Authority the Work it self I desire you but to receive what is there delivered not by any factious persons but by the Church Do this and we are agreed and satisfied And I make it my request to the Reader to peruse both Parts of that Homily that he may know how far the Church of England is from the loose conceits of the enemies of Godliness And if also you will read over the Homilies against the peril of Idolatry you will the fuller know the Judgement of the Church about the manner of Gods worship Indeed the whole Book is such as the people should be acquainted with I Have done my part to open to you the Necessity of SERIOVS DILIGENCE and to call up the sluggish souls of sinners to mind the work of their salvation and to do it SPEEDILY and with all their MIGHT I must now leave the success to God and you What use you will make of it and what you will be and do for the time to come is a matter that more concerneth your selves then me If long speaking or multitude of words were the way to prevail with you I should willingly speak here while my strength would endure and lengthen out my exhortations yet seven-fold But that 's not the way A little wearieth you You love long feasts and long visits and plays and sports much better then long Sermons or Books or Prayers But it is no small grief to us to leave you in a case of such importance without some considerable hopes of your deliverance Sirs the matter is now laid before you and much in your own hands it will not be so long What will ye now do Have I convinced you now that God and your salvation are to be sought with all your might If I have not it is not for want of evidence in what is said but for want of willingness in your selves to know the truth I have proved to you that it is a matter out of controversie unless your lusts and passions and carnal interest will make a controversie of it I beseech you tell me if you be of any Religion at all why are you not strict serious and diligent and mortified and Heavenly in that Religion which you are of Sure you will not so far shame your own Religion whatever it be as to say that your Religion is not for mortification holinesse heavenliness self-denial or that your Religion alloweth you to be ambitious covetous gluttonous drunken to curse and swear and whore and raile and oppress the innocent It is not Religion but Diabolical serpentine malignity that is for any of this It s wonderful to think that learned men and Gentlemen and men that pretend to reason and ingenuity can quietly betray their souls to the Devil upon such silly grounds and do the evil that they have no more to say for and neglect that duty that they have no more to say against when they know they must do it NOW or NEVER That while they confesse that there is a God and a life to come a Heaven and a Hell and that this life is purposely given us for preparation for Eternity while they confess that God is most wise and holy and good and just and that sin is the greatest evil and that the Word of God is true they can yet make shift to quiet themselves in an unholy sensual careless life And that while they honour the Apostles and Martyrs and Saints that are dead and gone they hate their successors and imitators and the lives that they lived and are inclined to make more Martyrs by their malicious cruelty Alas all this comes from the want of a sound belief of the things which they never saw and the distance of those things the power of passion and sensual objects and inclinations that hurry them away after present vanities and conquer reason and rob them of their humanity and by the noise of the company of sensual sinners that harden and deaffen one another and by the just judgement of God forsaking those that would not know him and leaving them to the blindness and hardness of their hearts But is there no remedy O thou the fountain of mercy and relief vouchsafe these miserable sinners a remedy O thou the Saviour of lost mankind have mercy upon these sinners in the depth of their security presumption and misery O thou the Illuminater and Sanctifier of souls apply the remedy so dearly purchased We are constrained oft to fear lest it be much long of us that should more seriously preach the awakening truths of God unto mens hearts And verily our consciences cannot but accuse us that when we are most lively and serious alas we seem but almost to trifle considering on what a message we come and of what transcendent things we speak But Satan hath got his advantage upon our hearts that should be instrumental to kindle theirs as well as on theirs that should receive the truth O that we could thirst more after their salvation O that we could pray harder for it and entreat them more earnestly as those that were loath to take a denial from God or man I must confess to you all with shame and sorrow that I am even amazed to think of the hardness of my own heart that melteth no more in compassion to the miserable and is no more earnest and importunate with sinners when I am upon such a subject as this and am telling them that it must be NOW or NEVER and when the messengers of Death within and the fame of mens displeasure from without doth tell me how likely it is that my Time shall be but short and that if I will say any thing that may reach the hearts of sinners for ought I know it must be NOW or NEVER O what an obstinate what a lamentable disease is this insensibility and hardness of heart If I were sure this were the last Sermon that ever I should preach I find now my heart would shew its sluggishness and rob poor souls of the serious fervour which is suitable to the subject and their case and needful to the desired success But yet poor sleepy sinners hear us Though we speak not to you as men would do that had seen Heaven and Hell and were themselves in a perfectly awakned frame yet hear us while we speak to you the words of truth with some seriousness and compassionate desire of your Salvation O look up to your God! Look out unto eternity Look inwardly upon your souls Look wisely upon your short and hasty Time and then bethink you how the little remnant of your Time should be employed and what it is that most concerneth you to dispatch and secure before you die Now you have Sermons and Books and Warnings It will not be so long Preachers must have done God threatneth them and death threatneth them and men threaten them and its you it s you that are most severely threatned and that are called on by Gods warnings
and you must hear it no more for ever That therefore which you will do must presently be done or it will be too late If ever you will repent and Believe it must be Now. If ever you will be converted and sanctified it must be Now. If ever you will be pardoned reconciled to God it must be Now. If ever you will reign it s now that you must fight and conquer O that you were wise that you understood this and that you would consider your latter end Deut. 32. 29. And that you would let those words sink down into your hearts which came from the heart of the Redeemer as was witnessed by his tears Luke 19. 41 42. If thou hadst known even thou at least in this thy day the things which belong unto thy peace But now they are hidden from thine eyes And that these warnings may not be the less regarded because you have so often heard them when often hearing increaseth your obligation and diminisheth not the truth or your danger 3. And as there is no Return to Earth so is there no doing this work hereafter Heaven and Hell are for other work If the Infant be dead born the open world will not revive him That which is generated and born a beast or serpent will not by all the influences of the Heavens or all the powers of Sun or Earth become a Man The second and third concoxion presuppose the first The harvest doth presuppose the seed time the labour of the husbandman It s now that you must sow and hereafter that you must reap It s now that you must work and then that you must receive your wages Is this believed and considered by the sleepy world Alas sirs do you live as men that must live here no more Do your work as men that must work no more and pray as men that must pray no more when once the time of work is ended What thinkest thou poor besotted sinner will God command the Sun to stand still while thou rebellest or forgettest thy work and him Dost thou look he should pervert the course of nature continue the spring and seed-time till thou hast a mind to sow or that he will return the dead-born or mis-shapen Infant into the womb that it may be better formed or quickned Will he renew thy age and make the young again and call back the hours that thou prodigally wastedst on thy lusts and idleness Canst thou look for this at the hand of God when Nature and Scripture assure thee of the contrary If not why hast thou not yet done with thy beloved sins Why hast thou not yet begun to live Why sittest thou still while thy soul is un-renewed and all thy preparation for death and judgement is yet to make How fain would Satan find thee thus at death How fain would he have leave to blow out thy candle before thou hast entred inâ—â— the way of life Dost thou look to have Preachers sent after thee to bring thee the mercy which thy contempt here left behind Wilt thou hear and be converted in the Grave and Hell or wilt thou be saved without holiness that is In despight of God that hath resolved it shall not be O ye sons of sleep of death of darkness awake and live and hear the Lord before the Grave and Hell have shut their mouths upon you Hear now least hearing be too late Hear now if you will ever hear Hear now if you have ears to hear And O ye sons of Light that see what sleeping sinners see not call to them and ring them such a peal of lamentations tears and compassionate intreaties as is suited to such a dead and doleful state Who knows but God may bless it to awake them If any of you be so far awakened as to ask me what I am calling you to do My Text tells you in general Up and be Doing Look about you and see what you have to do and Do it with your might 1. Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do That is whatsoever is a Duty imposed by the Lord whatsoever is a Means conducing to thy own or others welfare Whatsoever Necessity calleth thee to do and Opportunity alloweth thee to do Thy hand findeth that is Thy executive powers by the conduct of thy understanding is now to do Do it with thy Might Do thy best in it 1. Trifle not but do it presently without unnecessary Delay 2. Do it Resolutely Remain not doubtful unresolved in suspense as if it were yet a question with thee whether thou shouldest do it or not 3. Do it with thy most awakned affections and serious intention of the powers of thy soul Sleepiness and insensibility are most unsuitable to such works It is a peculiar people zealous of good works that Christ hath purchased to himself Tit. 2. 14. 4. Do it with all necessary forecast and contrivance Not with a distracting hindering Care but with such a Care as may shew that you despise not your Master and are not regardless of his work And with such a care as is suited to the difficulties nature of the thing and as is necessary to the due accomplishment 5. Do it not sloathfully but vigorously and with diligence Stick not at thy labour Lest thou hear Thou wicked and sloathful servant Mat. 25. 26. Hide not thy hand in thy bosom with the sloathful say not There is a Lion in the way Prov. 26. 13 14. The negligent and the vicious the waster and the sloathful differ but as one brother from another Prov. 18. 9. As the self-murder of the wilfully ungodly so also the desire of the sloathful killeth him because his hands refuse to labour Prov. 21. 25. The soul of the sluggard desireth hath nothing but the soul of the diligent shall be made fat Prov. 13 4. Be not sloathful in business but be fervent in spirit serving the Lord Rom. 12. 11. 6. Do it with Constancy not with destructive pawses and intermissions or with weariness and turning back The righteous shall hold on his way and he that is of clean hands shall be stronger and stronger Job 17. 9. Be stedfast unmovable alwayes abounding in the work of the Lord forasmuch as you know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord 1 Cor. 15. 58. Be not weary of well-doing for in due season we shall reap if we faint not Gal. 6. 9. These six particulars are necessary if you will observe serve the precept in my Text. But that misunderstanding hinder not the performance I shall acquaint you further with the sense by these few explicatory cautions 1. The Might and Diligence here required excludeth not the necessity of Deliberation and Prudent conduct Otherwise the faster you go the further you may go out of the way and mis-guided zeal may spoil all the work and make it but an injury to others or your selves A little imprudence in the season and order and manner of a Duty sometimes may
joynts and marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart Heb. 4. 12. And the enmity of the Cainites may teach the Christian what he should be and wherein his excellency lieth It is life and seriousness that your enemies hate and therefore it is life and seriousness that you must above all maintain though dead-hearted hypocrites never so much oppose and contradict you O sirs they are no trifles but the greatest things that God hath set before you in his Word and called you out to prosecute and possesse and your time of seeking them is short and therefore you have no time fortrifles nor any to lose in idleness and sloath And of all men Preachers should be most sensible of this If they were not against serious holiness in others it is double wickedness for such as they to be against it in themselves It is great things that they have to study and to speak of and such as call for the greatest seriousness and reverence and gravity in the speaker and condemn all trifling in matter or in manner A man that is sent to Christ to run for an immortal crown or to direct others in such a race to save his own or other mens souls from endless misery should be ashamed to fill up his time with trifles or to be slight and cold about such great and weighty things All the heart and soul and might is little enough for matters of such unspeakable importance When I hear Preachers or people spend time in little impertinent fruitless things that do but divert them from the great business of their lives or to dally with the greatest matters rather then to use them and treat of them with a seriousness suitable to their importance I oft think of the words of Seneca the serious Moralin as shaming the hypocrisie of such trifling Preachers and Professors of the Christian faith Verba copiosa componis interrogans vincula nectis dicis Acuta sunt ista Nihil acutius aristâ in quo est utilis Quaedam inutilia inefficacia ipsa subtilitas reddit that is You compose copious words and tye hard knots by curious questions and you say O these are acute things what is more acute then the peal of corn and yet what is it good for subtilty it self makes some things unprofitable and uneffectual Istae ineptiae Poetis relinquantur quibus aures oblectare propositum est dulcem fabulam nectere sed qui ingenia sanare fidem in rebus humanis retinere ac memoriam officiorum animis ingerere volunt serio loquantur inagnis viribus rem agant that is Leave these toyes or fooleries to Poets whose business is to delight the ear and to compose a pleasant fable But they that mean to heal mens understandings and retain credibility among men and to bring into mens minds the remembrance of their duties must speak seriously and do their business with all their might Demens omnibus merito videret He would justly by all be taken for a mad man that when the Town expecteth to be stormed by the enemies and others are busie at work for their defence will sit idle proposing some curious questions Nunquid tibi demens videtur si istis impendero operam nunc obsideor quid agam mors me sequitur vit a fugit Adversus haec me doce aliquid effice ut ego mortem non timeam vita me non effugiat And shall I not be taken for a mad man if I should busie my self about such things that am now besieged what shall I do death pursueth me teach me something against these make death not dreadful to me or life not to fly from me Si multum esset aetatis parce dispensandum erit ut sufficeret necessariis nunc quae dementia est supervacua discere in tanta temporis egestate If we had much time we should sparingly lay it out that it might suffice for necessary things But now what a madness is it to learn things needless or superfluous in so great a scarcity of time Metire ergo aetatem tuam tam multa non capit Measure thy age It s not enough for so many things Relinque istum ludum literarum Philosophis Rem magnificam ad syllabas vocant qui animum minuta discendo diminuunt conterunt id agunt ut Philosophia potius difficilis quam magna videatur Socrates qui totam Philosophiam revocavit ad mores hanc summam dixit esse sapientiam bona malaque distinguere Leave this learned play to Philosophers A gallant business They call us to syllables and debase and depress the mind by learning such little trivial things and make Philosophy rather to seem a matter of difficulty then great Socrates that revoked all Philosophy to manners 〈◊〉 call this the highest wisdom to distinguish good and evil Did a Seneca see by the light of nature so much of the necessity of seriousness and diligence about the matters of the soul and so much of the madness of spending words and time on trifles And yet shall there be found a man among professed Christians and among the Preachers of Faith and Holiness that plead for trifling and scorn at seriousness and count them moderate and wise that a Heathen brands as toyish and distracted What is it that cloudeth the glory of Christianity and keepeth so great a part of the world in Heathenism and Infidelity but this that among Christians there are so few that are Christians indeed and those few are so obscured by the multitude of formal trifling hypocrites that Christianity is measured and judged of by the lives of those that are no Christians Religion is a thing to be demonstrated and honoured and commended by practice words alone are ineffectual to represent its excellency to so blind a world that must know by feeling having lost their sight In our professed faith we mount unto the Heavens and leave poor unbelievers wallowing in the dirt O what a transcendent unconceivable glory do we profess to expect with God unto eternity And what manner of persons should they be in holy conversation and godliness that look for such a life as this How basely should they esteem those transitory things that are the food and felicity of the sensual world How patiently should they undergo contempt and scorn and whatsoever man can inflict upon them How studiously should they devote and refer all their time and strength and wealth and interest to this their glorious blessed end How seriously should they speak of and how industriously should they seek such sure such near such endless joyes Did professed Christians more exactly conform their hearts and lives to their profession and holy rule their lives would confute the reproaches of their enemies and command a reverent and awful estimation from the observers and do more to convince the unbelieving world of the truth and dignity of the Christian faith then all the
words of the most subtile disputant Christianity being an affecting practical Science must practically and affectionately be declared according to its nature Arguments do but paint it out And pictures do no more make known its excellency then the picture of meat and drink makes known its sweetness When a doctrine so holy is visibly exemplified and liveth and walketh and worketh in serious Christians before the world Either this or nothing will convince them and constrain them to glorify our Lord and say that God is among us or in us of a truth Mat. 5. 16. 1 Cor. 14. 25. But it is unchristian lives that darkneth the glory of the Christian Faith When men that profess such glorious hopes shall be as sordidly earthly and sensual and ambitious and impotent and impatient as other men they seem but fantastical dissembles And yet shall there be found such a perfidious wretch under the heavens of God as a professed Minister of Christ that shall subtilly or openly labour to make an exact and holy and heavenly conversation a matter of reproach and scorn and that under pretence of reproving the sins of Hypocrites and Schismaticks shall make the exactest conformity to the Christian rule and faithfullest obedience to the Almighty Soveraign to seem to be but hypocrisie or self-conceitedness or needless trouble if not the way to sedition and publick trouble and turning all things upside down that cannot reprove sin without malicious insinuating slanders or suspitions against the holy law and holy life that are most contrary to sin as life to death as health to sickness and as light to darkness For any man especially any professed Christian any where to oppose or scorn at godliness is a dreadful sign as well as a heinous sin But for a Preacher of Godliness to oppose and scorn at Godliness and that in the Pvlpit while he pretendeth to promote it and plead for it in the name of Christ is a sin that should strike the heart of man with horrour to conceive of Though I cannot subscribe my self to that passage in the second part of the tenth Homily Tom. 2. pag. 150. however I very much love and honour the book of Homilies yet for their sakes that not only can subscribe to it but would have all kept out of the Ministry that cannot and that take it for that Doctrine of the Church of England which they will believe and Preach I will recite it to the terror of the guilty not to drive to despair but to awake them or to shame them for their opposition to the wayes of godliness Expounding Psal 1. 1. Blessed is the man that hath not walked after the counsel of the ungodly nor stood in the way of sinners nor sit in the seat of the scornful having shewed who are the ungodly and the sinners it addeth these words The third sort he calleth scorners that is a sort of men whose hearts are so stuffed with malice that they are not contented to dwell in sin and to lead their lives in all kind of wickedness but also they do contemn and scorn in others all godliness true Religion all honesty and vertue Of the two first sorts of men I will not say but they may take Repentance and he converted unto God Of the third sort I think I may without danger of Gods judgement pronounce that never any yet were converted unto God by Repentance but continued still in their abominable wickedness heaping up to themselves damnation against the day of Gods inevitable judgement Though I dare not say but some such have Repented yet let the scorners that believe this remember that they subscribe the sentence of their own condemnation Though I look upon this sort of the enemies of Holiness as those that are as unlikely to be recovered and saved as almost any people in the world except Apostates and Malicious Blasphemers of the Holy Ghost yet in compassion to the people and themselves I shall plead the cause of God with their consciences and try what Light can do with their understandings and the terrours of the Lord with their hardened hearts 1. A Preacher of the Gospel should much excel the people in understanding And therefore this sin is greater in them then other men what means what light do they sin against Either thou knowest the necessity of serving for salvation with the greatest diligence or thou dost not If not what a sin and shame is it to undertake the sacred Office of the Ministry while thou knowest not the things that are necessary to salvation and that which every Infant in the Faith doth know But if thou dost know it how dost thou make shift maliciously to oppose it without feeling the beginnings of Hell upon thy Conscience When it is thy work to read the Scriptures and meditate on them dost thou not read thy doom and meditate terrour How canst thou choose but perceive that the scope of the word of God is contrary to the bent of thy affections and suggestions Yea what is more evident by the Light of Nature then that God and our salvation cannot be regarded with too much holy seriousness exactness and industry Should not the best things be best loved and the greatest matters have our greatest care And is there any thing to be compared with God and our eternal state O what overwhelming subjects are these to a sober and considerate mind what toyes are all things in comparison of them And yet dost thou make light of them and also teach men so to do As if there were something else that better deserved mens greatest care and diligence then they What a Preacher and not a Believer Or a Believer and yet not see enough in the matters of Eternity to engage all our powers of soul and body against all the world that should stand in competition 2. Is it not sinful and terrible enough to be thy self in a carnal unrenewed state Rom. 1. 13. and to be without the Spirit and life of Christ v. 9. but thou must be so cruel as to make others miserable also Psal 50. 16 17. But to the wicked saith God What hast thou to do to declare my Statutes or that thou shouldest take my Covenant in thy mouth seeing thou hatest instruction and castest my words behind thee Matth. 5. 19. Whosoever shall break one of the least Commandments and shall teach men so he shall be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven But whosoever shall do and teach the same shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven 3. What an aggravation is it of thy impiety and soul-murder that thou art bound by office to teach men that life of holiness which thou oppoposest and to perswade them to that with all thy might which thou endeavourest closely and cunningly to disgrace And wilt thou be a Traytor to Christ in the name of a Messenger and Preacher of the Gospel Wilt thou engage thy self to promote his interest and to use all thy skill