that only is capable of being imprest by the intervening ministry of our own understanding viz. by its Vision intimated as was formerly observed in that of the Apostle We shall be like for we shall see him c. It s natural perfections are antecedent and presupposed therefore not so fitly to be understood here And I say both these wayes for as we cannot form an intire Idea of God without taking in together his perfections of both sorts communicable and incommunicable the former whereof must serve instead of a genns the latter of a differentia in composing the notion of God so nor will his impresse on us be intire without something in it respecting both in the senses already given What it will contribute to future blessedness we shall shortly see in its place when we have made a brief enquiry which is the next thing according to our order proposed concerning Thirdly The satisfaction that shall hence accrue Where it will not be besides our purpose to take some notice of the significancy of the word And not to insist on its affinity to the word used for swearing or rather being sworn which an oath being the end of controversies and beyond which we go no further nor expect more in way of testifying would the more fitly here represent to us the soul in its non-ultra having attained the end of all its motions and contentions Its equal nearness to the word signifying the number of seven is not altogether unworthy observation That number is we know often used in Scripture as denoting plenitude and perfection and God hath as it were signalliz'd it by his rest on the seventh day and if this were not designedly pointed at here in the present use of this word as it must be acknowledged to be frequently used where we have no reason to think it is with such an intendment It may yet occasion us to look upon the holy soul now entered into the eternal Sabbath the rest of God which secluding all respect to that circumstance is yet the very substance and true notion of the thing it self to the consideration whereof I now passe under the word held forth to us For this satisfaction is the souls rest in God It s perfect enjoyment of the most perfect good The expletion of the whole capacity of its will the total filling up of that vast enlarged appetite the perfecting of all its desires in delight and joy Now delight or joy for they differ not save that the latter word is thought something more appropriate to reasonable nature is more fitly defined the rest of the desiring faculty in the thing desired Desire and Delight are but two acts of Love diversified only by the distance or presence of the same Object which when 't is distant the soul acted and prompted by love desires moves towards it pursues it when present and attained delights in it enjoyes it staies upon it satisfies it self in it according to the measure of goodness it finds there Desire is therefore love in motion Delight is love in rest and of this latter delight or joy Scripture evidently gives us this Notion He will rejoyce over thee with joy unto which is presently added as exegetical he will rest in his love Which resting can be but the same thing with being satisfied This satisfaction then is nothing else but the repose and rest of the soul amidst infinite delights It s peaceful acquiescence having attained the ultimate tearm of all its motions beyond which it cares to go no further the solace it finds in an adequate full good which it accounts enough for it and beyond which it desires no more reckons its state as good as it can be and is void of all hovering thoughts which perfect rest must needs exclude or inclination to change And so doth this being satisfied not only generally signifie the soul to be at rest but it specifies that rest and gives us a distinct account of the nature of it As that it is not a forced violent rest such as proceeds from a beguiled ignorance a drowsie sloth a languishing weakness or a desire and hope of happiness by often frustrations bafled into despair to all which the native import and propriety of that word satisfaction doth strongly repugne But it discovers it to be a natural rest I mean from an internal principle the soul is not held in its present state of enjoyment by a strong and violent hand but rests in it by a connaturalness thereunto is attempered to it by its own inward constitution and frame It rests not as a descending stone intercepted by something by the way that holds and stops it else it would fall further but as a thing would rest in its own centre with such a rest as the earth is supposed to have in its proper place that being hung upon nothing is yet unmoved ponderibus librata suis equally ballanced by its own weights every way It is a rational judicious rest upon certain knowledge that its present state is simply best and not capable of being changed for a better The soul cannot be held under a perpetual cheat so as alwayes to be satisfied with a â—hadow It may be so befool'd for a while but if it remain satisfied in a state that never admits of change that state must be such as commends it self to the most throughly informed reason and judgement It is hence a free voluntary chosen rest Such as God professes his own to be in Zion This is my rest here will I dwell for I have desired it It is a complacential rest wherein the soul abides steady bound only by the cords of love a rest in the midst of pleasantnesses The Lord is my portion the lots are fallen to me in amanitatibus it cannot be more fitly exprest than amidst pleasantnesses And this speaks not only what the Psalmists condition was but the sense and account he had of it That temper of mind gives us some Idea of that contentful satisfied abode with God which the blessed shall have He intimates how undesirous he was of any change Their sorrows he told us above should be multiplied that hasten after another God Hereafter there will be infinitely less appearance of reason for any such thought Now it is the sense of an holy soul Whom have I in heaven but thee and there is none I desire on earth besides thee q. d. Heaven and Earth yield not a tempting Object to divert me from thee 't is now so at sometimes when faith and love are in their triumph and exaltation but the Lord knows how seldom but much more when we see him as he is and are satisfied with his likeness It 's an active vigorous rest Action about the end shall be perpetuated here though action towards it ceases 'T is the rest of an awâ—kned not of a drowsie sluggish soul of a soul satiâ—fiâ—d by heavenly sensations and fruitions
The vital quickning beams of divine light are darting in upon it on every side and turning it into their own likeness The shadows of the evening are vanished and fled away It converses with no other objects but what are full themselves and most apt to replenish it with energy and life This cannot be but a joyful awakning a blessed season of satisfaction and delight indeed to the enlightned revived soul. But 2. It must be acknowledged the further and more eminent season of this blessedness will be the general resurrection day which is more expresly signified in Scripture by this term of awaying as is manifest in many plain Texts where 't is either expresly thus used or implyed to have this meaning in the opposite sense of the word sleep What addition shall then be made to the Saints blessedness lyes more remote from our apprehension in as much as Scripture states not the degree of that blessedness which shall intervene We know by a too sad instructive experience the calamities of our present state and can therefore more easily conceive wherein it is capable of betterment by the deposition of a sluggish cumbersome body where those calamities mostly have their spring but then we know less where to fix our foot or whence to take our rise in estimating the additional felicities of that future state when both the states to be compared are so unknown to us But that there will be great additions is plain enough The full recompence of obedience and devotedness to Christ of foregoing all for him is affixed by his promise to the resurrection of the just The judgment day gives every one his portion according to his workâ— Then must the holy obedient Christian hear from its Redeemers mouth Come ye-blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom c. Till then the Devils think their torment to be before their time 'T is when he shall appear we shall be like him and see him as he is That noted day is the day of being presented faultless with exceeding joy And divers things there are obviously enough to be reflected on which cannot but be understood to contribute much to the increase and improvement of this inchoate blessedness The acquisition of a glorified body For our vile bodies shall be so far transfigured as to be made like conform to the glorious body of the Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ. And this shall be when he shall appear from heaven where Saints here below are required to have their commerce as the infranchised Citizens thereof and from whence they are to continue looking for him in the mean time When he terminates and puts a period to that expectation of his Saints on earth then shall that great change be made i. e. when he actually appears at which time the trumpet sâ—unds and even sleeping dust it self awakes the hallowed dust of them that slept in Jesus first who are then to come with him This change may well be conceived to add considerably to their felicity A natural congruity and appetite is now answered and satisfied which did either lie dormant or was under somewhat an anxious restless expectation before neither of which could well consist with a state of blessedness every way already perfect And that there is a real desire and expectation of this change seems to be plainly intimated in those words of Job All the days of my appointed time will I wait till my change come Where he must rather be understood to speak of the resurrection than of death as his words are commonly mistaken and misapplyed as will appear by setting down the Context from the seventh verse For there is hope of a tree if it be cut down that it will sprout again and that the tender branch thereof will not cease Though the root thereof wax old in the earth and the stock thereof dye in the ground yet through the sent of water it will bud and bring forth boughs like a plant But man dyeth and wasteth away yea man giveth up the Ghost and where is he As the waters fail from the Sea and the flood decayeth and dryeth up so man lyeth down and riseth not till the heavens be no more they shall not be awaked nor raised out of their sleep O that thou wouldest hide me in the grave that thou wouldest keep me secret till thy â—rath be pâ—st that thou wouldest appoint me a set time and remember me If a man dye shall he live again All the dayes of my appointed time will I wait till my change come Thou shalt call and I will answer thee thou wilt have a desire to the work of thy hands He first speaks according to common apprehension and sensible appearance touching the hopeless state of man in death as though it were less capable of reparation then that of some inferiour creatures unto the end of ver 10. And then gradually discovers his better hope bewrayes his Faith as it were obliquely touching this point lets it breaking out first in some obscure glimmerings ver 11 12. giving us in his Protasis a similitude not fully expressive of his seeming meaning for waters and flouds that fail may be renewed and in his Apodosis more openly intimating mans sleep should be only till the heavens were no more Which till might be supposed to signiâ—ie never were it not for what follows ver 13. where he expresly speaks his confidence by way of petition that at a set and appointed time God would remember him so as to recall him out of the Grave and at last being now minded to speak out more fully puts the question to himself if a man dye shall he live again and answers it all the dayes of my appointed time i. e. of that appointed time which he mention'd before when God should revive him out of the dust will I wait till my change come i. e. that glorious change when the corruption of a loathsome grave should be exchang'd for immortal glory which he amplifies and utters more expresly ver 15. Thou shalt call and I will answer thou shalt have a desire to the work â—f thy hands Thou wilt not always forget to restore and perfect thy own creature And surely that waiting is not the act of his inanimate sleeping dust but though it be spoken of the person totally gone into Hâ—des into the invisible state 't is to be understood of that part that should be capable of such an action q. d. I in that part that shall be still alive shall patiently await thy appointed time of reviving me in that part also which Death and the Grave shall insult over in a temporary triumph in the mean time And so will the words carry a facile commodious sense without the unnecessary help of an imagined Rhetorical Scheme of Speech And then that this waiting carries in it a desirous expectation of some additional good is evident at â—irst sight which therefore must needs add to the
som big words or to give a faint or seeming assent to such as speak them in the names but t is impossible they should be in good earnest or believe themselves in what they say and profess And what reply then should we be able to make for who can think that any who acknowledge a God and understand at all what that name imports should value at so low a rate as we visibly do the eternal fruition of his glory and a present Sonship to him the pledge of so great an hope He that is born Heir to great Honours and Possessions though he be upon great uncertainties as to the enjoyment of them for how many interveniencies may prevent him yet when he comes to understand his possibilities and expectancies how big doth he look and speak what grandieur doth he put on His hopes form his Spirit and Deportment But is it Proportionably so with us Do our hopes fill our hearts with joy our mouths with praise and clothe our faces with a cheerful aspect and make an holy alacrity appear in all our conversations But let not the design of this discourse be mistaken 'T is â—oâ— a presumptuous confidence I would encourage nor a vain ostentation nor a disdainful overlooking of others when we fancie our selves to excel Such things hold no proportion with a Christian Spirit His is a modest humble exaltation a serious severe joy suitable to his solid stable hope His Spirit is not puft up and swol'n with air 't is not big by an inflation or a light and windy humour but 't is really fill'd with effectual pre-apprehensions of a weighty glory His joy accordingly exerts it self with a steady lively vigour equally removed from vain lightness and stupidity from conceitedness and insensibleness of his blessed state He forgets not that he is less then the least of Gods mercies but disowns not his title to the greatest of them He abases himself to the dust in the sense of his own vileness but in the admiration of Divine Grace he rises as high as Heaven In his humiliation he affects to equal himself with worms in his joy and praise with angels He is never unwilling to diminish himself but affraid of detracting any thing from the love of God or the issues of that love But most of all he magnifies as he hath cause this its last and most perfect issue And by how much he apprehends his own unworthiness he is the more rapt up into a wondering joy that such blessedness should be his designed portion But now how little do we find in our selves of this blessed frame of spirit How remote are we from it Let us but enquire a little into our own Souls Are there not too apparent Symptomes with us of the little joy we take in the forethoughts of future blessedness For First How few thoughts have we of it what any delight in they remember often 'T is said of the same person that his delight is in the Law of the Lord and that in his Law he doth meditate day and night And when the Psalmist professes his own delight in Gods statutes he adds I will not forget thy Word Should we not be as unapt to forget Heaven if our delight were there But do not dayes pass with us wherein we can allow our selves no leasure to mind the eternal glory when yet vanities throng in upon us without any obstruction or check And what is consequent hereupon How seldom is this blessed state the subject of our discourse How often do Christians meet and not a word of Heaven O heavy carnal hearts Our home and eternal blessedness in this appears to be forgotten among us How often may a person converse with us e're he understand our relation to the Heavenly Country If Exiles meet in a Forraign Land what pleasant discourse have they of home They suffer not one another to forget it Such was their remembrance of Sion who sate together bemoaning themselves by the Rivers of Babylon a making mention of it as the Phrase is often used And methinks even as to this remembrance it should be our common resolution too If we forget thee O Jerusalem If we forget to make mention of thee O thou City of the living God Let our right hand forget her cunning our tongue shall sooner cleave to the roof of our mouth and so it would be did we prefer that Heavenly Jerusalem above our chief joy Again how little doth it weigh with us It serves not to out-weigh the smallest trouble if we have not our eternal desire in every thing gratified if any thing fall out cross to our inclinations this glory goes for nothing with us Our discontents swallow up our hopes and joyes and heaven is reckon'd as a thing of naught If when outward troubles afflict or threaten us we could have the certain prospect of better dayes that would sensibly revive and please us Yea can we not please our selves with very uncertain groundless hopes of this kind without promise or valuable reason But to be told of a recompense at the resurrection of the just of a day when we shall see the face of God and be satisfied with his Likeness this is insipid and without favor to us and affords us but cold comfort The uncertain things of time signifie more with us then the certain things of eternity Can we think t is all this while well with us can we think this a tollerable evil or suffer with patience such a distemper of Spirit Methinks it should make us ever weary of our selves and solicitous for an effectual speedy redress The redress must be more in our own doing striving with our souls and with God for them then in what any man can say Most of the considerations under the foregoing rule are with little variation applicable to this present purpose I shall here annex only some few subordinate directions which may lead us into this blessed state of life and give us some joyful foretasts of the future blessedness according as our spirits shall comply with them But expect not to be cured by prescriptions without using them or that heavenly joy can be the creature of mortal unregarded breath we can onely prescribe means and methods through which God may be pleased to descend and in which thou art diligently to insist and wait And because I cannot well suppose the ignorant where much is said to this purpose I shall therefore say little 1. Possess thy soul with the apprehension that thou art not at liberty in this matter but that there is a certain spiritual delectation which is incumbent on thee as indispensable duty Some whose moroser tempers do more estrange them from delights think themselves more especially concern'd to banish every thing of that kind from their religion and phansie it onely to consist in sowr and rigorous severities Others seem to think it arbitrary and indifferent or that if they live in a continual sadness and dejection
consists first in righteousness and then in peace and joy in the holy Ghost Thou wilt so daily behold the face of God in righteousness and with pleasure but wilt most of all please thy self to think of thy final appearance before him and the blessedness that shall ensue 4. Watch and arm thy self against the too forcible strokes and impressions of sensible objects Let not the favor of such low vile things corrupt the pallate of thy soul. A sensual earthly mind and heart cannot tast heavenly delights They that are after the flesh do savor the things of the Flesh they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit Labor to be throughly mortified towards this world and the present state of things Look upon this scheme pageant as passing away keep natural appetites under restraint the world and the lusts of it pass away together sensuality is an impure thing Heavenly refined joy cannot live amid'st so much filth Yea and if thou give thy flesh liberty too far in things that are in specie lawful it will soon get advantage to domineer and keep thy soul in a depressing servitude Abridge it then and cut it short That thy mind may be enlarged and at liberty may not be throng'd and prepossest with carnal imaginations and affections Let thy soul if thou wilt take this instruction from a Heathen look with a constant erect mind into the undefiled light neither darkened nor born down towards the Earth but stopping its Ears and turning its Eyes and all other Senses back upon it self and quite abolishing out of it self all Earthly Sighs and Groans and Pleasures and Glories and Honours and disgrace and having forsaken all these choose for the Guides of its way true Reason and strong Love the one whereof will shew it the way the other make it easie and pleasant 5. Having voided thy mind of what is earthly and carnal apply and turn it to this blessed Theam The most excellent and the vilest objects are alike to thee while thou mindest them not Thy thoughts possibly bring thee in nothing but vexation and trouble which would bring in assoon joy and pleasure didst thou turn them to proper objects A thought of the heavenly glory is assoon thought as of an earthly Cross. We complain the world troubles us then what do we there why get we not up in our spirits into the quieter Region what trouble would the thoughts of future glory be to us How are the thoughts and wits set on work for this flesh but we would have our Souls flourish as the Lilies without any thing of their own care Yea we make them toyl for torture and not for joy revolve an affliction a thousand times before and after it comes and have never done with it when eternal blessedness gains not a thought 6. Plead earnestly with God for his Spirit This is joy in the Holy Ghost or whereof he is the Author Many Christians as they must be called are such strangers to this work of imploring and calling in the blessed Spirit as if they were capable of adopting these words We have not so much as heard whether there be an Holy Ghost That name is with them as an empty sound How hardly are we convinc't of our necessary dependance on that free Spirit as to all our truly Spiritual operations This Spirit is the very earnest of our inheritance The foretasts and first fruits we have here of the future blessedness The joy and pleasure the complacential relishes we have of it before hand are by the gracious vouchsafement and work of this blessed Spirit The things that eye hath not seen nor ear heard and which have not entred into the heart of man are revealed by this Spirit Therefore doth the Apostle direct his Prayer on the behalf of the Ephesians to the Father of this glory that he would give them this Spirit of wisdom and revelation to enlighten the eyes of their understanding that they might know the hope of his calling and the riches of the glory of his inheritance in or among the Saints And its revelation is such as begets an impression in respect whereof 't is said also to seal up to the day of redemption Therefore pray earnestly for this Spirit not in idle dreaming words of course but as being really apprehensive of the necessitie of prevailing And give not over till thou find that sacred fire diffusing it self through thy mind and heart to enlighten the one and refine the other and so prepossess both of this glory that thy soul may be all turned into joy and praise And then let me adde here without the formality of a distinct head That it concerns thee to take heed of quenching that Spirit by either resisting or neglecting its holy dictates or as the same precept is otherwise given of grieving the Spirit he is by Name and Office the Comforter The Primitive Christians 't is said walked in the fear of God and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost Is it equal dealing to grieve him whose business it is to comfort thee or canst thou expect joy where thou causest grief Walk in the Spirit adore its power Let thy Soul do it homage within thee Wait for its holy influences yield thy self to its ducture and guidance so wilt thou go as the redeemed of the Lord with everlasting joy upon thy head till thou enter that presence where is fulness of joy and pleasures for evermore Nor do thou think it improper or strange that thou should'st be called upon to rejoyce in what thou dost not yet possess Thy hope is in stead of fruition 't is an anticipated enjoyment We are commanded to rejoyce in hope and Saints have profest to do so to rejoyce even in the hope the hope of the glory of God Nor is it unreasonable that should be thy present highest joy For though yet it be a distinct thing and indistinctly revealed the excellency of the object makes compensation for both with an abundant surplusage As any one would much more rejoyce to be assured by a great person of ample possessions he would make him his heir to though he knew not distinctly what they should be then to see a shilling already his own with his own eyes CHAP. XXX The addition of two Rules that more specially respect the yet future season of this blessedness after this life viz. Rule 7. That we patiently wait for it until death Rule 8. That we love not too much this present life THere are yet two more Rules to be superadded that respect the season of this blessedness when we awake i. e. not till we go out of time into eternity not till we pass out of the drowsie darkness of our present state till the night be over with us and the vigorous light of the everlasting day do shine upon us Hence therefore it will be further necessary 7. That while the appointed proper season of this blessedness