senses these present things will be a strong temptation to us Prosperity and plenty wealth and honour ease and pleasure are accommodated to the desires of the flesh partly to its natural appetite and much more to it as inordinate by corruption And the flesh careth not for Reason how much soever it gainsay And then all these entising things are neer us and still present with us and before our eyes when Heavenly things are all unseen And the sweetness of honour wealth and pleasure is known by feeling and therefore known easily and by all when the goodness of things spiritual is known only by Reason and believing All which laid together with sad experience do fully shew that it must be a very great work to overcome this World and raise the heart above it to a better and so to sanctifie a soul 2. And worldly men do rise up against this Holy work as as well as worldly things Undenyable experience assureth us that through all the World ungodly sensual men have a marvellous implacable hatred to Godlyness and true mortification and will by flattery or slanders or scorns or plots or cruel violence do all that they are able to resist it So that he that will live a holy temperate life must make himself a scorn if not a prey The foolish wit of the ungodly is bent to reason men out of Faith Hope and Holiness and to cavill against our obedience to God and to disgrace all that course of life which is necessary to salvation And it is a great work to overcome all these temptations of the foolish and furious World Great I say because of the great folly and corruption of unregenerate men on whom it must be wrought though it would be smaller to a wise and considerate person To be made as an Owl and hunted as a Partridge or a beast of Prey by those that we converse with when we might have their favour and friendship and Preferments if we would say and do as they this is not easie to flesh and blood But its easie to the Spirit of God 3. The Devil is so notoriously an enemy to this sanctifying work that it is a strong discovery that Christ was sent from God to do it What a stir doth he first make to keep out the Gospel that it may not be Preached to the Nations of the World And where that will not serve what a stir doth he make to debauch Christs Ministers and corrupt them by ignorance heresie error schism domineering pride sensuality covetousness slothfulness and negligence that they may do the work of Christ deceitfully as if they did it not Yea and if it may be to win them to his service to destroy the Church by Oppression or Division under pretense of serving Christ And what cunning and industry doth this Serpent use to insinuate into great ones and Rulers of the Earth a prejudice against Christ and Godliness and to make them believe that all that are seriously Godly are their enemies and are against some interest of theirs that so he might take the sword which God hath put into their hands and turn it to his own service against him that gave it How cunning and diligent is he to seduce men that begin to set themselves to a Religious life into some false Opinions or dividing Sects or scandalous unjustifiable practice that thereby he may triumph against Christ and have something to say against Religion from the faults of men when he hath nothing to say against it justly from it self and that he may have something to say to those Rulers and People with whom he would fain make Religion odious How cunningly doth he engage ungodly men to be his Servants in seducing others and making them such as they are themselves and in standing up for sin and darkness against the light and life of Faith So that ungodly men are but the Souldiers and Preachers of the Devil in all parts employed to fight against God and draw men from holiness and justice and temperance to sin and to damnation So that it is a very discernable thing that Satan is the Head of one party in the World as the Destroying Prince of Darkness and deceit and that Christ is the Head of the other party as the Prince of light and truth and holiness And that there is a continued war or opposition between these two Kingdoms or Armies in all parts and ages of the World of which I have fullyer treated in another Book If any shall say How know you that all this is the work of Satan I shall have fitter occasion to answer that anon I shall now say but this that the nature of the work the tendency of it the irrationall erroneous or brutish tyrannical manner of doing it the internal importunity and manner of his suggestions and the effects of all and the contrariety of it to God and Man will soon shew a considerate man the author Though more shall be anon added V. All this aforegoing will shew a reasonable man that the Spirits Regenerating work is such as is a full attestation of God to that Doctrine by which it is effected And if any now say How prove you that all this is to be ascribed to Jesus Christ any more than to Socrates or to Seneca or Cicero I answer 1. So much truth of a sacred tendency as Plato or Pythagoras or Socrates or any Philosopher taught might do some good and work some reformation according to its quality and degree But as it was a lame imperfect doctrine which they taught so was it a very lame imperfect reformation which they wrought unlike the effects of the Doctrine and Spirit of Jesus Christ I need to say no more of this than to desire any man to make an impartial and judicious comparison between them And besides much more he shall quickly finde these differences following 1. That the Philosophers Disciples had a very poor dark disordered knowledge of God in comparison of the Christians and that mixt with odious fopperies either blasphemous or idolatrous 2. The Philosophers spake of God and the Life to come almost altogether notionally as they did of Logick or Physicks and very few of them Practically as a thing that mans happiness or misery was so much concerned in 3. They spake very jejunely and dryly about a holy state and course of life and the duty of Man to God in resignation devotedness obedience and love 4. They said little comparatively to the true humbling of a Soul nor in the just discovery of the evil of sin nor for self-denyall 5. They gave too great countenance to Pride and Worldliness and pleasing the senses by excess 6. The Doctrine of true Love to one another is taught by them exceeding lamely and defectively 7. Revenge is too much indulged by them and loving our Enemies and forgiving great wrongs was little known or taught or practised 8. They were so pitifully unacquainted with the certainty
world they are that sort of men that are likest unto Beasts except some few at Siam China the Indian Bannians the Japonians the Ethnick Persians and a few more The greatest deformity of Nature is among them the least of sound knowledge true policy civility and piety is among them Abominable wickedness doth no where so much abound So that if the doctrin and judgment of these may be judged of by the effect it is most insufficient to heal the diseased world and reduce man to holiness sobriety and honesty § 6. I find that these few among the Heathens who attain to more knowledge in the things which concern man's duty and happiness than the rest do commonly destroy all again by the mixture of some dotâ—ges and impious conceits The Literali in China exel in many things but besides abundance of ignorance in Philosophy they destroy all by denying the immortality of the Soul and affirming rewards and punishments to be only in this life or but a little longer At least none but the Souls of the good say some of them survive and though they confess One God they give him no solemn worship Their Sect called Sciequia or Sciacca is very clear for the Vnity of the Godhead the joys of Heaven and the torments of Hall with some umbrage of the Trinity c. But they blot all with the Pythagorean fopperies affirming these Souls which were in joy or misery after a certain space to be sent again into Bodies and so to continue through frequent changes to eternity to say nothing of the wickedness of their lives Their third Sect called Lauru is not worth the naming as being composed of fopperies and sorceries and impostures All the Japonian Sects also make the world to be eternal and Souls to be perpetuated through infinite transmigrations The Siamenses who seem the best of all and nearest to Christians have many fopperies and worship the Devil for fear as they do God for love The Indian Bramenes or Bannians also have the Pythagorean errors and place their piety in redeeming Bruits because they have Souls which sometimes were humane The Persians dispersed in India who confess God and Heaven and Hell yet think that these are but of a thousand years duration And it is above a thousand years since they believed that the world should continue but a thousand years and then Souls be released from Hell and a new world made § 7. Their great darkness and uncertainties appear by the innumerable sects and differences which are among them which are incomparably more numerous than all that are found in all parties in the world besides I need not tell you of the 288 Sects or Opinions de summo bono which Varro said was in his days The difference which you may find in Laertius Hesechius and others between the Cynicks Peripateticks Academicks Stoicks Scepticks Epicureans c. with all their sub-divisions are enow In Japan the twelve Sects have their subdivisions In China the three general Sects have so many subdivisions that Varenius saith of them Singuli fontes Iabentibus paulatim seculis à fraudum magistris in tot maeandros derivati sunt ut sub triplici nomine trecentae mihi sectae inter se discrepantes numerari posse videantur sed hae quotidianis incrementis augentur in pejus ruunt Petrus Texeica saith of the Indians In Regno Gazeratensivarii sunt ritus sectae incolarum quod mirum vix familiam invenias in qua omnes congruant alii comedunt carnem alii nequaquam alii comedunt quidem sed non mactant animalia alii nonnulla tantum animalia comedunt alii tantum pisces alii tantum lac herbas c. Johan a Twist saith of the Indian Bramenes Numerantur sectae praecipui nominis octoginta tres sed praeter has minus illustrium magna est multitudo ita ut singulae familiae peculiarem fere foveant religionem It were endless to speak of all the Sects in Africa and America to say nothing of the beastly part of them in Brasil the Cape of good hope that is Soldania and the Islands of Cannibals who know no God nor Government nor Civility some of them They are not only of as many minds as countries but of a multitude of sects in one and the same country § 8. I find not my self called or enabled to judge all these people as to their final state but only to say that if any of them have a holy heart and life in the true love of God they shall be saved but without this no form of Religion will save any man be it never so right § 9. But I find it to be my duty to love them for all the good which is in them and all that is true and good in their Religion I will embrace and because it is so defective to look further and try what I can learn from others There is so much lovely in a Cato Cicero Seneca Antonine Epictetus Plutarch c. in the Religions of Siam in the dispersed Persian Ethnicks in India in the Bramans or Bannians of India in the Bonzii of Japan and divers others in China and else-where that it obligeth us not only to love them benevolently but with much complacence And as I will learn from Nature it self what I can so also from these Students of Nature I will take up nothing meerly on their trust nor reject any doctrin meerly because it is theirs but all that is true and good in their Religions as far as I can discern it shall be part of mine and because I find them so dark and bad I will betake me for further information to those that trust to supernatural Revelation which are the Jews Mahumetans and the Christians of which I shall next consider a-part § 10. II. As to the Religion of the Jews I need not say much of it by it self the Positive part of their doctrine being confessed by the Christians and Mahumetans to be of Divine Revelation and the negative part their denying of Christ is to be tryed in the tryall of Christianity The Reasons which are brought for the Christian Religion if sound will prove the Old Testament which the Jews believe it being part of the Christians Sacred Book And the same reasons will confute the Jews rejection of Jesus Christ I take that therefore to be the fittest place to treat of this subject when I come to the proofs of the Christian Faith I oppose not what they have from God I must prove that to be of God which they deny § 11. III. In the Religion of the Mahumetans I finde much good viz. A Confession of one only God and most of the Natural parts of Religion a vehement opposition to all Idolatry A testimony to the Veracity of Moses and of Christ that Christ is the Word of God and a great Prophet and the Writings of the Apostles true All this therefore where Christianity is approved
errour it is a way that reason teacheth all men in the trying of any questioned point to reduce it to those that are unquestionable and see whether or no they accord with those And to mark the unquestionable Ends of Religion and try how it suiteth its means thereunto And therefore men of all sober professions have their determinate principles and ends by which they try such particular opinions as Christians do by their analogy of faith And in this trial of Christianity I shall tell you what I find it § 1. I find in general that there is an admirable concord between Natural Verity and the Gospel of Christ and that Grace is medicinal to Nature and that where Natural light endeth Supernatural beginneth and that the superstructure which Christ hath built upon Nature is wonderfully adapted to its foundation This is made manifest in all the first part of this Treatise Reason which is our Nature is not destroyed but repaired illuminated elevated and improved by the Christian faith Free-will which is our Nature is made more excellently free by Christianity Self-love which is our Nature is not destroyed but improved by right conduct and help to our attainment of its ends The Natural part of Religion is so far from being abrogated by Christianity that the latter doth but subserve the former Christ is the way to God the Father The duty which we owe by Nature to our Creator we owe him still and Christ came to enable and teach us to perform it the love of God our Creator with all our hearts is still our duty and faith in Christ is but the means to the love of God and the bellows to kindle that holy fire The Redeemer came to recover us to our Creator He taketh not the Book of the Creatures or Nature out of our hands but teacheth us better to read and use it And so it is through all the rest § 2. I find also that the state of this present world is exceeding suitable to the Scripture-character of it that it is exceeding evil and a deluge of sin and misery doth declare its great necessity of a Saviour and sheweth it still to be a place unmeet to be the home and happiness of Saints Of all the parts of God's Creation this earth doth seem to be next to Hell certainly it is greatly defiled with sin and overwhelmed with manifold calamities and though God hath not totally forsaken it nor turned away his mercy as he hath done from Hell yet is he much estranged from it so that those who are not recovered by grace are next to devils And alas how numerous and considerable are they to denominate it an evil world Those that Christ calleth out of it he sanctifieth and maketh them unlike the world and his grace doth not give them a worldly felicity nor settle them in a Rest or Kingdom here but it saveth them from this world as from a place of snares and a company of cheaters robbers and murderers and from a tempestuous Sea whose waves seem ready still to drown us I. I find it is a world of Sin II. And of Temptation III. And of Calamity I. For Sin it is become as it were its nature it liveth with men from the birth to the grave It is an ignorant world that wandereth in darkness and yet a proud self-conceited world that will not be convinced of its ignorance and is never more furiously confident than when it is most deceived and most blind Even natural wisdom is so rare and folly hath the major vote and strength that wise men are wearied with resisting folly and ready in discouragements to leave the foolish world unto it self as an incurable Bedlam so fierce are fools against instruction and so hard is it to make them know that they are ignorant or to convince men of their mistakes and errours The Learner thinks his Teacher doteth and he that hath but wit enough to distinguish him from a bruit is as confident as if he were a Doctor The Learned themselves are for the most part but half-witted men who either take up with lazie studies or else have the disadvantage of uncapable temperatures and wits or of unhappy Teachers and false principles received by ill education which keep out truth so that they are but fitted to trouble the world with their contentions or deceive men by their errors and yet have they not the acquaintance with their ignorance which might make them learn of such as can instruct them but if there be among many but one that is wiser than the rest he is thought to be unfit to live among them if he will not deny his knowledge and own their errours and confess that modesty and order require that either the highest or the major vote are the masters of truth and all is false that is against their opinions It is an Atheistical ungodly world that knoweth not its Maker or forgetteth contemneth and wilfully disobeyeth him while in words it doth confess him and yet an hypocritical world that will speak honourably of God and of vertue and piety of justice and charity while they are neglecting and rejecting them and cannot endure the practice of that which their tongues commend almost all sorts will prefer the life to come in words when indeed they utterly neglect it and prefer the fleshly pleasures of this life They cry out of the vanity and vexation of the world and yet they set their hearts upon it and love it better than God and the world to come they will have some Religion to mock God and deceive themselves which shall go no deeper than the knee and tongue in forms or ceremonies or a dissembled affection and profession But to be devoted absolutely to God in self-resignation obedience and love how rare is it even in them who cannot deny but the Law of Nature it self doth primarily and undeniably oblige them to it Their Religion is but self-condemnation while their tongues condemn their hearts and lives It is a sensual bruitish world and seemeth to have hired out their reason to the service of their appetites and lusts gluttony and excess of drink and sports and plays and gaming with pride and wantonness and fornication and uncleanness and worldly pomp and the covetous gathering of provision for the flesh to satisfie these lusts is the business and pleasure of their lives and if you tell them of Reason or the Law of God to take them off you may almost as well think to reason a hungry Dog from his carrion or a lustful Boar to forbear his lust And it is a Selfish world where every man is as an idol to himself and affected to himself and his own interest as if he were all the world drawing all that he can from others to fill his own insatiable desires loving all men and honouring and esteeming and praising them according to the measure of their esteem of him or their
this wickedness it is wilfull and stupid and incorrigible and ordinary means do little to the Cure Thus is it a sinfull evil World II. And it is a Tempting World that would make all bad as it is it self Whereever the sanctifying Truth of God doth come to illuminate and reform men the World is presently up in arms against it and fighteth against that which would save mens Souls as if it were a Plague or Enemy that would destroy them Princes think it is against their interest and the people finde that it is against their lusts And so the sin of Tyranny keepeth the Gospel out of the greatest part of the World and popular fury resisteth it where it cometh The Empires of the Turks and Tartarian and China are sad instances of the success of Tyranny against the means of mens salvation And the Empire of Japan hath given the World an instance of such unparallel'd cruelty to that end as maketh the persecutions of Nero and Dioclesian and even the Popish Inquisition and almost the Massacres of Piedmont France and Ireland to seem very merciful acts of Charity What rage what inhumane fury hath been shewed through all the World to keep out Knowledge and keep the Nations in their darkness and misery and forbid relief But for Error and Deceit Idolatry and Superstition how industriously are they propagated Empire and Arts Power and Learning are employed to deceive and undoe the World And though Empire be Gods Ordinance and Arts his gifts they are turned against him in the farr greatest part of the Earth and Satan is served by them as if they had been ordain'd by him Almost every Countrey hath their proper opinions and a Religion fitted to resist Religion He that is an Idolater or a Mahometan or Infidel would make more And they that are against all serious Religion are as eager to make others of their minde as if it were a work of charity or commodity And he that is endeavouring to undoe Souls is as vehement in it as he that is endeavouring to save them He that hath any passion or corrupt affection is as inclinable to convey it to another as fire is to kindle fire or one that hath the Plague to infect his Neighbour Covetousness ambition voluptuousness lust and wrath and revenge are all contagious Rioters think it strange if we run not with them into all excess The very noise of their impertinent talk and business and the great adoe that they make in doing nothing is a great diverter of those that are about them from serious business and sober consideration They keep men so busie about their vanities that they can finde no leisure to remember that they are men or to think what business they have in the World nor where it is that they must dwell for ever And when their folly and selfishness hath set them all together by the ears they must needs draw or drive others into the fire of contention with them They cry Who is on my side who And he that will not be of one party or other but will keep his peace shall lose it by the enmity of all And no man shall be taken for orthodox or honest that will not be of that Faction whose commendation he desireth And when he hath humoured them he shall go for a knave or a reproached person with all the rest A peaceable man shall hardly finde the peace which he desireth to himself but it 's ten to one but he loseth his labour if he would make peace between others especially if he have an honest ambition of extending that blessing to Parties and Countreys or any great and considerable numbers If by tyranny and cruelty by prisons and torments and death they cannot affright men from honesty and the obedience of God at least they will vex them in their way and be as thorns and bryars to them in this Wilderness III. And it is a calamitous miserable World It is void of the comforts of sacred Illumination and of the assured Love of God and of the exercise of wisdom or holiness The delights of Saints in loving God and waiting for eternal Life are unknown to all the multitudes of the ungodly They are confounded and lost in their ignorance and error and tormented with their own passions divisions and contentions Their vices are part of their disquietment and pain though pleasure be their intended end It is a pitifull servitude that they are in to Satan and an endless drudgery that they follow in serving their covetousness pride and lust and a tiresome task to care and labour to make provision for their fleshly appetites and wills They are led captive by Satan to do his will and yet in doing it they do their own and are in love with their Captivity and glory in their Chains They are engaged daily against God and Mercy against their Happiness and their Friends that would procure it and think him their Enemy that would make them wiser They go under the guilt of all this sin and they have no assurance of pardon or deliverance And God overtaketh them many times with bodily distresses here Sicknesses and pains consume men and torment them Warrs and plagues do send them by thousands out of the World which they took for their felicity Fire and famine piracy and robbery and fraud impoverish them The frustrations of their hope torment them And yet under all they are hardened against God and fall not out with their sin and folly but with the Justice of Heaven and with its instruments or rather with all that beareth the Image of the Holiness of God This is the visible condition of this World Obj. If you say How can all this stand with the infinite Goodness of God I have answered it before It sheweth you that it is not this World which is the great demonstration of the Goodness or Love of God from whence we must take our estimate of it by the effects If you will judge of the Kings splendour and bounty and clemency will you go seek for examples and demonstrations of it in the Gaol and at the Gallows or rather at the Court Hell is as the Gallows and Earth is as the Gaol Measure not Gods bounty and mercy by these It is no sign of unmercifulness in God that there are Flies and Worms and Toads and Serpents on Earth as well as Men nor that Earth was not made as indefectible as Heaven And when men have drown'd themselves in sin it is no want of Goodness in God but it is Goodness it selfe which causeth the demonstrations of his Justice on them This World is not so much to all Gods Creation as a wen or wart upon a Mans body is to the whole body And if it were all forsaken of God as it hath forsaken him it were proportionably no more than the cutting off such a wart or Wen. God hath many thousand thousand thousand times more capacious Regions which it 's
villanies though they call it railing nor will he flatter proud rebellious dust though they call flattery a necessary civility nor will he give leave to his Messengers to leave sin in honour and to let the proud do what their list and quietly damn themselves and others without plain reproof though it be called unreverent sawciness or sedition 2. And he that considereth how little Title Caesar had to the Kingdom of the Jews and that the sword alone is a better proof of force and strength than of Authority and is a Plea which an Usurper may have on his side will rather praise the submission and peaceableness of Christ than blame him as disloyal But for the doctrin of Obedience in general who hath ever taught it more plainly and pressingly than Christ and his Apostles 2. The Gospel or doctrin of Christ it self also hath the very Image and Superscription of God I will not say imprinted on it for that is too little but intrinsecally animating and constituting it which is apparent in the Matter and the Method and the Stile 1. The Matter and Design containeth the most wonderful expression of the Wisdom of God that ever was made to man on earth All is mysterious yet admirably fit consistent and congruous as is before declared That a world which is visibly and undeniably fallen into wickedness and misery should have a Redeemer Saviour and Mediator towards God! That he should be one that is near enough to God and unto us and hath the nature of both that he should be the second Adam the Root of the Redeemed and Regenerate that God should give all mercy from himself from his own bounty and fulness and not as unwilling be perswaded to it by another and therefore that the Redeemer be not any Angel or intermediate person but God himself that thus God come nearer unto man who is revolted from him to draw up man again to Him that he lose not the world and yet do not violate his governing Justice that he be so merciful as not to be unrighteous nor permit his Laws and Government to be despised and yet so just as to save the penitent renewed souls that he give man a new Law and conditions of salvation suitable to his lapsed guilty state and leave him not under a Law and conditions which were fitted to the innocent that he revealed himself to the apostate world in that way which only is fit for their recovery that is in his admirable love and goodness that so love might win our love and attract those hearts which under guilt and the terrors of condemning justice would never have been brought to love him that guilty souls have such evidence of God's reconciliation to encourage them to expect his pardon and to come to him with joy and boldness in their addresses having a Mediator to trust in and his Sacrifice Merits and acceptable Name to plead with God that Justice and Mercy are so admirably conjoyned in these effects that Satan and the world and death should be so conquered in a suffering way and man have so perfect a pattern to imitate for self-denial humility contempt of honour wealth and life and exact obedience and resignation to the will of God with perfect love to God and man that the world should be under such an universal Administrator and the Church be all united in such a Head and have one in their nature that hath risen from the dead to be in possession of the glory which they are going to and thence to send down his Spirit to sanctifie them and fit them for Heaven and afterward to be their Judge and to receive them unto blessedness and that sinners now be not condemned meerly for want of innocency but for rejecting the grace and mercy which would have saved them that we have all this taught us by a Messenger from Heaven and a perfect rule of life delivered to us by him and all this sealed by a Divine attestation that this doctrin is suited to the capacity of the weakest and yet so mysterious as to exercise the strongest wits and is delivered to us not by an imposing force but by the exhortations and perswasions of men like our selves commissioned to open the evidences of truth and necessity in the Gospel All this is no less than the Image and wonderful effect of the Wisdom of God And his Goodness and Love is as resplendent in it all for this is the effect of the whole design to set up a Glass in the work of our Redemption in which God's Love and Goodness should be as wonderfully represented to mankind as his Power was in the works of Creation Here sinful man is saved by a means which he never thought of or desired he is fetch'd up from the gates of hell redeemed from the Sentence of the righteous violated Law of God and the execution of his Justice The Eternal Word so condescendeth to man in the assumption of our nature as that the greatness of the love and mercy incomprehensible to man becomes the greatest difficulty to our belief He revealeth to us the things of the world above and bringeth life and immortality to light He dwelleth with men He converseth with the meanest He preacheth the glad tidings of Salvation to the world He refuseth not such familiarity with the poorest or the worst as is needful to their cure He spendeth his time in doing good and healing all manner of bodily diseases He refuseth the honours and riches of the world and the pleasures of the flesh to work out our salvation He beareth the ingratitude and abuse of sinners and endureth to be scorned buffeted spit upon tormented and crucified by those to whom he had done no greater wrong than to seek their salvation He maketh himself a Sacrifice for sin to shew the world what sin deserved and to save them from the deserved punishment God had at first decreed and declared that death should be the punishment of sin and Satan had maliciously drawn man to it by contradicting this threatning of God and making man believe that God would falsifie his word and that he did envy man the felicity of his advancement to be liker God in knowledge And now Christ will first justifie the truth and righteousness of God and will demonstrate himself by dying in our stead that death is indeed the wages of sin and will shew the world that God is so far from envying their felicity that he will purchase it at the dearest rate and deliver them freely from the misery which sin and Sathan had involved them in Thus Enemies are reconciled by the sufferings of him whom they offended even by his sufferings in the flesh whose Godhead could not suffer and by his death as Man who as God was most immortal As soon as he was risen he first appear'd to a Woman who had been a sinner and sent her as his first messenger with words of love and comfort to his
of my life in converse with such truly sanctified persons and in preaching this Gospel through the great mercy of God with such success upon no small numbers so that I am certain by full experience of the reality of that holy change which cannot be done but with the co-operation of God I have seen that this change is another matter than fancy opinion or factious conjunction with a Sect Even the setting up God in the soul as God as our Owner Ruler and Chief Good and the devoting of the soul to him in Resignation Obedience and thankful Love the seeking of an everlasting felicity in his glorious sight and love in heaven the contempt of this world as it pleaseth the flesh and the holy use of it as the way to our felicity and pleasing God the subduing and denying all carnal desires which would rebel against God and reason and restoring Reason to the government of the lower faculties the denying of that inordinate selfishness which setteth up our interest against our neighbours and the respecting and loving our neighbours as our selves and doing to others as we would be done by and doing good to all men as far as we have power the holy governing of our inferiours and obeying our superiours in order to these ends living soberly righteously and godly in this world and in the patient bearing of all afflictions and diligent serving God in our several places to redeem our time and prepare for death and wait with longing for the everlasting glory the hope of which is caused in us by faith in Christ our Ransome Reconciler Example Teacher Governour and Judge This is the true nature of the Religion expressed in the Gospel and impressed on the souls of sanctified men By this effect I know that Christ is the Saviour of the world and no deceiver as I know a man to be a true Physician and no deceiver when I see him ordinarily and throughly perform the cures which he undertaketh He saveth us actually from the power of our sins and bringeth up our hearts to God and therefore we may boldly say He is our Saviour This witness through his mercy I have in my self and is alway with me and in those whom I converse with round about me I have also upon just enquiry found that the witnesses of Christ's Resurrection and Miracles have delivered us their testimony with a three-fold evidence 1. The evidence of just credibility to a humane belief 2. The evidence of natural certainty in the natural impossibilities of deceit 3. The evidence of supernatural divine attestation in 1. The Image of God on their hearts and doctrine 2. Their miracles and 3. Their sanctifying success And I have found that the witnesses of the Miracles of the Apostles themselves have also given us the same three degrees of proof of the Verity of their testimony though Miracles continue not now as then And I have look'd round about me in the world as diligently and impartially as I could to see whether Christ and the way which he hath prescribed us have any competitor which may make it difficult to resolve which to prefer and follow And as I have found that none but GOD alone hath absolute Dominion and Sovereignty over us and is our chief Benefactor nor fit to be our felicity and ultimate end so I have found that there is no one so fit to be taken for our Mediator and the Way to God as Jesus Christ none else that hath a natural aptitude none else among men that is perfect without sin that hath conquered Satan the world and death that is a Messenger from Heaven so infallible and sure whose Doctrine and Life is suited to our case none else that is become a Sacrifice for our sins and hath risen from the dead and ascended into Glory and doth govern and preserve us and will judge the world and hath power to give the holy Ghost both for Gifts and Graces nor that actually giveth it to the sanctifying of all his sincere followers none else that hath such a Church and Kingdom contemning the world and contemned by the world and so truly fitted to the pleasing of God and the future fruition of him in Glory I see that Judaism is but the porch of Christianity and if Christ had not confirmed the verity of the Old Testament to me I should have found the difficulty of believing it much greater And as for Mahometanism besides the common truths which it retaineth of the Unity of the Godhead the Verity of Christ and the Life to come c. there is nothing else which at all inviteth my understanding And as for Heathenism the case that it hath brought the miserable world into is much to be pitied and deplored Much precious truth is revealed to us by Nature but experience telleth us of the need of more and Christianity hath all which Nature teacheth with a great deal more So that Christianity hath no considerable competitor And as for worldly wealth and honour superiority and command of others the favour applause and praise of great ones or of the multitude voluptuousness and fleshly delights c. ease long life or any accommodations of the flesh yea learning it self as it is but the pleasing of the fancy in the knowledge of unnecessary things all these I have perused and found them to be deceit and trouble a glimpse of heaven a taste of the love of God in Christ yea a fervent desire after God yea a penitent tear is better than them all and yieldeth a delight which leaveth a better taste behind it and which my Reason more approveth in the review and the vanity of all inferiour pleasures appeareth to me in the common effects they distract and corrupt the minds of those that have the greatest measure of them and make them the calamity of their times the furious afflicters of the upright and the pity of all sober standers-by who see them turn the world into a Bedlam and how all their honour wealth and sport will leave them at a dying hour and with what dejected minds unwelcome death will be entertain'd by them and with what sad reviews they will look back upon all their lives and in what sordid dust and darkness they must leave the rotting flesh when their souls are gone to receive their doom before the Judge of all the world All these are things which were past all doubt with me since I had any solid use of reason and things which are still before my eyes Wherefore my God I look to Thee I come to Thee to Thee alone No man no worldly creature Made me none of them did Redeem me none of them did Renew my soul none of them will justifie me at thy Bar nor forgive my sin nor save me from thy penal Justice none of them will be a full or a perpetual felicity or portion for my soul I am not a stranger to their promises and performances I have trusted them too