are so lamentably mutable that further than God promiseth to uphold us we know not one day what we shall think judge or Will the next But when Love is as a fixed Nature in us we shall be still the same adhering to amiable goodness without intermission or Cessation It will be as easy to us and more to love God and Holiness as it is to the Hungry and Thirsty to love meat and drink or to the proud to love praise or domination yea or to any Man to love his life And we shall be no more weary of Loving than the Sun is of shining or than the Hungry is of Feasting or a Friend of friendly love and converse Nay the Comparison is quite too low for all Creatures here have a fading vanity which wearieth the satiated or failing Appetite but there is no such thing in Heaven § 7. II. And as from the nature of that act so much more from the nature of the Object my love will appear to be my happiness The Objects which are as the Matter of the act will be these 1. GOD himself will be the full and everlasting Object of my Love And he that could but understand as well as those in Heaven do what this word signifieth to LOVE GOD and be BELOVED of him would say that there needs no other description of perfect happiness Perfect joyful Complacency in God is the Heaven which I desire and hope for This is my Felicity and much more As I am the Agent of Love to God and the Object of God's Love to me it is my Felicity As God is the ultimate Object of my Love and the Agent of his Love to me that is of the effects of it so it is unspeakably more high and excellent than to be my felicity Love is the closure of the Wills of God and Man And as it is God's part or interest efficiently or objectively it is infinitely more excellent than as it is my part and interest § 8. In GOD there is all that Love can desire for its full everlasting Feast 1. He is Infinitely good in himself that is most amiable And the nature of Man's will is to love Good as Good Could we love God with a Love that is adequate to the Object we should be God our selves which is impossible none but God can adequately know God or Love him In God's Love to Himself both the Act and Object are Infinite and indeed are both one there being not that formally which we know by the name of Act and Object but Act and Object are our analogical inadequate conceptions of that Act of God which is his Essence But in our Love to God the Act is finite and infinitely below the Object Yea the Object which in reality 〈◊〉 itself infinite yet proximately as the esse Cognitum is the Object of our Love is finite there It is the Conception or Idea of God in the Intellect which is the proper and nearest Object of the Will And this is as a Face in a Glass a shadow even the finite little shaddow of an infinite Being The same Infinite good is a felicity to diverâ— Persons in divers degrees according as they diversly love him and are receptive of his Love § 9. 2. God who is infinitely Good in himself will be that most suitable Good to me and meetest for the dearest embracements of my will For 1. He hath All in himself that I need or can desire There is no Room nothing above him or beyond him or without him for love to cleave to Though Below him the Creature though not being without him is loved without him by the deception of the mind § 10. 2. He is willing to be loved by me He disdaineth not my Love He might have refused to be embraced by such affections as have so oft and sinfully polluted themselves by embracing vanity and filth As Persons of state and stately cleanliness will not be touched by filthy hands much less let Dogs or dirty Swine leap on them which come from wallowing in the mire God might have driven me away from the happiness of loving him and have denyed me the leave for so high a work But he commandeth my Love and maketh it my greatest duty He inviteth and intreateth me as if he were a gainer by my happiness He seeketh to me to seek to him and as he is the first so is he the most earnest suiter He is far readier to receive my Love than I am to give it him All the compassionate invitations which I have had from him here by his Word and Mercies assure me that he will there receive me readily he that so valued my poor cold imperfect love to him on Earth will not reject my perfect love in Heaven He that made it the great work of his Spirit to Effect it will not refuse it when it is made perfect by himself § 11. 3. And he is near to me and not a distant God out of my reach and so unsuitable to my Love Blind Unbelievers may dream that he is far off but he is as near us even now as we are to our selves He is not far from any of us for in him we live and move and have our being The Light of the Sun is not so neaâ— my Eyes as God will be for ever to my Mind When he would sanctifie us to love him he bringeth us nigh to him in Christ. As we love our selves easily as being as they say the nearest to our selves So we shall as easily love God as our selves when we see â—â—at he is as near us as we are to our selves as well as that he is infinitely more Amiable in himself § 12. 4. And because of the imparity of the Creature and the Creator he hath provided such Means to demonstrate to us his nearness as are necessary to the exercise of our Love We shall see his Gâ—oâ—y and taste his Love in our glorified Mediator and in the Gâ—oâ—y of the Church and World God will condescend to shew himself to us according to our Capacities of beholding him Here we see him in his Works and Word and there we shall see him in the glory of all his perfect Works But this leadeth me to the second Object of my Love § 13. II. Under God as I shall see so I shall delightfully Love the glorious Perfection of the Universe even the Image of God in all the World as my Love will be my delight so I shall love best that which is best and most delight in it And the whole is better than any part And there is a peculiar Beauty and Excellency in the whole World as perfect compaginate harmonious which is not to be found in any part no not in Christ himself as Man nor in his Church The marvellous inclination that all things have to Union even the Inanimates might persuade me if I felt it not certainly in my self that it is most credible that Man also shall have the like
a Nature to us Else they would not cease at Death But holy LOVE is our New Nature and therefore ceaseth not with this bodily life And shall accidental love make me desire the company of a frail and mutable Friend And shall not this ingrafted inseparable love make me long to be with Christ Though the love of God to all his Creatures will not prove that they are all Immortal nor oblige them to expect another life that never had Capacity or Faculties to expect it yet his love to such as in Nature and Grace are made capable of it doth warrant and oblige them to believe and hope for the full Perfection of the work of love Some comfort themselves in the love of St. Peter as having the Keys of Heaven And how many could I name that are now with Christ who loved me so faithfully on Earth that were I sure they had the Keys and Power of Heaven and were not changed in their Love I could put my departing Soul into their Hands and die with joy And is it not better in the Hand of my Redeemer and of the God of Love and Father of Spirits Is any love comparable to his Or any Friend so boldly to be trusted I should take it for ungrateful unkindness in my Friend to doubt of my love and trustiness if I had given him all that he hath and maintained him constantly by my kindness But O how odious a thing is sin Which by destroying our love to God doth make us unmeer to believe and sweetly perceive his Love And by making us doubt of the Love of God and lose the pleasant relish of it doth more increase our difficulty of loving him The Title that the Angel gave to Daniel A Man greatly beloved of God methinks should be enough to make one joyfully love and trust God both in life and death Will Almighty LOVE ever hurt me or forsake me And have not all Saints that Title in their degrees What else signifieth their Mark and Name HOLINESS TO THE LORD What is it but our separation to God as his peculiar beloved People And how are they separated but by mutual love and our forsaking all that alienateth or is contrary Let Scorners deride us as self flatterers that believe they are God's Darlings and wo to the Hypocrites that believe it on their false Presumption without such belief or grounded hopes I see not how any Man can die in true Peace He that is no otherwise beloved than Hypocrites and Unbelievers must have his portion with them And he that is no otherwise beloved than as the ungodly unholy and unregenerate shall not stand in judgment nor see God nor enter into his Kingdom Most upright Souls are to blame for groundless doubting of God's Love but not for acknowledging it rejoicing in it and in their doubts being most solicitous to make it sure Love brought me into the World and furnished me with a Thousand Mercies Love hath provided for me delivered me and preserved me till now And will it not entertain my separated Soul Is God like false or insufficient Friends that forsake us in adversity I confess that I have wronged LOVE by sin by many and great unexcusable sins But all save Christ himself were sinners which love did purifie and receive to Glory God who is rich in Mercy for the great love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead in sins hath quickned us together with Christ by Grace we are saved and hath raised us up together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus Eph. 2. 4 5 6. O that I could love much that have so much forgiven The glorified praised him who loved us and washed us from our sins in his own Blood and made us Kings and Priests to God Rev. 1. 5 6. Our Father that hath loved us giveth us consolation and good hope through Grace 2 Thess 2. 16. I know no sin which I repent not of with self-loathing And I earnestly beg and labour that none of my sins may be to me unknown I dare not justifie even what is any way uncertain though I dare not call all that my sin which siding men of differing judgments on each side passionately call so While both sides do it on contrary accounts and not to go contrary ways is a Crime O that God would bless my accusations to my illumination that I may not be unknown to my self Though some think me much better than I am and others much worse it most concerneth me to know the Truth my self flattery would be more dangerous to me than false accusations I may safelier be ignorant of other mens sins than of my own Who can understand his errours Cleanse me Lord from secret sins and let not ignorance or errour keep me in impenitence and keep thou me back from presumptuous sins Psal 19. 12 13. I have an Advocate with the Father and thy Promise that he that confesseth and forsaketh his sins shall have Mercy Those are by some men taken for my greatest sins which my most serious Thoughts did judge to be the greatest of my outward duties and which I performed through the greatest difficulties and which cost me dearest to the Flesh and the greatest self-denial and patience in my reluctant Mind Where-ever I have erred Lord make it known to me that my confession may prevent the sin of others and where I have not erred confirm and accept me in the right And seeing an unworthy Worm hath had so many Testimonies of thy tender love let me not be like them Mal. 1. 1 2. that when thou saidst I have loved you unthankfully asked Wherein hast thou loved us Heaven is not more spangled with Stars than thy Word and Works with the refulgent Signatures of Love Thy well beloved Son the Son of thy Love undertaking the Office Message and Work of the greatest Love was full of that Spirit which is Love which he sheds abroad in the Hearts of thine Elect that the Love of the Father the Grace of the Son and the communion of the Spirit may be their hope and life His Works his Sufferings his Gifts as well as his comfortable Word did say to his Disciples Joh. 15. 9. As the Father loved me so have I loved you continue ye in my love And how Lord shall we continue in it but by the thankful belief of thy love and loveliness desiring still to love thee more and in all things to know and please thy Will Which thou knowest is my Souls desire Behold then O my Soul with what Love the Father Son and Holy Spirit have loved thee that thou should be made and called a Son of God redeemed regenerate adopted into that Covenant-state of Grace in which thou standest Rejoice therefore in hope of the Gâ—ory of God Rom. 5. 1 2. being justified by Faith having Peace with God and access by Faith and Hope that maketh not ashamed that being reconciled when an Enemy by the Death of Christ I shall be saved
This Nature and its faculties and powers are not made in vain II. Reason assureth me that all men are bound by Nature to prefer the least probability of a Life of Everlasting Joy before all the Prosperity of this World and to suffer the loss of all this short Vanity to escape the least possibility of endless misery And Nature hath such notices of Rewards and Punishments after Death that no Man can say that he is sure there is no such thing From whence it followeth that all men are bound by the very Law of Nature to be Religious and to seek first and most their Salvation in the Life to come And if so It 's certain that there is such a thing to be obtained Else God had made the very Nature of Man to be deceived by itself and to spend the chief part yea all his life through labour and suffering for that which is not and so made his greatest duty to be his greatest deceit and misery And the worst men should be least deceived But all this is not to be imputed to our wise and good Creator III. The universal sense of Moral Good and Evil in all Mankind is a great evidence of another life The vilest Atheist cannot abide to be accounted a Knave a Lyer a bad Man nor will equal a vicious Servant with another All would be thought good who will not be good And doth not God make a greater difference than Man And will he not shew it IV. The World is actually ruled much by the hopes and fears of another life and cannot well be ruled without it according to the Nature of Man But the Almighty most Wise and most Holy God needs not and will not rule the World by meer deceit V. The Gospel of Christ hath brought Life and Immortality into a clearer Light than that of Nature And it must be by believing in Christ that we must have our full satisfaction O what hath God done in the Wonders of Redemption to make us sure And against the doubts that are apt to rise from some hard particular Text of Scripture it must be considered I. That Christ and his Apostles did put the ascertaining Seal of the many uncontrolled Miracles to the Gospel Doctrin primarily which Doctrin 1. Was delivered and sealed Eight years before any of the New Testament was written and almost Seventy before the last 2. And Christ did not speak in the Language that the Gospel is written to us so that being but a Translation as to his own Words the Matter is the thing first sealed II. And that it was the two Legislator-Mediators Moses and Christ who came with the great stream of uncontrolled Miracles It being necessary that men should have full proof that a Law or Doctrin is of God before they believe it But the Priests and Prophets after Moses and the Preachers and Pastors of the Christian Church who were not Commissioned to bring men any New Laws or Gospel but to proclaim and teach that which they received needed no such New Testimony of Miracles III. The Belief of every particular Priest or Prophet after Moses or every Pastor after Christ and his Apostles was not of the same degree of necessity to Salvation as the belief of the Law and Gospel itself Therefore though all the Holy Scripture be true the Law and the Gospel must be much differenced from the rest IV. The History of the Law and Gospel have full ascertaining historical Evidence or else there is none such in the World Therefore the Doctrin must be true V. The Prophesies fulfilled prove the Gospel true VI. And the Divine Impress on the whole VII And the sanctifying work of the Spirit wrought by it in all Nations and Ages on serious Believers is a constant Divine attestation VIII And as my Faith hath so sure a Foundation it confirmeth my Faith and Hope that it hath been so long and great a work of God by his Word and Spirit on my Soul to raise it to believe and love and desire that Holy state of Perfection and Fruition which I hope for That which hath made me so much better than I else had been and turned my Heart and Life though imperfectly to things above the Pleasures of the Flesh must needs be of God And God would never send his Grace to work my Heart to Deceit and Lies and give me such Graces as shall all be frustrate His Spirit is the Earnest and first Fruits of Glory IX And all the course of Religious and Moral duty which he hath commanded me and in which he hath employed my life were never imposed to deceive me I am sure by Nature and Scripture that it is my Duty to love God and my Neighbour to desire Perfection and to serve God and do good with all my time and power and to trust God for my reward believing that all this shall not be in vain nor that which is best be made my loss O blessed be God for Commands and Holy Duty For they are equal to Promises Who can fear that he shall lose by seeking God X. As God hath sealed the Truth of his Word as aforesaid so he hath by an instituted Office and Ordinance sealed and delivered to my self his Covenant with the gift of Christ and Life in Baptism and the Lord's Supper XI He hath given me such a love to Holy Things and Persons that I greatly long to see his Church in perfect Light and Love and Concord Oh how sweet would it be to see all men Wise and Holy and Joyfully praising God Every Christian longs for this And therefore such a state will be XII I have found here the great benefit of the Love and Ministry of Angels such as is described in Psal 91. They have kept me Night and Day which confirmeth my hope that I shall dwell with them for I love them better than men because they love and serve God better XIII That low communion which I have here with God by Christ and the Spirit in his answer to my Prayers Supports Comforts Experiences tends to more XIV The pleasure which I have by Love in thinking of the happiness of my many many many holy departed Friends and of the Glory of Christ and the heavenly Jerusalem is sure some hopeful approach towards their state XV. When I see the Fire mount upward and think that Spirits are of a more sublime and excellent Nature than Fire And when I see that all that is done in this World is done by Spiritual unseen powers which move this gross and drossie Matter it puts me past doubt that my Soul being a Spirit hath a vast and glorious World of Spirits to ascend to God hath by Nature put into all things an aggregative uniting inclination Earth hath no other natural motion The ascent of Fire tells us its Element is above And Spiritâ— naturally incline to Spirits and holy Spirits peculiarly are inclined to the Holy XVI I am sure 1. By understanding
the wicked to prosecure his Servants to the Death and make duty costly and give no after recompence 6. If he let the most wicked on the Earth pass unpunished or to scape as well hereafter as the best and to live in greater pleasure here The Objections fetcht from the intrinsecal good of Duty I have elsewhere answered § 1. VI. But God hath not left us to the Light of meer Nature as being too dark for men so blind as we The Gospel Revelation is the clear Foundation of our Faith and Hopes Christ hath brought Life and Immortality to Light One from Heaven that is greater than an Angel was sent to tell us what is there and which is the way and to secure our hopes He hath risen and conquered death and entered before us as our Captain and Forerunner into the Everlasting habitations And he hath all power in Heaven and Earth and all Judgment is committed to him that he might give Eternal life to his Elect he hath frequently and expresly promised it them that they shall live because he liveth and shall not perish but have Everlasting life And how fully he hath proved and sealed the Truth of his Word and Office to us I have so largely opened in my Reasons of the Christian Religion and unreasonableness of Infidelity and in my Life of Faith c. and since in my Houshold Catechizing that I will not here repeat it § 2. And as all his Word is full of promises of our future Glory at the Resurrection so we are not without assurance that at Death the departing Soul doth enter upon a State of Joy and Blessedness For 1. He expresly promised the penitent crucified Thief This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise Luk. 23. 2. He gave us the Narrative or Parable of the damned sensualist and of Lazarus Luk. 16. to instruct us and not to deceive us 3. He tells the Sadduces that God is not the God of the Dead as his Subjects and Beneficiaries but of the Living Mat. 22. 32. 4. Henoch and Elias were taken up to Heaven and Moses that died appeared with Elias on the Mount Mat. 17. 5. He telleth us Luk. 12. 4. that they that kill the Body are not able to kill the Soul 6. And Christ's own Soul was commended into his Father's hands Luk. 23. 46. and was in Paradise when his Body was in the Grave to shew us what shall become of ours 7. And he hath promised that Where he is there shall his Servant be also Joh. 12. 26. And that the life here begun in us is Eternal life and that he that believeth in him shall not die but shall live by him as he liveth by the Father for he dwelleth in God and God in him and in Christ and Christ in him Joh. 17. 3. 6. 54. 3. 16 36. 6. 47 56 57 50. 1 Joh. 4. 5. 13. Luk. 17. 21. Rom. 14. 17. 8. And accordingly Stephen that saw Heaven opened prayed the Lord Jesus to receive his Spirit Act. 7. 5. 59. 9. And we are come to Mount Sion c. to an innumerable Company of Angels and to the Spirits of the Just made perfect Heb. 12. 22 23. 10. And Paul here desireth to depart and be with Christ as far better And to be absent from the Body and be present with the Lord 2 Cor. 5. 8. 11. And the dead that die in the Lord are blessed from henceforth that they may rest from their labours and their works follow them 12. And if the disobedient Spirits be in Prison and the Cities of Sodom and Gomorrah suffer the vengeance of eternal Fire 1 Pet. 3. 19. Jude 7. then the Just have eternal Life And if the Jews had not thought the Soul immortal Saul had not desired the Witch to call up Samuel to speak with him The rest I now pass by We have many great and precious promises on which a departed Soul may trust 13. And Luk. 16. 9. Christ expresly saith that when we fail that is must leave this World we shall be received into the Everlasting habitations § 1. VII And it is not nothing to encourage us to hope in him that hath made all these Promises when we find how he heareth Prayers in this life and thereby assureth his Servants that he is their true and faithful Saviour We are apt in our distress to cry loud for Mercy and deliverances and when humane help faileth to promise God that if he now will save us we will thankfully acknowledg it his work and yet when we are delivered to return not only to security but to ingratitude and think that our deliverance came but in the course of common Providence and not indeed as an answer to our Prayers And therefore God in Mercy reneweth both our distresses and our deliverances that what once or twice will not convince us of many and great deliverances may This is my own case O how oft have I cryed to him when men and means were nothing and when no help in second Causes did appear and how oft and suddenly and mercifully hath he delivered me What sudden ease what removal of long afflictions have I had such extraordinary changes and beyond my own and others expectations when many plain-hearted upright Christians have by Fasting and Prayer sought God on my behalf as have over and over convinced me of Special Providence and that God is indeed a hearer of Prayers And wonders I have seen done for others also upon such Prayer more than for my self Yea and wonders for the Church and publick Societies Though I and others are too like those Israelites Psal 78. who cried to God in their troubles and he oft delivered them out of their distress but they quickly for got this Mercies and their Convictions Purposes and Promises when they should have praised the Lord for his Goodness and declared his works with thanksgiving to the Sons of Men. And what were all these Answers and Mercies but the fruits of Christ's Power Fidelity and Love the fulfilling of his Promises and the earnest of the greater blessings of Immortality which the same Promises give me Title to I know that no Promise of hearing Prayer setteth up our wills in absoluteness or above God's as if every will of our must be fulfilled if we do but put it into a fervent or confident Prayer But if we ask any thing through Christ according to his will expressed in his Promise he will hear us If a sinful love of this present life or of Ease or Wealth or Honour should cause me to pray to God against Death or against all sickness want reproach or other Trials as if I must live here in Prosperity for ever if I ask it this sinful desire and expectation is not the work of Faith but of Presumption What if God will not abate me my last or daily pains What if he will continue my life no longer who ever pray for
them that have been piously inclined from their Childhood it is harder to discern the difference unless they mark the Case of others If Man be worth any thing it is for the use that his Faculties were made And if he be not good for the Knowledg Love and Service of his Creator what is he good for And certainly the generality of ungodly Worldlings are undisposed to all such works as this till the Spirit of Christ effectually change them Men are Slaves to sin till Christ thus make them free Joh. 8. 32 33 36. Rom. 6. 18. Act. 26. 18. Rom. 8. 2. But where the Spirit of the Lord is there is Liberty 2 Cor. 3. 17. If the Divine Nature and Image and the Love of God shed abroad on the Heart be not our Excellency Health and Beauty what is And that which is Born of the Flesh is Flesh but that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit Joh. 3. 6. Without Christ and his Spirit we can do nothing Our dead Notions and Reason when we see the Truth have not power to overcome Temptations nor to raise up Man's Soul to its Original and End nor to possess us with the love and joyful hopes of future Blessedness It were better for us to have no Souls than that those Souls should be void of the Spirit of God § 4. 2. And that HEAVEN is the Sum and End of all the Spirits Operations appeareth in all that â—â—e truly Conscious of them in themselves and to them and others by all God's Precepts which the Spirit causeth us to obey and the Doctrine which it causeth us to believe and by the description of all God's graces which he worketh in us What is our Knowledge and Faith but our knowledge and belief of Heaven as consisting in the Glory and Love of God there manifested and as purchased by Christ and given by his Covenant What is our Hope but the Hope of Glory See Heb. 11. 1. and throughout 1 Pet. 1. 3. 21. Heb. 6 11 18 19. 3. 6 Tit. 2 13. 3. 7. Col. 1. 5 23 27. And through the Spirit we wait for all this Hope Gal. 5. 5. What is our Love but a desire of Communion with the blessed God initially here and perfectly hereafter As the Sum of Christ's Gospel was Take up the Cross forsake all here and follow me and thou shalt have a Reward in Heaven Luke 14. 26 33. 18. 22 23. and the Consolation of his Gospel is Rejoice and be exceeding glad for great is your reward in Heaven Matt. 5. 11 12. So the same is the Sum of his Spirits Operations For what he teacheth and commandeth that he worketh For he worketh by that Word and the impress must be like the Signet what arm soever set it on He sendeth not his Spirit to make men craftier than others for this World but to make them wiser for Salvation and to make them more Heavenly and Holy For the Children of this World are wiser in their Generation than the Children of Light Heavenliness is the Spirits special work § 5. 3. And in working this it conquereth the inward undisposedness and aversness of a fleshly worldly mind and will and the customs of a Carnal life and the outward Temptations of Satan and all the allurements of the World Christ first overcame the World and teacheth and causeth us to overcome it even its flatteries and its frowns Our Faith is our Vâ—ctory Whether this Victory be easie and any honour to the Spirit of Christ let our experience of the wickedness of the ungodly World and of our own weakness and of our falls when the Spirit of God forsaketh us be our informer § 6. 4. And that None but God can do this work on the Soul of Man both the knowledge of Causes and Experience prove The most learned wise and holy Teachers cannot as they confess and shew The wisest and most loving Parents cannot and therefore must pray to him that can The greatest Princes cannot Evil Angels neither can nor will What Good Angels can do on the Heart we know not but we know that they do nothing but as the obedient Ministers of God And though we have some power on our selves yet that we our selves cannot do it that we cannot Quicken Illuminate or Sanctifie our selves and that we have nothing but what we have received Conscience and Experience fully tell us § 7. 5. And that Christ promised this Spirit in a special measure to all true Believers that it should be in them his Advocate Agent Seal and Mark is yet visible in the Gospel yea and in the former Prophets Isa 44. 34. Ezek. 36. 26. 37. 14. Joel 2. 28 29. Ezek. 11. 19. 18. 31. Eph. 1. 13. Joh. 3. 5. 4. 23 24. 6. 63. 7. 39. Joh. 1. 33. 14. 16 26. Act. 1. 5 8. Joh. 15. 26. 16. 7 8 9 c. Indeed the Spirit here and Heaven hereafter are the chief of all the Promises of Christ § 8. 6. And that this Spirit is given not to Hypocrites that abuse Christ and do not seriously believe him nor to meer pretending nominal Christians but to all that sincerely believe the Gospel is evident not only to themselves in certainty if they are in a condition to know themselves but to others in part by the effects They have other Ends other affections other lives than the rest of Mankind have Though their heavenly Nature and Design be the less discerned and honoured in the World because their chiefest difference is out of the sight of Man in the Heart and in their secret actions and because their imperfections blemish them and because the Malignant World is by Strangeness and Enmity an incompetent judge yet it is discernable to others that they live upon the hopes of a better life and their heavenly Interest is it that over-ruleth all the adverse Interests of this World and that in order thereunto they live under the conduct of Divine Authority and that God's will is highest and most prevalent with them and that to obey and please him so far as they know it is the greatest business of their lives though ignorance and adverse Flesh do make their Holiness and Obedience imperfect The universal noise and opposition of the World against them doth shew that men discern a very great difference which Error and cross Interests and Carnal inclinations render displeasing to those who find themselves condemned by their heavenly Designs and Conversations § 9. But whether others discern it or deny it or detest it the true Believer is conscious of it in himself Even when he groaneth to be better to believe and trust and love God more and to have more of the heavenly life and comforts those very desires signifie another Appetite and Mind than Worldlings have and even when his frailties and weaknesses make him doubt of his own sincerity he would not change his Governour Rule or Hopes for all that the World can
Patience a better and sweeter life than rest and joy § 14. But alas how deaf is Flesh to Reason Faith hath the Reason which easily may shame all contrary Reasoning but sense is unreasonable and especially this inordinate tenacious Love of present Life I have Reason enough to be willing to depart even much more willing than I am O that I could be as willing as I am convinced that I have Reason to be Could I Love God as much as I know that I should Love him then I should desire to depart and to be with Christ as much as I know that I should desire it But God in Nature hath here laid upon me some necessity of aversation though the inordinateness came from sin Else Christ had not so feared and deprecated the Cup Death must be a penalty even where it is a gain and therefore it must meet with some unwillingness Because we willingly sinned we must unwillingly suffer The Gain is not the pain or dissolution in itself but the happy consequents of it All the Faith and Reason in the World will not make Death to be no penalty and therefore will not take away all unwillingness No Man ever yet Reasoned or Believed himself into a Love of Pain and Death as such But seeing that the gain is unspeakably Greater than the Pain and Loss Faith and Holy Reason may make our willingness to be Greater than our unwillingness and our Hope and Joy than our Fear and Sorrow And it is the deep and effectual notice of Goodness which is God's way in Nature and Grace to change and draw the Will of Man Come then my Soul and Think believingly what is BEST for thee And wilt thou not Love and Desire most that which is certainly the BEST To Depart and to be with Christ is far better or rather to be chosen § 1. TO say and hear that it is far better to be with Christ is not enough to make us willing Words and Notions are such instruments as God useth to work on Souls but the convincing satisfying powerful Light and the inclining Love are other things The Soul now operateth ut forma hominis on and with the Corporeal Spirit and Organs and it perceiveth now its own perceptions but it is a stranger to the Mode of its future Action when it is separated from the Body and can have no formal conception of such conceptions as yet it never had And therefore its Thoughts of its future â—â—ate must be Analogical and General and partly â—range But General notices when certain may be very powerful and satisfie us in so much as is needful to our â—onsent and to such a measure of Joy as is suitable to this earthly state And such notices we have from the Nature of the Soul with the Nature of God the course of Providence and Government of Mankind the internal and external conflicts which we perceive about Mens Souls the Testimony and Promises of the Word of God the Testimony of Conscience with the Witness of the sanctifying Spirit of Christ and in it the Earnest and the foretast of Glory and the beginnings of Life eternal here of all which I have before considered § 2. The Socinians who would interpret this of the state of Resurrection only against plain evidence violate the Text Seeing Paul expresly speaketh of his Gain by Death which will be his abode with Christ and this upon his departure hence which in 2 Cor. 5. 7 8. he calleth his being absent from the Body and present with Lord And Christ to the penitent Thief calleth his being with him in Paradise And Luke 16. in the Parable of the Steward Christ intimateth to us that wise preparers when they go hence are received into the Everlasting habitations as he there further tells us Lazarus was in Abrahams bosom § 3. Goodness is primaria mensurans vel secundaria mensurata The first is God's perfect Essence and Will The second is either properly and simply Good or Analogical The former is the Creatures conformity to the Will of God or its Pleasingness to his will The later is 1. The Greater which is the wellfare or perfection of the Universe 2. The Lesser which is the Perfection of the several parts of the Universe either 1. In the nobler respect as they are Parts contributing to the Perfection of the whole or 2. In the lower respect as they are Perfect or Happy in themselves or 3. In the lowest respect of all as they are good to their fellow Creatures which are below themselves § 4. Accordingly It is far better to be with Christ I. Properly and simply as it is the fulfilling of God's will II. Analogically as it tendeth to the Perfection of the Universe and the Church III. And as it will be our own good or felicity IV. And as it will be Good to our inferiour fellow Creatures though this last be most questionable and seemeth not included in the meaning of this Text Somewhat of these in order § 5. I. It is an odious effect of Idolatrous SELFISHNESS to acknowledge no Goodness above our own FELICITY and accordingly to make the Goodness of God to be but formally his Usefulness Benovolence and Beneficence to his Creatures which is by making the Creature the ultimate End and God but the Means to make the Creature to be God and deny God indeed while we honour his Name As also it is to acknowledge no higher goodness formally in the Creature than its own felicity as such As if neither the pleasing of God's will nor the Perfection of the Church and World were better than we are We are not of our selves and therefore we are not chiefly for our selves and therefore we have a higher Good to Love That is simply Best which God willeth Therefore to Live here is Best whilest I do live here and to depart is best when the time of my departure cometh That is Best which is which is the work of God The World cannot be Better at this Instant than it is nor any thing Better which is of God because it is as he willeth it to be But when God hath changed them it will then be Best that they are changed Were there no other Good in my departure hence but this simple Good the fulfilling of God's will my Reason telleth me that I should be fully satisfied in it But there is also a subordinate sort of Good § 6. II. For my change will tend to the perfection of the Universe even that Material Good or Perfection which is its Aptitude for the use to which God hath created and doth preserve it As all the parts the modes the situation the motions of a Clock a Watch or other such Engine do to the ends of the Artificer Though God hath not told me particularly Why every Thing and Mode and Motion is as it is I know it is all done in perfect Wisdom and suited to its proper use and end If the Hen or Bird knoweth
intuitively and as Face to Face That which is essentially Life as a Living Principle will Live And that which is essentially an Active Intellective Volitive principle force and Virtue will still be such while it is itself and is not annihilated or changed into another thing which is not to be feared And that which is such can never want an Object till all things be annihilated § 8. Reason assureth me that were my will now what it should be and fully obsequious herein to my understanding to fulfil Gods will would be the fulfilling my own will for my will should perfectly comply with His and to please him perfectly would be my perfect pleasure And it is the unreasonable adhesion to this Body and sinful selfishness which maketh any one think otherwise now I am sure that my Soul shall Live for it is Life itself and I am sure that I shall live to God and that I shall fulfil and please his blessed will and this is as such incomparably better than my Felicity as such And yet so far as I am pleased in so doing it will be my Felicity § 9. I begin now to think that the strange Love which the Soul hath to this Body so far as it is not inordinate is put into us of God partly to signifie to us the great Love which Christ hath to his Mystical Political Body and to every member of it even the least He will gather all his Elect out of the World and none that come to him shall be shut out and none that are given him shall be lost As his Flesh is to them Meat indeed and his Blood is to them Drink indeed and he nourisheth them for Life eternal His Spirit in them turning the Sacrament the Word and Christ himself in esse objectivo as Believed in into Spirit and Life to us as the Soul and our Natural Spirits turn our food into Flesh and Blood and Spirits which in a dead Body or any lifeless repository it would never be so as we delight in the ease and prosperity of our Body and each Member and have pleasure in the pleasant food that nourisheth it and other pleasant Objects which accommodate it Christ also delighteth in the welfare of his Church and of all the Faithful and is pleased when they are fed with good and pleasant Food and when hereby they prosper Christ Loveth the Church not only as a Man must love his Wife but as we Love our Bodies And no Man ever hated his own Flesh Eph. 5. 27 c. And herein I must allow my Saviour the preeminence to overgo me in powerful faithful Love He will save me better from pain and death than I can save my Body and will more inseparably hold me to himself If it please my Soul to dwell in such a House of Clay and to operate on so mean a thing as Flesh how greatly will it please my glorified Lord to dwell with his glorified Body the triumphant Church and to cherish and bless each Member of it It would be a kind of death to Christ to be separated from his Body and to have it die Whether Augustine and the rest of the Fathers were in the right or no who thought that as our Bodies do not only shed their Hairs but by sicknesses and wast lose much of their very Flesh so Christ's Militant Body doth not only lose Hypocrites but also some living justified Members yet certain it is that confirmed Members and more certain that glorified Members shall not be lost Heaven is not a place for Christ or us to suffer such loss in And will Christ love me better than I love my Body Will he be lother to lose me than I am to lose a Member or to die Will he not take incomparably greater pleasure in animating and actuating me for ever than my Soul doth in animating and actuating this Body O then let me long to be with him And though I am naturally loth to be absent from the Body let me be by his Spirit more unwilling to be absent from the Lord And though I would not be unclothed had not sin made it necessary let me groan to be clothed upon with my heavenly Habitation and to become the delight of my Redeemer and to be perfectly loved by Love itself § 10. And even this blessed Receptivity of my Soul in terminating the Love and Delight of my glorified Head must needs be a felicity to me The insensible Creatures are but Beautified by the Suns communication of its Light and Heat but the sensitives have also the Pleasure of it Shall my Soul be sensless will it be a Clod or Stone Shall that which is now the form of be then more Lifeless Sensless or uncapable than the form of Bruits is now Doubtless it will be a living perceiving sensible Recipient of the felicitating Love of God and my Redeemer I shall be loved as a living Spirit and not as a dead and senseless thing that doth not comfortably perceive it § 11. And if I must rejoice with my fellow Servants that rejoice shall I not be glad to think that my blessed Lord will rejoice in me and in all his glorified Ones Union will make his pleasure to be much mine And it will be aptly said by him to the faithful Soul Enter thou into the Joy of thy Lord Mat. 25. 21. His own active Joy will objectively be Ours as Ours will be Efficiently His or from Him Can that be an ill condition to me in which my Lord will most rejoice It is Best to Him and therefore Best to me § 12. And the heavenly Society will joyfully welcome a Holy Soul If there be now Joy in Heaven among the Angels for one Sinner that Repenteth who hath yet so little Holiness and so much Sin What joy will there be over a perfected glorified Soul Surely if Our Angels there behold our Fathers Face they will be glad in Season of our Company The Angels that carried Lazarus to Abraham's Bosom no doubt rejoiced in their work and their success And is the Joy of Angels and the heavenly Host as nothing to me Will not Love and Union make their Joy to be my own if Love here must make all my Friends and Neighbours comforts to become my own And as their Joy according to their Perfection is greater than any that I am now capable of so the participation of so great a Joy of theirs will be far better than to have my little separated apartment Surely that will be my best condition which Angels and blessed Spirits will be best pleased in and I shall rejoice most in that which they most rejoice in III. The Constitutive Reasons from the Intellective state III. § 1. Though the Tempter would persuade men because of the case of Infants in the Womb Apoplectick's c. that the understanding will be but an unactive Power when separated from these corporeal Organs I have seen before sufficient Reasons to repel this
great Realities to the Logical and Philological game at Words and Notions it was Socrates his wisdom to call them to more concerning Studies and Pauls greater Wisdom to warn men to take heed of such vain Philosophy and to labour to know God and Jesus Christ and the things of the Spirit and not to overvalue this ludicrous dreaming worldly Wisdom And if I have none of this kind of Notional childish knowledge when I am absent from the Body the Glass and Spectacles may then be spared when I come to see with open Face or as face to Face Our future knowledge is usually in Scripture called SEEING Mat. 5. 8. Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God 1 Cor. 13. 12. We shall see Face to Face 1 Joh. 3. 2. We shall see him as he is Joh. 17. 24. Father I will that those which thou hast given me be with me where I am that they may behold my Glory which thou hast given me c. An Intuitive knowledge of all things as in themselves immediately is a more excellent sort of knowledge than this by similitudes Names and Notions which our Learning now consisteth in and is but an Art acquired by many acts and use § 3. If the Sun were as the Heathens thought it an Intellective Animal and it s emitted rayes were vitally visive and when one of those rayes were received by prepared seminal matter as in Insects it became the Soul of an inferiour Animal in this case the said ray would operate in that Insect or Animal but according to the Capacity of the recipient matter whereas the Sun itself by all it s emitted rays would see all things Intellectually and with delight and when that Insect were dead that Ray would be what it was an Intellective Intuitive emanation And though the Soul in Flesh do not know itself how it shall be united to Christ and to all other holy Souls and to God himself nor how near or just of what sort that union will be yet united it will be and therefore will participate accordingly of the the universal Light or understanding to which it is united The Soul now as it is or operateth in the Foot or Hand doth not understand but only as it is and operateth in the Head And yet the same Soul which is in the Hand understandeth in the Head and the Soul operateth not so selfishly or dividedly in the Hand as to repine there because it understandeth not there but it is quiet in that it understandeth in the Head and performeth its due Operation in the Hand But this diversity of Operations seemeth to be from the Organs and the Bodies use or need But Souls dismissed from the Body seem to be as all Eye or Intuitive Light Therefore though it might content us to say that our Head seeth all things and we are united to him yet we may say further that we our selves shall see God and all things that are meet for us to see § 4. And seeing it is most certain that the Superior glorious Regions are full of blessed Spirits who do see God and one another having much more perfect Operations than we have whose effects we Mortals find here below why should I that find an Intellective Nature in my self make any doubt of my more perfect Operations when I am dismissed hence being satisfied that a Soul will not lose its simple Essence Either those superiour Spirits have ethereal Bodies to act in or are such themselves or not If they are or have such why should I doubt of the like and think that my Substance or Vehicle will not be according to the Region of my abode If not why should I think that my departed Soul may not know or see without an igneous or ethereal Body or Vehicle as well as all those worlds of Spirits And the certainty of Apparitions Possessions and Witches do tell us not only that there are such Inhabitants of other Regions Ordinarily invisible to us but also that we are in the way to that Happiness or Misery which is in our invisible state § 5. These things reviewed being partly mentioned before assuring me that I shall have actual Intellection in my separated state the Region with the Objects but above all the Holy Scriptures will tell me as much as it is meet that I should here know what it is that I shall intuitively understand The Apostle 1 Cor. 13. 10 11 12. doth distinguish our knowing in part and knowing Perfectly knowing as a Child and as a Man knowing darkly and enigmatically as in a Glass and knowing Face to Face as we are known The great Question is When this Time of Perfection is Whether he mean at Death or at the Resurrection If Dr. Hammonds observation hold that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Scripture when The Flesh or Body is not joined with it signifies that Life which the Soul doth enter upon immediately after our Death and so that the Soul hath that after living which is sinified by the very word which we Translate Resurrection then it will lead men to think that there is less difference between Mansstate at his first departure and at his last Resurrection than most think even than Calvin himself thought But the difference between our first and last state of after life or Resurrection cannot be now distinctly known What difference there is now between Henoch Elias and those who rose at Christs Resurrection and the rest of the Saints even the Spirits of the perfected Just and whether the first have as much greater Glory than the rest as it is conceived that we shall have at the Resurrection above that which immediately followeth Death what mortal Man can tell I am past doubt that Flesh and Blood formally so called and not only ab accidente as sinful shall not inherit the Kingdom of God vid. Hammond in loc but that our Natural Bodies shall be made Spiritual Bodies And how a Spiritual Body differeth from a Spirit or Soul I pretend not well to understand but must stay till God by experience or fuller Light inform me But surely the difference is not like to be so great as that a Soul in Flesh shall know in part and a Soul in a Spiritual Body shall know perfectly and a Soul between both shall not know at all If it be Perfection which we shall have in our Spiritual Body it is like that we are nearer to that Perfection in Knowledge and Felicity while we are between both than we are in the Flesh § 6. And sure a Soul that even Solomon saith goeth upward and to God that gave it is liker to know God than that which is terminated in Flesh and operateth ut forma according to its capacity and state And a Soul that is with Christ is liker to know Christ and the Father in him than that which is present with the Body and absent from the Lord. What less can the Promise of being with him signifie § 7.
is here but as in the Seed the perfect union and communion is hereafter Earth and Heaven must be distinguished We must not extend our hopes or pretensions here beyond the Capacity of our Natures As perfect Holiness and Knowledge so perfect Unity and Concord is proper to Heaven and is not here to be expected The Papal pretensions of an impossible Union in one Governour of all the Earth is the means to hinder that Union which is possible But the state of Perfection is the state of perfect union communion Hasten then upwards O my Soul with the ferventest desires and breath after that state with the strongest Hopes where thou shalt not be rich and see thy Neighbours poor about thee nor be poor while they are rich nor be well while they are sick or sick while they are well But their Riches their Health their Joy will be all thine and thine will be all theirs as the common Light and none will have the less for the participation of the rest Yea Communion will be part of every ones felicity It constitueth the very being of the City of God This Celestial Communion of Saints in one holy Church above what is here to be attained is now an Article of our Belief But believing will soon end in seeing and enjoying V. The Constitutive Reasons from the heavenly Life or Practice § 1. Seeing and Loving will be the heavenly Life But yet it seemeth that besides these there will be EXECUTIVE Powers and therefore some answerable PRACTICE There are GOOD WORKS in Heaven and far more and better than on Earth For 1. There will be more Vital Activity and therefore more exercise of it For the Power is for Action 2. There will be more Love to God and one another And Love is active 3. There will be more likeness to God and our Redeemer who is communicative and doth good as he is good 4. Our Union with Christ who will be everlastingly beneficent as well as benevolent will make us in our places also beneficent 5. Our Communion in the City of God will prove that we shall all bear our part as the Members of the Body in contributing to the welfare of the whole and in the common returns to God § 2. But What are the heavenly Works we must perfectly know when we come thither In general we know 1. That they will be the works of love to God and to his Creatures that is such as Love inclineth us to exercise 2. And they will be works of Obedience to God that is such as we shall do to please his will and because he willeth them to be our duty 3. They will be useful works to others 4. They will be pleasant to our selves and part of our felicity 5. And they will carry all to God our End § 3. And somwhat of them is particularly described in the holy Scriptures As 1. We shall in Concord with the whole Society or Chore give Thanks and Praise to God and our Redeemer Rev. 19. 5. 1 Pet. 4. 11. Rev. 7. 4. 4. 7 11. 5. 13. 7. 12. 19. 1. Phil. 4 20. Whether there be any Voice or only such Spiritual activity and exultation as to Man in Flesh is not to be clearly understood is not fit for us here to presume to determine It will be somwhat more high and excellent than our vocal Praise and Singing is and of which this beareth some analogical resemblance or signification As all Passions earnestly desire vent and exercise so specially do our holy affections of Love Joy and Admiration of God Almighty And there is in us a desire of communion with many in such affections and expressions Methinks when we are singing or speaking God's praise in the great Assemblies with joyful and fervent Souls I have the liveliest foretast of Heaven on Earth And I could almost wish that our Voices were loud enough to reach through all the World and unto Heaven itself Nor could I ever be offended as many are at the Organs and other convenient Musick soberly and seasonably used which excite and help to tune my Soul in so holy a work in which no true assistance is to be despised No work more comforteth me in my greatest sufferings none seemeth more congruous and pleasant to me while I wait for Death than Psalms and words of Praise to God nor is there any exercise in which I had rather end my life And should I not then willingly go to the heavenly Chore where God is praised with perfect Love and Joy and harmony Had I more of a Praising frame of Soul it would make me long more for that Life of Praise For I never find my self more willing to be there than when I most joyfully speak or sing God's praise Though the Dead praise not God in the grave and dust doth not give him thanks yet living Souls in Heaven do it joyfully while their fleshly cloathing turns to dust Lord â—une my Soul to thy Praises now that sweet experience may make me long to be where I shall do it better I see where any excellent Musick is Nature maketh men flock to it and they that are but Hearers yet join by a concurrent phantasie and delight Surely if I had once heard the heavenly Chore I should Eccho to their holy Songs though I could not imitaâ— them and I should think it the truest Blessedness to be there and bear my part My God the voice of thy comforting Spirit speaking thy Love effectually to my Soul would make such holy Musick in me that would incline me to the Celestial consort and without it all these thoughts and words will be in vain It is the inward Mâ—lody of thy Spirit and my Conscience that must tune me to desire the hâ—avenly Melody O speak thy love first to my Heart and then I shall joyfully speak it to my Brethren and shall ambitiously seek that communion of them that praise thee better than sinful groaning Mortals can And though my sins here make a loathed jar and discord in my Songs I hope my groans for these sins and their effects will make no discord Sighs and Tears have had the honour to be accepted by thee who despisest not a contrite Soul But if thy Spirit will sing and speak within me and help me against the discordant murmurs of my unbelieving Heart and pained Flesh I shall offer thee that which is more suitable to thy Love and Grace I confess Lord that daily Tears and Sighs are not unsuitable to the Eyes and Voice of so great a Sinner who is under thy correcting Roâ— What better could I expect when I grieved thy Spirit than that it should prove my grief Yea this is far better than the genuine effects of sin But this is not it that is meeâ—est to be offered to the God of Love He that offereth Praise doth glorifie thee And is not this the Spiritual Sacrifice acceptable through Christ for which we were made Priests to God
others groping for it in the dark wandring and lost in the clearest Light where the illuminated can but pitty the Blind but cannot make them willing to be delivered What is Heaven to me but GOD GOD who is LIFE and LIGHT and LOVE communicating himself to blessed Spirits perfecting them in the Reception Possession and Exercise of LIFE and LIGHT and LOVE FOR EVER These are not the Accidents but the Essence of that God who is Heaven and All to me should I fear that Death which passeth me to Infinite Essential Life Should I fear a darksom passage into a World of perfect LIGHT Should I fear to go to LOVE itself Think O my Soul what the Suns quickening Light and Heat is to this lower corporeal World Much more is GOD even Infinite LIFE and LIGHT and LOVE to the blessed World above Doth it not draw out thy desires to think of going into a World of LOVE When LOVE will be our Region our Company our Life More to us than the Air is for our Breath than the Light is for our sight than our Food is for our Life than our Friends are for our Solace And more to us than we are to our selves and we more for it as our ultimate end than for our selves O excellent Grace of Faith which doth foresee and blessed Word of Faith that doth foreshew this World of LOVE Shall I fear to enter where there is no WRATH no fear no strangeness nor suspicion nor selfish separation but LOVE will make every holy Spirit as dear and lovely to me as my self and me to them as lovely as themselves and God to us all more amiable than our selves and all Where LOVE will have no defects or distances no damps or discouragements no discontinuance or mixed disaffection but as LIFE will be without Death and LIGHT without Darkness a perfect everlasting Day of Glory so will LOVE be without any hatred unkindness or allay As many Coals make one Fire and many Candles conjoined make one Light so will many living Spirits make one Life and many illuminated Glorious Spirits one Light and Glory and many Spirits innaturalized into LOVE will make one Perfect LOVE of GOD and be LOVED as One by God for ever For all the Body of Christ is One even here it is One in initial Union of the Spirit and Relation to One God and Head and Life 1 Cor. 12. throughout Eph. 4. 1. to 17. and shall be presented as beloved and spotless to God when the great Marriage Day of the Lamb shall come Eph. 5. 24 25 c. Rev. 21. 22. Had thou not given me O Lord the LIFE of Nature I should have had no conceptions of a Glorious everlasting Life But if thou give me not the Life of Grace I shall have no sufficient delightful inclination and desire after it Hadst thou not given me Sight and Reason the Light of Nature I should not have thought how desirable it is to live in the Glorious Light and Vision but if thou give me not the Spiritual Illumination of a seeing Faith I shall not yet long for the Glorious Light and beatifical Vision Hadst thou not given me a Will and Love which is part of my very Nature itself I could not have tasted how desirable it is to live in a World of Universal perfect endless LOVE But unless thou also shed abroad thy LOVE upon my Heart by the Spirit of Jesus the Great Medium of LOVE and turn my very Nature or Inclination into Divine and Holy LOVE I shall not long for the World of LOVE Appetite followeth Nature O give me not only the Image and the Art of Godliness the approaches towards it nor only some forced or unconstant acts but give me the Divine Nature which is Holy Love and then my Soul will hasten towards thee and cry How long O Lord How long O come come quickly make no delay Surely the fear of dying intimateth some contrary Love that inclineth the Soul another way and some shameful unbelief and great unapprehensiveness of the Attractive Glory of the World of LOVE Otherwise no frozen Person so longeth for the Fire none in a Dungeon so desireth Light as we should long for the heavenly Light and Love God's Infinite Essential SELF-LOVE in which he is Eternally delighted in himself is the most Amiable Object and Heaven itself to Saints and Angels And next to that His Love to all his Works to the World and to the Church in Heaven speaketh much more of his Loveliness than his Love to me But yet due Self-love in me is his work and part of his natural Image and when this by sin is grown up to excess through the withdrawing of a contracted narrow Soul from the Union and due Love to my fellow Creatures and to God I must also I cannot but enquire after God's Love to me and by this my desires must much be moved For I am not so capable of ascending above Self-interest and Self-love as in the state of Glorious Union I shall be I am glad to perceive that others do love God and I love those most that I find most love him But it is not other mens love to God that will be accepted by him instead of mine Nor is it God's Love to others which yet rejoiceth me that will satisfie me without his love to me But when all these are still before me God's Essential Self-love and Delight his Love to his Creatures especially the Glorified and his Love to me also even to me a vile unworthy Sinner what then should stay my ascending Love or discourage my desires to be with God And dost thou doubt canst thou doubt O my Soul whether thou art going to a God that loveth thee If the Jews discerned the great love of Christ to Lazarus by his Tears canst not thou discern his Love to thee in his Blood It is never the less but the more obliging and amiable that it was not shed for thee alone but for many May I not say as Paul Gal. 2 20. I live by the Faith of the Son of God that hath loved Me and given himself for me Yea it is not so much I that live as Christ Liveth in me And will he forsake the Habitation which his love hath chosen And which he hath so dearly bought O read often that triumphing Chapter Rom. 8. and conclude What shall separate us from the Love of God If Life have not done it Death shall not do it If leaning on his Breast at Meat was a token of Christ's special love to John is not his dwelling in me by my Faith and his living in me by his Spirit a sure token of his love to me And if a dark saying If he tarry till I come what is that to thee raised a report that the beloved Disciple should not die why should not plain Promises assure me that I shall live with him that loveth me for ever Be not so unthankful O my Soul as to question
hath also used them to do abundance of good against Idolatry in the Heathen World Where-ever they come Idolatry is destroyed Yea the corrupt Christians Greeks and specially Papists that worship Images Angels and Bread are rebuked and condemned justly by Mahometans But O that they who have Conquered so far by the Sword were Conquered by the Sacred Word of Truth and truly understood the Mystery of Redemption and the Doctrin of the Gospel of Jesus Christ Obj. But they think us Idolaters for saying that Christ is God and believing the Trinity I. As to the Trinity it is no contradiction that one Fire or Sun should have Essentially a Virtue or Power to Move Light and Heat Nor that one Soul should have a power of Vegetation Sense and Reason Nor as Rational to have a peculiar power of Vitality Intellection and Free-will Why then should the Trinity seem incredidible II. We do not believe that the Godhead hath any change or is made Flesh or the Manhood made God but that the Godhead is incomprehensibly united to the humane Nature by assumption so as he is united to no other Creature by and for those peculiar Operations on the humanity of Christ which make him our Redeemer They that well think that God is All in All things more than a Soul to all the World and as near to us as our Souls to our Bodies in whom we live and move and have our being will find that it is more difficult to apprehend how God is further from any Soul than that he is so much One with Christ Save that different Operations of God on his Creatures are apparent to us By all this we see that every sanctified Christian hath the certain Witness in himself that Christ is true He is truly a Physician that healeth and a Saviour that saveth all that seriously believe and obey him The Spirit of God in a New and Holy and Heavenly Nature of Spiritual Life and Light and Love is the Witness VI. The Sixth Article in my Text is Received up into Glory That Christ after Forty Days continuance on Earth was taken up into Heaven in the sight of his Disciples is a Matter of Fact of which we have all the forementioned infallible proof which I must not here again repeat And 1. If Christ were not glorified now in Heaven he could not send down his Spirit with his Word on Earth nor have enabled the first Witnesses to speak with all Tongues and heal the Sick and raise the Dead and do all the Miracles which they did A dead Man cannot send down the Holy Spirit in likeness of Firy cloven Tongues nor enable Thousands to do such VVorks nor could he do what is done on the Souls of serious Believers in all Ages and Nations to this Day He is sure alive that makes men live and in Heaven that draws up Hearts to Heaven 2. And this is our Hope and Joy Heaven and Earth are in his Power The Suffering and VVork which he performed for us on Earth was short but his heavenly Intercession and Reign is Everlasting Guilty Souls can have no immediate access to God All is by a Mediator All our receivings from God are by him And all our services are returned by him and accepted for his sake And as he is the Mediator between his Father and us his Spirit interceedeth between him and us By his Spirit he giveth us Holy desires and every Grace and by his Spirit we exercise them in returns to him And our glorified Saviour hath Satan and all our Enemies in his Power Life and Death are at his command All Judgment is committed to him He that hath redeemed us is preparing us for Heaven and it for us and receiveth our departing Souls to his own Joy and Glory He hath promised us that we shall be with him where he is and shall see his Glory He that is our Saviour will be our Judge He will come with Thousands of his Angels to the confusion of wicked Unbelievers and to be glorified in his Saints He will make a New Heaven and a New Earth in which Righteousness shall dwell Angels and Glorified Saints shall with Christ our Head make one City of God or holy Society and Chore in perfect Love and Joy to praise the blessed God for ever I. The differences between this World and that which I am going to I. THis World is God's Footstool That is his Throne II. Here are his Works of Inferiour Nature and of Grace There he shineth forth in Perfect Glory III. Here is gross Receptive Matter moved by Invisible Powers There are the noblest efficient communicative Powers moving all IV. This is the Inferiour subject Governed World That is the Superiour Regent World V. This is a World of Trial where the Soul is his that can win its consent That is a World where the Will is perfectly determined and fixed VI. Satan winning mens Consent hath here a large Dominion of Fools There he is cast out and hath no Possession VII Here he is a 〈◊〉 and Troubler of the Best There he hath neither Power to Tempt or Trouble VIII This World is as the dark Womb where we are regenerated That is the World of Glorious Light into which we are born IX Here we dwell on a World of sordid Earth There we shall dwell in a World of Celestial Light and Glory X. Here we dwell in a troublesom tempting perishing Body There we are delivered from this burden and prison into glorious liberty XI Here we are under a troublesom Cure of our Maladies There we are perfectly healed rejoicing in our Physicians praise XII Here we are using the Means in weariness and hope There we obtain the end in full fruition XIII Here sin maketh us loathsom to our selves and our own annoiance There we shall love God in our selves and our Perfected selves in God XIV Here all our Duties are defiled with sinful imperfection There perfect Souls will perfectly love and praise their God XV. Here Satans temptations are a continual danger and molestation There perfect Victory hath ended our temptations XVI Here still there is a remnant of the Curse and Punishment of sin Pardon and Deliverance are perfected there XVII Repenting Shame Sorrow and Fear are here part of my necessary work There all the troublesom part is past and utterly excluded XVIII Here we see darkly as in a Glass the Invisible World of Spirits There we shall see them as Face to Face XIX Here Faith alas too weak must serve instead of sight There presence and sight suspend the use of such believing XX. Desire and Hope are here our very Life VVork But there it will be full felicity in fruition XXI Our Hopes are here oft mixt with grievous doubts and fears But there full possession ends them all XXII Our holy Affections are here corrupted with Carnal mixtures But there all are purely Holy and Divine XXIII The coldness of our Divine Love is here our sin and
taste little more than a Beast may taste Poor Food and Rayment is sweet with the sense of the Love of God Had I more of this I should lie down and rise and walk in Pleasure and content I could bear the loss of other things And though Nature will feel pains I should have Pleasure and Peace in the midst of all my pains and groans This is the white Stone the New Name No Man well knoweth it who never felt it in himself 1. There is no dying comfortably without this experienced taste of the Love of God This will draw up the desires of the Soul Love tasted casteth out fear though God be Holy and Just and Judgment terrible and Hell intollerable and the Soul hath no distinct Idea of its future state out of the Body and though we see not whither it is that we must go the taste of God's love will make it go joyfully as trusting him as a Child will go any whither in his Father's power and hand But all the knowledge in the World without this quiets not a departing Soul A Man may write as many Books and Preach as many Sermons of Heaven as I have done and speak of it and think of almost nothing else and yet till the Soul be sweetned and comforted with the Love of God shed abroad on it by the Holy Ghost death and the next life will be rather a Man's fear than his desire And the common fear of death which we see in the far greatest part even of godly Persons doth tell us that though they may have saving desires and hopes yet this sense of God's love on the Heart is rare What wonder then if our Language our Converse our Prayers have too little savour of it and in comparison of joyful Believers duties be but like green Apples to the mellow ones My God I feel what it is that I want and I perceive what it is that is most desirable O let not guilt be so far unpardoned as to deprive my Soul of this greatest good which thou hast commended to me and commanded and which in my languishing and pains I so much need Did I beg for Wealth or Honour I might have it to the loss of others But thy Love will make me more useful to all and none will have the less for my enjoyment For thou Lord art enough for all Even as none hath the less of the Sun-light for my enjoying it The least well grounded hope of thy Love is better than all the pleasures of the Flesh But without some pleasant sense of it alas what a withered languishing thing is a Soul thy loving kindness is better than life but if I taste it not how shall I here rejoice in God or bear my heavy burdens O let me not be a dishonour to thy Family where all have so great cause to honour thy bounty by their joy and hopes Nor by a sad and fearful Heart tempt men to think that thy love is not real and satisfactory I can easily believe and admire thy Greatness and thy Knowledge Let it not be so hard to me to believe and taste thy Goodness and thy Love Which is as necessary to me If there be any thing as surely there is in which the Divine Nature and Spirit of Adoption consisteth as above all the Art and Notions of Religion which are but like to other acquired Knowledge sure it must be this holy Appetite and Habitual Inclination of the Soul to God by way of Love which is bred by an internal sense of his Loveliness and Loving inclination to Man which differenceth a Christian from other men as a Child differs towards his Father from Strangers or from common Neigbours Till the love of God be the very state or nature of the Soul working here towards his Honour Interests Word and Servants no Man can say that he is God's habitation by the Spirit And how the Heart will ever be thus habited without believing God's Love to us it 's hard to conceive Experience tells the World how strongly it constraineth Persons to love one another if they do but think that they are strongly beloved by one another In the love that tends to marriage if one that is inferior do but know that a Person of far greater worth doth fervently love them it almost puts a necessity and constraint on them for returns of Love Nature can scarce choose but love in such a case Love is the Loadstone of Love A real taste of the Love of God in saving Souls by Christ and grace is it that constraineth them to be holy that is to be devoted to that God in Love III. But this must as necessarily be the work of the Holy Ghost and can be no more done without him than the Earth can be illuminated and the Vegetables live without the Sun But all the approaches of the Holy Spirit suffice not to produce this great effect and give us the Divine holy Nature The same Sun shine hath three different effects on its Objects 1. On most things as Houses Stones Earth it causeth nothing but the Accidents of Heat Colour and Motion 2. On some things it causeth a seminal Disposition to Vegetable life but not Life itself 3. In this disposed matter it causeth Vegetable life itself So doth the Spirit of God 1. Operate on Millions but lifeless Accidents as the Sun on a stone Wall 2. On others Dispose and prepare them to Divine Life 3. On others so disposed it effecteth the Divine life itself When holy Love is turned into a habit like to Nature That none but the Holy Ghost doth make this holy change is evident For the effect cannot transcend the causes 1. Nature alone is dark and knoweth not the attractive amiableness of God till illuminated nor can give us a satisfactory notice of God's special Love to us 2. Nature is Guilty and Guilt breedeth fears of Justice and fear makes us wild and fly from God lest he will hurt us 3. Nature is under penal sufferings already and feeleth pain fear and many hurts and foreseeth Death And under this is undisposed of itself to feel the pleasure of God's Love 4. Nature is corrupted and diverted to Creature vanity and its Appetite goeth another way and cannot cure itself and make itself suitable to the amiableness of God 5. God hateth wickedness and wicked men and meer Nature cannot secure us that we are saved from that enmity Diligence may do much to get religious Knowledge and Words and all that which I call the Art of Religion And God may bless this as a preparation to holy Life and Love But till the Souls Appetite incline with desire to God and Holiness Divine things will not sweetly relish And this is a great comfort to the Thoughts of the Sanctified that certainly their holy Appetite Desire and Complacency is the work of the Holy Ghost For 1. This secureth them of the Love of God of which it is the proper token 2. And