be cut off nay to be Rack'd or to have all the Instruments of tortures apply'd to him than to be cast both Soul and Body into Hell where the Worm dies not and the fire is not quenched The sence of a greater does divert a lesser affliction and hereby Men are more appeased under unhappy circumstances when they see others more rigorously dealt with and proclaim their grievances with hideous cries groans and fearful lamentations In like manner a view by thought of the other miserable World and the pains and agonies the Damned there do suffer will make Men bear any temporal affliction with more patience and submissiveness Thirdly and Lastly We learn from the consideration that God has prepared a Hell to torment and pain those who die in enmity with him to hate every sin since it produces so woful an effect This is it which God abhors and therefore has contrived unconceiveable Plagues to punish it Now he manifests his aversion to sin by menacing it with future torments but hereafter his threats will be put in execution in raining down indignation and wrath tribulation and anguish upon every Soul that dies in an impenitent state Where is the sence then of sporting our selves in vicious repasts if we are like to pay so dear in another World for it What is a Man profited if he gain the whole World and lose his own Soul What if he were as Wealthy as Croesus as Great as Alexander had the whole Universe and all the Delights and Pleasures thereof at his beck if when he dies he must descend into the Regions of Sorrow and be locked up in the Prison of Hell for ever and ever What will it avail him that once he was Rich and Honourable since now all the Goods that ever he had are converted into flames Hell comprehends a deprivation of all Good and the presence of every Evil and one would imagine that the very thoughts of it were enough to damp Mens spirits and to make them carefully shun the breach of their Innocence that they would caution them against Temptations and fill their Minds with Wise Considerations When Men draw so near to a woful Eternity that they can as it were look over to it when they see the Grim and Terrible Serjeant Death coming to hale them into another World then they will be terrified and amazed and cry out against those sins they formerly delighted in and will wish they had been so wise for themselves to have considered the unhappy and fatal consequences of Vice that they might have avoided it in time of health and strength And why will not Sinners come to a serious and a right frame of Mind now since they know they shall repent of those things with shame and sorrow which now they glory in when they lie languishing If therefore we would escape those punishments which God Almighty has prepared in the other miserable World let us so meditate and pause upon them as to shun those things which are threatned with the second Death Therefore Beloved since ye know these things beware lest ye fall from your stedfastness but grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ to whom with the Father and ever Blessed Spirit be given all Honour Praise Thanksgiving and Obedience now henceforth and for evermore Amen SERMON VII Luke XVI 25 26. But Abraham said Son remember that thou in thy life time receivedst thy good things and likewise Lazarus evil things but now he is comforted and thou art tormented And besides all this between us and you there is a great gulf fixed so that they that would pass from hence to you cannot neither can they pass to us that would come from thence THis is the Answer to the Rich Man's foregoing Request That Abraham would send Lazarus with a drop of Water to cool his Tongue Abraham gives him the Title of Son either as he was lineally descended from him or as he was a Member of that Church of which he was the Father So he terms him by way of Irony or Exprobration that he might Remember as an addition of his misery how basely he degenerated from the practice and example of the Father of the Faithful the advantages and opportunities of being happy he neglected and his folly in contenting himself with the bare denomination of being a Member of the Church of Christ Remember that in the other life thou enjoyedst the upper and the nether Springs hadst all the comfortable Accommodations the World could present thee with and in them all thy happiness was fixed thy heart and affections were wholly taken up with the pomp and pride of Life thou hadst no regard to nor value for the things of another world thou hadst neither reverence for God the Author and Giver of thy store nor common compassion for thy Fellow-Creatures driven to poverty and extream want Therefore art thou now tormented a wretched and pitiless Object Not because of thy riches but because thou didst not employ them to those ends and purposes for the which they were bestowed upon thee Lazarus whom thou desirest to cool thy Tongue shall not bring thee the least comfort because thou wert so stubborn and hard-hearted to deny him the crumbs which fell from thy Table He was poor and despicable appeared like one forsaken had neither Friends nor Wealth but embracing such a poor condition with patience and thankfulness is now made amends for all and enjoys all that can caress his powers all that can ravish his heart all that is good lovely and desirable But besides there is a great gulf fixed between you and us that there is not a possibility for the Saints to come to you nor for you to come to us both states are determined Thou therefore must endure hunger and thirst and the other direful torments in Hell without pity or succour and Lazarus shall enjoy the sweet and ravishing entertainments of Heaven without lett or hinderance where no satiety shall ever render his fruition lothsom or tedious no sad circumstances imbitter his delights nor any temptation disturb or molest him But Abraham said Son remember that thou in thy life-time receivedst thy good things and likewise Lazarus evil things but now he is comforted and thou art termented And besides all this between us and you there is a great gulf fixed so that they that would pass from hence to you cannot neither can they pass to us that would come from thence From which words we are advised First of all That it will be a great aggravation of the misery of the damned to consider and recollect the former means and advantages they have been under for Salvation if they have descended from godly Parents or have been Members of the Church of Christ initiated thereinto by Baptism and have made an open acknowledgement of its Faith and Doctrines Son says Abraham to the rich Man remember that thou in thy life-time receivedst thy good things Secondly
Infidelity when the Word of God doth not take place convince Men of their Sins and happily bring them from under the power of Satan unto God And now I proceed to draw some Inferences from the whole and so conclude And here First We learn what a mighty Privilege and Advantage we are partakers of that Almighty God should honour us sinful Creatures with the declaration of his Will the which is a guide to conduct us through cragged and uneven ways a glass to discover our nakedness the spots and stains upon our Souls that we may wipe them out by repentance and a new life and a Lamp to light us to Heaven We might still have been bewildered with foolish fancies and gross illusions have followed the ignis fatuus of our heady Minds and run violently into the Ocean of Misery if God who careth for us and highly values our good had not set out this great illuminary his Word to bring us back and call us from the destruction we were ignorantly posting to What an esteem and veneration ought we to have then for the Scriptures How dear should they be to us We cannot read and meditate on them too often we cannot be too wise for Heaven nor too much acquainted with our selves Our selves are a great Mystery which requires a good Judgment a discerning Spirit and a sagacious Mind to comprehend and the Scriputres mightily help us in the knowledge of our selves by them as one of the Fathers has it all Men may be amended the weak strengthened and the strong confirmed so that surely there are none who are enemies to the reading of God's Word but such as either be so ignorant that they know not how wholsom and salvisick it is or else be so sick that they loath and stomach at the most comfortable and adapt Medicines to heal their malady or so ungodly that they would with all persons might continue in blindness and gross ignorance of God and themselves It is a lamentable consideration that the Bible which treateth of Mens salvation and teacheth them how they may make sure of Heaven should be so much slighted as it is that Novels Romantick Hisicries and Pedantick Poetry all but human Wit and Invention should be read with such attention and curiosity with an eager appetite and a well-pleased fancy and the Word of God which hath brought light and immortality into the World hurried over and slovenly perused as if it were a dull sapless and heavy composition not worth Mens while to carry in their memories It will turn to a dismal after-reckoning when God shall judge the contemners and despisers of his Oracles when they shall be tried by that Word which now they disdain and the threatnings therein denounced which now they laugh at shall be put in full execution better they had never heard of a Gospel or a Jesus Christ better they had lived in some dark corner of the earth where the Sun of righteousness never shined Secondly If we hope and wish for the continuance of God's Word among us if we would that it may be a savour of life unto life to us in fine if we would have that righteousness wherein we must stand before the Son of Man when he comes attended with his mighty Angels to judge the World and to determine every Mans final state then it highly concerns us to put a separate value upon the Scriptures to read them as the Oracles of God to believe them as the contents of his Will concerning us and to order our Lives and Conversations according as they direct us To revere them as they bring the glad tidings of Salvation and to admire them as they contain wonderful expressions of the Divine Love to us They instruct us how to behave our selves in all conditions of Life If we are rich they counsel us to be humble meek and condescending to be indifferently affected with our Wealth that we may not be too much incumbered with cares fears and uneasie jealousies which disturb the Mind distract the Thoughts and make Men unapt for the Kingdom of Heaven If we be poor the Bible even improves and sweetens an adverse state by counselling us to cast all our care upon God who careth for us to put our confidence in him to present our Pravers to him who if he grant not those things we pray for yet some other he knows most suitable and convenient for us and at last will reward us with the felicities of his Kingdom for our faith patience and continuing in well-doing In fine the Bible has a Salve for every Sore Medicaments of all sorts it cures blindness of Heart weakness of Judgment the inconstancy of Faith and makes a Christian such a one as God would have him to be Is then this Book to be slighted and thrown by as useless Can Men be unwilling to peruse and meditate upon it or think their time ill spent in reading it Can they be better imployed than in acquainting themselves with God's Will and searching how they may fullfil it How they may pass through this troublesom and vexatious World blameless that they may commence a happy and blessed Eternity What can be compared with the Soul And what loss so irreparable as the loss of it Insomuch that our Saviour says What will it avail a Man if he had the Worlds wealth every thing that is great good and desirable in it and lose his Soul All that he has cannot make him satisfaction or repair his damage What therefore should be every Mans study so much as to provide for the after state of his Soul to read and ponder the ways and means he must use to prepare his Soul for the embraces of the Father of Spirits How melancholy soever Men may think it is to fill their Minds with the thoughts of Death Judgment and Eternity yet when they come to die they will earnestly wish themselves well provided for their Voyage into another World Let them therefore lose no time in health but read diligently meditate seriously and practise conscionably the Word of God which by Divine Grace and their own endeavours will make them wise unto Salvation Finally and to conclude As we are Christians let us have a special regard to God's Word and with the Psalmist hide it in our hearts that we may not sin against our Maker Let it be our Counsellor our Guide and Director that all our Actions Words and Thoughts may be pure and blameless And that we may thus order our steps let us pray as our Church O Blessed Lord who hast caused all Holy Scriptures to be written for our Learning grant that we may in such-wise hear them read mark learn and inwardly digest them that by patience and comfort of thy holy Word we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting Life which thou hast given us in thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord to whom with the Father and the ever Blessed Spirit be given all
Lazarus was naked and almost famished he begs for a little sustenance and that of the meanest sort too but was scornfully denied it From these two heads I took occasion to shew First of all That Riches are strong incentives to Luxury and Riotousness Secondly To Pride Haughtiness and Uncharitableness Thirdly That Poverty is looked upon as a despicable state and renders a Man vile and mean in the eye of others As to the former of these namely That Riches strongly tempt to Luxury and Riotousness I urged the proof of this from this Noble man's daily voluptuous fareing every day was alike he observed no intervals for Mortification no times for Holy Retirement Religious Exercises were too dull and flatulent of an unsavoury gust to him whose Palate could only relish the choicest Provisions he had nothing else to do but to Sing his Quietus Soul take thine ease eat drink and be merry for thou hast much Goods laid up for many years Thus many whom Fate has bless'd with Plenty and Store take up all their thoughts what rare pleasures and gratifications they may purchase contriving how they may accommodate their Appetites with the choicest and most select Dainties but seldom or never think of their Spiritual Concernments as if these were such inferior businesses requisite only for those of mean Fortunes to employ themselves about Mortification to such Persons is in a degree as obnoxious as being stripp'd of their Pomp and Riches In a word whatsoever may put them in mind of Death Judgment and a future State is as unwelcom to their thoughts as was God's Sentence to the Avaricious Miser in the Gospel Thou fool this night shall thy soul be required of thee As to the second General head namely That Riches strongly tempt to Pride Haughtiness and Uncharitableness I endeavoured the proof of this from the lofty carriage of this Noble-man his chiding the Beggar for his bold importunity casting a disdainful Eye upon and dismissing him from his Gates Hungry Thirsty Naked and full of Sores as he came as if Dives upon hearing the doleful Complaints of Needy Lazarus should have expressed himself to this effect What impertinent and audacious Person is that who knocks at my Door and fills my Ears with such a Din Shall I who am great and honourable richly clad a Companion for noted Persons cast such a visible slur upon my Person and Dignity as to change a word with such a contemptible Creature or be seen to take notice of one who is disfigur'd with Rags so wan and formidable so pester'd with Ulcers and putrifying Sores No no let him be removed from before my Gates and get a Belly full where he can Such is the imperious Carriage of many towards those who beg their Charity and conclude it one of the most foul blots upon them to lend an Ear to or to seem affected with their mournful complaints Thus far I went the last time only adding some useful Inferences I now go on to what remains namely to the third general Thing Thirdly That Poverty is a despicable State or so accounted and renders a Man vile and mean in the Eye of others how much good soever he may have formerly done with what he had Poor Lazarus though he had a Soul as great and good as the most Puissant Monarch but inward Endowments are not so much the World's observation was treated with Scorn and Infamy because his outward appearance was not comely and creditable sightly and fashionable Possibly that little Cloathing he had was Weather-beaten and so shattered that it could scarce hang about him his Face lean wan and ghastly those rarer adornments of Nature being faded by the sharpness of Hunger and Thirst his flesh full of Blotches and running Sotes the whole Mass of Blood being corrupted and gangreen'd for want of a vivid circulation This miserable Object Inhumane Dives scornfully rejects and looks upon him fit for nothing else but to be his Dogs Companion But remember thou disdainful wretch the time is coming when thou shalt be derided by the same Lazarus whom now thou treatest at thy Gates with contempt and disgrace it is the Will of Heaven that his Portion here shall be narrow and scanty that his Reward in another World may be great and glorious when thou who art here Invested with the rarest and most sublime Accommodations shalt be stripp'd of all and become a Victim to his Triumph God may permit his Servants to be savagely used to be a Reproach and By-word in the World because he hath enough to make them infinitely amends but to illustrate the Subject and enlarge the Matter of it I shall First of all Shew why the Generality of the World despise Poverty Secondly The Unreasonableness of this Practice And Lastly How infinitely we are obliged to respect them which are poor First Then I am to shew why the generality of the World despise Poverty First Because they are infected with wrong Notions of Things and draw false Conclusions They look upon Poverty as a Judgment inflicted for some Wickedness or other as the Disciples did the blindness which seized the Man from his birth John 9.2 And in favour to this Opinion think it justifiable enough to contemn and slight it For say they if God makes Poverty a visible Mark of his Resentment of some open Indignities offered to him it is but equal that we also should express our aversion from it But what an erroneous and rash Judgment this is will appear if we consider That though Poverty is the just and most reasonable effect of Prodigality or ill Husbandry by which means abundance have been reduced to a morsel of Bread a draught of Water Nakedness and the like yet many notwithstanding their industrious Care indefatigable Labours early Risings and late taking Rest and all to get subsistance and an answerable competency in the World are invisibly frustrated their simple and honest contrivances cannot arrive to Perfection but are blasted and nipped in their very birth Now the Scripture says They that will not work shall not eat implying that a plodding Head industrious Hands and honest Endeavours are the appointed means whereby Wealth is to be obtained Why therefore doth Providence obstruct and hinder Success I answer God knows Men better than they themselves he understands their Nature and tendency of their Appetites and possibly sees that if they should prosperously thrive they would be apt to forget their Creator and impute their Substance to their own Industry That they would be too much enamoured with the World and place all their Happiness in these lower Delights So that though in the common judgment of Men this seems a harsh Providence yet thus considered it carries in it all the Instances of Love and Mercy Poverty therefore is not altogether a Judgment which is one reason why the ruder and more unthinking part of the World despise and contemn it but very often the effect of God's Goodness a visible Indication of
the Authors of but yet poor Mens Souls are as precious in the sight of God as rich Mens The World distinguishes Men by their Rank and Quality but God by their Goodness and how mean soever his Servants may be in this Life yet they shall be hereafter Kings and Priests and reign with God for ever It matters not then O Christian tho' thou art poor and despicable thou art not to live here always the time is coming when all things will be set to rights when thou shalt have amends made thee for thy scanty Portion and those Indignities offer'd thee for thy Poverty then every Man shall be rewarded according to his Works A Nebuchadnezzar a Nimrod a Belteshazzar a lofty Felix and an ambitious Herod and other Grandees of the World shall be no more respected than thou For God is no respecter of persons It is no matter whether thy Body be honourably buried or no if thy Soul be but vertuous and found in the ways of holiness then both shall be gloriously re-united and live together in Paradise for ever Poor Lazarus lived miserably died so and his Body probably thrown into some Pit or other but yet his Soul was carried by the Angels into Abrahams bosom And thus much for the death of Lazarus I now proceed to make some special Use of what has been said and then conclude And here First From hence we may learn that it is very often the lot of God's dear Children to suffer Affliction in this Life Not that he delights in the Miseries of his People but because he would fit them for himself draw their Affections from things here below let them see the vanity and emptiness of all Worldly satisfactions and put their confidence in him as a sure Refuge in time of trouble Such are the wise and holy ends of God towards his faithful Servants Job a just Man and one that feared God and eschewed evil was wofully punished his Children suddenly slain his Plenty turned into Scarcity his Body afflicted with Swellings and Carbuncles his Friends became his Enemies his Wife in the midst of sufferings tempting him who would but conclude that this was a Judgment upon him for some great sin or other And yet is it left upon Record that this change of things was only to try him who yet retaining his Integrity was blest with much more than ever he had S. James 1.2 says Count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations As if he had express'd himself thus Be not disheartned and cast down if Calamities besiege you provided they be not of your own seeking but by God's Providence for he has no other end upon you but to make you yet better and to fit you more exactly for his heavenly Kingdom And St. Paul 12. Heb. 6. makes affliction a special mark of God's love Whom he loves he rebukes and chastens every Son whom he receives Then Christian bear up under thy sufferings Hast thou but a scanty Portion hardly enough to keep thee alive Be content Heaven will be thine and tho' it may seem long ere thou be in possession of it yet it will infinitely make thee amends when thou comest there Art thou friendless Dost thou suffer Reproach Calumnies Do Men despise thee Does the World deny thee Peace Hast thou none that will take thy part Sink not under this calamity for God is thy Friend he hears thy Sighs and Groans records thy Prayers and bottles up thy Tears and will abundantly recompence thee when thou comest into his Kingdom Put thy trust in him keep covenant with Christ and get an interest in him and fear not what Man can do unto thee It was this which encouraged the Martyrs under their Sufferings and made them even rejoice in the midst of their bitter conflicts they made their Calling and Election sure all was well between God and their Spirits and therefore fainted not at the thought of being sent to him tho' by the most violent and cruel death It is recorded of Ignatius that when he was condemned by that imperious Tyrant Trajan to be torn apieces by wild Beasts he replied I am not afraid to go out of the World this way nor at the suddenness of my departure for I care not how soon nor by what means I hasten to my dear Redeemer whom I love more than Life for that I can freely part with all for his sake who did so much for me he did groan and sigh sweat bleed and die for me and therefore I can never forget him Secondly From the death of Lazarus we learn to be pitiful and compassionate towards those that are Poor Lazarus died with hunger Had his Necessities been supplied he might have lived longer but wanting Nourishment he died What a sad Consideration is it to send the hungry and thirsty away empty when Men have to spare This argues an ungrateful Mind towards God and an insensibility of our own Demerits If God Almighty should deal with us proportionably to our deserts Hell would become our Lot but he deals not with us after our Sins nor rewards us according to our Iniquities he overlooks our manifold Weaknesses passes by our many wilful Miscarriages forgives the Affronts we offer to his Divine Majesty and crowns us with his Goodness his providential Hand is always heaping Blessings upon us his Mercy triumphs over Judgment Now the meer Consideration of this methinks is enough to make Men of flexible condescending Humours of compassionate charitable Dispositions and oblige them to be as forward to give as the Poor is to ask them that is according to their Abilities What a lamentable thing is it when a poor Man almost famished his Face wan his Countenance ghastly his Spirits fainting and his Tongue cleaving to the roof of his Mouth and begs for God's sake for Christ Jesus sake to satisfie his craving Stomach and thirsly Soul or else he must perish to send him away empty as he came Suppose this pining Wretch should drop and die at thy Door upon a denial tho' this be not Murder in the sense of ours yet it is in the judgment of God's Laws and his Blood thou must answer for and O woful Account in the Day of Inquisition Christ who is the ordained Judge has threatned to revenge the Indignities of his poor Servants in Matth. 25. Go ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels for I was an hungred and ye gave me no meat I was thirsty and ye gave me no drink I was naked and ye cloathed me not I was a stranger and ye took me not in I was sick and in prison and ye visited me not Then will the uncharitable answer and say Lord when saw we thee an hungred or a thirst or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not minister unto thee Then shall he answer them In as much as ye did it not unto one of the least of these my poer servants ye did
it not to me and in denying of them ye deny'd me and their cause I will espouse and therefore go ye carsed into everlasting fire But Thirdly From the death of Lazarus we learn to be content with our Condition tho' never so mean and to keep our selves in the Exercise of Religion tho' we are deprived of this Worlds goods Lazarus tho' he was Hungry and Thirsty his Soul fainted in him tho' he was Naked and full of Sores yet he murmured not but committed himself to God to whom his Soul was carried by the Angels as soon as separated from his Body It is excellent to be Poor and Virtuous for it argues the strongest Faith the best Hope and the best Affections because there are not those outward encouragements to Goodness in Adversity as Prosperity Poverty is look'd upon as a kind of Judgment as if God hates the Person and therefore makes him an Object of Scorn and Infamy so that he is apt to be discouraged and can do nothing else but bewail and lament his unhappy circumstances sit drooping and pausing on his low condition But however the Scripture has well inform'd us that God Almighty means no ill towards his Creatures and that when he changes things and removes Prosperity from the Door it is only to try them how they will manage themselves upon an alteration what kind of nature they will appear to have whether they will make application to him and carry themselves in all Duty and Allegiance towards him And since such is God's Wise design it is but very reasonable that we should be as Good and Vertuous when poor as well as when rich especially considering that we deserve nothing at the Hands of God nothing but Fury and everlasting Damnation Besides the advantage of Piety Is a Man poor and low in the World it doth improve and sweeten even that State It keepeth his Spirits up above dejection desperation and disconsolateness it frees him from all grievous solicitude vnd anxiety shewing him that altho' he seemeth to have little yet he may be assured to want nothing he having a certain Succour and never-failing supply from God's good Providence that notwithstanding the present straightness of his condition or scantiness of outward things he has a title to goods infinitely more precious and more considerable To conclude Let it be our main imploy to improve our Judgments and Understandings in things Spiritual that we may have right notions of God such as become the perfections of his Nature and the excellency of his Goodness that in whatsoever state and condition we are we may glorifie his Name And thus when we have conquer'd our selves and brought our Minds to a settlement in the ways of Holiness we shall resign our Concernments with more freedom to God's wise disposal and be submissive to his Laws whatever our condition be May God assist us by the influences of his Grace and blessed Spirit so to order and govern our Natures that we may love him freely believe in him stedfastly and serve him faithfully to our lives end And this for Jesus Christs sake to whom with the Father and ever blessed Spirit be given all Honour Praise Thanksgiving and Obedience now henceforth and for ever more Amen SERMON IV. Luke XVI part of the 22 Verse And was carried by the Angels into Abrahams bosom HAving in my last Discourse treated of the Death of Lazarus and particularly considered what were the immediate causes of his death the manner and circumstance of his dying and how his dead body was probably disposed of My Text now leads me to consider the state and condition of his Soul after separation from the Body It was carried by the Angels into Abrahams bosom Many differ in their sentiments about this Expression and have conceived Witty and Learned Notions of it but yet seem to agree in this that by Abrahams bosom is meant Heaven and the Reason of this phrase is Abraham is stiled The Father of the Faithful and while he lived a very Hospitable person to him was the Soul of Lazarus convey'd as a Sanctuary of Rest and Peace the just reward of his patience during his great want and heavy conflicts Some urge it as a Metaphor from Parents who imbosom and hug their Children when tired by running to and fro or have met with some hurtful mischance and come weeping and lamenting themselves A very adapt Parallel The Soul of poor Lazarus was grieved and wearied with Fastings and Miseries perplexed and overwhelm'd with sorrows for the cruel treatment he met with in the world it was therefore conducted by the Heavenly Courtiers into Abraham's bosom to be succour'd and made amends for past indignities He was carried by the Angels As if they contended who should usher it into Paradise Now Lazarus thou recountest with triumph the difficulties thou hast rubb'd through the afflictions thou hast endured the shame pain and ignominy thou hast undergone for Christs sake Now thou art made acquainted with the Arcana Imperii the secrets of the other happy World and rejoycest with joy unspeakable and full of glory Nothing shall interrupt thy peace nor call thee off from thy enjoyments but there thou shalt swim in rapturous pleasures for evermore This may serve to prevent those who are in sorrow trouble or any other adversity from reflecting upon the Divine Justice as if he unequally distributed his Mercies In this life it matters not whether his Servants be accommodated with sublunary affluences or no since he has prepared a wide and capacious Heaven to receive and replenish them wherein are all the instances of Joy all the ingredients of felicity and nothing else to the contrary all that can caress our powers all that can ravish our hearts all that is good lovely desirable is there to be compendiously enjoyed But to traverse the Text The Soul of Lazarus was carried by the Angels into Abrahams bosom or Heaven Which words afford us this matter First That the Angels are imploy'd to convey the Souls of true Believers into a fixed state of blessedness And to prove this granting that there are such Beings as Angels because the Scriptures often speak of them I shall First of all Undertake to shew their Offices as relating to God's faithful Children in this life Secondly The great love and kindness they have for mankind First then I am to distinguish their Offices as relating to God's faithful Children in this life They are called in Heb. 1. ult 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ministring spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be Heirs of Salvation The word Angel signifies an Ambassador which is sent upon another's Errand and in Scripture sense it is restrainedly taken for a select divine sort of Emissaries Spiritual Beings created commissioned and employed by and under God Now first it is part of the Angels Employment upon any urgency to reveal God's mind and will and to bring Embassies from him to us for our instruction and
either of eternal happiness or misery But such was the stupid folly of Dives that to dye was the least of his care and the least in his mind His chief study was what he should eat drink and put on what sort of pleasures would best suit with and accommodate his senses In sine his happiness was fixed in these perishing enjoyments and so fondly imagined his condition immutable But behold a woful change of things In the midst of his carnal security death steps in an unwelcome Guest a frightful Spectrum and irresistably hauls him from all his darling repasts and crouds him into the Region of damned Spirits Now he that was cloathed with Purple and fine Linnen is inveloped in devouring and unquenchable flames he that fared sumptuously and deliciously every day is confined to a loathsom dungeon and doomed to suster those intolerable preparations And to enhance his Misery Lazarus whom he uncharitably denyed the crumbs which fell from his Table and without any reluctancy permitted to faint languish and dye at his Gates is at a distance presented to his view lying in Abrahams bosom crowned with glory and encircled with the rades of eternal bliss To Abraham he addresses himself Pity my hard fate consider my woful condition see how the flames scorch and torment me see how my tongue is parched with heat I am so miserably afflicted that I cannot express my self I pray thee therefore to send Lazarus with a drop of water to abate the anguish and allay the throbbing of my enflamed tongue So great and vehement are the plagues of Hell that the damned Spirits there cry continually for help and succour but are not pitiable Objects having withstood the frequent tenders of grace and mercy Now from the words of the Text we learn First That as the Souls of true Believers when they go out of their Bodies launce into a fixed state of happiness so the Souls of wicked men immediately upon separation go into a fixed state of misery We no sooner read of the Rich Man being dead and buried but it follows And in Hell he lifted up his eyes being in torment Secondly That it will be a great part of the misery of the damned to understand those to be in Heaven whom they in this life scorned reproached and abused and it may be were instruments of hastening them to those blessed Mansions It was doubtless an aggravation of the rich Mans torments to see Lazarus in Abrahams bosom that Lazarus whom be did brow-beat and suffered to perish with hunger at his own Gates Thirdly That there will come a time when the most proud and ambitious sinners would gladly be relieved by the meanest Saints Father Abraham says the rich Man send Lazarus the very same who begg'd at my Gates for the crumbs which fell from my Table Fourthly That the state of the damned will be void of the least degrees of comfort The rich Man desired but the cooling of his tongue with as much water as could be brought upon the tip of Lazarus's finger Lastly That the Tongue is a Member the abuse of which in another life will lye very heavy upon lost Souls The chief member which the rich man complained was most afflicted was his Tongue send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and could my tongue Intolerable are those preparations in the other miserable world But concerning the former of these First That the Souls of wicked men as-soon as they go out of their bodies pass into a fixed state of misery Which we learn from the former part of the Text The rich man also dyed and was buried and in Hell he lift up his eyes being in torments That is his Soul was hurried by evil Spirits into a state of misery His Body we read dyed and was honourably and splendidly buried in the Earth and there must rest till the great Creator bids it rise in the last day and then shall be re-united to its particular Spirit and both share alike in those unconceivable torments which God has prepared for ungodly men It is therefore an idle fancy of some who conceit that the Soul sleepeth together with the Body and remaineth unactive and insensible as the body The Soul being a Spirit cannot be subject to death and though its agility is much restrained while confined in the body yet as soon as it is delivered it swiftly returns to its own place carried either by good Angels into a state of happiness or by evil Spirits into a place of torments And such is the opinion of the wise man Eccles 12.7 The dust that is the body so termed from the matter of which it is compounded returneth to the Earth again as it was and the Soul to him that gave it to be sentenced either to dwell with God or damned Spirits for ever And though the happiness and misery of departed Souls is not compleat at the highest perfection till that day wherein Christ will come in the glory of his Father with the Holy Angels to judge all the world yet this no way favours the Romish Doctrine which insinuateth a Purgatory a place where departed Spirits are purged by fire and by the fervency of prayer may be redeemed from thence a most pernicious principle As the tree falls so it lyes After this life which is the time of Tryal and Probation a fixed state either of bliss or torment commences And a good Soul cannot then be deprived of happiness tho' not yet in the highest degree but with exceeding joy and a kind of holy impatience it waiteth for the Day of Judgment then to enter on the possession of those good things which God hath prepared for them who continue stedfast unmoveable always abounding in his work Nor on the other hand can a wicked Soul be ransomed from Hell tho' it be not yet in the midst of most exquisite torments but with dread and fear sadly looks for the great and terrible day wherein it must change its unhappy condition for a much worse Those Angels which kept not their first estate are reserved in chains under darkness unto the Judgment of the great Day that is they are not yet afflicted with those punishments which they shall feel and endure when Christ comes to separate the Sheep from the Goats They are therefore said to tremble at the thoughts of a Judgment when Sentence shall pass upon them to be confined in those unhappy Residencies of Misery and to undergo the utmost fury of an Omnipotent God And tho' it is expressed that the Rich man being dead and buried in Hell he lift up his Eyes being in torments we are not to understand him in that place of Misery which wicked men shall be doomed to in the General Judgment but in a state of despair of Mercy without any intermission of hope weeping and wailing for the loss of Heaven which Lazarus whom he reproached reviled and suffered to perish has a sure hope of A state of dread
and fear being too well convinced that he must take up his Eternal Abode with Devils and damned Fiends A state of Torment too his Conscience sadly bringing to his remembrance that he played away the Day of Grace and wilfully rejected the Methods of Eternal Happiness That he was too much taken up with the Pomp and Pride of life spending all his time in catering for his Body cloathing it with Purple and fine Linnen and gorging it with delicious fare but had no regard to his Soul which must live for ever This is Torment inexpressible to reflect on those things which cannot possibly be retrieved to repent and wish he had not been so foolish without the least hope of pardon to sigh and sob groan and howl without pity We may in some measure conceive the uneasiness of this kind of Torment in some who are so unfortunate to be in such an ill frame of spirit as to imbibe unworthy thoughts of God that he is an inxorable Being that he delighteth in the Miseries of his People and will not be intreated for pardon after such an advancement in sin no though they seek it with flouds of tears with many prayers and penitential groans What an Hell is there within the Breasts of these dejected Souls What an abundance of melancholy and frightful thoughts invade their minds how do they wander hither and thither like despairing Ghosts as if Sentence was already past upon them Humane Conversation or other sublunary delights and pleasures become dull and flatulent Now if in this life such an unhappy frame of spirit occasioned either by strength of fancy or too much tenderness of spirit does disorder and confuse the mind and make men their own Tormentors tho' there is yet hopes of forgiveness from God how infinitely more vexatious and afflicting must it needs be in the other World to reflect that the time of Mercy is past and that God will certainly pass Sentence of Eternal Death upon the Soul having no Advocate to plead nor any Vertues to render it an Object of Mercy And here by way of Digression we will suppose the Cryes the woful Complaints of the Rich man's Soul in the other World he is unexpectedly snatched away from all his Pomp and Greatness and surpriz'd into the wide World of Despairing Ghosts Whither am I hurried Oh the doleful sighs and unutterable groans I hear Mercy Mercy but there is none Cursed be my folly in living without a thought of this unhappy Region Cursed be my heart for loving so much the World and worldly things cursed be my avaricious humour in retaining of pelf as if I was never to die cursed be my hands that would not liberally dispence to poor Lazarus O that I was but to live my time over again I would alter my very Nature and make amends for all the wrongs I have done Father Abraham be moved by my recantation pity me who am thus tormented Let Lazarus whom it repenteth me that I did not consider and relieve when it was in my power come with some cooling drops and allay my anguish O that I had never been born that I had given a groan and dyed in my Mothers Womb May that day be darkness wherein it was said I was brought forth Cursed be my Father that begat me cursed be my Mother that bare me cursed be the Place wherein I was Educated cursed be the Purple and fine Linnen that cloathed me the delicious Meats which nouvished me and the Estate that made me live secure and thoughtless till I was surprized into this place of weeping wailing and gnashing of teeth But thus much for the first thing namely that the Souls of wicked Men as soon as they go out of their Bodies pass into a fixed state of misery tho' not the extremity of it till the day of Judgment yet it is irreversible for there is no returning into this life again I pass on to the second general thing namely Secondly That it will be a great part of the misery of the Damned to understand those to be in Heaven whom they in this life scorned reproached and abused and it may be were Instruments of hastening them to those blessed Mansions It was doubtless an aggravation of the Rich Man's torments to see Lazarus in Abraham's bosom that Lazarus whom he formerly Brow-beat and suffered to perish with Hunger at his Gates This Vision could not but enhance his rage he that was but a Beggar the very abject of Mankind he that bowed and cringed for a little sustenance and was the most despicable Object in Nature he that would have been glad of the crumbs which fell from my Table Is he thus advanced into Glory And I who once was of great repute and had all things that were great good and desirable thus sunk into the depth of Disgrace and inveloped in a sad and woful Eternity O wretched change of things Doubtless it will be brought to the memory of the Damned how cruelly despitefully and disdainfully they have treated the Servants of God in this Life and fill them with rage and passion For if Hell be a place wherein are all the instances of torment the perfection of misery it must follow that whatsoever may tend to the unhappiness of those cursed inhabitants will be eternally present with them not only the outward Senses such as the Sight the Ear the Smell the Taste and Touching shall be proportionably tormented but the inferior faculties also First The Imaginative Faculty shall be perplexed with horrid Idea's more terrible and affrighting than the most melancholy fancy in their Dreams and shall be hurried into strange consternations surprized into a kind of convulsive delirium it shall never conceive a Notion but what may disturb disquiet and make it unconceiveably uneasie Secondly The Appetites shall be tormented with the fury of their own passions and shall issue out after a vehement manner namely fears heaviness irksomness agonies anger desperations envyings out-rages with such a cruel War among themselves that they shall clash and make most horrid noises Thirdly The Intellectual Memory shall be tormented with a continual and fixed Recordation of the many opportunities and advantages there once were of getting to Heaven the many offers of Grace which have been stubbornly refused the many affronts and injuries that have been offered to God and his Saints the good things it formerly possessed the evils it suffers at present and those it must painfully endure to all Eternity So that it cannot think or imagine any thing but what will grieve and torment it Fourthly The Understanding shall be darkned without being able to discourse or understand any thing that may please it it shall be full of Errors and Illusions pondering and exaggerating his own Evils and judging with a furious boldness that God Almighty doth him wrong Fifthly The Will shall be obstinate and obdurate in his sins and in the hatred of God and his Saints without being able to be appeased or
were out upon thee when Death like an Executioner comes to seise and apprehend thee and hurry thee before the dreadful Tribunal where all thy past Actions must be examined all thy secret Sins laid open and a dreadful Sentence shall be immediately pronounced upon thee Is not the Consideration of this enough to prevail with Men who have their Wits about them to break off their Sins timely by Repentance and apply themselves to a serious thoughtfulness of their latter end Should a damned Spirit be permitted to come from the Region of Misery to tell thee how intolerable those Preparations are what Pain and Anguish those wretched Ghosts endure thou saist it may be that thou wouldst repent but if thou wilt not be convinced by the assertions of the Gospel it is to be presumed nothing besides can have effect upon thee as Abraham answered the rich Man in that Parable who desired him to send some Spirit to his surviving Bretheren to scare them to Repentance If they will not believe Moses and the Prophets they will not be persuaded though one rose from the dead Lastly And since we are promised all the assistance imaginable to fit us for those Mansions of Bliss let us not be so injurious to our selves as to be lacking on our parts Let us offer violence to our stubborn Wills wean our Affections from the objects of Sin and mortifie the Flesh till it is brought in subjection to the Spirit and intirely submissive to the Law of Reason Let us improve the means of Grace and be purely governed by the motions of God's Spirit What a comfortable Death will such a regular and well-managed Life produce All slavish fears misgivings frightful thoughts and terrible apprehensions will flee away and a prospect of the Heavenly Canaan will present it self we shall have a view of that glorious reception we are like to have which will sweeten the agonies of Death lift us up under the pressure of a sore Disease and carry us out of the World with a solid hope of entering into our Masters joy And here the Soliloquy of a Soul that is ready to pass out of this World into a better I a poor Creature of this World below I who have felt the troubles of this Mortal State been tortured by the Passions of Flesh and Blood Fears and Cares Despair and Hopes even I am going into a Heaven where none of these can enter where I shall be made happy with these Enjoyments which make God and Angels so I shall be made equal to the Angels in Heaven how far above them in my Happiness For what a value will the Experience of this World make me set upon the joys of another The sence and memory of Misery will make my Heaven double Oh! The mighty Raptures and Extasies this holy Soul falls into till it is swallowed up in uninterrupted Joys and holy Wonder And since there is far less trouble in Virtue than in Sin and since the Reward of each is so vastly different how blameable and worthy of Condemnation are they who refuse the former and chuse the latter Let none of us then for the sake of a few short-liv'd Pleasures run our selves in danger of being cast into a miserable Eternity wherein we shall sorely repent of our Inadvertencies and stubborn Perversenesses and wish we had been perswaded in time Let us therefore with our Church pray O Almighty God the Protector of all that trust in thee without whom nothing is strong nothing is holy increase and multiply upon us thy Mercy that thou being our Ruler and Guide we may so pass through things Temporal that we finally lose not the things Eternal And thus we beg for Jesus Christ's sake to whom with the Father and the ever Blessed Spirit be given all Honour Praise Thanksgiving and Obedience now henceforth and for evermore Amen SERMON VI. Luke XVI latter part of 22 verses The Rich man also died and was buried And in Hell he lift up his Eyes being in torments and sees Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom And he cried and said Father Abraham have mercy on me and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my Tongue for I am tormented in this flame WHen I enter'd upon these words you may remember I raised these following particulars from them As First That as the Souls of true Believers when they go out of their Bodies launch into a fixed state of Blessedness so the Souls of wicked men pass into a fixed state of Misery We no sooner read of the Rich man's being dead and buried but in Hell he lift up his Eyes being in torment Secondly That it will be a great part of the misery of the damned to understand those to be in Heaven whom in this life they scorned reproached and abused and it may be were Instruments of hastening them to those blessed Mansions It was doubtless a great aggravation of the Rich man's misery when he saw Lazarus in Abraham's bosom that Lazarus whom he suffered to perish with hunger at his Gates Thirdly That the time will come when the most proud and ambitious Sinners would gladly be relieved by the meanest Saints Father Abraham says the Rich man send Lazarus the very same who begg'd for the crumbs which fell from my Table Fourthly That the state of the damned will be void of the least degrees of comfort The Rich man desired but the cooling of his Tongue but with as much Water as could be brought upon the tip of Lazarus 's finger Fifthly and lastly That the Tongue is a member the abuse of which in another life will lie very heavy upon lost Souls The chief member which the Rich man complained was most afflicted was his Tongue Send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue As concerning the former of these That the Souls of wicked Men when they go out of their Bodies pass into a fixed state of misery I urged that though their punishment will not be compleat till the day of Judgment when Soul and Body shall be re-united and sentence pass upon them yet their condition is irreversible no changing it for a better but there they weep and howl for the loss of Heaven reproach themselves for their obstinate perversenesses in neglecting the opportunities and slighting the means of happiness and sadly expect the day of Judgment having too much Reason to believe they shall be cast and condemned at that formidable Audit Hence I told you the Devils are said to fear and tremble being convinced that they shall at the last reckoning be thrown into the lake that burns with fire and brimstone And therefore it is spoken by St. Jude concerning the fallen Angels that kept not their first Estate having violated those everlasting Laws given to them by their Creator They are reserved in chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day That is they are not in
that extremity of torment which they shall endure when Jesus Christ cometh with ten thousand of Saints to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodlily committed and of all their ungodly speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him As to the second particular namely That it will be a great part of the misery of the damned to understand those to be in Heaven whom they in this life scorned reproached and abused and it may be were instruments of hastening them to those blessed Mansions I urged that if Hell be a Place where all the victims to Divine Justice must for ever reside and where are all the instances of torment it is not to be doubted but this will be one instance of their punishment to understand those are in a state of glory who while in this world they cloathed with dishonour and treated with disgrace and infamy or suffering their rage and passion to froth up and boyl against them sent them into the other life before the time There is nothing more exasperates and frets a malicious man than to see one whom he oweth a grudge or has no common respect for thrive and get wealth this fills him with indignation and fury and makes him very uneasie as often as he meets with or thinks of the Object of his hate or when a Discourse arises about him Then is he big with wishes for his entire ruine that which improves his unhappiness is it is not in his power to mischief or harm him by all his base and envious contrivances against him And what an aggravation of the misery of the damned must it needs be to know and understand those to be in Heaven whom they in this world envied reproached and spake all manner of evil against Whatsoever may torment the interiour faculties and make them at discord and variance shall not be wanting And after an enlargement upon this Point I proceeded to draw some practical Inferences and then closed My business then is now to go on to the third Thing namely Thirdly That the time will come when the most proud and ambitious sinners would gladly be relieved by the meanest Saints Father Abraham says the Rich Man send Lazarus that Lazarus who came to my Gates in tattered cloathing with a wan and meagre countenance being pinched with hunger and begged for the crumbs which fell from my Table We know how much against the grain it goes when fate so disposes matters and turns the harmony of things for a man who once lived in good repute and fashion had all things which were commodious and useful and made his life pleasant and comfortable to beg courtesies of another who was formerly poor and despicable when he was a favourite of fortune and probably deny'd him both respect and supplies how doth he pro and con with himself before he can come to such an humble temper to ask the benevolence of an enemy whom he made so and brook the insolent language and flat denials he may probably meet with from him Former unkindnesses do not presently slip out of mind But the sense of his present wants and of the inconveniences which attend him by reason of his unfortunate fall out-weighs the sense of his ill natur'd carriage and the reason he has to fear the same measure he met will be measured to him again There is no disputing the point poverty and urgent necessity presses him to it against his will How much elated and puffed up soever he was when in a flourshing state though then never so haughty and aspiring yet now he must cringe and kneel change his ill nature or at least dissemble a good one and appear in all the circumstances of an humble Supplicant Now if such an alteration of affairs in this life does grate upon the mind and makes a man probably more unhappy than his present mean condition what a torment will it be to the damned in Hell to be sensible that their miseries could be abated by the meanest Saints in Heaven even by those whom they most scornfully treated and shamefully abused in this life but shall beg and wish and desire to no purpose how will they rage and flame with indignation against those glorified Souls who are carried into Abrahams bosom where they shall never weep nor sigh nor sorrow more where a part of their happiness is to know that they are fallen as so many victims to Divine Justice who in this world grieved and vexed and harrassed them by their unreasonable dealings and inhumane contrivances against them Could but the raies of bliss glance through some cranny into that dungeon of darkness this would administer some comfort or if those happy Spirits above would vouchsafe to descend and visit those tormented Ghosts and pity their irreparable and lost condition it would divert their anguish and make their long eternity more tolerable but such is the contrivance and determinate will of God that those terrible preparations which he has provided for his Enemies shall never be mingled with the least instance of consolation as those blessed Mansions he has fixed for the reception of his obedient Children shall never be interrupted with contrarieties and so the Saints injoy perfect happiness and the damned suffer perfect misery being deprived of every thing which may mitigate and asswage the pains of Hell they must endure the absence of all good and suffer the presence of all evil And here we will suppose the conflicts of the rich man and insert those probable lamentations he may make in his eternal banishment from all hopes of a return When I was in prosperity I insulted over poverty and foolishly imagined no evil should happen to me I lived splendidly every day and had all things at my beck which were ravishing and pleasurable and never considered the pressing wants and extream hardships of indigent persons I too sadly remember how imperious and currish I behaved my self to impoverish'd Lazarus who was laid at my Gates full of the Leprosie and just famished he begged he beseeched me to help him in his extremity but I would not Had he required any thing considerable I might have deny'd him with a plausible excuse but he ask'd only for the wast crumbs which fell from my Table and I wretch that I was sent him away empty What hardness possessed me To what a height of inhumanity was I arrived And now what a woful change is here That same Lazarus is in Heaven and made amends for those hardships he patiently endured and suffered in the other life and I am sunk down by the weight of my own guilt into the Eternal Abyss of Misery How glad should I be of the least comfort from him if it were but a drop of water upon the tip of his finger to cool my Tongue Father Abraham dispatch him from those glorious Regions to answer my small request Was I re-instated in my wealth pomp and splendor had I
and gnashing of Teeth a never-dying Worm but flames that cannot be quenched And St. John describes Hell A Lake of Fire and Brimstone which torments the Damned day and night for ever and ever Rev. 20.10 The Second Reason is The same Bodies which are buried in the Earth must be raised again and be re-united to their particular Spirits and be made Immortal Now I cannot conceive how the Body can suffer pain so much as by Fire and that being of a piercing nature and most afflicting we may very reasonably conjecture that there is a fire prepared by God for impenitent Sinners to chastize their Bodies for their acts of Lust and in these flames all the outward Senses shall be tormented and all the Members particularly the Tongue which in this Life was used to Cursing and Swearing to Lying Cheating and Flattary which was accustomed to blaspheme God and Providence to ridicule his Religion and Worship and to speak evil of the Saints which was Instrumental of Gluttony Intemperance and obscene Discourses But how and in what nature the Tongue must suffer will be time enough for Sinners to understand when they come there Certain it is that Omnipotence has prepared the most exquisite miseries for those who live and die in sin In fine all that is evil and irksom all that is grievous and painful whatsoever may compleat and make up a miserable and woful Eternity is provided and made ready for all those unfortunate wretches who shall be sunk into the fatal Abyss by the weight of their own guilt And thus much for the fifth and last particular That the Tongue is a Member the abuse of which in another life will lie very heavy upon lost Souls And now I proceed to draw some Practical Inferences from what has been said and so conclude And here First What love and affection do we owe to Almighty God for his tender compassions towards us in bearing with our weaknesses and not revenging our stubborn perversenesses by suddenly casting us into this dismal place of Hell How many has he rigorously sent weeping into the fatal Abyss The Angels had no sooner committed the sin but they were immediately banished from their Happiness and now are reserved in Chains under Darkness unto the Judgment of the Great Day What multitudes of others are now suffering the dire effects of an unappeas'd vengeance for a less number of sins than we are guilty of and who if they had been permitted to live probably might have be thought themselves changed their Minds and Nature and become as eminent for Vertue as ever they were notorious for Vice Why does not Almighty Justice take the advantage and for our Iniquities tumble us into the Lake that burns with fire and brimstone Why does he yet bear with our insolent carriage and suffer the affronts we daily offer to his Majesty Wherefore does he spare the Blasphemous Person the Common Swearer who impudently rend his Sacred Name at every turn Wherefore does he who can by a word of his Mouth by a blast of the breath of his Nostrils crush proud Mortals into the unhappy Residences of Misery from whence there can be no Redemption still endure their treacherous Infidelities and many wilful Miscarriages What does he discern in us that should move him to such impunity and forbearance Nothing in us but it is his Goodness which dilates it self over the whole Earth Can such Clemency and Graciousness then slip out of our Minds and be buried in Oblivion Can we think any thing too much to do for such a benign Being who loveth us far beyond the love of Parents Might any of those cursed Spirits below be permitted to re-enter this World and live another life in this Mortal State how thankful would they be How wary and circumspect in their respective Vocations how tender of their Innocency how sincere in their Obedience They would pluck out a Right Eye cut off a Right Hand or Foot rather than to have all their Members and cast into Hell where the Worm dieth not and the Fire is not quenched they would celebrate the Memory of such a Redemption with a faithful and constant submission to the Will of God How then should we live live to him who yet spareth us and preserves us from the bottomless Pit Let us then shake off that improvidence which detaineth us bethink our selves renew our Spirits change our very Natures and no longer live to our selves but unto him who loveth us beyond measure Our Debts are many and great our Scores with God are large and numerous and he has not yet cast us into Prison from whence we must not come out till we have paid the uttermost farthing Let this merciful and gracious Creditor therefore be rever'd honoured esteemed and served by us so will he at length give us a clear discharge from all future demands and make us Rulers over all his Goods Secondly From the premises we learn to exercise our patience under the evils and miseries of this Life Worldly misfortunes are not to be compared to those unhappinesses which attend lost Souls the former either by the help of Friends or some means or other may be repaired or if not their malignity is abated by the consideration that they will not last always for we must die and there is an end of all Earthly troul les But the torments of Hell are durable and eternal no redemption from thence nor is there any thing that can ease the miserable wretches there There is no condition in this Life tho' never so uncomfortable never so despicable and grievous but the Damned would very gladly exchange their state for it and think themselves infinitely bettered as having parted with an eternally miserable condition which admits of no abatements for a temporally evil one and which may be accommodated by some Instruments or other When therefore thou fallest under Poverty and the World brow-beats thee think of the Poverty the Damned endure they are deprived of the summum bonum the chiefest good even God and in him of all other sensible goods When thou art despised and hated that thou art ready to be betrayed into dejection desperation and disconsolateness ponder with thy self how the tormented Souls in Hell are rejected despised reproached by God Angels and Saints and that World without end must undergo the unappeased vengeance of an offended Deity When thou art seized and oppressed with a Fever and thy blood in a violent ferment consider what heats and pains lost Souls feel in Hell inveloped in devouring flames and every part and member of their Bodies exposed to that scorching fire doubtless it would very much tend to the easement of Mens maladies and render the worst condition in this Life more tolerable if Men did often entertain themselves with the thoughts of those unspeakable preparations which Divine Justice has provided for impenitent sinners Who would not rather suffer an Eye to be plucked out an Arm or Leg to
happily bring them from under the power of Satan unto God I shall treat of both these distinctly beginning with the former First That the Scriptures are the only means appointed by God for the Conviction Conversion and the Salvation of Sinners drawn from Abraham's answer to the Rich Man's Petition that he would send Lazarus away with a special Commission to his surviving Brethren No they have Moses and the Prophets let them hear them The Word of God is a Declaration of his Will concerning Mankind who desiring their eternal Good hath by Moses and the Prophets sent and commissioned after him prescribed the Methods in a plain and familiar manner to be used and prosecuted to that end He therefore inserts his Prerogative and the undeniable claim he has to our Worship and the best of our Services as the Lord our God the Contriver and Builder of the Universe our Creator who breathed into us the breath of Life and we became living Souls And to strengthen the belief of those Truths written and dispersed by his chosen Servants graciously condescended to come down from Heaven eclipsed with Humanity and supplied the defects of his Laws delivered in the Minority of the World And lest by additions and seeming alterations the Jews with whom he chiefly conversed should stagger in the belief of the Mosaical Traditions tells them Matth. 5.17 Think not that I am come to destroy the Law and the Prophets I am not come to destroy but to fullfil more emphatically to reveal the full intent and meaning of the Law anciently delivered that Men may be put out of scruple and doubt concerning their Duty and the terms upon which their Salvation is promised And therefore St. Paul to create a separate veneration and high esteem for Sacred Writ gives an excellent Commendation and pathetick Encomium of it 2. Tim. 3.16 17. It is profitable says he for doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction in righteousness that the man of God may be perfect throughly furnished unto all good works That is the holy Scriptures termed the Old and New Testament are undeniably profitable to instruct us in the belief of those Propositions absolutely necessary to Salvation to convince us of any truth which consists with our happiness or of any sin the allowed practice of which will sink us into the Abyss of Misery to correct us when straying to shew us the right path and to bring us to rights to instruct us in that righteousness in which we must appear before God to the end that Christians may be as perfect in this frail state as they can be aptly prepared to every good work commendable and praise-worthy in the sight of God And in the 15th Verse he urges That the Scriptures are able to make us wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus they have sufficiency of Doctrine to make us wise enough to get to Heaven if we have a genuine Faith in Jesus Christ receiving him as our Saviour and a Faith assenting and agreeing to these holy Writings as the revelation of the Divine Will So that it is fond flattery for Men to disregard the Oracles of God as if they were only Human Inventions composed and written in a melancholy studious humour or by strength of fancy and expect extraordinary revelations to convince and convert them as an Angel from above cloathed with the brightness of glory with a special Commission in his Hand to make them believe that there is a Heaven and a damned Spirit from beneath with the woful marks of Divine vengeance upon him wringing his hands tearing his hair gnashing his teeth and telling them what terrible preparations God has provided for impenitent sinners to beget in them the belief of a Hell God is not obliged to convert Men after such an extraordinary manner nor indeed is it reasonable he should since he has revealed his mind concerning Mankind to his Servant Moses and to the Prophets after him and confirmed the same by his Son working mighty Miracles and astonishing Wonders and by him delivered to the Apostles who converted many convinced them of their errors and fixed them in the profession of Christianity and by them handed down to us Wherefore should God detract from the power authority and truth of his holy Word by reforming Men after a strange and unusual course The nice and stubborn Pharisees notwithstanding those numberless Miracles which our Saviour wrought in their view to possess them with the belief of his Divinity and that he had his Commission from God the Father impertinently required a sign from him something extraordinary more than he had already done expecting that such a Mission should be so confirmed Either perhaps that he would alter the course of the Sun or make it stand still as it did upon the Dial of Ahaz or that he would demand a Guard of Angels from Heaven who should testifie his Authority and that he was no Impostor as they prophanely suspected or it may be that he would cause a Voice from Heaven to thunder in their Ears that he was the Son of God and threaten them with Damnation if they disputed the Truth of it To this our blessed Lord answers An evil and adulterous Generation seeketh after a Sign but there shall no Sign be given them I have wrought Miracles enough to convince them if they were not harder than the nethermost Mill-stone I filled five thousand Persons with five Loaves and two Fishes and of the fragments thereof remained twelve Baskets full I raised Lazarus to life who had been dead four days With a word I have cast out Devils out of those who were possessed opened the Eyes of those who were born blind A Woman that had an Issue of Blood twelve years and had spent all her Substance with Physicians for cure was perfectly made whole by touching the hem of my Garment The Lame and Paralitick are restored to Health and Strength by me without medicinal Applications The Widows Son of Nain who was carrying forth in order to be buried received life again by my command Arise Abundance more Miracles of this kind I have wrought before you O ye of little faith to convince you that I am sent from God But still retaining Prejudice and Malice against me whereby you are hardened and seared with Infidelity there shall no other Sign be shewn to satisfie your vain Curiosity since enough has been done to make impartial and ingenuous Minds believe that I act by a Divine Power and consequently have received my Commission from God To run parallel God having revealed his Will concerning Mankind now called the Old and New Testament the former relating to Moses and the Prophets who were chosen and peculiar Ambassadors commissioned by and immediately employed under God to spread the knowledge of his Laws and to insinuate with his Creatures to revere the Sanction thereof The latter pertaining to the Blessed Jesus who was impowered and authorized by his Father to
power and force to convince and reform Men than a singular special miracle wrought to that purpose can have is this It is not only the appointed means but God has ordained no other to reclaim men He will not that they be convinced so much by Sense as by Reason not so much by Ocular Demonstration as Rational Conclusions And therefore it argues that those men who are not won and brought over by the insinuations of the Gospel but expect some extraordinary dealings to convict them are desperately hardened and must perish without remedy It would infinitely detract from the power and authority of Gods word and render it insignificant and invalid if when men out of a fond humour and perverse disposition refuse to hearken to and be converted by it God should deviate from the ordinary rule by permitting Spectrums or Apparitions to discourse with and persuade them to break off their sins by a timely repentance His promises and threatnings would take but little effect nay men would scarce have Faith enough to believe them if such extraordinary methods were commonly used to cure Men of their obstinate blindness and perverse infidelity But wherefore should God answer Mens vain curiosity Why should he confute them of their Errours by new and strange means when the truth of Christianity hath been attested by wonders and miracles by the blood of Martyrs who died for the Confirmation of it and by the Conversion of many thousands since It must be concluded that they were weary of their lives very soft and easie melancholly fanciful Persons who would thus embrace death relinquish their interests goods and possessions for the sake of the Truth of which they had no apparent testimony They must imagine the world has lain a long while in Ignorance and Darkness amused only with fictious Relations and vain Genealogies and that those who died long since in the belief of the Scripture are without hope Or otherwise how is it that the Oracles of God are not more credited by them Why are men so seared and impenitrable that the word of God which is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged Sword loseth its Vertue and its healing Operations upon them quit defeated And furthermore If God had discovered any insufficiency in his Holy Word that it was not able to turn mens hearts he would have used some other methods to that end and not have permitted so many thousands to have lived and dyed in their sins to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever He would not suffer poor Souls to run into the Labyrinth of Despair nor others to be hardened if his word alone which hath brought Life and Immortality into the world was not capable or had not sufficiency of Doctrine to instruct and guide them in the path that leads to Heaven Nor would our blessed Saviour have pronounced such terrible woes against the Unbelieving Jews nor had Divine providence cursed them who were once his peculiar People a chosen Generation a royal Priest-hood as he did by scattering them all the world over but no where incorporated into a Nation a standing and visible mark of Vengeance upon them I say this people would not have been so severely dealt with upon the account of their infidelity If the word preached by the Holy Jesus and confirmed by miracles and unusual signs was not convincing and influential Wherefore it is sadly recorded of them John 12.40 That God hath blinded their eyes and hardened their heart that they should not see with their eyes and understand with their heart and be converted From hence I draw this Conclusion That when men arrive to such a pitch of daring presumption as to give little or no heed to the written word of God all other means used for their Conversion such as Preaching friendly Counsel and Admonishment seldom affecteth or worketh a change in them Hence a Friend becometh anothers Enemy because he tells him the truth mildly reproves him for his sin sorrowfully tells him what a desperate condition he is in and what he must expect if he persists and dies in an irrepentant state By such Gods Ministers and their wholesom Discourses are reproached those Sermons which they should use as medicaments to heal their wounded Souls are made their sport and pastime fitting only to be Subjects of vain wit and frothy drollery It is a sad presage of final ruine when the standing Revelation of Gods Will doth not work upon men to the changing of their manners and turning them from under the power of Satan unto God In all probability neither an Angel from Heaven nor a damned Ghost from beneath could ever reach and overcome them For if that word which was ushered into the world with Thundrings and Lightnings delivered by the Prophets by God's special Order and Inspiration and to strengthen the credibility of it was rehearsed and promulged by Jesus Christ and that the knowledge thereof might be universally spread was delivered by the same Jesus to the Apostles and that succeeding ages might not be brought up in ignorance and live and dye without the knowledge of God and their Duty was handed down from the Apostles to Us That word that reformed three thousand Souls at one time Converted Heathens who had no other sense of their Maker than what they received from the Book of Nature and brought over multitudes to the Profession and Practice of Christianity who never heard of it before I say if this word of God which has abundantly evidenced its power and efficacy and is the means of that Piety and Religion practised in our days cannot prevail with men their stubbornness and wilful infidelity defeating its aptness and influence we may very reasonably conclude that if a special miracle was wrought to convert them it would be to no purpose But here notwithstanding what has been already urged some may yet say in the Language of the Text But if one rose from the dead we would repent The Motives and Arguments of the Gospel being still and the same and which by experience we find have not power enough to reclaim us some new method used for our Conversion as an Apparition or Ghost would above any thing else persuade us Now how little this would affect them I shall shew in the prosecution of the second Point which is Secondly That should God condescend to gratifie a Wicked Mans vain Curiosity by causing one to rise from the dead and to testifie unto him that the course he takes without speedy amendment will be the eternal ruine of him and that the preparations in Hell are very terrible and insupportable yet he will invent Arguments and propound Reasons to fortisie himself that he may not be affected with and instuenced by such an Apparition and frightful Relation as heretofore he did to withstand the prevalent Motives of Religion It is not to be disputed but that if a Spectrum or Ghost should appear to a very wicked man suppose it to
be an aerial Representation of his Companion who with a hollow Voice dreadful Visage and lamentable Utterance tells him that there is a God both just and powerful and that there is an eternally happy and miserable state and that it is his misfortune to be doomed to the latter which in his life-time he used all the means he could to banish from his thoughts and that if he does not speedily amend his life and heartily repent of the many wickednesses he has wilfully and presumptuously committed as they were formerly Companions in sin so they would be unhappy Fellow-sufferers in a lamentable Eternity I say I question not but if a Ghost should appear to any of us after this manner it would make some impression upon us But then whether or no this miracle wrought would so prevail with a man who has habituated himself to Wickedness as to work a Reformation in him It is to be supposed No For after the surprize is over those heats allayed which were at first stirred up in him he will quickly invent excuses and arguments why he should not effect that Reformation he has so much aversion from For First Tho' he was deeply touched at first and all his Powers in such a consternation that he was scarce himself yet being recovered from the fright the inclination he has to sin will put him upon doubt and scrutiny and to question the reality of the thing He knows not but the Vision was only the effect of Melancholy and a drooping Mind or the imagination of a distempered Brain He knows that when Persons lie under the extremity of a Fever their fancies are very whimsical and suppose they see frightful shapes a company of Fiends about their Beds or that they see Hell open and abundance of Souls tormenting there That some who are naturally frightful suppose an Apparition instead of their shadow and will scarce be beaten out of that strong Illusion and thus the World comes to be filled with relations of Ghosts or Apparitions He knows that some by strength of fancy will imagine a cluster of Clouds to be an Army of Men ingaged in a pitch'd Battel and why may not the Vision which he saw be only an imaginative shape nothing real but a thing framed in his disordered Mind It is easie for a Man who is not willing to believe any thing of this nature to bring himself to such an opinion to evade and shift off the thoughts of it that they might not disturb and trouble him in his wickednesses But then he is much more encouraged when he tells his idle and wanton Companions the relation who upon hearing it will not forbear jesting him out of the conceit nor will they want arguments to convince him that he was either in a Dream or was pensively musing or was imploying his thoughts about Stories which tell of Ghosts and Spirits and so giving way to them foolishly conjectured that his melancholy fancy metamorphos'd it self into form and shape But he must banish all such whimsical Notions and never credit any thing of that kind or otherwise he must forsake their Society and not din their ears with such Nonsence but those who are easie too credulous Persons who spend their time in carrying such ridiculous relations up and down the World But Secondly Supposing that notwithstanding all this he cannot easily baffle the credit of his Senses for tho' he has hitherto used all the means he could to banish the belief of the Vision yet he cannot be fully perswaded but that there was somewhat in it My blood says he would not so suddenly without some extraordinary cause fly in my face nor would my powers ruffle together in such confusion if something praeter-natural had not made towards me I was neither a sleep nor musing but perfectly in my senses when I saw the Apparition and therefore I cannot deny Matter of Fact But still the great love he bears to sin will put him upon framing another Argument It is true I was amazed at a Vision but how do I know that it was one risen from the Dead It might peradventure be a human Body dress'd up in Grave-cloaths imitating the walk and gesture of a Ghost who intended by this Religious fraud to scare me from my sins but it so confounded him that he could not distinguish truly between the Imposture or the Reality But supposing it is no fraud but indeed a Spirit yet he knows not whether it be his Friend if he was convinced of this he would credit his relation and immediately change upon it But for ought he knows it may be one of those evil Spirits in the Air who disturb and fluster Men and possess them with strange whimsies fancies and frightful imaginations and therefore till further conviction to the contrary he will not be influenced and wrought upon by any Spirit of that Order since I know and have heard that they are maliciously bent against us and would do us much more mischief than they do if they were not limited and restrained by a superior Power But Thirdly As it is not to be doubted that such a Man as I am now speaking of will create and raise many Arguments to withstand the force and influence of such a Miracle wrought in order to his Conversion so there is one more yet remaining which he may probably urge to sortifie himself against Conviction and Conversion And that is the unusualness of such kind of means as a Spirit or Apparition to bring Men to Repentance It is true he has been haunted but why he above the rest of Mankind The singularity of the thing will increase his doubt If the Neighbourhood where he lives were thus disturbed or if any of his near Acquaintance should come and tell him that at such a time they were surprized by a Ghost who told them That if they continued in that course of Life they so vigorously prosecuted they would be as miscrable as himself who suffers eternal torments for committing the very same sins they now live in this relation would indeed alarm him and make him suspect his present circumstances and leave those Vices he is diss waded from But since none that he knows of are thus handled he has no reason to credit the relation of the Spirit If such means of Conviction were rational and powerful doubtless others would be afforded them as well as he but since he hears nor knows of none he shall not take things upon trust but continue unperswaded as he is Thus we see how Men who withstand the Motives of Christianity refuse to be reformed by Moses and the Prophets by Jesus Christ and his Apostles will also find out shifts and ways to evade the force and argument of a Spirit should one be sent on purpose to convert them And thus is Abraham's Answer made good to the Rich Man who importunately desired him to send Lazarus from the dead to testifie to his Brethren for that they could