of suffering for Christ when he usually appears most manifestly to his people Didst thou never see one walking in the midst of the fiery furnace with thee like to the Son of God If thou do know him value him as thy life and follow on to know him and thou shalt know incomparably more then this Or if I do but renew thy grief to tell thee of what thou once didst feel but now hast lost I counsel thee to Remember whence thou art fallen and Repent and do the first works and be watchful and strengthen the things which remain and I dare promise thee because God hath promised thou shalt see and know that which here thine Eye could not see nor thy Understanding conceive Beleeve me Christians yea beleeve God You that have known most of God in Christ here it is as nothing to that you shall know It scarce in comparison of that deserves to be called Knowledg The difference betwixt our knowledg now and our knowledg then will be as great as that between our fleshly bodies now and our spiritual glorified bodies then For as these bodies so that knowledg must cease that a more perfect may succeed Our silly childish thoughts of God which now is the highest we reach to must give place to a manly knowledg All this saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 13.8 9 10 11 12. Knowledg shall vanish away For we know in part c. But when that which is perfect is come then that which is in part shall be done away When I was a childe I spake as childe I thought as a childe I understood as a childe but when I became a man I put away childish things For now we see through a glass darkly but then face to face Now I know in part but then I shall know even as also I am known Marvel not therefore Christian at the sence of that place of John 17.3 how it can be life eternal to know God and his Son Christ You must needs know that to enjoy God and his Christ is eternal Life and the souls enjoying is in knowing They that savor only of earth and consult with flesh and have no way to try judg but by sense and never were acquainted with this Knowledg of God nor tasted how gracious he is these think it 's a poor happiness to know God let them have health and wealth and worldly delights and take you the other Alas poor men they that have made tryal of both do not grudg you your delights nor envy your happiness but pity your undoing folly and wish O that you would come near and taste and try as they have done and then Judg Then continue in your former mind if you can For our parts we say with that knowing Apostle though the speech may seem presumptuous 1 John 5.19 20. We know that we are of God and the whole world lieth in wickedness And we know that the Son of God is come and hath given us an understanding that we may know him that is True and we are in him that is True in his Son Jesus Christ This is the true God and eternal Life Here one verse contains the sum of most that I have said The Son of God is come to be our Head and Fountain of Life and so hath given us an understanding that the Soul may be personally qualified and made capable to know him God that is True the Prime Truth and we are brought so near in this enjoyment that we are in him that is True not properly by an essential or personal union but we are in him by being in his Son Jesus Christ. This we have mentioned is the only True God and so the fittest object for our understanding which chuseth Truth and this knowing of him and being in him in Christ is eternal life SECT VII ANd doubtless the Memory will not be Idle or useless in this Blessed work If it be but by looking back to help the soul to value its enjoyment Our knowledg will be enlarged not diminished therefore the knowledg of things past shall not be taken away And what is that knowledg but Remembrance Doubtless from that height the Saint can look behind him and before him And to compare past with present things must needs raise in the Blessed Soul an unconceiveable esteem and sense of its Condition To stand on that Mount whence we can see the Wilderness and Canaan both at once to stand in Heaven and look back on Earth and weigh them together in the ballance of a comparing sense and judgment how must it needs transport the soul and make it cry out Is this the purchase that cost so dear as the blood of God No wonder O blessed price and thrice blessed Love that invented and Condescended Is this the end of Believing Is this the end of the Spirits workings Have the Gales of Grace blown me into such a Harbour Is it hither that Christ hath enticed my Soul O blessed way and thrice blessed end Is this the Glory which the Scripture spoke of and Ministers preached of so much Why now I see the Gospel indeed is good tydings even tydings of peace and Good things tydings of great Joy to all Nations Is my mourning my fasting my sad humblings my heavy walking groanings complainings come to this Is my praying watching fearing to offend come to this Are all my afflictions sickness languishing troublesom physick fears of Death come to this Are all Satans Temptations the worlds Scorns and Jeers come to this And now if there be such a thing as Indignation left how will it here let fly O vile nature that resisted so much and so long such a blessing Unworthy Soul Is this the place thou camest so unwillingly towards Was Duty wearisom Was the world too good to lose Didst thou stick at leaving all denying all and suffering any thing for this Wast thou loath to dye to come to this O false Heart that had almost betrayed me to Eternal flames and lost me this Glory O base flesh that would needs have been pleased though to the loss of this felicity Didst thou make me to question the truth of this Glory Didst thou shew me Improbabilities and draw me to distrust the Lord Didst thou question the Truth of that Scripture which promised this Why my soul art thou not now ashamed that ever thou didst question that Love that hath brought thee hither That thou wast Jealous of the faithfulness of thy Lord That thou suspectest his Love when thou shouldst only have suspected thy self I hat thou didst not Live continually transported with thy Saviours Love and that ever thou quenchedst a motion of his Spirit Art thou not ashamed of all thy hard thoughts of such a God Of all thy mis-interpreting of and grudging at those providences and repining at those ways that have such an end Now thou art sufficiently convinced that the ways thou calledst Hard and the Cup thou calledst Bitter were
they disobeyed whose Ministers they abused whose Servants they hated now sitting to judg them When their own Consciences shall cry out against them and call to their Remembrance all their misdoings Remember at such a time such or such a sin at such a time Christ sued hard for thy Conversion the Minister pressed it home to thy heart thou wast touched to the quick with the Word thou didst purpose and promise returning and yet thou casts off all When an hundred Sermons Sabbaths Mercies shall each step up and say I am witness against the Prisoner Lord I was abused and I was neglected Oh which way will the wretched sinner look Oh who can conceive the terrible thoughts of his heart Now the world cannot help him his old companions cannot help him the Saints neither can nor will onely the Lord Jesus can but Oh there 's the Soul-killing misery he will not Nay without violating the truth of his Word he cannot though otherwise in regard of his Absolute power he might The time was Sinner when Christ would and you would not and now Oh how fain would you and he will not Then he followed thee in vain with entreaties Oh poor Sinner what dost thou Wilt thou sell thy Soul and Saviour for a lust Look to me and be saved Return why wilt thou dye But thy Ear and heart was shut up against all Why now thou shalt cry Lord Lord open to us and he shall say Depart I know you not ye workers of iniquity Now Mercy Mercy Lord Oh but it was Mercy you so long set light by and now your day of Mercy is over What then remains but to cry out to the mountains fall upon us and to the hills O cover us from the presence of him that sits upon the Throne But all in vain For thou hast the Lord of Mountains and hils for thine enemy whose voyce they will obey and not thine Sinner make not light of this for as true as thou livest except a through change and coming in to Christ prevent it which God grant thou shalt shortly to thy unconceiveable horror see that day Oh Wretch Will thy cups then be wine or gall Will they be sweet or bitter Will it comfort thee to think of all thy merry days and how pleasantly thy time slipt away Will it do thee good to think how rich thou wast and how honorable thou wast or will it not rather wound thy very Soul to remember thy folly and make thee with anguish of heart and rage against thy self to cry out Oh Wretch where was thine understanding Didst thou make so light of that sin that now makes thee tremble How couldst thou hear so lightly of the Redeeming Blood of the Son of God How couldst thou quench so many motions of his Spirit and stifle so many quickening thoughts as were cast into thy Soul What took up all that Life's time which thou hadst given thee to make sure work against this day What took up all thy heart thy love and delight which should have been layd out on the Lord Jesus Hadst thou room in thy heart for the worâ—d thy friend thy flesh thy lusts and none for Christ Oh Wretch whom hadst thou to love but him What hadst thou to do but to seek to him and cleave to him and enjoy him Oh wast thou not told of this dreadful day a thousand times till the Commonness of that doctrine made thee weary How couldst thou slight such warnings and rage against the Minister and say he preacheth Damnation Had it not been better to have heard and prevented it then now to endure it Oh now for one offer of Christ for one Sermon for one day of Grace more But too late alass too late Poor careless Sinner I did not think here to have said so much to thee for my business is to refresh the Saints But if these lines do fall into thy hands and thou vouchsafe the reading of them I here charge thee before God and the Lord Jesus Christ who shall judg the quick and the dead at his appearing and his Kingdom that thou make hast and get alone and set thy self sadly to ponder on these things Ask thy heart Is this true or is it not Is there such a day and must I see it Oh what do I then Why trifle I Is it not time full time that I had made sure of Christ and comfort long ago should I sit still another day who have lost so many Had I not at that day rather be found one of the Holy faithful watchful Christians then a worldling a good-fellow or a man of honor Why should I not then choose it now Will it be best then and is it not best now Oh think of these things A few sad hours spent in serious fore-thoughts is a cheap prevention It 's worth this or It 's worth nothing Friend I profess to thee from the Word of the Lord That of all thy sweet sins there will then be nothing left but the sting in thy Conscience which will never out through all eternity except the blood of Christ beleeved in and valued above all the world do now in this day of grace get it out Thy sin is like a Beautiful Harlot while she is young and fresh she hath many followers but when old and withered every one would shut their hands of her she is onely their shame none would know her So will it be with thee now thou wilt venture on it what ever it cost thee but then when mens rebellious ways are charged on their Souls to death O that thou couldst rid thy hands of it O that thou couldst say Lord it was not I Then Lord when saw we thee hungry naked imprisoned How fain would they put it off Then sin will be sin indeed and Grace will be Grace indeed Then say the foolish Virgins Give us of your Oyl for our Lamps are ouâ— Oh for some of your faith holiness which we were wont to mock at But what 's the answer Go buy for your selves we have little enough would we had rather much more Then they will be glad of any thing like Grace and if they can but produce any external familiarity with Christ or Common gifts how glad are they Lord we have eat and drunk in thy presence prophecyed in thy name cast out devils done many wonderful works we have been baptized heard Sermons professed Christianity But alas this will not serve the turn He will profess to them I never knew you Depart from me ye workers of iniquity Oh dead hearted sinner is all this nothing to thee As sure as Christ is true this is true Take it in his own words Math. 25.31 When the Son of man shall come in his Glory and before him shall be gathered all Nations and he shall separate them one from another as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats and he shall set the sheep on the right hand and
or the frequency of the understandings apprehensions this Truth doth make a deeper impression so is longer retained which impâ—â—ssion and retention we call memory And as truth is thus variously presented to the understanding and received by it so also is the goodness of the object variously represented to the will which doth accordingly put forth its various acts When it appeareth only as good in it self and not good for us or suitable it is not the object of the will at all but only this Enuntiation It is good is passed upon it by the Judgment and withal it raiseth an admiration at its excellency If it appeare evil to us then we Nill it But if it appear both good in it self and to us or suitable then it provoketh the affection of Love If the good thus loved do appear as absent from us then it exciteth the passion of Desire If the good so Loved and Desired do appear possible and feasible in the attaining then it exciteth the passion of Hope which is a compound of Desire and Expectation when we look upon it as requiring our endeavor to attain it and as it is to be had in a prescribed way then it provokes the passion of courage or boldness and concludes in resolution Lastly if this good be apprehended as present then it provoketh to delight or Joy If the thing it self be present the Joy is greatest If but the Idea of it either through the remainder or memory of the good that is past or through the fore-apprehension of that which we expect yet even this also exciteth our Joy And this Joy is the perfection of all the rest SECT II. SO that by this time I suppose you see both what are the objects that must move our affections and what powers of the soul apprehend these objects you see also I doubt not what affections you must excite and in what order it is to be done Yet for your better assistance I will more fully direct you in the several particulars 1. Then you must by cogitation go to the memory which is the Magazine or Treasury of the understanding thence you must take forth those heavenly doctrines which you intend to make the subject of your Meditation for the present purpose you may look over any promise of eternal life in the Gospel any description of the glory of the Saints or the very Articles of the Resurrection of the body and the Life everlasting some one sentence concerning those Eternal Joyes may afford you matter for many yeers Meditation yet it will be a point of our wisdom here to have always a stock of matter in our memory that so when we should use it we may bring forth out of our treasury things new and old For a good man hath a good Treasury in his heart from whence he bringeth forth good things Luke 6.45 and out of this abundance of his heart he should speak to himself as well as to others Yea if we took things in order and observed some Method in respect of the matter and did Meditate first on one Truth concerning Eternity and then another it would not be amiss And if any should be barren of Matter through weakness of memory they may have notes or books of this subject for their furtherance SECT III. 2. WHen you have fetcht from your memory the matter of your Meditation your next work is to present it to your Judgment open there the case as fully as thou canst set forth the several ornaments of the Crown the several dignities belonging to the Kingdom as they are partly laid open in the beginning of this Book Let judgment deliberately view them over and take as exact a survey as it can Then put the question and require a determination Is there happiness in all this or not Is not here enough to make me blessed Can he want any thing who fully possesseth God Is there any thing higher for a creature to attain Thus urge thy judgment to pass an upright sentence and compel it to subscribe to the perfection of thy Celestial happiness and to leave this sentence as under its hand upon Record If thy senses should here begin to mutter and to put in a word for fleshly pleasure or profits let judgment hear what each can say weigh the Arguments of the world and flesh in one end and the Arguments for the preheminence of Glory in the other end and judg impartially which should be preferred Try whether there be any comparison to be made which is more excellent which more manly which is more satisfactory and which more pure which freeth most from misery and advanceth us highest and which dost thou think is of longer continuance Thus let deliberate judgment decide it and let not Flesh carry it by noise and by violence And when the sentence is passed and recorded in thy heart it will be ready at hand to be produced upon any occasion and to silence the flesh in its next attempt and to disgrace the world in its next competition Thus exercise thy Judgment in the contemplation of thy Rest thus Magnifie and Advance the Lord in thy heart till a holy admiration hath possessed thy Soul SECT IV. 3. BUt the great work which you may either promise or subjoyn to this as you please is To exercise thy belief of the truth of thy Rest And that both in respect of the truth of the Promise and also the truth of thy own Interest and Title As unbelief doth cause the languishing of all our Graces so Faith would do much to revive and actuate them if it were but revived and actuated it self Especially our belief of the verity of the Scripture I conceive as needful to be exercised and confirmed as almost any point of Faith But of this I have spoken in the Second Part of this Book whither I refer thee for some confirming Arguments Though few complain of their not believing Scripture yet I conceive it to be the commonest part of unbelief and the very root of bitterness which spoileth our Graces Perhaps thou hast not a positive belief of the contrary nor dost not flatly think that Scripture is not the Word of God that were to be a down-right Infidel indeed And yet thou maist have but little belief that Scripture is Gods Word and that both in regard of the habit and the act It s one thing not to beleeve Scripture to be true and another thing positively to beleeve it to be false Faith may be idle and suspend its exercise toward the Truth though it do not yet act against the Truth It may stand still when it goes not out of the way it may be asleep and do you little service though it do not directly fight against you Besides a great deal of unbelief may consist with a small degree of Faith If we did soundly beleeve That there is such a Glory that within a few days our eyes shall behold it O what passions would it
Truth and saved you from the spirit of Giddiness Levity and Apostacy of this age who hath preserved you from those scandals whereby others have so hainously wounded their profession and hath given you to see the mischief of Separation and Divisions and made you eminent for Vnity and Peace when almost all the Land is in a flame of contention and so many that we thought godly are busily demolishing the Church and striving in a zealous ignorance against the Lord. Beloved though few of you are rich or great in the world yet for this riches of mercy towards you I must say Ye are my Glory my Crown and my Joy And for all these rare favors to my self and you as I have oft promised to publish the praises of our Lord so do I here set up this stone of remembrance and write upon it Glory to God in the highest Hitherto hath the Lord helped us My flesh and my heart failed but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever But have all these Deliverances brought us to our Rest No We are as far yet from it as we are from Heaven You are yet under oppression and troubles and I am yet under consuming sickness And feeling that I am like to be among you but a little while and that my pained body is hastening to the dust I shall here leave you my best advice for your immortal souls and bequeath you this counsel as the legacy of a dying man that you may here read it and practise it when I am taken from you And I beseech you receive it as from one that you know doth unfainedly love you and that regardeth no honors or happiness in this world in comparison of the welfare and salvation of your souls yea receive it from me as if I offered it you upon my knees beseeching you for your souls sake that you would not reject it and beseeching the Lord to bless it to you yea as one that hath received authority from Christ to command you I charge you in his name as ever you will answer it when we shall meet at judgment and as you would not have me there be a witness against you nor all my labors be charged against you to your condemnation and the Lord Jesus your Judg to sentence you as rebellious that you faithfully and constantly practise these ten directions 1. Labor to be men of knowledg and sound understandings A sound judgment is a most precious mercy and much conduceth to the soundness of heart and life A weak judgment is easily corrupted and if it be once corrupt the will and conversation will quickly follow Your understandings are the in-let or entrance to the whole soul and if you be weak there your souls are like a Garison that hath open or il-guarded Gates and if the enemy be once let in there the whole City will quickly be his own Ignorance is virtually every error therefore let the Bible be much in your hands and hearts Remember what I taught you on Deut. 6.6 7. Read much the writings of our old solid Divines such as Perkins Bolton Dod Sibbs especially Doctor Preston You may read an able Divine when you cannot hear one especially be sure you learn well the Principles of Religion Begin with the Assemblies lesser Catechism and then learn the greater and next Master Balls with the Exposition and then Doctor Ames his Marrow of Divinity now Englished or Ushers If you see men fall on Controversies before they understand these never wonder if they are drowned in errors I know your povertie and labors will not give you leave to read so much as others may do but yet a willing minde will finde some time if it be when they should sleep and especially it will spend the Lords day wholly in these things O be not ignorant of God in the midst of such light as if the matters of your salvation were less worth your study then your trading in the world 2. Do the utmost you can to get a faithful Minister when I am taken from you and be sure you acknowledg him your Teacher Overseer and Ruler 1 Thess. 5.12 13. Acts 20.28 Heb. 13.7 17. and learn of him obey him and submit to his doctrine except he teach you any singular points and then take the advice of other Ministers in trying it Expect not that he should humor you and please your fancies and say and do as you would have him that is meer Independencie for the people to rule themselves and their Rulers If he be unable to Teach and Guide you do not chuse him at first if he be able be ruled by him even in things that to you are doubtful except it be clear that â—e would turn you from the truth if you know more then he become Preachers your selves if you do not then quarrel not when you should learn especially submit to his private over-sight as well as publike Teaching It is but the least part of a Ministers work which is done in the Pulpit Paul taught them also from house to house day and night with tears Acts 20.20 31. To go daily from one house to another and see how you live and examine how you profit and direct you in the duties of your families and in your preparation for death is the great work Had not weakness confined me and publike labors forbidden me I should judg my self hainously guiltie in neglecting this In the Primitive times every Church of so many souls as this Parish had many Ministers whereof the ablest speakers did preach most impublike and the rest did the more of the less publike work which some mistake for meer Ruling Elders But now Sacriledg and Covetousness will scarce leave maintenance for one in a Church which is it that hath brought us to a loss in the nature of Government 3. Let all your Knowledg turn into Affection and Practice keep open the passage between your heads and your hearts that every Truth may go to the quick Spare not for any pains in working out your salvation Take heed of loitering when your souls lie at the stake Favor not your selves in any slothful distemper Laziness is the damnation of most that perish among us God forbid you should be of the mad opinion of the world That like not serving God so much nor making so much ado to be saved All these men will shortly be of another minde Live now as you would wish you had done at death and judgment Let no scorns dishearten you nor differences of opinion be an offence to you God and Scripture and Heaven and the Way thither are still the same It will do you no good to be of the right Religion if you be not zealous in the exercise of the Duties of that Religion Read oft the fifth and sixt Chapters of the third part of this Book 4. Be sure you make conscience of the great Duties that you are to perform in your families Teach your
And seldom doth a Minister live to see the ripeness of his people but one soweth and planteth another watereth and a third reapeth and receiveth the increase Yet were all this Duty delightful had we but a due proportion of strength But to informe the old ignorant sinner to convince the stubborne and worldly wise to perswade a wilful resolved wretch to prick a stony heart to the quick to make a rock to weep and tremble to set forth Christ according to our necessity and his Excellency to comfort the soul whom God dejecteth to clear up dark and difficult Truths to oppose with convincing Arguments all gainsayers to credit the Gospel with exemplary Conversations when multitudes do but watch for our halting O who is sufficient for these things So that every Relation State Age hath variety of Duty Every conscientious Christian cryes out O the burden or O my weakness that makes it so burdensom But our remaining Rest will ease us of the burden Then will that be sound Doctrine which now is false that the Law hath no more to do with us that it becomes not a Christian to beg for pardon seeing all his sins are perfectly pardoned already that we need not fast nor mourn nor weep nor repent and that a sorrowful Countenance beseems not a Christian Then will all these become Truths SECT XVIII 10. ANd lastly we shall Rest from all those sad affections which necessarily accompany our absence from God The trouble that is mixt in our desires and hopes our longings and waitings shall then cease We shall no more look into our Cabinet and miss our Treasure look into our hearts and miss our Christ nor no more seek him from Ordinance to Ordinance and enquire for our God of those we meet our heart will not lie in our knee nor our souls be breathed out in our requests but all concluded in a most full and blessed Fruition But because this with the former are touched before I will say no more of them now So you have seen what we shall Rest from SECT XIX NInthly The ninth and last Jewel in our Crown and blessed Attribute of this Rest is That it is an Eternal Rest. This is the Crown of our Crown without which all were comparatively little or nothing The very thought of once leaving it would else imbitter all our joys and the more would it peirce us because of the singular excellencies which we must forsake It would be a Hell in Heaven to think of once loosing Heaven As it would be a kinde of Heaven to the damned had they but hopes of once escaping Mortality is the disgrace of all sublunary delights It makes our present life of little value were it not for the reference it hath to God and Eternity to think that we must shortly lay it down How can we take delight in any thing when we remember how short that delight would be That the sweetness of our Cups and Morsels is dead as soon as they are once but paâ—â— our taste Indeed if man were as the beast that knows not his suffering or death till he feel it and little thinks when the knife is whetting that it is making ready to cut his throat then might we be merry till death forbids us and enjoy our delights till they shall forsake us But alas we know both good and evil and evil foreknown is in part endured And thus our knowledg encreaseth our sorrows Eccles. 1.18 How can it chuse but spoil our pleasure while we see it dying in our hands how can I be as merry as the jovial World had I not mine eye fixed upon eternity when methinks I foresee my dying hour my friends waiting for my last gasp and closing mine eyes while tears forbid to close their own Methinks I hear them say He is dead Methinks I see my Coffin made my Grave in digging and my Friends there leaving me in the dust And where now is that we took delight in O but methinks I see at the same view that Grave opening and my dead revived Body rising Methinks I hear that blessed voyce Arise and live and die no more Surely were it not for eternity I should think man a silly piece and all his life and honor but contemptible I should call him with David A vain shadow and with the Prophet Nothing and less then nothing and altogether lighter then vanity it self It utterly disgraceth the greatest glory in mine eyes if you can but truly call it Mortal I can value nothing that shall have an end except as it leads to that which hath no end or as it comes from that love which neither hath beginning nor end I speak this of my deliberate thoughts And if some ignorant or forgetful soul have no such sad thoughts to disturb his pleasure I confess he may be merrier for the present But where is his mirth when he lieth dying Alas it s a poor happiness that consists onely in the Ignorance or Forgetfulness of approaching misery But O blessed eternity where our lives are perplexed with no such thoughts nor our joys interrupted with any such fears where we shall be pillars in Gods Temple and go out no more O what do I say when I talk of Eternity Can my shallow thoughts at all conceive what that most high expression doth contain To be eternally blessed and so blessed Why surely this if any thing is the resemblance of God Eternity is a piece of Infiniteness Then O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory Days and Nights and Yeers Time and End and Death are words which there have no signification nor are used except perhaps to extol eternity as the mention of Hell to extol Heaven No more use of our Calendars or Chronology All the yeers of our Lord and the yeers of our lives are lost and swallowed up in this Eternity While we were servants we held by lease and that but for the term of a transitory life but the Son abideth in the House for ever Our first and earthly Paradise in Eden had a way out but none that ever we could finde in again But this eternal paradise hath a way in a milky way to us but a bloody way to Christ but no way out again For they that would pass from hence to you saith Abraham cannot A strange phrase would any pass from such a place if they might Could they endure to be absent from God again one hour No but upon supposal that they would yet they could not O then my soul let go thy dreams of present pleasures And loose thy hold of Earth and Flesh. Fear not to enter that estate where thou shalt ever after cease thy Fears Sit down and sadly once a day bethink thy self of this Eternity Among all thine Arithmetical numbers study the value of this infinite Cypher which though it stand for nothing in the vulgar account doth yet contain all our Millions
disproportionable to the justice of the Law but Christs doth extend to every title If he intercede there is no denial such is the dignity of his person and the value of his merits that the Father granteth all he desireth He tells us himself that the Father heareth him always His sufferings being a perfect satisfaction to the Law and all power in Heaven and Earth being given to him he is now able to supply every of our wants and to save to the uttermost all that come to him Quest. How can I know his death is sufficient for me if not for all And how is it sufficient for all if not suffered for all Answ. Because I will not interrupt my present discourse with controversie I will say something to this Question by it self in another Tract if God enable me 3. The Soul is also here convinced of the perfect excellency of Jesus Christ both as he is considered in himself and as considered in relation to us both as he is the onely way to the Father and as he is the end being one with the Father Before he knew Christs excellency as a blinde man knows the light of the Sun but now as one that beholdeth its glory And thus doth the Spirit convince the Soul SECT IIII. 3. AFter this sensible conviction the Will discovereth also its change and that in regard of all the four forementioned objects 1. The sin which the understanding pronounceth evil the will doth accordingly turn from with abhorrency Not that the sensitive appetite is changed or any way made to abhor its object but when it would prevail against the conclusions of Reason and carry us to sin against God when Scripture should be the rule and Reason the Master and Sense the Servant This disorder and evil the will abhorreth 2. The misery also which sin hath procured as he discerneth so he bewaileth It is impossible that the soul now living should look either on its trespass against God or yet on its own self-procured calamity without some compunction and contrition He that truly discerneth that he hath killed Christ and killed himself will surely in some measure be pricked to the heart If he cannot weep he can heartily groan and his heart feels what his understanding sees 3. The Creature he now renounceth as vain and turneth it out of his heart with disdain Not that he undervalueth it or disclaimeth its use but his idolatrous abuse and its unjust usurpation There is a twofold sin One against God himself as well as his Laws when he is cast out of the heart and something else doth take his place This is it that I intend in this place The other is when a man doth take the Lord for his God but yet swerveth in some things from his commands of this before It is a vain distinction that some make That the soul must be turned first from sin secondly from the Creature to God For the sin that is thus set up against God is the choice of something below in his stead and no Creature in it self is evil but the abuse of it is the sin Therefore to turn from the Creature is onely to turn from that sinful abuse Yet hath the Creature here a twofold consideration First As it is vain and insufficient to perform what the Idolater expecteth and so I handle it here Secondly As it is the object of such sinful abuse and the occasion of sin and so it falls under the former branch of our turning from sin and in this sense their division may be granted but this is onely a various respect for indeed it is still onely our sinful abuse of the Creature in our vain admirations undue estimations too strong affections and false expectations which we turn from There is a twofold Error very common in the descriptions of the work of Conversion The one of those who onely mention the sinners turning from sin to God without mentioning any receiving of Christ by Faith The other of those who on the contrary onely mention a sinners believing and then think they have said all Nay they blame them as Legalists who make any thing but the bare believing of the love of God in Christ to us to be part of this work and would perswade poor souls to question all their former comforts and conclude the work to have been onely legal and unsound because they have made their changes of heart and turning from sin and Creatures part of it and have taken up part of their comfort from the reviewing of these as evidences of a right work Indeed should they take up here without Christ or take such change in stead of Christ in whole or in part the reprehension were just and the danger great But can Christ be the way where the Creature is the end Is he not onely the way to the Father And must not a right end be intended before right means Can we seek to Christ for to reconcile us to God while in our hearts we prefer the Creature before him Or doth God dispossess the Creature and sincerely turn the heart therefrom when he will not bring the soul to Christ Is it a work that is ever wrought in an unrenewed soul You will say That without Faith it is impossible to please God True but what Faith doth the Apostle there speak of He that cometh to God must believe that God is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him The belief of the Godhead must needs precede the belief of the Mediatorship and the taking of the Lord for our God must in order precede the taking of Christ for our Saviour though our peace with God do follow this Therefore Paul when he was to deal with the Athenian Idolaters teacheth them the knowledg of the Godhead first and the Mediator afterwards But you will say May not an unregenerate man believe that there is a God True and so may he also believe there is a Christ But he can no more cordially accept of the Lord for his God then he can accept of Christ for his Saviour In the soul of every unregenerate man the Creature possesseth both places and is both God and Christ. Can Christ be believed in where our own Righteousness or any other thing is trusted as our Saviour Or doth God ever throughly discover sin and misery and clearly take the heart from all Creatures and Self-righteousness and yet leave the soul unrenewed The truth is where the work is sincere there it is intire and all these parts are truly wrought And as turning from the Creature to God and not by Christ is no true turning so believing in Christ while the Creature hath our hearts is no true believing And therefore in the work of Self-examination whoever would finde in himself a through-sincere work must finde an entire work even the one of these as well as the other In the
their sorrows and that which shakes the whole building is the weakness of their faith about the truth of Scripture though perhaps the other be more perceived and this taken notice of by few There may be great weakness and unsoundness of belief where yet no doubtings are perceived to stir Therefore though we could perswade people to believe never so confidently that Scripture is the very Word of God and yet teach them no more reason why they should believe this then any other book to be that Word as it will prove in them no right way of believing so is it in us no right way of teaching 8. There is many a one who feels his faith shake here who never discovers it To doubt of our Evidences is taken for no great disgrace and therefore men more freely profess such doubts nay and some perhaps who are not much troubled with them because they would be thought to be humble Christians But to question the truth of Scripture is a reproachful Blalphemy and therefore all that are guilty here speak not their doubts 9. Is not the greatest battery by all sort of enemies especially made against this Foundation The first place that the Papist assaults you in is here How know you the Scripture to be the Word of God The Seekers who are the Jesuits By blows though they yet know not their own father will accoast you with the like question How know you that your Scripture and your Ministery is of God The Familists and Libertines do spit their venom here And some Christians by experience are able to testifie that Satans temptations are most violent here Yea and our own carnal deluded Reason is aptest of all to stumble here They talk of a Toleration of all Religions and some desire that the Jews may have free commerce amongst us it will then be time for us I think to be well armed at this point Let the ordinary Professors of our Time who are of weak judgments and fiery spirits look to it how they will stand in such assaults least as now when they cannot answer a Separatist they yield to him and when they cannot answer an Antinomian they turn Antinomians so then when they can much less answer the subtil Arguments of a Jew against Christ and the Gospel they should as easily turn Jews and deny Christ and the verity of the Gospel The Libertines among us think it necessary that we should have such a Toleration to discover the unsound who hold their faith upon Tradition and Custome I am no more of their mindes in this then of his who would have a fair Virgin to lye with him and try his Chastity and make its victory more honorable But if we must needs have such a triall its time to look to the grounds of our belief that we may be ready to give a reason of our Hope 10. However though I were mistaken in all this yet certain I am that the strengthening of our faith in the verity of Scripture would be an exceeding help to the joy of the Saints and would advance their confident hopes of Rest. For my self if my faith in this point had no imperfection if I did as verily believe the Glory to come as I do believe that the Sun will rise again when it is set O how would it raise my desires and my joyes what haste should I make how serious should I be how should I trample on these earthly vanities and even forget the things below How restless should I be till I were assured of this Rest and then how restless till I did possess it How should I delight in the thought of death and my heart leap at the tidings of its approach How glad should I be of the bodies decaies to feel my prison moulder to dust Surely this would be the fruit of a perfect belief of the truth of the Promise of our eternal Rest. Which though it cannot be here expected yet should we use the most strengthening means and press on till we had attained SECT II. THus much I have purposely spoken as to stir up Christians to look to their faith so especialiy to provoke some choise servant of Christ among the multitudes of Books that are written to bestow their labors on this most needful Subject and all Ministers to preach it more frequently and clearly to their people Some think it is Faiths honor to be as credulous as may be and the weaker are the rational grounds the stronger is the faith and therefore we must believe and not dispute Indeed when it s once known to be a Divine Testimony then the most credulous soul is the best But when the doubt is whether it be the Testimony of God or no a man may easily be over-credulous Else why are we bid believe not every spirit but try them whether they be of God or not And how should the false Christs and false Prophets be known who would deceive were it possible the very Elect to be given up of God to believe a lye is one of the sorest of Gods Judgments Some think the onely way to deal with such temptations to Blasphemy is to cast them away and not to dispute them And I think the direction is very good so it be used with some distinction and caution The Rule holds good against reall Blasphemy known to be such but if the person know it not how shall he make use of this Rule against it Further it is supposed that he who knows it to be Blasphemy hath Arguments whereby to prove it such else how doth he know it Therefore here lyes the sin when a man is by sufficient evidence convinced or at least hath Evidence sufficient for conviction that it is a Divine Testimony and yet is still cherishing doubts or hearkning to temptations which may feed those doubts when a man like Balaam will take no answer But he who will therefore cast away all doubts before he hath Arguments sufficient against them or could ever prove the thing in Question he doth indeed cast aside the temptation but not overcome it and may expect it should shortly return again It is a methodicall cure which prevents a relapse Such a neglecter of temptations may be in the right and may as well be in the wrong but however it is not right to him because not rightly believed Faith alwayes implies a Testimony and the knowledg usually of the matter and Author of that Testimony Divine Faith hath ever a Divine Testimony and supposeth the knowledg of the matter when the Faith is particular but always of the Author of that Testimony An implicite Faith in God that is a believing that all is true which he testifieth though we see no reason for it from the evidence of the matter this is necessary to every true Believer But to believe implicitly that the Testimony is Divine or that Scripture is the Word of God this is not to believe God
but to resolve our faith into some humane Testimony even to lay our foundation upon the sand where all will fall at the next assault It s strange to consider how we all abhor that piece of Popery as most injurious to God of all the rest which resolves our faith into the Authority of the Church And yet that we do for the generality of professors content our selves with the same kinde of faith Onely with this difference The Papists believe Scripture to be the Word of God because their Church saith so and we because our Church or our Leaders say so Yea and many Mininisters never yet gave their people better grounds but tell them which is true that it is damnable to deny it but help them not to the necessary Antecedents of Faith If any think that these words tend to the shaking of mens faith I answer First Onely of that which will fall of it self Secondly And that it may in time be built again more strongly Thirdly Or at least that the sound may be surer setled It s to be understood that many a thousand do profess Christianity and zealously hate the enemies thereof upon the same grounds to the same ends and from the same inward corrupt principles as the Jews did hate and kill Christ It is the Religion of the Countrey where every man is reproached that believes otherwise they were born and brought up in this belief and it hath increased in them upon the like occasions Had they been born and bred in the Religion of Mahomet they would have beeen as zealous for him The difference betwixt him and a Mahometan is more that he lives where better Laws and Religion dwell then that he hath more knowledg or soundness of apprehension Yet would I not drive into causless doubtings the soul of any true Believer or make them believe their faith is unsound because it is not so strong as some others Therefore I add some may perhaps have ground for their beliefe though they are not able to expresse it by argumentation and may have Arguments in their hearts to perswade themselves though they have none in their mouths to perswade another yea and those Arguments in themselves may be solid and convincing Some may be strengthened by some one sound Argument and yet be ignorant of all the rest without overthrowing the truth of their Faith Some also may have weaker apprehensions of the Divine authority of Scripture then others and as weaker grounds for their Faith so a lesse degree of assent And yet that assent may be sincere and saving so it have these two qualifications First If the Arguments which we have for believing the Scripture be in themselves more sufficient to convince of its truth then any Arguments of the enemies of Scripture can be to perswade a man of the contrary And do accordingly discover to us a high degree at least of probability Secondly And if being thus far convinced it prevailes with us to chuse this as the onely way of life and to adventure our souls upon this way denying all other and adhering though to the losse of estate and life to the Truth of Christ thus weakly apprehended This I think God will accept as a true Beliefe But though such a faith may serve to salvation yet when the Christian should use it for his consolation he will finde it much faile him even as leggs or arms of the weak or lame which when a man should use them do faile him according to the degrees of their weakness or lameness so much doubting as there remaines of the Truth of the word or so much weakness as there is in our believing or so much darkness or uncertainty as there is in the evidence which perswades us to believe so much will be wanting to our Love Desires Labors Adventures and especially to our joyes Therefore I think it necessary to speak a little and but a little to fortifie the believer against temptations and to confirme his faith in the certain Truth of that Scripture which containes the promises of his Rest. CHAP. III. SECT I. ANd here it is necessary that we first distinguish betwixt 1. The subject matter of Scripture or the doctrine which it contains 2. And the words or writings containing or expressing this doctrine The one is as the blood the other as the veins in which it runs Secondly We must distinguish betwixt 1. the substantiall and fundamentall part of Scriptureâ— doctrine without which there is no salvation and 2. the circumstantiall and less necessary part as Genealogies Successions Chronology c. Thirdly Of the substantiall fundamentall part 1. Some may be known and proved even without Scripture as being written in nature it self 2. some can be known onely by the assent of Faith to Divine Revelation Fourthly Of this last sort 1. some things are above Reason as it is without Divine Revelation both in respect of their Probability existence and futurity 2. others may be known by meer Reason without Divine Testimony in regard of their Possibility and Probability but not in regard of their existence or futurity Fifthly Again matter of Doctrine must be distinguished from matter of fact Sixthly Matter of fact is either 1. such as God produceth in an ordinary way or 2. extrordinary and miraculous Seventhly History and Phophesie must be distinguished Eighthly We must distinguish also the books and writings themselves 1. between the maine scope and those parts which express the chief contents and 2. particular words and phrases not expressing any substantialls Ninthly Also it s one question 1. whether there be a certain number of books which are Canonicall or of Divine Authority and 2. another question what number there is of these and which particular books they are Tenthly The direct expresse sense must be distinguished from that which is only implyed or consequentiall Eleventhly We must distinguish Revelation unwriten from that which is writen Twelfthly and Lastly We must distinguish that Scripture which was spoke or written by God immediatly from that which was spoke or writ immediatly by man and but mediatly by God And of this last sort 1. Some of the instruments or penmen are known 2. Some not known Of those known 1. Some that spoke much in Scripture were bad men 3. others were godly And of these some were 1. More eminent and extraordinary as Prophets and Apostles 2. Others were persons more inferiour and ordinary Again as we must distinguish of Scripture and Divine Testimony so must we also distinguish the apprehension or Faith by which we do receive it 1. There is a Divine Faith when we take the Testimony to be Gods own and so believe the thing testified as upon Gods word Secondly There is a Human Faith when we believe it meerly upon the credit of man 2. Faith is either first implicit when we believe the thing is true though we understand not what it is or secondly explicit when we believe and understand
before a Sunshine day and that God delighteth to work by contraries and to walk in the clouds and to hide the birth in the womb till the very hour of deliverance that I am the less afraid of all this Our unbelief hath been silenced with wonders so oft that I hope we shall trust him the better while we live I know the Sword is a most heavy plague and War is naturally an enemy to Vertue and Civility and wo be to them that delight in bloud or use the Sword but as the last remedy and that promote not Peace to the utmost of their power I know also how unsatisfied many are concerning the lawfulness of the war which hath been managed This is not a time or place to satisfie such I have attempted that largely in another audience And as I cannot yet perceive by any thing which they object but that we undertook our defence upon most warrantable grounds so am I most certaine that God hath wonderfully appeared through the whole And as I am certain by sight and sense that the extirpation of Piety was the enemies great designe which had so far succeeded that the generality of the most able Ministers were silenced Lectures and Evening Sermons on the Lords Day suppressed Christians imprisoned dismembred and banished the Lords Day reproached and devoted to Pastimes that it was as much as a mans estate at lest was worth to hear a Sermon abroad when he had none or worse at home to meet for prayer or any godly exercise and that it was a matter of credit and a way to preferment to revile at and be enemies against those that were most consciencious and every where safer to be a Drunkard or an adulterer then a painfull Christian and that multitudes of humane Ceremonies took place when the worship of Christs institution was cast out besides the slavery that invaded us in civil respects so am I most certain that this was the work which we took up Arms to resist and these were the offenders whom we endeavoured to offend And the generality of those that scruple the lawfulness of our war did never scruple the lawfulness of destroying us nor of that dolefull havock and subversion that was made in the Churches of Christ among us though now perhaps they will acknowledg some of our persecutors miscariages The fault was that we would not dye quietly nor lay down our necks more gently on the block nor more willingly change the Gospel for the Mass-book and our Religion for a fardle of Ceremonies nor betray the hopes of our Posterity to their wils As Dalilah by Sampson so do they by us They accuse us that we do not love them because we will not deliver up our strength that they may put out our eyes and make us their slaves Now the former dangers and miseries are forgotten and the groans of the godly under persecution and of the land under the departure of their freedomes are not heard men begin to forget the state they were in and to be incompetent judges of the former engagement And as bad as they deeme the successe hath yet been sure I am many hundred congregations that were in darknesse and are now in light and multitudes of souls who by these means have been already converted and brought to the knowledge and love of Christ are real Testimenies of our happy change Beside the high hopes of the far greater spreading of the Gospel and the foundation that is laid for the happiness of Posterity I am no Prophet nor well skilled in the interpretation of Scripture prophesies yet the clear and deep engagements of God in this work which I have so evidently discerned do strongly perswade me that in despite of all the policy and hopes of our enemies and of all our own unworthiness folly miscarriages and errors yet God will end this work in mercy and make the Birth which we travell with more beautifull then our slanderous enemies or our unbelieving hearts do yet imagine and that the records of the wonders of this our Age shall even convince the world of the truth of the Promises and consequently That the Scripture is the very word of God In the mean time me thinks I hear Christ as it were saying to me as in my personall so in the Churches dangers and distresses as he did to Peter What I do thou knowest not now but thou shalt know hereafter SECT III. THirdly Consider also of the strange judgements which in all ages have overtaken the most eminent of the enemies of the Scriptures Besides Antiochus Herod Pilate the persecuting emperours especially Julian Church Histories will acquaint you with multitudes more Foxes book of Martyes will tell you of many undeniable remarkable judgements on those adversaries of pure Religion the Papists whose greatest wickedness is against these Scriptures subjecting them to their Church denying them to the people and setting up their Traditions as equall to them Yea our own times have afforded us most evident examples Sure God hath forced many of his enemies to acknowledg in their anguish the truth of his threatnings and to cry out as Julian Vicisti Galilee SECT IV. FOurthly Consider also the eminent Judgements of God that have befallen the vile transgressors of most of his Laws Besides all the voluminous Histories that make frequent mention of this I refer you to Doctor Beard his Theatre of Gods Judgments and the book entituled Gods Judgements upon Sabbath-breakers And it is like your own observation may adde much SECT V. FIfthly Consider further of the eminent providences that have been exercised for the bodies and states of particular believers The strange deliverance of many intended to Martyrdome As you have many instances in the Acts and Monuments besides those in Eusebius and others that mention the stories of the first persecutions If it were convenient here to make particular mention of mens names I could name you many who in these late wars have received such strange preservations even against the common course of nature that might convince an Atheist of the finger of God therein But this is so ordinary that I am perswaded there is scarce a godly experienced Christian that carefully observes and faithfully recordeth the providences of God toward him but is able to bring forth some such experiment and to shew you some such strange and unusuall mercies which may plainly discover an Almighty disposer making good the promises of this Scripture to his servants some in desperate diseases of body some in other apparent dangers delivered so suddenly or so much against the common course of nature when all the best remedies have failed that no second cause could have any hand in their deliverance Sixthly And Lastly Consider the strange and evident dealings of God with the souls and consciences both of believers and unbelievers What pangs of hellish despaire have many enemies of the truth been brought to How doth God extend the spirits of
this is a lower excellency then Scripture was intended to And thus I have done with this weighty Subject That the Scripture which contains the Promises of our Rest is the certain infallible VVord of God The reason why I have thus digressed and said so much of it is because I was very apprehensive of the great necessity of it and the common neglect of being grounded in it and withall that this is the very heart of my whole Discourse and that if this be doubted of all the rest that I have said will be in vain If men doubt of the Truth they will not regard the goodness And the reason why I have said no more but passed over the most common Arguments is because they are handled in many books already which I advise Christians to be better versed in To the meer English Reader I commend especially these Sir Phil. Mornay Lord du Plessis his Verity of Christian Religion Parsons Book of Resolution Corrected by Bunny the Second Part. Dr. Jackson on the Creed and come forth since I begun this Mr. White of Dorchester Directions for Reading Scripture Mr. John Goodwins Divine Authority of Scripture asserted though some of his Positions I judg unsound yet the Work for the main is commendable Also Read a Book Called A Treatise of Divinity first Part. Written by our honest and faithful Countryman Colonel Edward Leigh a now Member of the House of Commons Also Vrsins Catachism on this Question and Balls Catachism with the Exposition which to those that cannot read larger Treatises is very usefull For the Question How it may be known which books be Canonical I here meddle not with it I think Humane Testimony with the forementioned qualifications must do most in determining that As I begun so I conclude this with an earnest request to Ministers that they would Preach and People that they would study this subject more throughly that their Faith and Obedience may live and flourish while they can prove the Scripture to be the Word of God which contains the Promise of their Everlasting Rest. CHAP. VIII Rest for none but the people of God proved SECT I. IT may here be expected that as I have proved That this Rest remaineth for the people of God so I should now prove that it remaineth onely for them and that the rest of the world shall have no part in it But the Scripture is so full and plain in this that I suppose it needless to those who believe Scripture Christ hath resolved that those who make light of him and the offers of his Grace shall never taste of his Supper And that without holiness none shall see God And that except a man be regenerate and born again he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God That he that believes not shall not see life but the wrath of God abideth on him That no unclean person nor covetous nor railer nor drunkard c. shall enter into the Kingdom of Christ and of God Ephes. 5.4 5. That the wicked shall be turned into hell and all they that forget God That all they shall be damned that obey not the Truth but have pleasure in unrighteousness 2 Thes. 2.12 That Christ will come in flaming fire to take vengeance on them that know not God and obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power And Christ himself hath opened the very maner of their process in judgment and the sentence of their condemnation to eternal fire prepared for the devil and his Angels Matth. 25. So that here is no Rest for any but the people of God except you will call the intollerable everlasting flames of Hell a Rest. And it were easie to manifest this also by Reason For first Gods Justice requires an inequality of mens state hereafter as there was of their lives here And secondly They that walk not in the way of Rest and use not the means are never like to obtain the End They would not follow Christ in the Regeneration nor accept of Rest upon his conditions they thought him to be too hard a Master and his way too narrow and his Laws too strict They chose the pleasures of sin for a season rather then to suffer affliction with the people of God They would not suffer with Christ that so they might raign with him What they made choise of that they did injoy They had their good things in this life and what they did refuse it is but reason they should want How oft would Christ have gathered them to him and they would not And he useth to make men willing before he save them and not to save them against their wils Therefore will the mouths of the wicked be stopped for ever and all the world shall acknowledg the Justice of God Had the ungodly but returned before their life was expired and been heartily willing to accept of Christ for their Saviour and their King and to be saved by him in his way and upon his most reasonable tearms they might have been saved Object But may not God be better then his Word and save those that he doth not promise to save Answ. But not false of his word in saving those whom he hath said he will not save Mens souls are in a doleful case when they have no hope of Happiness except the Word of God prove false To venture a mans eternal salvation upon Hope that God will be better then his word that is in plain English that the God of Truth will prove a lyer is somewhat beyond stark madness which hath no name bad enough to express it Yet I do believe that the description of Gods people in England and in America must not be the same because as Gods Revelations are not the same so neither is the actual Faith which is required in both the same and as the Written and Positive Laws in the Church were never given them so obedience to those meer Positives is not required of them Whether then the threats against unbelievers be meant of Unbelief privative and positive only and not negative such as is all non-believing that which was never revealed Or whether their believing that God is and that he is a Rewarder of them that seek him will serve the turn there Or whether God hath no people there I acknowledg again is yet past my understanding CHAP. IX Whether the Souls departed enjoy this Rest SECT I. I Have but one thing more to clear before I come to the Use of this doctrine And that is Whether this Rest remain till the resurrection before we shall enjoy it Or whether we shall have any possession of it before The Socinians and many others of late among us think that the soul separated from the body is either nothing or at least not capable of happiness or misery Truly if it
might have obtained it If I had striven I might have had the mastery If I had fought valiantly I had been crowned SECT VIII THirdly It will yet more torment them to remember not only the possibility but the great Probability that once they were in to obtain the Crown and prevent the misery It will then wound them to think Why I had once the gales of the spirit ready to have assisted me I was fully purposed to have been another man to have cleaved to Christ and to have forsook the world I was almost resolved to have been wholly for God I was once even turning from my base seducing lusts I was purposed never to take them up again I had even cast off my old companions and was resolved to have associated my self with the godly And yet I turned back and lost my hold and broak my promises and slacked my purposes Almost God had perswaded me to be a reall Christian and yet I conquered those perswasions What workings were in my heart when a faithfull Minister pressed home the truth O how fair was I once for Heaven I had almost had it and yet I have lost it If I had but followed on to seek the Lord and brought those beginnings to maturity and blown up the spark of desires and purposes which were kindled in me I had now been blessed among the Saints Thus will it wound them to remember what hopes they once had and how a little more might have brought them over to Christ and have set their feet in the way of peace SECT IX FOurthly Furthermore it will exceedingly torment them to remember the fair opportunity that once they had but now have lost To look back upon an age spent in vanity when his salvation lay at the stake To think How many weeks and months and yeers did I lose which if I had improved I might now have been happy Wretch that I was Could I finde no time to study the work for which I had all my time Had I no time among all my labours to labour for eternity Had I time to eat and drink and sleep and work and none to seek the saving of my soul Had I time for sports and mirth and vain discourse and none for prayer or meditation on the life to come Could I take time to look to my estate in the world And none to try my title to Heaven and to make sure of my spirituall and everlasting state O pretious time whither art thou fled I had once time enough and now I must have no more I had so much that I knew not what to do with it I was fain to devise pastimes and to talk it away and trifle it away and now it is gone and cannot be recalled O the golden hours that I did enjoy Had I spent but one yeer of all those yeers or but one month of all those months in through examination and unfeigned conversion and earnest seeking God with my whole heart it had been happy for me that ever I was born But now its past my dayes are cut off my glass it run my Sun is set and will rise no more God himself did hold me the candle that I might do his work and I loitered till it was burnt out And now how fain would I have more but cannot O that I had but one of those yeers to live over again O that it were possible to recall one day one hour of that time Oh that God would turn me into the world and try me once again with another lives time How speedily would I repent How earnestly would I pray And lye on my knees day and night How diligently would I hear How carefully would I examine my spirituall state How watchfully would I walk How strictly would I live But it s now too late alas too late I abused my time to vanity whilest I had it and now I must suffer justly for that abuse Thus will the remembrance of the time which they lost on earth be a continuall torment to these condemned souls SECT X. FIfthly And yet more will it add to their calamity to remember how often they were perswaded to return both by the ministery in publike and in private by all their godly faithfull friends every request and exhortation of the Minister will now be as a fiery dart in his spirit How fresh will every Sermon come now into his minde even those that he had forgotten as soon as heard them He even seems to hear still the voice of the Minister and to see his tears O how fain would he have had me to have escaped these torments How earnestly did he intreat me With what love and tender compassion did he beseech me How did his bowels yearn over me And yet I did but make a jest of it and hardened my heart against all this How oft did he convince me that all was not well with me And yet I stifled all these convictions How plainly did he rip up my sores And open to me my very heart And shew me the unsoundness and deceitâ—fulness of it And yet I was loath to know the worst of my self and therefore shut mine eyes and would not see O how glad would he have been after all his study and prayers and pains if he could but have seen me cordially entertain the truth and turn to Christ He would have thought himself well recompenced for all his labors and sufferings in his work to have seen me converted and made happy by it And did I withstand and make light of all this Should any have been more willing of my happiness then my self Had not I more cause to desire it then he Did it not more neerly concern me It was not he but I that was to suffer for my obstinacie He would have laid his hands under my feet to have done me good he would have fallen down to me upon his knees to have begged my obedience to his message if that would have prevailed with my hardened heart O how deservedly do I now suffer these flames who was so forewarned of them and so intreated to escape them Nay my friends my parents my godly neighbours did admonish and exhort me They told me what would come of my wilfulness and negligence at last but I did neither believe them nor regard them Magistrates were fain to restrain me from sinning by Law and punishment Was not the foresight of this misery sufficient to restraine me Thus wil the Remembrance of all the means that ever they enjoyed be fuell to feed the flames in their consciences O that sinners would but think of this when they sit under the plain instruction and pressing exhortations of a faithfull Ministry How dear they must pay for all this if it do not prevaile with them And how they will wish a thousand times in the anguish of their souls that they had either obeyed his doctrine or had never heard him The melting words of
tells us plainly who shall be saved and who shall not So that if men would but first search the Word to find out who be these men that shall have Rest and what be their properties by which they may be known and then next search carefully their own hearts till they find whether they are those men or not how could they chuse but come to some Certainty But alas either men understand not the nature and use of this duty or else they will not be at the pains to try Go through a Congregation of a thousand men and how few of them shall you meet with that ever bestowed one hour in all their lives in a close Examination of their title to Heaven Ask thy own Conscience Reader When was the time and where was the place that ever thou solemnly tookest thy heart to task as in the sight of God and examined it by Scripture Interrogatories Whether it be Born again and Renewed or not Whether it be Holy or not Whether it be set most on God or on creatures on Heaven or on Earth and didst follow on this Examination till thou hast discovered thy Condition and so past sentence on thy self accordingly But because this is a Work of so high Concernment and so commonly neglected and mens Souls do so much languish every where under this neglect I will therefore though it be Digressive 1. Shew you That it is possible by trying to come to a Certainty 2. Shew you the hinderances that keep men from trying and from Assurance 3. I will lay down some Motives to perswade you to it 4. I will give you some Directions how you should perform it 5. And lastly I will lay you down some Marks out of Scripture by which you may try and so come to an infallible Certainty Whether you are the People of God for whom this Rest Remaineth or no. And to prepare the way to these I will a little first open to you what Examination is and what that Certainty is which we may expect to attain to SECT III. THis Self-Examination is An enquiry into the course of our lives but more especially into the inward Acts of our Souls and trying of their Sincerity by the Word of God and accordingly Judging of our Real and Relative Estate So that Examination containeth severall Acts 1. There must be the Tryal of the Physical Truth or Sincerity of our Acts That is An enquiry after the very Being of them As whether there be such an Act as Belief or Desire or Love to God within us or not This must be discovered by Conscience and the internal sense of the Soul whereby it is able to feel and perceive its own Acts and to know whether they be Real or Counterfeit 2. The next is The Tryal of the Moral Truth or Sincerity of our Acts Whether they are such as agree with the Rule and the Nature of their Objects This is the discursive work of Reason comparing our Acts with the Rule It implyeth the former knowledg of the Being of our Acts and it implyeth the knowledg of Scripture in the point in question and also the Belief of the Truth of Scripture This Moral Spiritual Truth of our Acts is another thing far different from the Natural or Physical Truth as far as a Mans Being differeth from his Honesty One man loveth his wife under the notion of an harlot or only to satisfie his lust Another loveth his wife with a true Conjugal Affection The former is True Physical Love or true in point of Being but the latter only is True Moral Love The like may be said in regard of all the Acts of the Soul There is a Believing Loving Trusting Fearing Rejoycing all True in point of Being and not counterfeit which yet are all false in point of Morality and right-being and so no gracious Acts at all 3. The third thing contained in the Work of Self-Examination is The Judging or Concluding of our Real Estate that is of the habitual temper or disposition of our Hearts by the quality of their Acts Whether they are such Acts as prove a Habit of Holiness or only some slight Disposition or whether they are only by some Accident enticed and enforced and prove neither Habit nor Disposition The like also of our Evil Acts. Now the Acts which prove a Habit must be 1. Free and chearful not constrained or such as we had rather not do if we could help it 2. Frequent if there be opportunity 3. Through and Serious Where Note also That the Tryal of the Souls Disposition by those Acts which make after the End as Desire Love c. to God Christ Heaven is always more Necessary and more Certain then the tryal of its Disposition to the Means only 4. The last Act in this Examination is To Conclude or Judg of our Relative Estate from the former Judgment of our Acts and Habits As if we find sincere Acts we may Conclude that we have the Habits so from both we may Conclude of our Relation So that our Relations or Habits are neither of them felt or known immediately but must be gathered from the knowledg of our Acts which may be felt As for Example 1. I enquire whether I Believe in Christ or Love God 2. If I find that I do then I enquire next whether I do it sincerely according to the Rule and the Nature of the Object 3. If I find that I do so then I conclude that I am Regenerate or Sanctified 4. And from both these I conclude that I am Pardoned Reconciled Justified and Adopted into sonship and title to the Inheritance All this is done in a way of Reasoning thus 1. He that Believes in Spiritual Sincerity or He that Loves God in Spiritual Sincerity is a Regenerate Man But I do so Believe and Love Therefore I am Regenerate 2. He that Believes in Sincerity or He that is Regenerate for the Conclusion will follow upon either is also Pardoned Justified and Adopted But I do so Believe or I am Regenerate Therefore I am Justified c. SECT IV. THus you see what Examination is Now let us see what this Certainty or Assurance is And indeed It is nothing else but the Knowledg of the forementioned Conclusions that we are Sanctified Justified shall be Glorified as they arise from the premises in the work of Examination So that here you may observe how immediately this Assurance followeth the Conclusion in Examination and so how necessary Examination is to the obtaining of Assurance and how conducible thereunto Also that we are not speaking of the Certainty of the Object or of the thing in it self considered but of the Certainty of the Subject or of the thing to our Knowledg Also you may observe that before we can come to this Certainty of the Conclusion That we are Justified and shall be Glorified there must be a Certainty of the Premises And in respect of the Major Proposition He that Believeth
that they may well be said to Witness Together Not one laying down the intire Conclusion of it self That we are the Children of God and then the other attesting the same entirely again of it self But as concurrent Causes to the same Numerical Conclusion But this with Submission to better Judgments and further Search By this also you may see that the common distinction of Certainty of Adherence and Certainty of Evidence must be taken with a grain or two of salt For there is no Certainty without Evidence no more then there is a Conclusion without a Medium A small degree of Certainty hath some small glimpse of Evidence Indeed 1. the Assent to the truth of the promise 2. and the Acceptation of Christ offered with his benefits are both before and without any sight or consideration of Evidence and are themselves our best Evidence being that Faith which is the Condition of our Justification But before any man can in the least Assurance conclude that he is the Child of God and Justified he must have some Assurance of that Mark or Evidence For who can conclude Absolutely that he shall receive the thing contained in a Conditional Promise till he know that he hath performed the Condition For those that say There is no Condition to the New Covenant I think them not worthy a word of confutation And for their Assertion That we are bound immediately to Believe that we are Justified and in special Favour with God It is such as no man of competent knowledg in the Scripture and belief of its truth can once imagine For if every man must believe this then most must believe a lye for they never shall be Justified yea all must at first believe a lye for they are not Justified till they believe and the believing that they are Justified is not the faith which Justifieth them If only some men must believe this how shall it be known who they be The truth is That we are Justified is not properly to be Believed at all For nothing is to be Believed which is not written but it is no where written that you or I are Justified only one of those premises is written from whence we may draw the Conclusion That we are Justified if so be that our own hearts do afford us the other of the Premises So that Our Actual Justification is not a matter of meer Faith but a Conclusion from Faith and Conscience together If God have no where promised to any man Justification immediately without Condition then no man can so believe it but God hath no where promised it Absolutely therefore c. Nor hath he declared to any man that is not first a Believer that he loveth him with any more then a common love Therefore no more can be believed but a common love to any such For the Eternal Love and Election is manifest to no man before he is a Believer SECT V. 2. HAving thus shewed you what Examination is and what Assurance is I come to the second thing promised To shew you That such an Infallible Certainty of Salvation may be attained and ought to be laboured for though a Perfect Certainty cannot here be attained And that Examination is the means to attain it In which I shall be the briefer because many writers against the Papists on this point have said enough already Yet somewhat I will say 1. because it is the common conceit of the Ignorant Vulgar That an Infallible Certainty cannot be attained 2. and many have taught and printed That it is only the Testimony of the Spirit that can assure us and that this proving our Justification by our Sanctification and searching after Marks and Signs in our selves for the procuring of Assurance is a dangerous and deceitful way Thus we have the Papists the Antinomians and the ignorant Vulgar conspiring against this doctrine of Assurance and Examination Which I maintain against them by these Arguments 1. Scripture tells us we may know that the Saints before us have known their Justification and future Salvation 2 Cor. 5.1 Rom. 8.36 Joh. 21.15 1 Joh. 5.19 4.13 3.14 24. 2.3 5. Rom. 8.15 16 36. Ephes. 3.12 I refer you to the places for brevity 2. If we may be certain of the Premises then may we also be certain of the undenyable Conclusion of them But here we may be certain of both the Premises For 1. That whosoever believeth in Christ shall not perish but shall have everlasting life is the voyce of the Gospel and therefore that we may be sure of That we are such Believers may be known by Conscience and internal Sense I know all the question is in this Whether the Moral Truth or Sincerity of our Faith and other Graces can be known thus or not And that it may I prove thus 1. From the natural use of this Conscience and internal Sense which is to acquaint us not only with the Being but the Qualifications of the Acts of our Souls All voluntary Motions are Sensible And though the heart is so deceitful that no man can certainly know the heart of another and with much difficulty clearly know their own yet by diligent observation and examination known they may be for though our inward Sense and Conscience may be depraved yet not extirpated or quite â—â—â—â—inguished 2. The Commands of Believing Repenting c. were in Vain especially as the Condition of the Covenant if we could not know whether we perform them or not 3. The Scripture would never make such a wide difference between the Godly and the Wicked the Children of God and the Children of the Devil and set forth the happiness of the one and the misery of the other so largely and make this Difference to run through all the veins of its doctrine if a man cannot know which of these two estates he is in 4. Much less would the Holy Ghost urge us to give all diligence to make our Calling and Election sure if it could not be done 2 Pet. 1.10 And that this is not meant of Objective Certainty but of Subjective appeareth in this That the Apostle mentioneth not Salvation or any thing to come but Calling and Election which to Believers were Objectively Certain before as being both past 5. And to what purpose should we be so earnestly urged to examine and prove and try our selves Whether we be in the Faith and whether Christ be in us or we be Reprobates 1 Cor. 11.28 and 2 Cor. 13.5 Why should we search for that which cannot be found 6. How can we obey those precepts which require us to Rejoyce always 1 Thes. 5.16 to call God our Father Luk. 11.2 to live in his Praises Psal. 49.1 2 3 4 5. and to long for Christs Coming Rev. 22.17 20. 1 Thes. 1.10 and to comfort our selves with the mention of it 1 Thes. 4.18 which are all the Consequents of Assurance Who can do any of these heartily that is not
temper of the person All meats are not for all stomacks One man will vomit that up again in your face which another will digest 1. If it be a learned or ingenious rational man you must deal more by convincing Arguments and less by passionate perswasions 2. If it be one that is both ignorant and stupid there is need of both 3. If one that is convinced but yet is not converted you must use most those means that rouze up the affections 4. If they be obstinate and secure you must reprove them sharply 5. If they be of timorous tender natures and apt to dejections or distraction they must be tenderly dealt with All cannot bear that rough dealing as some can Love and Plainness and Seriousness takes with all but words of terror some can scarce bear This is as we say of stronger Physick Hellebore Colloquintida c. nec puero nec seni nec imbecillo sed robusto c. not fit for every complexion and state 3. You must be wise also in using the aptest expressions Many a Minister doth deliver most excellent necessary matter in such unsavory harsh and unseemly language that it makes the hearers loath the food that they should live by and laugh at a Sermon that might make them quake Especially if they be men of curious ears and carnal hearts and have more common wit and parts then the speaker And so it is in private Exhortation as well as publique If you cloath the most amiable beautiful Truth in the sordid rags of unbeseeming language you will make men disdain it as monstrous and deformed though it be the off-spring of God and of the highest nature SECT X. 7. LEt all your Reproofs and Exhortations be backed with the Authority of God Let the sinner be convinced that you speak not from your selves or of your own head Shew them the very words of Scripture for what you say Turn them to the very Chapter and Verse where their sin is condemned and where the duty is commanded Press them with the Truth and Authority of God Ask them whether they beleeve that this is his Word and that his Word is true So much of God as appeareth in our Words so much will they take The voyce of man is contemptible but the voyce of God is awful and terrible They can and may reject your words that cannot nor dare reject the words of the Almighty Be sure therefore to make them know that you speak nothing but what God hath spoken first SECT XI 8. YOu must also be Frequent with men in this Duty of Exhortation It is not once or twice that usually will prevail If God himself must be constantly solicited as if importunity could prevail with him when nothing else can and therefore require us always to pray and not to wax faint the same course no doubt will be most prevailing with men Therefore are we commanded to Exhort one another dayly and with all long-suffering As Lypsius saith The fire is not always brought out of the flint at one stroke nor mens affections kindled at the first exhortation And if they were yet if they be not followed they will soon grow cold again Weary out sinners with your loving and earnest entreaties Follow them and give them no rest in their sin This is true Charity and this is the way to save mens Souls and a course that will afford you comfort upon review SECT XII 9. STrive to bring all your Exhortations to an Issue Stick not in the work done but look after the success and aim at that end in all your speeches I have long observed it in Ministers and private men that if they speak never so convincing powerful words and yet their hearts do not long after the success of them with the hearers but all their care is over when they have done their speech pretending that having done their duty they leave the Issue to God these men do seldom prosper in their labors But those whose very heart is set upon the work and that long to see it take for the hearers conversion and use to enquire how it speeds God usually blesseth their labors though more weak Labor therefore to drive all your speeches to the desired Issue If you are reproving a sin cease not till if it may be you have got the sinner to promise you to leave it and to avoyd the occasions of it If you are exhorting to a Duty urge the party to promise you presently to set upon it If you would draw them to Christ leave not till you have made them confess that their present unregenerate state is miserable and not to be rested in and till they have subscribed to the necessity of Christ and of a change and till they have promised you to fall close to the use of means O that all Christians would be perswaded to take this course with all their Neighbors that are yet in the flesh that are enslaved to sin and strangers to Christ SECT XIII 10. LAstly Be sure that your Examples may Exhort as well as your words Let them see you constant in all the Duties that you perswade them to Let them see in your lives that difference from sinners and that excellency above the world which you perswade them to in your speeches Let them see by your constant Labors for Heaven that you do indeed beleeve that which you would have them to beleeve If you tell others of the admirable Joys of Heaven and your selves do nothing but drudg for the world and are as much taken up in striving to be rich or as quarrelsom with your Neighbors in a case of commodity as any others who will then beleeve you or who will be perswaded by you to seek the everlasting riches Will they not rather think that you perswade them to look after another world and to neglect this that so you might have the more of it to your self Let not men see you proud while you exhort them to be humble nor to have a seared Conscience in one thing while you would have theirs tender in another An innocent life is a continual powerful reproof to the wicked And the constant practice of a holy and heavenly life is a constant disquietment to the Conscience of a Worldling and a constant solicitation of him to change his course And thus I have opened to you the first and great part of this Duty consisting in private familiar Exhortation for the helping of poor Souls to this Rest that are out of the way and have yet no Title to it and I have shewed you also the maner how to perform it that you may succeed I will now speak a little of the next part SECT XIV BEsides the duty of private admonition you must do your utmost endevors to help men to profit by the publique Ordinances And to that end you must do these things 1. Do your endevors for the procuring of Faithful Ministers where
chiefly pressed those Duties which must be used for the attainment of this Everlasting Rest. In this I shall chiefly handle those which are necessary to raise the heart to God and to our Heavenly and comfortable life on Earth It is a Truth too evident which an inconsiderate Zealot reprehended in Master CULVERWELL as an Error That many of Gods Children do not enjoy that sweet Life and blessed Estate in this World which God their Father hath provided for them That is Which he offereth them in his Promises and chargeth upon them as their duty in his Precepts and bringeth even to their hands in all his Means and Mercies God hath set open Heaven to us in his Word and told every humble sincere Christian That they shall shortly there live with himself in unconceiveable Glory and yet where is the person that is affected with this Promise whose heart leaps for joy at the hearing of the news or that is willing in hopes of Heaven to leave this World But even the godly have as strange unsavory thoughts of it as if God did but delude us and there were no such Glory and are almost as loath to die as men without hope The consideration of this strange disagreement between our Professions and Affections caused me to suspect that there was some secret lurking unbelief in all our hearts and therefore I wrote those Arguments in the second Part for the Divine Authority of the Scripture And because I finde another cause to be the carelesness forgetfulness and idleness of the Soul and not keeping in action that Faith which we have I have here attempted the removal of that cause by prescribing a course for the daily acting of those Graces which must fetch in the Celestial Delights into the heart O the Princely joyful blessed Life that the godly lose through meer idleness As the Papists have wronged the merits of Christ by their ascribing too much to our own Works so it is almost incredible how much they on the other extream have wronged the safety and consolation of mens Souls by telling them that their own endevors are onely for Obedience and Gratitude but are not so much as Conditions of their Salvation or Means of their increased Sanctification or Consolation And while some tell them That they must look at nothing in themselves for Acceptation with God or Comfort and so make that Acceptance and Comfort to be equally belonging to a Christian and a Turk And others tell them That they must look at nothing in themselves but onely as signes of their good Estate This hath caused some to expect onely Enthusiastick Consâ—lations and others to spend their days in enquiring after signes of their sincerity Had these poor Souls well understood that Gods way to perswade their wills and to excite and actuate their Affections is by the Discourse Reasoning or Consideration of their Vnderstandings upon the Nature and Qualifications of the Objects which are presented to them And had they bestowed but that time in exercising holy Affections and in serious Thoughts of the promised Happiness which they have spent in enquiring onely after Signes I am confident according to the ordinary Workings of God they would have been better provided both with Assurance and with Joyes How should the Heir of a Kingdom have the comfort of his Title but by fore-thinking on it It s true God must give us our Comforts by his Spirit But how by quickening up our souls to beleeve and consider of the promised Glory and not by comforting us we know not how nor why or by giving men the foretasts of Heaven when they never think of it I have here prescribed thee Reader the delightfullest task to the Spirit and the most tedâ—ous to the Flesh that ever men on Earth were imployed in I did it first onely for my self but am loath to conceal the means that I have found so consolaâ—ory If thou be one that wilt not be perswaded to a course so laborious but wilt onely go on in thy task of common formal duties thou mayest let it alone and so be destitute of delights except such as the World and thy Forms can afford thee but then do not for shame complain for want of comfort when thou dost wilfully reject it And be not such an Hypocrite as to pray for it while thou dost refuse to labor for it If thou say Thy comfort is all in Christ I must tell thee it is a Christ remembred and loved and not a Christ forgotten or onely talked of that will solidly comfort Though the Directory for Contemplation was onely intended for this Part yet I have now premised two other Uses The heart must be taken off from Resting on Earth before it will be fit to converse above The first Part of saving Religion is the taking God onely for our End and Rest. CHAP. I. USE VI. Reproving our Expectations of Rest on Earth SECT I. DOth this Rest remain How great then is our sin and folly to seek and expect it here Where shall we finde the Christian that deserves not this Reproof Surely we may all cry guilty to this accusation We know not how to enjoy convenient Houses Goods Lands and Revenues but we seek Rest in these enjoyments We seldom I fear have such sweet and heart contenting thoughts of God and Glory as we have of our earthly delights How much Rest do the voluptuous seek in Buildings Walks Apparel Ease Recreations Sleep pleasing Meats and Drinks merry Company Health and Strength and long Life Nay we can scarce enjoy the necessary Means that God hath appointed for our Spiritual good but we are seeking Rest in them Do we want Minister Godly Society or the like helps O think we if it were but thus and thus with us we were well Do we enjoy them O how we settle upon them and bless our selves in them as the rich fool in his wealth Our Books our Preachers Sermons Friends Abilities for Duty do not our hearts hug them and quiet themselves in them even more then in God Indeed in words we disclaim it and God hath usually the preheminence in our tongues and professions but it s too apparent that it s otherwise in our hearts by these Discoveries First Do we not desire these more violently when we want them then we do the Lord himself Do we not cry out more sensibly O my Friend my Goods my Health then O my God! Do we not miss Ministry and Means more passionately then we miss our God Do we not bestir our selves more to obtain and enjoy these then we do to recover our communion with God Secondly Do we not delight more in the Possession of these then we do in the fruition of God himself Nay be not those mercies and duties most pleasant to us wherein we stand at greatest distance from God We can read and study and confer preach and hear day after day without much weariness because in these we have to do with
fruit perhaps we should be sooner drawn unto them and we should itch as the Bethshemites to be looking into this Ark. Sure I am where God hath forbidden us to place our thoughts and our delights thither it is easâ—y enough to draw them If he say Love not the World nor the things of the World we dote upon it never the less We have love enough if the world require it and thoughts enough to pursue our profits How delightfully and unweariedly can we think of vanity and day after day imploy our mindes about the Creature And have we no thoughts of this our Rest How freely and how frequently can we think of our pleasures our friends our labors our flesh our lusts our common studies or news yea our very miseries our wrongs our sufferings and our seats But vvhere is the Christian vvhose heart is on his Rest Why Sirs vvhat is the matter vvhy are vve not taken up vvith the vievvs of Glory and our souls more accustomed to these delightful Meditations Are vve so full of joy that vve need no more or is there no matter in Heaven for our joyous thoughts or rather are not our hearts carnal and blockish Earth vvill to Earth Had vve more Spirit it vvould be othervvise with us As the Jews use to cast to the ground the Book of Esther before they read it because the Name of God is not in it And as Austin cast by Ciceroes writings because they contained not the Name of Jesus So let us humble and cast dovvn these sensual hearts that have in them no more of Christ and Glory As we should not own our duties any further then somewhat of Christ is in them so should we no further own our hearts And as we should delight in the creatures no further then they have reference to Christ and Eternity so should we no further approve of our own hearts If there were little of Christ and Heaven in our mouths but the world were the onely subject of our speeches then all would account us to be ungodly why then may we not call our hearts ungodly that have so little delight in Christ and Heaven A holy tongue will not excuse or secure a profane heart Why did Christ pronounce his Disciples eyes and eares so blessed but as they were the doors to let in Christ by his Works and Words into their hearts O blessed are the eyes that so see and the ears that so hear that the heart is thereby raised to this blessed heavenly frame Sirs so much of your hearts as is empty of Christ and heaven let it befilled with shame and sorrow and not with ease SECT II. BUt let me turn my Reprehension to Exhortation That you would turn this Conviction into Reformation And I have the more hope because I here address my self to men of Conscience that dare not wilfully disobey God and to men whose Relations to God are many and neer and therefore methinks there should need the fewer words to perswade their hearts to him Yea because I speak to no other men but onely them whose portion is there whose hopes are there and who have forsaken all that they may enjoy this glory and shall I be discouraged from perswading such to be heavenly-minded why fellow Christians if you will not hear and obey who will well may we be discouraged to exhort the poor blinde ungodly world and may say as Moses Exod. 6.12 Behold the Children of Israel have not hearkned unto me how then shall Pharoah hear me Who ever thou art therefore that readest these lines I require thee as thou tendrest thine Allegiance to the God of Heaven as ever thou hopest for a part in this glory that thou presently take thy heart to task chide it for its wilful strangeness to God turn thy thoughts from the pursuit of Vanity bend thy soul to study Eternity busie it about the life to come habituate thy self to such contemplations and let not those thoughts be seldom and cursory but settle upon them dwell here bathe thy soul in heavens Delights drench thine affections in these rivers of pleasure or rather in this sea of Consolation and if thy backward soul begin to flag and thy loose thoughts to fly abroad call them back hold them to their work put them on bear not with their lasiness do not connive at one neglect and when thou hast once in obedience to God tried this work and followed on till thou hast got acquainted with it and kept a close guard upon thy thoughts till they are accustomed to obey and till thou hast got some mastery over them thou wilt then finde thy self in the suburbs of Heaven and as it were in a new world thou wilt then finde indeed that there is sweetness in the work and way of God and that the life of Christianity is a life of Joy Thou wilt meet with those abundant consolations which thou hast prayed and panted and groaned after and which so few Christians do ever here obtain because they know not this way to them or else make not conscience of walking in it You see the work now before you This this is it that I would fain perswade your souls to practise Beloved friends and Christian neighbors who hear me this day let me bespeak your consciences in the name of Christ and command you by the Authority I have received from Christ that you faithfully set upon this weighty duty and fix your eye more stedfastly on your Rest and daily delight in the fore-thoughts thereof I have perswaded you to many other duties and I bless God many of you have obeyed and I hope never to finde you at that pass as to say when you perceive the command of the Lord that you will not be perswaded nor obey if I should it were high time to bewail your misery Why you may almost as well say we will not obey as sit still and not obey Christians I beseech you as you take me for your Teacher and have called me thereto so hearken to this Doctrine if ever I shall prevail with you in any thing let me prevail with you in this to set your heart where you expect a Rest and Treasure Do you not remember that when you called me to be your Teacher you promised me under your hands that you would faithfully and conscionably endeavor the receiving every truth and obeying every command which I should from the Word of God manifest to you I now charge your promise upon you I never delivered to you a more apparent Truth nor prest upon you a more apparent duty then this If I knew you would not obey what should I do here preaching Not that I desire you to receive it chiefly as from me but as from Christ on whose Message I come Me thinks if a childe should shew you Scripture and speak to you the Word of God you should not dare to disobey it Do not wonder that I perswade you so earnestly though
my companions in this observation That they are usually men least acquainted with a Heavenly life who are the violent disputers about the circumstantials of Religion He whose Religion is all in his opinions will be most frequently and zealously speaking his opinions And he whose Religion lyes in the Knowledg and love of God in Christ will be most delightfully speaking of that time when he shall enjoy God and Christ. As the body doth languish in consuming fevers when the native heat abates within and an unnatural heat inflaming the external parts succeeds so when the zeal of a Christian doth leave the internals of Religion and fly to ceremonials externals or inferior things the soul must needs consume and languish Yea though you were sure your opinions were true yet when the chiefest of your zeal is turned thither and the chiefest of your conference there laid out the life of grace decays within your hearts are turned from this heavenly life Not that I would perswade you to undervalue the least truth of God nor that I do acknowledg the hot disputers of the times to have discovered the truth above their Brethren but in case we should grant them to have hit on the Truth yet let every Truth in our thoughts and speeches have their due proportion and I am confident the hundreth part of our time and our conference would not be spent upon the now common Theams For as there is an hundred truths of far greater consequence which do all challenge the precedencie before these so many of those Truths alone are of an hundred times neerer concernment to our souls and therefore should have an answerable proportion in our thoughts Neither is it any excuse for our casting by these great fundamental Truths because they are common and known already For the chief improvment is yet behind and the soul must be daily refreshed with the Truth of Scripture and the goodness of that which it offereth and promiseth as the body must be with its daily food or else the known Truths that lye Idle in your Heads will no more nourish or comfort or save you then the bread that lies still in your Cupboards will feed you Ah he is a rare and pretious Christian who is skilled in the improving of well known truths Therefore let me advise you that aspire after this Joyous Life spend not too much of your thoughts your time your zeal or your speeches upon quarrels that less concern your souls But when hypocrits are feeding on huskes or shels or on this heated food which will burn their lips far sooner then warm and strengthen their hearts then do you feed on the Joys above I could wish you were all understanding men able to defend every truth of God and to this end that you would read and study controversie more and your understanding and stability in these dayes of tryal is no small part of my comfort and encouragment But still I would have the chiefest to be chiefly studyed and none to shoulder out your thoughts of Eternity The least controverted points are usually most weighty and of most necessary frequent use to our souls For you my neighbors and friends in Christ I bless God that I have so little need to urge this hard upon you or to spend my time and speeches in the Pulpit on these quarrels as I have been necessitated to my discontent for to do elsewhere I rejoyce in the wisdome and goodness of our Lord who hath saved me much of this labor 1. Partly by his tempering of your spirits to sincerity 2. Partly by the doleful yet profitable example of those few that went out from us whose former and present condition of spirit makes them stand as the pillar of Salt for a continual terror and warning to you and so to be as useful as they were like to be hurtful 3. Partly by the confessions and bewailings of this sin that you have heard from the mouth of the Dying advising you to beware of changing your fruitful society for the company of deceivers I do unfeignedly rejoyce in these providences and bless the Lord who thus establisheth his Saints Study well those precepts of the Spirit Rom. 14.1 Him that is weak in the faith receive but not to doubtful disputations 2 Tim. 2.23 But foolish and unlearned questions avoid knowing that they do gender strifes And the servant of the Lord must not strive Tit. 3.9 But avoid foolish questions and genealogies and contentions and strivings about the Law for they are unprofitable and vain 1 Tim. 6.3 4 5. If any man teach otherwise and consent not to wholesome words even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ and to the doctrine which is according to godliness he is proud knowing nothing but doting about questions and strifes of words whereof cometh envy strife railing evil surmisings perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth supposing that gain is godliness From such withdraw thy self SECT V. 5. AS you value the comforts of a heavenly Life take heed of a proud and lofty spirit There is such an Antipathy between this sin and God that thou wilt never get thy heart neer him nor get him neer thy heart as long as this prevaileth in it If it cast the Angels from heaven that were in it it must needs keep thy heart estranged from it If it cast our first parents out of Paradise and separated between the Lord and us and brought his curse on all the creatures here below it must needs then keep our hearts from Paradise and increase the cursed seperation from our God Believe it hearers a proud heart and a Heavenly heart are exceeding contrary Entercourse with God will keep men low and that lowliness will further their entercourse when a man is used to be much with God and taken up in the study of his glorious attributes he abhors himself in dust and ashes and that self-abhorrance is his best preparative to obtain admittance to God again Therefore after a soul-humbling day or in times of trouble when the soul is lowest it useth to have freest access to God and savour most of the life above He will bring them into the wilderness and there he will speak comfortably to them Hos. 2.14 The delight of God is in a humble soul even him that is contrite and trembleth at his word and the delight of a Humble soul is in God and sure where there is mutual delight there will be freest admittance and heartiest welcome and most frequent converse Heaven would not hold God and the proud Angels together but a humble soul he makes his dwelling and surely if our dwelling be with him and in him and his dwelling also be with us and in us there must needs be a most neer and sweet familiarity But the soul that is proud cannot plead this priviledg God is so far from dwelling in it that he will not admit it to any neer access
no truer nor greater cause then their ignorance and unconscionable neglect of Meditation If a man have the Lientery that his meat pass from him as he took it in or if he vomit it up as fast as he eates it what strength and vigor of body and senses is this man like to have Indeed he may well eat more then a sounder man and the small abode that it makes in the stomack may refresh it at the present and help to draw it out a lingering languishing uncomfortable unprofitable life And so do our hearers that have this disease perhaps they hear more then otherwise they needed and the clear discovery and lively delivery of the Truth of God may warm and refresh them a little while they are hearing and perhaps an hour or two after and it may be it may linger out their Grace in a languishing uncomfortable unprofitable life But if they did hear one hour and meditate seven if they did as constantly digest their Sermons as they hear them and not take in one Sermon before the former is well concocted they would finde another kinde of benefit by Sermons then the ordinary sort of the forwardest Christians do I know many carnal persons do make this an Argument against frequent preaching and hearing who do it meerly from a lothing of the word and know far less how to Meditate then they know how understandingly to hear Only they pretend Meditation against often hearing because that beeing a duty of the minde you cannot so easily discern their omission of it These are sick of the Anorexia and Apepsy they have neither appetite nor digeston the other of the Boulimos they have appetite but no digestion SECT III. 2. BUt because Meditation is a general word and it is not all Meditation that I hear intend I shall therefore lay thee down the difference whereby this Meditation that I am urging thee to is discerned from all other sorts of Meditation And the difference is taken from the Act and from the object of it 1. From the Act which I call The set and solemn acting of all the powers of the soul. 1. I call it the Acting of them for it is Action that we are directing you in now and not relations or dispositions yet these also are necessarily presupposed It must be a soul that is qualified for the work by the supernatural renewing grace of the spirit which must be able to perform this Heavenly exercise It s the work of the Living and not of the dead It s a work of all others most spiritual and sublime and therefore not to be well performed by a heart that 's meerly carnal and terrene Also they must necessarily have some relation to heaven before they can familiarly there converse I suppose them to be the sons of God when â— perswade them to love him and to be of the family of God yeâ— the spouse of his Son when I perswade them to press into his presence and to dwell with him I suppose them to be such as have title to Rest when I perswade them to rejoyce in the Meditation of Rest. These therefore being all presupposed are not the duty here intended and required But it is the bringing of their sanctified dispositions into Act and the delightful reveiwing of theiâ— high relations Habits and Powers are but to enable us to Action To say I am able to do this or I am disposed to do it doth neiâ—ther please God nor advantage our selves except withal we really do it God doth not regenerate thy soul that it may be able to know him and not know him or that it may be able to believe and yet not believe or that it may be able to love him and yet not love him But he therefore makes thee able to know to believe and love that thou mayest indeed both know believe and love him What good doth that power which is not reduced into Act Therefore I am not now exhorting thee to be an able Christian but to be an Active Christian according to the degree of that ability which thou hast As thy store of money or food oâ— rayment which thou lettest lye by thee and never usest doth theâ— no good but to please thy fancy or raise thee to an esteem in the eyes of others so all thy gifts and powers and habits which lye still in thy soul and are never Acted do profit or comfort thee little or nothing but in satisfying thy fancy and raising thee to the repute of an able man so far as they are discernable to the standers by SECT IV. 1. I Call this Meditation The acting of the powers of the Soul meaning the soul as Rational to difference it from the cogitations of the soul as Sensitive the Sensitive soul hath a kinde of Meditation by the common sense the Phantasie and Estimation The fleshly man mindeth the things of the flesh If it were the work of the Ear or the Eye or the Tongue or the Hands which I am setting you on I doubt not but you would more readily take it up but it is the work of the soul for bodily exercise doth here profit but little The soul hath its labor and its ease its business and its idleness its intention and remission as well as the body And diligent students are usually as sensible of the labor and weaâ—â—ness of their spirits and brain as they are of that of the members of the body This action of the soul is it I perswade thee to SECT V. 3. I Call it the acting of All the powers of the soul To difference it from the common Meditation of Students which is usually the meer imployment of the Brain It is not a bare thinking that I mean nor the meer use of Invention or Memory but a business of a higher and more excellent nature when Truth is apprehended only as Truth this is but an unsavory and loose apprehension but when it is apprehended as Good as well as True this is a fast and delightful apprehending As a man is not so prone to live according to the Truth he knows except it do deeply affect him so neither doth his soul enjoy its sweetness except Speculation do pass to Affection The Understanding is not the whole soul and therefore cannot do the whole work As God hath made several parts in man to perform their several Offices for his nourishing and life so hath he ordained the faculties of the soul to perform their several Offices for his spiritual life the Stomack must chy lisy and prepare for the Liver the Liver and Spleen must sanguify and prepare for the Heart and Brain and these must beget the vital and animal spirits c. so the Understanding must take in Truths and prepare them for the Will and it must receive them and commend them to the Affections The best digestion is in the bottome of the Stomack the Affections are as it were the bottome of the soul and
the remaining Work is onely to direct you how to use your hands and mouth to feed your stomack I mean how to use your â—nderstandings for the warming of your Affections and to fire your Hearts by the help of your Heads And herein it will be necessary that I observe this Method First to shew you what instrument it is that you must work by Secondly VVhy and how this way of working is like to succeed and attain its end Thirdly VVhat powers of the soul should here be acted and what are the particular Affections to be excited and what objective Considerations are necessary thereto and in what order you should proceed Fourthly By what acts you must advance to the height of the work Fifthly VVhat advantages you must take and what helps you must use for the facilitating your success Sixthly In what particulars you must look narrowly to your hearts through the whole And I will be the briefer in all left you should loâ—e my meaning in a crowd of words or your thoughts be carried from the VVork it self by an over-long and tedious Explication of it SECT II. 1. THe great Instrument that this Work is done by is Ratiocination Reasoning the case with your selves Discourse of minde Cogitation or Thinking or if you will call it Consideration I here suppose you to know the things to be considered and therefore shall wholly pass over thaâ— Meditation of Students which tends onely to Speculation or Knowing They are known Truths that I perswade you to consider for the grossly ignorant that know not the Doctrine of everlasting Life are for the present uncapable of this duty Mans soul as it receives and retains the Idea's or Shapes of things so hath it a power to chuse out any of these deposited Idea's and draw them forth and act upon them again and again even as a Sheep can fetch up his meat for rumination otherwise nothing would affect us but while the sense is receiving it and so we should be somewhat below the Bruits This is the power that here you must use To this choice of Idea's or subjects for your Cogitation there must necessarily concur the act of the Will which indeed must go along in the whole Work for this must be a voluntary not a forced Cogitation Some men do consider whether they will or no and are not able to turn away their own thoughts so will God make the wicked consider of their sins when he shall set them all in order before them Psal. 50.21.22 And so shall the damned consider of Heaven and of the excellency of Christ whom they once despised and of the eternal joyes which they have foolishly lost But this forced Consideration is not that I mean but that which thou dost willingly and purposely chose but though they will be here requisite yet still Consideration is the instrument of the Work SECT III. 2. NExt let us see what force Consideration hath for the moving of the affections and for the powerful imprinting of things in the heart Why First Consideration doth as it were open the door between the Head and the Heart The Understanding having received Truths layes them up in the Memory now Consideration is the conveyer of them from thence to the Affections There 's few men of so weak Understanding or Memory but they know and can remember that which would strangely work upon them and make great alterations in their spirits if they were not locked up in their brain and if they could but convey them down to their hearts Now this is the great work of Consideration O what rare men would they be who have strong heads and much learning and knowledge if the obstructions between the Head and the Heart were but opened and their Affections did but correspond to their Understandings why if they would but bestow as much time and pains in studying the goodness and the evil of things as they bestow in studying the Truth and Falshood of Enunciations it were the readiest way to obtain this he is usually the best Scholar who hath the quick the clear and the tenacious apprehension but he is usually the best Christian who hath the deepest piercing and affecting Apprehension He is the best Scholar who hath the readiest passage from the Ear to the Brain but he is the best Christian who hath the readiest passage from the Brain to the Heart now Consideration is that on our parts that must open the passage though the Spirit open as the principal cause inconsiderate men are stupid and senseless SECT IV. 2. MAtter 's of great weight which do neerly concern us are aptest to work most effectually upon the Heart now Meditation draweth forth these working Objects and presents them to the Affections in their worth and weight The most delectable Object doth not please him that sees it not nor doth the joyfullest news affect him that never hears it now Consideration presents before us those Objects that were as absent and brings them to the Eye and the Ear of the soul Are not Christ and Glory think you affecting Objects would not they work wonders upon the soul if they were but clearly discovered and strangely transport us if our apprehensions were any wâ—it answerable to their worth why by Consideration it is that they are presented to us This is the Prospective Glass of the Christian by which he can see from Earth to Heaven SECT V. 3. AS Consideration draweth forth the weightiest Objects so it presenteth them in the most affecting way and presseth them home with enforcing Arguments Man is a Rational Creature and apt to be moved in a Reasoning way especially when Reasons are evident and strong Now Consideration is a reasoning the case with a mans own heart and what a multitude of Reasons both clear and weighty are always at hand for to work upon the heart VVhen a Believer would reason his heart to this heavenly work how many Arguments do offer themselves from God from the Redeemer from every one of the Divine Attributes from our former Estate from our present Estate from Promises from Seals from Earnest from the Evil we now suffer from the Good we partake of from Hell from Heaven every thing doth offer it self to promote our joy now Meditation is the Hand to draw forth all these as when you are weighing a thing in the Ballance you lay on a little more and a little more till it weigh down so if your Affections do hang in a dull indifferency why due Meditation will add Reason after Reason till the scales do turn Or as when you are buying any thing of necessity for your use you bid a little more and a little more till at last you come to the sellers price so when Meditation is perswading you to Joy it will first bring one Reason and then another till it have silenced all your distrust and sorrows and your cause to rejoyce lyes plain before you If another mans reasons will
indignation against thy self for such miscarriage 7. Of thy zeal and jealousie over thy heart least thou shouldst again be drawn to the like iniquity 8. And of thy pity toward those who are ignorantly walking in the contrary course and in apparent danger of losing all this But I will confine my self to the former chief affections and not meddle with these least I be too prolix but leave them to thy own spiritual prudence I would here also have thee to understand that I do not place any flat necessity in thy Acting of all the forementioned affections in this order at one time or in one duty perhaps thou mayest sometime feel some one of thy affections more flat then the rest and so to have more need of exciting or thou mayest finde one stirring more then the rest and so think it more seasonable to help it forward or if thy time be short thou mayest work upon one affection one day and upon another the next as thou findest cause All this I leave still to thy own Prudence And so I have done with the third part of the direction viz. What powers of the soul are here to be acted what Affections excited by what objective considerations and in what order CHAP. X. By what Actings of the soul to proceed in this work of Heavenly contemplation SECT I. FOurthly The fourth part of this Directory is To shew you how and by what Acts you should advance on to the height of this work The first and maine Instrument of this work is that Cogitation or consideration which I before have opened and which is to go along with us through the whole But because meer Cogitation if it be not prest home will not so pierce and affect the heart Therefore we must here proceed to a second step which is called Soliloquy which is nothing but a pleading the case with our own souls As in preaching to others the bare propounding and opening of truths and duties doth seldome finde that successe as the lively application so it is also in meditating and propounding Truths to our selves The moving pathetical pleadings with a sinner will make him deeply affected with a common Truth which before though he knew it yet it never stirr'd him What heart-meltings do we see under powerfull application when the naked explication did little move them If any where there be a tender-hearted affectionate people it is likely under such a moving close-applying Ministry Why thus must thou do in thy Meditation to quicken thy own heart Enter into a serious debate with it Plead with it in the most moving and affecting language Urge it with the most weighty and powerful Arguments This soliloquy or self-conference hath been the practice of the holy men of God in all times How doth David plead with his soul against its dejections and argue it into a holy confidence and comfort Psal. 42.5 11. and 43.5 Why art thou cast down O my soul and why art thou so disquieted within me Trust in God for I shall yet give him thanks who is the health of my countenance and my God So in the 103. Psal. 1 2. c. Bless the Lord O my soul and all that is within me bless his holy name Bless the Lord O my soul and forget not all his benefits c. so doth he also end the Psalm and so doth he begin and end the 104. Psal. So 146.1 So Psal. 116.7 Return unto thy Rest O my soul for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee The like you may see in the Meditations of holy men of later times Austin Bernard c. So that this is no new path which I perswade you to tread but that which the Saints have ever used in their Meditation SECT II. THis Soliloquy hath its several parts and its due method wherein it should be managed The parts of it are according to the several Affections of the soul and according to the severall necessities thereof according to the various Arguments to be used and according to the various wayes of Arguing So that you see if I should attempt the full handling hereof it would take up more time and room then I intend or can allow it Only thus much in brief As every good Master and Father of a Family is a good Preacher to his own Family so every good Christian is a good Preacher to his own soul. Soliloquy is a Preaching to ones self Therefore the very same Method which a Minister should use in his Preaching to others should a Christian use in speaking to himself Dost thou understand the best Method for a publick Preacher Dost thou know the right parts and order of a Sermon and which is the most effectual way of application why then I need to lay it open no further thou understandest the Method and partes of this soliloquy Mark the most affecting heart-melting Minister observe his course both for matter and manner set him as a patern before thee for thy imitation and the same way that he takes with the hearts of his people do thou also take with thy own heart Men are naturally addicted to imitation especially of those whom they most affect and approve of How neer do some Ministers come in their Preaching to the imitation of others whom they usually hear and much reverence and value so maist thou in this duty of preaching to thy heart Art thou not ready sometime when thou hearest a Minister to remember divers things which thou thinkest might be moving and pertinent and to wish that he would have mentioned and pressed them on the Hearers why remember those when thou art exhorting thy self and press them on thy own heart as close as thou canst As therefore this is accounted the most familiar Method in Preaching so is it for thee in Meditating viz. First Explain to thy self the subject on which thou dost Meditate both the Terms and the subject Matter study the difficulties till the Doctrine is clear Secondly Then confirm thy Faith in the Belief of it by the most clear convincing Scripture-Reasons Thirdly Then Apply it according to its nature and thy necessity As in the case we are upâ—on That there is a Rest remaining for the people of God 1. Consider of the useful Consectaries or Conclusions that thence arise for the clearing and confirming of thy judgment which is commonly called a Use of Information Here thou maist press them also by other confirming Arguments and adjoyn the confutation of the contrary Errors 2. Proceed then to consider of the Duties which do appear to be such from the Doctrine in hand which is commonly called A use of Instruction as also the reprehension of the contrary vices 3. Then proceed to question and try thy self how thou hast valued this Glory of the Saints how thou hast loved it and how thou hast laid out thy self to obtain it This is called A use of Examination Here thou maist also
go before to prepare so glorious a Mansion for such a wretch and art thou now loth to go and possess it must his blood and care and pains be lost O unthankful unworthy foul Shall the Lord of glory be willing of thy company and art thou unwilling of his are they fit to dwell with God that had rather stay from him Must he crown thee and glorifie thee against thy will or must he yet deal more roughly with thy darling flesh and leave thee never a corner in thy ruinous cottage for to cover thee but fire thee out of all before thou wilt away Must every Sense be an inlet to thy sorrows and every friend become thy scourge and Jobs Messengers be thy daily intelligencers and bring thee the Curranto's of thy multiplied calamities before that Heaven will seem more desireable then this Earth Must every joynt be the seat of Pain and every Member deny thee a room to rest in and thy groans be indited from the very heart and bones before thou wilt be willing to leave this flesh Must thy heavy burdens be bound upon thy back and thy so-intolerable Paroxysms become incessant and thy intermittent agueish woes be turned into continual burning Feavers Yea must Earth become a very Hell to thee before thou wilt be willing to be with God O impudent soul if thou be not ashamed of this what is loathing if this be love Look about thee O my soul behold the most lovely Creature or the most desireable State and tell me Where wouldst thou be if not with God Poverty is a burden and riches a snare Sickness is little pleasing to thee and usually health as little safe the one is full of sorrow and the other of sin The frowning World doth bruise thy heel and the smiling World doth sting thee to the heart VVhen it seemeth ugly it causeth loathing when beauteous it is thy bane when thy condition is bitter thou wouldst fain spit it out and when delightful it is but sugered misery and deceit The sweetest poyson doth oft bring the surest death So much as the world is loved and delighted in so much it hurteth and endangereth the lover and if it may not be loved why should it be desired If thou be applauded it proves the most contagious breath and how ready are the sails of Pride to receive such winds so that it frequently addeth to thy sin but not one cubit to the stature of thy worth And if thou be vilified slandered or unkindly used methinks this should not entice thy love Never didst thou sit by the fire of prosperity and applause but thou hadst with it the smoke that drew water from thy eyes never hadst thou the Rose without the pricks and the sweetness hath been expired and the beauty faded before the scars which thou hadst in gathering it were healed Is it not as good be without the honey as to have it with so many smarting stings The highest delight thou hast found in any thing below hath been in thy successful labors and thy godly friends And have these indeed been so sweet as that thou shouldst be so loth to leave them If they seem better to thee then a life with God it is time for God to take them from thee Thy studies have been sweet and have they not been also bitter My minde hath been pleased but my body pained and the weariness of the flesh hath quickly abated the pleasures of the Spirit VVhen by painful studies I have not discovered the truth it hath been but a tedious way to a grievous end discontent and trouble purchased by toilsom wearying labors And if I have found out the truth by Divine assistance I have found but an exposed naked Orphan that hath cost me much to take in and cloath and keep which though of noble birth yea a Divine off-spring and amiable in mine eyes and worthy I confess of better entertainment yet from men that knew not its descent hath drawn upon me their envy and furious opposition and hath brought the blinded Sodomites with whom I lived at some peace before to crowd about me and assault my doors that I might prostitute my heavenly Guests to their pleasure and again expose them whom I had so gladly and lately entertained yea the very Tribes of Israel have been gathered against me thinking that the Altar which I built for the interest of Truth and Unity and Peace had been erected to the Introduction of Error and Idolatry And so the increase of Knowledg hath been the increase of Sorrow My heart indeed is ravished with the beauty of naked Truth and I am ready to cry out I have found it or as Aquinas Conclisum est contra c. But when I have found it I know not what to do with it If I confine it to my own brest and keep it secret to my self it is as a consuming fire shut up in my heart and bones I am as the Lepers without Samaria or as those that were forbidden to tell any man of the works of Christ I am weary of forbearing I cannot stay If I reveal it to the world I can expect but an unwelcome entertainment and an ungrateful return For they have taken up their standing in religious knowledg already as if they were at Hercules Pillars and had no further to go nor any more to learn They dare be no wiser then they are already nor receive any more of Truth then they have already received lest thereby they should accuse their Ancestors and Teachers of Ignorance and Imperfection and themselves should seem to be mutable and unconstant and to hold their opinions in Religion with reserves The most precious Truth not apprehended doth seem to be Error and fantastick novelty Every man that readeth what I write will not be at the pains of those tedious studies to finde out the truth as I have been but think it should meet their eyes in the very reading If the meer writing of Truth with its clearest Evidence were all that were necessary to the apprehension of it by others then the lowest Scholar in the School might be quickly as good as the highest So that if I did see more then others to reveal it to the lazy prejudiced world would but make my friends turn enemies or look upon me with a strange and jealous eye And yet Truth is so dear a friend it self and he that sent it much more dear that what ever I suffer I dare not stifle or conceal it O what then are these bitter sweet studies and discoveries to the everlasting views of the face of the God of Truth The Light that here I have is but a knowing in part and yet it costeth me so dear that in a temptation I am almost ready to prefer the quiet silent night before such a rough tempestuous day But there I shall have Light and Rest together and the quietness of the night without its darkness I can never now have the
clay to totter Look on thy glass and see how it runs Look on thy watch how fast it getteth what a short moment is between us and our Rest what a step is it from hence to Everlastingness While I am thinking and writing of it it hasteth neer and I am even entring into it before I am aware While thou art reading this it pâ—steth on and thy life will be gone as a tale that is told Mayst thou not easily foresee thy dying time and look upon thy self as ready to depart It s but a few dayes till thy friends shall lay thee in the grave and others do the like for them If you verily believed you should dye to morrow how seriously would you think of Heaven to night The condemned prisoner knew before that he 〈◊〉 dye and yet he was then as Jovial as any but when he hears the sentence and knows he hath not a week to live then how it sinkes his heart within him So that the true apprehensions of the neerness of Eternity doth make mens thoughts of it to be quick and piercing and put life into their fears and sorrowes if they are unfitted and into their desires and Joyes if they have assurance of its glory When the Witches Samuel had told Saul By to morrow this time thou shalt be with me this quickly worked to his very heart and laid him down as dead on the earth And if Christ should say to a believing soul By to morrow this time thou shalt be with me this would be a working word indeed and would bring him in spirit to Heaven before As Melanchton was wont to say of his uncertain station because of the persecution of his enemies Ego jam sum hic Dei beneficio 40. annos et nunquam potui dicere aut certus esse me per unam septimanam mansurum esse i. e. I have now been here this fourty yeers and yet could never say or be sure that I shall tarry here for one week so may we all say of our abode on earth As long as thou hast continued out of heaven thou canst not say thou shalt be out of it one week longer Do but suppose that you are still entring in it and you shall finde it will much help you more seriously to minde it SECT IV. 4. ANother help to this Heavenly Life is To be much in serious discoursing of it especially with those that can speak from their hearts and are seasoned themselves with an heavenly nature It s pitty saith Mr. Bolton that Christians should ever meet together without some talk of their meeting in Heaven or the way to it before they part Its pitty so much pretious time is spent among Christians in vain discourses foolish janglings and useless disputes and not a sober word of Heaven among them Methinks we should meet together of purpose to warm our spirits with discoursing of our Rest. To hear a Minister or private Christian set forth that blessed Glorious State with power and life from the Promises of the Gospel Methinks should make us say as the two Disciples Did not our hearts burn within us while he was opening to us the Scripture while he was opening to us the windows of Heaven If a Felix or wicked wretch will tremble when he hears his judgment powerfully denounced why should not the believing soul be revived when he hears his Eternal Rest revealed Get then together fellow Christians and talk of the affairs of your Country and Kingdom and comfort one another with such words 1 Thess. 4.18 If Worldlings get together they will be talking of the World when Wantons are together they will be talking of their Lusts and wicked men can be delighted in talking of wickedness and should not Christians then delight themselves in talking of Christ and the heirs of heaven in talking of their Inheritance This may make our hearts revive within us as it did Jacobs to hear the Message that called him to Goshen and to see the Chariots that should bring him to Joseph O that we were furnished with skil and resolution to turn the stream of mens common discourse to these more sublime and pretious things And when men begin to talk of things unprofitable that we could tell how to put in a word for heaven and say as Peter of his bodily food Not so for I eat not that which is common and unclean this is nothing to my eternal Rest O the good that we might both do and receive by this course If it had not been needful to deter us from unfruitful conference Christ would not have talked of giving an account of every idle word at judgment say then as David when you are in conference Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chiefest mirth And then you shall finde the truth of that Prov. 15.4 A wholsom tongue is a Tree of Life SECT V. 5. ANother help to this Heavenly Life is this Make it thy business in every duty to winde up thy affections neerer Heaven A mans attainments and receivings from God are answerable to his own desires and ends that which he sincerely seeks he findes Gods end in the institution of his Ordinances was that they be as so many stepping stones to our Rest and as the staires by which in subordination to Christ we may daily ascend unto it in our affections Let this be thy end in using them as it was Gods end in ordaining them and doubtless they will not be unsuccessful though men be personally far asunder yet they may even by Letters have a great deal of entercourse How have men been rejoyced by a few lines from a friend though they could not see him face to face what gladness have we when we do but read the expressions of his Love or if we read of our friends prosperity and welfare Many a one that never saw the fight hath triumphed and shouted made Bonefires and rung Bels when he hath but heard and read of the Victory and may not we have entercourse with God in his Ordinances though our persons be yet so far remote May not our spirits rejoyce in the reading those lines which contain our Legacy and Charter for heaven with what Gladness may we read the expressions of Love and hear of the state of our Celestial Country with what triumphant shoutings may we applaud our Inheritance though yet we have not the happiness to behold it Men that are separated by sea and land can yet by the meer entercourse of Letters carry on both great and gainful trades even to the value of their whole estate and may not a Christian in the wise improvement of duties drive on this happy trade for Rest Come not therefore with any lower ends to duties Renounce Formality Customariness and Applause When thou kneelest down in secret or publike prayer let it be in hope to get thy heart neerer God before
thou risest off thy knees when thou openest thy Bible or other Books let it be with this hope to meet with some passage of Divine truth and some such blessing of the Spirit with it as may raise thine affections neerer Heaven and give thee a fuller taste thereof when thou art setting thy foot out at thy door to go to the publike Ordinance and Worship say I hope to meet with somewhat from God that may raise my affections before I returne I hope the Spirit will give me the meeting and sweeten my heart with those celestial delights I hope that Christ will appear to me in that way and shine about me with light from heaven and let me hear his instructing and reviving voyce and causa the scales to fall from mine eyes that I may see more of that glory then I ever yet saw I hope before I return to my house my Lord will take my heart in hand and bring it within the view of Rest and set it before his Fathers presence that I may return as the Shepherds from the heavenly Vision glorifying and praising God for all the things that I have heard and seen Luke 2.20 and say as those that behold his Miracles We have seen strange things to day Luke 5.26 Remember also to pray for thy Teacher that God would put some Divine Message into his mouth which may leave a heavenly relish on thy spirit If these were our ends and this our course when we set to duty we should not be so strange as we are to heaven When the Indian first saw the use of Letters by our English they thought there was sure some spirit in them that men could so converse together by a paper If Christians would take this course in their duties they might come to such holy fellowship with God and see so much of the Mysteries of the Kingdom that it would make the standers by admire what is in those Lines what is in that Sermon what is in this praying that fils his heart so full of joy and that so transports him above himself Certainly God would not fail us in our duties if we did not fail our selves and then experience would make them sweeter to us SECT VI. 6. ANother help is this Make an advantage of every object thou seest and of every passage of Divine providence and of every thing that befals in thy labor and calling to minde thy soul of its approaching Rest. As all providences and creatures are means to our Rest so do they point us to that as their end Every creature hath the name of God and of our final Rest written upon it which a considerate believer may as truly discern as he can read upon a post or hand in a cross way the name of the Town or City which it points to This spiritual use of creatures and providences is Gods great End in bestowing them on man And he that overlooks this End must needs rob God of his chiefest praise and deny him the greatest part of his thanks The Relation that our present mercies have to our great Eternal mercies is the very quintessence and spirits of all these mercies Therefore do they loose the very spirits of their mercies and take nothing but the huskes and bran who do overlook this Relation and draw not forth the sweetness of it in their contemplations Gods sweetest dealings with us at the present would not be half so sweet as they are if they did not intimate some further sweetness As our selves have a fleshly and a spiritual substance so have our mercies a fleshly and spiritual use and are fitted to the nourishing of both our parts He that receives the carnal part and no more may have his body comforted by them but not his soul. It is not all one to receive six pence meerly as six pence and to receive it in earnest of a thousand pound though the sum be the same yet I trow the relation makes a wide difference Thou takest but the bear earnest and overlookest the maine sum when thou receivest thy mercies and forgettest thy crown O therefore that Christians were skilled in this Art You can open your Bibles and read there of God and of Glory O learn to open the creatures and to open the several passages of providence and to read of God and Glory there Certainly by such a skilful industrious improvement we might have a fuller tast of Christ and Heaven in every bit of bread that we eat and in every draught of Beer that we drink then most men have in the use of the Sacrament If thou prosper in the world and thy labor succeed let it make thee more sensible of thy perpetual prosperity If thou be weary of thy labors let it make thy thoughts of Rest more sweet If things go cross hard with thee in the world let it make thee the more earnestly desire that day when all thy sorrows and sufferings shall cease Is thy body refreshed with food or sleep Remember thy unconceivable refreshings with Christ. Dost thou hear any news that makes the glad Remember what glad tydings it will be to hear the sound of the trump of God and the absolving sentence of Christ our Judg. Art thou delighting thy self in the society of the Saints Remember the Everlasting amiable fraternity thou shalt have with perfected Saints in Rest. Is God communicating himself to thy spirit Why remember that time of thy highest advancement when thy Joy shall be full as thy communion is full Dost thou hear the raging noise of the wicked and the disorders of the vulgar and the confusions in the world like the noise in a crowd or the roaring of the waters Why think of the blessed agreement in Heaven and the melodious harmony in that Quire of God Dost thou hear or feel the tempest of wars or see any cloud of blood arising Remember the day when thou shalt be housed with Christ where there is nothing but calmness and amiable union and where we shall solace our selves in perfect Peace under the wings of the Prince of Peace for ever Thus you may see what advantages to a Heavenly Life every condition and creature doth afford us if we had but hearts to apprehend and improve them As it s said of the Turkes that they 'l make bridges of the dead bodyes of their men to passe over the trenches or ditches in their way So might Christians of the very ruines and calamities of the times and of every dead body or misery that they see make a bridge for the passage of their thoughts to their Rest. And as they have taught their Pigeons which they call carriers in divers places to bear letters of entercourse from friend to friend at a very great distance so might a wise industrious Christian get his thoughts carried into Heaven and receive as it were returns from thence again by creatures of slower wing then Doves by the assistance of the Spirit the Dove of God