grace to improve and make the best use of this blessing to my further increase in Wisdom and Goodness which are the greatest treasures of all O that I may feel my heart disposed and enclined by a particular love to some to be kind and loveing to all other men and especially to love thee and our blessed Lord the more my best and my eternal Friend Bestow upon those to whom I am united in friendly affection all that I can desire for my self An healthful body a long life a clear understanding a ready apprehension an exact prudence a vertuous will an unwearied diligence a constant chearfulness a sweet and obliging behaviour an useful conversation and good success in all their undertakings Requite all their kindnesses to me in multitude of blessings and above all with a sense of thy Divine favour and with the perpetual joy and comfort of the Holy Ghost O blessed Lord hear all their own Prayers Hear them for themselves and for me also And stir us up all to pray with greater ardency with a more zealous affection to thy Honour and each others good and with a most inflamed desire to be as like thee as possibly we can That after a constant and hearty friendship here in this World we may have a comfortable departure out of it and rest in a joyful hope to meet together in the other life and embrace in the bosome of our blessed Lord Christ Jesus Amen Amen XI IN the next place I must exhort you to exercise a great faith in Gods good Providence which rules in all affairs This is of great force to banish all perplexing thoughts and consequently to make you of a chearful spirit and to be good company for your self when you are alone or about your necessary employments And it hath not only this oblique aspect upon our Souls to defend them from that heaviness sadness which is too apt to oppress them but is of a more direct and manifest influence to comfort and enliven them on all occasions By removing that is those impediments out of the way which are a clog and a burden to our spirits and by begetting likewise an higher faith in Gods goodness to our better part which takes such care of our lower concernments For what is it that makes our heart unwilling to go to God and to wait upon him as Mary sate at our Saviours Feet but the multitude of businesses wherewith like Martha we incumber and trouble our selves We imagine we can never take care enough about those things and when we have done our best still we remain solicitous about the success And so our Souls being already filled crowded with these thoughts there is no room left to admit of any other till they be thrust out And suppose now our own Conscience begin in this case to reprove us and bid us go to our God yet if it be that only which urges us and not a quiet faith in his good providence how do we hear those things calling us off again and inviting nay drawing our hearts to them as being indeed their own It is nothing else that distracts us but these cares which are not ejected by faith but only silenced and stilled a little by natural conscience which tells us we do amiss Or if they have lain quiet a while and given us leave to pray to God and think of better things how easily do they thrust out all our good Meditations and pious affections when they return again Nay how do they eat up and prey on the very Soul it self as well as on all the good notions which are within it If we be necessarily engaged then in more affairs than willingly we would it is as necessary we should be strongly perswaded of the Care which God takes of all things that they shall go well with those who trust in him That so we may use but a moderate diligence and not trouble our selves about issues and events and that we may save abundance of time for better thoughts and that these affairs may not take up our hearts both while we are in them and when we are out of them too That 's too much familiarity with them when they will never let us alone And we ought to endeavour that though they employ our minds for many Hours yet when we have done our work they may not then ingross our time also The care of Religion is great enough we need not take upon us the care of the World too With what reason do we complain that we find it difficult to govern our selves when it seems we think our selves meet to govern this World and all No wonder that we are weary of our work when we have not only our own to do but will needs undertake Gods work likewise We may well sigh and be discouraged when we carry such a vast burden upon our Shoulders There is no end of these Cares which intermix themselves not only with our particular businesses but trouble us continually with sad and fearful thoughts about the affairs of Nations and the state of the publique wherein our private wealth is embarqued And this is the mischief of it that when we are discouraged by this means it is a sin and not meerly our misery because we will meddle with more than belongs unto us We put our selves to an unnecessary pain to put our selves out of the favour and care of him who would ease us of this burden by casting it upon his merciful providence It is an uncomfortable and a sinful condition which is aggravated by this that it is a needless and a bold intrusion into his business who governs the World It is as if I should be very solicitous whether the Sun will shine to morrow or not when I have occasion to stay all Day about my affairs at home Let us do what concerns us and leave God to dispose of all the rest And let us believe that he will assist us in our dispatches and a great deal the more if we will not stretch our selves to meddle beyond our line He will help us to do what we ought when we do no more than we should When we are not oppressed I mean with fear that we shall not be able to go thorough our employments and when we are not too careful what will become of them after we have finished our work God will take care that we shall do them and that they shall have the best success when they are done Look upon your self as a part of the World and upon God as the Governour of the whole And then by faith in him make your self as it were a part of himself that so he may have a particular concernment in your affairs Look upon your self not only as one of his Family and therefore under his General Providence but also as one of his Children for whose good he will more than ordinarily provide And be always confident he will provide the better for you because
greatest repute in his faculty to look after their health and administer Medicines to them Just thus it is in the case of our Souls it is too much presumption and careless confidence to rely upon our own counsel alone in the setlement of our everlasting estate or in the Cure of those Disorders and Distempers in our mind which threaten danger we ought to take good advice and for fear of mistake have the judgement of some more skilful Person to secure us as well as our own And indeed from hence you may learn what account God makes of your Soul and how highly it ought to be valued by your self for the safety of which He hath made such careful and plentiful provision Having next to the gift of his Son and of the Holy-Ghost setled an order of men to minister unto Souls to look after them and see that they do not perish for want of instruction or good advice As he would have our Saviour lay down his life for them so he hath thereby made him a most compassionate High-Priest and preferred him to a Kingdome which is nothing else but an Office Power and Authority to take care of Souls and do them good continually By vertue of which he hath committed Authority unto others in a perpetual succession that they should watch for Mens souls as the Apostle to the Hebrews speaks declaring to them their own worth and his love ingrafting that Word in them which is able to save them calling them to repentance establishing them in the Faith incouraging their Progress in vertue ordering their goings feeding them with his blessed Body and Blood absolving them from their sins assisting them in their last agony that they may finish their course with joy This is the effect of a peculiar kindness to Souls He hath not dealt so with our Bodies for we never heard of a Company of Men appointed by God to invent pleasures and contrive ways for the feasting of our Senses There are none separated and set apart by him to teach the World how to get riches and improve their Estates and fill their Coffers But all the wisdom of Heaven is employed to other purposes having ordained Men to teach us how to live above those things and to replenish our minds with his knowledg and our wills with his love This he hath made their constant function and perpetual employment to the Worlds end And therefore be not slack to use their Ministry nor doubt of the blessing of God upon it But have so much love to your Soul as to apply your self to them for assistance who are particularly concerned to give it and so much love to God as to be confident he will make those means successful which he hath particularly ordained for your good A PRAYER I Adore Thee O Lord the Father of Mercies who hast designed Mankind to the greatest felicity in everlasting Life And hast not left us in pursuance of it to the uncertain guesses of our own Mind but sent thy dear Son into the World both to assure us of that happiness and to direct us by his holy Doctrine and Example how we may attain it Blessed be the tender mercy of our God whereby the Son of Righteousness hath visited us from on high to give light to them that sate in darkness and in the shadow of death and to guide our feet into the way of peace Great is thy love O Lord which after he had left the World sent his Apostles and other Ministers of thy Word to be the Messengers of Reconciliation and Peace the Leaders and Conducters of Souls the Stewards of thy Mysteries and the Guides unto Blessedness Great is thy love which to this day continueth a merciful care over Souls in providing a succession of faithful Pastors and Instructors to teach us our duty to reduce us when we go astray to resolve us when we doubt to help us when we are weak or weary and by their counsels admonitions and comforts to bring our Souls back again safe to Thee the Father of Spirits I see O Lord how dear and precious our Souls are in thy sight for which our Saviour hath done and suffered so much and imployeth still the care and pains of so many Persons to take the charge and oversight of them and guide them unto their Rest My Soul blesses Thee and all that is within me praises thy holy Name as for all other thy Benefits so for the many good Instructors I have met withall the many good Lessons I have been taught and the pious Counsels and Advices I have received I thank thee for putting me into the Hands of such Friendly and skilful Guides and that I have never hitherto wanted some to conduct me in all the dangerous and troublesome passages of my Life Be pleased still to favour me with the continuance of the like happiness enduing me with wisdome to chuse and grace to follow such a person who may on all occasions clearly inlighten my understanding settle my doubts confirm my resolutions quicken my endeavours direct my zeal keep all my passions in order and secure my goings in thy paths That so I may neither miss my way nor proceed with irregular motions nor be discouraged in it but hold an even steady and constant course in well doing till they to whom thou hast committed the care of me deliver me up in peace and safety into the hands of the great Shepheard and Bishop of our Souls Christ Jesus To whom be Glory and Dominion for ever Amen XIV BUT when you are in your best moods and think your self furthest off from danger it will be good to exercise an Holy Fear and Jealousie over your self least you should give way to any thing which may make you grow worse Remember how false and treacherous the conquered Enemy is and therefore it ought to be narrowly watcht Though it promise fair Remember that you must not trust it without a constant Guard And mark the least beginings of an evil for fear if they be slighted as small faults they draw you into a greater Though we must not be dejected for our little irregularities yet we must not pass them over neither without a serious observance If a Father laugh or smile when he chides a wanton Child it is so far from being a check to his follies that it doth the more embolden him to play those idle tricks for which he is reproved And so it is to be feared we shall find our selves disposed if we be not in good earnest displeased at our selves for any thing that borders upon Vice and do not reprove our selves seriously for making too much use of our liberty We may be in danger by this mildness and gentleness to take the boldness to proceed to further transgressions But I may seem to forget to whom I write and considering what a great quantity you have of this fear I had need give it a large dash of some other mixture least it turn
ADVICE TO A FRIEND DEPRESSA RESVRGO ECCLUS xiv 13. Do good unto thy Friend before thou dye GREG. NYSSEN 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 London Printed for R. Royston Book-seller to His most Sacred Majesty MDCLXXIII AN ADVERTISEMENT FROM THE PVBLISHER TO THE READER Reader I Have nothing to say either of this Boâ—k or of its Author But only desire the Reader if he like the Counsels which are here given for the promoting and better ordering of Devotion and for the preserving of a pious Soul in peace and chearfulness that he would be so kind and faithfull to himself as to follow them And the hope I have that after a perusal they will invite him so to do makes me secure the Author will not be displeased to see that exposed to publique view which was at first intended only for a private Persons use For if the Advice be good the more common it grows so much the better it is and it will not be the less mine when it is gone into other hands Plato I am told calls Love the Ornament of all both of the Gods and of Men the fairest and most excellent Guide whom every man ought to follow and celebrate with Hymnes and Praises And what is there in which we can better express and declare it to others than in communicating to them that which we hold in highest esteem our selves It was that which first produced this Treatise and from thence it comes abroad That which the same Person saith is the Father of delights of mirth of whatsoever is gracefull and desirable was the Parent of this Book And therefore let it be accepted with the same kindness wherewith it was writ and is now Printed Let all the faults if you find any be overlookt with a friendly eye and do not discourage so excellent a vertue as Friendship to which we owe the best things in the World by severe and harsh censures of any thing that it produces But I need not I think be solicitous about this the pious design of the Book being sufficient to give it protection if it cannot gain it approbation It hurts no body and therefore may pass it self with more safety and it offers its service to do every body good which me thinks should be taken kindly even by those who stand in no need of it As for those who shall make use of it and find any benefit by it they will complain perhaps only of the Author's thriftiness and wish he had been more liberal of his Advice And so it 's like he would if he had not consulted his Friends ease more than his own and considered rather what would be usefull than what would make a great show You will take a wrong measure of his kindness if you judg of it by the bulk of the Book which was purposely contracted into a little room that it might be a constant Companion and as easie to carry in mind as it is to carry in ones hand And let the defects of it be what they will they may be supplied out of one of the Rules you here meet with if you please to make use of it which is to chuse a good Guide from whom you may receive further Advice in any thing that is necessary for your Progress in Piety or for the setling your Conscience in peace And that we may none of us ever want such a faithful and skilful Person to conduct us and that we may receive a benefit by these and all other good Counsels let us heartily joyn in that Prayer to God which is the Collect for this Day and add it often to the ensuing Devotions Leave us not we beseech Thee destitute of thy manifold Gifts nor yet of Grace to use them alway to thy Honour and Glory through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen St. Barnabie's Day 1673. IMPRIMATUR Sam. Parker R. Rmo in Christo Patri ac Domino D no Gilberto Divinâ Providentiâ Archi. Ep. Cant. à Sacris Domesticis Maii 14. 1673. Ex Aed Lambeth ADVICE TO A FRIEND My Friend MAN bears some resemblance and may not unfitly be compared to a Diamond or such like precious stone whose darker parts confess that it is of the earth but the brighter look as if it had borrowed some rayes from the Sun or Stars He is a substance I mean consisting of a terrestrial Body and celestial Spirit with his Feet he touches the earth but with his Head he touches Heaven Though the neighbourhood knows whence his Body came and remembers the time perhaps when it lay in the dark Cell of his mothers womb yet his Soul doth absolutely deny that it is of so mean extraction And casting its eyes upward calls to mind its high descent and parentage and takes it to be no presumption to affirm that we are the off-spring of God He cannot therefore but find in himself propensions and desires not only different from but contrariant to each other For since two worlds meet in him and he is placed in the confines of heaven and earth his will must needs hang between two widely distant goods the one propounding pleasures to his body and the other to his mind And though once there was a time when these two preserved such a friendship and gave such due satisfaction to one anothers just interests and inclinations that they did not break out into an open war yet this peace lasted not so long as to let us feel the blessings and happiness thereof But that part whose kindred and acquaintance was in this world apprehended the first occasion that offered it self to quarrel with the other whose native countrey was not so visible through walls of flesh and denying to consent unto it plainly rebelled and entred into a state of hostility against it This it might do with the more ease because two parts of those three into which the Soul is ordinarily divided stand very much affected to the Body and its concernments The Desiring part that is always ready to run to any thing and embrace it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which hath the appearance of a bodily good the Angry part that is no less forward to shun and to make defence against whatsoever seems to be a bodily evil to the Rational is committed the direction and government of these which that it may manage aright it is to maintain a constant conversation with an higher good to which all the lower desires and passions ought to be subordinate and subject These are handsomely compared by a noble Greek Philosopher to the Three Ranks or Orders of men that are in a City 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Proclus L. 1. in Timaeum The Servants the Souldiers and the Magistrates The first of which are to do all the work and make such provisions as are necessary for its support The second serve for a guard to protect and defend it from all dangerous assaults And the third sits in Counsel pronounces Judgment issues out Orders makes Rules and gives
direction how both shall be employed But so it falls out that as the Slaves and the Souldiers sometimes prove mutinous and unruly and combining their forces together make themselves masters of the Conservators of the true peace and liberty so have the violent desires that are in us of enjoying a sensual good and of avoiding all outward evils and inconveniencies grown to such a head-strong and unbridled humor that they have overtopt reason and refuse to hearken to the authority and to obey the dictates of our understanding Many wayes have been tryed both by God and Man to reduce them to a good agreement again But though all fair satisfaction hath been offered and is allowed to the lower part it would not yield to a surrender of that power and soveraignty which it hath usurped As a company of Factious people that strive for superiority over their Governours when they have compassed their designs and possessed themselves of the throne are with more difficulty suppressed than they were before kept in subjection So it is with the multitude of mens furious lusts and passions now that they have dethroned reason advanced themselves into the seat of Government Having tasted very strongly of a sensual good and felt the sweetness as they take it of being absolute they are loth to be denyed the license which they have so long enjoyed and will by no means grant any obedience to be due to an higher power God was pleased therefore to manifest himself in our flesh to countenance the claim and assert the title of our Mind and Understanding and by shewing its undoubted right of Government to take up this controversie and put an end to these sad contests which have hapned to the ruin of mankind In the Lord Jesus there appeared such an absolute and constant dominion of the Spirit as in the first Adam after his fall there did of the Flesh And he came not only to give us a glorious Example to overawe all unruly motions in us by his divine Authority and to inspire our feeble Spirits with some courage by his great and precious promise of eternal life but to comfort us by his Death Resurrection and Exaltation at the right hand of the Majesty on high with the hopes of a mighty power from above to aid and assist us in our Christian conflict with all unreasonable desires This he actually sends into our souls to give them sufficient force and ability for the doing of their duty redeeming themselves from this slavery and recovering their ancient rights and liberty And in all those who attend unto his holy Counsels and receive his Divine grace and are renewed and led by his good Spirit there appear many happy tokens of the Souls victory and they are daily winning new conquests over the flesh with all the affections and lusts thereof The heavenly good seems so great in their eyes that they cannot upon any terms think of submitting their souls any longer to attend wholly or chiefly upon the pleasures and satisfactions of the lower man The mind is furnished with such right opinons the Will is become so tractable and compliant with their resolutions the Affections grow so subject and obedient to the orders and commands of both in short God and his will is so seriously loved and their Spirit strives so earnestly after the ardors and fervent Devotion of love that the ancient Government is again restored its lost authority rights and royalties are manifestly recovered and they live in good hope to be more than conquerors over all temptations from the World the Flesh and the Devil aspiring to an humble rejoycing glorying and triumph over all these enemies But notwithstanding all this these men remain still both flesh and spirit The Body is not destroyed the goods wherein it delights have not altered their nature its habitation is not removed from their neighbourhood and it retains the same inclination to them and they are often remembring it of its forepast fruitions and which is worst of all the Soul cannot presently recover its perfect health and soundness but feels the maimes and the bruises that it got when it was formerly beaten down and oppressed by them Hence it comes to pass that for some time at least there are many motions made for a revolt and every thing in the world is tampering with the heart to corrupt and bring it over again to their party and the mind it self in some fits almost wearied with their importunity may be ready to lend half an ear to these solicitations There is not such a perfect peace established but there will be some endeavours of the fleshly part to resume its power and get into its hand its pretended liberty Yea by the violence of many outward accidents the mind may sometimes fall into a dream and be tempted to muse whether there be sufficient reason to prefer those future and unseen goods before present enjoyments The Will may begin to bend it self to some civil carriage and fair complyance with the flesh the Affections being much wooed and complimented may feel themselves in danger to be inveigled or the heat at least and liveliness of Devotion may in such a condition be much abated and impaired And indeed it is not to be expected that the Body should go along as nimbly as the Spirit would have it towards a good with which it is not acquainted All that the Mind can do is to take a very great care that it move it self with as slow a pace towards that good to which the other is most inclined That we love these outward things cannot be blamed but it will require much diligence to keep our hearts from doting on that for which we naturally have no small affection That we hold some acquaintance with them can by no means be avoided but that we grow not too familiar with them ought to be our prudent care and cannot without some difficulty be prevented There will some kindnesses pass between us and we cannot deny the Body these sensible pleasures but that our Souls should thereby suffer themselves to be undermined and their interest betrayed there is no small danger For while the Good of the body is near at hand and the Good of the soul is at some distance while that which is near seems great and that which is remote seems small while the one is present and the other future while things present call upon us and we must earnestly call for things future while the one is alwayes before us and the other comes but at certain seasons while the one is of old and the other but of a late acquaintance we having been bred up with the one and being but brought to the other the one coming first and the other thereby prejudiced as long I say as there are these plain advantages on the one side if we use not attentive diligence to give the soul just and true information they will prevail with it inconsiderately to slight the
far greater advantages on the other Just as you see sometimes a wild-headed and unthrifty Heir though there be no comparison between his future inheritance and a small sum of present money yet for the pleasing of a violent passion sells the reversion of an estate which after some years would make him very rich and happy So do souls that are not serious and deliberate heedlesly resign for mere trifles their apparant title to such things as are of most importance to their true and lasting felicity Though the possessions of the other world be as far beyond all our enjoyments here as this world is above nothing yet because these things here are present and because they are ever soliciting and offering themselves to us and because they entertain our desires with pleasure and because they put us to little pains to give our selves the fruition of them they are wont to prevail with sleepy and careless minds to purchase them though they part with all their interest in the other world as the price of the bargain From hence there grows a necessity of that precept of vigilance and watchfulness which our Lord Christ hath given his Souldiers lest through subtle insinuations or frequent and violent assaults this old enemy get up again and establish it self in a new and more grievous tyranny Augustus deservedly reproved the folly of Alexander who as the story goes was troubled in his mind for want of imployment after the conquest as he imagined of the whole world for he should have considered said that great Emperour that there is no less pains and wisdom requisite to keep a possession than there is to win it We must not think that we have ended our warfare when we have reduced the flesh to some terms of obedience and peace but the strongest soul will find it necessary to keep a constant guard or else that enemy whose weakness consists in our watchfulness will succeed in its indeavours to get all into its hands once more and settle it self in that throne from whence it was so happily depos'd Whensoever we grow remiss the experience of all the world tells us our souls lose as much in a week as they have been acquiring by a whole years labour To fall down is very easie and we tumble apace but we cannot climb the hill without difficulty and by little steps and slow motions we advance towards the upper world and the celestial blessedness which will cost us much patience and unwearied industry before we approach it But what will keep the Mind may you demand from this remisness what remedies can you prescribe to preserve a feeble spirit from being stupified and lull'd asleep sometimes with these gaudy Poppies these fair and soft enjoyments which appear every where and continually surround us who is able to keep a perpetual watch and never take a nap In such a long work who can chuse but be sometimes weary When I consider my own infirmity and the enemies strength my natural love to these worldly things and their restless importunity the length of my journey and my aptness to be tired and especially when I see so many seeming Champions that have been overcome so many that did run well who have grown slack or retired I am afraid may your heart say that I shall never hold out to the end and maintain the ground stedfastly on which I stand And indeed it must be confessed that the spirit is not alwayes alike able to make a valiant resistance and couragious opposition But what through the defect and disorder of the bodily instruments which it uses and what through strange occasions and unusual accidents that it meets withal to surprise it and what through the strength of some one object either of joy or grief or such like that seises mightily upon the imagination and what through its own timorousness which makes the enemy grow confident and what through the want now and then of those delectable motions of Gods good Spirit and those heavenly consolations wherewith it hath been transported it may fall into some listlesness and dulness and grow so faint that it hath but little heart to maintain its Christian warfare But yet for all this you ought not to despond nor be quite discouraged at the thoughts that you may possibly one day find your self in these unhappy circumstances You are not left without a Remedy either for the preventing of the fall of your soul into this condition or for the delivery and raising of it up should it chance to slide into it or for its safety and preservation that it may receive no harm whilst it lies therein and can for the present meet with no means to rid it self of so great a burthen This little Book comes to bring you some relief and lend you some support and aid in such a case It hath no other business but to give your soul the best assistance that mine can afford it for its security that whatsoever assault may be made upon you whatsoever weaknesses you may feel in your self and whatsoever advantage the enemy may make of them the flesh notwithstanding may never be able to draw you back again underits power but your Spirit may stand fast in its pious resolution and come off with victory and triumph at the last And let the Divine Spirit of Wisdom and Grace I humbly beseech the Father Almighty so guide my Pen that your Soul may receive no less benefit by the reading of these Papers than mine doth contentment in the writing of them and that the Good they do you may be proportionable to the Love from whence they come Amen I. AND in the first place let me advise you to bring your self into as great an acquaintance and familiarity as ever you can with unseen and spiritual things and to make your mind so sensible of them that they may seem the most real and substantial beings You easily discern how sutable this Counsel is to the foregoing discourse and you can tell your self how much of our listlesness and want of spiritual appetite proceeds from hence that these outward things press continually very hard upon us and make us feel that they have a being and a solid subsistance but the other rarely touch us with any force and so appear as if they were only in our fancy Our soul seems to us in our careless thoughts as if it were but a breath or a thin vapour But our Body we perceive to be a massy bulk of whose concerns we are therefore very apprehensive The Divine being though the cause of all others seems but like a shadow on whom our Soul having no fast hold it is no wonder that we rather catch at those things which we can grasp and feel to have some substance in them The report of immortal life and bliss in heaven comes to us like a common story of which there is some probability but no certainty and that inclines us to close so greedily with the
enjoyments of this life which make more strong impressions on our body than the other on our Spirit The glass through which we look upon this lower world makes every thing we desire appear exceeding great nay multiplies and increases it to vast dimensions but when we cast our eyes upward towards our heavenly countrey alas things appear there as if we had turn'd about the perspective so little so remote so like nothing that we can scarce discern them or retain any remembrance of them We have a kind of opinion and half perswasion concerning these inward and intellectual objects but we have a sense and full apprehension of our outward enjoyments Now though opinion may govern us and we may follow it while there are no considerable impediments to oppose it yet when any difficulty arises or something crosses our way to which we stand very much affected it will soon submit it self and leave us to our new inclinations because it is but an opinion We must confirm our souls therefore in a full belief of those spiritual things which thus differs from a bare opinion of them The one is grounded only upon probable reasons or on good reason but half considered and feebly assented unto the other upon clear and manifest evidences well digested and fully entertained So that the one leaves us weak and wavering because it leaves us half in and half out of the arms of Truth but the other makes us firm constant and unmoveable because it puts us compleatly and intirely into its embraces All those times then which are so favourable as to let your mind be free and unclog'd spend some of your retired thoughts in the company of immaterial beings and approach so near them that you even feel and handle them and remain perswaded they are no less real than those which you see and hear and touch with your outward man By which means they will infinitely more engage your affections and tie your heart unto them than any thing else can do because of the vast disproportion which every one acknowledges supposing their existence between them and all that you love in this sensible world 1. Think first of all that your Body is but the clothes and garments of your Soul and that this indeed is the man And undress your self in your own thoughts strip your self of these robes and conceive that you are only a naked Spirit This you can do and thereby you will both make your Soul think more of it self and you will likewise plainly prove it is quite distinct from your body in whose society though it live yet is not of its lineage but of another nature and original For nothing can think it self not to be since by its very thinking so it proves that it hath a being But we can quite put off all thoughts that we have this body hanging about us and the Soul can think it self to be what now it is though it look not through these eyes nor speak with this tongue nor write with these hands nor have any other thing about it but its own thoughts And therefore it is not such a thing as this Body but some better and more noble substance It is that which tells you that you have a Body If you believe it you have reason to believe withal that it self is some other being of more force and longer continuance because you can now think you have castoff your body and conceive it lying in the dust your soul still remaining as it is full of these and other such like thoughts but you can never think you have no soul because even by that conception you prove that you have and shew your self to be a thoughtful thing 2. When you have thus therefore discoursed your self into some feeling of your Soul think in the next place very seriously that whatsoever you clearly apprehend by this though it be perceived by none of your outward senses yet is no less real and certain than what you use with them Disbelieve your eyes and think that your ears bring you a false report rather than doubt of any thing which your mind doth plainly and distinctly perceive Though you cannot but yield an assent to the relation which any of your senses make you yet since the mind is the more excellent Principle and it hath a most certain existence give the greatest credit to what it affirms when none of them can afford you any evidence 3. And then you will presently find that your mind asserts nothing so strongly as the being of a God without whom it could not be Perswade your self therefore as confidently of him as you do of that which your eyes behold Though your eyes see him not as they do the Sun yet say to your self my Soul doth which gives as sound an evidence on his behalf as my eyes do for the Sun That great Light and all the rest of those Globes of Fire which I see in the Skies declare him as clearly to my mind as they do themselves to my outward Sense I cannot think of them nor of my self nor of any thing else in this great World but a Divine Being presents it self before me by whose incomparable wisdom and Almighty goodness they were at once produced and set in this beautiful and useful order in which I behold them Exhort your self therefore to look about you as often for this end as you are apt to do for other little purposes that you may see God in this goodly Temple which he hath built himself for his own glory Set your Soul in that Divine Presence which fills all things Open your eares listen to the wide World and hear as Gregory Nazianzen excellently speaks that great and admirable Preacher of his Majesty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Orat. 43. Is it possible as Athanasius well reasons to come into a great City consisting of a Multitude of Inhabitants of different sorts great and small rich an◠poor old and young Men Wome◠and Children Slaves Souldiers an◠Tradesmen and to see all things ordered so handsomely that every on◠of these though opposite in their inclinations agree and conspire together for the common good the Rich not grieving the Poor nor the strong oppressing the weak nor the young rising up against the aged Can one possibly I say behold all this and not conclude that there is a wise and powerful Governour there though we see him not by whose Authority they enjoy this happy concord Why then should we not draw the same Conclusion from the sight of this great World composed of divers contrary Beings moving several ways and to distant ends but making as good harmony alltogether as the various strings of a Lute whose sweet Musick coming to our eares proves there is some excellent Artist Orat. contra Gentes though hid from our eyes by whom they are tuned and touched Confusion is a sign of anarchy but order demonstrates a Governour 4. If then there be a God
but the good are best instructed by their enjoyments Ingrateful People think of God when he takes away his blessings from them but ingenuous and thankful minds have a great regard to him when his favours are in their hands Nor do they only think it a duty but feel it a pleasure to reflect on the bounty of their great Benefactor which endeares the practise of it and makes it still both more facile and more frequent In so much that in the use of all these outward and carnal things a pious heart may soon learn to turn its thoughts and raise up its affections to a more spiritual good and nobler fruitions Do you not observe how the Holy Ghost is wont to express the joyes of the World to come by such pleasures as are most acceptable to us here What is the reason of it if it be not in compassion to the weakness of our apprehensions and to let us see that all bodily delights administer occasion for pious thoughts and holy desires after diviner enjoyments God would preserve us from sinking into a fleshly sense by our daily conversation with and use of fleshly things He shows us how we may lift up our minds even by those things which are apt to depress them and take an advantage from these inferiour comforts to climb up towards those higher satisfactions Hence it is that the happy enjoyments of the other World are compared so often to the pleasures of eating and drinking whereby our hunger and thirst is asswaged and our bodily life supported Yea to a Feast which is a more liberal entertainment of that kind and is the meaning of that phrase in the Gospel which represents Lazarus carried by Angels into Abrahams bosome placed that is in the uppermost Room at that Heavenly Feast and treated as the noblest and most beloved guest Yea to a Marriage-Feast which being a time of the greatest joy Men are wont to make the largest provision of good chear that their friends may rejoyce together with them And lastly to a Marriage-Feast made by a King a Royal entertainment such as a Monarch would make at the Wedding of his Son All which may serve to provoke good minds to look up above such things as these which are most enticing in this World and to be so far from being swallowed up in sensual pleasures as to give themselves thereby a more lively taste of that excessive joy which God will impart unto them when they shall live with him and be feasted by him in his Heavenly Kingdom The like benefit you may reap from all other things which you converse withall and though the World will attract your thoughts to it and imploy a great many of your hours yet you may draw at last something from thence which will pay you well for the time which you have spent upon it As for Example when you look about you and behold the delightful Objects wherewith you are inviron'd on every side which present themselves continually to your Eyes or your Eares or your Tast or other of your Senses you may think with your self 1. If God have provided such a multitude of pleasant things for the entertainment of this poor body in this present life What are the joys and delights which he hath prepared for my better part in the life which is to come This is the World of Bodies the other of Souls and Spirits Therefore if this little Carkase which is but as the Grass of the Field be so well accomodated if there be so many rare things in the Earth and the Sea and the Air for its refreshment and pleasure What may I not expect hereafter for my mind in those Celestial those spacious Regions which I see above O the inconceivable felicity which is provided in the Paradise of God for this more wide and capacious Spirit which beares his own Image and like himself is to live for ever 2. Again you may think with your self if there be such pleasure to be found in a Creature O what is there then in the Creator of all If the sight of the Sun the Moon the Stars and all the rest of the beauties of this World be so glorious What will it be to see my God to be filled with that wisdom which contrived and with that goodness which produced this vast this goodly and comely Fabrick If the melodies of Musick be so charming O what an ecstasie of joy will it cast me into to hear God himself say I love thee I delight in thee for ever If the love of a true Friend do so much ravish and transport my Spirit what pleasure is it that I shall feel when my Soul shall love him as much as its most enlarged Powers will enable it and know how much I am beloved by him There is a delicious Meditation in St. Austin to this effect who thus speaks to God in one of his Confessions Lib. 10. Cap. 6. I love thee O my God thou hast smitten my heart with thy Word and I have loved thee Nay the Heavens and the Earth and all things contained therein admonish me on every side that I should love thee and they cease not to say the same to all Men else so that they are inexcusable if they do not love thee But what do I love when I love thee Not the beauty of a Body not the grace and comeliness of time not the brightness of light and yet O how friendly and agreeable is that to these eys not the sweet melodies of well-composed Songs not the fragrant odors of Flowers or unguents or costly Spices not Manna not Honey not the embraces of the dearest and most lovely Person these are not the things that I love when I love my God And yet I love a certain light and a certain voice and a certain grateful odor and a certain food and a kind of embracement when I love my God the true light the melody the food the satisfaction and the embracement of my inward man Where that shines to my Soul which no place can contain where that sounds which no time can snatch away where that scents which no Wind can disperse and scatter abroad where I taste that which eating cannot diminish where I cleave to that which no fulness no satiety can force away This is that which I love when I love my God And what is this I askt the Earth and it said I am not I askt the Sea and the Deeps and all living Creatures and they answered We are not thy God look above us and enquire after him for here he is not I askt the Air and all its Inhabitants yea the Heavens the Sun Moon and Stars and they confessed We are not him whom thy Soul seeketh And I spake to all things whatsoever that stand round about the Gates of my Flesh saying Ye tell me that ye are not my God but tell me something of him And they all cried out with a loud voice He made
may still see more of that wonderful love which he hath discovered in his Gospel and to accompany me with his grace till I arrive at his heavenly Court O let his good Spirit breath upon me and carry away my Soul in holy desires towards him Let it guide my course through this troublesome Sea wherein I am tossed Let it shine upon me and prosper my endeavours Let it bring me safely to a quiet haven in Eternal Rest and Peace These pious aspirations you may still pursue at the end of these Meditations in some such Prayer as this A PRAYER I Praise Thee I magnify thy wise and mighty Goodness O Lord who hast made this great World the Heavens and the Earth with all things contained therein to the everlasting honour of thy Name I thank Thee with all my Soul for bringing me into it and for advancing me so much above the rest of thy Creatures here below that I see the glory of thy Majesty shining every where and hear thy Name proclaimed and praised by all thy works of wonder But above all I acknowledg thy bounty with the most admiring thoughts and the devoutest affections of my heart for sending Jesus Christ upon Earth to open unto us the Kingdom of Heaven and to show us the glories of another World O the exceeding greatness of that love which gave him to dye for us and rewarded all his sufferings with a blessed Resurrection and then translated him to Heaven and appointed Him Heir of all things and setled his Throne for ever and ever on the right hand of thy Majesty on high From thence he hath sent the Holy Ghost to be witness of the fulness of his Royal Power and Love and hath shown himself sometime in Majesty and Glory above the Sun when it shineth in its strength that we might hope in thee for the like Resurrection to a glorious immortality in the Heavens No tongue can utter nor heart conceive what Honour Glory and Peace what joy and gladness of heart thou hast prepared there for those that love Thee But blessed for ever blessed be the riches of thy grace whereby I understand so much as to feel most earnest longings in my Soul after a fuller sense of that which thou hast made me taste and relish beyond all the pleasures of this Life O raise and inlarge my Spirit unto clearer more comprehensive thoughts of that supreme blessedness Thou who entertainest all thy Creatures with so much liberality who causest thy Sun to shine upon the good and the bad and the showers of Heaven to fall on the just and the unjust deny not to satisfie the pious desires of a Soul in whom thou hast excited an ardent thirst after its proper and eternal good But inlighten the eyes of my understanding that I may know more and more what is the hope of thy Heavenly calling and what the riches of the glory of thy Inheritance in the Saints and what the exceeding greatness of thy power to us-ward who believe according to the working of thy mighty power which wrought in Christ when thou raisedst him from th dead and set him at thy own righâ— hand in the heavenly places O life up my mind to that high and holy place where thou dwellest and where Jesus is inthroned and where the Angels and Saints continually behold and praise with joyful hearts the Majesty of thy glory and where our Lord hath promised all the faithful shall live and reign with him for ever Help me to climb up daily by all thy Creatures on which thou hast set such marks of thy Greatness Wisdome and Goodness to the contemplation of that Celestial Bliss And possess me with such a constant sense and desire of it that nothing here may ingage my heart which will indispose me for the happy company and society of the blessed Assist me good Lord by such Meditations as these to discern more and more the incomparable and surpassing greatness of that felicity which thy Royal bounty will bestow upon our advanced spirits and bodies in the world of rewards and recompences Affect my heart more powerfully with it and fill me with love and joy unspeakable and full of glory when I turn my eyes towards it Stir me up thereby to prepare my self with diligence and care by a lively resemblance of the Lord Jesus for the day of his appearing and to wait with patience for that blessed Hope when I shall not see as now through a Glass darkly but face to face and be made compleatly like him by seeing him as he is Enable me always to live upon this Hope and according to it that growing in all goodness by a chearful obedience to his holy commands I may be found of him in peace and be so happy as to hear at last those gracious words of his Well done good and faithful Servant enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. Amen III. I Need say no more to excite one of your vertue to the frequent exercise of such Meditations as these which are no less delightful than they are useful Let me next unto this advise you to study the truest notions of God and of Religion the love of which is the way to that transcendent bliss and happiness of which I have spoken As you must believe things unseen and perswade your self thoroughly that they are so it is necessary you should inform your mind aright what they are And in particular look upon Religion as a most pleasant thing and represent it to your self with a face as fair and beautiful as you can If it seem cloudy dark and melancholy it will make you to be of the same complexion But if it have a lovely and chearful aspect it will encline you always to smile upon it The poor Norwegian whom stories tell of was afraid to touch Roses when he first saw them for fear they should burn his Fingers He much wondered to see that Trees as he thought should put forth flames and blossomes of Fire before which he held up his hands to warm himself not daring to approach any nearer But as he you may be sure was happily undeceived when he came not only to touch but likewise to smell those innocent Flowers which seemed to burn in his eyes so will it be with us when we come rightly to understand and feel the pleasure that Religion gives us which at first sight before we come acquainted with it looks as if it intended to make us Martyrs but not to crown us with any joys or contentments As the Martyr said of the real fire wherein he was covered that it seemed to him as if it were a Bed of Roses so shall we say of true Religion which we are afraid will scorch us and prove too hot for us Its flames are but the flames of love and it makes us not lye down in sorrow but in the most comfortable sense of the tender love of our dearest Lord. Think with your self therefore
whom he loved better If therefore we had such a love to God as others have to the things of this World the thoughts of them could not quite thrust out the thoughts of him But still we should be apt to write if I may so speak upon the very forehead of every earthly good God is most lovely or God is my exceeding joy the Lord is my portion O how amiable are his Courts or as an holy man who it is said could never get these words out of his mouth My God and all things Where he is there in effect are all things and where his love dwells there he will be sure to be We shall meet him every where see him in every beautiful thing and taste him before we have done in all the delightful enjoyments of this life 2. And as it comprehends in it the practice of making God present which some Masters in Divinity have said may serve instead of all other Rules for the ordering of our life aright so it contains in it likewise the very spirit of Prayer to God which all acknowledg to be not only a great part of a godly life but a great help and furtherance to us in all the rest of our Christian duty If by Prayer we understand as some have explained it the ascent or raising up of the Soul to God it is love only which continually aspires towards him and carries the heart aloft from other things to be joyned to him Or if we call it the converse of the Soul with God which are the words of Gregory Nyssen or a holy conference and discourse with the Divine Majesty as it is termed by S. Chrysostome it is manifest the love of God includes this in it for it is the nature of this passion to make us frequent the company of those whom we love Their conversation is most welcome their discourse delightful we are exceedingly desirous to impart our mind to them and especially to let them know how much we love them For which purpose it needs not alwayes the help of the tongue but can frame a language of its own and speak by the very countenance and the eyes and make use of silence instead of words to declare its inclinations According to the admirable expression of the Psalmist who setting forth the pious affections of the People to God their Deliverer saith Praise is silent for thee O God in Sion so the Hebrew hath it as your Margin tells you to Thee shall the vow be performed But let us take it simply for the desiring and requesting good things of God and then we must needs acknowledg that love being a passion full of desires cannot but comprehend in it as I said at first the very spirit of Prayer and Supplication You know how much we long for that to which we have given our hearts And therefore if they be devoted in love to God we cannot chuse but be ever breathing after more sensible apprehensions and tastes of him So much as we love him so much we shall thirst after a larger communication of his Divine Grace to us It will make us sigh for more tokens of his favour and wait for a greater power of his Holy Spirit and vehemently long to be more transformed and changed into his Image What was it but this that made David say Psal 42.1 As the Hart panteth after the Water-brooks so panteth my Soul after thee O God The chased Deer in a great Forrest and in the midst of Summer did not more long after the streames of Water than this good Man being it is likely in the Wilderness of Judah and so denyed the favour of going to the Tabernacle of God did ardently desire the happiness which there he had sometime tasted in the Divine Presence He opens his mouth and pants after this with a thirst so vehement that it makes him cry out in the following words O when shall I come and appear before God It is the heat of that Creature to whose pantings David compares the longings of his Soul which is the cause of its thirst and that being a constant desire which goes not off by continuance as many inconveniences do but rather more encreases it beares the greater resemblance to this Divine passion of love whose fervours and ardent longings are perpetual and do not abate by length of time but grow still greater and greater There is nothing so likely as this to enable us to fulfil that exhortation of the Apostle Pray without ceasing and to make us importunate and unwearied in it which are the two qualifications our Saviour requires in our devout addresses to God Luk. 18.1 Where you read a Parable of his to this end that Men ought alwayes to pray and not faint It marvelously disposes us also for the Divine favour by moving us to quit all that is inconsistent with our desires in hope of that which we pray God to bestow upon us There was a Monarch you have heard perhaps who offered his Kingdome for a Cup of cold Water in a time of extreme thirst And therefore what is it which the heat of this heavenly affection will not make us resign to God and absolutely part withall that it may obtain its Petitions and have its desires satisfied Besides it hath one wonderful power in it which nothing else can furnish us withall to make our Prayers prevalent and that is by fixing our thoughts and fastning our minds to the business which we are about For love you know doth not willingly stir from the Object to which it is devoted It is this flame which keeps our heart close to the Holy Sacrifice and will not easily suffer us to wander from the Gate of Heaven It sets us in the Presence of God it keeps our eye upon him it makes us converse attentively with him and while the power of it lasts our very hearts are tyed to him and cannot go aside from him But as soon as ever it begins to dye or decay then it is that the mind steales away and gads about the World till this flame revive again and make us fly back to the Altar of God The best Soul that is I confess may feel some loosness and distraction of spirit especially at some untoward season some ashes may dim and dull the Fire but yet this love and ardent desire will keep the greater part of our thoughts together and knit our heart so to our duty that there shall be no long nor wide breaches in it but it shall still be strong and fervent and effectual with our Heavenly Father Thus you see how wisely these two are joyned together by St. Jude v. 20. Who after he had exhorted the Faithful to Pray in the Holy Ghost immediately bids them keep themselves in the love of God There is nothing comparable to this to inspire us with devout and earnest desires And it hath an equal force also to excite us to Praise and Acknowledg our great Benefactor who gives
be performed at another time so they will not wait upon us and stay our leisure and that as they pass away so we know not when they will come again For May as the Proverb is comes not every Moneth and a fit opportunity lies not in every lock of Times head And if there should yet it is bald behind and we cannot call back that which is gone which may be better than will be presented to us again And if we find by experience that these occasions do excite our Souls then the observing and embracing them will be an excellent means to keep us from dulness because it is likely that God will favour us with more of them when he sees that we use those well which he hath given us already But yet you ought to be cautious that this do not prove matter of scruple and perplexity to you if you neglect an occasion when you are otherwise necessarily employed For both prudence and the forwardness of our affections and every thing else must give way to a real necessity and of two necessary things that seems to be most necessary in which we are already engaged Make therefore a short Address to God and both comfort and quicken your self after this manner when you are dull and indisposed or otherwise apt to be perplexed upon such accounts as these A PRAYER O My God whose Name is most excellent in all the Earth and ought to be celebrated with the highest and continual Praises of Men and Angels How happy are they whose minds are ever delighted in the thoughts of Thee and whose hearts constantly burn with ardent affection and devotion to Thee It is some satisfaction to think of that vehement love wherewith the Holy Spirits above perpetually acknowledg thy bounty to them to us and to all thy Creatures and to feel my self desirous if it were possible to accompany them at all times with the like affections of a most chearful and joyful heart in that Heavenly employment Accept I most humbly beseech thy Divine Goodness of these sincere desires that thou hast wrought in me Graciously accept of these pantings of my Soul after a freer and more delightful converse with Thee And pitty the great weakness and dulness of my nature which will not permit such ardours of love to continue always as by thy grace I sometimes feel in my heart towards Thee Pitty O pitty and take compassion upon me when I am so heavy as not to be able to lift up mine eyes towards Heaven or when I move so slowly and faintly as if I had no lift to serve thee in the works of piety righteousness and charity O that I may feel my spirit stirred with a greater zeal and carried with stronger desires at all other times when I am better disposed for thy service that then I may run the ways of thy Commandments when thou hast enlarged my heart And endue me likewise with prudence equal to that uprightness and integrity of heart which I hope I shall always carefully preserve That I may neither neglect any occasion of exciting and expressing a most fervent love to Thee nor dispirit my self by an indiscreet heat and forwardness to the performance of any part of my Christian duty Dispose me but to be ever serious resolved stedfast and watchful to be always well or innocently imployed and to be still going on with continued and constant motions to perfect holiness in thy fear and I shall hope by thine Infinite grace to finish my course at last with joy and to arrive at the happiness of that blessed company who as they do thy Commandments hearkning to the voice of thy Word so they are not weary in their obedience to Thee but with incessant Praises and Thanksgivings serve Thee World without end Amen V. YOU see already how necessary it is well to understand our selves and therefore lest you should think the pleasures of Religion to be other than they are it will concern you My Friend in the next place to Distinguish carefully between those consolations that are spiritual and those that are sensible For your receiving benefit by this Rule you must consider that the spirit of man being as I said joyned to a body and made a member of this World and yet belonging to another Country hath several sorts of faculties which we call its upper and lower powers whereby it converses with both With the former which are the mind understanding and will it hath entercourse with God and Invisible things and is fitted to improve all lower objects to an heavenly end with the other which we call sense imagination and sensitive appetite we can maintain acquaintance with nothing but this outward World Or rather this one Soul of Man is fitted with Capacities of such different kinds that it can hold correspondence with God and the higher World and likewise with the goods of the body in this World which is sensible to us Now such a friendship there is between the Soul and the Body by reason of their nearness and between the upper and lower faculties of the Soul if you so conceive of it by reason as I may call it of their oneness that they do mutual good offices for each other when they are able And as the Soul lends such a great part of it self to serve the Bodies necessities so the bodily spirits likewise are ready to assist the Soul in their better Moods to a freer pursuit of its own concernments in its motion towards God and the things above And more than this the pleasures of the one redound to the other what the Soul doth for the Body returning upon the mind it self and the bodily spirits likewise oft-times feeling the contentment of which the mind tasteth Hence it is that by discreet use of bodily enjoyments and due attendance to the outward Mans moderate satisfaction the spirits ofttimes are made so mild and sweet so chearful and compliant that the Mind finds them more ready and forward to accompany it in the contemplation of Diviner objects and it serves it self the more by serving the Body for a while And on the contrary part when the mind converses with Heavenly things they so powerfully touch it at certain Seasons that they make a motion there all over even as far as the very skirts of its Territories The Heart is glad the Spirits leap and dance for joy and the very blood in our Veins runs the smoother for it Now while we have this sensible delectation in the borders of our Soul by the agitation of the Animal Spirits to which the mind communicates its resentments there is no part of us but can be well content to accompany the mind in its devotions and they will not be enclined to with draw their attendance from these delightful services But on the other side if the Mind through incapacity it is like of the Body to receive them cannot impress its perceptions upon the Spirits nor make such a warmth and
heat in them that they are pleased and move delightfully though it really hath no less of God in it self than it had before when they skipt for joy yet now the Body becomes like a lump of Clay and cannot endure to be drawn any longer to these Holy Duties Yea the Soul it self unless it duly consider will begin hereat to be greatly dejected and to have little list to that which gives so small contentment to it as it is an Inhabitant in Flesh and which makes its abode nothing pleasant and comfortable for the present But if in this state the Mind recollect it self and consider that for its part it doth what it did before though it doth not feel it self and perceive its power in the same manner and that it is not bound to produce these pleasurable motions in the lower man and that they are more pleasing to us than unto God it might presently have rational satisfaction and tranquillity in its own breast which is the best of all other joys and be perswaded to hold on in its course notwithstanding this seeming discouragement And if the Mind by these or such like considerations be induced to do as it was wont then I cannot see but all its performances would be both more acceptable to God and in the issue more delightful to it self For there is more strength of a Mans reason and will in them now that he wants that pleasing assistance which the Body used to afford him in the doing of them His love to God is the more fervent and unconquerable in that it will not cease its motion towards him though all things else fail it but only the force of its own inclination He is not in true understanding more weak and feeble now but a Person of greater might and courage than he was before He breaks through all difficulties and will not suffer himself to be overborn by the great load that lies upon his Spirits I said just now that the lower man finding a delectation in Gods service might be well contented with it if not desirous of those Holy Duties and so the Soul in doing them gave no great proof at such a time of the power and vigour of its own affections to them because there was no impediment or reluctance in the other party But when there is nothing but a sense of its duty to invite it and all beside begin to withdraw their consent then it is that it showes its resolution and what it can do by it self Then a man demonstrates his heart to be so set towards God and to be so much in love with him that he will please him though he cannot please half of himself in what he doth in obedience to his commands And besides by a right understanding of this that I have said there may be some way perhaps found of recovering these sensible joyes which are so grateful to us that we never think we have enough of them Either 1 by more preparing our Mind and labouring to work in it a deeper apprehension of what we go about And if the fault be there this will cure it Or 2 by gratifying our outward man with some recreations and sensible goods that it is in love withal whereby its spirits may be better cheared than they can be for the present with Divine exercises Seeing it cannot now have a good liking of that which the mind doth most desire let the mind make no scruple to comply more freely with it and entertain it with those innocent pleasures which agree best with its inclinations And if the fault lye there and arise from its lumpishness this may be a Remedy for it Or 3 by using humiliations of the Body by abstinence and fasting if through too much fulness it be indisposed or by smiting on our Breast casting down our selves on our Face if through too strong a taste of earthly joyes it be grown untractable and if the fault be partly in the mind and partly in the body it may be in this manner removed No body doubts but discreet Fasting is very profitable in some cases and for the other we find so many examples of them in the Holy Books that we cannot think they are to be despised Nay it is likely that good men found by an outwardly humbled body that the mind was more affected and apt to be humbled therewith But then remember that it is far better when the Mind affects the Body than when the Body affects the Mind and we should strive rather after that though we should not reject the help of this I will give you an instance which shall at once prove this and show withall the influence the Body hath upon the Mind Let a Man Pray or Preach in a melting tone with much action of his hands and with earnest looks and motions of his Head and the affections of the People shall be exceedingly stirred when as the very same matter and words delivered after another manner shall not half so much work upon them Nay if the Voice be but sweet and the carriage graceful though there be little action of the Body and no arts of insinuation to conjure up the affections yet the discourse which comes with these advantages shall find more favour and better entertainment with the Hearers than that which proceeds from an harsher mouth and a less plausible behaviour though otherwise it be of far greater weight and moment And so we see many People chuse to sit in the Ministers face rather than behind a Pillar or the Pulpit because they say their minds are made more attentive and their hearts more engaged thereby From all which you are satisfied how much the Soul many times is beholden to the eyes and eares and those stirrings in the blood which outward Objects create But yet you know very well also that one strong touch or stroke that the Mind gives it self by a piercing consideration is of far greater force to breed even a sensible delectation if the Body be disposed than all the commotions and agitations in the Body are to beget a rational satisfaction and contentment of mind though it be never so desirous of it And the affections you know likewise that are raised by those outward means are not half so much worth as those which the mind it self excites from the matter and not the manner of what is delivered These sensible consolations then are not to be slighted but it is far better to look after the other And if when we desire them it were as a step and help to the other they were the more to be valued and endeavoured after As the pleasant trembling and warmbling I may call it of the Spirits doth much clarify them just as the Air is purified by being shaken upon that account it is desirable for the affording our mind a freer sight of its own objects But if we love it only for the harmony and ravishing delight that is in it self then it may prove
dangerous because it is apt to take the mind off from its own proper pleasures It is to be acknowledged that when the Spirits are refined by gentle agitations the Soul sits in the Body like to the Eye in a clear Sun-shine day But if at such a time it gaze meerly on this light and do not make use of it to look upon other objects it loses by its advantages and for an eye full of light le ts go an heart full of joy and pure contentment And besides this it is to be considered that we may be easily cheated by these sensible delectations and therefore they are not to be desired so much as the other wherein there is not so much danger of being cozened Many warm Souls think themselves very Religious because they are moved at a Sermon or can weep in their Prayers whereas they remain as cold as a stone and as dry as a rotten stick to all good works They are covetous peevish proud and censorious and yet these ill qualities do not trouble them as long as they feel those pleasing motions which tickle them into a belief that they are beloved of God though they be no better And on the other side many good Souls imagine that they have more of God in them at such times when they find such melting affections in their hearts than they have at others when they are without them whereby they set a lighter esteem upon far greater testimonies of Gods love which then they need not want such as Humility Patience Denial of our own wills and resignation to his good will and pleasure Upon this account many Papists that have left our communion are wont wretchedly to deceive and abuse themselves who profess that they find their hearts more stirred before a Crucifix and the Image of the blessed Virgin and with Prayers which they hear in an unknown Language than they were while they attended on the Divine Service of our Church where they knew or might have known as much of God and our Lord Jesus Christ and all spiritual things as they can do now Alas they consider not how much the fancy is taken with Pictures and Bodily Gestures and all things of Novelty without any preceding consideration of the mind or any consent of the will before demanded These may be but natural motions such as are common to us with brute Creatures which are raised by outward objects and not by our selves And as a drop of sweet phlegme that trickles down upon a Mans Palate in a slumber makes him think he swallows honey or is glutted with sweet meats So many times do drowsy and inconsiderate Souls dream that they are full of the joys of God and satiated with Divine Pleasures when they are but mocked with those natural delights which agreeable Objects stroke them withall while their fancies are awake and their minds are asleep Let us attend therefore My Friend to the giving all satisfaction to our inward man and seriously comply with our noblest desires of pleasing God by doing his will in every thing And if we can likewise give contentment thereby to all about us well and good but if that be not possible let us not think we are the worse because we cannot since we are not the better if we can And seeing variety is so grateful to our weakness you may try what passions you can excite in your heart by this short address to God which I shall add at the end of this particular to many others which you are acquainted withall advising you still to be satisfied and well pleased in the doing of what you ought though it prove not so delightful to you as you desire A PRAYER O Great God What an happiness is this that I should be beloved of Thee who art the Lord of all things What contentment what joy what gladness of heart ought I to conceive in the thoughts of thy surpassing love to me and how willingly how chearfully ought I to do thy will that I may be more beloved of Thee Thy love is wonderful and unsearchable we have nothing in us whereby to take a measure of it It is beyond our understanding and hath exceeded all our desires and what have we larger than these I must turn my thoughts therefore into admiration and stand amazed at thy marvellous love who hast done such things for such poor and inconsiderable Creatures as we are Thou hast sent thy Son to be our Servant and he hath laid down his Life for our Redemption and he is alive again and exalted in Heaven to give us hope of thy endless love in life Immortal and glorious O how short is my understanding of all this O how weak are my thoughts now that I reflect upon it And my affections alas how short do they fall of my thoughts and how soon do they vanish and expire I can only cry out What is man that thou art so mindful of him Lord what are all the Sons of men that thou makest such account of them And when I have said this I have said nothing but that I know not what to say or what to think of thy love But it is part of the love which I admire that thou wilt accept of such as we have of our little thoughts and feeble desires and weak endeavours when they proceed from true love and sincere affection to thy service That O Lord I most heartily profess Truly I am thy Servant I am thy Servant and resolve for ever to continue in faithful and absolute obedience to all thy holy and good Commandements I am willing to be and to do what thou pleasest And I refuse nothing O that I knew how to attain that happiness which may make thy service alwayes pleasing to me Support me howsoever I most earnestly beseech thee with thy Almighty Grace that I may not be disheartned in my duty by any dulness or indisposition that seises on me but persevere in well doing with an humble trust and confidence that I shall never forsake Thee nor be forsaken of Thee Preserve me from vain elation of mind and false opinion of thy favour when I feel my self transported with extraordinary delight in thy service and from all dejection of spirit and unjust suspicions of thy anger and displeasure when I find less delight and complacence in the sincere and careful performance of all the duty which I owe thee Fix me in such a stedfast and immoveable love to justice mercy soberness and godliness that serving Thee constantly in these with an equal and quiet mind I may have an unshaken belief of thy immutable love to me in all the alterations and changes which I feel in my self in this life and an undoubted hope of a better condition in the life to come through thy inconceiveable mercies in Christ Jesus the righteous Amen Amen VI. BUT that your mind may not grow quite dull when your bodily spirits begin to sink and to be flat and listless Observe
which is the only thing that can give any value to them It is a shame that I should groan or go heavily under the sweet the easie and gentle Yoke of my most loving Saviour none of whose Commandments are grievous but all his wayes pleasantness and his pathes peace But there is nothing more frightful than to think that I have at any time opposed his will and thrown off the light burden of obedience which he layeth on me I adore thy pardoning mercy and wait on thee likewise for power from above to save me from reproaching his Religion by so much as any unwillingness to obey him I implore thy Divine Inspirations to preserve in my heart that delightful sense of Thee which may render it no less my contentment than my duty to follow Jesus in his humility and condescension of spirit in his meekness and patience in his kindness and tenderness in his holiness and purity in his love to thee and to all man-kind in doing good and suffering evil in resolved denyal of my own will when contrary to thine and in every thing giving thanks to thee O Father of Mercies which is thy will concerning us in Christ Jesus To whom be Glory for ever and ever Amen VII AND having thus poured forth your Soul to God you may feel your self sometimes so mightily moved that your heart runs out with much pleasure in abundance of pious thoughts and holy affections which you are not wont to find at other times And then My Friend let me tell you it would be of singular use if you would set down those extraordinary thoughts and passionate effusions of your Soul which you feel in your greater enlargements These are as so many Records which you have to show of the Spirits prevalency and triumph over the dull flesh They are the flights of your Soul whereby you see to what it aspires and how great and happy it may be when God pleases They are the tokens of Gods love whereby he would indear himself to your heart And you may look upon them as if they were Golden Chains let down from Heaven to draw and attract you thither and bind you fast but willingly to your duty It is great pity to throw away such sweet flowers after once smelling of them to lay by such good thoughts as we do a common Book after the first reading I would wish you to find some safe repository for them and to lay up carefully such expressions of your mind in Meditation or Prayer as are most lively and affecting and to fetch them out for your use when any dulness or straitness shall oppress you As a good Student when he reads a Book though he may let pass the most of it which he knew before yet remarks and preserves in his Notes the choicest parts in which he finds great strength of reason or sharpness of wit or may be any ways useful to him in his design so would I have you mark those passages in your converse with God and Divine things which have in them some fulness of sense some liveliness of conceit some elevation of mind and are so much beyond the ordinary strain of thinking as if they were some beam of light darted from an higher hand or the utmost endeavour of the Soul to be with God When you find I say your conceptions so fit and proper that you seem to behold the bare face of truth when some thing smites your heart with such a force of reason that you are constrained to yield or when such an holy breath comes into you that your Soul swells and grows too big for your body let them be noted as carefully as the Moneth and the Day was by your Parents which brought you into the World or as you remember the happy time when God bestowed some singular blessing on you which made this World a more comfortable place than otherwise you should have found it Examples you know are wont to move us much and therefore of what power may we suppose it to be when we can propound our selves for an Example to us This Copy as I may call it of our selves besides that it will make us blush at another time to see how unlike we are to our selves will also excite us to recover the same countenance and aspect that once we had and make some colour come into our Faces and warmth into our Spirits when we are pale and cold in the service of God It will remember us likewise of the pleasurable motions that were then in our hearts and remembrance is the way to call them back again It will furnish us also with some matter for our thoughts when they are barren and can bring forth nothing For though reading of some good Book in this case may be very advantageous to us yet nothing can more assist us than a Book of our own making the births as I may term them of our own mind Both because they best sute with our notions and can soon find the place where they lay before and because they will remember us also of Gods grace and goodness to us so that either shame or love or hope will make us strain to do the same again or to excel our selves When no thoughts will stir within we must call for some helps without to move us and what is there that will so easily enter as that which was once within us before Nothing sure can better fit us than that which our own Souls have cut out and shaped for themselves As a Chymist therefore that is drawing out the more retired spirits of things if he grows faint in his work takes a drop or two of his own extracts to bring his Soul back again so should we do when our liveliness begins to forsake us and our Soul complains of its weak and fainting Fits We must pour in some of those thoughts which we have formerly drawn out of our hearts which are as it were the quintessence of our Souls and the very spirits of our Devotion that they may recall the life that is flying away And tell me I beseech you what a reviving it is but to think that we once had such thoughts in our mind What a Cordial is it to the languishing Soul to feed as I may say upon its own Honey and taste of its own sweetness How greedily will it embrace and how gladly will it smile upon the Children of its own Womb How pleasant will it be but to hope that it may become fruitful again as well as it was before to behold the Picture of what it may be as well as of what it hath been in former times Save therefore some of these and let them not all be spilt as they distill from your Soul Lay them up in store considering the time may come when your Soul will be glad to have them restored to it and will receive them as so many drops of Balm Keep them by you as you do some precious
of men What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits towards me I will delight my self in thy Commandments which I have loved My Hands also will I lift up to thy Commandments which I have loved and I will meditate in thy Statutes O how I love thy Law it shall be my Meditation every day How sweet are thy words unto my taste yea sweeter than Honey to my mouth Through thy Precepts I get understanding therefore I hate every false way Do I not hate them O Lord that hate thee and am I not grieved with those that rise up against thee I hate them with perfect hatred I count them mine enemies Search me O God and know my heart try me and know my thoughts And see if there be any wicked way in me and lead me in the way everlasting Teach me thy way O Lord I will walk in thy truth unite my heart to fear thy Name So will I praise thee O Lord my God with all my heart and I will glorifie thy Name for evermore Amen IX AND that you may be the more humbly confident both of Gods continued goodness and your own fidelity and the more fit likewise for pious Meditations labour I intreat you as much as ever you can to maintain a constant chearfulness of spirit and lightsomness of heart Without this it will be always night with you or but a cold Winters day and as you will have no list either for meditation or any other employment so you will be apt to live in perpetual suspicion of God and of your Friends and of your self Melancholy is a dull lumpish humour which makes us of a frozen disposition and a Leaden temper It inclines us not only to think worse of our selves than we are but to do worse than otherwise we should It represents those things as exceeding difficult which may be done with ease and those as impossible which have in them any considerable difficulty It benums and stupifies our Souls and will let us feel nothing but it self It quite dispirits us and will not suffer us to do any thing because it imagines we cannot stir It shows us to our selves in an ugly Glass and then no wonder we look amiss upon all things else Some things it makes to appear bigger than they are and then all the rest appear less And having conceived them otherways than they are it nourishes the conceit till we believe it real As under the weight of some sluggish matter in the blood a man sometimes fancies his Arms are as big as Posts and then his Hands seem as heavy as a Pig of Lead and he thinks he is unable to lift them up to his Head so it is with our minds when they are oppressed with the burden of a sad and melancholy humour It makes all our duty seem very great and our strength to be none at all All impediments it renders as big as Mountains but our selves not of force enough to remove a straw It first binds up all the powers of the Soul and then will not let them be unloosed It makes us very fearful of that which it perswades us we cannot avoid And it afflicts us for that which yet it makes us fancy we cannot do In an heat it pushes us forward but suddenly it cools and says we cannot go If it catch fire it makes us wild and when it hath spent that flame it leaves us sots and fools It pricks us forward sometimes to an enterprize but it self is the shackles and fetters that will not let us move This heaviness you must take heed of and give no indulgence to it For it is the worm of the mind as one of the Antients expresses it which eateth up its Parent that brought it forth Contrary to the nature of other births it pleases us much when we bring it forth but proves a miserable torment to us as soon as it is born Melancholy musings I mean are at first a very delightful entertainment to the mind but they grow in a little time to be a very troublesome brood They are a dangerous maze in which a Man may easily lose himself and from whence he cannot without much difficulty get forth Honey is not sweet to a feaverish man nor are the sweetest truths acceptable to the sad Clogs are not a greater impediment to the Feet than this humour to the motions of the Soul The eyes are not more darkned with some kind of fumes and vapours than the understanding is with its black imaginations The Ayr is not more poysoned when it is charged with a thick and stinking mist than the mind is offensive to it self and others when it is buried in its Clouds And as the Sun when it looks through a Fog seems as if it were all bloody So do the fairest objects even God himself appear in a dismal and horrid shape when these sullen exhalations gather about us Labour then continually to disperse them and blow them away by such means as you find by experience to be most available to that purpose For chearfulness causes the Soul to breath in a pure Air and to dwell in a wholsome and sweet inclosure It makes our work seem easie and difficulties seem little and God seem good and so our strength seem great and irresistable It inlightens the mind it incourages the heart it adds wings to the affections and therefore he that forbids it to our Souls keeps out the welcomest Guest and the best Friend that Nature hath It misbeseems none but the wicked in whom it is commonly a light mirth and a foolish jollity As you see fine ornaments and curious dresses set off an handsome Face though they render those who are ugly more ill-favoured So doth chearfulness exceedingly become good Souls though in bad men it be most ridiculous For which cause it is neither unmeet to use any helps that Nature affords us to acquire it nor to call in the assistance of innocent arts and pretty inventions to invite it to keep us company Socrates blushed not to be found at Boyes-play with his Children The wise and solemn Cato sometimes stooped to be a little frollick The great Scipio thought it not unbecoming his triumphal body as Seneca calls it to use grave dances and trip about a Room in decent measures Some devout men indeed have pronounced of such like pastimes as Physicians do of Mushromes that the best ordered are worth nothing but they did not mean sure to decry all those pleasures which of themselves are indifferent and which the intention alone can render good as well as evil You ought not to refuse any ingenious or harmless recreations which you find will cherish or refresh your spirit though by Souls of a dark complexion they be deemed fooleries It is too great a burden to impose on your self such restraints as not to dare so much as laugh for fear of giving occasion of suspicion to the weak or of slander to the wicked But since
a spirit free and full of life is most useful being indued with more strength and ability than any other it ought to be preserved in its alacrity and when it droops and languishes be excited to recover its chearfulness again I know you do not think it a crime to laugh nor are you in love with a studied face You are none of those who take innocence and severity to be such inseparable companions that they can never be found asunder nor that judg a free carriage to be a certain sign of an ill mind and a merry humour to be a constant token of levity of spirit or want of judgment But I desire that you would not only think it lawful but necessary to be pleasant and that you would by no means suffer your self to become sad under the notion of being serious The Ancient Christians were so cautious in this Point that we read in Palladius of an old Hermite who having five hundred Scholars would never dismiss them without this Lesson My Friends be chearful do not forget I beseech you to be chearful This was his constant lecture which he repeated as often as St. John did those words which he is reported always to have had in his mouth My little Children love one another He took it I suppose out of St. Paul who gives this admonition thrice to the Philippians III. 1. IV. 4. Rejoyce in the Lord. Rejoyce in the Lord always and again I say rejoyce It is an unseemly thing for you to be sad and heavy who serve so good a Master from whom you shall receive the reward of an Eternal Inheritance If they that traffick in earthly Goods rejoyce in an advantageous bargain Why should not Religious People whose Merchandise is Wisdome a choiser thing than Silver or Gold who have many divine blessings already in possession and are in certain hope of more and greater cherish a perpetual joy and ever be of good comfort By which you may see whence we are to derive our chearfulness and to what we must be principally beholden for it It springs out of an hearty and solid belief of the blessed Gospel and out of a sincere obedience to it and increases with our growth in spiritual knowledg and understanding and in love to God and all our Brethren All which it would be easie to show you is comprehended in those words of the Apostle to the Colossians 11.2 3. where he expresses his earnest desire for them and other Christian People that their hearts might be comforted being knit together in love and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding to the acknowledgment of the mystery of God and of the Father and of Christ in whom are hid all the Treasures of Wisdom and Knowledge But when our natural spirits fail and sink within us we must use natural remedies to recruit them and raise them up again None are to be rejected which are not sinful or will endanger to make us so But those especially are to be chosen which will chear the Body and yet do no injury but rather prove beneficial to the Mind Of which sort I shall recommend one to you when I have concluded this Advice as I have done the rest with a short Prayer to God A PRAYER O Father of Mercies and God of all comfort who hast given us everlasting consolation and good hope through thy grace in Christ Jesus Blessed be thy abundant love which hath exceeded towards us in him beyond all our desires O how excellent is thy loveing kindness O God which hath so blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus that it is become our duty to rejoyce in him alway and to be exceeding glad even in the midst of all the troubles of this life O that I could keep such a perpetual and fresh remembrance of his benefits in my mind as may make me rejoyce evermore That so I may recommend the Religion of our Lord Jesus to all others and testify to all the World by my alacrity in doing and suffering his blessed will that his Yoke is easie and his burden is light Possess me with such right notions and apprehensions of thee and bless me also with such integrity of heart that I may both have the peace of a good conscience which is a continual feast and be filled likewise with joy in the Holy-Ghost out of a sense of thy divine favour to me which is better than life it self Deliver me both from unprofitable sadness and from vain mirth Preserve me constantly in an equal tranquillity of mind and a becoming chearfulness of spirit Bear me up I beseech thee above all the afflictions which may befall me by the joyes of faith and hope and love And when I shall need the relief of inferiour pleasures O that they may never make me lose the tast of Heavenly delights but rather dispose me by the refreshments of my body to a more lively discharge of all my duty and to a quicker sense of all divine enjoyments And teach me to be so wise in the choice of my pleasures that they may not leave me sad afterward but I may remain innocent and unblameable before thee and be better pleased also in the humble expectation of the times of refreshment which shall come from the Presence of our Lord. Amen X. THIS puts me in mind to speak a little of Good Company as a singular means not only to chear and refresh your spirits but to quicken and improve your mind also in wisdome or vertue The joy of one Soul is no joy say the Hebrews in their common Proverb which is much-what the same with that of the Greeks One man is no man Good Company will help to divert our thoughts and yet not let us spend our time unprofitably It will make us chearful and yet wise and serious It will delight us and do us no harm but make us rather much better Some chearfulness I confess is supposed in a Mans spirit to make him good Company for his Neighbours for it renders his conceits quick and pleasant his words gracious and acceptable and his very countenance smooth and obliging But if some dulness at present make him not to be a good Companion for them yet they may be the better company for him and their chearfulness may serve to revive his spirits and make him as brisk and well pleased as themselves For it is not more natural to us to yawn when others do than to be uncloudy in our countenances when the Faces of others shine We can scarce refrain from sighing when we are entering upon a very long Journey through ways in which there are many dangers and which we have never gone before But to perform it all alone is so uncomfortable that we are apt to grow weary as soon as we have begun it and therefore are mighty inclined to seek for some Fellow-travellers to make it seem less tedious Our very Horses will go the better when they
of immoderate love of dying things to enjoy them innocently and chearfully to do good with them heartily and to envy no Man's greater prosperity to suffer evil and to take the loss of them patiently to admire that mercy which still prolongs so frail a life as mine is and especially to admire the gracious terms of thy holy Gospel which for our short labours or sufferings here hath promised us the reward of an endless life in a better place Dispose me likewise to be willing to leave this World and to be always in a readiness for my departure that I may never be surprised with sudden Death nor obey thy summons with an heavy heart but freely resign my spirit unto Thee who gavest it O how much do I desire the continuance of these holy thoughts and inclinations that so I may have such a love to this world as is consistent with my hope of Heaven and be so busied in earthly affairs that my heart may be there where my treasure is and be tyed to my friends in such affection that we may not be eternally divorced And the nearer I draw to that eternal World O that I may be the more pure and separated from all worldly mixtures and the clearer sight and prospect I may have of my happiness and attain the greater assurance of thy love and be the fuller of joy in hope of thy glory Pitty my present weakness increase my strength help me not only to resist but to overcome all temptations enable me to discharge the duties of my several relations prepare me for all varieties of conditions that in prosperity I may not forget Thee nor imagine in adversity that thou forgettest me but in all I may be the same and have the same thoughts of thee love to thee and delight in Thee till I come to an unchangeable goodness and happiness with the Lord Jesus Amen XVI BUT if you be so much discomposed at any time that you cannot get your thoughts close to this business nor find any relief in any of the foregoing counsels I must then in the last place send you to a never failing remedy which is to Exercise a great deal of patience towards your self I am so well assured of your goodness and that my judgment is not herein blinded by my affection to you that I dare conclude with this Advice Be content to be dull sometime and able to do nothing as you would and yet do not think the worse of your self for it But if it do stir up any suspicions in your mind of you do not know what fault yet never bluster at your self but with a calm and gentle spirit suffer this distemper Look upon your self as sick and think that it is not good now to stir any humours And therefore strive not too much neither with your self do not distrust this counsel when you are thus melancholy for that will but cast you more into it You will be the sooner eased if you do as well as you can and add not a greater load to your spirit by your own fretful thoughts at this untoward indisposition You must consider that our Bodies being a part of this World will be obnoxious to those changes which are in things adjacent to them And that your Soul being united to your Body cannot but feel its vicissitudes Just as when the House smoaks the Inhabitant is offended unless he can step out of Doors Consider also that the same work is not required of a weak and of a stronger Person The Nemalim and the Gemalim as the Jews speaks must not be alike loaded that is the Ants cannot carry such a Burden as the Camels You must thank God it is no worse with you and that you have not quite forgot Him Thank him I say that you have any use of patience and that you are not under an absolute stupidity Remember likewise that it will be better with you As long as there is the same Sun in Heaven the Clouds will be dispersed and we shall have fair days as well as foul and as long as our Lord lives and changes not there will be a brighter season and we shall be warm as well as cold Think likewise how unworthy the best of us is to live always under the Sun-beames And that as there are many Countrys more North 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 gland who in the depth of our Winter are in a long and dismal Night so there are many Souls who are in a colder case and more remote from the Sun of righteousness than yours is But however think that after you have done what you can it is the will of God that you should be as you are And if this dulness please him it need not displease you Remember also that he is not perfect in patience who can bear with others but not with himself And again that there is good reason you should bear with your self because accidentally this dulness will breed a greater activity when you come out of it Both out of justice that you may make some recompence for that drowsiness and out of gratitude to him by whose goodness you were delivered from it For Nature you know instructs us to be very kind to those who have helpt us ou◠of a very great distress and it is not easie to blot their readiness to relieve us out of our memories And besides it is manifest there are some kinds of dulness and indisposition which arise from the meer necessity of Nature With which we can no more reasonably quarrel than we do because it rains or snows when we would have it fair weather Can it be expected for instance that a Woman with Child should be so vigorous as she was wont She must be content perhaps to spend that time in vomiting which once she did in praying It must not put her to pain in this case that she cannot read or think so long or with so much delight or with such clearness of understanding as formerly she could but she must comply with her condition and considering no more can be done in such circumstances believe that God requires no more There is as much reason to be troubled because she hath not Wings to fly or cannot walk now as fast up her stairs as when she had no burden as to chide her self that she cannot be so earnest so long so chearful as formerly in the performance of Holy Duties There are many cases like to this in which there is no more caution necessary but to see that too much care of our ease and indulgence to our present infirmity which must at such a time be liberally allowed do not tempt us to be negligent in that which it is in our power to perform We may often retire to God in shorter thoughts and affectionate longings and pantings after him and thereby keeping our hearts in a glowing temper we may prevent that chilness and laziness which otherwise might creep upon us and make us imagine our selves less