvement in mortification and some growing in grace or a gracious willingness to be and do so mixt with honest endeavours tho it be not so lively and flourishing as it would tho the soul labours and sweat in the fire of contention and conflict with its lusts and corruptions and feels not that success it prayes and thirsts after yet do not discourage nor greive thine own spirit and so hinder its elevation to work and service The root of grace appears to me to be plainly in thee and that it will by degrees wax and increase like the house of David and if thou canst perceive some growth tho but little it is a sure and certain Index of life If thou daily diest in some measure to sin Psal 18. and particularly to that sin which thou art most inclined to thy peevish froward cursed proud contentious humors and lusts or any else upon sudden inroads of Satan which thy heart and faithful Ministers and Friends check thee for and beginnest to live a little more to holiness then thou didst and growest perseverest in grace and art watchful against thy lusts and humbly and meekly thankful to them that reprove thee and labourest to imitate the holiness and meekness of Christ the beloved I must say and insist upon it that sincerity is the cardo rei the very hinge of that door that lets thee into life and salvation and if thou dost truly love him who pardons all thy foolishness I say then th◠thou fear the work that it was not right at first at such a time when thou thoughtst it was a sound and a true conversion never stand puzling and frighting your spirits about the point what that
beginners insist a little according to what I may by the help of grace and ponder on the first discoveries and discernings of this work in the heart under the beginning work of Regeneration that is under the present agitations and breathings of the holy Spirit To which purpose I may genuinely compare the sense which the mother of an Embrio begins to feel when discerns an inward conception by some secret pulsations â—s of a little wind in her bowels and some nauseous ebullitions from her stomack Ferneli de c. Weckerus de Secretis l. 4. P. 85. Bas. 1629.8 thereby perceives there is a new work of impregnation formed with in bevond all observations of the state of body since her birth and begins to give a right judgment that in Gods due time she may become a happy Mother indeed of some beautiful creature Or give leave to behold it in the glass of another Emblem It fares here as when persons by some unobserved and unforeseen emanations of spirits from the heart Plin. l. 11. c. 37 Song 6.5 4.9 and pressing through the optick nerves flow into their mutual eyes and dart themselves into one anothers breasts whence they become suddenly taken and as it were inkindled by certain lineatures in their feitures and are rapt into deep admiration of somewhat in each other which neither themselvâ—s nor the wifest Philosopher in being can give reason fagacious enough to unfold the surprizing influence when they are constellated to conjugal union So true is that I think of Lucretius Multa tegit sacro involucro natura neque ullis Fas est scire quidem mortalibus omnia c Nature with sacred mantle things does hide Nor can Man's wit such mysteries decide Much more deep shall we find it to be in spiritual and divine concernments when the Soul having heard or read of the admirable and unparallel'd incomparable excellencies of Christ begins by the powor of heavens influence to hearken to Gospel motions whence the first beginnings of grace are coucht in faint and weak though sâ—eet and pleasing inclinations to hear more of that precious and excellent person Then the Soul proceeds with the Daughters of Jerusalem to enquire further of his dignities and the blessed disposition of this kingly Saviour Next after intelligence received it never rests seeking for him with the lovely Spouse In Niceph call and when once come to a sight of that glorious countenance in which Majesty and Love sit upon their Throne as 't is reported of his external hiâ—w then does the soul by this interview break forth into holy Ardors after the enjoymâ—nt of his everlasting kindness and the bottomless bowels of his infinite mercy and affection This is the point which I would endeavour yet further to exemplifie in the sequel of this Chapter and labour to state the first beginnings of grace to lie in secret motions holy wishes and inclinations of the will to Christ this Princely Saviour of the Elect. The desire of a man sayes Solomon is his kindness thâ— he cant accomplish his will yet t is acceptable with God for the deed Prrv. 19.22 2 Cor. 8.12 When some spiritual good is presented to the newly sanctified will by the light of a heaven-born judgment it draws the soul to think ponder and study how to attain that happiness and this volition or extension of the spirit is found in different persons at various times Some feel a blessed inclination from their very child hood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to Religious courses and the holy wayes of God. 2 Tim. 3.15 You may observe in some Children at four or five years old a love to the sacred Bible and the wise instructions of godly Parents It would do ones soul good to see how prettily and earnestly the little hearts will lean their heads to the wall or hangings and suck in the sincere milk of a mothers instructions as Solomon did Only let Parents be prudent and heedful in pressing too much or powring too long into little Venice Glasses lest it nauseate or run over Gen. 33.13 Remember Jacob would not drive the little ones too fast lest they died Children are like a Chicken or little Birds feed them too much and by night and you endanger killing them Be wise towards such Isai 28.10 and sow here a little and there a little and the work of God may prosper sweetly In Persons at the first workings of the Spirit of God you may observe 1. First There appears some savouring of the things of God which shews there is a new palate formed by the spirit of God in the soul â— Cor. 2.14 Rom. 8.5 suited to the Manna of heaven they begin to mind the things of the Spirit with a disrelish of vain and frothy company a happy inclination to virtue and wholsom infusions with some reverent awe to their Teachers and instructors which when once taken off from the heart all the Argument or Rhetorick in the world shall never fasten any good maxim upon such a person but now you shall see very young ones love to have their heads in a Bible and the tears ready to spring at some sweet passages in that blessed Book intimating to us that the same spirit who penned it hath begun to write the faithful counterpart on the fleshy tables of their hearts 2. They find and feel the inward bent of their soul to be towards God the byas of the will alwayes inclined Heaven-ward tho some rubs and hillocks may divert a while They are like the Sun-flower ever turning to that glorious Lamp or as the needle pointing to the Northern Pole. It may suffer some variations and supervariations and misteries of Declination not hitherto fully determined to heip the longitude but in the main its course bent and delight is toward that point of the compass The soul no otherwise having received an affrication or touch from divine love evermore bends the motion towards God and is enamoured upon the goodness and Excellency of our blessed Saviour Vain things like vinegar upon nitre gives an odious hiss Prov. 25.29 Eccl. 2 2. and fumes away in a Stench so does this gracious soul pity carnal mens laughter as a touch of madness and sayes of foolish mirth what does it 3. Again There is in this new heart of flesh this covenant heart an inward sweet sensibleness of that great stone of impenitence that as yet remains unbroken in pieces which with its ragged points and angles wounds the tender fleshy part and makes it bleed with joyful sorrow The holy new convert is greatly sensible of its proud flesh and that heavy lump that hangs like a talent of lead at the feet and the worlds bird-lime that sticks to the wings of the soul when it would mount up to heaven in holy duties Or as persons after a great autumnal fever labour under a squeazy stomack with a mass of baked humours at the bottom So does the