more fit and expedite for the race set before us viz. that we be more particularly careful to arm our selves against those temptations to lay aside those lusts to which we perceive our selves by nature or custom most inclined This I conceive is meant here by the sin which doth so easily beset us Every man who gives himself the leisure to examine his own heart impartially will find that some temptations have a great deal more easie access to him than others and our great adversary the Devil is very diligent and watchful to set before us such objects and lay such snares in our way which are most likely to prevail upon us The sins we are naturally inclined to oft-times creep upon us insensibly and get possession of our hearts before we are well aware of them Sometimes they disguise themselves under the pretence of Piety and seeming holiness and a great zeal against the contrary extream Sometimes they plead Nature and Custom for their continuance that these cannot be overcome sometimes we have ways to extenuate them and make them seem small and venial and if men take time to deliberate about parting with them there is great hazard but they will keep possession So apt are we to be vanquished when we have a mind to it when our Adversaries from without have their correspondents in our own bosom when we have so many treacherous Guests so many deceitful Lusts within us which are ready to betray us and to yield up our hearts to a subtle and powerful enemy Here then is our greatest danger here we must exert our greatest care and vigilance here we must shew our courage and resolution in throwing off these darling and beloved Lusts the sins that do so easily beset us This is that which our Saviour elsewhere requires of us when he bids us cut off our right hands and pluck out our right eyes when they make us to offend And thus much for the first part of the Exhortation Having according to our power laid aside every weight having freed our selves from our evil habits and customs and from our most secret and beloved Lusts we are not to rest here Thus much is required as a preparation to be Christs Disciples but when we are admitted into the number we must then set our selves upon an active obedience to his Laws A negative holiness will not serve our turn We must not onely eschew evil but we must do what good we can in the several places and stations to which God hath called us They who run in a Race when they have stript themselves and laid aside all unnecessary weights and incumbrances have yet the whole Race before them which they must run through if they expect their Crown and Prize and therefore in proportion to what is required of them we also are exhorted in the 2. Second place to run the Race set before us Now the positive duties required of all Christians answer to that part of the similitude and to discharge them faithfully is meant by running the race set before us And this is elsewhere expressed in plainer Exhortations Work out your salvation with fear and trembling giving all diligence add to your faith vertue and to vertue knowledge and to knowledge temperance and to temperance patience and to patience godliness and to godliness brotherly kindness and to brotherly kindness charity Whatsoever things are true whatsoever things are honest whatsoever things are just whatsoever things are pure whatsoever things are lovely whatsoever things are of good report if there be any praise or if there be any vertue think on and do these things Now these and the like Exhortations and Precepts often repeated in holy Scripture being all in general terms the particular instances of duty required by them must be left to each mans private consideration and they are various according to mens several abilities and opportunities according to their several relations in which God hath placed them God the supream 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hath by his wise and good providence allotted every man his course It is not of our choosing but it is a race set before us He hath likewise distributed among men various gifts and abilities whereby they are severally fitted to do good and according to these every man must judge of his duty in particular what it is that the Lord requires of him and no man who doth not want will and resolution to do the will of God can ordinarily be ignorant what he ought to do and therefore I shall not descend to any particular instances of duty only from the similitude here used I shall crave leave to suggest these two things 1. That our obedience to God ought to be vigorous and chearful 2. That it ought to be constant and uninterrupted 1. The similitude of Running imports great vigour and alacrity in the discharge of our duty They who run with hopes of Victory must not be faint-hearted and languish but must be chearful and couragious full of hope and eager expectation of the desired triumph Thus must a Christian behave himself in the race set before him He must go about his duty with chearfulness and freedom as one that doth it with a willing mind and hopes for success by so doing He must always have in his eye the great recompence of reward the joy set before him the Crown of Glory laid up for him and in prospect of that he must chearfully undertake whatever difficulties he meets with in his way And indeed if we have once obeyed the former part of the Exhortation if we have once freed our minds from the low and sordid cares and incumbrances of this life present there can then remain nothing to hinder or retard our motion or to abate our courage in running the Race set before us And this holy David seems to express saying I will run the way of thy commandments when thou hast set my heart at liberty When we are once at liberty from the World and have weaned our affections from things below and placed them on a better and more enduring substance then though we meet with dangers and inconveniences we shall joyfully go on and every days progress in our course of piety will render our task more easie and delightful We shall apprehend our selves every day more and more approaching to the end of our hopes and to the Crown of our labours and out of prospect of so sure a reward so nigh at hand and out of a fore-taste of that happiness shall be able to say of Religion from our own experience that her ways are ways of pleasantness and all her paths Peace 2. Another thing represented by this similitude of Running is that our course of Piety our religious conversation ought to be constant and uninterrupted He that runs in a Race cannot find leisure to stop and divert himself or salute his friends by the way A little needless ceremony at such a time may hazard the loss of the whole
diligence add to your Faith Vertue and to Vertue Knowledge and to Knowledge Temperance and to Temperance Patience and to Patience Godliness and to Godliness Brotherly Kindness and to Brotherly Kindness Charity For so an entrance shall be ministred unto you effectually into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Now these and the like Exhortations would be of no force at all to persuade us if these promises could be attained without the performance of these conditions In a word in all the descriptions of a Judgment to come there is nothing plainer than this that I now plead for that God will reward every one according to what he hath done I shall mention but two places more Rom. ij 6. God will render to every man according to his deeds to them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and honour and immortality eternal life But unto them that are contentious and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness indignation and wrath tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man that doth evil of the Jew first and also of the Gentiles For there is no respect of persons with God The other place is Mat. xxv where our Saviour having given us a large description of those good Works which shall then be rewarded and having there represented the vanity of those mens excuses who had not wrought them he concludes with this sentence these shall go away into everlasting punishment and the righteous into life eternal There remains onely to draw some inferences from what hath been said that may be of use to us for the government of our lives 1. If there be a Judgment to come wherein men shall receive rewards and punishments according to their actions whether good or bad it is easie then to understand how much those men deceive themselves who hope to be saved by vertue of any absolute and inconditionate decree For if God have from eternity fore-ordained such and such particular persons to eternal life and others to eternal damnation without any consideration of their actions whether good or bad then certainly God cannot proceed in judgment according to the method before described nor could the promises and threatnings of the Gospel have any force of persuasion to engage men in the practice of Vertue or to discourage them from Sin and Wickedness In vain would the Apostle here make use of the terrours of the Lord to persuade men if God have before determined that such a certain number of them shall not escape the wrath to come whatsoever diligence they use on their parts On the contrary the promises of the Gospel cannot have any reasonable force to engage men to obedience if once they knew and believed that their future state was from everlasting unalterably fixed so that they could not fall short of it by any neglect Nay upon this supposition all the various methods of persuasion which God uses in Scripture to bring men to repentance and a better life prove nothing else but illusion and hypocrisie For that God should so often by his holy Prophets and Apostles invite and exhort and beseech all men that they would turn from their evil ways and live when in the mean time he hath excluded many myriads of men from any possibility of salvation by an absolute and irresistible decree which no endeavour of theirs can revoke or cancel this way of proceeding cannot by any means consist with that truth and sincerity and goodness which is inseparable from the divine nature We must therefore conclude that if there be a Judgment to come when all men shall receive rewards and punishments according to what they have done then certainly no man shall ever be excluded from those rewards but by his own fault nor yet any man obtain the same but by a due diligence in working out his salvation and performing those conditions upon which they are promised 2. From what hath been said concerning the method of Gods proceeding at the Judgment of the last Day we may also observe that those men do extreamly mistake the conditions of salvation who talk of being saved by Faith as it is distinguished from good works and obedience who take so much pains to cry down the value of our good works as though they had little or no influence in the justification or salvation of a Christian For surely if we shall be judged according to what we have done Faith alone cannot be the whole condition required on our parts in order to our salvation It is true indeed glorious things are spoken of Faith in holy Scripture but these things must not be understood of a bare assent to the truth of the Gospel which is the proper importance of that word Faith but of such a Faith as is a principle of life and action such a Faith as hath influence upon the whole course of our lives and is not contradicted by our practice and conversation a Faith that worketh by love and is fruitful of good works and obedience Thus it is not to be considered as a single Vertue and separate from the rest but as being the fruitful parent of all other Christian Vertues and including them in it For if we understand Faith in a more strict sense as distinct from an holy conversation it is no more than the Devils themselves may pretend to and yet this is so far from being any relief to them that it is the great aggravation of their misery To know and be assured of the glorious things revealed in the Gospel and to know withal that they themselves are finally excluded from the benefit of them this doubtless is a mighty aggravation of their horrour and we may well conclude as S. James doth that they believe and tremble nay that this belief doth make them tremble 3. If we shall be judged according to what we have done in the body it then follows that all that is to be done by us in the great work of our Salvation must be performed in our life time whilest we are in the body Now must we give all diligence to make our calling and election sure and not leave any thing to be done after our death either by our selves or others This I observe in opposition to that Doctrine of the Church of Rome which supposes that some sins are expiated after death and purged away by the fire of Purgatory and by the Prayers and Sacrifices of those that are left alive But this is not onely a vain and groundless opinion but certainly doth much tend to the hindrance of Piety and lessening mens care of their future state As the Tree falleth so it lieth As a man goeth out of this World such will be his future state and he will be judged according to what he was when he left the body according to what he had done in the body 4. If it be thus certain that we must all appear before the Judgment seat of Christ that every one may receive the things done in his body this certainly ought to awaken our diligence in the business of our Salvation that to day while it is called to day we break off our sins by a sincere and hearty repentance that knowing the terrours of the Lord we pass the time of our so journing here in fear For surely did men seriously consider that there is a day coming when all the hidden works of darkness shall be made manifest when the secrets of all mens hearts shall be revealed when all the close impieties which had passed here undiscerned should be laid open before God and all the World they would not now so fondly flatter themselves with hopes of secresie or impunity Did men seriously reflect upon the terribleness of that great day when God shall appear with ten thousand of his Saints to take vengeance on them that have not feared his name did they often think upon that dreadful sentence which will then be pronounced against all impenitent sinners Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels this certainly if any thing would put a check to the bold impiety of this Age. Men would not then dare so openly to defie Heaven and blaspheme the Majesty of the great God who will at that day appear so terrible nor would they continue by their hardness and impenitent hearts to treasure up to themselves wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous Judgment of God On the contrary as the terrours of that day ought to make us sensible of our danger if we continue in disobedience so the glorious reward which shall at that day be given to those that have lived obediently to the will of God ought to be a most effectual motive to persuade us thereunto For what greater encouragement to our duty than the consideration of those great and glorious things which God hath prepared for them that love him Who would not willingly forsake all the flattering joys and transitory pleasures of this life that he may secure to himself such an inheritance incorruptible undefiled that fadeth not away which God the righteous Judge shall give him at that day Or who would not despise all the sufferings of this life which may possibly attend him in the practice of his duty when he remembers that these light afflictions which endure but for a moment work out for him a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory Now the great God grant us all his grace that we may have the judgment of the last day always present to our minds that denying all ungodliness and worldly lusts we may live soberly righteously and godly in this present world looking for that blessed hope and glorious appearance of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ that when we come to stand before that great Tribunal we may be presented pure and unblamable in his sight and that not for any merits of our own but through the mediation of our blessed Saviour To whom with the Father and Eternal Spirit be ascribed as is most due all power praise thanksgiving and obedience for evermore FINIS
his good Spirit to enable us to understand and do those things which are necessary for us and to lead us into all truth For we are not to understand this promise of our Saviour as though God would infuse the knowledge of divine truth by a miracle but that those that will do the will of God shall be blest by him in the diligent use of those ordinary means which he hath appointed for their instruction And therefore in the old Oeconomy the Jews were referred to Moses for their instruction what they ought to do And under the Gospel God hath given some Apostles some Prophets and some Evangelists and some Pastors and Teachers for the perfecting the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ and to these men and their successors we must have recourse in order to instruction and satisfaction in matters of Religion To these themselves we may have recourse in the Books of the New Testament which they have left behind them as a certain guide to us in all things necessary if we be not wanting to our selves To their Successors we have recourse in our attendance upon the publick Ministry who derive their commission by a continued succession from the Apostles who were impowered by Christ to ordain others for the continuance of their Office to the end of the World And to these persons thus impowered all private Christians ought to apply themselves with humility and diligence for their instruction and in the diligent use of those means of knowledge above-mentioned he that will do the will of God by vertue of this promise of our Saviour shall know of the doctrine 3. This condition if any man will do his will implies further that in our search after divine truth and in our use of those means of knowledge which God hath afforded us we must propose to our selves the doing the will of God as the ultimate end of our knowledge This is that which is more particularly expressed in the Text. Many there are who are very inquisitive after truth but they have oft-times very different and undue ends in their enquiry sometimes they do it to gratifie their curiosity sometimes that they may be able to maintain their Party they are ingaged in with some plausible shew of reason sometimes they do it for ostentation and vain-glory that they may appear wiser and more learned than their neighbours and sometimes they seek for knowledge as other men do their Merchandise that they may make a gain of it and provide for their subsistence in the World Now Now all these several sorts of Enquirers may possibly attain the several ends they propose to themselves they may grow learned and wise in the ordinary account of men they may grow rich and gain esteem and applause among men and in this they have their reward but still they may want the true knowledge and satisfaction which our Saviour here speaks of which is not attainable by any that do not intend and resolve to do the will of God according to their knowledge this alone makes them capable of a full and sensible conviction of the divine authority and excellency of those revelations which are contained in the Gospel For it is not every one that can talk superficially about religious matters or that can give a tolerable account of the rational grounds upon which the truth of the Gospel is conveyed to us not every one that can dispute learnedly about points of Faith and decide Controverfies not every one that is thus accomplished is properly said to know of the doctrine in our Saviours sense No he that is resolved to do the will of God absolutely and entirely such a one shall receive a more full and ample satisfaction concerning those things that are necessary for him than can be gained by the strongest reasonings and most convincing demonstrations He shall find in his soul a lively sense of the excellency of those truths which the Gospel delivers such as shall leave no room for doubtfulness or disputing 4. We must not onely intend and resolve to do the will of God and propose to our selves this as the great end of our enquiry but we must actually endeavour to discharge those duties we already know if we hope to attaim to a sufficient satisfaction in our Religion for he that neglects to do the will of God as far as he already knows he cannot be presumed to have a sincere resolution of submitting to those further instructions which he may find in the Gospel And indeed in this place our Saviour may well be understood to exact this qualification of those who came to hear him that they should practise those duties they already knew if they would be satisfied concerning the truth of his Religion for otherwise it may seem an improper and preposterous way of proceeding to persuade men first to obey the Gospel and then to promise them satisfaction about the truth of it Men are not willing to enter upon a way of living so strict and severe as the Gospel enjoyns without being satisfied before hand of the truth of it that that is truly the will of God which is there required and that it is their great duty and interest to obey it Nay it is manifest by sad experience that many who are convinced of the truth of the Gospel are yet very backward to practise the precepts of it but how much more unwillingly would they undertake this practice if they were not capable of satisfaction about the truth of the Gospel till they had obeyed it So that it is most reasonable to suppose that the doing the will of God here spoken of must in part be understood of those previous instructions in the will of God which those who came to hear our Saviour had before received The Jews to whom our Saviour here directs his discourse had the instructions of Moses and the Prophets from whom they might have understood the principal rules of good living and their obedience to Moses and the Prophets would doubtless have been a great preparation for their reception of the Gospel and then for those Enquirers after truth who have been bred up in a Christian Commonwealth they cannot be supposed to be wholly ignorant of their duty No man can ordinarily grow up in a Christian Society to an age capable of such enquiries but must have been competently instructed in the general rules of good living in the substantial and necessary parts of Religion Those three great branches of Duty which S. Paul teaches us to be the summe of the Gospel the living righteously soberly and godly in the World are in themselves of so evident an obligation that no man who hath come to the use of Reason especially in a Christian Common-wealth can be ignorant that it is his duty to live so Suppose we then a man competently instructed in the general rules of good living whether by the Law of Nature written in his
prize His adversary perhaps who was of less ability and courage may by such an advantage easily get the start of him and defeat him of the Crown and he become the derision and scorn of the beholders The case is not unlike in our Christian Race It is not sufficient that we be Religious and Devout by fits and starts at some set time or upon some solemn occasion but it ought to be our constant behaviour the continued imployment of our lives The doing the will of God is much more our business than any other imployment whatsoever and ought to be as constantly and vigorously pursued For if at any time we give our selves leisure to be idle and make any least delay or stop in our Christian Race alas we do not consider how easily we may fall short of our desired end For how fast soever we go on in our way our former lusts and desires we had cast off will be sure to follow us close to tread in our steps and will watch every opportunity to desire Parley with us and entreat our stay And if we once make the least intermission to treat with them it is easie to foresee how soon our vigour and heat with which we began the Race will abate and cool our joints will then grow stiff and unactive and then presently a thousand difficulties arise and we are as far from our Journies end as when we first set out So dangerous a thing it is when we have begun well and gone on for a while then to stay and look back and deliberate whether we shall go farther or not Nay in these cases of a moral nature to stay is to go backward For such is the nature of man he cannot be altogether idle if he be not engaged in things that are good and vertuous he will certainly be imployed in somewhat else that is bad and sinful And then it is very plain that a good habit is much more weakened by a little intermission than it can be strengthened or improved by many instances of Vertue So that from these considerations it may abundantly appear how necessary it is that our progress in this Race before us should be constant and uninterrupted 3. The third and last part of this Exhortation is that our vigour and diligence in this affair must be continued to the end of our lives We must run with patience How diligent and active soever we may have been in the practice of our duty how far soever we have proceeded in our Christian Race let no man yet flatter himself that he hath done his whole duty or that he hath attained to the utmost degree of perfection he is capable of or that he is already secure of his Reward and Crown For this is a very dangerous mistake and many who did run once well may upon this presumption foolishly miscarry notwithstanding all their pains and labour they have heretofore endured All the promises of a future reward are limited to such as persevere in well-doing and this very similitude is a clear evidence of it For who ever pretended to have won the prize without running to the end of the Race Now there is nothing more plain than that our life here is the time of our trial wherein we must work out our salvation and run the Race set before us and that the life to come is the time of reward or retribution As long therefore as we live here we must keep up our diligence in our Christian calling labouring every day to go on from strength to strength to grow in grace and to improve in the practice of all vertue and godliness of living And as for those who imagine to themselves I know not what security of their condition they would do well to remember that God hath assured us that he hath made no such irrevocable decree for any particular mans salvation but that he is in a possibility of falling short of it if he fall from his uprightness and integrity Ez. 33. 13. When I shall say to the righteous that he shall surely live if he trust to his own righteousness and commit iniquity all his righteousness shall not be remembred For his iniquity that he hath committed he shall die for it Out of a sense of the possibility and danger of this S. Paul exhorts us 1 Cor. x. 12. Wherefore let him that thinketh he stands take heed lest he fall Where the Apostle plainly intimates that they who think themselves perfect and secure of their condition are in greater danger of falling than others because that very security is apt in its own natural tendency to make men supine and negligent and unwilling to proceed further in the Race set before them The truth is as long as we are in the body though we have made it our endeavour to throw off every weight though we have used great diligence in our Christian Race yet still we have something more to do we have still many adversaries to contend with many temptations to resist the seed of those desires which we had before do still remain in us which will always afford new matter for our vigilance and care Nor can we ever be secure that we have earned our prize till we have finished our course with patience and God calls us hence to receive our reward Sure I am if any man might be secure before hand that he had done his whole duty and was now ascertained of his reward S. Paul might pretend as reasonably to that priviledge as any other but yet he describes his own condition as still imperfect and still depending upon his future diligence Phil. iij. 12. Not as though I had already attained either were already perfect but I follow after if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus Brethren I count not my self to have apprehended but this one thing I do forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are before I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus Thus if we would follow S. Pauls example and the Exhortation in the Text we must still continue pressing forward and run with patience to the end of our race Having thus far considered the Exhortation in the Text and the extent of it I might now endeavour to enforce it by representing to your thoughts the exceeding great reward the glorious prize we are to run for in the Race set before us Which is so great a degree of blessedness that neither eye hath seen nor ear heard nor can it enter into the heart of man sufficiently to conceive of it I might also here recal to your remembrance the faithfulness and truth and goodness of God who hath promised this reward and will bestow it on those who have endured to the end and run with patience I might farther add the consideration of the assistances of Gods good Spirit the great comfort support and
motives to a like stedfastness in our Holy Calling inasmuch as they bear witness by their Examples that there are no difficulties so great in the ways of Holiness no afflictions so grievous but that by the power of a lively and active faith and by a prospect of the Joy set before us and by the assistance of Gods grace in the discharge of our duty they may be endured with patience and comfort nay further with joy and satisfaction Let us now cast our eyes back on those great Examples of Faith and Patience recorded in the foregoing Chapter let us behold the mighty power and efficacy of their Faith and the bravery of their Vertues in its most afflicted state let us call to mind the chearfulness and joy with which they trampled on and despised the sufferings of this life present that they might obtain a better inheritance Let us add to these the glorious company of Apostles and Evangelists the noble Army of Martyrs and Confessors and innumerable companies of just men made perfect who have departed this life in the Faith of Christ being Witnesses to us of better promises than the Fathers had And lastly let us look unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our Faith who for the Joy set before him endured the Cross despised the Shame and is now set down upon the right hand of the Throne of God and then surely if the Apostles Argument was a reasonable motive in his days it will now be much more so since the Cloud of Witnesse is so much increased by the Saints and Martyrs of the Christian Church Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses let us lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us and let us run with patience the race that is set before us SERM. V. HEB. xij 2. Looking unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our Faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the Cross despising the shame and is set down at the right hand of the Throne of God THere is no kind of Argument more naturally fitted to prevail upon mens minds and to engage their industry and diligence in any enterprise whatsoever than the example of others who have gone before them whose wisdom and vertue they have in reverence who have performed the like undertaking with honour and success The opinion we have of their wisdom and vertue makes us think it not unreasonable for us to follow their steps and imitate their practice and the success of their endeavours takes away all those faint excuses which Sloth and Idleness are apt to suggest to us We cannot then pretend that it is an impossible task we are persuaded to when we see before our eyes the examples of others of like frame with our selves who have already performed it with chearfulness and joy The Apostle therefore well knowing that the Profession of Christianity was to be attended with many difficulties and dangers and that our Saviour had made it a necessary qualification of all that would be his Disciples to take up the Cross and follow him to prepare the minds of his new converted Hebrews against all discouragements whatsoever that might withdraw them from their stedfastness in the Faith they had embraced in the foregoing Chapter of the Epistle he largely represents to them the many examples of the Patriarchs of old whose Seed they were of the holy Prophets whose Writings they had received of all the Worthies recorded in Sacred Story whose Praises they had been instructed in that all these in confidence that God would reward their Obedience and Faith in another life though he suffered them to be evil intreated here had patiently undergone the most barbarous cruelties which the wit or malice of men could exercise upon them Some of them were stoned and sawn in sunder some of them wandered about being destitute afflicted tormented but yet these and many other kinds of calamities they chearfully submitted to not accepting deliverance that they might obtain a better resurrection And then applying their examples to the state of those first Christians he gives them to understand that if the Fathers before recited by the power of their Faith were enabled to endure such things as these then surely they who had received far better promises ought not to fall short of their patience and resolution and constant perseverance in their holy Profession though they should be exposed to many Trials and Persecutions for it This application he makes in the words before the Text Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses let us lay aside every weight and the sin that doth so easily beset us and let us run with patience the race that is set before us But because the duty of Patience under Sufferings is that which of all others we are naturally most averse to that there might be nothing wanting to confirm their resolution to go on chearfully in the Race set before them he proceeds in the Text to raise their thoughts to the contemplation of a far more eminent and illustrious example whom they ought always to have in their eye as the best pattern of their Obedience and affording the strongest motives and encouragement to it Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the Cross despising the shame and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God Considering the words with this dependance they are a prevailing argument and motive to engage us to imitate our Saviour as in all other parts of a holy conversation so more particularly in the patient suffering of those afflictions and calamities which befall us in this life Which duty though it have a more peculiar reference to the state of the Primitive Christians who were continually exposed to the most unsupportable calamities for their profession of Christianity yet we are not to persuade our selves that we in these days are wholly exempt from our share in it Though open Persecutions are not now felt among us yet all that will live godly have many Trials and Temptations to oppose themselves against many difficulties and dangers to struggle with many enemies to withstand through the whole course of their pilgrimage who are always active and busie to hinder our progress in our Christian Race and to defeat us of our Reward and Crown Though we are not now brought before Kings and Rulers for the sake of Christ though we cannot now be tempted to a total Apostasie from our Christian Profession to an open denial of the Lord that bought us yet still we are exposed to many temptations which are apt to draw us from our uprightness and to betray us into those evil habits and customs which are inconsistent with the Faith which we outwardly prosess and with the Salvation we hope for We have therefore need of great watchfulness and care and constant resolution if