superstruct this Happiness and build that Joy upon it that shall never end O how great are the Priviledges of one that Remembereth God whom he doth visit and continually comfort and rejoyce with refreshig Consolations To whom he openeth when they come to him with desire and doth embrace when they cast themselves on him whom he is teaching and shewing the pleasure that strangers intermeddle not with But were this all they would be miserable in comparison of what they now are How sweet are his very Delays Frowns and the Chastisements of his Rod His Estrangements Threatnings and the signs of his Displeasure dreadful to the Wicked but sweet to them that have his special Grace to make their advantage of them are in the mean while supported under them I know they are sad to them and cause great thoughts of Heart but having the root of the matter in them Job 19.28 And being forewarned by the Word of God that thus it will sometime be with his dearest Children and directed what to do in such times of Mourning and knowing that they shall not be tempted above their strength These considerations recommend Sufferings and Afflictions to them and make them far more desirable to them than the most splendid Pomp and Prosperity of those that forget God As all the Mirth and Pleasures of wicked men are preparing them for Misery and would be dreadful to their thoughts if they did but see what they all contribute to their eternal shame So all is contrary in an honest and pure hearted Believer not only the smiles but the angry looks of God are sweet to his Apprehensions not as they are signs of his displeasure but as they help him forward in the hatred of sin and mortifie his Affections to the Pleasures here below I know the Anger of God is not directly desirable to any Person but the sanctified fruits of it are desirable And some little of it when sin that would otherwise undo us makes it necessary and it is mingled with a greater proportion of Love and the Soul is disposed by Grace to tremble under it and to be rid of it upon any terms Consider therefore thou that Remembrest God Is it not an unvaluable comfort to fore-know that all thy Trouble and Sorrows shall befriend thee and that the leanest pasture thou canst be put in shall feed thee up to everlasting Joys when on the other side those that forget God though they fare deliciously every day and are gotten into the richest pastures and have the desire of their carnal hearts yet they are but fatting themselves for the slaughter and who would envy a fat Sheep or Hog that fares a little better and is preparing for the Shambles Nay who would envy a Lobworm in a fat Dunghil They seed on wicked men 〈◊〉 makes them so fat and merry it is but Dung and Filth in comparison of that which a Soul mindful of Good feeds upon Methinks that place should sound dreadful to one that prospereth in the World and doth not remember God Psal 92.7 The two verses that go before it ushers it in and that follows after in fearful pomp and state O Lord how great are thy Works and thy Thoughts very deep A brutish man knoweth not neither doth a fool understand this When the wicked spring as the Grass and all the workers of Iniquity do flonrish it is that they shall be destroyed for ever And we may say as well on the other side that God is as wonderful in his thoughts toward such as are mindful of him though a Fool understand not That when the humble Believer in whose thoughts God in Christ dwelleth uppermost withers as the Grass and fades like the green Herb it is that he may flourish for ever If thou art trod upon thou shalt grow the better Thy necessities shall cause thee to make more haste and get nearer to the Fountain that is opened to the eternal praise of Gods Mercy for such needy ones All thy miseries shall but the more illustrate the Glory of his Compassion toward thee when refuge faileth thee and none careth for thy Soul Many a one had liv'd and died in perpetual obsourlty whose names are a rich persume in the Church of God thorough their Sufferings and Afflictions which have made them the more famous and embalm'd their Memory When the ways of a Man please the Lord he can and will in one sense or other make his very Enemies to be his Friends 1. Their hatred shall be turned into love or if it do continue still God shall turn their very hatred and enmity to the greater advantage of those that are mindful of him This made Paul to boast in his Infirmities Necessities and Tribulation 2 Cor. 11.30 What if thou art poor and necessitous if the Lord remember thee What if thou hast no Friends on Earth if thou hast one in Heaven What if thou art destitute of Health it self the greatest Earthly Blessing if thou art one that remembrest God it shall turn to thine advantage If thou hast God in thy Remembrance thou hast all for he will make every state and condition serve thy turn What if thou art a Servant if God be thy Master If thou hast nothing to recommend thee unto Men if thou hast this Grace I am pressing to to recommend thee unto God thou shalt be more a gainer than if thou hadst had Dominion in the World and all the Paint and Varnish that would set thee off to the Eye of Men. Thy Temptations Reproach Sufferings of every kind and thy very Prosperity and Wordly Happiness which for the most part is such a preparative to Destruction shall be like the Dew and Sun-shine to thee and make thee more fruitful and ripen thy Graces if thou art one that hast God always in thy Remembrance Thirdly If thou art one that remembrest God as I have expressed thou hast the Key to unlock all the Mercies of God and to open the rich and most rarest Treasures of Divine Grace and to get the very desire of thy Heart I mean thou mayst come with Faith and Confidence to the Throne of Mercy and open thy very Heart to him who hath an Ear for all thy Requests The secrets of the Lord are with them that fear him and he will shew them his Covenant Psal 25.14 and Psal 37.4 Delight thy self in the Lord and he shall give thee the desires of thy heart and Jam. 5. later clause 16. v. The effectual fervent Prayer of a Righteous Man availeth much Now to fear the Lord to remember him to delight in him are but several Descriptions of a Righteous Man and Believer Thou canst not have God in thy Mind and Heart but thou wilt fear him love him delight in him in some degree think on him trust in him in the way that he hath directed and then thou art a Believer and a Righteous Person in the Gospel sense though not in the sense of the Law that requires
know the best have too much of this sin and forget their endeared Lord too much not only in the works of their civil and common Employment but also in their acts of Worship and immediate Service of him and have not adoring prising thoughts of his Greatness and Goodness as they should have and this is some degree of forgetfulness and therefore they will be ready to condemn themselves and take some share in this Reproof but the sharpest part of the Reproof belongs most to them that are least disposed to take it and most ready to quarrel with and fight against it And this is the most doleful aggravation of their misery O what a misery is it to need a bitter Cup a smarting Rod sharp and cutting reproof and yet not to endure the remedy and the proper means of their recovery to be desperately sick and not to abide the Physician This is the condition of those that have most of Guilt and therefore the sorer they are the less they care to be search'd and dress'd If it be any dangerous Distemper in the Body it 's sad when the case is thus but if the Wound be Spiritual and the Soul be the subject to be handled and will not abide it the condition of that Man or Woman is much more to be lamented O how sad is their case that need Humiliation and Repentance and the sense of their sins and misery that make them so forgetful of God and yet are impatient of the means that the Wisdom of God hath appointed and that they must use to bring this to pass O what a fearful state is it and deeply to be lamented to have the greatest necessities on them accompanied with the greatest stupidity and insensibility To have need to cry aloud for mercy mercy and a heart fit to receive it and yet to have no mind to lift up an earnest Prayer unto God and to stir up the remembrance of him nor to be awakened thereto by any way that 's like to speed How dreadful is the condition of a senseless hard hearted sinner that must die Eternally without Repentance and be broken by the vengeance of God for ever if his heart do not break now and yet doth eonsent yea and set this Seal to his own Destruction and yet doth reject all the humbling softning means that Christ the greatest friend that ever he had or shall have in the World hath taught him and beseeched him to use say not that a man may forget God and yet need no such reproof nor be in any such danger I have told you what forgetfulness of God implies and who they are that are chargeable therewith and who can easily speak worse of any unless it be those that have more of this sin and are guilty of it in a higher degree Those that the Text speaks to are such as God threatens to tear in pieces unless they be recovered by consideration And the Scripture doth not use to speak with so much heat and indignation where the sin is not so provoking I come therefore now to shew you 1. The guiltiness this sin 2. The danger of this sin And what a madness as well as wickedness it is to forget God that if it be possible this double sight of the sin and danger may the better prepare them for the means that must recover them and bring them to speedy use of them And this will appear 1. From the hainous nature of this sin 2. From the fearful effects thereof The odious nature of this sin is manifest in that this forgetfulness of God is a sin against the highest Obligations 1. On Gods part 2. On Our part 1. On Gods part 1. First In that he hath given us our Faculties on purpose to remember him and hath fitted them for this very use and service And what a sin must it needs be to frustrate so great a design of God in the very Make and Fabrick of the best of his Creatures here on Earth This end and use is legible enough in his uppermost Faculties which the rest were made to serve and obey For if all were made to minister unto one and that on purposelâ—y to do Homage unto God then all are made ultimatly for God but that he had his noblest Perfections for this very end it 's easie to see with half an Eye What should he do with an Immortal Soul indued with the powers of Reason and free Choice But that by the one he might discern the greatest Good and by the other make it his Choice There are certain Relations that intercede between all Creatures amongst which those of Cause and Effect Means and End are the most principal which the understanding of Man was given him intentionally to argue and find out that by these he might step up to the highest Cause and the supream and last end and do the highest acts of Homage and Reverence to them that his understanding and will are able to give in appretiation and love which are their two most essential Acts. Not a Creature but would lead the Reason of Man to the Creator of all things if he will use his Reason and follow this Guide The most contemptible thing had a Father that begot it that I may use Job's expression Job 38.28 c. Hath the Rain a Father or who begot the drops of the Dew Every thing hath a cause that brought it into being and that was produced by a former and that by something that was before that till you come to the foremost and highest cause And so for the other Relation of Means and End there 's nothing but is subservient to some end and that to a higher till you come to the highest e.g. The Showres moisten and supple the Earth and make it bring forth Grass This Grass is to serve a higher end viz. to feed and noâ—rish the Beasts that they might be fit for the use and service of Man his Food and other imployments either serious or recreative And can we think that here 's a full stop and man was made for no higher end but to domineer over the other Creatures and take aâ—ay their lives when it pleaseth him for his uses Certainly there was a further and higher end that God intended Man for and that is to have him in perpetual Remembrance It 's certain there 's no Creature here on Earth but Man hath any capacity to know God or to bear his Image in Holiness or to worship him which two last imply the first 1. A knowledge of him 1. What he is in himself in some measure 2. What he is to them Their Creator Preserver and bountiful Provider Neither hath any of them a Faculty to express and utter thus much to another Creature being all deprived of Speech and Eloquution which is mans Glory only Obj. And if you object the 19 Psalm 1. The Heavens declare the Glory of God and the Firmament c. and therefore not man only Ans The
perfect Obedience It was said of Luther that he could do what he would with God by Prayer If God be promoted in thy Heart as high as he was in Luth. thou shalt prevail with him as much as ever Luth. did I know thou hast no ground from the word to expect that God should satisfie thy desires in temporal things when they will not consist with the welfare of thy Soul But every desire that is honourable to God to grant and profitable to thy Soul to receive thou shalt have And when he denies thee what thou dost express he will give what thou dost imply and mean When he granteth not thy particular Request he will give thee thy general Request whatsoever thou askest it 's happiness that thou meanest that 's the general intent and meaning and this he will fulfil though not always in the same method it may be that thine own Wisdom suggesteth he will give thee money or money worth Thou shalt have thy desire in kind or value yea a frequent Remembrance of God will teach thee to pray so as thou shalt prevail and the knowledge of his Attributes and Perfections which the Remembrance of God doth imply will make thee so ingenious as to ask nothing that shall cross the Wisdom Justice or Holiness of God or be the least prejudicial to the merciful design of thy Salvation O what a priviledge is it to have such an open free access to him that can strangely turn things about when it pleaseth him and is wonderful in Counsel and mighty in Working Esay 28.29 with a promise to be heard to plead with God and get the Blessing for thy Self for thy Relations and for the Land of thy Nativity and by this means to be one of the Props and Pillars of the Nation of which thou art a Member This is an Honour indeed and an unvaluable Mercy which yet thou shalt partake of in that degree and measure as thou dost Remember him Fourthly To Remember God is the ready way to entail the Blessing of Heaven and Earth upon thy Seed and Posterity Children speed ordinarily according to their Parents interest or want of interest in God Those that die in Infancy it 's more than probable that they speed according as their Parents or those that have the nearest interest in them are in Covenant with God or out of Covenant And those that live beyond an Infants state have cause to count amongst the greatest of their early Blessings that they have either one or both Parents that are true Believers especially where the Faith of their Parents is gotten up to some degree of Eminency I would not intimate that the Lord doth never shew special love and mercy to the Posterity of the Wicked nor that he doth always impart saving Grace to the Children of the godly But I believe it will prove a rare case if one instance can be produced that all the Children of Believers if they have several are finally forsaken of God and denyed his saving Grace yea many times they are all remembred It is the Argument that Peter useth to perswade Faith and Repentance to his hearers in the first Sermon which he preached after Christs Assention and the Descension of the Holy Ghost that by this means Parents would bring their Children to participate in Gospel-mercy with themselves Acts 2.39 Repent and be Baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost For the Promise is to you and your Children And it hath the most general testimony of the soundest Writers that the Faith of the Parents is the condition of the Childrens right to Baptism The Profession of it in the Court of Men the Possession of it in the Court of Heaven * See the Reverend Mr. Baxters Dispu of right to Sacrament But be it how it will I am sure it 's a doleful condition to be the Child of wicked Parents that forget God and a mercy better than the biggest Portion can be left them to be the Seed of Parents that Remember him Thus saith the Lord c. Fear not O Jacob my Servant for I will pour my Spirit upon thy Seed and my Blessing upon thine off-spring Esa 44.3 And as the special Promise was made to Isaac so even Ishmael fared the better for being Abraham's Seed And as it is threatned in one of the Prophets that the Seed of evil doers shall never he Renowned so the Posterity of those that Remember God are the most likely to be Remembred even in this Life and to be famous in their Congregation Men of Renown Num. 16.2 I do not mean for their worldly Pomp and Splendor but for their Grace Wisdom and Usefulness to the World To which sometime such a measure of these outward Blessings are added as may make their Grace more resplendent and them more serviceable to him that will most eminently reward it If therefore your own Bowels are dear to you and you desire that your Posterity should be blessed here and had in Eternal Remembrance hereafter advance God in your Remembrance Lastly This Exercise of thy Thoughts and Affections in the Remembrance of God is thy greatest Happiness as well as thy greatest interest I mean it will yield thee the highest Pleasure as well as the highest Profit I know to the ignorant that have no competent knowledge of God and such as are unwonted to these thoughts and have their Affections buried in the World and are loaden with divers Lusts no work is more unpleasant nothing that they will more decline Light it self is unpleasant to a sore and distempered Eye but those that are pretty well acquainted with the amiable Nature and Perfections of God and with such Thoughts and Meditations of him as will amount to a worthy Remembrance of him would not be untaught this Art for all the Pleasures which the World can supply to them These are the most reviving these are the most comforting these are the most satisfying Thoughts These are the most illuminating instructing perfecting Thoughts These are the Thoughts that best improve our present Comfort and our future Hopes From all these Heads I might particularly and distinctly shew how the sincere Remembrance of God doth make way for the greatest Pleasure viz. In that it doth 1. Clear and perfect the Understanding 2. Purifie and rejoyce the Heart 3. Revive the Spirit and actuate it to greater Life and Life is sweet 4. In that it doth quiet and satisfie the very Soul 5. Multiply and improve our present Comforts 6. And our future Happiness All these ways and many other doth this Remembrance of God contribute to our immediate Pleasure and Happiness That Soul must needs abound most with Life and Joy and Pleasure that hath most frequent access to the Fountain of all Life and Pleasure who enjoy themselves more than they if other things concur that are most under the power and command of
it is to escape without Repentance Who more likely to abhor himself to be humbled and broken in heart to confess his Sin with Shame and to resolve against it which are but the several parts of Repentance than he that considers how he hath affronted God perverted his Order seduced his Brethren and wronged his own Soul and disparaged the very Reason that God hath given him and laid the Foundation of Gods Eternal displeasure and his own everlasting ruine You see Consideration when it is of such particulars is the ready way to bring a Sinner to Repentance And on the other side who so like to find joy and pleasure in the Contemplation of Heaven and the joys thereof in the possession it self and the promise that gives Right and Title to it than he that hath some good hope through Grace that he shall enjoy it So that you see of what use Consideration is both before and after Conversion but yet as before Regeneration there may be in the heart of a Sinner that love which worketh by desire though not that which worketh by complacency to Heaven and heavenly things so before Conversion there may be that Consideration that is forced and constrained but after Conversion it 's like to be more sweet and pleasant and to bring in greater profit and advantage O could you but look upon God as your reconciled Father in Christ and one that is at peace with you how would this help up your thoughts Heavenward and sweeten your Meditations of the life and happiness to come you would not need then so much to force and spur up your mind to such comfortable thoughts at least sometimes it will be getting up of its own voluntary accord upon Mount Nebo to view the promised Land he that hopes to be one of the Inhabitants of the Heavenly Jerusalem will at least sometimes walk about Sion and go round her and tell the Towers thereof And mark well her Bulwarks and view and consider her stately Mansions and Palaces Psa 48.12 13. what an encouragement will you have to look up and behold the glory and perfection of the Divine Nature when you can say This is my Father and these Attributes I have an Interest in But yet I must needs confess that even after Conversion there will be oft-times much backwardness and reluctancy to this spiritual and heavenly Duty and you will need to quicken up your selves and chide your backward hearts that they should be so strange to the place where their Treasure is laid up But yet it will not be so hard to bring your heart to such Meditations as it was when you were without hope and without God in the world Fifthly It will further the work of consideration to lay Temporal things in the balance with Eternal things and to make advantage of every Object that 's presented to our Senses to make the consideration of the highest and greatest things more warm and piercing You may very well and rationaily conclude that if the glory of Earth be so great as to dazle the eyes of some beholders and strongly to enamour their affections that the glory of Heaven doth far out-shine it He hath reserved joy and gladness indeed for that place and state if there be so much to be found in this sinning imperfect state here on Earth for all Earthly things serve but to the example and shadow of Heavenly things Heb. 8.5 If the beauty of the body be so taking that men and women oftentimes dote upon it what is the beauty of the Soul do you think and if it were to be seen with bodily eyes how much would it ravish and amaze the beholders If the pleasure of the Senses be so sweet and delicious that men will buy them at the dearest rate how sweet must the pleasures of the Soul needs be when there is so vast a difference between the Soul and Body that are the subjects of these pleasures As there is an unspeakable disproportion between a Spirit and a Body so there must needs be as wide a disproportion between the delights of the one and the delights of the other For I suppose none can be so absurd as to think that the state to come shall be no better than this present state and that mens Bodies are as much worth as their Souls and the Heaven which is the place of his glorious Habitation and Palace is no more adorned than the Earth None can be so void of reason to think that God bestows as much upon his Rational Creatures whilst they are in a state of Tryal and Probation as when they are come to Perfection and are actually chosen to be Citizens of the Heavenly Corporation where they shall live for ever How can the joy of Seed-time be comparable to the joy of Harvest And how can this visible Sun rejoyce the Creatures that it shines upon so much as the Face of God will rejoyce those that behold it You may well therefore rise up in your Meditations from any perfection that you behold on Earth to admire those perfections that are unseen They are the greatest that lye not open to the bodily eye nor can be enjoyed by any Corporeal Faculty or Organ so that when you walk abroad and look upon the glory of the visible Heaven and Earth you may much more admire the splendour and excellency of the invisible Heavens and consequently of all those things that lead thither God that made all things made those visible things that they might be some advantage to the Understanding of things invisible and that they might lead up our apprehensions and affections to him that cannot be immediately seen without the help of such a Glass God is infinitely exalted above our understanding neither are we capable of having any direct and proper Conceptions of the state and life to come and therefore the glory of Heaven is set forth to us in the Word of God by such things as seem glorious to our Senses The Streets of the New Jerusalem or Heaven are said to be paved with Gold and the Gates to consist of Pearl and precious Stones and the pleasures of that state are set forth by a Feast because these are so pleasing to our Senses Now though we must not understand these things in a proper litteral sense yet we are hence instructed that the happiness is exceeding great and such as cannot be well understood by us but by such helps as these So that we may well argue from any pleasures or excellency here on Earth to the excellency and pleasure of that state and make this advantage of all sensible comforts to make our apprehensions of things spiritual more lively and affecting As therefore you may collect the unspeakable torment and misery of the Damned by the pressures and calamities that we feel here on Earth and Hell is usually set forth by Fire and Darkness and a Worm continually feeding upon the Conscience which are things obvious to our Senses so
by a satisfying ravishing sight and intuition Were the Soul it self loosned from this bodily Prison it would be a Spectacle worth your beholding and a most delectable glorious sight and your curiosity to behold such a sight as this would be far more excusable than theirs whom our Saviour taxed in that question What went you out for to see a Reed shaken with the wind But what went you out for to see a man cloathed in Purple and soft rayment such are in Kings houses Mat. 11.8 And if then the Soul of man be such a beautiful taking sight what a blessed sight will that be when God shall display the fulness of his glory If a Spirit be so bright and glorious what is the Father of Spirits to whom all created beauty is but a drop What a goodly sight will that be to behold the company of Prophets Martyrs and Apostles cloathed in shining rayment with Crowns on their Heads and Palms in their hands And what a ravishing pleasure must it needs be to see Sun and Stars under our feet and to behold the order and beauty of the Heavenly Jerusalem and to joyn in that Heavenly Consort to be admitted into his presence that hath made the Soul and Body out of nothing that hath fulness of joy at his right hand and pleasures for evermore Psal 16.11 Happy are the persons indeed that after a few miserable days here on Earth shall be translated thither into that Heavenly Palace with long life will he satisfie them and shew them his Salvation Psal â— 16 Talk no more so exceeding proudly O ye Sons of men of your worldly Dignity and Honour what a Dream and meer Imagination is all Earthly felicity to this of the Saints in Heaven Your riches if they were worthy to be named when we are discoursing of the riches of the Inheritance of the Saints Eph. 1.12.18 yet they may be corrupted and your garments may be Moth-eaten James 5.1 But the glory of the Saints endureth for ever for the Lord himself hath prepared a City for them Heb. 11.16 Though they were contemn'd here on Earth yet they shall have glory enough in Heaven Then shall that great Soveraign of the World command the best Robe to be brought forth and put it on them and call for the fatted Calf to entertain them and they shall sit down with Abraham Isaac and Jacob in his Eternal Kingdom and they shall have an Everlasting Feast of joy and gladness Luke 15.22 23. Here they have but a Tast and do but sip now and then but there they shall have â—uch a draught that shall satisfie their Souls with Eternal pleasure a Cup that shall be ever going down O the joys of that state that no tongue can utter no mortal man did ever comprehend But yet mistake me not I do not intend by these borrowed expressions to intimate a Turkish Paradise to you of carnal delights and pleasures neither would I pervert your judgment by that which is meant for the Excitation and advancement of your affections It 's very material that your apprehensions of that glory be as right as we can attain to in such a place of darkness and distance from it where we live if you should mistake a Fleshly for a Spiritual felicity to be enjoyed hereafter it 's very possible that even a voluptuous Epicure may think himself in the Suburbs of that Kingdom already and that his Heaven is already begun here on Earth These forms of Speech therefore taken from eating and drinking and feasting whereby the Scripture represents to you the transcending pleasures of the other life are but Spectacles for weak eyes and a help for humane infirmity We are uncapable in this life of true and proper Conceptions of the happiness of that state only in general that it will be spiritual and not like these fleshly pleasures that here we tast of whilst we are in this Prison of the Body we are not able to understand the liberty that there we shall enjoy whilst we are here below in this Dungeon of the body we are not capable of beholding the light and brightness of that glory But you may safely use these Spectacles to help the dulness of your sight when Heaven is proposed to you and take the benefit of these gross expressions if they will but help to attract your desires and to raise your hopes and expectations more Heavenwards whilst you do but remember that the pleasures of that state are incomparably greater than all the pleasures here on Earth and quite of another kind that here we want a faculty to express because we want a faculty to tast You know a Horse or a Cow would take little pleasure in that food that is most delicious to us yea and many a man hath pleasure unintelligible to another man because he wants his tast and experience And it 's very hard to describe pleasure that depends upon a tast and experience that we our selves have not The sweetness of Honey would never be understood by all the definitions in the world if we had never tasted it Marvel not therefore if I tell you that the joys of that state are not to be properly understood here on Earth because we have now neither the tast nor the Meat that then we shall feed on I mean neither the faculty nor the object And certain it is that all pleasure is founded in the suitableness of the Faculty to the Object Since therefore neither Faculty nor Object shall be then the same that here we have the glorious pleasures of the perfected Saints must needs be beyond our Comprehensions But if you shall reply and say that Grace and Glory differ only gradually and not specifically and that they are the same in kind though not in the height of degree and therefore that the Regenerate and such as are truly enlightned and partakers of the Holy Ghost may taste the Heavenly gift and the Powers of the world to come Heb. 6.4 5. I answer they may better understand than others can that want their imperfect grace but yet there is so vast a difference between Faith and Sight perfect and imperfect Knowledge the Mustard-seed and the Tree that grows up from it that you may well say it is at the best far beyond their compleat and adequate comprehension And will not such a happiness as this be worthy thy frequent consideration Thou dost not soundly believe it saith Drexelius if thou dost but seldome and slightly think on it It cannot be that such as penetrate and search into this blessedness with lively active and piercing thoughts should venture the loss of it upon any terms Thou would'st have little list to part with thy hopes of future happiness for the gain of all Earthly delights if Consideration had once taught thee what Heaven is or if the Devil or the world should surprize thee before thou hast well considered what it is and befool thee to let go the hopes of Eternal Life