more to be regarded in many points which require experience than many of the younger sort that are yet more zealous and of quicker understanding and expression than the elder So those that we call the Fathers or Ancients were indeed in the younger ages of the Church and we that are faln into the later and more exprienced age have all the helps of the wisdom and experience of the Ages that were before us And therefore God will require at our hands an account of these greater talents which we have received As it were unexcusable now in a Physicion that hath the help of such Voluminous institutions observations and experiments of former ages to know no more than those former times that had no such helps so would it be as unexcusable for this present age of the Church to be no wiser than those former ages When Aquinas Scotus Ariminensis and other Schoolmen delivered the Doctrine of Christianity to the Church in a dress so far different from Ignatius Irenaeus Tertullian Cyprian or any of those former ages they certainly thought that they had attained to a far greater excellency and accurateness in the Knowledge of Divinity than those their Ancestors had attained And whatever they swear in the Trent Oâ—th of not expounding any Scripture otherwise than the Fathers do I doubt not but Suarez and Vasquez and others of their modern Schoolmen thought so too and would have been loth to be accounted wise in the measure only of those ancients The later and elder ages of the Church have had abundant experience e. g. of the tendâ—ncy of Ambition and Papal aspirings and usurpations of the mischiefs of composing and imposing the Popish Missals and numerous ceremonies and of their implicite faith and their concealment of the Scriptures from the Vulgar and many such points And if we are never the wiser for all this experience we are the more unexcusable and may be judged as the neglâ—cters of our greater helps § 32. Direct 21. In Controversies which depend most upon skill in the Languages Philosophy or other Direct 21. parts of common learning prefer the judgement of a few that are the most Learned in those matters before the judgement of the most ancient or the most Godly or of the greatest numbers even whole Churches that are unlearned In this case neither Numbers nor Antiquity nor Godliness will serve turn but as one clear eye will see further then ten thousand that are purblind so one Hierome or Origen may judge better of a translation or the Grammatical sense of a Text than a hundred of the other Fathers could One man that understandeth a Language is fitter to judge of it than a whole Nation that understand it not One Philosopher is fitter to judge of a philosophical question than a thousand illiterate persons Every man is most to be regarded in the matters which he is best acquainted with § 33. Direct 22. In Controversies of great difficulty where Divines themselves are disagreed and a Direct 22. clear and piercing wit is necessary regard more the judgement of a few acute judicious well studied Divines that are well verst in those Controversies than of a multitude of dull and common wits that think to carry it by the reputation of their number It is too certainly attested by experience that Judicious Satis triumphâ—t Vâ—ritas si apud paucos bonosque accepta nec indoles ejus est placere multis Lipsius men are very few and that the multitude of the injudicious that have not wit enough to underderstand them nor humility enough to confess it and to learn of them have yet pride and arrogoncy enough to contradict them and often malice enough to vilifie them In such differences it is not only a sign of a wise man to be content with the approbation of a few but also to have but few approvers except where the injudicious do implicitly believe those few that are judicious Commonly a very few that are wiser than the multitude are fain to stand by and compassionate not only the World but the Church and see the disease and the easie remedy and all in vain while they are but neglected or despised by the rest that will not be made wiser by them § 34. Direct 23. In all contentions hold close to that which all sides are agreed in There is so Direct 23. much agreed on even between the Papists and the Protestants as would certainly save them all if all of them did sincerely believe Love and Practise it For they all confess that the whole Canonical Scripture is true Therefore be more studious sincerely to hold and improve those common truths which they all profess than to oppose the particular opinions of any further than that common truth requireth it See that the Articles of the common Creed which all profess be unfeignedly believed by you and that the Petitions in the Lords Prayer be sincerâ—ly and earnestly put up to God and that the ten Commandments be heartily and entirely obeyed and then no errour or difference will be damning to you § 35. Direct 24. Take nothing as necessary to salvation in point of faith nor as universally necessary Direct 24. in point of practice which the universal Church in every age since Christ did not receive For if any thing be necessary to salvation which the Church received not in every age then the Church it self of that age could not be saved and then the Church was indeed no Church For Christ is the Saviour of his body But certainly Christ had in every age a Church of saved-ones who openly professed all that was of common necessity to salvation An opinion may be true which accuseth the generality in the Church of some errour or imperfection For it is most certain that the Church on Earth is composed of none that have the use of reason but erring and imperfect members But no opinion can be true that condemneth all the Church to Hell in any one age For the Head and Husband of the Church must be her Judge § 36. Direct 25. Be not born down by the censoriousness of any to overrun your own understanding Direct 25. and the truth and to comply with them in their errours and extreams But hold to the truth Thus Peter and Barâ—abas erred Gal. 2. and keep your station Jer. 15. 19. Let them return unto thee but return not thou unto them It is too usual for the younger and more injudicious sort of Christians to be most zealous about some little Opinions Ceremonies and Words and to censure all those that differ from them with such bitter censures as ungodly flashearted c. that hereupon some of the more judicious forsake the truth and simplicity of the Gospel to comply with these censurers meerly to escape them or as some say that they may keep an interest in them to do them good But such carnal compliances though with the most zealous men will bring
Associate your selves with them that go the way to Heaven if you resolve your selves to go it O what a deal of difference will you find between these two sorts of companions The one sort if you have any thoughts of Repentance would stifle them and laugh you out of the use of your reason into their own distracted mirth and dotage And if you have any serious thoughts of your salvation or any inclinations to repent and be wise they will do much to divert them and hold you in the power and snares of Satan till it be too late If you have any zeal or heavenly mindedness they will do much to quench it and fetch down your minds to earth again The other sort will speak of things of so great weâ—â—â—â—t and moment and that with seriousness and reverence as will tend to raise and quicken your souâ— and possess you with a taste of the heavenly things which they discourse of They will encourage you by their own experiences and direct you by that truth which hath directed them and zealously communicate what they have received They will pray for you and teach you how to pray They will give the example of holy humble obedient lives and lovingly admonish you of your duties and reprove your sins In a word as the carnal mind doth savour the things of the flesh and is enmity against God the company of such will be a powerful means to infect you with their plague and make you such if you were escaped from them much more to keep you such if you are not escaped And as they that are spiritual do mind the things of the Spirit so their converse tendeth to make you spiritually minded as they are Rom. 8. 7 8. Though there are some useful qualities and gifts in some that are ungodly and some lamentable faults in many that are spiritual yet experience will shew you so great a difference between them in the main in heart and life as will make you the more easily to believe the difference that will be between them in the life to come § 6. 6. Another means is serious Meditation on the life to come and the way thereto Which though all cannot manage so methodically as some yet all should in some measure and season be acquainted with it § 7. 7. The last Means is to choose some prudent faithful Guide and Counsellor for your soul to Of how great concernment faithful Pastors are for the Conversion of the ungodly see a Jesuite Acosta li. 4. c. 1. 2 3 4. Infinitum esset caetera persequi quae contra hos satuos principes Tanaos contra Pastores stultos vel potius idola pastorum contra seipsos potius pascentes contra vaesâ—nos Prophetas contra Sacerdotes contemptores atque arrogantes contra â—lercus solennitatum contra popularis plausus captatores contra inexplebiles pecuniae gurgites caeâ—erasque pestes Propheticus sermo declamat Vix alias sancti Patres plenioribus velis feruntur in Pelagus quam cum de sacerdotali contumelia oratio est Acosta ib. p. 353. Non est iste sacerdos non est sed infestus atrox dolosus illusor sui lupus in dominicum gregem ovina pelle armatus Ibid. open those cases to which are not fit for all to know and to resolve and advise you in cases that are too hard for you Not to lead you blindfold after the interest of any seduced or ambitious men nor to engage you to his singular conceits against the Scripture or the Church of God but to be to your soul as a Physicion to your body or a Lawyer to your estates to help you where they are wiser than you and where you need their helps Resolve now that instead of your idle company and pastime your excessive cares and sinful pleasures you will wait on God in the seasonable use of these his own appointed means and you will find that he appointed them not in vain and that you shall not lose your labour Direction 17. THat in all this you may be sincere and not deceived by an hypocritical change be sure Direct 17. that God â—e all your Confidence and all your hopes be placed in Heaven and that there be no secret reserve in your hearts for the world and flesh and that you divide not your hearts between God and the things below nor take not up with the Religion of an hypocrite which giveth God what the flesh can spare § 1. When the Devil cannot keep you from a change and reformation he will seek to deceive you with a superficial change and half reformation which goeth not to the root nor doth not recover the heart to God nor deliver it entirely to him If he can by a partial deceitful change perswade you that you are truly renewed and sanctified and fix you there that you go no further you are as surely his as if you had continued in your grosser sins And of all other this is the most common and dangerous cheat of souls when they think to halve it between God and the world and to secure their fleshly interest of pleasure and prosperity and their salvation too and so they will needs serve God and Mammon § 2. This is the true Character of a self-deceiving hypocrite He is neither so fully perswaded of The â—ull desâ—â—iption of a 〈…〉 e câ—nâ—ersiâ—n and of an Hypocriâ—e Whâ—â—â—â—â—â— there are two great and grievous â—oâ—â—â—â— of â—roâ—ble â—â—â—â—â—d â—â—nâ— in the Churchâ—â— at the tryal of members and another â—n mens Consciences in trying their staâ—â—s about this Question How to know true Conversion or Sanctification I must tell them in boâ—h theâ—e troubles plainly that Christianity is but one thing the same in all Ages which is thâ—â—â—â— Consent to the Baptismal Covenant And there is no such way to resolve this question as to write or set before you the Covenant of Baptism in its proper sense and then ask your hearts whether you unâ—eignedly and resolvedly Consent He that consenteth truly is Converted and Justified and he that professeth Consent is to be received into the Church by Baptism if his Parents Coâ—â—â—â—t did not bring him in before which he is to do nevertheless himself at age the certain truth of the Scripture and the life to come nor yet so mortified to the flesh and world as to take the joyes of Heaven for his whole portion and to subject all his worldly prosperity and hopes thereunto and to part with all things in this world when it is necessary to the securing of his salvation And therefore he will not lose his hold of present things nor forsake his worldly interest for Christ as long as he can keep it Nor will he be any further religious than may stand with his bodily welfare resolving never to be undone by his godliness but in the first place to save himself and his prosperity in the world as long as he can And therefore he is truly a carnal worldly
unheard or upon rash presumption Prop. 12. Christianity and Heresie being personal qualities and no where found but in individuals Ezek. 18 17. Gen. 18 3 24 â—5 nor one man guilty of anothers error it followeth that it is single persons upon personal guilt that must be judged Prop. 13. Any man may judge another to be a Christian or Heretick by a private judgement of 1 Cor. â—0 1â— Acts 1. 19. 1 Cor. â— 3 4 5. 1 Cor. 11. 3. Mat. 5. 11 12. John 16. 2. discerning or the reason which guideth all humane actions But only Church Rulers may judge him by that publick Judgement which giveth or denyeth him his publick priviledges and Communion Prop. 14. If by notorious injustice Church Rulers condemn Christians as no Christians though they may thereby deny them communion with those publick Assemblies which they govern yet do they not oblige the people to take such injured persons for no Christians Else they might oblige all to believe a lye to consent to malicious injuries and might disoblige the people from Truth Righteousness and Charity Prop. 15. There is no one Natural or Collective Head and Governour of all the Churches in the 1 Cor. 12. 27 28 29. world the Universal Church but Jesus Christ And therefore there is none that by such Governing power can excommunicate any man out of the Universal Church And such Usurpation would Eph. 4. 5 6 7. 1 Cor. 1. 12 13 3. 22 23. be Treason against Christ whose Prerogative it is Prop. 16. Yet he that deserveth to be excommunicated from one Church deserveth to be Ephes. 5. 23. 4 15. excommunicated by and from all if it be upon a Cause common to all or that nullifieth his Christianity Col. 1. 18. 2. 19. Prop. 17. And where neighbour Churches are Consociate and live in Order and Concord he that 3 John is orderly excommunicate from one Church and it be notified to the rest should not be taken into the communion of any of the rest till he be cleared or become fit for their communion But Ephes. 5. 11. 1 Cor. 5. 1â— this obligation ariseth but from the Concord of Consociate Churches and not from the Power of one over the rest And it cannot reach all the world where the person cometh not nor was ever known but only to those who through neighbourhood are capable of just notice and of giving or denying communion to that person Prop. 18. From all this it is clear that it is not either Papists alone or Greeks alone or Protestants alone or any party of Christians who are the Universal Church seeing that Church containeth All 1 Cor. 1â— 12. John 13. 3â— 1 Cor. 13 1 2 c. Christians And that reviling others yea whole Nations as Hereticks Schismaticks and no Christians or Churches will no more prove the Revilers to be the only Church or Christians than Want of Love will prove a man to be one of Christs Disciples who by Love are known to all men to be his Prop. 19. It is therefore the shameful language of distracted men to cry out against other Christian Nations It is not you but we that are the Catholick or Universal Church And our shameful Controversie which of them is the Catholick is no wiser than to question Whether it be this house or that which is the Street Or this Street or that which is the City Or whether it be the 1 Cor. 12. 12. 1 Cor. 6. 17. 10. 17. Kitchin or the Hall or the Parlour which is the House Or the Hand or Foot or Eye which is the Man O when will God bring distracting Teachers to Repentance and distracted people to their wits Ephes. 4. 3 c. Prop. 20. There is great difference in the Purity or soundness of the several parts of the Universal Church some being more Orthodox and holy and some deâ—â—led with so many Errours and sins Gal. 4. 11 12. as to make it difficult to discern whether they do not deny the very essentials Prop. 21. The Reformed Churches are the soundest and purest that we know in the world and Rev. 3 8 9 10 11 12. 2 10 11. Act. 14 22. Tit. 1 5. Rom. 16. 4 16. 1 Cor. 7 17. 11. 16. 14. 3â— 34. 2 Thes. 1. 4. Rev. 2. 23. therefore their priviledge exceeding great though they are not all the Universal Church Prop. 22. Particular Churches consisting of Lawful Pastors and Christian people associated for personal Communion in Worship and holy living are societies or true Churches of Christâ— institution and the chief parts of the Universal Church As Cities and Corporations are of the Kingdom Prop. 23. There are thousands of these in the world and a man may be saved in one as well as in another Only the purest give him the best advantages for his salvation And therefore should be preferred by all that are wise and love their souls so far as they are free to choose their Communion Prop. 24. The case then being easily resolved which is the true Church viz. All Christians ☜ as Christians are the Catholick or Universal Church and All Congregations afore described of 1 Cor. 1. 13. Rom. 16. 17. Act. 20. 30. true Pastors and Christians being particular true Churches differing only in degrees of purity he is to be suspected as a designing deceiver and troubler of the world that pretending to be a Learned man and a Teacher doth still perplex the Consciences of the ignorant with this frivolous question and would muddy and obscure this clear state of the case lest the people should rest in the discerned truth Prop. 25. The Papal Church as such being no true Church of Christs institution of which by it self anon it followeth that a Papist as a Papist is no member of the Church of Christ that is Acts 2. 44. 1 Cor. 1. 10. 1 Thes. 5. 12 13. no Christian. But yet whether the same person may not be a Papist and a Christian and so a member of the Catholick Church we shall anon enquire Prop. 26. There are many things which go to make up the fitness and desireablness of that particular Heb. 10. 25. 1 Tim. 3. 7. 3 Joh. 12. Church which we should prefer or choose for our ordinary personal Communion As 1. That it be the Church of that place where we dwell If the place be so happy as to have no divided Churches that it be the sole Church there However that it be so neerâ—â— to be fit for our Communion 2. That it be a Church which holdeth Communion with other neighbour Churches and is not singular or divided from them Or at least not from the Generality of the Churches of Christ nor Act 16 32 34. Act 10. 2. 22. Act. 18. 8. Col. 4. 15. differeth in any great matters from those that are most pure 3. That it be under the Reputation of soundness with the other Churches aforesaid
1. And there are many things easie to be understood 2. We never said that men should not use the help of their Teachers and all that they can to understand it 3. Were not those Teachers once ignorant And yet they did read it by the help of Teachers And so may others 4. As the King for Concord commandeth all the Schoolmasters to teach one Grammar So God makeeth it the Ministers Office to Instruct people in the Scriptures And were it not a question unworthy of a Schoolmaster to dispute Whether the Scholars must learn by their Book or by their Master Yea to conclude that it must be by their Master and not by their Book or that they must never open their Book but when their Master is just at hand to teach them The Doctrine of the Papists who tell us that the Scriptures should not be read by the Vulgar it being the rise of all Heresies is so inhumane and impious as savouring of gross enmity to Scriptures and to knowledge that were there no other it would make the Lovers of Religion and mens souls to pray earnestly to Christ to save his flocks from such seducers who so Jewishly use the Key of Knowledge Object But many wrest the Scriptures to their own destruction and what Heresie is not defended as 2 Pet. 3. 1â— Psal. 19. 3 8 9 10. 2 Tim. 3. 16. â— Pet. 1. 23. by their authority Answ. 1. And many thousands receive saving knowledge and grace by them The Law of the Lord is perfect converting the soul. All Scripture is profitable to instruction c. to make the man of God perfect It is the incorruptible seed by which we are born again and the sincere milk by which we are nourished 2. And is it not as true 1. That the Law of the Land is abused by every false pretender Lawyer and Corrupt Judge What title so bad that is not defended in Westminster Hâ—ll sometimes under pretence of Law And what action so bad that some pretend not Law for What then Must the Law be forbidden the common people for this 2. Nay what is so much abused to unrighteousness and sin as Reason it self What Heresie or Crime do not men plead Reason for Must Reason therefore be forbidden the Vulgar 3. Yea Contrarily this signifieth that Law and Reason are so far from being things to be forbidden men that they are indeed those things by which Nature and Necessity have taught all the world to try and discern right from wrong good from bad Otherwise good and bad men would not all thus agree in pretending to them and appealing to their decisions 4. If many men are poysoned or killed in eating or drinking If many mens eye sight is abused to mislead them unto sin c. the way is not to eat nothing but what is put into our mouths nor to put out our eyes or wink and be led only by a Priest but to use both the more cautiously with the best advise and help that we can get 5. And do not these Deceivers see that their Reason pleadeth as strongly that Priests and Prelates themselves should never read the Scripture and consequently that it should be banished out of the world For who that is awake in the world can be ignorant that it is Priests and Prelates who have been the Leaders of almost all Heresies and Sects who differ in their Expositions and opinions and lead the Vulgar into all the Heresies which they fall into Who then should be forbidden to read the Scripture but Priests and Prelates who wrest them to their own and other mens destruction Quest. 147. How far is Tradition and mens Words and Ministry to be used or trusted in in the exercise of faith Answ. 1. THe Churches and Ministers received the Gospel in Scripture from the Apostles and Heb. 2. 3 4. 2 Pet. 1. 17 18 19 20 21. 2 John 1. 1 1 3 4 5. 4. 6. 2 Tim. 2. 2. Titus 1. 5. the Creed as the summary of faith And they delivered it down to others and they to us 2. The Ministers by Office are the Instructers of the people in the meaning of it And the keepers of the Scriptures as Lawyers are of the Laws of the Land Quest. 148. How know we the true Canon of Scripture from Apocrypha Answ. BY these means set together 1. There is for the most part a special venerable excellency in the Books themselves which helpeth us in the distinct reception of them 2. The Tradition of infallible Church History telleth us which Books they are which were written by men inspired by the Holy Ghost and who sealed their Doctrine with Miracles in those times It being but matter of fact which Books such men wrote whom God bear witness to infallible Church History such as we have to know which are the Statutes of the Land and which are counterfeit is a sufficient notification and proof 3. The sanctifying Spirit still in all Ages and Christians attesteth the Divinity and Truth of the Doctrine of the main body of the Bible especially the Gospel And then if we should err about the authority of a particular Book it would not overthrow our Faith It is not necessary to salvation to believe this particular Text to be Divine But it is sin and folly to doubt causelesly of the parts when the Spirit attesteth the Doctrine and the Body of the Book I pass these things briefly because I have largelier handled them elsewhere Quest. 149. Is the publick Reading of the Scripture the proper work of a Minister or may a Lay-man ordinarily do it or another Officer Answ. 1. IN such cases as I before shewed that a Lay-man may preach he may also Read the Scriptures Of which look back 2. No doubt but it is a work well beseeming the ordained Ministers or Pastors and an integral part of their Office and should not be put off by them when they can do it 3. When they need help the Deacons are ordained Ministers authorized to help them in such work and fittest to do it 4. Whether in a case of necessity a Lay-man may not ordinarily Read the Scripture to the Congregation is a Case that I am loth to determine being loth to suppose such a necessity But if the Minister cannot and there be no Deacon I cannot prove it unlawful for a Lay-man to do it under the direction of the Pastor I lived sometime under an old Minister of about eighty years of age who never preached himself whose eye sight failing him and having not maintenance to keep an assistant he did by Memory say the Common-prayer himself and got a Taylor one year and a Thresher or poor day-labourer another year to Read all the Scriptures Whether that were not better than nothing I leave to consideration And I think it is commonly agreed on that where there is no Minister it is better for the people to meet and hear a Lay-man Read the Scriptures and some good Books
that will rule them and not â—e ruled by them that will not suffer them to take their pleasure nor enjoy their riches but hold them to a life which they cannot endure and even undo them in the world he is then no longer a guest for them Whereas if Christ had been received as Christ and Truth and Godliness deliberately entertained for their welldiscerned Excellency and Necessity the deep rooting would have prevented this Apostacie and cured such Hypocrifie § 4. But alas poor Ministers find by sad experience that all prove not Saints that flock to hear them and make up the crowd nor that for a season rejoyce in their light and magnifie them and take their parts The blossom hath its beauty and sweetness but all that blossometh or appeareth in the bud doth not come to perfect fruit Some will be blasted and some blown down some nipt with â—â—osts some eaten by Worms some quickly fall and some hang on till the strongest blasts do cast them down some are deceived and poysoned by false Teachers some by worldly cares and the deceitfulness of riches become unfruitful and are turned aside The lusts of some had deeper rooting then the Word And the friends of some had greater interest in them than Christ and therefore they forsake him to satisfie their importunity some are corrupted by the hopes of preferment or the favour of man some feared from Christ by their threats and frowns and choose to venture on damnation to scape persecution And some are so worldly wise that they can see reason to remit their zeal and can save their souls and bodies too and prove that to be their duty which other men call sin if the end will but answer their expectations And some grow weary of truth and duty as a dull and common thing being not supplyed with that variety which might still continue the delights of Novelty § 5. Yet mistake not what I have said as if all the affection furthered by Novelty and abated by Commonness and use were a sign that the person is but an Hypocrite I know that there is something in the Nature of man remaining in the best which disposeth us to be much more passionately affected with things when they seem New to us and are first apprehended than when they are old and we have known or used them long There is not I believe one man of a thousand but is much more delighted in the Light of Truth when it first appeareth to him than when it is trite and familiarly known and is much more affected with a powerful Minister at first than when he hath long â—ate under him The same Sermon that even transported them at the first hearing would affect them less if they had heard it preach'd an hundred times The same Books which greatly affected us at the first or second reading will affect us less when we have read them over twenty times The same words of Prayer that take much with us when seldom used do less move our affections when they are daily used all the year At our first conversion we have more passionate sorrow for our sin and love to the godly than we can afterwards retain And all this is the case of learned and unlearned the sound and unsound though not of all alike Even Heaven it self is spoken of by Christ as if it did participate of this when he saith that Joy shall be in Heaven over One sinner that repenteth more than over ninety and nine just persons that need no repentance Luke 15. 7 10. And I know it is the duty of Ministers to take notice of this disposition in their hearers and not to dull them with giving them still the same but to profit them by a pleasant and profitable variety Not by preaching to them another Christ or a new Gospel It is the same God and Christ and Spirit and Scripture and the same Heaven the same Church the same faith and hope and repentance and obedience that we must preach to them as long as we live Though they say we have heard this an hundred times Let them hear it still and bring them not a new Creed If they hear so oft of God and Christ and Heaven till by Faith and Love and Fruition they attain them as their end they have heard well But yet there is a grateful variety of subordinate particulars and of words and methods and seasonable applications necessary to the right performance of our Ministry and to the profitting of the flocks Though the Physicion use the same Apothecaries Shop and Dispensatory and Drugs yet how great a variety must he use of compositions and times and manner of administration § 6. But for all this though the best are affected most with things that seem new and are dulled with the long and frequent use of the same expressions yet they are never weary of the substance of their Religion so as to desire a change And though they are not so passionately affected with the same Sermons and Books or with the thoughts or mention of the same substantial matters of Religion as at first they were Yet do their Iudgements more solidly and tenaciously embrace them and esteem them and their wills as Resolvedly adhere to them and use them and in their lives they practise them better than before Whereas they that take up their Religion but for Novelty will lay it down when it ceaseth to be New to them and must either change for a Newer or have none at all § 7. And as unsound are they that are Religious only because their education or their friends or the Laws or judgement of their Rulers or the Custom of the Countrey hath made it necessary to their Reputation These are Hypocrites at the first setting out and therefore cannot be saved by continuance in such a carnal Religiousness as this I know Law and Custom and education and friends when they side with Godliness are a great advantage to it by affording helps and removing those impediments that might stick much with carnal minds But truth is not your own till it be received in its proper evidence nor your faith divine till you believe what you believe because God is true who dâ—th reveal it nor are you the Children of God till you Love him for himself nor are you truly Religious till the Truth and Goodness of Religion it self be the principal thing that maketh you Religious It helpeth much to discover a mans sincerity when he is not only Religious among the Religious but among the prophane and the enemies and scorners and persecutors of Religion And when a man doth not pray only in a praying family but among the prayerless and the deriders of fervent constant prayer And when a man is heavenly among them that are earthly and temperate among the intemperate and riotous and holdeth the truth among those that reproach it and that hold the contrary When a man is not carried only by a stream of
company or outward advantages to his Religion nor avoideth sin for want of a temptation but is Religious though against the stream and innocent when cast unwillingly upon temptations and is Godly where Godliness is accounted singularity hypocrisie faction humour disobedience or heresie and will rather let go the reputation of his honesty than his honesty it self Direct 2. TAke heed of being Religious only in Opinion without Zeal and holy practice or only in Direct 2. Zealous affection without a sound well grounded judgement But see that Iudgement Zeal and practice â—e conjunct § 1. Of the first part of this advice against a bare Opinionative Religion I have spoken already in my Directions for a Sound Conversion To change your Opinions is an easier matter than to change the Heart and Life A holding of the truth will save no man without a Love and practice of the truth This is the meaning of Iames 2. where he speaketh so much of the unprofitableness of a dead uneffectual belief that worketh not by love and commandeth not the soul to practice and obedience To believe that there is a God while you neglect him and disobey him is unlike to please him To believe that there is a Heaven while you neglect it and prefer the world before it will never bring you thither To believe your duty and not to perform it and to believe that sin is evil and yet to live in it is to sin with aggravation and have no excuse and not the way to be accepted or justified with God To be of the same Belief with holy men without the same hearts and conversations will never bring you to the same felicity He that knoweth his Masters will and doth it not shall be so far from being accepted for it that he shall be beaten with many stripes To believe that Holiness and Obedience is the best way will never save the disobedient and unholy § 2. And yet if Iudgement be not your Guide the most zealous affections will but precipitate you Scientiâ— quae est 〈…〉 ota à just 〈…〉 caâ—â—iditaâ— poâ—â—us quam sapientia 〈◊〉 est ◠〈◊〉 Of the necessity of Pâ—udence in Religious men â—ead 〈…〉 The unprudenciâ—s of welâ—-meaning men have done as much hurt to the Church sometimeâ— as the persecution of enemies e. g. When Coâ—stantine the Son of Constans was Emperour some busie men would prove from the Orthodoâ— Doctrine of the Trinity That his two Brethren Tibtrius and Heraclius should reign with him saying Si iâ— Trinitate creâ—iâ—â—is â—res etiam 〈…〉 which cost the chief of them a hanging Abbas Urspergens Edit Melancth p. 162. and make you run though quite out of the way like the Horses when they have cast the Coachman or the Riders To ride Post when you are quite out of the way is but laboriously to lose your time and to prepare for further labour The Jews that persecuted Christ and his Apostles had the testimony of Paul himself that they had a zeal of God but not according to knowledge And Paul saith of the deceivers and troublers of the Galathians whom he wisheth even cut off that they did zealously affect them but not well Rom. 10. 2. Gal. 4. 17. And he saith of himself while he persecuted Christians to prison and to death I was zealous towards God as ye are all this day Acts 22. 3 4. Was not the Papists Saint Dominick that stirred up the persecution against the Christians in France and Savoy to the murdering of many thousands of them a very zealous man And are not the Butchers of the inquisition zealous men And were not the Authors of the third Canon of the General Council at the Laterane under Pope Innocent the third very zealous men that decreed that the Pope should depose Temporal Lords and give away their Dominions and absolve their Subjects if they would not exterminate the godly called Hereticks Were not the Papists Powder-Plotters zealous men Hath not zeal caused many of later times to rise up against their lawful Governours and many to persecute the Church of God and depriue the people of their faithful Pastors without compassion on the peoples souls Doth not Christ say of such Zealots The time cometh when whosoever killeth you will think he doth God service John 16. 2. or offereth a service acceptable to God Therefore Paul saith It is good to be zealously affected alwayes in a good matter Gal. 4. 18. Shewing you that zeal indeed is good if sound judgement be its guide Your first question must be Whether you are in the right way and your second Whether you go apace It is sad to observe what odious actions are committed in all Ages of the world by the instigation of mis-guided zeal And what a shame an imprudent Zealot is to his profession while making himself ridiculous in the eyes of the adversaries he brings his prosession it self into contempt and maketh the ungodly think that the Religious are but a company of transported brain-sick Zealots And thus they are hardened to their perdition How many things doth unadvised affection provoke well-meaning people to that afterwards will be their shame and sorrow § 3. Labour therefore for knowledge and soundness of understanding that you may know truth from falshood good from evil and may walk confidently while you walk safely and that you become not a shame to your profession by a furious prosecution of that which you must afterwards confess to be an error by drawing others to that which you would after wish that you had never known your selves And yet see that all your knowledge have its efficacy upon your heart and life And take every truth as an instrument of God to reveal himself to you or to draw your heart to him and conform you to his holy will Direct 3. LAbour to understand the true Method of Divinity and see Truths in their several degrees Leg. Acost l. 4. c. 21. 22 de fructu catechizandi Et Li. 5. and order that you take not the last for the first nor the lesser for the greater Therefore see that you be well grounded in the Catechism and refuse not to learn some Catechism that is sound and full and keep it in memory while you live § 1. Method or right order exceedingly helpeth understanding memory and practice Truths Opas est imprimis duplici Catechismo Uno compendaâ—io brevi quem memoâ—iter addiscant ubi summa sit eorum omnium quae ad fidem mores Christiano sunt necessaria altero ubeâ—iore ubi eadem amplius dilucidiusque dicantur copiosius confirmentur Ut ille prioâ— discipulis potius hic posterior ipsâ— praeceptoribus usu sit Acosta l. 5. c. 14. p 490. have a dependance on each other The lesser branches spring out of the greater and those out of the stock and root Some duties are but means to other duties or subservient to them and to be measured accordingly And if it be not
as you have no need § 5. As for Play books and Romances and idle Tales I have already shewed in my Book of Self-dâ—nyal how pernicious they are especially to youth and to frothy empty idle wits that know not what a man is nor what he hath to do in the world They are powerful baits of the Devil to keep more necessary things out of their minds and better Books out of their hands and to poyson the mind so much the more dangerously as they are read with more delight and pleasure and to fill the minds of sensual people with such idle fumes and intoxicating fancies as may divert them from the serious thoughts of their salvation And which is no small loss to rob them of abundance of that precious time which was given them for more important business and which they will wish and wish again at last that they had spent more wisely I know the fantasticks will say that these things are innocent and may teach men much good like him that must go to a Whore-house to learn to hate uncleanness and him that would go out with Robbers to learn to hate Theevery But I shall now only ask them as in the presence of God 1. Whether they could spend that time no better 2. Whether better Books and practices would not edifie them more 3. Whether the greatest Lovers of Romances and Playes be the greatest Lovers of the Book of God and of a holy life 4. Whether they feel in themselves that the Love of these vanities doth increase their love to the Word of God and kill their sin and prepare them for the life to come or clean contrary And I would desire men not to prate against their own experience and reason nor to dispute themselves into damnable impenitency nor to befool their souls by a few silly words which any but a sensualist may perceive to be meer deceit and falshood If this will not serve they shall be shortly convinced and answered in another manner Direct 17. TAke heed that you receive not a Doctrine of Libertinism as from the Gospel nor conceive Direct 17. of Christ as an encourager of sin nor pretend free grace for your carnal security or sloth For this is but to set up another Gospel and another Christ or rather the Doctrine and works of the Devil against Christ and the Gospel and to turn the Grace of God into wantonness § 1. Because the Devil knoweth that you will not receive his doctrine in his own Name his usual Siquis est hoc robore aniâ—â—t atque hoc indole virtuâ—s aâ— continentiâ— ut respâ—at omnes vo 〈…〉 omnemâ—â—â— vitae â—uae â—â—rsâ—m â—aâ—â—â—â— co 〈…〉 aequalium fludia non â—udi non convivia delectant nihil in vita expeâ—endum putet nisi quod est cum laude honore conjunâ—tum hunc mea sententia divinis quibusdam bonis instructum atque ornatum puto Ciâ— pâ—o Cal. method is to propound and preach it in the name of Christ which he knoweth you reverence and regard For if Satan concealed not his own Name and Hand in every temptation it would spoil his game And the more excellent and splendid is his pretence the more powerful the temptation is They that gave heed to seducing Spirits and Doctrines of Devils no doubt thought better of the Spirits and the Doctrines especially seeming strict for the Devil hath his strictnesses as forbidding to marry and abstinence from meats which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving 1 Tim. 4. 1 3. But the strictnesses of the Devil are alwayes intended to make men loose They shall be strict as the Pharisees in Traditions and vain Ceremonies and building the Tombs of the Prophets and garnishing the Sepulchres of the Righteous that they may hate and murder the living Saints that worship God in Spirit and in truth Licentiousness is the proper Doctrine of the Devil which all his strictness tendeth to promote To receive such principles is pernicious but to father them upon Christ and the Gospel is blasphemous § 2. The Libertines Antinomians and Autonomians of this age have gathered you too many instances The Libertine saith The Heart is the man therefore you may deny the truth with your tongue you may be present at false Worship as at the Mass you need not suffer to avoid the speaking of a word or subscribing to an untruth or error or doing some little thing but as long as you keep your hearts to God and mean well or have an honest mental reservation and are forced to it by therâ— rather than suffer you may say or subscribe or swear any thing which you can your selves put a lawful sense upon in your own minds or comply with any outward actions or customs to avoid â—ffence and save your selves The Antinomians tell you that The Moral Law is abrogated and that the Gospel is no Law and if there be no Law there is no Governour nor Government no duty no sin no judgement nâ— punishment no before they are born or repent or believe that their sin is pardoned 〈…〉 that God tâ—â—k them as suffering and fulfilling all the Law in Christ as if it had been they that diâ— iâ— in â—iâ— that we are justified by faith only in our consciences that justifying faith iâ— but t 〈…〉 we are justified that every man must believe that he is pardoned that he may 〈…〉 ed in â—is câ—â—science and this he is to do by a Divine faith and that this is the sense of the Aâ—tiâ—le I beliâ—â—â—â— the forgiveness of sins that is that my sâ—ns are forgiven and that all are forgi 〈…〉 it that it is legal and sinful to work or do any thing for salvation that sin once pa 〈…〉 ssed and lamented or at least we need not ask pardon of sin daily or of one 〈…〉 t that 〈◊〉 are no punishments and yet no other punishment is threatned to believers for their sins and consequently that Christ hath not procured them a pardon of any sin after believing but prevented all necessity of pardon and therefore they must not ask the pardon of them nor do any thing to obtain it that fear of Hell must have no hand in our obedience or restraint from sin And some add that he that cannot repent or believe must comfort himself that Christ repented and believed for him 〈…〉 a contradiction Many such Doctrines of Licentiousness the abusers of Grace have brought forth And the Sect which imitateth the Father of Pride in affecting to be from under the Government of God and to be the Law-givers and Rulers of themselves and all others which I therefore call the Antonomians are Licentious and much more They equally contend against Christs Government and for their own They fill the world with Wars and bloodshed oppression and cruelty and the ears of God with the cryes of the Martyrs and oppressed ones and all that the spiritual and holy Discipline of Christ may be suppressed and
but also that you may Use it And it is fit that we Direct you how to Use it before we direct you how to know that you have it because it is Grace in exercise that you must discern and Habits are not perceived in themselves but by their Acts And the more lively and powerful the exercise is the more easily is Grace perceived So that this is the nearest and surest way to a Certainty of our own sincerity He that Useth Grace most and best hath most Grace And he that hath most and useth it most may most easily be Assured that he hath it in sincerity and truth In these Directions I shall begin with those great internal duties in which the very Life of all Religion doth consist and the General Practice of these Principles and Graces and all these Generals shall be briefly set together for the easiness of Understanding and Remembring them And then I shall give you such Particular Directions as are needful in subordination to those Generals DIRECT I. Labour to understand well the Nature Grounds Reason and Order of Faith and Gr. Dir. 1. Godliness and to Believe upon such grounds so well understood as will not suffer For a well-grounded Faith you to stagger or entertain a contrary belief § 1. IGnorance and ungrounded or ill-grounded perswasions in matters of Religion are the cause that abundance of people delude themselves with the empty name and dead profession of a Faith and Religion which they never were indeed possessors of I know there are low degrees of knowledge comparatively in many that are true believers and that there may be much Love and Holiness where knowledge is very small or narrow as to the objective extent of it And that there is a knowledge that puffeth up while Charity edifieth And that in many that have the narrower knowledge there may be the fastest faith and adherence to the truth which will conquer in the time of tryal But yet I must tell you that the Religion which you profess is not indeed your own Religion if you know not what it is and know not in some measure the true Grounds and Reasons why you should be of that Religion If you have only learnt to say your Creed or repeat the words of Christian Doctrine while you do not truly understand the sense or if you have no better Reasons why you profess the Christian faith than the custom of the Countrey or the command of Princes or Governours or the Opinion of your Teachers or the example of your Parents friends or neighbours you are not Christians indeed You have a humane belief or opinion which objectively is true but subjectively in your selves you have no true divine belief I confess there may be some insufficient yea and erroneous Reasons which a true Believer may mistakingly make use of for the proof of certain fundamental truths But then that same man hath some other Reason for his reception of that truth which is more sound and his faith is sound because of those sound infallible principles though there be a mixture of some other Reasons that are unsound The true Believer buildeth on the Rock and giveth deep rooting to the holy seed Matth. 7. 24. 13. 5 8. Though some deluded men may tell you that Faith and Reason are such enemies that they exclude each other as to the same object and that the less Reason you have to prove the truth of the things believed the stronger and more laudable is your faith yet when it cometh to the tryal you will find that Faith is no unreasonable thing and that God requireth you to believe no more than you have sufficient reason for to warrant you aâ—â— bâ—â—r you out and that your faith can be no more than is your perception of the Reasons why you should believe and that God doth suppose Reason when he infuseth Faith and useth Reason in â—â—e usâ— of faith They that Believe and know not why or know no sufficient Reason to warâ—ant their Belief do take a fansie an Opinion or a dream for faith I know that many honest hearted Christians are unable to dispute for their Religion or to give to others a satisfactory account of the Reasons of their faith or hâ—pe But yet they have the true apprehension of some solid Reasons in themselves and they are not Christians they know not why And though their knowledge be small as to the number oâ— propositions known yet it doth alwayes extend to all that is essential to Christianity and Godliness and they do not believe they know not what And their knowledge is greater intensively and in its value and operation than the knowledge of the learnedst ungodly man in the world § 2. Though I may not here digress or stay so long as largely to open to you the Nature Grounds Reason and Method of Faith and Godliness which I am perswading you to understand yet I shall first â—â—y before you a few Propositions which will be useful to you when you are enquiring into these things and then a little open them unto you Prop. 1. A life of Godliness is our living unto God as God as being absolutely addicted to him 2. A life of Faith is a living upon the unseen everlasting Happiness as purchased for us by Christ with all the necessaries thereto and freely given us by God 3. The contrary life of sense and unbelief is a living in the prevalency of sense or flesh to this present world for want of such believing apprehensions of a better as should elevate the soul thereto and conquer the fleshly inclination to things present 4. Though man in innocency needing no Redeemer might live to God without faith in a Redeemer yet lapsed man is not only unable to Redeem himself but also unable to live to God without the grace of the Redeemer It was not only necessary that he satisfie Gods justice for us that he may pardon and save us without any wrong to his Holiness Wisdom or Government but also that he be our Teacher by his Doctrine and his Life and that he Reveal from Heaven the Fathers will and that Objectively in him we may see the wonderful condescending Love and Goodness of a Reconciled God and Father and that effectually â—e illuminate sanctifie and quicken us by the operations of his Word and Spirit and that he protect and govern justifie and glorifie us and be the Head of Restored Man as Adam was the Root of lapsed man and as the lapsed Spirits had their Head And therefore we must wholly Live upon him as the Mediator between God and man and the only Saviour by Merit and by â—fficacy 5. Faith is a knowledge by certain credible Testimony or Revelation from God by means supernatural or extraordinary 6. The knowledge of things naturally revealed as the cause by the effect c. is in order before the Knowledge or Belief of things revealed supernaturally 7. It is matter of natural Revelation
of honour than of obscurity and contempt of mens praises and applause than of their disprâ—â—ses slanders and repâ—â—â—â—h of preâ—erment and greatness than of a low and mean condition of a delicious than of lâ—ss tempting meats and drinks of curious costly than of mean and cheap and plain attire Let those that have hired out their reason to the service of their fleshly lusts and have delivered the Crown and Sâ—epter to their appetites think otherwise No wonder if they that have sold the birthright of their intellects to their senses for a meâ—s of Pottage for a Whore or a high place or a domineering power over others or a belly full of pleasant Meats or Liquors do deride all this and think it but a melancholy conceit more suitable to an Eremiâ—e or Anchorite than to men of society and business in the world As Heaven is the portion of serious believers and mortified Saints alone so it shall be proper to them alone to understand the doctrine and example of their Saviour and practically to know what it is to deny themselves and forsake all they have and take up their Cross and follow Christ and by the Spirit to mortifiâ— the deeds of the body Luke 14. 26 27 28 29 33. Rom. 8. 5 6 7 13. Col. 3. 1 2 3 4. Such know that millions part with God for Pleasures but none for Griefs and that Hell will be stored with those that preferred Wealth and Honour and Sports and gluttony drink and filthy lusts before the Holiness and happiness of believers but none will be damn ed for preferring poverty and disgrace and abstinence hunger and thirst and chastity before them It must be something that seemeth good that must entice men fâ—om the chiefest Good Apparent Evil is no fit bait for the Devils hook Men will not displease God to be themselves displeased nor choose present sorrows instead of everlasting joyes but for the pleasures of sin for a season many will despise the endless pleasures § 23. Direct 10. Meet every motion to disobedience with an Army of holy Graces with wisdom and Direct 10. fear and hatred and resolution with Love to God with Zeal and courage and quench every spark that falls upon your hearts befâ—re it break out into a flame When sin is little and in its infancy it is weak and easily resisted It hath not then turned away the mind from God nor quenched grace and disablâ—d it to do its office But when it s grown strong then grace grows weak and we want its help and want the sense of the presence and Attributes and truths of God to rebuke it O stay not till your hearts are gone out of hearing and stragled from God beyond the observance of his Calls The Habit of Obedience will be dangerously abated if you resist not quickly the acts of sin § 24. Direct 11. Labour for the clearest understanding of the Will of God that doubtfulness about Direct 11. your duty do not make you flag in your obedience and doubtfulness about sin do not weaken your detestation and resistance and draw you to venture on it When a man is sure what is his Duty it is a great help against all temptations that would take him off And when he is sure that a thing is sinful it makes it the easier to resist And therefore it is the Dâ—vils Method to delude the understanding and make men believe that duty is no duty and sin is no sin and then no wonder if duty be neglected and sin committed And therefore he raiseth up one false Prâ—phet or other to say to Ahab Go and prosper or to say There is no hurt in this To dispute for sin and to dispute against Duty And it is almost incredible how much the Devil hath got when he hath once but made it a matter of Controversie Then every hypocrite hath a cloke for his sin and a dose of Opium for his Conscience when he can but say It is a Controversie some are of one mind and some of another you are of that Opinion and I am of this Especially if there be wise and learned on both sides and yet more if there be Religious men on both sides And more yet if he have an equal number on his side And most of all if he have the major Vote as error and sin have commonly in the world If Ahab have but four hundred lying flattering Prophets to one Micaiah he will think he may hate him reproach him and persecute him without any sâ—â—â—â—ple of Conscience If it be made a Controversie whether Bread be Bread and Wine be Wine when we see and taste it some will think they may venture to subscribe or swear that they hold the Negative if their credit or livings or lives lie upon it much more if they can say It is the judgement of the Church If it be once made a Controversie whether perjury be a sin or whether a Vow materially lawful bind or whether it be lawful to equivocate or lye with a mental reservation for the truth or to do the greatest evil or speak the falsest thing with a true and good intent and meaning almost all the hypocrites in the Countrey will be for the sinful part if their fleshly interest require it And will think themselves wronged if they are accounted hypocrites lyâ—rs or perjured as long as it is but a Point of Controversie among learned men If it be once made a Controversie whether an Excommunicate King become a private man and it be lawful to kill him and whether the Pope may absolve the subjects of Temporal Lords from their Allegiance notwithstanding all their Oaths and if such Learned men as Zuarez Bellarmine Perron c. are for it to say nothing of Santarellus Mariana c. you shall have a Clement a Ravilliack a Faux yea too great choice of instruments that will be satisfied to strike the blow If many hold it may or must be dâ—ne some will be found too ready to do it especially if an approved General Council Lateran sub Innâ—c 3. Can. 3. be for such Papal absolution We have seen at home how many will be emboldned to pull down Government to sit in Judgement on their King and condemn him and to destroy their Brethren if they can but say that such and such men think it lawful If it were but a Controversie once whether drunkenness whoredom swearing stealing or any villany be a sin or not it would be committed more commonly and with much less regret of conscience Yea good men will be ready to think that modesty requireth them to be less censorious of those that commit it because in controverted cases they must suspect their own understandings and allow something to the judgement of dissenters And so all the Rules of Love and Peace and Moderation which are requisite in Controversies that are about small and difficult points the Devil will make use of and apply them all to the patronage of
many § 64. Direct 20. Remember that God needeth no sinful means to attain his ends He will not be Direct 20. beholden to the Devil to do his work He would not have forbad it if he would have had you done it He is never at such a loss but he can find right means enough to perform his work by It is a great pâ—â—t of our wisdom which our salvation lieth on to choose and use right means when we are resolved on a right end It 's a horrible injury against God to intitle him to sin and make it seem necessary to his ends and honour Good ends will not justifie evil actions What sin so odiouâ— that hath not had good ends pretended for it Even Christ was murthered as a malefactor 〈…〉 ds at least pretended even to vindicate Gods honour from blasphemy and Caesar from 〈…〉 â—â—â—â—â—â— and the nation from calamity And his disciples were killed that God might be served by it â—â—d â—â—â—â—â—ent troublers of the world taken away § 65. Tempt 21. He would make us presume because we are Gods children and speciall grace 〈…〉 â—aâ—â—â—â—t be wholy lâ—â—t and we have found that once we had grace therefore we may venture as being safe § 66. Direct 21. But many a thousand shall be damned that once thought they had the truth Direct 21. of Grace It is a hard controversie among learned and godly men whether some in a state of saving grace do not fall from it and perish But it is past controversie that they shall perish that live and dâ—â— impâ—nitently in willful sin To plead truth of grace for encouragement in sin is so much against the nature and use of grace as may make you question the truth of it You can be no suâ—â—r that you have true grace than you are sure that you hate all known sin and desire to be free from it Christ teacheth you how to answer such a horrid temptation Mat. 4. 6 7. Iâ— thâ—â—â—e the Son of God cast thy self down For it is written â—e shall give his Angels charge over thâ—â— Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God Son-ship and promises and truth of grace are incongruous arguments to draw you to sin and heynous aggravations of sin so committed § 67. Tempt 22. The Devil â—ft most dangerously imitateth the Holy Ghost and comes in the shape of Tempt 22. â—n Angel of light He will be for knowledge in the Gnosticks for Unity and Government in the Papists for Mortifcation in the Fryars for free-grace and tenderness of our Brethrens Consciences in the Libertiâ—â—s for Peace and Mutual forbearance in the Socinians for Zeal Self-denâ—al and fearfulness of men and pretended revelations and spirituality in the Quakers He will be against heresie schism error disobedience hypocrisie pretendedly in haters and persecutors of holiness and reformation And when he will seem religious he will be superstitious and seem to out-go Christ himself § 68. Direct 22. Kerp close to Christ that you may know his voice from the voice of strangers Direct 22. And get â—oâ—y wisdom to try the spirits and to discern between things that diâ—â—â—â—r Let the whole frame of Truth and Godliness be in your Head and Heart that you may perceive when any would make a breach in any part of it The Devil setteth up no good but in order to some evil Therefore examine whither it tendeth and not only what it is but what use he would have you make of it And love no evil because of any Goâ—d that is pretended for it and dislike or reject no good because of any evil use that is by others made of it And whatever doctrine is brought you try it thus 1. Receive none that is against the certain Nature Attributes and honour of God 2. Nor any that is against the Light or Law of nature 3. Nor any that is against the Scripture 4. Nor any that is against Holiness of heart and life 5. Nor any against Charity and Justice to men 6. Nor any about matters to be ordered by men that is against order nor any against Government and the peace of Church and State 7. Nor any that is against the true Unity Peace and Communion of Saints 8. Nâ—r any that is certainly inconsistent with great and certain truths Thus try the spirits whether they be of God § 69. Tempt 23. The Tempter usually draâ—eth men to one extream under pâ—etense of avoiding another Tempt â—3 causing men to be so fearful of the danger on one side as to take no heed of that on the other sâ—de § 70. Direct 23 Understand all your danger and mark the latitude or extent of Gods commands Direct 23. and watch on every side And you must know in what duties you are in danger of extreames and in what not In thâ—se acts of the soul that are purely rational about your ultimate end you cannot do too much as in knowing God and Loving him and being willing and resolved to please him But passions may possibly go too farr even about God especially fear and grief for they may be such as nature cannot bear without distraction death or hinderance of duty But few are guilty of this But towards the creature passions may easily exceed And in external actions towards God or man there may be excess But especially in point of Iudgement its easie to slide from extream into extream 2. And you must know in every duty you do and every sin which you avoid and every truth you receive what is the contrary or extream to that particular truth or sin or duty and keep it in your eye If you do not thus watch you will râ—â—l like a drunken man from side to side and never walk uprightly with God You will turn from Prodigality to Covetousness from cruel persecution to Libertinism or from Libertinism to persecuting cruelty from hypocritical formality to hypocritical pretended spirituality or from enthusiasms and faction to dead formality But of this I have spoke at large Chap. 5. Part. 2. Dir. to Students § 71. Tempt 24. On the contrary the Tempter usually pleadeth Moderation and Prudence against Tempt 24. a holy life and accurate zealous obedience to God and would make you believe that to be so diligent in duty and sâ—rupulously afraid of sin is to run into an extream and to be righteous over much and to make Religion a vexatious or distracting thing and that its more a do than needs § 72. Direct 24. This I have answered so oft that I shall here say but this that God cannot be Direct 24. too much loved nor Heaven too much valued nor too diligently sought or obeyed nor sin and Hell be too much avoided nor doth any man need to fear doing too much where he is sure when he hath done his best to do too little Hearken what men say of this at death § 73. Tempt 25. The Tempter would perswade us that one sin is necessary to avoid
certain obedience for uncertain sin Or if a Priest among them say I am certain that it is a duty to preach Gods word but I am not certain that the Trent Articles which I must swear or subscribe are sinful or false therefore I must not leave a great and certain duty for an uncertain sin The answer to them both is easie 1. It is your sin that you are uncertain of the sinfullness of those things which God hath forbidden And God biddeth you first to search the Scriptures and cure that error He made his Law before your doubts arose and will not change it because you doubt 2. You contradict your selves by a mistake you have no more certainty that you should obey your Teachers in these particulars than you have that the things which they teach or command you are not against that Law of God You are certain that you must obey them in all things not forbidden by God and within the reach of their office to require And you are as certain that it is unlawful to obey them against the Law of God and that God must be obeyed before man But whether you must obey them in this particular case you cannot be certain while you are uncertain whether it be forbidden of God And the Priest must be as uncertain whether it be any duty of his at all to preach Gods word as he is uncertain of the lawfullness of the Trent-Oath or subscription unless he can do it without If a subject say I am certain that to Govern the Kingdom well is a great good work and duty but I am uncertain whether to depose the King if he Govern not well and set up my self be a sin therefore the Certain good must overrule the uncertain evil I give him the same answer It is your sin to be uncertain whether Rebellion be a sin and God bindeth you to lay by the sin of your judgement and not to make it a shooing-horn to more 2. You are sure that Governing well is a Good work but you should be as sure that it is no duty of yours nor no Good work for you to do as you are sure that you are but a private man and a subject and never called to do the Good of anothers office A private man may say I am sure preaching is a good work but I am not sure that a private unordained man may not statedly separate himself to do it But he can be no surer that it is a duty to him than he is that he is called to it § 43. Quest. 12. Well suppose my ignorance be my sin and suppose that I am equally uncertain of Quest. the duty and of the sin annexed yet if I have done all that I am able and remain still unresolved and after my most diligent enquiry am as much in doubt as ever what should I then do Answ. 1. If you had by any former sin so forfeited Gods assistance as that he will leave you Answ. to your blindness this altereth not his Law and your obligations which are still the same to Learn understand and practise 2. But if you are truly willing to understand and practise and use his means you have no cause to imagine that he will thus forsake you undoubtedly he appointeth you no means in vain If you attain not sufficient resolution to guide you in your duty it is either because your hearts are false in the enquiry and byassed or unwilling to know the truth or do it or because you use not the true appointed means for resolution but in partiality or laziness neglect it § 44. Quest. 13. Suppose still my ignorance be my sin which is the Greater sin to neglect the Quest. good work or to venture on the feared evil that is annexed I am not conscious of any unfaithfullness but humane frailty that keepeth me from certainty And no man is so perfect as to have no culpable ignorance and to be certain in every point of duty Therefore I must with greatest caution avoid the greatest sin when I am out of hope of avoiding all On one side it is a common Rule that I must do nothing against Conscience no not a doubting Conscience though I must not allwaies do what it biddeth me For he that doubteth is condemned if he eat for whatsoever is not of faith is sin Rom. 14. 23. On the other side if all duty be omitted which conscience doubteth of I may be kept from allmost every duty Answ. The heart is so deceitful that you have great cause to watch lest humane frailty be pretended Answ. for that error which a corrupted byassed partial mind or willful lazyness is the cause of Diligent study and enquiry and prayer with a sincere desire to know the truth may succeed at least to so much satisfaction as may keep your minds in quietness and peace and give you comfort in your way and preserve you from all such sin as is inconsistent with this your safety and acceptance with God But yet it is true that humane frailty will occasion in the best uncertainties in some particular cases and though God make it not our duty of two sins to choose the less but to refuse both yet he maketh it our duty more diligently to avoid the greater than the less And oft times the case is so sudden that no enquiry can be made And therefore I confess a Christian should know which sins are greatest and to be most avoided At present I shall lay down these following Rules premising this that where accidents and circumstances which make sins Great or Small are to be compared they are oft times so numerous and various that no Rules can be laid down before hand that will serve all turns no more than in Law and Physick any Law-books or Physick-books will serve all cases without a present experienced judicious Counsellor Present PRUDENCE and SINCERITY must do most § 45. Rule 1. In things altogether indifferent nothing must be done that Conscience doubteth of Rule because there is a possibility or fear of sinning on the one side but none on the other And in that case it is a certain sin to venture on a feared sin But then it is supposed that the thing be indifferent as cloathed with all its circumstances and that there be no accident that taketh away its indifferencie § 46. Rule 2. â—â—â—aâ—e the thing be really unlawful and I think it to be lawful but with sâ—me 〈…〉 ing â—ut aâ—â— clear that the forbearing it is no sin there the sin is only in the doing it because all â—s clâ—â—r and sâ—sâ— on the other side § 47. Rule 3. There are many sins which are allwaies and to all persâ—ns in all cases sins and not dâ—uâ—teâ— â—â—â—â— any witâ—â—ut gâ—â—â—â— unfaithfullness or negligence and â—ere there is no room for any dâ—ubting whether we must do that â—â—â—â—d which cannot be done without that sin it being certain that nâ— sâ—â—â—â— Goâ—d can be
Unhumbledness Impurity Unreformedness and all sin in general as sin In the ninth you are directed against †Of Presumption and false hope enough is said in the Saints Rest and here about Temptation Hope and other Heads afterward Security Unwatchfulness and yielding to temptations and in general against all danger to the soul. In the tenth you are directed against Barrenness Unprofitableness and Sloth and Uncharitableness and against mistakes in matter of duty or good works In the eleventh you are directed against all Aversness Disaffection or cold Indifferency of heart to God In the twelfth you are directed against Distrust and sinful Cares and Fears and Sorrows In the thirteenth you are directed against an over sad or heartless serving of God as meerly from fear or forcedly without delight In the fourteenth you are directed against Unthankfulness In the fifteenth you are directed against all unholy or dishonourable thoughts of God and against all injurious speeches of him or barrenness of the tongue and against all scandal or barrenness of life In the Books referred to in the sixteenth and seventeenth you are directed against selfishness self-esteem self-love self-conceit self-will self-seeking and against all worldliness and fleshliness of mind or life But yet leâ—t any necessary helps should be wanting against such heinous sins I shall add some more particular Directions against such of them as were not fully spoken to before PART I. Directions against UNBELIEF § 1. I Know that most poor troubled Christians when they complain of the sin of Unbelief do mean by it their not Believing that they are sincere believers and personally justified and shall be saved â— Whether not to believe that my sins are pardoned â—e indeed Unbelieâ— And I know that some Divines have affirmed that the sense of that Article of the Creed I believe the Remission of sins is I believe my sins are actually forgiven But the truth is to believe that I am elect or justified or that my sins are forgiven or that I am a sincere Believer is not to Believe any word of God at all For no word of God doth say any of these nor any thing equivalent nor any thing out of which it can be gathered For it is a Rational Conclusion and one of the premises which do infer it must be found in my self by reflexion or internal sense and self-knowledge The Scripture only saith He that truly believeth is justified and shall be saved But it is Conscience and not Belief of Scripture which must say I do sincerely believe Therefore the Conclusion that I am justified and shall be saved is a Rational Collection from what I find in Scripture and in my self set together and resulting from both can be no firmer or surer than is the weaker of the premises Now Certainty is objective or subjective in the Thing or in my Apprehension As to Objective Certainty in the thing it self all truths are equally true But all Truths are not equally discernable there being much more cause of doubting concerning some which are less evident than concerning others which are more evident And so the Truth of Gods promise of Justification to believers is more certain that is hath fuller surer Evidence to be discerned by than the Truth of my sincere believing And that I sincerely believe is the more Debile of the premises and therefore the conclusion followeth this in its Debility And so can be no article of faith And as to the subjective Certainty that varyeth according to mens various apprehensions The premises as in their evidence or aptitude to ascertain us are the cause of the Conclusion as evident or knowable And the premises as apprehended are the Cause of the Conclusion as known Now it is a great doubt with some Whether a man can possibly be more certain that he believeth Whether a man can be more certain that he believeth than he is that the thing believed is true than he is that the thing believed is true because the act can extend no further than the object and to be sure I believe is but to be sure that I take the thing believed to be true But I shall grant the contrary that a man may possibly be surer that he believeth than he is that the thing believed is true because my believing is not alwayes a full subjective certainty that the thing is true but a believing that its true And though you are fully certain that all Gods word is true yet you may believe that this is his word with some mixture of unbelief or doubting And so the question is but this Whether you may not certainly without doubting know that you Believe the Word of God to be true though with some doubting And it seems you may But then it is a further question Whether you can be surer of the saving sincerity of your faith than you are that this Word of God is true And that ordinarily men doubt of the first as much as they doubt of the later I think is an experimented truth But yet grant that with some it may be otherwise Because he believeth sincerely that so far believeth the Word of God as to trust his life and soul upon it and forsake all in obedience to it And that I do so I may know with less doubting than I yet have about the Truth of the Word so believed All that will follow is but this That of those men that doubt of their Iustification and Salvation some of their doubts are caused more by their doubting of Gods Word than by the doubting whether they sincerely though doubtingly believe it and the doubts of others whether they are justified and shall be saved is caused much more by their doubting of their own sincere belief than by their doubting of the truth of Scriptures And the far greatest number of Christians seem to themselves to be of this later sort For no doubt but though a man of clear understanding can scarcely believe and yet not know that he believeth yet he may believe sincerely and not know that he believeth sincerely But still the knowledge of our own justification is but the effect or progeny of our Belief of the Word of God and of our Knowledge that we do sincerely believe it which conjunctly are the Parents and Causes of it And it can be no stronger than the weaker of the Parents which in esse cognoscibili is our faith but in esse cognito is sometime the one and sometime the other And the effect is not the cause The effect of faith and knowledge conjunct is not faith it self It is not a Believing the Word of God to believe that you believe or that you are Iustified But yet because that faith is one of the Parents of it some call it by the name of faith though they should call it but an effect of faith as one of the causes And well may our doubtings of our own salvation be said to be from Unbelief because
22. Live continually as one that is going to be judged at the barr of God where all Direct 22. Hypocrisie will be opened and shamed and Hypocrites condemned by the All-knowing God One thought of our appearing before the Lord and of the day of his impartial judgement one would think should make men walk as in the light and teach them to understand that the Sun is not eclipsed as oft as they wink nor is it night because they draw the Curtains What a shame will it be to have all your dissimulation laid open before all the world Luke 12. 1 2 3. Beware of the leven of the Pharisâ—es which is Hypocrisie For there is nothing covered which shall not be revealed neither â—id that shall not be known Therefore what ever ye have spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light and that which ye have spoken in the ear in closets shall be proclaimed on the house tops § 28. Direct 23. Think not that you avoid Hypocrisie by changing the expressions of it but see that Direct 23. you run not into a more subtile kind while you avoid a grossee There is no outward way of worshipping God nor no opinion in Religion so sound but an Hypocrite can make a cloak of it You see an ignorant ridiculous Hypocrite such as Bishop Hall describeth in his character that can pray up to a Pillar when his heart knoweth not what his tongue is doing that babbleth over a few words to God while he is dressing or washing him and talking between to the standers by who offereth to God the Sacrifice of a fool and knoweth not that he doth evil Eccles. 5. 2. that serveth God with toyes and antick gestures and saying over certain words which were never acquainted with the feeling of his heart nor scarce with his understanding And to avoid his hypocrisie perhaps you can merrily deride him and make a formal Popish Hypocrite the subject of your jeasts and you can your selves with good understanding poure out your selves many hours togethers in orderly and meet expressions of prayer But remember that many an Hypocrite maketh himself a cloak of as good stuff as this And that as Pride hath more advantage to work upon your greater knowledge and better parts so Hypocrisie is but the off-spring of Pride All this without a Heart entirely devoted unto God is but a carkass better drâ—sâ— as the rich have more curious monuments than the poor There is no outside thing in which an Hypocrite may not seem excellent Direct 24. § 29. Direct 24. Be true to Conscience and hearken diligently to all it saith and be often treating Quid proâ—â—st reâ—o dâ—â—eâ—se oâ—â—â—â—os hoâ—â—num auâ—eâ—que viâ—are â—â—â—â—a 〈…〉 entia tâ—â—â—â—m ad 〈…〉 maâ—â— aâ—â—em in so 〈…〉 anxâ—â— â—oâ—â—â—â—iâ—a est Sâ— honesta sunt quae sa is omnes sâ—â—ant Sâ— turyâ—a quid reâ—ert neminem sâ—â—re cum â—u tu scias Oâ—â— miserum si câ—ntâ—mâ—ts â—unâ—â—â—â—â—em Sâ—â— Ep. 9â— Matth. 23. 13 14 15 23 25 27 29. with it and daily conversant and well acquainted with it Hypocrites bear little reverence to their Consciences They make so often and so grosly bold with them that Conscience is deposed from its office at the present and 〈…〉 d by them lest it should gall them by preaching to them those hard sayings which they cannot bâ—â—â—â— And perhaps at last it is â—eared or bribed to take part with sin But usually an Hypocrite hath â— secret Judge within him which condemneth him Take heed how you use your Consciences as you love your peace or happiness Next Christ it must be your best friend or your gr 〈…〉 y Palliate it how you will at present if you wound it it will smart at last And it is easier to bear poverty or shame or torment than to bear its wounds Prov. 18. 14. 1. Mark the very principles and former judgement of your Consciences and if they are changed know what changed them 2. Hearken to all the secret counsel and reproofs of Conscience especially when it speaketh oft and terribly Turn it not off without a hearing yea know the reason of its very scruples and doubts 3. When it is sick and disquieted know what the matter is Psal 53. 5. and vomit up the matter that justly disquiets it whatever it cost you and be sure you go to the bottom and do not leave the root behind 4. Open your Consciences to some able trusty guide when it is necessary though it cost you shame An over-tender avoiding of such shame is the Hypocrites sin and folly Counsel is safe in matters of such importance 5. Prefer Conscience before all men how great soever None is above it but God It is Gods messenger when it is Conscience indeed Remember what it saith to you and from whom and for what end Let friends and neighbours and company and basiness and profit and sports and honour stand by and all give place whilst Conscience speaketh For it will be a better friend to you than any of these if you use it as a friend It would have been better to Iudas than his thirty pieces were 6 Yet see that it be well informed and see its commission for it is not above God nor is it masterless or lawless 7. Converse not with it only in a crowd but in secret Psal. 4. 4. 8. Keep it awake and keep it among awakening means and company It will much sooner fall asleep in an Ale-house or a Play-house or among the foolish and prophane than at a lively Sermon or Prayer or reverent discourse of God If I could but get Conscience awakened to perform its office and preach over all this that I have said in secret it would â—â—rret the Hypocrite out of his self-deceit Go Conscience and search that deceitful heart and speak to it in the Name of God Ask that Hypocrite whether Conversion ever made him a new Creature and whether his soul and all that he hath be entirely devoted unto God and whether his hopes and treasure be laid up in Heaven and his heart be there and whether he subject all his worldly interest to the Will of God and the interest of his soul and whether his greatest work be about his Heart and to approve himself to God and whether he make an impartial diligent enquiry after the truth with a desire to receive it at the dearest rates Tell him that a proud self-flattery may now make him justifie or extenuate his sins and take his formalities and lip-service and abuse of God for true devotion and hate every man that would detect his hypocrisie and convert him by bringing in the light But a light will shortly appear to his soul which he shall not resist And then let him stand to his justification if he can and let him then make it good that he gave up himself in sincerity simplicity and self-denyal to his God § 30. Direct 25. Remember that Hypocrisie lyeth much in doubling and
the Holy Ghost to lead men by obedience to felicity Behold it with reverence as a Letter or Message sent from Heaven and as a thing of grand importance to your souls When you meditate of any Grace think on it as a part of the Image of God implanted and actuated by the Holy Ghost to advance the soul into communion with God and prepare it for him When you meditate on any Duty remember who commandeth it and whom you are chiefly to respect in your obedience and what will be the end of obeying or disobeying When you meditate on any sin remember that it is the defacing or privation of Gods image and the rebell that riseth up against him in all his attributes to depose him from the Government of the soul and of the world and foresee the End to which it tendeth Take in God if you would feel Life and Power in all that you meditate on § 21. Direct 7. Let your ordinary Meditations be on the Great and Necessary things and think Direct 7. less frequently on the less Necessary matters Meditation is but a means to a further end It is to work some good upon the soul Use therefore those subjects which are most powerful and fit to work it Great truths will do great works upon the heart They are usually the surest and most past controversie and doubt There is more weight and substance and power in one Article of the Creed or one Petition in the Lords Prayer or one Commandment in the Decalogue to benefit the soul than in abundance of the controverted opinions which men have troubled themselves and others with in all ages As one purse of Gold will buy more than a great quantity of Farthings Meditating on Great and weighty truths makes Great and weighty Christians And meditating inordinately on light and controverted opinions makes light opinionative contentious professors Little things may have their time and place but it must be but little time and the last place except when God maketh any little thing to be the matter of our lawful calling and employment as all the common matters of the world are little And then they may have a larger proportion of our time though still they must have the lowest place in our estimation and in our hearts § 22. Direct 8. When ever you are called to meditate on any smaller truth or thing see that you Direct 8. take it not as separated from the greater but still behold it as connexed to them and planted and growing in them and receiving their life and beauty from them so that you may still preserve the life and interest of the greatest matters in your hearts and may not mortifie the least and turn it into a deceit or idol We are to climb upwards and not to descend downwards and therefore we begin at the body of the Tree and so pass up to the few and greatest boughs and thence to the smaller numerous branches which as they are hard to be discerned numbred and remembred so are they not all strong enough to bear us but are fitted rather to be looked on than trodden and rested on But if you take them not as growing from the greater boughs but cut them off they lose their life and beauty and fruitfulness If all the Controversies in the Church had been managed with due honour and preservation of Holiness Charity Unity Peace and greater truths and if all the circumstantials in Religion had been ordered with a salvo and due regard and just subsâ—rviency to the power and spirituality of holy Worship the Christian world would have had more Life and strength and fruitfulness and less imagery unholy ludicrous complement and hypocrisie § 23. Direct 9. Let the end and order of your meditations be first for the setling of your judgements Direct 9. and next for the resalving and setling of your wills and thirdly for the reforming and bettering of your lives and but in the fourth place after all these for the raising of your holy passions or lively feeling which must have but its proper room and place But indeed where some of these are done already they may be supposed and we may proceed to that which is yet to do As if you know what is sin and duty but do it not your meditation must be not to make you know what you knew not but first to consider well of what you know and set the powerful truth before you and then labour hereby to bring your wills to a fixed Resolution of obedience But if it be a Truth whose principal use is on the Will and Affections as to draw up the heart to the Love of God by the meditating on his attractive excellencies then the most pains must there be taken Of which see Chap. 3. Direct 11. § 24. Direct 10. Turn your cogitations often into soliloquies methodically and earnestly preaching Direct 10. to your own hearts as you would do on that subject to others if it were to save their souls As this will keep you in order from rambling and running out and will also find you continual matter Of this see the third part of my Saints Rest more fully For method is a wonderful help both to invention memory and delight so it will bring things soonest to your affections An earnest pleading of convincing reasons with our own Hearts is a powerful way to make the fire burn and to kindle desire fear love hatred repentings shame sorrow joy resolution or any good effect Convictions upbraidings expostulations reprehensions and self-perswasions may be very powerful when a dull way of bare thinking is but like a dull way of preaching without any lively application which little stirs the hearers Learn purposely of the liveliest Books you read and of the best and liveliest Preachers you hear to preach to your hearts and use it orderly and you will find it a most powerful way of meditating § 25. Direct 11. Turn your meditations often into ejaculatory prayers and addresses unto God For Direct 11. that will keep you reverent serious and awake and make all the more powerful because the more Divine When you meditate on sin turn sometimes to God by penitent lamentation and say Lord what a wretch and rebell was I to entertain such an enemy of thine into my heart and for nothing to offend thee and violate thy Laws O pardon O cleanse me O strengthen me Conquer and â—ast out this odious enemy of thee and me So when you are seeking to excite or exercise any grace send up a fervent request to God to shew his Love and power upon thy dead and sluggish heart and to be the principal agent in a work which is so much his own Prayer is a most holy duty in which the soul hath so nearly to do with God that if there be any holy seriousness in the heart it will be thus excited A dull and wandring mind will bear some reverence to God and therefore
the final obstinate refusers of Christ and life 4. That he that so far believeth the truth of the Gospel as to Consent to the Covenant of Grace even that God the Father be his Lord and Reconciled Father and Christ his savior and the Holy Ghost his sanctifier hath true saving faith and right to the blessing of the Covenant 5. That the day of Grace is so far commensurate or equal to our Life time that whosoever truly Repenteth and Consenteth to the Covenant of Grace before his death is certainly pardoned and in a state of life and that it is every mans duty so to do that pardon may be theirs 6. That Satans temptations are none of our sins but only our yielding to them 7. That the effects of natural sickness or diseasedness is not in it self a sin 8. That those are the smallest sins formally and least like to condemn us which we are most unwilling of and are least in Love or liking of 9. That no sin shall condemn us which we hate more than love and which we had rather leave and be delivered from than keep For this is true Repentance 10. That he is truly sanctified who had rather be perfect in Holiness of heart and life in Loving God and Living by Faith than to have the greatest pleasures riches or honours of the world taking in the Means also by which both are attained 11. That he who hath this Grace and desire may know that he is elect and the making of our Calling sure by our Consenting to the holy Covenant is the making of our Election sure 12. That the same thing which is a great duty to others may be no duty to one who by bodily distemper as Feavors Phrensies Melancholy is unable to perform it § 6. Direct 2. Take heed of worldly cares and sorrows and discontents Set not so much by earthly things as to enable them to disquiet you But learn to cast your cares on God You can have less peace in an affliction which cometh by such a carnal sinful means It s much more safe to be distracted with cares for Heaven than for Earth § 7. Direct 3. Meditation is no duty at all for a melancholy person except some few that are able to Direct 3. bear a diverting meditation which must be of something farthest from the matter which troubled them Or except it be short meditations like ejaculatory prayers A set and serious meditation will but confound you and disturb you and disable you to other duties If a man have a broken leg he must not go on it till it s knit lest all the body fare the worse It is your Thinking faculty or your Imagination which is the broken pained part and therefore you must not use it about the things that trouble you Perhaps you 'll say That this is to be prophane and forget God and your soul and let the tempter have his will But I answer No It is but to forbear that which you cannot do at present that by doing other things which you can do you may come again to do this which you now cannot do It is but to forbear attempting that which will but make you less able to do all other duties And at the present you may conduct the affairs of your soul by holy Reason I perswade you not from Repenting or Believing but from set and long and deep Meditations which will but hurt you § 8. Direct 4. Be not too long in any secret duty which you find you are not able to bear Prayer Direct 4. it self when you are unable must be performed but as you can Short confessions and requests to God must serve instead of longer secret prayers when you are unable to do more If sickness may excuse a man for being short where nature will not hold out the case is the same here in the sickness of the brain and spirits God hath appointed no means to do you hurt § 9. Direct 5. Where you find your selves unable for a secret duty struggle not too hard with your Direct 5. selves but go that pace that you are able to go quietly For as every striving doth not enable you but vex you and make duty wearisom to you and disable you more by increasing your disease Like an Ox that draweth unquietly and a Horse that chaseth himself that quickly tireth Preserve your willingness to duty and avoid that which makes it grievous to you As to a sick stomach it is not eating much but digesting well that tends to health and little must be eaten when much cannot be digested So it is here in case of your meditations and secret prayers § 10. Direct 6. Be most in those dutys which you are best able to bear which with most is Prayer Direct 6. with others hearing and good discourse As a sick man whose stomach is against other meats must eat of that which he can eat of And God hath provided variety of means that one may do the work when the other are wanting Do not misunderstand me In cases of absolute necessity I say again you must strive to do it whatever come of it If you are backward to believe to Repent to Love God and your neighbour to live soberly righteously and godly to pray at all here you must strive and not excuse it by any backwardness for it is that which must needs be done or you are lost But a man that cannot read may be saved without his reading and a man in prison or sickness may be saved without hearing the word and without the Church-communion of Saints And so a man disabled by melancholy may be saved by shorter thoughts and ejaculations without set and long meditations and secret prayers And other duties which he is able for will supply the want of these Even as nature hath provided two eyes and two ears and two nostrils and two reins and lungs that when one is stopt or faulty the other may supply its wants for a time So is it here § 11. Direct 7. Avoid all unnecessary solitariness and be as much as possible in honest chearful company Direct 7. You have need of others and are not sufficient for your selves And God will use and honour others as his hands to deliver us his blessings Solitariness is to those that are fit for it an excellent season for meditation and converse with God and with our hearts But to you it is the season of temptation and danger if Satan tempted Christ himself when he had him fasting and solitary in a wilderness much more will he take this as his opportunity against you Solitude is the season of musings and thoughtfulness which are the things which you must fly from if you will not be deprived of all § 12. Direct 8. When blasphemâ—us or disturbing thoughts look in or fruitless musings presently meet Direct 8. them and use that authority of Reason which is left you to cast them and command them out If you
them no harm while they can but keep themselves ignorant of it Which makes the opposed Truth have so few entertainers or Students among the Papists or any that persecute or reproach it And others discerning this extream do run into the contrary and under pretence of the loveliness of Truth and the need of liberty of judging do think the edifying way is first to pull down all that others have built before them and little regard the judgement of their predecessors but think they must take nothing on trust from others but begin all from the very ground themselves And usually their pride makes them so little regard the most approved Authors that they have not patience to read them till they throughly understand them but reject that which is received before they understand it meerly because it was the received way And while they say that nothing must be taken upon trust they presently take upon trust themselves that very opinion and with it the other opinions of those Novelists that teach them this And believing what such say in disgrace of others withal they believe what they hold in opposition to those that they have disgraced But it is easie to see how sad a case mankind were in if every man must be a fabricator of all his knowledge himself and posterity should be never the better for the discoveries of their ancestors and the greatest labours of the wisest men and their highest attainments must be no profit to any but themselves Why do they use a Teacher if they must do all themselves If they believe not their Tutors and take nothing on trust it seems they must know every Truth before they will learn it And what difference is there between believing a Tutor and an Author And is not that more credible which upon long experience is approved by many Nations and Ages than that which is recommended to you but by one or few These Students should have made themselves an Alphabet or Grammer and not have taken the common ones on trust It is easier to add to other mens inventions than to begin and carry on all our selves By their course of study the world would never grow wiser but every age and person be still beginning and none proceed beyond their rudiments § 33. Direct 16. Be sure you make choice of meet Teachers and companions for your studies and your Direct 16. lives That they be such as will assist you in the holy practice of what you know as well as in your knowledge And shun as a plague the familiarity 1. Of sensual idle brutish persons 2. And of carnal ambitious ones who know no higher end than preferment and applause 3. And of proud hereticall contentious wits whose wisdom and Religion is nothing but censuring reproaching and vilifying them that are wiser and better than themselves § 34. Bad company is the common ruine of youth Their own sensuality is easily stirred up by the temptations of the sensual and their consciences over-born by the examples of other mens voluptuous lives It emboldneth them to sin to see others sin before them as Cowards themselves are drawn on in an Army to run upon the face of death by seeing others do it and to avoid the reproach of cowardize And the noise of mirth and ranting language are the Drums and Trumpets of the Devils by which their ears are kept from hearing the cryes of wounded dying men the lamentations of those that have found the error of that way And there is in corrupted nature so strong an inclination to the prosperity and vain-glory of the world that makes them quickly take the bait especially when the Devil doth offer it them by a fit instrument which shall not deter them as it would do if he had offered it them himself It is a pleasant thing to flesh and blood to be rich and great and generally applauded and a grievous thing to be poor and despised and afflicted The rawness also and unsetledness of youth who want well furnished understandings and experience is a great advantage to Hereticks and deceivers who still sweep many such away whereever they come Sana consultatio est ex eruditia multarumque rerum peritia experientia Plato in Laâ—rt and have but opportunity Children are easily tost up and down and carried to and froâ— with every wind of doctrine by the cunning slight and subtility of them that lye in wait to deceive Ephes. 4. 14. Deceivers have their Methods and Methods are the common instruments of deceit which are not easily detected by the unexperienced On the contrary the benefit of wise and staid and sober and peaceable meek humble holy heavenly companions is exceeding great especially to youth Such will lead them in safe paths and be still preserving them and promoting the most necessary parts of knowledge and quickning them to holy practice which is the End of all § 35. Direct 17. In all your studies be jealous of both extreams and distinctly discern which are the Direct 17. extreams that you run not into one while you avoid the other And be specially careful that you imagine not co-ordinates or subordinates to be opposites and throw not away every truth which you Cum opiniones tam variae sint inter se dissidentes alterum â—ieri potest ut earum nulla alterum certe non potest ut plus una vera sit Cicero de Nat. Dâ—oâ— pag. 5. cannot presently place rightly in the frame and see it fall in agreeably with the rest For a further insight into true Method attained but by very few may reconcile you to that which now offendeth you What God hath joyned together be sure that you never put asunder though yet you cannot find their proper places § 36. There is scarce any error more common among Students than supposing those Truths to be inconsistent which indeed have a necessary dependance on each other and a casting truth away as error because they cannot reconcile it to some other truth And there is nothing so much causeth this as want of a true Method He that hath no Method considerable or after much curious labour hath fallen upon a false Method or a Method that in any one considerable point is out of joynt will deal thus by many certain truths As an ignorant person that is to set all the scattered parts of a Clock or Watch together if he misplace one will be unable rightly to place all the rest and then when he finds that they fit not the place which he thinks they must be in he casteth them away and thinks they are not the right and is searching for or making something else to fit that place False Method rejecteth many a truth § 37. And unless it be in Loving God or other acts of the superiour faculties about their ultimate end and highest object there is scarce any thing in morality but hath its extreams And where they are not discerned they are seldom well
is we must first know what Truth is and what is the What Truth is Use of Speech Truth is considerable 1. As it is in the things known and spoken of 2. As it is in the conception or knowledge of the mind 3. As it is in the expressions of the tongue 1. Truth Vid. Aquin. de Veritat in the things known is nothing but their Reality that indeed they are that which their names import or the mind apprehendeth them to be This is that which is called both Physical and Metaphysical Truth 2. Truth in the conception or knowledge of the mind is nothing else but the agreement or conformity of the knowledge to the thing known To conceive of it truly is to conceive of it as it is Mistake or error is contrary to this Truth 3. Truth as it is in the expressions is indeed a twofold relation 1. The primary relation is of our words or writings to the matter expressed And so Truth of speech is nothing but the agreeableness of our words to the things expressed when we speak of them as they are 2. The secondary relation of our words is to the mind of the Speaker For the natural use of the tongue is to express the mind as well as the matter And thus Truth of Speech is nothing but the agreeableness of our words to our thoughts or judgements Truth as it is the agreement of Thoughts or words to the matter may be called Logical Truth And this is but the common Matter of Moral or Ethical Truth which may be â—ound partly in a Clock or Watch or Weather-cock or a Seamans Chart. The agreement of our words to our minds is the more proper or special matter of Moral Truth The form of it as a Moral Virtue is its agreement to the Law of the God of Truth And as the Terminus entereth the definition of relations so our words have respect to the Mind of the hearer or reader as their proper Terminus their use being to acquaint him 1. With the matter expressed 2. With our minds concerning it Therefore it is necessary to the Logical Truth of speech that it have an aptitude rightly to inform the hearer and to the Ethical Truth that it be intended by the speaker really to inform him and not to deceive him Supposing that it is another that we speak to § 2. You see then that to a Moral Truth all these things are necessary 1. That it be an agreement of the words with the matter expressed as far as we are obliged to know the matter 2. That it be an agreement of the words with the speakers mind or judgement 3. That the expressions have an aptitude to inform the hearer of both the former truths 4. That we really intend them to inform him of the truth so far as we speak it 5. That it be agreeable to the Law of God which is the Rule of duty and discoverer of sin § 3. In some speeches the Truth of our words as agreeing to the Matter and to the Mind is all one viz. when our own conception or judgement of a thing is all that we assert As when we say I think or I believe or I judge that such a thing is so Here it is no whit necessary to the Truth of my words that the Thing be so as I think it to be For I affirm it not to be so but that indeed I think as I say I think But that our words and minds agree is alwayes and inseparably necessary to all Moral Truth § 4. We are not bound to make known all that is true for then no man must keep a secret How far we are bound to speak the truth much less to every man that asketh us Therefore we are not bound to endeavour the Cure of every mans ignorance or error in every matter For we are not bound to talk at all to every man And if I be not bound to make known the truth at all or my mind at all I am not bound to make known all the truth or all that is in my mind No not to all those to whom I am bound to make known part of both If I find a man in an ignorance or error which I am not bound to cure nay possibly it were my sin to cure it as to open the secrets of the Kings Counsels or Armies to his Enemies c. I may and must so fit my speech to that man even about those matters as not to make him know what he should not know either of the matter or of my mind I may either be silent or speak darkly or speak words which he understandeth not through his own imperfection or which I know his weakness will misunderstand But I must speak no falshood to him Also there is a great difference between speaking so as not to cure the ignorance or error of the hearer which I found him in and so speaking as to lead him into some new error I may do the former in many cases in which I may not do the latter And there is great difference between speaking such words as in the common use of men are apt to inform the hearers of the truth though I may know that through some weakness of their own they will misunderstand them and be deceived by them and the speaking of words which in common use of men have another signification than that which I use them to By the former way the hearer sometime is the deceiver of himself and not the speaker when the speaker is not bound to reveal any more to him But by the later way the speaker is the deceiver Also there is great difference to be made between my speaking to one to whom it is my duty to reveal the truth and my speaking to a man to whom I am not bound to reveal it yea from whom my duty to God and my King or Country bind me to conceal it By these grounds and distinctions you may know what a Lye is and may resolve the ordinary doubts that are used to be raised about our speaking truth or falshood As § 5. Quest. 1. Am I bound to speak the Truth to every one that asketh me Answ. You are not Quest. 1. bound to speak at all in every case to every one that asketh you And he that is silent speaketh not the truth § 6. Quest. 2. Am I bound to speak the Truth to every one that I answer to Answ. Your Answer Quest. 2. may sometimes be such as signifieth but a denying to answer or to reveal what is demanded of you § 7. Quest. 3. Am I bound to speak all the Truth when ever I speak part of it Answ. No It is Quest. 3. Gods Word that must tell you when and how much you must reveal to others And if you go as 〈…〉 â—6 63. Maâ— 1â— 61. 15. 5 Luke 23. 9. Jâ—â—n 19 9. â—â—r 8 26 27. far as God alloweth you it followeth not that
therefore you must go further A Souldier taken by the enemy may tell the truth when he is asked in things that will do no harm to his King and Country but he must conceal the rest which would advantage the enemy against them § 8. Quest. 4. Is it alwayes a sin to speak a Logical falshood that is to speak disagreeably to the thing which I speak of Answ. Not alwayes For you may sometimes believe an untruth without sin Quest. 4. For you are to believe things according to their evidence and appearance Therefore if the deceit be unavoidably caused by a false appearance or evidence without any fault of yours it is not then your fault to be mistaken But then your expressions must signifie no more certainty than you have nor no more confidence than the evidence will warrant When you say such a thing is so the meaning must be but I am perswaded it is so For if you say I am certain it is so when you are not certain you offend § 9. Quest. 5. Is it alwayes a sin to speak falsly or disagreeably to the matter when I know it to be Quest. 5. false that is Is it alwayes a sin to speak contrary to my judgement or mind Answ. Yes for God hath forbidden it and that upon great and weighty Reasons as you shall hear anon § 10. Quest. 6. Is it a sin when I speak not a known untruth nor contrary to my opinion nor with Quest. 6. a purpose to deceive Answ. Yes it is oft a sin when there is none of this For if it be your Duty to know what you say and to deliberate before you speak and your duty to be acquainted with the truth or falshood which you are ignorant of and your duty to take heed that you deceive not another negligently and yet you neglect all these duties and by a culpable ignorance and negligence deceive both your selves and others then this is a sin as well as if you knowingly deceived them § 11. Quest. 7. But though it be a sin it remaineth doubtful whether it be a lye Answ. This is Quest. 7. but liss de nomine a Controversie about the Name and not the Thing As long as we are agreed that is a sin against God and to be avoided whether you call it a Lye or by another name is no great matter But I think it is to be called a Lye Though I know that most definers follow Cicero and say that a Lye is A falshood spoken with a purpose to deceive yet I think that where the Will is culpably neglective of not deceiving an untruth so negligently uttered deserveth the name of a Lye § 12. Quest. 8. Must my words to free them from falshood be alwayes true in the proper literal Quest. 8. sense Answ. No Augustin's determination in this case is clear truth Quod figurate dicitur non est mendacium i. e. eo nomine To speak Ironically Metonymically Metaphorically c. is not therefore to lye For the truth of words lying in that aptitude to express the thing and mind which is suited to the intellect of the hearers they are True words that thus express them whether properly or figuratively But if the words be used figuratively contrary to the hearers and the common sense of them with a purpose to deceive then they are a lye not withstanding you pretend a Figure to verifie them § 13. Quest. 9. Must my words be used by me in the common sense or in the hearers sense Answ. No Quest. 9. doubt but so far as you intend to inform the hearer you are to speak to him in his own sense If he have a peculiar sense of some word differing from the common sense and this be known to you you must speak in his peculiar sense But if it be in a case that you are bound to conceal from him the question is much harder Some think it an untruth and sinful to speak to him in words which you know he will use to his own deceit Others think that you are not bound to fit your selves to his infirmity and speak in his dialect contrary to common sense And that it is not your fault that he misunderstandeth you though you foresee it where it will not profit him to understand you nor your selves are obliged to make him understand you but the contrary The next will open this § 14. Quest. 10. Is it lawful by speech to deceive another yea and to intend it Supposing it be by Quest. 10. truth Answ. It is not a sin in all cases to contribute towards another mans error or mistake For Acts 23. 6 7 8 9. Licitum est aliquando salva veritate illa verba proferre ex quibus probabiliter novimus auditores aliquid conclusuâ—os falsi Hoc enâ—m non est mentiri vel falsum testaâ—i sed tantum occasionem alteri praebere errandi non ad peccatum committendum sed potius vitandum Ames Cas. Conse l. 5. c. 53. See Luke 24. 28. John 7. 8 10. 1. There are many cases in which it is no sin in him to mistake nor any hurt to him Therefore to contribute to that which is neither sin or hurt is of it self no sin yea there are some cases in which an error though not as such may be a duty As to think charitably and well of an hypocrite as long as he seemeth to be sincere Here if by charitable reports I contribute to his mistake it seemeth to be but my duty For as he is bound to believe so I am bound to report the best while it is probable 2. There are many cases in which a mans ignorance or mistake may be his very great benefit His life or estate may lye upon it and I may know that if he understood such or such a thing he would make use of it to his ruine 3. There are many cases in which a mans innocent error is necessary to the safety of others or of the Commonwealth 4. It is lawful in such cases to deceive such men by Actions as an Enemy by Military Stratagems or a Traytor by signs which he will mistake And words of truth which we fore-know he will mistake not by our fault but by his own do seem to be less questionable than actions which have a proper tendency to deceive 5. God himself hath written and spoken those words which he fore-knew that wicked men would mistake and deceive themselves by and he hath done those works and giveth those mercies which he knoweth they will turn to a snare against themselves And his Dominion or Prerogative cannot here be pleaded to excuse it if it were unholy And in this sense as to Permitting and Occasioning it is said Ezek. 14. 9. And if the Prophet be deceived I the Lord have deceived that Prophet Yet must we not think with Plato that it is lawful to lye to an enemy to deceive him For 1. All deceit that is against
Laws for the preservation of so excellent a thing as Truth he should not secure the happiness of the world As to the securing of mens lives it is not enough to make a Law that you shall not kill men without just cause though that be all that the Law intendeth to attain for then every man being left to judge would think there were just cause whenever his passion or interest told him so But the Law is You shall not kill at all without the judgement of the Magistrate So if the Law against Lying did intend no more than the securing men from the injuries of errour and deceit yet would it not have been a sufficient means to have said only You shall not injure men by Lying for then men would have judged of the injury by their own interests and passions But much more is it needful to have a stricter Law when Truth it self is the thing that God intendeth to secure as well as the interest of men In the eyes of Christians and Heathens and all mankind that have not unmand themselves there appeareth a singular beauty and excellency in Truth Aristotle could say that the Nature of man is made for Truth Cicero could say that Qâ—â—d verum simplex sincerumque est id naturae bominis accommodatissimum est Verity and Virtue were ever taken as the inseparable perfections of man Pythagoras could say that to Love Truth and do Good were the two things that made man likest to God and therefore were his two most excellent gifts Plato could say that Truth was the best rhetorick and the sweetest oration Epictetus could say that Truth is a thing immortal eternal of all things most precious better than friendship as being less obnoxious to blind affections Iamblichus could say that as Light naturally and constantly accompanyeth the Sun so Truth accompanyeth God and all that follow him Epaminondas is praised for that he would not Lye no not in jeast Pomponius Atâ—icus was so great a hater of a lye that all his friends were desirous to Trust him with their â—â—â—â—y lye iâ— evil and to be avoided saâ—â—h Aristot. Eâ—hâ—c l 4 See Psal. 5. â— Prov. 6 17 19. 12. 22. 19. 5 9. 21 18 Rev. 21. 27. 22 15. Joh. 8. 44. Col. 3. 9. business and use him as their Counsellor He knoweth not what use mans understanding or his tongue were made for that knoweth not the excellency of Truth Let a Pilate only ask as a stranger what is Truth Joh. 18. 38. as Pharaoh asked who is the Lord For this end Christ himself came into the world to bear witness to the Truth and every one that is of the Truth will hear him Joh. 18. 37. He is the Truth Joh. 14. 6. and full of Grace and Truth Joh. 1. 14. Grace and Truth came by him Joh. 1. 17. His spirit is given to guide his servants into the Truth Joh. 16. 13. and to sanctifie them by the truth Joh. 17. 19. that knowing the truth it might make them free Joh. 8. 32. The fruit of the spirit is in all truth Ephes. 5. 9. His Ministers can do nothing against the truth but for the truth 2 Cor. 13. 8. Truth is the girdle that must gird our loins Ephes 6. 14. The Church is the pillar and ground of Truth 1 Tim. 3. 15. The faithful are they that believe and know the Truth 1 Tim. 4. 3. Speaking the truth in Love is the way of the Churches growth and edification Ephes. 4. 15. Repentance is given men to the acknowledging of the Truth that they may escape out of the power of the Devil 2 Tim. 2. 25 26. The dullards are they that are never able to come to the knowledge of the truth 2 Tim. 3. 7. They are men of perverse minds that resist the Truth 2 Tim. 3. 8. They that receive not the Truth in the Love of it cannot be saved 2 Thes. 2. 10. All they are damned that believe not the Truth 2 Thes. 2. 12 13. You see what Truth is in the judgement of God and all the sober world Therefore a Lye that is contrary to Truth as darkness to Light must be equally odious as truth is amiable No wonder therefore if it be absolutely forbidden of God § 21. 3. You may the easilyer perceive this by considering that other faults of the tongue as idle talk swâ—aring and such like are forbidden not only because they are a hurt to others but for the intrinsical evil in the thing it self Great reason therefore that it should be so in this § 22. 4. Lying is a vice which maketh us most unlike to God For he is called the God of truth Psal. 31. 5. Deut. 32. 4. All his ways are mercy and truth Psal. 25. 10. His judgement is according to truth Rom. 2. 2. It is impossible for God to lye Heb. 6. 18. Tit. 1. 2. His word is the word Numb 23. 19. 1 Sam. 15. 29. 1 Joh. 5. 10. of truth Psal. 119. 43. Col. 1. 5. 2 Tim. 2. 15. Jam. 1. 15. 2 Cor. 6. 7. And who shall dwell in his Tabernacle but thâ—se that speak the truth in their hearts Psal. 15. 2. The disconformity of the soul to God then being its greatest dâ—formity in things wherein it is made to be conform to him it may hence appear that Lying is an odious sin And this may the easilyer appear if you consider what a case the world were in if God could lye and were not of undoubted truth we should then be sure of nothing and therefore could have no sure information by his word no sure direction and guidance by his precepts and no sure consâ—lation in any of his promises Therefore that which maketh us so unlike to the true and holy God must needs be odious § 23. 5. Lying is the Image or work of the Devil and Lyars are his Children in a special sort For Christ telleth us that he abode not in the truth for there is no truth in him when he speaketh a lye he speaketh of his own for he is a lyar and the father of it Joh. 8. 44. The Proud the Malicious and 1 King 22. 22 23. I will be a lying spirit in the moâ—â—hâ— of all his Prophets 2 Chron 18. 21 22. the Lyars are in a special sort the Children of the Devil for these three are in Scripture in a special manner made the Devils sins Therefore sure there is an intrinsical evil and odiousness in a lye It was Satan that filled the hearts of Ananias and Saphira to Lye to the Holy Ghost Act. 5. 3. To change the Truth of God into a lye and to make God a lyar are therefore the most odious sins Rom. 1. 25. 1 Joh. 5. 10. because it is a feigning him to be like the Devil And should we make our selves like him then by the same vice If you love not the Devils sin and image love not a lye § 24. 6. Lying destroyeth humane converse and bringeth
most pernicious confusion into the affairs of mankind Iâ— Truth be excluded men cannot buy and sell and trade and live together It would It was one of the Roman Lawâ— â—aâ— 12. Qui â—aâ—sâ—m tâ—stâ—monium dâ—â—â—â—se convictus erit e saâ—o Taâ—pâ—iâ— dejiciatur be sufficient to destroy their rational converse if they had no tongues But much more to have false tongues Silence openeth not the mind at all Lying openeth it not when it pretendeth to open it and falsly representeth it to be what it is not And therefore though you say that your Lyes do no such hurt yet seeing this is the nature and tendency of Lying as such it is just and merciful in the Righteous God to banish all Lying by the strictest Laws As the whole nature of Serpents is so far at enmity with the nature of man that we hate and kill them though they never did hurt us because it is in their nature to hurt us so God hath justly and mercifully condemned all lying because it 's nature tendeth to the desolation and confusion of the World and if any indulgence were given to it all iniquity and injustice would presently like an inundation overwhelm us all § 25. 7. Lying tendeth directly to perjury it self It is the same God that forbiddeth them both And when once the heart is hardened in the one it is but a step further to the other Cicero could observe that He that is used to lye will easily be perjured A sâ—ared Conscience that tollerateth one will easily be brought to bear the other § 26. 8. There is a partiality in the Lyar that condemneth himself and the sin in another which in himself he justifieth For there is no man that would have another lye to him As Austin saith Hic autem homâ—nes fallunâ— falluntur Misericres suâ—t cum mentiendo fallunt quam cum mentientibus credendo falluntur Uâ—que adeo tamen rationalis natura refugit falsitatem quantum potest devitat errorem ut falli nolint etiam quicunque amant fallere August Enchyrid c. 17. I have known many that would deceive but never any that would be deceived If it be good why should not all others lye to thee If it be bad why wilt thou lye to others Is not thy tongue under the same Law as theirs Dost thou like it in thy Children and in thy Servants If not it should seem much worse to thee in thy self as thou art most concerned in thy own actions § 27. 9. Iudge what lying is by thy own desire and expectation to be believed Wouldst thou not have men believe thee whether thou speak truth or not I know thou wouldst For the Lyar loseth his end if he be known to lye and be not believed And is it a reasonable desire or expectation in thee to have men to believe a Lye If thou wouldst be believed speak that which is to be believed § 28. 10. Lying maketh thee to be always incredible and so to be useless or dangerous to others For he that will lye doth leave men uncertain whether ever he speak truth unless there be better Evidence of it than his credibility As Aristotle saith A Lyar gets this by Lying that no body will believe him when he speaks the truth How shall I know that he speaketh true to day who lyed yesterday unless open Repentance recover his credibility Truth will defend it self and credit him that owneth it at last But falshood is indefensible and will shame its Patrons Saith Petrarch excellently Petrarâ—h l 1. de vit solit As Truth is immortal so a fiction and lye endureth not long Dissembled matters are quickly opened as the hair that is combed and set with great diligence is ruffled with a little blast of wind and the paint that is laid on the face with a deal of labour is washed off with a little sweat the craftyest lye cannot stand before the truth but is transparent to him that neerly looketh into it every thing that is covered is soon uncovered shadows pass away and the native colour of things remaineth It is a great labour to keep hidden long No man can long live under water he must needs come forth and shew the face which he concealed At the farthest God in the day of judgement will lay open all § 29. Direct 2. If you would avoid lying take heed of guilt Unclean bodies need a cover Direct 2. and are most ashamed to be seen Faultiness causeth Lying and Lying increaseth the fault When Sâ—epe delinquentibus promptissimum est mentiri Ciâ—â—r men have done that which they are afraid or ashamed to make known they think there is a necessity of using their art to keep it secret But wit and craft is no good substitute for honesty such patches make the rent much worse But because the corrupted heart of man will be thus working and flying to deceitful shifts prevent the cause and occasion of your lying Commit not the fault that needs a lye Avoiding it is much better than hiding it if you were sure to keep it never so close As indeed you are not for commonly truth will come to light It is the best way in the World to avoid lying to be innocent and do nothing which doth fear the light Truth and honesty do not blush nor desire to be hid Children and Servants are much addicted to this crime when their folly or wantonness or appetites or slothfulness or carelesness hath made them faulty they presently study a lye to hide it with which is to go to the Devil to intreat him to defend or cover his own works But wise and obedient and careful and diligent and conscionable Children and Servants have need of no such miserable shifts § 30. Direct 3. Fear God more than man if you would not be Lyars The excessive fear of man Direct 3. is a common cause of Lying This maketh Children so apt to lye to escape the rod and most persons Iâ—â—e veâ—â—tatâ—â— Defeâ—â—or esse debeâ— quâ— cum râ—cteâ—â—â—â—ntâ— loquâ— non metuâ—t nec erubeâ—â—â—â—t Ambâ— â—yarâ— are â—aliant against God cowardâ— against men Montaâ—â—a â—sâ— that are obnoxious to much hurt from others are in danger of Lying to avoid their displeasure But why fear you not God more whose displeasure is unspeakably more terrible Your Parents or Master will be angry and threaten to correct you But God threatneth to damn you and his wrath is a consuming fire No mans displeasure can reach your souls and extend to eternity will you run into Hell to escape punishment on Earth Remember whenever you are tempted to escape any danger by a lye that you run into a thousand fold greater danger and that no hurt that you escape by it can possibly be half so great as the hurt it bringeth It 's as foolish a course as to cure the tooth-ach by cutting off the head § 31. Direct 4. Get down your Pride and overmuch regard
as all metaphors are equivocal and yet may be used 2. When the equivocal sense is the most usual or obvious and if it be not understood it is through the hearers fault or extraordinary dulness 3. When a Robber or usurping Tyrant or any cruel enemy that hath no authority to do it shall seek to ensnare my life by questions I may lawfully answer him in such doubtful words as purposely are intended to deceive him or leave him ignorant of my sense so be it they be not lies or false in the ordinary usage of those words 4. And to such a person I may answer doubtfully when it is apparent that it is a doubtful answer and that I do it as professing that I will answer him no more particularly nor plainly but will conceal the rest Quest. 6. Whether all mental reservation be unlawful Quest. 6. Answ. This needeth no other answer than the former If the expressed words be a Lie the mental Answ. reservation will not make them justifiable as a truth But if the expressed words of themselves be true then the mental reservation may be lawful when it is no more than a concealment of part of the truth in a case where we are not bound to reveal it But of both these cases I must refer the Reader to what I have said about Vows Tom. 3. Chap. 5. Tit. 2. without which he will not know my meaning Quest. 7. May Children Servants or Subjects in danger use words which tend to hide their faults Quest. 7. Answ. 1. When they are bound not to hide the fault they may not Which is 1. When due obedience Answ. or 2. the greater good which will follow require them to open it 2. When they are not bound to open it they may hide it by just means but not by Lies or any evil In what cases they may hide a fault by just means I shall here say no more to Quest. 8. May I speak that which I think is true but am not sure Quest. 8. Answ. If you have a just call you may say you think it is true but not flatly that it is so Answ. Quest. 9. May I believe and speak that of another by way of news discourse or character which I hear Quest. 9. reported by godly credible persons or by many Answ. 1. The main doubt is when you have a call to speak it which is answered after Tom. 4. at Answ. large 2. You may not so easily believe and report evil of another as good 3. You must not believe ill of another any further than evidence doth constrain you Yet you may believe it according to the degree of evidence or credibility and make use of the report for just caution or for good But not to defame another upon uncertainty or without a call 4. The sin of Receiving and spreading false reports of others upon hearsay is now so common among those that do profess Sobriety and Religion that all men should take heed of it in all company as they would do of the Plague in an infectious time And now it is so notorious that false news and slanders of others are so common neither good mens words nor common fame will allow you or excuse you to believe or report any evil of another till you are able to prove that it is your duty But all Christians should joyn in Lamenting and reproving this common uncharitable sin Tit. 4. Special Directions against Idle talk and Babling § 1. Direct 1. UNderstand well what is idle talk For many take that to be vain which is not Direct 1. and many take not that to be vain which is I shall therefore open this before I go any further § 2. The judgement of infidels and impious men here are of little regard 1. Some of them What is not idle talk think prayer to be but vain words because God knoweth our wants and hearts Iob. 22. 2 3. and our service is not profitable to him As if he had bid us seek him in vain Isa. 45. 19. These I have elsewhere Jâ—b 21 15. Mal. 3. â—4 confuted 2. Others think frequent preaching vain and say as the Infidels of Paul Act. 17. 18. What will this Babler say and as Pharaoh Exod. 5. 9. Let them not regard vain words But God saith Deut. 32. 46 47. Set your hearts to all the words which I testifie among you for it is not a vain thing for you because it is your life 3. Some carnal wretches think all vain in Gods service which is spiritual and which they understand not or which is above the reach of a fleshly mind 4. And some think all vain in Preaching Conference Writing or Prayer which is long But Christ spake Job 34 9 Heb. 13. â—5 no vain words when he prayed all night Luk. 6. 12. Nor are we bid pray in vain when we are bid pray continually instantly and importunately 1 Thes. 5. 17. Act. 6. 4. Luk. 18. 1 2. Nor did Paul speak idly when he preacht till midnight Act. 20. Godliness is not vain which is profitable to all things 1 Tim. 4. 8. Indeed as to their own salvation the wicked may make our preaching vain but the word of God returneth not empty The oblations of the disobedient are vain Isa. 1. 13. and the prayer of the wicked abominable to the Lord but the prayer of the upright is his delight Prov. 15. 8. 4. Some think all preaching vain of that which they know already whereas they have most need to hear of that lest they condemn themselves by sinning against their knowledge 2 Pet. 1. 12 13. Rom. 14. 22. 6. Some think it vain if the same things be often preached on or repeated see Phil. 3. 1. though yet they never received and obeyed them Or if the same words be oft repeated in prayer though it be not from emptiness or affectation but fervencie Mark 14. 39. Psalm 136. 119. 7. Unbelievers Isa. 49. 4â— 5. think our boasting in God is vain 2 King 18. 20. 8. And some malitious adversaries charge it on Ministers as Preaching in vain whenever the hearers are not converted See Heb. 4. 2. Gal. 5. 2. 3. 4. 4. 11. Isa. 53. 1. § 3. On the other side many that are godly mistake in thinking 1. That all talk is vain which is not of absolute necessity to some great use and end 2. And that all mirth and pleasant discourse 1 King 18 27. Prov. 29. 9. is vain Whereas the Holy Ghost saith Prov. 17. 22. A merry heart doth good like a medicine but a broken spirit dryeth the bones Prov. 15. 13. A merry heart maketh a cheerful countenance but by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken Gen. 26. 8. King Abimelech saw Isaack sporting with Rebekah his wife Laughing as the Hebrew is or playing as the Chaldee and Samaritan and Sept. or jeasting as the Syriack Arabick and Vulgar Latine § 4. Observe these
§ 10. Direct 10. Make Conscience of Teaching and provoking others Pity the souls of the ignorant Direct 10. about you God often blesseth the grace that is most improved in doing him service and our stock is like the Womans Oyle which increased as long as she poured out and was gone when she stopped 1 King 17. 12 14 16. Doing good is the best way for receiving good He that in pity to a poor man that is almost starved will but fall to rubbing him shall get himself heat and both be gainers Tit. 4. Directions to bring what we Hear into Practice WIthout this the rest is vain or Counterfeit and therefore somewhat must be said to this § 1. Direct 1. Be acquainted with the failings of your hearts and lives and come on purpose to get Direct 1. directions and help against thâ—se particular failings You will not know what Medicine you need much less how to use it if you know not what aileth you Know what duties you omit or carelesly perform and know what sins you are most guilty of and say when you go out of doors I go to Christ for Physick for my own disease I hope to hear something before I come back which may help me more against this sin and fit me better for my duty or provoke me more effectually Are those men like to practise Christs directions that either know not their disease or love it and would not have it cured § 2. Direct 2. The three forementioned are still presupposed viz. that the word have first done its Direct 2. part upon your understandings memory and Hearts For that word cannot be practised which is not understood nor at all remembred nor hath not procured Resolutions and Affections It is the due work upon the Heart that must prevail for the reformation of the Life § 3. Direct 3. When you understand what it is in point of Practice that the Preacher driveth at Direct 3. observe especially the Uses and the Moving reasons and plead them with your own hearts and let Conscience be Preaching over all that the Minister Preacheth to you You take them to be soul-murderers that silence able faithful Preachers and also those Preachers that silence themselves and feed not the flock committed to their care And do you think it a small matter to silence your own Conscience which must be the Preacher that must set home all before it can come to Resolution or Practice Keep Conscience all the while at work preaching over all that to your hearts which you hear with your ears and urge your selves to a speedy Resolution Remember that the whole body of Divinity is practical in its end and tendency and therefore be not a meer notional hearer but consider of every word you hear what Practice it is that it tendeth to and place that deepest in your memory If you forget all the words of the Reasons and Motives which you hear be sure to remember what Practice they were brought to urge you to As if you heard a Sermon against uncharitableness censoriousness or hurting others though you should forget all the Reasons and Motives in particular yet still remember that you were convinced in the hearing that censâ—rious and hurtful uncharitableness is a great sin and that you heard Reason enough to make you resolve against it And let Conscience Preach out the Sermon to the end and not let it dye in bare conviction but Resolve and be past wavering before you stir And above all the Sermon remember the Directions and Helps for Practice with which the truest method usually shuts up the Sermon § 4. Direct 4. When you come home let Conscience in secret also repeat the Sermon to you Between Direct 4. God and your selves consider what there was delivered to you in the Lords message that your souls were most concerned in what sin reproved which you are guilty of what duty pressed which you omit And there meditate seriously on the weight and Reasons of the thing and resist not the light but yet bring all to a fixed Resolution if till then you were unresolved Not ensnaring your selves with dangerous Vows about things doubtful or peremptory Vows without dependance on Christ for strength But firmly Resolving and cautelously engaging your selves to duty not with carnal evasions and reserves but with humble dependance upon grace without which of your selves you are able to do nothing § 5. Direct 5. Hear the most Practical Preachers you can well get Not those that have the finest Direct 5. Notions or the cleanest stile or neatest words but those that are still urging you to Holiness of Heart and life and driving home every truth to Practice not that false doctrine will at all bear up a holy life but true doctrine must not be left in the pâ—rch or at the doors but be brought home and used to its proper end and seated in the heart and placed as the poise upon the Clock where it may set all the wheels in motion § 6. Direct 6. Take heed especially of two sorts of false Teachers ANTINOMIAN LIBERTINES Direct 6. and AUTONOMIAN PHARISEES The first would build their sins on Christ not pleading for sin it self but taking down many of the chief helpes against it and disarming us of the weapons by which it should be destroyed and reproaching the true Preachers of obedience as Legalists that preach up works and call men to Doing when they Preach up Obedience to Christ their King upon the terms and by the Motives which are used by Christ himself and his Apostles Not understanding aright the true doctrine of Faith in Christ and Iustification and free grace which they think none else understand but they they pervert it and make it an enemy to the Kingly office of Christ and to sanctification and the necessary duties of obedience The other sort do make void the Commandments of God by their Traditions and instead of the holy Practice of the Laws of Christ they would drive the world with fire and sword to practise all their superstitious sopperies so that the few plain and necessary precepts of the Law of the Universal King is drowned in the greater body of their Canon Law and the Ceremonies of the Popes imposing are so many in comparison of the Institutions of Christ that the worship of God and work of Christianity is corrupted by it and made as another thing The wheat is lost in a heap of Chaff by them that will be Lawgivers to themselves and all the Church of Christ. § 7. Direct 7. Associate your selves with the most holy serious practical Christians Not with the Direct 7. ungodly nor with barren opinionists that talk of nothing but their Controversies and the way or interest of their sects which they call the Church nor with outside formal Ceremonious Pharisees that are pleading for the washing of Cups and tithing of Mint and the tradition of their Fathers while they hate and persecute
little more And to see a man fell his God and Soul and Heaven for fleshly pleasure when perhaps he hath not a year or a month or for ought he knoweth a day more to enjoy it For a man to be weary and give over prayer just when the mercy is at hand and to be weary and give over a holy life when his labour and sufferings are almost at an end How sad will this day be to thee if Death this night be sent to fetch away thy soul Then whose will all those pleasures be that thou â—oldst thy soul for Luk. 12. 19 20 21. If thou knewest that thou hadst but a month or year to live wouldst thou not have held out that one year Thou knowest not that it shall be one week This is like the sad story of a Student in one of our Universities who wanting money and his Father delaying to send it him he stayed so long till at last he resolved to stay no longer but steal for it rather than be without And so went out and robbed and murdered the first man he met who proved to be his Fathers messenger that was bringing him the money that he rob'd and killed him for which when he perceived by a letter which he found in his pocket he confest it through remorse of Conscience and was hang'd when a few hours patience more might have saved his innocency and his life And so is it with many a backsliding wretch that is cut off if not like Zimri and Cosbi in the act of their sin yet quickly after and enjoy the pleasure which they forsook their God for but a little while § 43. Direct 4. When you are awakened to see the terribleness of a relapsed state presently return Direct 4. and fly to Christ to reconcile your guilty souls to God and make a stop and go not one step further in your sin nor make no delayes in returning to your fidelity It is too sad a case to be continued in If thou darest delay yet longer and wilfully sin again thou art yet impenitent and thy heart is hardened and if the Lord have not mercy on thee to recall thee speedily thou arâ— lost for ever § 44. Direct 5. Make haste away from the occasions of thy sin and the company which ensnareth Direct 5. thee in it If thou knewest that they were Robbers that intended to murder thee thou wouldst be gone If thou knewest that they had plague sores running on them thou wouldst be gone And wilt thou not be gone when thou knowest that they are the servants of the Devil that would infect thee with sin and cheat thee of thy salvation Say not Is not this company lawful and that pleasure lawful c. If it be like to entise thy heart to sin it is unlawful to thee whatever it is to others It is not lawful to undoe thy soul. § 45. Direct 6. Come off by sound and deep repentance and shame thy self by free confession Direct 6. and mince not the matter and deal not gently with thy sin and be not tender of thy fleshly interest and Jam. 5. 16. Neh. 9. 2 3. Matth. 3. 6. Act. 19. 18. skin not over the sore but go to the bottom and deceive not thy self with a seeming cure Many a one is undone by repenting by the halves and refusing to take shame to themselves by a free confession and to engage themselves to a through reformation by an openly professed resolution Favouring themselves and sparing the flesh when the sore should be lanced and searched to the bottom doth cause many to perish while they supposed that they had been cured § 46. Direct 7. Command thy senses and at least forbear the outward acts of sin while thy Conscience Direct 7. considereth further of the matter The drunkard cannot say that he hath not power to shut his mouth Let the forbidden cup alone No one compelleth you You can forbear it if you will The same I may say of other such sins of sensuality Command thy hand thy mouth thy eye and guard these entrances and instruments of sin § 47. Direct 8. Engage some faithful friend to assist thee in thy watch Open all thy case to some Direct 8. one that is fit to be thy guide or helper And resolve that whenever thou art tempted to the sin thou wilt go presently and tell them before thou do commit it And intreat them to deal plainly with you and give them power to use any advantages that may be for your good § 48. Direct 9. Do your first works and set your selves seriously to all the duties of a holy life Direct 9. And incorporate your selves into the society of the Saints For holy employment and holy company are very great preservatives against every sin § 49. Direct 10. Go presently to your companions in sin and lament that you have joyned with them Direct 10. and earnestly warn and intreat them to repent and if they will not renounce their course and company and Mat. 26. 75. Luk. 22. 62. tell them what God hath shewed you of the sin and danger If really you will return as with Peter you have faln so with Peter go out and weep bitterly and when you are converted strengthen your brethren and help to recover those that you have sinned with Luk. 22. 32. § 50. I have suited most of these Directions to those that relapse into sins of sensuality rather than to them that fall into Atheism Infidelity or Heresie because I have spoken against these sins already and the Directions there given shew the way for the recovery of such Tit. 2. Directions for preventing Backsliding or for Perseverance APostacy and Backsliding is a state that is more easily prevented than cured And therefore I shall desire those that stand to use these following Directions lest they fall § 1. Direct 1. Be well grounded in the Nature and Reasons of your Religion For it is not the highest Direct 1. zeal and resolution that will cause you to persevere if your judgements be not furnished with sufficient Reasons to confute gainfayers and evidence the truth and tell you why you should persevere I speak that with grief and shame which cannot be concealed The number of Christians is so small that are well seen in the Reasons and Methods of Christianity and are able to prove what they hold to be true and to confute Opposers that it greatly afflicteth me to think what work the Atheists and Infidels would make if they once openly play their game and be turned loose to do their worst If they deride and oppose the immortality of the soul and the life to come and the truth of the Scriptures and the work of Redemption and office of Christ alas how few are able to withstand them by giving any sufficient Reason of their hope We have learnt of the Papists that he hath the strongest faith that believeth with least Reason and we have
he hath in the most dangerous disease which is not desperate For when it is certain that there is no hope without them if they do no good they do no harm So must we try the saving of a poor soul while there is life and any hope For if once death end their time and hopes it will be then too late and they will be out of our reach and help for ever To those that sickness findeth in so sad a case I shall give here but a few brief Directions because I have done it more at large in the first Tome and first Chapter whither I refer them § 5. Direct 1. Set speedily and seriously to the Iudging of your selves as those that are going to Direct 1. be judged of God And do it in the manner following 1. Do it willingly and resolvedly as knowing For Examination that it is now no time to remain uncertain of your everlasting state if you can possibly get acquainted with it Is it not time for a man to know himself whether he be a sanctifiâ—d believer or not when he is just going to appear before his maker and there be judged as he is found 2. Do it impartially as one that is not willing to find himself deceived as soon as death hath acquainted him with the truth O take heed as you love your souls of being foolishly tender of your selves and resolving for fear of being troubled at your misery to believe that you are safe whether it be true or false This is the way that thousands are undone by Thinking that you are sanctified will neither prove you so nor make you so no more than thinking that you are well will prove or make you well And what good will it do you to think you are pardoned and shall be saved for a few days longer and then to find too late in Hell that you were mistaken Is the ease of so short a deceit worth all the pain and loss that it will cost you Alas poor soul God knoweth it is not needlesly to affright thee that we desire to convince thee of thy misery We do not cruelly insult over thee or desire to torment thee But we pity thee in so sad a case To see an unsanctified person ready to pass into another world and to be doomed unto endless misery and will not know it till he is there Our principal reason of opening your danger is because it is necessary to your escaping it If soul diseases were like bodily diseases which may sometimes be cured without the patients knowing them and the danger of them we would never trouble you at such a time as this But it will not be so done You must understand your danger if you will be saved from it Therefore be impartial with your self if you are wise and be truly willing to know the worst 3. In Iudging your selves proceed by the same Rule or Law that God will judge you by that is by the word of God revealed in the Gospel For your work now is not to steal a little short-lived quiet to your Consciences but to know how God will judge your souls and whether he will doom you to endless joy or misery And how can you know this but by that Law or Rule that God will judge you by And certainly God will judge you by the same Law or Rule by which he Governed you or which he gave you to Live by in the world It will go never the better or worse there with any man for his good or bad conceits of himself if they were his mistakes But just what God hath said in his word that he will do with any man that will he do with him in the day of judgement All shall be justified whom the Gospel justifieth and all shall be condemned that it condemneth and therefore judge your self by it By what signes you may know an unsanctified man I have told you before Tom. 1. Chap. 1. Dir. 8. And by what signes true grace may be known I told you before in Preparation for the Sacrament 4. If you cannot satifie your self about your own condition advise with some Godly able Minister or other Christian that is best acquainted with you that knoweth how you have lived towards God and man or at least open all your heart and life to him that he may know it And if he tell you that he feareth you are yet unsanctified you have the more reason to fear the worst But then be sure that he be not a carnal ungodly worldly man himself For they that flatter and deceive themselves are not unlike to do so by others Such blind deceivers will dawb over all and bid you never trouble your self but even comfort you as they comfort themselves and bid you believe that all is well and it will be well or will make you believe that some forced confession and unsound Repentance will serve instead of true Conversion But a man that is going to the bar of God should be loth to be deceived by himself or others § 6. Direct 2. If by a due examination you find your self unsanctified bethink you seriously of your Direct 2. case both what you have done and what a condition you are in till you are truly humbled and willing of For Humiliation and Repentance any conditions that God shall offer you for your deliverance Consider how foolishly you have done how rebelliously how unthankfully to forsake your God and forget your souls and lose all your time and abuse all Gods mercies and leave undone the work that you were made and preserved and redeemed for Alas did you never know till now that you must dye and that you had all your time to make preparation for an endless life which followeth death Were you never warned by Minister or friend Were you never told of the necessity of a holy heavenly life and of a regenerate sanctified state till now O what could you have done more unwisely or wickedly than to cast away a life that eternal life so much depended on and to refuse your Saviour and his grace and mercies till your last extremity Is this the time to look after a new birth and to begin your life when you are at the end of it O what have you done to delay so great a work till now And now if you die before you are regenerate you are lost for ever O humble your souls before the Lord Lament your folly and presently condemn your selves before him and make out to Him for mercy while there is hope Direct 3. § 7. Direct 3. When you are humbled for your sin and misery and willing of mercy upon any terms For Faith in Christ. believe that yet your case is not Remediless but that Iesus Christ hath given himself to God a sacrifice for your sins and is so sure and allsufficient a Saviour that yet nothing can hinder you from pardon and salvation but your own impenitence and unbelief
Kingdom of God and his righteousness as esteeming it above all the Riches of the world Object Thou hast kept thy sins while thou wentest on in a profession of Religion Answ. I had no sin but what in the habitual ordinary temper of my soul I hated more than I loved it and had rather have been delivered from it than have kept it and none but what I unfeignedly repented of Object Thou didst not truly believe the promises of God and the life to come or else thou wouldst never have doubted as thou hast done nor sought such a Kingdom with such weak desires Answ. Though my faith was weak it overcame the world I so far believed the promise of another life as that I preferred it before this life and was resolved rather to forsake all the world than to part with my hopes of that promised blessedness And that faith is sincere how weak soever that can do this Object But thou hast done thy works to be seen of men and been troubled when men have not approved thee nor honoured thee and what was this but meer hypocrisie Answ. Though I had some hypocrisie yet was I not an hypocrite because it was not in a reigning and prevalent degree Though I too much regarded the esteem of men yet I did more regard the esteem of God Thus if a Christian discern his evidences the false reasonings of Satan are to be refuted § 21. 2. But ordinarily it is a readier way to take the second course which is At present to Believe and Repent and so confute Satan that saith you are not penitent believers But then you must truly John 1. 10 11 12. 3. 16. 19 20. Rom. 7. 21 22 23 24 25. Psal. 119 1 4 5. understand what Believing and Repenting is or else you may think that you do not Believe and Repent when you do Believing in Christ is a Believing that he is the Saviour of the world and a consent of will that he be your Saviour to justifie you by his blood and sanctifie you by his Spirit To Repent is to be so sorry that you have sinned that if it were to do again you would not do it as to gross sin and a state of sin and the smallest infirmities your will is so far set against that you desire to be delivered from them Believing to Justification is not the Believing that you are already justified and your sins forgiven you And Repenting consisteth not in such degrees of sorrow as some expect but in the change of the mind and will from a life of sensuality to a life of holiness When you know this then answer the Tempter thus If I should suffer thee to deprive me of the comfort of all my former uprightness yet shalt thou not so deprive me of the comfort of my present sincerity and of my hopes I am now too weak and distempered to try all that is past and gone Past actions are now known but by remembring them And they are seldome judged of as indeed they then were but according to the temper and apprehension of the mind when it revieweth them And I am now so changed and weakned my self that I cannot tell whether I truly remember the just temper and thoughts of my heart in all that 's past or not Nor doth it most concern me now to know what I have been but to know what I am Christ will not judge according to what I was but according to what he findeth me Never did he refuse a penitent believing soul because he repented and believed late I do now unfeignedly repent of all my sins and am heartily willing to be both pardoned and cleansed and sanctified by Christ and here I give up my self to him as my Saviour and to this Covenant I will stand And this is true Repenting and Believing Thus a poor Christian in the time of sickness may oft-times much easier clear it up to himself that he Repenteth now than that he Repented formerly And it is his surest way § 25. Tempt 2. And yet sometimes he cometh with the quite contrary Temptation and must be Tempt 2. resisted by the contrary way When he findeth a Christian so perplexed and weakned and distempered with sickness that his understanding is disabled from any composed thoughts then he asketh him Now where is thy Faith and Repentance If thou hast any or ever hadst any let it now appear In this case a Christian is to take up with the remembrance of his former sincerity and tell the Tempter I am sure that once I gave up my self unfeignedly to my Lord and those that come to him he will in no wise cast out And if now I be disabled from a composed exercise of grace he will not impute my sickness to me as my sin § 26. Tempt 3. Another ordinary Temptation is that Its now too late God will not now accept Tempt 3. repentance the day of grace is past and gone or at least a death-bed Repentance is not sincere To this the Tempted soul must reply 1. That if faith and repentance were not accepted at any time in this life then Gods promise were not true which saith that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life John 3. 16. So Luke 24. 47. Acts 5. 31. 11. 18. 20 21. 2 Tim. 2. 25. 2 Pet. 3. 9. There is a time in this life in which some resisters of the truth are given up to their own lusts to the love of sin and hatred of holiness so that they will not Repent But there was never a time in this life in which God refused to justifie a true repenting sinner upon his belief in Christ. 2. That if a death-bed Repentance do truly turn the heart from the world to God and from sin to holiness so that the penitent person if he should recover would lead a new and holy life then that Repentance hath as sure a promise of pardon and salvation as if it had been sooner And yet delay must be confessed to be dangerous to all and casteth men under very great difficulties and their loss is exceeding great though at last they repent and are forgiven § 27. Tempt 4. Sometime the Tempter saith Thou art not elected to salvation and God saveth Tempt 4. none but his Elect and so puzzleth the ignorant by setting them on doubting of their Election To this we must answer that every soul that is chosen to faith and Repentance and perseverance is certainly chosen to salvation And I know that God hath chosen me to Faith and Repentance because he hath given them me And I have reason enough to trust on him for that upholding grace which will cause me to persevere § 28. Tempt 5. But saith the Tempter Christ did not dye for thee and no one can be saved that Tempt 5. Christ did not dye for To this it must be answered That Christ dyed for all men so far as to be a sufficient
know by your own experience thâ—se Joyes or Torments which the wicked will not know by faith And O what a preparation doth such a change require II. You are next to know what persons they are and how they differ who must abide for ever in these different states As we are the Children of Adam we are all corrupted our minds are carnal and set upon this world and savour nothing but the things of the flesh And the further we go in sin the worse we are being strangers to the Life of faith and to the Love of God and the Life to come taking the prosperity and pleasure of the flesh for the felicity which we most desire and seek The name of this state in Scripture is Carnal and ungodly and unholy because such men live in a meer flâ—shly nature or disposition for fleshly ends in a fleshly manner and are not at all Devoted to God and carryed up to Heavenly Desires and Delights but live chiefly for this life and not for the life to come And though they may take up some kind of Religion in a second place and upon the by for fear of being damned when they can keep the world no longer yet is it this world which they principally value love and seek and their Religion is subject to their worldly and fleshly interest and delights And though God hath provided and offered them a Saviour to teach them better and reclaim and sanctifie them by his word and spirit and forgive them if they will believe in him and return yet do they sottishly neglect this mercy or obstinately refuse it and continue their worldly fleshly lives till time be past and mercy hath done and there is no remedy These are the men that God will condemn and this is the true description of them And it will not stand with the Governing-Justice and Holiness and truth of God to save them But on the other side all those that God will save do heartily believe in Iesus Christ who is sent of God to be the Saviour of souls and he maketh them know by his word and spirit their grievous sin and misery in their state of corrupted nature and he humbleth them for it and bringeth them to true Repentance and maketh them loath themselves for their iniquities and seeing how they have cast away and undone themselves and are no better than the slaves of Satan and the heirs of hell they joyfully accept of the remedy that is offered them in Christ They heartily take him for their Saviour and King and give up themselves in Covenant to him to be justified and sanctified by him whereupon he pardoneth all their sin and further enlighteneth and sanctifieth them by his spirit He sheweth them by faith the infinite Love of God and the sure everlasting Holy Ioyes which they may have in Heaven with him and how blessed a life they may there obtain through his purchase and gift with all the blessed Saints and Angels He maketh them deliberately to compare this offer of Eternal Happiness with all the pleasures and seeming commodities of sin and all that this deceitful world can do for them And having considered of both they see that there is no comparison to be made and are ashamed that ever they were so mad as to prefer Earth before Heaven and an inch of Time before Eternity and a dream of pleasure before the Everlasting Ioyes and to love the pleasures of a transitory world above the presence and favour and Glory of God! And for the time to come they are firmly Resolved what to do Even to take Heaven for their only Happiness and there to lay up their Hopes and Treasure and to live to God as they have done to the flesh and to make sure of their salvation whatever become of their worldly interest And thus the spirit doth dwell and work in them and renew their Hearts and give them a hatred to every sin and a Love to every holy thing even to the holy word and worship and wayes and servants of the Lord and in a word he maketh them New Creatures and though they have still their sinful imperfections yet the bent of their Hearts and Lives is Holy and Heavenly and they long to be perfect and are labouring after it and seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness and live above the world and flesh And shortly Christ will make them perfect and Iustifie them in the day of their judgement and give them the Glorious end of all their faith obedience and patience These are the persons and none but these among us that have the use of Reason that shall live with God III. Now this being the infallible truth of the Gospel and this being the true difference between the Righteous and the wicked the Iustified and Condemned souls O how neerly doth it now concern you to try which of these is your own condition Certainly it may be known For God will judge the world in righteousness by the same Law or Covenant by which he Governeth them Know but whom the Law of Christ condemneth or justifieth and you may soon know whom the Judge will condemn and justifie For he will proceed according to this Law If you should die in an unrenewed state in your sins your Hopes of Heaven would all die with you And if you should think never so well of your self till death and pretend never so confidently to trust on Christ and the Mercy of God one hour will convince Mat. 18. 3. Heb. 12. 14. Joh. 3. 3 5 6. you to your everlasting woe that Gods mercy and Christs merits did never bring to Heaven an unsanctified soul. Self flattery is good for nothing but to keep you from Repenting till time be past and to quiet you in Satans snares till there be no remedy Therefore presently as you love your soul examine your self and try which of these is the condition that you are in and accordingly judge you self before God judge you May you not know if you will whether you have most minded Earth or Heaven and which you have preferred and sought with the highest esteem and Resolution and whether your Worldly or Heavenly interest have born sway and which of them it is that gave place unto the other Cannot a man tell if he will what it is which his very soul hath practically taken for his chief concernment and what it is that haâ—â— had most of his Love and Care and what hath been next his heart and which he hath preferred wheâ—â—hey came to the parting and one was set against the other Cannot you tell whether you have lived principally to the flesh for the prosperity of this world and the pleasures of sin or whether the spirit of Christ by his word hath enlightned you and shewed you your â—in and misery and humbled you for it and shewed you the Glory of the life to come and the happiness of living in the Love of God and hereupon hath
is the inherent evidence 3. The miracles of the spirit is the concomitant attestation or evidence 4. And the sanctifying work of the spirit is the subsequent attestation renewed and accompanying it to the end of the World So that the Argument runs thus That doctrine which hath this witness of the Holy Ghost antecedently in such prophecies inherently bearing his image so unimitably accompanyed by so many certain uncontrouled miracles and followed and attended with such matchless success in the sanctification of the body of Christ is fully attested by God to be his own But such is the ☞ doctrine of the Gospel Therefore c. The Major you are not to take upon trust from your Teachers though your esteem of their judgement may the better dispose you to learn But you are to discern the evidences of truth which is apparent in it For he that denyeth this must by force of argument be driven to deny 1. Either that God is the Governour of the World or that he is the supream but say he is controuled by another 3. Or that he is Good and True and must affirm that he either Governeth the world by meer deceits and undiscernable lyes or that he hath given up the power to some one that so governeth it All which is but to affirm that there is no God which is supposed to be proved before § 25. 8. There now remaineth nothing to be taught you as to prove the truth of the Gospel 8. To know the matters of fact subservient to our â—aâ—â—â—â— but only those matters of fact which are contained and supposed in the Minor of the two last arguments And they are these particulars 1. That there were such persons as Christ and his Apostles and such a Gospel Preached by them 2. That such Miracles were done by them as are supposed ☞ 3. That both Doctrine and Miracles were committed to writing by them in the Scriptures for the Est enim mirabilâ—â— quâ—dam continuatio seriesque rerum ut alia ex alia nexa omnes inter se aptae colligataeque videantur Ciâ— dâ— Natur. deor pag. 6. certainer preserving them to the Churches use 4. That Churches were planted and souls converted and confirmed by them in the first ages many of whom did seal them with their blood 5. That there have been a succession of such Churches as have adhered to this Christ and Gospel 6. That this which we call the Bible is that very Book containing those sacred Writings fore-mentioned 7. That it hath been still copyed out and preserved without any such depravation or corruption as might frustrate its ends 8. That the Copies are such out of which we have them Translated and which we shew 9. That they are so truly translated as to have no such corruptions or mistakes as to frustrate their ends or make them unapt for the work they were appointed to 10. That these particular words are indeed here written which we read and these particular Doctrines containing the Essentials of Christianity together with the rest of the material objects of faith § 26. All these ten particulars are matters of fact that are meerly subservient to the constitutingprinciples of our faith but yet very needful to be known Now the question is How these must be known and received by us so as not to invalidate our faith And how far our Teachers must be here believed And first it is very useful to us to enquire How so many of these matters of fact as were then existent were known to the first Christians As How knew they in those dayes that there were such persons as Christ and his Apostles that they preached such Doctrines and spake such Languages and did such Works and that they wrote such Books and sent such Epistles to the Churches and that Churches were hereby converted and confirmed and Martyrs sealed this with their blood c. It s easie to tell how they were certain of all these Even by their own eyes and ears and sensible observation as we know that there are Englishmen live in England And those that were remoter from some of the matters of fact knew them by such report of those that did see them as those among us that never saw the King or Court or his Restoration do know that such a thing there was and such a person there is Thus they knew it then § 27. From whence I note 1. That in those dayes it was not necessary to the being of true faith that any supernatural testimony of the Spirit or any other sort of proof than their very senses and reason should acquaint them with those matters of fact which they were eye-witnesses of 2. That credible report or history was then the means for any one that saw not a matter of fact to know as much as they that saw it 3. That therefore this is now the way also of producing faith Some things we have yet sight and sense for as that such Bibles and such Churches are existent that such holy effects this Doctrine hath upon the soul which we see in others by the fruits and after feel in our selves The rest we must know by History Tradition or Report § 28. And in the reception of these historical passages note further 1. That humane belief is here a naturally necessary means to acquaint us with the matter of our Divine belief 2. That there are various By all this it is easie to gather whether a Pastor may do his work per alium Saith Grotius de Imâ— p. 290 291. Nam illud Quod quis per alium facit per se facere videtur ad eas duntaxat pertinet actiones quarum causa efficiens proxima à jure indefinita est Yet people should labour after such maturity and stedfastness that they may be able to stand if their Pastors be dead or taken from them by persecution yea or forsake the truth themselves Victor Uâ—iâ— saith of the people in Africk when their Pastors were banished and others might not be ordained in their steads Inter haec tamen Dei populus in fide consistens ut examina apum cereas aedificantia manâ—iones crescendo melleis fidei claviculis firmabatur Quanto magis affligebantur tanto magis multiplicabantur Victor p. 382. degrees of this belief and some need more of it by far than others according to the various degrees of their ignorance As he that cannot read himself must know by humane belief in great part that the Preacher readeth truly or that such words indeed are in the Gospel as he saith are there But a literate person may know this by his eye sight and not take it upon trust So he that understandeth not Hebrew and Greek must take it upon trust that the Scripture is truly translated But another that understandeth those Tongues may see it with his eyes 3. History being the proper means to know matters of fact that are done in times past and out of our
whether you find it or not for any good its like to do you Every Truth of God is appointed to be his Instrument to do some holy work upon your heart Let the Love of Holiness be it that maketh you search after Truth and then you may expect that God should be your teacher § 4. Direct 3. Seek after Truth without too great or too small regard to the judgement of others neither contemn them nor be captivated to them Use the help of the wise but give not up your Direct 3. Reason absolutely to any Engage not your selves in a Party so as to espouse their errors or Non tam autoritatis in disputando quam rationis momenta quaerenda sunt Cic. Nat. Deo p. 6. Obest plerumque iis qui discere volunt autoritas eorum qui se docere profitentur Desinunt enim suum judicium adhibere Id habent ratum quod ab eo quem probant judicatum vident Cic. de Nat. Deo p. 7. implicitely to believe whatever they say For this breedeth in you a secret desire to please your party and interesseth you in their dividing interest and maketh you betray the Truth to be accounted Orthodox by those you value § 5. Direct 4. Take heed of Pride which will make you dote upon your own conceits and cause Direct 4. you to slight the weightiest reasons that are brought by others for your conviction And if once you have espoused an error it will engage all your wit and zeal and diligence to maintain it It will make you uncharitable and furious against all that cross you in your way and so make you either Persecutors if you stand on the higher ground or Sect-leaders or Church-dividers and turbulent and censorious if you are on the lower ground There is very great reason in Pauls advice for the choice of a Bishop 1 Tim. 3. 6. Not a Novice lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the Devil It is no more wonder to see a Proud man erroneous and in the confidence of his own understanding to rage against all that tell him he is mistaken than to hear a drunken man boasting of his wit to the increase of his shame § 6. Direct 5. Take heed of slothfulness and impatience in searching after Truth and think not Direct 5. to find it in difficult cases without both hard and patient studies and ripeness of understanding to enable you therein And suspect all opinions which are the off-spring of idleness and ease what ever Divine illumination they may pretend except as you take them from others upon trust in a slothful way who attained them by diligent studies For God that hath called men to labour doth use to give his blessing to the laborious And he that hath said by his Spirit 1 Tim. 4. 15. Meditate upon these things give thy self wholly to them that thy profiting may appear to all doth accordingly cause those men to profit who seek it in this laborious way of his appointment And he that hath said The desire of the slothful killeth him doth not use to bless the slothful with his teachings He that Prov. 24. 30. Prov. 21. 25. Matth. 25. 26. will say to him in judgement Thou wicked and slothful servant will not encourage the slothfulness which he condemneth My Son if thou wilt receive my words and hide my commandments with thee so that thou incline thine ear to wisdom and apply thine heart to understanding Yea if thou cryest after knowledge and liftest up thy voice for understanding If thou seekest her as Silver and searchest for her as for hid treasures Then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God For the Lord giveth Wisdom Prov. 2. 1 2 3 4 5 6. Mark here to whom God giveth wisdom All the godly are taught of God But mark here how it is that he teacheth them Not while they scorn at Studies and Universities and look that their knowledge should cost them nothing or that the Spirit should be instead of serious studies or that their understandings should discern what 's true or false at the first appearance But while they think no pains or patience too great to learn the truth in the School of Christ. § 7. Direct 6. Keep out Passion from your Disputes and in the management of all your controversies Direct 6. in Religion For though Passion be useful both antecedently to the the Resolution of the Will and consequently Quae duae virtutes in Disputatore primae sunt eas ambas in Hubero deprehendi Patientiam adversarium prolixe sua explicantem audiendi lenitatem etiam aspere dicta perserendi inq Scultetus post disâ— Cuâ—â—ic p. 33. to the effectual execution of its Resolutions yet it is commonly a very great seducer of the understanding and strangely blindeth and perverteth judgement so that a Passionate man is seldome so far from the truth as when he is most confident he is defending it When Passion hath done boyling and the heart is cooled and leaveth the judgement to do its work without any clamour and disturbance its strange to see how things will appear to you to be quite of another tendency and reason than in your Passion you esteemed them § 8. Direct 7. Keep up a sense of the evil and danger of both extreams and be not so wholly intent Direct 7. upon the avoiding of one extream as to be fearless of the other The narrow minds of unexperienced men are hardly brought to look on both sides them and to be duly sensible of the danger of both extreams But while they are taken up only with the hating and opposing one sort of errors they forget those on the other side And usually the sin or error which we observe not is more dangerous to us than that which we do observe if the wind of temptation sit that way Direct 8. § 9. Direct 8. When you detect any antient error or corruption enquire into its original and see whether Reformation consist not rather in a restitution of the primitive state than in an extirpation of the whole Even in Popery it self there are many errors and ill customs which are but the corruption of some weighty truth and the degenerating of some duty of Gods appointment And to reduce all in such cases to the primitive verity is the way of wise and true reformation and not to throw away that which is Gods because it is fallen into the dirt of humane depravation But in cases where all is bad there all must be rejected § 10. Direct 9. Pretend not Truth and Orthodoxness against Christian Love and Peace and so follow Direct 9. Rom. 12. 13. 1 Cor. 13. Truth as that you lose not Love and Peace by it As much as in you lyeth live peaceably with all men Charity is the End of Truth And it is a mad use of Means to use them against the End
us for holding that the meer natural progeny of believers are saved as such did well understand our doctrine they would perceive that in this we differ not from the understanding sort among them or at least that their accusations run upon a mistake I told you before that there are three things distinctly to be considered in the title of Infants to baptism and salvation 1. By what right the Parent covenanteth for his child 2. What right the child hath to baptism 3. What right he hath to the benefits of the Covenant sealed and delivered in baptism To the first two things concur to the title of the Parent to Covenant in the name of his child One is his Natural Interest in him The child being his own is at his dispose The other is Gods gracious will and consent that it shall be so that the Parents Will shall be as the childs for his good till he come at age to have a Will of his own To the second The childs right to baptism is not meerly his Natural or his Birth relation from such Parents but it is in two degrees as followeth 1. He hath a Virtual Right on condition of his Parents faith the Reason is because that a believers consent and self-dedication to God déth Virtually contain in it a dedication with himself of all that is his And it is a contradiction to say that a a man truly dedicateth himself to God and not all that he hath and that he truly consenteth to the Covenant for himself and not for his child if he understand that God will accept it 2. His Actual title-condition is his Parents or Owners Actual Consent to enter him into Gods Covenant and his Actual mental dedication of his child to God which is his title before God and the Profession of it is his title before the Church So that it is not a meer Physical but a Moral title-condition which an Infant hath to baptism that is His Parents Consent to dedicate him to God 3. And to the third His title-condition to the Benefits of baptism hath two degrees 1. That he be really dedicated to God by the heart-consent of his Parent as aforesaid And 2. That his Parent express this by the solemn engaging him to God in baptism The first being necessary as a Means sine quo non and the second being necessary as a Duty without which he sinneth when its possible and as a Means coram Ecclesia to the priviledges of the Visible Church The sum of all is that our meer natural interest in our children is not their title-condition to baptism or to salvation but only that presupposed state which enableth us by Gods Consent to Covenant for them But their title-condition to baptism and salvation is our Covenanting for them or Voluntary dedicating them to God which we do 1. Virtually when we dedicate our selves and all that we have or shall have 2. Actually when our Hearts consent particularly for them and Actually devote them to God before Baptism 3. Sacramentally when we express this in our solemn baptismal covenanting and dedication Consider exactly of this again And if you loath distinguishing confess ingenuously that you loath the truth or the necessary means of knowing it Quest. 39. What is the true meaning of Sponsors Patrimi or God-fathers as we call them And is it lawful to make use of them Answ. I. TO the first question All men have not the same thoughts either of their Original or of their present use 1. Some think that they were Sponsors or Sureties for the Parents rather than the child at first And that when many in times of Persecution Heresie and Apostasie did baptize their children this month or year and the next month or year apostatize and deny Christ themselves that the Sponsors were only credible Christians witnessing that they believed that the Parents were credible firm believers and not like to apostatize 2. Others think that they were undertakers that if the Parents did apostatize or dye they would see to the Christian Education of the child themselves 3. Others think that they did both these together which is my opinion viz. That they witnessed the probability of the parents fidelity But promised that if they should either apostatize or dye they would see that the children were piously educated 4. Others think that they were absolute undertakers that the children should be piously educated whether the Parents dyed or apostatized or not So that they went joint-undertakers with the Parents in their life time 5. And I have lately met with some that maintain that the God-fathers and God-mothers become Proprietors and Adopt the child and take him for their own and that this is the sense of the Church of England But I believe them not for these reasons 1. There is no such word in the Liturgie Doctrine or Canons of the Church of England And that is not to be feigned and fathered on them which they never said 2. It would be against the Law of Nature to force all Parents to give the sole propriety or joynt-propriety in their children to others Nature hath given the propriety to themselves and we cannot rob them of it 3. It would be heinously injurious to the children of Noble and Learned persons if they must be forced to give them up to the propriety and education of others even of such as perhaps are lower and more unfit for it than themselves 4. It would be more heinously injurious to all God-fathers and God-mothers who must all make other mens children their own and therefore must use them as their own 5. It would keep most children unbaptized Because if it were once understood that they must take them as their own few would be Sponsors to the children of the poor for fear of keeping them and few but the Ignorant that know not what they do would be Sponsors for any because of the greatness of the charge and their aversness to adopt the children of others 6. It would make great confusion in the State while all men were bound to exchange children with another 7. I never knew one man or woman that was a God-father or God-mother on such terms nor that took the child to be their own And if such a one should be found among ten thousand that is no rule to discern the judgement of the Church by 8. And in Confirmation the God-father and God-mother is expresly said to be for this use to be Witnesses that the Party is Confirmed 9. And in the Priests speech to the Adult that come for baptism in the Office of baptism of those of riper years it is the persons themselves that are to promise and covenant for themselves and the God-fathers and God-mothers are only called these your Witnesses And if they be but Witnesses to the adult its like they are not Adopters of Infants II. Those that doubt of the Lawfulness of using Sponsors for their children do it on these two accounts 1. As supposing
faith and repentance of children as they grow up is from Gods fulfilling of his Baptismal Covenant with them The reason is because that God in that Covenant did give them a Right of Relation to the holy Spirit in Christ their Head as their Sanctifier to operate on them as they are capable But if they first prove Apostates and be after converted God is disobliged yea to hypocrites never was obliged as to the engagement made by him in baptism And doth now 1. Freely give them faith and repentance as a Benefactor to his elect and then 2. As a Covenanter give them pardon and adoption c. 13. So to the adult that truly made the Baptismal Covenant and never apostatized from it all the Grace that God giveth them through their lives is his fulfilling of his promise made to them and sealed by baptism and a fruit of their baptism But to Hypocrites and Apostates it is otherwise as is before explained Quest. 45. What is a proper Violation of our Baptismal Covenant Answ. NOte well that there is a wide difference between these questions 1. When doth a man John 3 16 17 18 36. miss of or lose his present part in the Covenant or Promise of God in the Gospel This is as long as he is Impenitent an Unbeliever and Refuser 2. When doth a man totally lose his part John 1 11 12 13 and hope in that Promise or Covenant of God so as to be â—yable to all the penalty of it That is only by final Impenitence Unbelief and refusal when Life is ended 3. And when doth a man violate his own Covenant or promise made to God in baptism Which is our present question To which I answer 1. This Promise hath parts Essential and parts Integral We promise not both these parts alike nor on the same terms Though both be promised The essential parts are our essential duties of Christianity Faith Love Repentance in the essential parts c. The Integrals are the Integral 2 Pet. 2 20 21 22 23. duties of Christianity Heb. 6 2 4 5 6 â— 8. 2. He that performeth not the essential duties is an Apostate or Hypocrite 3. He that performeth not the Integral duties is a sinner not only against the Law of Nature and Heb. 10 26 27 28. Christs Precepts but his own Promise And in this sense we all confess our breach of Covenant with Christ But he is no Apostate Hypocrite or out of Covenant 1 Joh. 1 9 10. James 3. 2 3. Quest. 46. May not Baptism in some Cases be repeated And when Answ. 1. YOu must distinguish between Baptism taken Morally or only Physically 2. Between Baptism Morally as it is a Church or Visible Covenant and as a Heart Covenant 3. Between Real baptism and seeming baptism which is a Nullity 4. Between certain reception of baptism and that which is uncertain or justly doubted of And so I answer 1. Real and Certain Baptism as a visible Church-Ordinance may not be repeated Though the Heart-Covenant was wanting And though it wanted not only decent modes but integral parts 2. But in these cases Baptism may be used where it seemed to have been received before 1. When the person made no profession of the Christian faith nor his Parents for him if an Infant 2. If that profession notoriously wanted an Essential part As if he only professed to believe in God the Father and not in the Son or the Holy Ghost 3. If the Minister only baptized him into the name of the Father or Son or left out any essential part 4. If the person or Minister only contracted for a distant futurity As I will be a Christian when I am old c. and not for the present which is not to be christened but only to promise to be christened hereafter 5. If all application of water or any watery element was omitted which is the external sign 6. Of the Baptizers power I shall speak anon 7. If the Church or the person himself have just cause of doubting whether he was truly baptized or not to do it again with hypothetical expressions If thou art not baptized I baptize thee yea or simply while that is understood is lawful and fit And it is not to be twice baptized Morally but only Physically As I have fully opened in the Question of Re-ordination to which I must refer the Reader 3. And I confess I make little doubt but that those in Acts 19. were Re-baptized notwithstanding the witty evasion invented by Phil. Marnixius Aldegondus and Beza's improvement of it and the now common reception of that interpretation For 1. A new and forced exposition which no Reader Of Acts 19 1 2 3 4 5. dreameth of till it be put into his head is usually to be suspected lest art deceive us Whether it were re-baptizing 2. The omission of the Holy Ghost is an essential defect and maketh Baptism specifically another thing And he were now to be re-baptized who should be so baptized 3. Whatever some say in heat against the Papists Iohns baptism and our Christian baptism are so specifically distinct also that he that had now but Iohns were to be yet baptized The person of the Mâ—ssiah himself being not determinately put into Iohns baptism as such Nor can it be supposed that all the Jews that Iohn baptized were baptized into the profession of faith in this numerical person Iesus but only to an unknown Saviour undetermined However he pointed to Christ in the hearing of some of his disciples We must not run from plain truth in pievishness of opposition to Papists oâ— any other men 4. The fifth Verse would not be true of Iohns baptism as the History sheweth that When Johns hearers heard this they were baptized into the Name of the Lord Iesus This is contrary to the Text that recordeth it 5. In the fourth Verse the words that is on Christ Iesus are plainly Pauls expository words of Iohns and â—ot Iohns words Iohn baptized them into the Name of the Messiah that should come after him which indeed saith Paul was Christ Iesus though not then personally determined by Iohn 6. The connexion of the fourth fifth and sixth Verses puts all out of doubt 1. In the fourth Verse the last words are Pauls that is on Christ Iesus 2 In the next words Ver. 4. When they heard this they were baptized c. must refer to the last words or to his that was speaking to them 3. Ver. 6. The Pronoun Them when Paul had laid his hands on them plainly reâ—â—erreth to them last spoken of Ver. 5. which therefore was not Iohns hearers as such 4. And the â—ords they were baptized into the name of the Lord Iesus are plainly distinctive from Iohns baptism Saith Grotius Sic accepere Latinus Syrus Arabs Veteres omnes ante Marnixium â—ut verba Lâ—ucae Yet I say not so hardly of Iohns baptism as Tertuliâ—â— on this Text de Baptis Adeo pasâ—â—â—â—a in
than to have no publick helps and Worship Quest. 150. Is it lawful to read the Apocrypha or any good Books besides the Scriptures to the Church as Homilies c. Answ. 1. IT is not lawful to Read them as Gods Word or to pretend them to be the Holy Scriptures for that is a falshood and an addition to Gods Word 2. It is not lawful to read them scandalously in a title and manner tending to draw the people to believe that they are Gods Word or without a sufficient distinguishing of them from the holy Scriptures 3. If any one of the Apocryphal books as Iudith Tobit Bell and the Dragon c. be as fabulous false and bad as our Protestant Writers Reignoldus Amesius Whitakers Chamier and abundance more affirm them to be it is not lawful ordinarily to Read them in that honourable way as Chapters called Lessons are usually read in the assemblies Nor is it lawful so to Read heretical fabulous or erroneous books But it is lawful to Read publickly Apocryphal and humane Writings Homilies or edifying Sermons on these conditions following 1. So be it they be indeed sound doctrine holy and fitted to the peoples edification 2. So be it they be not read scandalously without sufficient differencing them from Gods Book 3. So they be not Read to exclude or hinder the Reading of the Scriptures or any other necessary Church-duty 4. So they be not Read to keep up an ignorant lazy Ministry that can or will do no better nor to exercise the Ministers sloth and hinder him from preaching 5. And specially if Authority command it and the Churches Agreement require it as a signification what doctrine it is which they profess 6. Or if the Churches Necessities require it As if they have no Minister or no one that can do so much to their Edification any other way 7. Therefore the use of Catechisms is confessed lawful in the Church by almost all Quest. 151. May Church Assemblies be held where there is no Minister Or what publick Worship may be so performed by Lay-men As among Infidels or Papists where Persecution hath killed imprisoned or expelled the Ministers Answ. 1. SUch an Assembly as hath no Pastor or Minister of Christ is not a Church in a political sense as the word signifieth a Society consisting of Pastor and flock But it may be a Church in a larger sense as the word signifieth only a Community or Association of private Christians for mutual help in holy things 2. Such an Assembly ought on the Lords dayes and at other fit times to meet together for mutual help and the publick worshipping of God as they may rather than not to meet at all 3. In those meetings they may do all that followeth 1. They may pray together a Lay-man being ☞ the Speaker 2. They may sing Psalms 3. They may Read the Scriptures 4. They may read some holy edifying Writings of Divines or repeat some Ministers Sermons 4. Some that are ablest may speak to the instruction and exhortation of the rest as a Master may do in his family or neighbours to stir up Gods graces in each other as was opened before 5. And some such may Catechize the younger and more ignorant 6. They may by mutual Conference open their cases to each other and communicate what knowledge or experience they have to the praise of God and each others edification 7. They may make a solemn profession of their Faith Covenant and Subjection to God the Father Son and Holy Ghost And all this is better than nothing at all But 1. None of them may do any of this as a Pastor Ruler Priest or Office-Teacher of the Church 2. Nor may they Baptize 3. Nor administer the Lords Supper 4. Nor excommunicate by sentence but only executively agree to avoid the notoriously impenitent 5. Nor Absolve Ministerially or as by authority nor exercise any of the power of the Keyes that is of Government 6. And they must do their best to get a Pastor as soon as they are able Quest. 152. Is it lawful to subscribe or profess full Assent and Consent to any Religious Books besides the Scripture seeing all are fallible Answ. 1. IT is not lawful to profess or subscribe that any Book is truer or better than it is or that there is no fault in any that is faulty or to profess that we believe any mortal man to be totally Infallible in all that he shall write or say or impeccable in all that he shall do 2. Because all men are fallible and so are we in judging it is not lawful to say of any large and dubious Books in which we know no fault that there is no fault or error in them we being uncertain and it being usual for the best men even in their best writings prayers or works to be faulty as the consequent or effect of our common culpable imperfection But we may say That we know no fault or error in it if indeed we do not know of any 3. It is lawful to profess or subscribe our Assent and Consent to any humane Writing which we judge to be True and Good according to the measure of its Truth and Goodness As if Church-Confessions that are found be offered us for our Consent we may say or subscribe I hold all the Doctrine in this Book to be true and good And by so doing I do not assert the Infallibility of the Authors but only the Verity of the Writing I do not say that He cannot err or that he never erreth but that he erreth not in this as far as I am able to discern Quest. 153. May we lawfully swear Obedience in all things Lawful and honest either to Usurpers or to our lawful Pastors Answ. 1. IF the question were of Imposing such Oaths I would say that it was many a hundred years before the Churches of Christ either under persecution or in their prosperity and glory did ever know of any such practice as the people or the Presbyters swearing obedience to the Bishops And when it came up the Magistracy Princes and Emperours fell under the feet of the Pope and the Clergy grew to what we see it in the Roman Kingdom called a Church And far should I be from desiring such Oaths to be imposed 2. But the question being only of the Taking such Oaths and not the Imposing of them I say that 1. It is not lawful to swear obedience to an Usurper Civil or Ecclesiastical in licitis honestis Because it is a subjecting our selves to him and an acknowledging that authority which he hath not For we can swear no further to obey the King himself but in things lawful and honest And to do so by an Usurper is an injury to the King and unto Christ. 2. But if the King himself shall command us to swear obedience to a subordinate Civil Usurper he thereby ceaseth to be an Usurper and receiveth authority and it becometh our duty And if he that
â—3 Rom. 8. 9. 1 John 3. 24. John 3. 5 6. Many Romish Priests and others do so without the Ministry of man to preserve deliver translate expound and preach it to the people 5. And those that think it sufficient to sanctifie men without the concourse of the Spirits illumination vivification and inward operation to that end 6. And they that say that no man can be saved by the knowledge belief love and practice of all the substantial parts of Christianity brought to him by Tradition Parents or Preachers who tell him nothing of the Scriptures but deliver him the Doctrines as attested by Miracles and the Spirit without any notice of the Book 7. And those that say that Scripture alone must be made use of as to all the History of Scripture Times and that it is unlawful to make use of any other Historians as Iosephus and such others 8. And they that say no other Books of Divinity but Scripture are useful yea or lawful to be read of Christians or at least in the Church 9. And they that say that the Scriptures are so Divine not only in Matter but in Method and Style as that there is nothing of humane inculpable imperfection or weakness in them 10. And those that say that the Logical Method and the phrase is as perfect as God was able to make them 11. And they that say that all passages in Scripture historically related are Moral Truths And so make the Devils words to Eve of Iob to Christ c. to be all true 12. And they that say that all passages in the Scripture were equally obligatory to all other places and ages as to those that first received them As the kiss of peace the Vails of women washing feet anointing the sick Deaconesses c. 13. And they that make Scripture so perfect a Rule to our belief that nothing is to be taken for certain that cometh to us any other way As natural knowledge or historical 14. And those that think men may not translate the Scripture turn the Psalms into Metre tune them divide the Scripture into Chapters and Verses c. as being derogatory alterations of the perfect Word 15. And those that think it so perfect a particular rule of all the Circumstances Mâ—des Adjuncts and external expressions of and in Gods Worship as that no such may be invented or added by man 1 Cor. 14. 33 40. 26. that is not there prescribed As Time Place Vesture Gesture Utensils Methods Words and many other things mentioned before 16. And those that Jewishly feign a multitude of unproved mysteries to lye in the Letters Orders Numbers and proper Names in Scriptures though I deny not that there is much mysterie which we little observe 17. They that say that the Scripture is all so plain that there is no obscure or difficult passages in them which men are in danger of wresting to their own destruction 18. And they that say that All in the Scripture is so necessary to salvation even the darkest Prophecies Heb. 5. 10 11 12. that they cannot be saved that understand them not all or at least endeavour not studiously and particularly to understand them 19. And they that say that every Book and Text must of necessity to salvation be believed to be Canonical and true 20. And those that say that God hath so preserved the Scripture as that there are no various readings Of which see Lud. Capellus Crit. Saâ—â— and doubtful Texts thereupon and that no written or printed Copies have been corrupted when Dr. Heylin tells us that the Kings Printer printed the seventh Commandment Thou shalt commit adultery All these err in over-doing III. The dangers of the former detracting from the Scripture are these 1. It injureth the Spirit who is the author of the Scriptures 2 It striketh at the foundation of our faith by weakning the Records which are left us to believe And emboldneth men to sin by diminishing the authority of Gods Law And weakneth our Hopes by weakning the promises 3. It shaketh the universal Government of Christ by shaking the anthority or perfection of the Laws by which he governeth 4. It maketh way for humane Usurpations and Traditions as supplements to the holy Scriptures And leaveth men to contrive to amend Gods Word and Worship and make Co-ordinate Laws and Doctrines of their own 5. It hindereth the Conviction and Conversion of sinners and hardneth them in unbelief by questioning or weakning the means that should convince and turn them 6. It is a tempting men to the Cursed adding to Gods Word IV. The dangers of over-doing here are these 1. It leadeth to downright Infidelity For when men find that the Scripture is imperfect or wanting in that which they fansie to be part of its perfection and to be really insufficient e. g. to teach men Physicks Logick Medicine Languages c. they will be apt to say It is not of God because it hath not that which it pretends to have 2. God is made the Author of defects and imperfections 3. The Scripture is exposed to the scorn and confutation of Infidels 4. Papists are assisted in proving its imperfection But I must stop having spoke to this point before in Quest. 35. and partly Quest. 30. 31. 33. more at large Quest. 167. How far do good men now Preach and Pray by the Spirit Answ. 1. NOt by such Inspiration of new matter from God as the Prophets and Apostles had which indited the Scriptures 2. Not so as to exclude the exercise of Reason Memory or Diligence which must be as much and more than about any common things 3. Not so as to exclude the use and need of Scripture Ministry Sermons Books Conference Examples Use or other means and helps But 1. The Spirit indited that Doctrine and Scripture which is our Rule for prayer and for preaching 2. The Spirits Miracles and works in and by the Apostles seal that doctrine to us and confirm Heb. 2. 3 4. 1 Peâ— 1. 2 22. 2 Thess. 1. 13. John 3. 5 6. Rom. 8. 9. Rom. 8. 15 16 26 27. 2 Tim. 1. 7. Nehem. 9. 20. Isa. 11 â— Ezek. 36. 26. 37. 14. Gal. 4. 6. Zech. 12. 10. Ezek. 18. 31. 11. 19. Rom. 7. 6. John 4. 23 24. 7. 38 39. 1 Cor. 2 10 11. 1 Cor. 6. 11 17. 2 Cor. 4. 13. Gal. 5. 5 16 17 18 25. Ephes. 3. 16. 5. 9 18. 6. 18. 1 Thess. 5. 19. our faith in it 3. The Spirit in our faithful Pastors and Teachers teacheth us by them to pray and preach 4. The Spirit by Illumination Quickning and Sanctification giveth us an habitual acquaintance with our sins our wants with the word of precept and promise with God with Christ with Grace with Heaven And it giveth us a Habit of holy Love to God and Goodness and Thankfulness for mercy and faith in Christ and the life to come and desires of perfection and hatred of sin And he
Direct 2. exercise of your function but the promoting of Iustice for the righting of the just and the publick It was an ill time when Petr. Bles. said Officium officialium est bodie jura confundere lites suscitare transactiones rescindere dilationes innectere supprimere â—eâ—iâ—atem fovere mendacium quaestum sequi aequitatem vendere inhiare actionibus versutiâ—â— concinnare gâ—od and therein the pleasing of the most righteous God For your work can be to you no better than your End A baâ—e end doth debase your work I deny not but your competent gain and maintenance may be your lower end but the promoting of justice must be your higher end and sought before it The question is not Whether you seek to live by your Calling for so may the best nor yet Whether you intend the promoting of Iustice for so may the worst in some degree But the question is Which of these you prefer and which you first and principally intend He that looketh chiefly at his worldly gain must take that gain instead of Gods reward and look for no more than he chiefly intended For that is formally no Good work which is not intended chiefly to please God And God doth not Reward the servants of the world Nor can any man rationally imagine that he should reward a man with happiness hereafter for seeking after Riches here And if you say that you look for no Reward but Riches you must look for a Punishment worse than Poverty For the neglecting of God and your Ultimate End is a sin that deserveth the privation of all which you neglect and leaveth not your actions in a state of innocent indifferency § 5. Direct 3. Be not Counsellâ—rs or Advocates against God that is against Iustice Truth or Innocency A bâ—d cause would have no Patrons if there were no bad or ignorant Lawyers It s a dear bought fee which is got by sinning especially by such a wilful aggravated sin as the deliberate Direct 3. pleading for iniquity or opposing of the Truth Iudas his gain and Aohitophels counsel will be too hot at last for conscience and sooner drive them to hang themselves in the review than afford them any true content As St. Iames saith to them that he calleth to weep and howl Bias fâ—râ—ur in câ—â—sis orandâ—s summus aâ—que vehemenâ—â—ssimu◠〈◊〉 bonam tamen in parâ—em â—â—câ—ndi vâ—â— exerâ—â—â— solâ—tum Laâ—tius â— 53. â—uâ—um est hâ—mines propter justitiam diligâ—râ— non autem justitiam propter homines postpâ—nere Gregor Reg. Justitia non novit patrem vel matrem Veritatem novit personam non novit Deum imitatur Cassian Plutarch saith that Callicratidas being offered a great summ of money of which he had great need to pay his Seamen if he would do an unjust act refused To whom saith Cleander his Counsellor Ego prosecto hoc accepissem si fuissem Callicratidas He answered Ego accepissem si fuissem Cleander for their approaching misery Your Riches are corrupted and your garments moth-eaten your Gold and Silver is cankered and the rust of them shall be a witness against you and shall eat your flesh as it were fire ye have heaped treasure together for the last dayes What ever you say or do against truth and innocency and justice you do it against God himself And is it not a sad case that among profâ—ssed Christians there is no cause so bad but can find an Advocate for a fee I speak not against just counsel to a man that hath a bad cause to tell him it is bad and perswade him to disown it Nor I speak not against you for pleading against excessive penalties or damages For so far your cause is good though the main cause of your Client was bad But he that speaketh or counselleth another for the defence of sin or the wronging of the innocent or the defrauding another of his right and will open his mouth to the injury of the just for a little money or for a friend must try whether that money or friend will save him from the vengeance of the Universal Judge unless faith and true repentance which will cause Confession and Restitution do prevent it The Romans called them Thieves that by fraud or plea or judgement got unlawful gain and deprived others of their right Lampridius saith of Alexander Severus Tanti eum stomachi fuisse in eos judices qui furtorum fama laborassent etiamsi damnati non essent ut si eos casu aliquo videret commotione animi stomachi choleram evomeret toto vultu inardescente ita ut nihil posset loqui And afterwards Severissimus judex contra fures appellans eosdem quotidianorum scelerum reos solos hostes inimiâ—osque reipublicae Adding this instance Eum notarium qui falsum causae brevem in confilio imperatorio retulisset incisis digitorum nervis ita ut nunquam posset scribere deportavit And that he caused Turinus one of his Courtiers to be tyed in the Market-place to a stake and choaked to death with smoak for taking mens money on pretence of furthering their suits with the Emperour Praecone dicente Fumo punitur qui vendidit fumum He strictly prohibited buying of Offices saying Necesse est ut qui emit vendat Ego vero non patiar mercatores potestatum quos si patiar damnare non possum The frowns or favour of man or the love of money will prove at last a poor defence against his Justice whom by injustice you offend Facile est justitiam homini justissimo defendere Cicâ—ro The Poet could say Iustum tenacem propositi virum Non civium ardor prava jubentium Non vâ—ltus instantis tyranni Mente quatit solida Horat. But if men would first be just it would not be so hard to bring them to do justly Saith Plautus Iusta autem ab injustiâ— petere insipientia est Quippe illi iniqui jus ignorant neque tenent § 6. Direct 4. Make the cause of the innocent as it were your own and suffer it not to miscarry Direct 4. through your slothfulness and neglect He is a lover of money more than justice that will sweat in the cause of the Riâ—h that pay him well and will slubber over and starve the cause of the poor because he getteth little by them What ever your place obligeth you to do let it Vix potest negligere qui novit aequitatem nec facile erroris viâ—io sordescit quem doctrina purgaverit Cassiodor be done diligently and with your might both in your getting abilities and in using them Scaevola was wont to say ut lib. Pandect 42. tit refer Ius civile vigilantibus scriptum est non dormientibus Saith Austin Ignorantia judicis plerumque est calamitas innocentis And as you look every Labourer that you hire should be laborious in your work and your Physicion should be diligent in his employment for your health so is it as just that you be diligent
Quest. 7. Answ. No not by private assault or violence But if the crime be so great that the Law of the Land doth punish it with death if that Law be just you may in some cases seek to bring the offendor to publick justice But that is rare and otherwise you may not do it For 1. It belongeth only to the Magistrate and not to you to be the avenger 2. And killing a man can be no meet defence against calumny or slander For if you will kill a man for prevention you kill the innocent If you kill him afterward it is no Defence but an unprofitable revenge which vindicateth not your honour but dishonoureth you more Your patience is your honour and your bloody revenge doth shew you to be so like the Devil the destroyer that it is your greatest shame 3. It is odious Pride which maketh men over-value their reputation among men and think that a mans life is a just compensation to them for their dishonour Such bloody Sacrifices are fit to appâ—ase only the blood-thirsty Spirit But what is it that Pride will not do and justifie CHAP. XI Special Directions to escape the guilt of persecuting Determining also the case about Liberty in matters of Religion THough this be a subject which the guilty cannot endure to hear of yet the misery of persecutors the blood and grones and ruines of the Church and the lamentable divisions of profâ—ssed Christians do all command me not to pass it by in silence but to tell them the truth whether they will hear or whether they will forbear though they were such as Ezek. 3. 7 8 9 11. § 1. Direct 1. If you would escape this dreadful guilt Understand well what Persecution is Else Direct 1. you may either run into it ignorantly or oppose a duty as if it were persecution § 2. The Verb Persequor is often taken in a good sence for no more than continuato motu vel ad extremum sequor and sometime for the blameless prosecution of a delinquent But we take it here as the English word Persecute is most commonly taken for inimico affectu insequor for a malicious or injurious hurting or prosecuting another and that for the sake of Religion or Righteousness For it is not common injuries which we here intend to speak of Three things then go to make up Persecution 1. That it be the Hurting of another in his Body liberty relations estate or reputation 2. That it be done injuriously to one who deserveth it not in the particular which is the cause 3. That it be for the cause of Religion or of Righteousness that is for the Truth of God which we hold or utter or for the worship of God which we perform or for obedience to the will of God revealed in his Laws This is the cause on the sufferers part what ever is intended by the Persecuter § 3. There are divers sorts of Persecution As to the Principles of the Persecutors 1. There is a Persecution which is openly professed to be for the cause of Religion As Heathens and Mahometans persecute Christians as Christians And there is an Hypocritical Persecution when the pretended cause is some odious crime but the real cause is mens Religion or obedience to God This is the common Persecution which nominal Christians exercise on serious Christians or on one another They will not say that they Persecute them because they are Godly or serious Christians but that is the true cause For if they will but set them above God and obey them against God they will abate their Persecution Many of the Heathens thus persecuted the Christians too under the name of Ungodly and evil doers But the true cause was because they obeyed not their commands in the Worshipping of their Idol Gods So do the Papists persecute and murder men not as Professours of the truth which is the true cause but under the name of Hereticks and Schâ—smaticks or Rebels against the Pope or what ever their malice pleaseth to accuse them of And prophane nominal Christians seldome persecute the serious and sincere directly by that name but under some Nickname which they set upon them or under the name of Hypocrites or self-conceited or factious persons or such like And if they live in a place and Age where there are many Civil Wars or differences they are sure to fetch some odious name or accusation thence Which side soever it be that they are on or if they meddle not on any side they are sure by every party whom they please not to hear Religion loaded with such reproaches as the times will allow them to vent against it Even the Papists who take this course with Protestants it seems by Acosta are so used themselves not by the Heathens but by one another yea by the multitude yea by their Priests For so saith he speaking of the Parish Priests Priests among the Indians having reproved their Diceing Carding Hunting Idleness Lib. 4 c. 15. pag. 404 405. Itaque is cui Pastoralis Indorum cura committitur non solum contra diaboli machinas naturae incentiva pugnare debet sed jam etiam confirmatae hominum consuetudini tempore turba praepotenti sese objicere ad excipienda invidorum ac malevolorum tela forte pectus opponere qui siquid à profano suo instituto abhorrentem viderint proditorem hypocritam hostem clamaâ—t that is He therefore to whom the Pastoral care of the Indians is committed must not only fight against the Engines of the Devil and the incentives of nature but also now must object or set himself against the confirmed custome of men which is grown very powerful both by time and by the multitude and must valiantly oppose his breast to receive the darts of the envious and malevolent who if they see any thing contrary to their profane fashion or breeding cry out A Traitor An Hypocrite an Enemy It seems then that this is a common course § 4. 2. Persecution is either done in Ignorance or Knowledge The commonest persecution is that which is done in Ignorance and errour when men think a Good cause to be bad or a bad cause to be good and so persecute Truth while they take it to be falshood or good while they take it to be evil or obtrude by violence their Errours for Truths and their evils as good and necessary things Thus Peter testifieth of the Jews who killed the Prince of life Act. 3. 13 14 17. I know that through Ignorance you did it as did also your Rulers And Paul 1 Cor. 2. 8. which none of the Princes of this world knâ—w for had they known it they would not have Crucified the Lord of glory And Christ himself saith Joh. 16. 3. These things will they do unto you because they have not known the Father or me And Paul saith of himself Act. 26. 9. I thought verily with my self that I ought to do many things contrary to the name
of Iesus of Nazareth which thing I also did c. And 1 Tim. 1. 13. that it was ignorantly in unbelief that he was a blaspheamer a persecutor and injurious And on the other side some Persâ—cute Truth and Goodness while they know it to be so Not because it is Truth or Goodness but because it is against their carnal worldly interest and inclination As the Conscience of a worldling a drunkard a whoremonger beareth witness against his sin while he goeth on in it so oft-times doth the Conscience of the Persâ—cutor and he hath secret convictions that those whom he persecuteth are better and happier than himself § 5. 3. As to the cause sometime persecution is for Christianity and Godliness in the gross or for some great essential point And sometimes it is only for some particular Truth or duty and that perhaps of a lower nature so small or so dark that it is become a great Controversie whether it be Truth or errour duty or sin In some respects it is more comfortable to the persecuted and more heynous in the persecutor that the suffering be for the Greatest things For this leaveth no doubt in the mind whether our cause be good or not and this sheweth that the persecutors mind is most aliene from God and truth But in some other respect it is an aggravation of the sin of the persecutor and of the comfort of the persecuted when it is for smaller truths and duties For it is a sign of great uncharitableness and cruelty when men can find in their hearts to persecute others for little things And it is a sign of a heart that is true to God and very sincere when we will rather suffer any thing from Man than renounce the smallest truth of God or commit the smallest sin against him or omit the smallest duty when it is a duty 4. Sometime persecution is directly for Religion that is for matters of professed Faith or Worship And sometimes it is for a civil or a common cause Yet still it is for our Obedience to God or else it is not the persecution which we speak of though the Matter of it be some common or civil thing As if I were persecuted meerly for giving to the poor or helping the sick or for being Loyal to my Prince and to the Laws or for doing my duty to my Parents or because I will not bear false-witness or tell a lye or subscribe a falshood or any such like This is truly persecution whatever the matter of it be as long as it is truly for Obeying God that we undergo the suffering § 6. I omit many other less considerable distributions And also those afflictions which are but improperly called persecutions as when a man is punished for a fault in a far greater measure than it deserveth this is Injustice but not persecution unless it be his Religion and Obedience to God which is the secret cause of it § 7. Direct 2. Understand well the greatness of the sin of Persecution that you may be kept in a Direct 2. due fear of being tempted to it Here therefore I shall shew you how Great a sin it is § 8. 1. Persecution is a fighting against God So it is called Act. 5. 39. And to fight against God is odious Malignity and desperate folly 1. It is Venemous malignity for a Creature to fight against his Creator and a sinner against his Redeemer who would save him and for so blind a worm to rise up against the wisdom of the All-knowing God! and for so vile a sinner to oppose the fountain of Love and Goodness 2. And what Folly can be greater than for a Mole to reproach the Sun for darkness or a lump of Earth to take up Arms against the Almighty terrible God Art thou able to make good thy cause against him or to stand before him when he is offended and chargeth thee with sin Hear a Pharisee Act. 6. 38 39. And now I say unto you refrain from these men and let them alone for if this counsel or this work be of men it will come to nought But if it be of God ye cannot overthrow it lest happily ye be found even to fight against God Or hear Christ himself Act. 9. 4 5. I am Iesus whom thou persecutest It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks with bare feet or hands to beat the thorns How unmeet a match is man for God! He needeth not so much as a word to take away thy soul and crush thee to the lowest Hell His will alone can lay thee under thy deserved pains Canst thou Conquer the Almighty God Wilt thou assault the Power which was never overcome or storm Jehovahs Throne or Kingdom First try to take down the Sun and Moon and Stars from the Firmament and to stop the course of the Rivers or of the Sea and to rebuke the Winds and turn night into day and Winter into Summer and decrepit Age into vigorous Youth Attempt not greater matters till thou hast performed these It is a greater matter than any of these to conquer God whose cause thou fightest against Hear him again Isa. 45. 9. Woe unto him that striveth with his Maker Let the potsherd strive with the Potsherds of the Earth Shall the Clay say to him that fashioneth it What makest thou Or thy work He hath no hands And Isa. 45. 9. who would set the bryars and thorns against me in battel I would go through them I would burn them together Wo to the man that is not content to fight with men but chooseth the most dreadful God to be his enemy It had been better for thee that all the World had been against thee § 9. 2. Persecution opposeth the gracious design of our Redeemer and hindereth his Gospel and work of mercy to the world and endeavoureth the ruine of his Kingdom upon earth Christ came to save men and persecutors raise up their power against him as if they envyed salvation to the World And if God have made the work of mans Redemption the most wonderful of all his works which ever he revealed to the sons of men you may easily conceive what thanks he will give them that resist him in so high and glorious a design If you could pull the Stars out of the Firmament or hinder the motions of the Heavens or deny the rain to the thirsty Earth you might look for as good a reward for this as for opposing the merciful Redeemer of the World in the blessed work of mans salvation § 10. 3. Persecution is a resisting or fighting against the Holy Ghost Act. 7. 51. saith Stephen to the Jews Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears ye do alwayes resist the Holy Ghost as your fathers did so do ye If you silence the Ministers who are the means by which the spirit worketh in the illuminating and sanctifying of souls Act. 26. 17 18. or if you afflict men for those Holy duties which the
named 3. What are the particular wayes and sorts of scandal 4. The greatness of this sin 5. Directions to avoid it § 2. I. I shall not need to stand upon the Etymologie of the word Scandal whether it come Scandal what it is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 claudico as Erasmus thought or from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 curvum c. Martinius Stephanus Lyserus c. have sufficiently done it whither I referr you As for the sense of the word it is past doubt that the ordinary use of it in Scripture is for a stumbling block for a man to fall upon or a trap to ensnare a man And in the Old Testament it is oft used for a stumbling stone on which a man may fall into any corporal calamity or a snare to hurt or ruine a man in the world As Exod. 10. 7. 1 Sam. 18. 21. 25. 31. Psal. 119. 165. Ezek. 7. 19. Sept. But in the New Testament which speaketh more of spiritual hurts it is taken for a stumbling block or temptation by which a man is in danger of falling into sin or spiritual loss or ruine or dislike of Godliness or any way to be turned from God or hindered in a Religious holy way And if sometimes it be taken for Grieving or Troubling it is as it hereby thus hindereth or ensnareth So that to scandalize is sometimes taken for the doing of a blameless action from which another unjustly taketh occasion to fall or sin or be perverted But when it signifieth a sin as we take it in this place then to scandalize is By something unlawful of it self or at least unnecessary which may occasion the spiritual hurt or ruine of another 1. The matter is either something that is simply sinful and then it is a double sin or something Indifferent or unnecessary and then it is simply the sin of scandal 2. It must be that which may occasion anothers fall I say occasion For no man can forcibly cause another man to sin but only occasion it or tempt him to it as a Moral Cause § 3. II. By this you may see 1. That to scandalize is not meerly to displease or grieve another What is not Scandal that is by many so called For many a man is displeased through his folly and vice by that which tendeth to his good and many a man is tempted that is scandalized by that which pleaseth him When Christ saith If thy right eye or hand offend or scandalize thee pluck it out or cut it off c. Mat. 5. he doth not by offending mean displeasing or grieving For by so offending it may profit us But he plainly meaneth If it draw thee to sin or else he had never added that it is better to enter maimed into life than having two eyes or hands to be cast into Hell That is in a word Thy damnation is a greater hurt than the loss of hand or eye and therefore if there were no other way to avoid it this would be a very cheap way So pedem offendere in lapidem is to stumble upon a stone The most censorious and humorous sort of men have got a notion that what ever offendeth or displeaseth them is scandalous And they think that no man must do any thing which grieveth or displeaseth them lest he be guilty of scandal And by this trick who ever can purchase impatiency and pievishness enough to be alwayes displeased with the actions of others shall rule the world But the truth is the ordinary way of scandalizing these men is by pleasing them § 4. I will give you one instance of scandal in Scripture which may help this sort of people better to understand it Gal. 2. 10. to 16. Peter there giveth true scandal to the Jews and Gentiles He walked not uprightly according to the truth of the Gospel but laid a stumbling block before the Jews and Gentiles And this was not by displeasing the Jews but by pleasing them The Jews thought it a sin to eat with the Gentiles and to have communion with uncircumcised men Peter knew the contrary but for fear of them of the circumcision lest they should be offended at him as a sinner he withdrew and separated himself This scandal tended to harden the Jews in their sinful separation and to seduce the Gentiles into a conceit of the necessity of circumcision and Barnabas was carryed away with the dissimulation Here you may see that if any think it a sin in us to have communion in such or such Congregations with such persons in such worship which God alloweth us not to separate from it is a sin of scandal in us to separate to avoid these mens offence We scandalize them and others even by pleasing them and by avoiding that which they falsly called scandalous And if we would not scandalize them we must do that which is just and not by our practice hide the sound doctrine which is contrary to their separating error § 5. 2. And it is as apparent that to scandalize another is not as is vulgarly imagined by the ignorant to do that which is commonly reputed sinful or which hath the appearance of a sin or which will make a man evil thought of or spoken of by others Yet commonly when men say This is a scandalous action they mean it is an action which is reproachful or of evil report as a sin And therefore in our English speech it is common to say of one that slandereth another that he raised a scandal of him But this is not the meaning of the word in Scripture Materially indeed scandal may consist in any such thing which may be a stumbling block to another But formally it is the Tempting of another or occasioning his fall or ruine or hurt which is the nature of scandalizing And this is done more seldome by committing open disgraceful sins and doing that which will make the doer evil spoken of For by that means others are the more assisted against the temptation of imitating him But scandal is most commonly found in those actions which are under least reproach among men or which have the most plausible appearance of good in them when they are evil For these are apter to deceive and overthrow another § 6. 3. And it is also apparent that it is no sinful scandalizing to do a duty or necessary action which I have not power to forbear though I know that another will be offended or fall by it into sin If God have made it my duty even at this time I must not disobey him and omit my duty because another will make it an occasion of his sin It must be either a sinful or an indifferent action that is scandal or something that is in my own power to do or to forbear Yet this must be added that Affirmatives binding not ad semper to all times and no duty being a duty at every moment it may oft fall out that that which else would have been my duty at
enough to implant it in all the hearers why do your Children go so long to School and after that to the Universities and why are you so long Preaching to all your Parishioners Sure you preach not novelties to them as long as you live And yet thirty or fourty years painful preaching even of the same fundamentals of Religion shall leave many ignorant of them in the best Parishes in the Land There must be a right and ripe disposition in the hearers or else the clearest reasoning may be uneffectual A disused or unfurnished mind that hath not received all the truths which are presupposed to those which you deliver or hath not digested them into a clear understanding may long hear the truest reasons and never apprehend their weight There is need of more adoe than a bare unfolding of the truth to make a man receive it in its proper evidence Perhaps he hath been long pre-possessed with contrary opinions which are not easily rooted out Or if he be but confident of the truth of some one opinion which is inconsistent with yours no wonder if he cannot receive that which is contrary to what he so verily believeth to be the truth There is a marvellous variety of mens apprehensions of the same opinions or reasons as they are variously represented to men and variously pondered and as the natural capacity of men is various and as the whole course of their lives their education company and conversation have variously formed their minds It is like the setting together all the parts of Watch when it is in pieces If any one part of many be misplaced it may necessitate the misplacing of those that follow without any wilful obstinacy in him that doth it If in the whole frame of sacred Truth there be but some one misunderstood it may bring in other mistakes and keep out many truths even from an honest willing mind And who is there that can say he is free from errour Have not you perceived in your selves that the truths which you heard an hundred times over to little purpose when you were Children were received more convincingly and satisfyingly when you were men And that you have found a delightful clearness in some points on a sudden which before you either resisted or held with little observation or regard And yet it is common with the scandalizers of souls to cry out against all that conform not to their opinions and will as soon as they have heard their reasons that they are stubborn and refractory and wilful and factious and so turn from arguments to Clubs as if they had never known themselves or others nor how weak and dark the understandings of almost all men are But they shall have judgement without mercy who shew no mercy And when their own errours shall all be opened to them by the Lord they will be loth they should all be imputed to their wilful obstinacy And perhaps these very censorious men may prove themselves to have beenonthe wrong side For Pride and uncharitableness are usually erroneous § 34. Direct 12. Engage not your selves in an evil cause For if you do it will engage you to Direct 12. draw in others You will expect your friends should take your part and think as you think and say as you say though it be never so much against truth or righteousness § 35. Direct 13. Speak not rashly against any cause or persons before you are acquainted with Direct 13. them or have well considered what you say Especially take heed how you believe what a man of any Sect in Religion doth speak or write against his Adversaries of a contrary sect If experience had not proved it in our dayes beyond contradiction it would seem incredible how little men are to be believed Psal. 119. 69. in this case and how the falsest reports will run among the people of a Sect against those whom the interest of their opinion and party engageth them to mis-represent Think not that you are excusable for receiving or venting an ill report because you can say he was an honest man that spoke it For many that are otherwise honest do make it a part of their honesty to be dishonest in this They think they are not zealous enough for those opinions which they call their Religion unless Vix equidem credar sed cum sint praemia falsi Nulla â—atam dâ—bet testis habere fidem Oâ—iâ— l. Rom. 3. 7 8. Jam. 3. 14. â—â—â—â—â— â— 8. they are easie in believing and speaking evil of those that are the Adversaries of it When it may be upon a just tryal all proveth false And then all the words which you ignorantly utter against the truth or those that follow it are scandals or stumbling blocks to the hearers to turn them from it and make them hate it I am not speaking against a just credulity There must be humane belief or else there can be no humane converse But ever suspect partiality in a party For the interest of their Religion is a more powerful charm to the Consciences of evil speakers than personal interest or bribes would be How many Legends tell us this how easily some men counted Godly have been prevailed with to Lie for God § 36. Direct 14. Take heed of mocking at a Religious life yea or of breaking any jeasts or scorns Diâ—â—â—â— 14. at the weaknesses of any in Religious exercises which may possibly reflect upon the exercises themselves Many a thousand souls have been kept from a holy life by the scorns of the vulgar that speak of it as a matter of derision or sport Reading the Scriptures and holy conference and prayer and instructing our families and the holy observation of the Lords day and Church-discipline are commonly the derision of ungodly persons who can scorn that which they can neither confute nor learn And weak people are greatly moved by such senseless means A mock or jear doth more with them than an argument They cannot endure to be made a laughing-stock Thus was the name of a Crucified God the derision of the Heathens and the scandal of the World both Jews and Gentiles And there is scarce a greater scandal or stumbling block at this day which keepeth multitudes from Heaven than when the Devil can make it either a matter of danger or of shame to be a Christian or to live a holy mortified life Persecution and Derision are the great successful scandals of the World And therefore seeing men are so apt to be turned off from Christ and Godliness never speak unreverently or disrespectfully of them It is a prophane and scandalous course of some that if a Preacher have but an unhansome tone or gesture they make a jeast of it and say He whined or he spoke through the nose or some such scorn they cast upon him which the hearers quickly apply to all others and turn to a scorn of Preaching or Prayer or Religion it self Or if men differ from each other
created for § 2. Mot. 2. There is no subject so sublime and honourable for the Tongue of man to be imployed about as the matters of God and life eternal Children will talk of childish toyes and Countreymen talk of their Corn and Cattel and Princes and Statesmen look down on these with contemptuous smiles as much below them But Crowns and Kingdoms are incomparably more below the business of a holy soul The higher subjects Philosophers treat of the more honourable if well done are their discourses But none is so high as God and glory § 3. Mot. 3. It is the most profitable subject to the hearers A discourse of Riches at the most can but direct them how to grow rich A discourse of Honours usually puffeth up the minds of the ambitious And if it could advance the auditors to Honour the fruit would be a vanity little to be desired But a discourse of God and Heaven and Holiness doth tend to change the hearers minds into the nature of the things discourst of It hath been the means of converting and sanctifying many a thousand souls As learned discourses tend to make men learned in the things discourst off so holy discourses tend to make men holy For as natural Generation begetteth not Gold or Kingdoms but a Man so speech is not made to communicate to others directly the wealth or health or honours or any extrinsecal things which the speaker hath but to communicate those Mental Excellencies which he is possest of Prov. 16. 21 22. The sweetness of the lips increaseth learning Understanding is a well-spring of life to him that hath it Prov. 10. 13 21. In the lips of him that hath understanding wisdom is found The lips of the righteous feed many Prov. 15. 7. The lips of the wise disperse knowledge but the heart of the foolish doth not so Prov. 20. 15. There is Gold and a multitude of Rubies but the lips of knowledge are a precious Iewel Prov. 10. 20. The tongue of the just is as choice Silver the heart of the wicked is little worth § 4. Mot. 4. Holy discourse is also most profitable to the speaker himself Grace increaseth by the exercise Even in instructing others and opening truth we are oft times more powerfully led up to further truth our selves than by solitary studies For Speech doth awaken the intellectual faculty and keepeth on the thoughts in order and one truth oft inferreth others to a thus excited and prepared mind And the tongue hath a power of moving own our hearts When we blow the fire to warm another both the exercise and the fire warm our selves It kindleth the flames of holy love in us to declare the praise of God to others It increaseth a hatred of sin in us to open its odiousness to others We starve our selves when we starve the souls which we should cherish § 5. Mot. 5. Holy and Heavenly discourse is the most delectable I mean in its own aptitude and to a mind that is not diseased by corruption That which is most Great and Good and Necessary is most delectable What should best please us but that which is best for us And best for others And best in it self The excellency of the subject maketh it delightful And so doth the exercise of our Graces upon it And serious conference doth help down the truth into our hearts where it is most sweet Besides that Nature and Charity make it pleasant to do good to others It can be nothing better than a subversion of the appetite by carnality and wickedness that maketh any one think idle jeasts or tales or plays to be more pleasant than spiritual Heavenly conference and the talking of Riches or Sports or Lusts to be sweeter than to talk of God and Christ and grace and glory A holy mind hath a continual feast in it self in meditating on these things and the communicating of such thoughts to others is a more Common and so a more pleasant feast § 6. Mot. 6. Our faithfulness to God obligeth us to speak his praise and to promote his truth â—â—d plead his cause against iniquity Hath he given us tongues to magnifie his name and set before us the admirable frame of all the World to declare his Glory in And shall we be backward to so sweet and great a work How precious and useful is all his holy word What light and life and comfort may it cause And shall we bury it in silence What company can we come into almost where either the bare-faced committing of sin or the defending it or the opposition of truth or Godliness or the frigidity of mens hearts towards God and supine neglect of holy things do not call to us if we are the servants of God to take his part and if we are the Children of light to bear our testimony against the darkness of the World and if we love God and truth and the souls of men to shâ—w it by our prudent seasonable speech Is he true to God and to his cause that will not open his mouth to speak for him § 7. Mot. 7. And how precious a thing is an immortal soul and therefore not to be neglected Did Christ think souls to be worth his Mediation by such strange condescension even to a shameful death Did he think them worth his coming into flesh to be their teacher And will you not think them worth the speaking to § 8. Mot. 8. See also the greatness of your sin in the negligence of unfaithful Ministers It is easie to see the odiousness of their sin who preach not the Gospel or do no more than by an hours dry and dead discourse shift off the serious work which they should do and think they may be excused from all personal oversight and helping of the peoples souls all the Week after And why should you not perceive that a dumb private Christian is also to be condemned as well as a dumb Minister Is not profitable conference your duty as well as profitable preaching is his How many persons condemn themselves while they speak against unfaithful Pastors being themselves as unfaithful to Families and Neighbours as the other are to the flock § 9. Mot. 9. And consider how the cheapness of the means doth aggravate the sin of your neglect and shew much unmercifulness to souls Words cost you little Indeed alone without the company of good works they are too cheap for God to accept of But if an Hypocrite may bring so cheap a sacrifice who is rejected what doth he deserve that thinketh it too dear What will that man do for God or for his Neighbours soul who will not open his mouth to speak for them He seemeth to have less love than that man in Hell Luk. 16. who would so fain have had a messenger sent from another World to have warned his brethren and saved them from that place of torment § 10. Mot. 10. Your fruitful conference is a needful help to the ministerial work When
worst they can against another as an enemy but as loving friends do use an amicable arbitration resolving contentedly to stand to what the Iudge determineth without any alienation of mind or abatement of brotherly love § 12. Direct 9. Be not too confident of the righteousness of your own cause but ask counsel of some Direct 9. understanding godly and impartial men and hear all that can be said and patiently consider of the case and do as you would have others do by you § 13. Direct 10. Observe what terrors of Conscience use to haunt awakened sinners especially on a Direct 10. death-â—ead for such sins as false witnessing and false judging and oppressing and injuâ—ing the innocent even above most other sins CHAP. XXIII Cases of Conscience and Directions against Backbiting Slandering and Evil Speaking Tit. 1. Cases of Conscience about Backbiting and Evil Speaking Quest. 1. MAy I not speak evil of that which is evil And call every one truly as Quest. 1. he is Answ. You must not speak a known falshood of any man under pretence of Charity or speaking well But you are not to speak all the evil of every man which is true As opening the faults of the King or your Parents though never so truly is a sin against the fifth Commandment Honour thy Father and Mother So if you do it without a call you sin against your neighbours honour and many other wayes offend Quest. 2. Is it not sinful silence and a consenting to or countenancing of the sins of others to say Quest. 2. nothing against them as tender of their honour Answ. It is sinful to be silent when you have a call to speak If you forbear to admonish the offender in love between him and you when you have opportunity and just cause it is sinful to be silent then But to silence backbiting is no sin If you must be guilty of every mans sin that you talk not against behind his back your whole discourse must be nothing but backbiting Quest. 3. May I not speak that which honest religious credible persons do report Quest. 3. Answ. Not without both sufficient evidence and a sufficient call You must not judge of the action by the person but of the person by the action Nor must you imitate any man in evil doing If a good man abuse you are you willing that all men follow him and abuse you more Quest. 4. May I believe the bad report of an honest credible person Quest. 4. Answ. You must first consider Whether you may hear it or meddle with it For if it be a case that you have nothing to do with you may not set your judgement to it either to believe it or disbelieve it And if it be a thing that you are called to judge of yet every honest mans word is not presently to be believed You must first know whether it be a thing that he saw or is certain of himself or a thing which he only taketh upon report And what his evidence or proof is and whether he be not engaged by interest passion or any difference of opinion Or be not engaged in some contrary faction where the interest of a party or cause is his temptation Or whether he be not used to rash reports and uncharitable speeches And what concurrence of testimonies there is and what is said on the other side Especially what the person accused saith in his own defence If it be so heinous a crime in publick Judgement to pass sentence before both parties are heard and to condemn a man before he speak for himself it cannot be justifiable in private judgement Would you be willing your selves that all should be believed of you which is spoken by any honest man And how uncertain are we of other mens honesty that we should on that account think ill of others Quest. 5. May I not speak evil of them that are enemies to God to Religion and godliness and are Quest. 5. open persecutors of it or are enemies to the King or Church Answ. You may on all meet occasions speak evil of the sin and of the persons when you have a just call but not at your own pleasure Quest. 6. What if it be one whose honour and credit countenanceth an ill cause and his dishonour would Quest. 6. disable him to do hurt Answ. You may not belye the Devil nor wrong the worst man that is though under pretence of doing good God needeth not malice nor calumnies nor injustice to his glory It is an ill cause that cannot be maintained without such means as these And when the matter is true you must have a call to speak it and you must speak it justly without unrighteous aggravations or hiding the better part which should make the case and person truly understood There is a time and due manner in which that mans crimes and just dishonour may be published whose false reputation injureth the truth But yet I must say that a great deal of villany and slander is committed upon this plausible pretence and that there is scarce a more common cloak for the most inhumane lyes and calumnies Quest. 7. May I not lawfully make a true Narration of such matters of fact as are criminal and Quest. 7. dishonourable to offenders Else no man may write a true History to posterity of mens crimes Answ. When you have a just cause and call to do it you may But not at your own pleasure Historians may take much more liberty to speak the truth of the dead than you may of the living Though no untruth must be spoken of either yet the honour of Princes and Magistrates while they are alive is needful to their Government and therefore must be maintained oft times by the concealment of their faults And so proportionably the honour of other men is needful to a life of love and peace and just society But when they are dead they are not subjects capable of a right to any such honour as must be maintained by such silencing of the truth to the injury of posterity And posterity hath usually a right to historical truth that good examples may draw them to imitation and bad examples may warn them to take heed of sin God will have the name of the wicked to rot and the faults of a Noah Lot David Solomon Peter c. shall be recorded Yet nothing unprofitable to posterity may be recorded of the dead though it be true nor the faults of men unnecessarily divulged much less may the dead be slandered or abused Quest. 8. What if it be one that hath been oft admonished in vain May not the faults of such a one be Quest. 8. mentioned behind his back Answ. I confess such a one the case being proved and he being notoriously impenitent hath made a much greater forfeiture of his honour than other men And no man can save that mans honour who will cast it away himself But yet it is
bind me to judge men better than they are Answ. Charity bindeth you 1. Rather to observe the best in them than the worst 2. And as I said to judge of no mans faults uncalled 3. Nor to judge of that which is not evident but out of sight And thus consequently it bindeth you to judge some men to be better than they are but not directly Object Then a man is bound to err and to believe an untruth Answ. No You are not bound to believe that it is certainly true that such a man is better than he is Because you have no evidence of its certain truth But you are bound to believe it a thing probable or verisimile likely to be true by an opinion or fallible humane faith And this is not a falshood For that is likely and probable to you which hath the more probable evidence and more for it than against it So that the thing which you are to believe immediately is this proposition There is more evidence to me to prove it likely that this man is sincere than contrary And consequently you believe this and believe not the contrary because the contrary hath no evidence But you are not to take it as a certain thing that the contrary hath no latent reality Quest. 2. How far may I judge ill of one by outward appearances as by the countenance gestures and Quest. 2. other uncertain but suspicious signs Answ. There are some signs which are not so much as probable but a little suspicious and which men are very ordinarily mistaken by As those that will judge of a man at the first look by his face And those that will judge a studious serious person a Lawyer a Judge or a Divine to be morose or proud because they are not complemental but of few words or because they have not patience to waste pretious hours in hearing an empty vessel sound an ignorant self-conceited person talk foolishly Such censures are but the effects of injudiciousness unrighteousness and rash haste There are other signs which make it probable to a wise and charitable person that the man is bad e. g. proud or covetous or an hypocrite If with these there are as great signs to make the contrary probable we must rather incline to the better than the worse But if not we may fear the worst of that person but not conclude it as a certainty And therefore we may not in publick censures proceed upon such uncertainties nor venture to divulge them but only use them to help us for due caution and pity and prayer and endeavour for such a ones recovery and help Quest. 3. How far may I censure upon the report of others Quest. 3. Answ. According to the degree of the credibility of the persons and evidence of the narrative not simply in themselves but as compared with all that is to be heard on the contrary part Else you are partial and unjust Quest. 4. Doth not the fifth Command oblige me in honour to Parents and Princes to judge them to be better than their lives declare them to be Quest. 4. Answ. You are gradually to honour them more than others and therefore to be more afraid of dishonouring them and must not sit in judgement on them to believe any harm of them which evidence doth not compell you to believe But you are not to judge any sin the less because it is theirs nor to judge contrary to evidence nor to call evil good nor to be wilfully blind nor to flatter any in their sin Quest. 5. Whom must we judge for sincere and sanctified Christians Quest. 5. Answ. 1. All those that Profess to be such whom you cannot disprove 2. But as there are several degrees of evidence and probability so must there be several degrees of your good opinion of others Of some who give you the highest probability you may have the strongest confidence short of certainty Of others you may have less and of some you may have much more fear than hope 3. And yet in matters of Church-rights and publick communion your fears will not allow you to use them as no Christians For their profession of faith and repentance is certain And as long as your fears of their hypocrisie or unsoundness is but uncertain it must not on that account prevail to deprive another of his right Quest. 6. But is not my error my sin if I prove mistaken and take that man for a sincere Christian Quest. 6. who is none Answ. If you judged it to be certain your judgement and error was your sin But if you only judged him a Professor of Christianity and one that on that account you were bound to have Church-communion with as if he were sincere because you cannot prove the contrary this was no error Or if you erred for want of sufficient evidence to know the truth this error is not in it self a sin Quest. 7. Whom must I judge a visible member of the Church with whom I am thus bound to hold communion Quest. 7. Answ. 1. If you are the Pastor of the Church who are made the Judge at his admittance by Baptism or afterwards you must so judge of every one who maketh a credible profession of true Christianity that is of his present Consent to the Sacramental Covenant And that profession is credible which is 1. Understood by him that maketh it 2. Deliberate 3. Voluntary 4. Seemingly serious 5. And is not disproved by valid evidence of the contrary These are the true measures of Church communion For every man next God is the Judge of his own heart And God would have every man the Chooser or Refuser of his own mercies 2. But if you are but a private member of the Church you are to judge that person a visible member of the Church whom the Pastor hath taken in by Baptism and not cast out again by excommunication Except the contrary be notorious And even then you are oft obliged for order sake to carry your self towards him as a visible member till he be regularly cast out Quest. 8. Whom must I judge a true worshipper of God and whom not Quest. 8. Answ. Him that professeth true Christianity and joyneth in true Worship with a Christian Church or privately when hindered acknowledgeth the true God in all his Essential Attributes and heareth his Word and prayeth to him for all things necessary to salvation and praiseth him accordingly not giving the Worship proper to God unto any creature And doth all this as a sinner redeemed by Jesus Christ trusting in his Merits Sacrifice and intercession and giveth not his Office to any other And he is a false Worshipper who denyeth any essential Attribute of God or essential part of the Office of Christ or giveth these to any other or refuseth his Word or excludeth in his prayers any thing essential to Christianity or absolutely necessary to salvation But secundum quid in lesser parts or circumstances or
measures every man on earth is a false Worshipper that is he offereth God a worship some way faulty and imperfect and hath some sin in his worshipping of God And sin is a thing that God requireth not but forbiddeth even in the smallest measures Quest. 9. Which must I judge a true Church of Christ and which a false Church Quest. 9. Answ. The Universal Church is but one and is the whole society of Christians as united to Christ their only Head And this cannot be a false Church But if any other set up an Usurper as the Universal Head and so make another Policy and Church this is a false Church formally or in its policy But yet the members of this false Church or policy may some of them as Christians be also members of the true Church of Christ And thus the Roman Church as Papal is a false Catholick Church haveing the Policy of an Usurper but as Christians they may be members of the true Catholick Church of Christ. But for a particular Church which is but part of the Universal that is a true Church considered meerly as an ungoverned Community which is a true part of the Catholick prepared for a Pastor but yet being without one But that only is a true Political Church which consisteth of Professed Christians conjoyned under a true Pastor for Communion in the profession of true Christianity and for the true worshipping of God and orderly walking for their mutual assistance and salvation Quest. 10. Whom must we judge true Prophets and Pastors of the Church Quest. 10. Answ. He is a true Prophet who is sent by God and speaketh truth by immediate supernatural revelation or inspiration And he is a false Prophet who either falsly saith that he hath Divine revelations or inspiration or prophesieth falshood as from God And he is a true Pastor at the bar of God who is 1. Competently qualified with abilities for the Office 2. Competently disposed to it with willingness and desire of success And hath right ends in undertaking and discharging it 3. Who hath a just admission by true Ordination of Pastors and Consent of the flock And he is to be accounted a true Pastor in foro Ecclesiae in the Churches judgement whom the Church judgeth to have all these qualifications and thereupon admitteth him into possession of the place till his incapacity be notorious or publickly and sufficiently proved or he be removed or made uncapable Tit. 2. Directions for the Cure of sinful Censoriousness Direct 1. MEddle not at all in judging of others without a call Know first whether it be any Direct 1. of your work If not be afraid of those words of your Judge Matth. 7. 1 2 3 4 5. Iudge not that ye be not judged For with what judgement you judge you shall be judged c. And Rom. 14. 4. Who art thou that judgest another mans servant To his own Master he standeth or falleth And vers 10. 13. But why dost thou judge thy brother Or why dost thou set at nought thy brother We shall all stand before the judgement seat of Christ Every one of us shall give account of himself to God Let us not therefore judge one another any more 1 Cor. 4. 3 4 5. But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you or of mans judgement Therefore judge nothing before the time till the Lord come who both will bring to light the bidden things of darkness and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts Col. 2. 16. Let no man judge you in meat or in drink or in respect of an holy day or of the new Moon or Sabbath Quest. But when have I a call to Iudge another Answ. You may take the answer to this from the answer to Quest. 10. Chap. 23. Tit. 1. 1. If your Office or place require it as a Magistrate Pastor Parent Master Tutor c. 2. If the safety of the Church or your neighbour do require it 3. If the good of the sinner require it that you may seek his repentance and reformation 4. If your own preservation or welfare or any other duty require it Direct 2. Keep up an humble sense of your own faults and that will make you compassionate to Direct 2. others He that is truly vile in his own eyes is least inclined to vilifie others And he that judgeth himself with the greatest penitent severity is the least inclined to be censorious to his brother Pride is the common cause of censoriousness He that saith with the Pharisee I fast twice a week and pay tythe of all that I have I am no adulterer c. will also say I am not as other men nor as this Publican when the true penitent findeth so much of his own to be condemned that he smiteth on his own breast and saith God be merciful to me a sinner The prouder self-conceited sort of Christians are ever the most censorious of their neighbours Direct 3. Be much therefore at home in searching and watching and amending your own hearts Direct 3. and then you will find so much to do about your selves that you will have no mind or leisure to be censuring others Whereas the superficial hypocrite whose Religion is in externals and is unacquainted with his heart and Heaven is so little employed in the true work of a Christian that he hath leisure for the work of a censorious Pharisee Direct 4. Labour for a deep experimental insight into the nature of Religion and of every duty Direct 4. For no men are so censorious as the ignorant who know not what they say whilest experienced persons know those difficulties and other reasons which calm their minds As in common business no man will sooner find fault with a Workman in his work than idle praters who least understand it So is it commonly in matters of Religion Women and young men that never saw into the great mysteries of Divinity but have been lately changed from a vicious life and have neither acquaintance with the hard points of Religion nor with their own ignorance of them are the common proud censurers of their brethren much wiser than themselves and of all men that are more moderate and peaceable than themselves and are more addicted to Unity and more averse to Sects and separations than they Study harder and wait till you grow up to the experience of the aged and you will be less censorious and more peaceable Direct 5. Think not your selves fit Iudges of that which you understand not And think not proudly Direct 5. that you are liker to understand the difficulties in Religion with your short and lazy studies than those that in reading meditation and prayer have spent their lives in searching after them Let not pride make you abuse the Holy Ghost by pretending that he hath given you more wisdome in a little time and with little means and diligence than your betters have by the
a man choose for a matter of trust Quest. 2. Answ. As the matter is One that hath wisdom skill and fidelity through conscience honesty friendship or his own apparent interest Quest. 3. In what cases may I commit a secret to another Quest. 3. Answ. When there is a necessity of his knowing it or a greater probability of good than hurt by it in the evidence which a prudent man may see Quest. 4. What if another commit a thing to me with charge of secresie and I say nothing to him and so Quest. 4. promise it not Am I bound to secresie in that case Answ. If you have cause to believe that he took your silence for consent and would not else have committed it to you you are obliged in point of fidelity as well as friendship except it be with robbers or such as we are not bound to deal openly with and on terms of equality Quest. 5. What if it be a secret but I am under no Command or Promise at all about it Quest. 5. Answ. You must then proceed according to the Laws of Charity and Friendship and not reveal that which is to the injury of another without a greater cause Quest. 6. What if it be against the King or State or common good Quest. 6. Answ. You are bound to reveal it so far as the safety of the King or State or common good requireth it Yea though you swear the contrary Quest. 7. What if it be only against the good of some third ordinary person Quest. 7. Answ. You must endeavour to prevent his wrong either by revealing the thing or disswading from it or by such means as prudence shall tell you is the meetest way by exercising your love to one without doing wrong to the other Quest. 8. What if a man secretly entrust his estate to me for himself or children when he is in debt Quest. 8. to defraud his Creditors Answ. You ought not to take such a trust And if you have done it you ought not to hold it but resign it to him that did entrust you Yea and to disclose the fraud for the righting of the Creditors except it be in such a case as that the Creditor is some such vicious or oppressing person as you are not obliged to exercise that act of charity for or when the consequents of revealing it will be a greater hurt than the righting of him will compensate especially when it is against the publick good Quest. 9. What if a delinquent entrust me with his estate or person to secure it from penalty Quest. 9. Answ. If it be one that is prosecuted by a due course of Justice cujus poena debetur reipublicae whose punishment the common good requireth the case must be decided as the former You must not take nor keep such a trust But if it be one whose Repentance giveth you reason to believe that his impunity will be more to the common good than his punishment and that if the Magistrate knew it he ought to spare or pardon him in this case you may conceal his person or estate so be it you do it not by a lye or any other sinful means or such as will do more hurt than good Quest. 10. What if a friend entrust me with his estate to secure it from some great taxes or tributes to Quest. 10. the King May I keep such a trust or not Answ. No if they be just and legal taxes for the maintenance of the Magistrate or preservation of the Common-wealth But if it were done by a Usurper that had no authority or done without or beyond authority to the oppressing of the subject you may conceal his estate or your own by lawful means Quest. 11. What if a man that suffereth for Religion commit his person or estate to my trust Quest. 11. Answ. You must be faithful to your trust 1. If it be true Religion and a good cause for which he suffereth 2. Or if he be falsly accused of abuses in Religion 3. Or if he be faulty but the penalty intended from which you secure him is incomparably beyond his fault and unjust Supposing still that you save him only by lawful means and that it be not like to tend to do more hurt than good to the cause of Religion or the Common-wealth Quest. 12. What if a Papist or other erroneous person entrust me being of the same mind to educate Quest. 12. his Children in that way when he is dead and afterwards I come to see the errour must I perform that trust or no Answ. No 1. Because no trust can oblige you to do hurt 2. Because it is contrary to the primary intent of your friend which was his Childrens good And you may well suppose that had he seen his errour he would have entrusted you to do accordingly You are bound therefore to answer his primary intention and truly to endeavour his Childrens good Quest. 13. But what if a man to whom another hath entrusted his Children turn Papist or Heretick Quest. 13. and so thinketh errour to be truth what must he do Answ. He is bound to turn back again to the truth and do accordingly Obj. But one saith this is the truth and another that And he thinketh he is right Answ. There is but one of the contraries true Mens thinking themselves to be in the right doth not make it so And God will not change his Laws because they misunderstand or break them Therefore still that which God bindeth them to is to return unto the truth And if they think that to be truth which is not they are bound to think otherwise If you say They cannot It is either not true or it is long of themselves that they cannot And they that cannot immediately yet mediately can do it in the due use of means Quest. 14. What if I foresee that the taking of a trust may hazard my estate or otherwise hurt me and Quest. 14. yet my dying or living friend desireth it Answ. How far the Law of Christianity or friendship oblige you to hurt your self for his good must be discerned by a prudent considering what your obligations â—â—e to the person and whether the good of your granting his desires or the hurt to your self is like to be the greater and of more publick consequence And whether you injure not your own Children or others by gratifying him And upon such comparison prudence must determine the case Quest. 15. But what if afterward the trust prove more to my hurt than I foresaw Quest. 15. Answ. If it was your own fault that you foresaw it not you must suffer proportionably for that fault But otherwise you must compare your own hurt with the Orphanes in case you do not perform the trust And consider whether they may not be relieved another way And whether you have reason to think that if the Parent were alive and knew your danger he would expect
own case whatever censures for it I incur When I was first awakened to the regard of things spiritual and eternal I was exceedingly inclined to a vehement Love to those that I thought the most serious Saints and especially to that intimacy with some one which is called Friendship By which I found extrordinary benefit and it became a special mercy to my soul. But it was by more than one or two of the fore-mentioned wayes that the strict bond of extraordinary Friendship hath been relaxed and my own excessive esteem of my most intimate friends confuted And since then I have learned to love all men according to their real worth and to let out my love more extensively and without respect of persons acknowledging all that is good in all But with a double Love and honour to the excellently wiâ—e and good and to value men more for their publick usefulness than for their private suitableness to me and yet to value the ordinary converse of one or a few suitable friends before a more publick and tumultuary life except when God is publickly Worshipped or when publick service inviteth me to deny the quiet of a private life And though I more difference between man and man than ever I do it not upon so slight and insufficient grounds as in the time of my unexperienced credulity nor do I expect to find any without the defects and blots and failings of infirm imperfect mutable man Quest. 10. What qualifications should Direct us in the choice of a special bosome friend Quest. 10. Answ. 1. He must be one that is sincere and single hearted and not given to affectation or any thing that is much forced in his deportment plain and open hearted to you and not addicted to a hiding fraudulent or reserved carriage 2. He must be one that is of a suitable temper and disposition I mean not guilty of all your own infirmities but not guilty of a crosness or contrariety of disposition As if one be in love with plainness of Apparel and frugality in dyet and course of life and the other be guilty of curiosity and ostentation and prodigality If one be for few words and the other for many If one be for Labour and the other for Idleness and frequent interruptions If one be for serving the humours of men and the other for a contempt of humane censure in the way of certain duty these disparities make them unfit for this sort of bosome friendship 3. He must not be a slave to any vice For that which maketh him false to God and to betray his own soul may make him false to man and to betray his friend 4. He must not be a selfish person that is corruptly and partially for himself and for his own Carnal ends and interest For such a one hath no true love to others but when you seem cross to his Own interest his pleasure wealth or honour he will forsake you For so he doth by God himself 5. He must be Humble and not notably proud For Pride will make him quarrelsome disdainful impatient and quite unsuitable to a humble person 6. He must be one that 's throughly and resolvedly Godly For you will hardly well center any where but in God nor will he be useful to all the ends of friendship if he be not one that Loveth God and holy things and is of a pious conversation Nor can you expect that he that is false to God and will sell his part in him for the pleasure or gain of sin should long prove truly faithful unto you 7. He must be one that is judicious in Religion that is not of an erroneous heretical wit nor ignorant of those great and excellent Truths which you should ost confer about But rather one that excelleth you in solid understanding and true judgement and a discerning head that can teach you somewhat which you know not and is not addicted to corrupt you with false opinions of his own 8. He must be one that is not Schismatical and embodied in any dividing Sect For else he will be no longer true to you than the interest of his party will allow him And if you will not follow him in his conceits and singularities he will withdraw his love and despise you And if he do not yet he may endanger your stedfastness by the temptation of his love 9. He must be one that hath no other very intimate friend unless his friend be also as intimate with you as with him Because else he will be no further secret and trusty to you than the interest or will of his other friend will allow him 10. He must be one that is Prudent in the management of business and especially those which your converse is concerned in else his indiscretion in words or practice will not suffer your friendship to be long entire 11. He must be one that is not addicted to loquacity but can keep your secrets Otherwise he will be so untrustly as to be uncapable of doing the true office of a friend 12. He must have a zeal and activity in Religion and in all well-doing Otherwise he will be unfit to warm your affections and to provoke you to love and good works and to do the principal works of friendship but will rather cool and hinder you in your way 13. He must be one that is not addicted to levity unconstancy and change or else you can expect no stability in his friendship 14. He must not much differ from you in Riches or in poverty or in quality in the world For if he be much Richer he will be carryed away with higher company and converse than yours and will think you fitter to be his servant than his friend And if he be much poorer than you he will be apt to value your friendship for his own commodity and you will be still in doubt whether he be sincere 15. He must be one that is like to live with you or near you that you may have the frequent benefit of his converse counsel example and other acts of friendship 16. He must be one that is not very covetous or a Lover of Riches or preferment For such a one will no longer be true to you than his Mammon will allow him 17. He must be one that is not pievish passionate and impatient but that can both bear with your infirmities and also bear much from others for your sake in the exercise of his friendship 18. He must be one that hath so good an esteem of your person and so true and strong a Love to you as will suffice to move him and hold him to all this 19. He must be yet of a publick Spirit and a lover of good works that he may put you on to well doing and not countenance you in an idle self-pleasing and unprofitable life And he ought to be one that is skilful in the business of your Calling that may be fit to censure your work and amend it and