power and force to convince and reform Men than a singular special miracle wrought to that purpose can have is this It is not only the appointed means but God has ordained no other to reclaim men He will not that they be convinced so much by Sense as by Reason not so much by Ocular Demonstration as Rational Conclusions And therefore it argues that those men who are not won and brought over by the insinuations of the Gospel but expect some extraordinary dealings to convict them are desperately hardened and must perish without remedy It would infinitely detract from the power and authority of Gods word and render it insignificant and invalid if when men out of a fond humour and perverse disposition refuse to hearken to and be converted by it God should deviate from the ordinary rule by permitting Spectrums or Apparitions to discourse with and persuade them to break off their sins by a timely repentance His promises and threatnings would take but little effect nay men would scarce have Faith enough to believe them if such extraordinary methods were commonly used to cure Men of their obstinate blindness and perverse infidelity But wherefore should God answer Mens vain curiosity Why should he confute them of their Errours by new and strange means when the truth of Christianity hath been attested by wonders and miracles by the blood of Martyrs who died for the Confirmation of it and by the Conversion of many thousands since It must be concluded that they were weary of their lives very soft and easie melancholly fanciful Persons who would thus embrace death relinquish their interests goods and possessions for the sake of the Truth of which they had no apparent testimony They must imagine the world has lain a long while in Ignorance and Darkness amused only with fictious Relations and vain Genealogies and that those who died long since in the belief of the Scripture are without hope Or otherwise how is it that the Oracles of God are not more credited by them Why are men so seared and impenitrable that the word of God which is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged Sword loseth its Vertue and its healing Operations upon them quit defeated And furthermore If God had discovered any insufficiency in his Holy Word that it was not able to turn mens hearts he would have used some other methods to that end and not have permitted so many thousands to have lived and dyed in their sins to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever He would not suffer poor Souls to run into the Labyrinth of Despair nor others to be hardened if his word alone which hath brought Life and Immortality into the world was not capable or had not sufficiency of Doctrine to instruct and guide them in the path that leads to Heaven Nor would our blessed Saviour have pronounced such terrible woes against the Unbelieving Jews nor had Divine providence cursed them who were once his peculiar People a chosen Generation a royal Priest-hood as he did by scattering them all the world over but no where incorporated into a Nation a standing and visible mark of Vengeance upon them I say this people would not have been so severely dealt with upon the account of their infidelity If the word preached by the Holy Jesus and confirmed by miracles and unusual signs was not convincing and influential Wherefore it is sadly recorded of them John 12.40 That God hath blinded their eyes and hardened their heart that they should not see with their eyes and understand with their heart and be converted From hence I draw this Conclusion That when men arrive to such a pitch of daring presumption as to give little or no heed to the written word of God all other means used for their Conversion such as Preaching friendly Counsel and Admonishment seldom affecteth or worketh a change in them Hence a Friend becometh anothers Enemy because he tells him the truth mildly reproves him for his sin sorrowfully tells him what a desperate condition he is in and what he must expect if he persists and dies in an irrepentant state By such Gods Ministers and their wholesom Discourses are reproached those Sermons which they should use as medicaments to heal their wounded Souls are made their sport and pastime fitting only to be Subjects of vain wit and frothy drollery It is a sad presage of final ruine when the standing Revelation of Gods Will doth not work upon men to the changing of their manners and turning them from under the power of Satan unto God In all probability neither an Angel from Heaven nor a damned Ghost from beneath could ever reach and overcome them For if that word which was ushered into the world with Thundrings and Lightnings delivered by the Prophets by God's special Order and Inspiration and to strengthen the credibility of it was rehearsed and promulged by Jesus Christ and that the knowledge thereof might be universally spread was delivered by the same Jesus to the Apostles and that succeeding ages might not be brought up in ignorance and live and dye without the knowledge of God and their Duty was handed down from the Apostles to Us That word that reformed three thousand Souls at one time Converted Heathens who had no other sense of their Maker than what they received from the Book of Nature and brought over multitudes to the Profession and Practice of Christianity who never heard of it before I say if this word of God which has abundantly evidenced its power and efficacy and is the means of that Piety and Religion practised in our days cannot prevail with men their stubbornness and wilful infidelity defeating its aptness and influence we may very reasonably conclude that if a special miracle was wrought to convert them it would be to no purpose But here notwithstanding what has been already urged some may yet say in the Language of the Text But if one rose from the dead we would repent The Motives and Arguments of the Gospel being still and the same and which by experience we find have not power enough to reclaim us some new method used for our Conversion as an Apparition or Ghost would above any thing else persuade us Now how little this would affect them I shall shew in the prosecution of the second Point which is Secondly That should God condescend to gratifie a Wicked Mans vain Curiosity by causing one to rise from the dead and to testifie unto him that the course he takes without speedy amendment will be the eternal ruine of him and that the preparations in Hell are very terrible and insupportable yet he will invent Arguments and propound Reasons to fortisie himself that he may not be affected with and instuenced by such an Apparition and frightful Relation as heretofore he did to withstand the prevalent Motives of Religion It is not to be disputed but that if a Spectrum or Ghost should appear to a very wicked man suppose it to
perfect and promulge the intent and meaning of his Laws that we might not be be-wildred in Fancies and Illusions grovel in the Dark and perish in Ignorance If notwithstanding this Pharos or great Illuminary which would light and guide us to Heaven's Gates we still wander and stray from the Truth expecting a miraculous Revelation that God will convert us by some other means which we have no warrant for nor have the least reason to suppose we shall be grosly deceived and obstinately plunge our selves into remediless Ruine he having appointed no other means for our Conviction Conversion and Salvation than his Holy Word which he has commissioned his Ministers to preach and propagate And thus much may suffice for the first thing which I proposed to speak to namely That the Word of God is the only Means appointed to convert and bring us to the enjoyment of him Which is the Argument Abraham urges to the rich Man to excuse the grant of his request That Lazarus might be sent to his Brethren to testifie unto them No they have Moses and the Prophets the appointed means for Salvation let them give heed to them It is but in vain for them to expect extraordinary Revelations and for you to desire them From hence I proceed to the second general Thing namely Secondly That it is too plain an argument of a seared Heart and strong Infidelity when the Word of God doth not take place convince Men of their Sins and happily bring them from under the power of Satan unto God And this Abraham implies in his Answer to the rich Man Thy Brethren have Moses and the Prophets who are sufficient to reclaim and work a reformation in them unless their Heart be like an Adamant stubborn and impenetrable For their Commission is immediately from God and that which they preach is by his special Inspiration St. Paul asserts Heb. 4.12 That the word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged Sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of Soul and Spirit that is it is convincing and influential of mighty force and sagacity active and searching Now it evidently follows that Men must be prodigiously hardened and arrived to a very high pitch of Infidelity when this quickening and converting Word of God loseth its Vertue and seems no more than an idle Tale to them For no more it is in effect while Men continue in sin and live secure and thoughtless under the sound and preaching of it The Eunuch who had but a small sense of God as he was journying accidentally pitching upon Isai 53.7 where he read He was led as a Sheep to the slaughter and like a Lamb dumb before his Shearers so he opened not his Mouth In his humiliation his judgment was taken away and who shall declare his generation For his life is taken from the Earth Being affected with the Expression asketh Philip of whom the Prophet spake Philip answered Of Jesus and preaching him to him and the necessity of being admitted into his Fold he seeing a large Pool saith What doth hinder me to be baptized And Philip said If thou believest thou maist He answered I do believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and was immediately baptized Acts 8. from 30 to 39. Of such Force and Energy is the Word of God when it is read with Care heard with Attention and received into a flexible and unprejudiced Heart While St. Peter was Expounding and preaching the Scriptures about three thousand Souls at once were converted from Judaisin and made eminent Proselites of the holy Jesus Acts 2.41 While St. Paul was preaching to Felix the Governor concerning Righteousness Temperance and Judgment to come the Text saith he fell a trembling Acts 24.25 The Word preached searched him to the bottom and filled him with a sense of his own guilt it dictated to him that he was the Man tho' his own perverseness defeated its healing Operation upon him It is Mens infidelity and stubbornness of Heart which they have contracted by customary sinning which choaks the Word that it becometh unfruitful Or otherwise could they read and hear God speaking to them to break off their Sins and exert new and vertuous Habits beseeching and intreating them to be wise for themselves that God who can every moment by an invisible and irresistable Power revenge himself on disobedient Man and send him roaring into the infernal Pit I say could Men live under the constant sound of the Word of God and yet remain unconvinced and unaffected unless they were seared against Reproof and impregnable to good Advice did a Man absolutely without any reserve believe that God will certainly punish all proud Contemners of his Laws that his threatnings without any respect of Persons will be executed upon every one that shall be found in Rebellion against him would he think you dare to love his Sins and spend his time in vain Sports and Pastimes Would he not rather presently bethink himself change his mind and resolve to be conformable in Action and Affection to the Word of Truth Did a Man fear God as he ought which implies a belief in him in the construction of the Scriptures he would dread his displeasure and prudently withdraw himself from those Vices which will incur it As a Man fears thee so is thy displeasure says the Psalmist Psalm 90.11 Or more plainly according as Mens Thoughts are of God so are their Lives And from hence we may without being censured as uncharitable conclude whether Men revere or contemn God by the general course of their Actions It is an andeniable Argument of a profound love belief and fear of God when a Man makes the Scripture his Rule when he avoids those things it interdicts and chearfully doth those it commands As on the contrary when Men Swear blaspheme God and and his Religion Cheat Oppress Lye commit Adultery and the like and allow themselves herein with delight and complacency This is Proof beyond all contradiction that God is not in all their Thoughts that his Word is as a Cypher that they either conclude him a Being which does not disturb himself by taking cognizance of Things committed here below or if he does yet will not be so rigid to call them to Account and thus give themselves encouragement to follow their own Inventions and to sin without Concern or Thought And when once Men are deaf to the Calls of the Gospel despise its Promises and contemn its Threatnings when neither Moses nor the Prophets nor Christ Jesus nor his Substitutes can work upon them to renounce their Impieties and to order their Conversation as becomes Christians I say if these mighty Helps prove ineffectual it is is to be reasonably presumed that nothing besides no not an Angel from Heaven nor a damned Spirit from beneath could ever reach or have any influence upon them And thus much for the second Thng namely That it is too great an Argument of a seared Heart and strong
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