present fruit this earnest as I may say and ready money in hand the peace and satisfaction of our own minds which is much more valuable than thousands of gold and silver the unspeakable comfort whereof every man will then find when he hath most need of it For it will be matter of great joy to him not only under the sorest afflictions and calamities of Life but even at the hour of Death when the miseries of life oppress him and the sorrows of death compass him about and the pangs of it are ready to take hold of him There is certainly no such comfort under the evils and afflictions of this life as a faithful witness in our own breasts of our own innocency and integrity When we are afflicted by God or persecuted and revil'd by men it cannot but be a mighty consolation to us to be conscious to our selves of our own sincerity For though no man can acquit and justifie himself before God as to the perfect innocency of his life in which sence St. Paul says that though he knew nothing by himself yet was he not thereby justified I say though no man can plead perfect innocency yet as to the general course and tenour of an unblameable life a good man may appeal to God and even when he afflicts him may look upon him as a tender and compassionate Father and not as an angry and revengeful Judge With this holy and patient Job under all those terrible disasters and calamities which befel him was able in some measure to comfort himself After he had lost all and he had a great deal to lose when he was forsaken of all other comfort even the charitable opinion of his best Friends concerning his sincerity In these sad and disconsolate circumstances what was it that bore up his spirit nothing but the conscience of his own integrity See with what resolution and constancy of mind he asserts and maintains it I will not says he remove mine integrity from me my righteousness will I hold fast and will not let it go mine heart shall not reproach me so long as I live You see that when every thing else was gone his intergrity stuck by him and supported him to the last And as to persecutions and sufferings from men our own innocency and the goodness of our Cause will be our best comfort under them When we are not guilty to our selves that we have deserv'd them from men and are inwardly assur'd that whatever we patiently suffer for God and a good conscience will all turn to our account another Day and work for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory This was that which supported the first Christians that noble Army of Martyrs under all those bitter and cruel persecutions which had otherwise been beyond all humane patience to have endur'd This comforted them in all their tribulations Our rejoycing says St. Paul is this the testimony of our consciences that in simplicity and godly sincerity we have had our conversation in the world So likewise under that inferiour but equally malicious sort of persecution of which this Age is so very profuse and prodigal I mean the causeless calumnies and reproaches of men If under these we can but approve our Consciences to God the uncharitable Censures of men are not so much to be regarded by us some impression they will make upon a tender mind but we must not if we can help it let them sink too deep into our spirits If our hearts condemn us not we may have confidence towards God and then surely much more towards men If God and our own Consciences do but acquit us methinks it should be no such difficult matter to bear the slanders and hard censures of men But above all other times the comfort of a good Conscience is most sensible and most considerable at the hour of Death For as nothing dejects a man's spirit more and sends him down with so much sorrow to the grave as the guilt of an evil Conscience what terrour and anguish what rage and despair do seize upon a Sinner at that time when he reflects upon what he hath done and considers what he is like to suffer So on the other hand there is nothing that revives and raises the fainting spirits of a dying man like the Conscience of a holy and useful life which hath brought glory to God and good to men The wicked says Solomon is driven away in his wickedness that is he is carried out of the World as it were in a storm and tempest But the righteous hath hope in his death he usually dies calmly and comfortably Mark the perfect man says David and behold the upright for the end of that man is peace If a man be conscious to himself that he hath sincerely endeavour'd to keep the commandments of God and to do the things which please Him if he hath lived inoffensively and as St. Paul says of himself in all good conscience before God and men what an unspeakable consolation must it be to him in that dark and gloomy time and when he is walking through the valley of the shadow of death then to fear no evil and to be able with our Blessed Saviour to say though in a much inferiour measure and degree Father I have glorified thee on the earth I have finished the work which thou hast given me to do And to be able to look Death in the face with the like courage and constancy of mind as St. Paul did when he saw it approaching towards him I am now says he ready to be offer'd and the time of my departure is at hand I have fought a good fight I have finish'd my race I have kept the faith henceforth there is laid up for me a Crown of righteousness which the Lord the righteous Judge shall give me at that day A comfortable Death that is free from the stings and upbraidings the terrours and tortures the confusion and amazement of a guilty Conscience is a happiness so desireable as to be well worth the best care and endeavour of a man's whole life Let us then have a conscientious regard to the whole compass of our Duty and with St. Paul Let us exercise our selves to have always a Conscience void of offence towards God and towards men And let us never do any thing whereby we shall offer violence to the light of our minds God hath given us this Principle to be our constant guide and companion and who-ever after due care to inform himself aright does sincerely follow the dictate and direction of this Guide shall never fatally miscarry But who-ever goes against the clear dictate and conviction of his Conscience in so doing he undermines the foundation of his own comfort and peace and sins against God and his own Soul And to the end we may keep our Consciences clear of guilt we should frequently examine our selves and look back upon the actions of
mind the business of Religion in some degree but not so heartily and vigorously as a matter of such infinite consequence doth require and deserve And here I fear the very best are greatly defective and so much the more to be blamed by how much they are more convinc'd than others of the necessity of a Religious and Holy Life and that without this no man shall ever be admitted into the Mansions of the Blessed They believe likewise that according to the degrees of every mans holiness and vertue in this Life will be the degrees of his happiness in the other that he that sows sparingly shall reap sparingly and he that sows plentifully shall reap plentifully and that the measure of every man's reward shall be according to his improvement of the Talents that were committed to him But how little do men live under the power of these convictions And notwithstanding we are allur'd by the most glorious promises and hopes and aw'd by the greatest fears and urg'd by the most forcible argument in the world the evident necessity of the thing Yet how faintly do we run the Race that is set before us How frequently and how easily are we stop'd or diverted in our Christian course by very little temptations How cold and how careless and how inconstant are we in the Exercises of Piety and how defective in every part of our Duty Did we act reasonably and as Men use to do in matters of much less moment we could not be so indifferent about a thing so necessary so slight and careless in a matter of Life and Death and upon which all Eternity does depend Let us then shake off this sloth and security and resolve to make that the great business of Time which is our great concernment to all Eternity And when we are immers'd in the cares and business of this Life and troubled about many things let this thought often come into our minds That there is one thing needful and which therefore deserves above all other things to be regarded by us Secondly There are another sort of persons who are grosly careless of this one thing necessary and do not seem to mind it at all Who go on securely in an evil course as if either they had no Souls or no concernment for them I may say to these as the Master of the Ship did to Jonah when he was fast asleep in the Storm What meanest thou O sleeper Arise and call upon thy God When our Souls are every moment in danger of sinking it is high time for us to awake out of sleep to ply every Oar and to use all possible care and industry to save a thing so precious from a danger so threatning and so terrible We are apt enough to be sensible of the force of this Argument of necessity in other cases and very carefully to provide against the pressing necessities of this life and how to avoid those great temporal evils of poverty and disgrace of pain and suffering But the great necessity of all and that which is mainly incumbent upon us is to provide for Eternity to secure the everlasting happiness and to prevent the endless and insupportable miseries of another World This this is the one thing necessary and to this we ought to bend and apply all our care and endeavours If we would fairly compare the necessity of things and wisely weigh the concernments of this Life and the other in a just and equal balance we should be ashamed to misplace our diligence and industry as we do to bestow our best thoughts and time about these vain and perishing things and to take no care about that better part which cannot be taken from us Fond and vain men that we are who are so solicitous how we shall pass a few days in this world but matter not what shall become of us for ever But as careless as we are now about these things time will come when we shall sadly lay them to heart and when they will touch us to the quick When we come to lie upon a Death-bed if God shall be pleas'd to grant us then so much time and use of our Reason as to be able to recollect our selves we shall then be convinc'd how great a necessity there was of minding our Souls and of the prodigious folly of neglecting them and of our not being sensible of the value of them till we are ready to despair of saving them But blessed be God this is not yet our case though we know not how soon it may be Let us then be wise and consider these things in time lest Death and Despair should overtake and oppress us at once You that are young be pleas'd to consider that this is the best opportunity of your Lives for the minding and doing of this work You are now most capable of the best impressions before the habits of Vice have taken deep root and your hearts be harden'd through the deceitfulness of sin This is the acceptable time this is the day of salvation And there is likewise a very weighty consideration to be urg'd upon those that are old if there be any that are willing to own themselves so that this is the last opportunity of their lives and therefore they should lay hold of it and improve it with all their might For it will soon be past and when it is nothing can call it back It is but a very little while before we shall all certainly be of this mind that the best thing we could have done in this World was to prepare for the other Could I represent to you that invisible World which I am speaking of you would all readily assent to this counsel and would be glad to follow it and put it speedily in practice Do but then open your eyes and look a little before you to the things which are not far off from any of us and to many of us may perhaps be much nearer than we are aware Let us but judge of things now as we shall all shortly judge of them And let us live now as after a few days we shall every one of us wish with all our Souls that we had liv'd and be as serious as if we were ready to step into the other World and to enter upon that change which Death will quickly make in every one of us Strange stupidity of Men That a change so near so great so certain should affect us so coldly and be so little consider'd and provided for by us That the things of Time should move us so much and the things of Eternity so little What will we do when this change comes if we have made no preparation for it If we be Christians and do verily believe the things which I am speaking of and that after a few days more are pass'd Death will come and draw aside that thick Veil of sense and security which now hides these things from us and shew us that fearful and amazing sight which
we are now so loth to think upon I say if we believe this it is time for us to be wise and serious And happy that man who in the days of his health hath retir'd himself from the noise and tumult of this world and made that careful preparation for Death and a better Life as may give him that constancy and firmness of Spirit as to be able to bear the thoughts and approaches of his great Change without amazement and to have a mind almost equally poiz'd between that strong inclination of Nature which makes us desirous to live and that wiser dictate of Reason and Religion which should make us willing and contented to die whenever God thinks fit Many of us do not now so clearly discern these things because our eyes are dazzel'd with the false light and splendor of earthly felicity But this assuredly is more worth than all the Kingdoms of the World and the Glory of them to be able to possess our Souls at such a time and to be at perfect Peace with our own minds having our hearts fixed trusting in God To have our Accounts made up and Estate of our immortal Souls as well settled and secur'd as by the assistance of God's Grace humane care and endeavour though mix'd with much humane frailty is able to do And if we be convinc'd of these things we are utterly inexcusable if we do not make this our first and great care and prefer it to all other interests whatsoever And to this end we should resolutely disentangle our selves from worldly cares and incumbrances at least so far that we may have competent liberty and leisure to attend this great concernment and to put our Souls into a fit posture and preparation for another World That when Sickness and Death shall come we may not act our last part indecently and confusedly and have a great deal of work to do when we shall want both time and all other advantages to do it in Whereby our Souls when they will stand most in need of comfort and support will unavoidably be left in a trembling and disconsolate condition and in an anxious doubtfulness of mind what will become of them for ever To conclude This care of Religion and our Souls is a thing so necessary that in comparison of it we are to neglect the very necessaries of Life So our Lord teacheth us Take no thought saying what shall we eat or what shall we drink or wherewithal shall we be cloathed But seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness The Calls of God and Religion are so very pressing and importunate that they admit of no delay or excuse whatsoever This our Saviour signifies to us by denying the Disciple whom he had call'd to follow him leave to go and bury his Father Let the dead says he bury their dead but do thou follow me There is one thing needful and that is the business of Religion and the care of our immortal Souls which whatever else we neglect should be carefully minded and regarded by every one of us O that there were such a heart in us O that we were wise that we understood this that we would consider our latter end Which God grant we may all do in this our day for his mercies sake in Jesus Christ to whom with the Father and the Holy Ghost be all Honour and Glory now and ever Amen Of the Eternity of Hell-Torments A SERMON Preached before the QUEEN AT WHITEHALL March 7. 1689 90. Of the Eternity of Hell-Torments MATTH 25.46 And these shall go away into everlasting punishment but the Righteous into life eternal AMong all the arguments to Repentance and a good Life those have the greatest force and power upon the minds of men which are fetch'd from another World and from the final state of good and bad men after this Life And this our Saviour represents to us in a most lively manner in that prospect which in the latter part of this Chapter he gives us of the Judgment of the great Day namely that at the end of the World the Son of Man shall come in his glory with his Holy Angels and shall sit upon the Throne of his Glory and all Nations shall be gathered before him and shall be separated into two great Companies the Righteous and the Wicked who shall stand the one on the Right hand and the other on the Left of this great Judge who shall pronounce sentence severally upon them according to the actions which they have done in this Life The Righteous shall be rewarded with eternal happiness and the Wicked shall be sentenc'd to everlasting punishment And these that is the Wicked shall go away into everlasting punishment but the Righteous into Life eternal The Words are plain and need no explication For I take it for granted that every one at first hearing of them does clearly apprehend the difference between the Righteous and the Wicked and between endless Happiness and Misery But although these Words be so very easy to be understood they can never be too much consider'd by us The Scope and design of them is to represent to us the different Fates of good and bad men in another World and that their Ends there will be as different as their Ways and doings have been here in this World The serious consideration whereof is the greatest discouragement to Sin and the most powerful argument in the World to a holy and vertuous life Because it is an argument taken from our greatest and most lasting interest our happiness or our misery to all Eternity A concernment of that vast consequence that it must be the greatest stupidity and folly in the World for any man to neglect it This eternal state of Rewards and Punishments in another World our Blessed Saviour hath clearly revealed to us And as to one part of it viz. That good men shall be eternally happy in another World every one gladly admits it But many are loth that the other part should be true concerning the eternal punishment of wicked men And therefore they pretend that it is contrary to the Justice of God to punish temporary Crimes with eternal Torments Because Justice always observes a proportion between Offences and Punishments but between temporary Sins and eternal Punishments there is no proportion And as this seems hard to be reconcil'd with Justice so much more with that excess of Goodness which we suppose to be in God And therefore they say that though God seem to have declar'd that impenitent Sinners shall be everlastingly punish'd yet these declarations of Scripture are so to be mollified and understood as that we may be able to reconcile them with the essential perfections of the Divine nature This is the full force and strength of the Objection And my work at this time shall be to clear if I can this difficult Point And that for these two Reasons First For the vindication of the Divine Justice and Goodness
not enter into his Rest yet we are to consider that both the tenour of the Sentence which our Blessed Saviour hath assur'd us will be pass'd upon them at the Judgment of the Great Day Depart ye cursed into everlasting fire and likewise this Declaration in the Text that the Wicked shall go away into everlasting punishment though they do not restrain God from doing what he pleases yet they cut off from the Sinner all reasonable hopes of the relaxation or mitigation of them For since the great Judge of the World hath made so plain and express a Declaration and will certainly pass such a Sentence it would be the greatest folly and madness in the world for the Sinner to entertain any hope of escaping it and to venture his soul upon that hope I know but one thing more commonly said upon this Argument that seems material And that is this That the words death and destruction and perishing whereby the punishment of wicked men in the other World is most frequently express'd in Scripture do most properly import annihilation and an utter end of Being and therefore may reasonably be so understood in the matter of which we are now speaking To this I answer that these words and those which answer them in other Languages are often both in Scripture and other Authors used to signify a state of great misery and suffering without the utter extinction of the miserable Thus God is often in Scripture said to bring destruction upon a Nation when he sends great Judgments upon them though they do not exterminate and make an utter end of them And nothing is more common in most Languages than by perishing to express a person's being undone and made very miserable As in that known passage in Tiberius his Letter to the Roman Senate Let all the Gods and Goddesses saith he destroy me worse than at this very time I feel my self to perish c. in which Saying the words destroy and perish are both of them us'd to express the miserable anguish and torment which at that time he felt in his mind as Tacitus tells us at large And as for the word Death a state of misery which is as bad or worse than death may properly enough be call'd by that name And for this reason the punishment of wicked men after the Day of Judgment is in the Book of the Revelation so frequently and fitly call'd the second death And the Lake of fire into which the wicked shall be cast to be tormented in it is expresly call'd the second death But besides this they that argue from the force of these words that the punishment of wicked men in the other world shall be nothing else but an utter end of their Being do necessarily fall into two great inconveniencies First That hereby they exclude all positive punishment and torment of Sinners For if the second death and to be destroy'd and to perish signify nothing else but the Annihilation of Sinners and an utter extinction of their Being and if this be all the effect of that dreadful Sentence which shall be pass'd upon them at the Day of Judgment then the Fire of Hell is quench'd all at once and is only a frightful Metaphor without any meaning But this is directly contrary to the tenour of Scripture which doth so often describe the punishment of wicked men in Hell by positive torments And particularly our Blessed Saviour describing the lamentable state of the damned in Hell expresly says that there shall be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth which cannot be if Annihilation be all the meaning and effect of the Sentence of the Great Day Secondly Another inconvenience of this Opinion is that if Annihilation be all the punishment of Sinners in the other World then the punishment of all Sinners must of necessity be equal because there are no degrees of Annihilation or not-being But this also is most directly contrary to Scripture as I have already shewn I know very well that some who are of this Opinion do allow a very long and tedious time of the most terrible and intolerable torment of Sinners and after that they believe that there shall be an utter end of their Being But then they must not argue this from the force of the Words before mentioned because the plain inference from thence is that Annihilation is all the punishment that wicked men shall undergo in the next Life And if that be not true as I have plainly shewn that it is not I do not see from what other words or expressions in Scripture they can find the least ground for this Opinion that the torment of wicked men shall at last end in their Annihilation And yet admitting all this for which I think there is no ground at all in Scripture I cannot see what great comfort Sinners can take in the thought of a tedious time of terrible torment ending at last in Annihilation and the utter extinction of their Beings Thirdly We may consider further that the primary end of all Threatnings is not punishment but the prevention of it For God does not threaten that men may sin and be punish'd but that they may not sin and so may escape the punishment threaten'd And therefore the higher the threatning runs so much the more mercy and goodness there is in it because it is so much the more likely to hinder men from incurring the penalty that is threatned Fourthly Let it be consider'd likewise that when it is is so very plain that God hath threatned eternal misery to impenitent Sinners all the prudence in the World obliges men to believe that he is in good earnest and will execute these threatnings upon them if they will obstinately stand it out with him and will not be brought to Repentance And therefore in all reason we ought so to demean our selves and so to perswade others as knowing the terrour of the Lord and that they who wilfully break his Laws are in danger of eternal Death To which I will add in the Fifth and last place That if we suppose that God did intend that his threatnings should have their effect to deterr men from the breach of his Laws it cannot be imagin'd that in the same Revelation which declares these threatnings any intimation should be given of the abatement or non-execution of them For by this God would have weaken'd his own Laws and have taken off the edge and terror of his threatnings Because a threatning hath quite lost its force if we once come to believe that it will not be executed And consequently it would be a very impious design to go about to teach or perswade any thing to the contrary and a betraying men into that misery which had it been firmly believ'd might have been avoided We are all bound to preach and You and I are all bound to believe the terrors of the Lord. Not so as sawcily to determine and pronounce what God must do in this
case for after all He may do what he will as I have clearly shewn But what is fit for us to do and what we have reason to expect if notwithstanding a plain and express threatning of the vengeance of eternal fire we still go on to treasure up to our selves wrath against the day of wrath and the revelation of the righteous Judgment of God and will desperately put it to the hazard whether and how far God will execute his threatnings upon Sinners in another World And therefore there is no need why we should be very sollicitously concern'd for the honour of God's Justice or Goodness in this matter Let us but take care to believe and avoid the Threatnings of God and then how terrible soever they are no harm can come to us And as for God let us not doubt but that he will take care of his own Honour and that He who is holy in all his ways and righteous in all his works will do nothing that is repugnant to his eternal Goodness and Righteousness and that He will certainly so manage things at the Judgment of the Great Day as to be justified in his sayings and to be righteous when we are judged For notwithstanding his Threatnings he hath reserved Power enough in his own hands to do right to all his Perfections So that we may rest assur'd that he will judge the world in righteousness and if it be any-wise inconsistent either with Righteousness or Goodness which He knows much better than we do to make Sinners miserable for ever that He will not do it nor is it credible that he would threaten Sinners with a Punishment which he could not justly execute upon them Therefore Sinners ought always to be afraid of it and reckon upon it And always to remember that there is great Goodness and Mercy in the severity of God's Threatnings and that nothing will more justify the infliction of eternal Torments than the foolish presumption of Sinners in venturing upon them notwithstanding such plain and terrible Threatnings This I am sure is a good Argument to all of us to work out our Salvation with fear and trembling and with all possible care to endeavour the prevention of that misery which is so terribly severe that at present we can hardly tell how to reconcile it with the Justice and Goodness of God This God heartily desires we would do and hath solemnly sworn that he hath no pleasure in the death of the wicked but rather that he should turn from his wickedness and live So that here is all imaginable care taken to prevent our miscarriage and all the assurance that the God of Truth can give us of his unwillingness to bring this misery upon us And both these I am sure are arguments of great Goodness For what can Goodness do more than to warn us of this misery and earnestly to persuade us to prevent it and to threaten us so very terribly on purpose to deterr us from so great a danger And if this will not prevail with us but we will still go on to despise the riches of God's goodness and long suffering and forbearance what in reason remains for us but a fearful looking for of Judgment and fiery Indignation to consume us And what almost can Justice or even Goodness it self do less than to inflict that punishment upon us which with eyes open we would wilfully run upon and which no warning no persuasion no importunity could prevail with us to avoid And when as the Apostle says knowing the Judgment of God that they which commit such things are worthy of death yet for all that we would venture to commit them And therefore whatever we suffer we do but inherit our own choice and have no reason to complain of God who hath set before us Life and Death eternal Happiness and Misery and hath left us to be the Carvers of our own Fortune And if after all this we will obstinately refuse this happiness and wilfully run upon this Misery Wo unto us for we have rewarded evil to our selves You see then by all that hath been said upon this Argument what we have all reason to expect if we will still go on in our Sins and will not be brought to Repentance You have heard what a terrible Punishment the just God hath threatned to the Workers of Iniquity and that in as plain words as can be used to express anything These that is the wicked shall go away into everlasting Punishment but the righteous into Life eternal Here are Life and Death Happiness and Misery set before us Not this frail and mortal Life which is hardly worth the having were it not in order to a better and happier Life nor a temporal Death to get above the dread whereof should not methinks be difficult to us were it not for the bitter and terrible consequences of it But an eternal Life and an eternal enjoyment of all things which can render Life pleasant and happy and a perpetual Death which will for ever torment us but never make an end of us These God propounds to our choice And if the consideration of them will not prevail with us to leave our sins and to reform our lives what will Weightier Motives cannot be propos'd to the understanding of Man than everlasting Punishment and Life eternal than the greatest and most durable happiness and the most intolerable and lasting misery that human Nature is capable of Now considering in what terms the Threatnings of the Gospel are express'd we have all the reason in the world to believe that the Punishment of Sinners in another world will be everlasting However we cannot be certain of the contrary time enough to prevent it not till we come there and find by experience how it is And if it prove so it will then be too late either to prevent that terrible Doom or to get it revers'd Some comfort themselves with the uncomfortable and uncertain hope of being discharg'd out of Being and reduc'd to their first Nothing at least after the tedious and terrible suffering of the most grievous and exquisite Torments for innumerable Ages And if this should happen to be true good God! how feeble how cold a comfort is this Where is the Reason and Understanding of Men to make this their last Refuge and Hope and to lean upon it as a matter of mighty consolation that they shall be miserable beyond all imagination and beyond all patience for God knows how many Ages Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge No right sense and judgment of things No consideration and care of themselves no concernment for their own lasting Interest and Happiness Origen I know not for what good reason is said to have been of opinion That the punishment of Devils and wicked men after the Day of Judgment will continue but for a thousand years and that after that time they shall all be finally saved I can very hardly persuade my self that so wise
and learned a man as Origen was should be positive in an Opinion for which there can be no certain ground in Reason especially for the punctual and precise term of a thousand years and for which there is no ground at all that I know of from Divine Revelation But upon the whole matter however it be be it for a thousand years or be it for a longer and unknown term or be it for ever which is plainly threatned in the Gospel I say however it be this is certain that it is infinitely wiser to take care to avoid it than to dispute it and to run the final hazard of it Put it which way we will especially if we put it at the worst as in all prudence we ought to do it is by all possible means to be provided against So terrible so intolerable is the thought yea the very least suspicion of being miserable for ever And now give me leave to ask You as St. Paul did King Agrippa Do you believe the Scrâ—ptures And I hope I may answer for you my self as he did for Agrippa I know you do believe them And in them these things are clearly revealed and are part of that Creed of which we make a solemn profession every day And yet when we consider how most men live is it credible that they do firmly believe this plain Declaration of our Saviour and our Judge That the wicked shall go away into everlasting Punishment but the righteous into Life eternal Or if they do in some sort believe it is it credible that they do at all consider it seriously and lay it to heart So that if we have a mind to reconcile our belief with our Actions we must either alter our Bible and our Creed or we must change our Lives Let us then consider and shew our selves men And if we do so can any man to please himself for a little while be contented to be punish'd for ever and for the shadow of a short and imperfect happiness in this life be willing to run the hazard of being really and eternally miserable in the next World Surely this consideration alone of the extreme and endless misery of impenitent Sinners in another World if it were but well wrought into our minds would be sufficient to kill all the temptations of this World and to lay them dead at our feet and to make us deaf to all the Enchantments of Sin and Vice Because they bid us so infinitely to our loss when they offer us the enjoyment of a short Pleasure upon so very hard and unequal a condition as that of being miserable for ever The eternal Rewards and Punishments of another Life which are the great Sanction and Security of God's Laws one would think should be a sufficient weight to cast the Scales against any Pleasure or any Pain that this World can tempt or can threaten us withal And yet after all this will we still go on to do wickedly when we know the terrors of the Lord and that we must one day answer all our bold violations of his Law and contempts of his Authority with the loss of our immortal Souls and by suffering the vengeance of eternal Fire What is it then that can give men the Heart and Courage but I recall that Word because it is not true Courage but fool hardiness thus to out brave the Judgment of God and to set at nought the horrible and amazing consideration of a miserable Eternity How is it possible that men that are awake and in their wits should have any ease in their minds or enjoy so much as one quiet hour whilst so great a danger hangs over their heads and they have taken no tolerable care to prevent it If we have any true and just sense of this danger we cannot fail to shew that we have it by making haste to escape it and by taking that care of our Souls which is due to immortal Spirits that are made to be Happy or Miserable to all Eternity Let us not therefore estimate and measure things as they appear now to our sensual and deluded and deprav'd Judgments but let us open our eyes and look to the last issue and consequence of them Let us often think of these things and consider well with our selves what apprehensions will then probably fill and possess our minds when we shall stand trembling before our Judge in a fearful expectation of that terrible Sentence which is just ready to be pronounced and as soon as ever it is pronounc'd to be executed upon us When we shall have a full and clear sight of the unspeakable Happiness and of the horrible and astonishing Miseries of another World When there shall be no longer any Veil of Flesh and Sense to interpose between them and us and to hide these things from our eyes And in a word when Heaven with all the Glories of it shall be open to our view and as the expression is in Job Hell shall be naked before us and Destruction shall have no covering How shall we then be confounded to find the truth and reality of those things which we will not now be persuaded to believe And how shall we then wish that we had believed the terrors of the Lord and instead of quarrelling with the Principles of Religion and calling them into question we had lived under the constant sense and awe of them Blessed be God that there is yet hope concerning us and that we may yet flee from the wrath to come and that the Miseries of Eternity may yet be prevented in Time And that for this very end and purpose our most Gracious and Merciful God hath so clearly revealed these things to us not with a desire to bring them upon us but that we being warned by his Threatnings might not bring them upon our selves I will conclude all with the Counsel of the Wise Man Seek not Death in the error of your Life and pull not upon your selves destruction with the works of your own hands For God made not death neither hath he pleasure in the destruction of the Living But ungodly men with their works and words have called it down upon themselves Which that none of us may do God of his infinite Goodness grant for his Mercies sake in Jesus Christ To whom with Thee O Father and the Holy Ghost be all Honour and Glory Dominion and Power Thanksgiving and Praise both now and for ever Amen Success not always answerable to the probability of Second Causes A FAST-SERMON Preached before the House of COMMONS ON Wednesday April the 16th 1690. Jovis 17. die April 1690. Ordered THat the Thanks of this House be given to Dr. Tillotson Dean of St. Pauls for the Sermon Preached before this House Yesterday And that he be desired to Print the same And that Sir Edmund Jenings do acquaint him therewith Paul Jodrell Cler. Dom. Com. Success not always answerable to the probability of Second Causes Ecclesiastes IX 11 I
the end of these men How thou didst set them in slippery places c. This satisfied him that when-ever the secret design of God's Providence should be unfolded whether in this World or the other how strange and cross soever things might seem to be at present yet in the issue and conclusion it would appear that neither are bad men so happy nor good men so miserable as at present they may seem to be So that upon a full debate of this matter the Psalmist concludes that these Objections against Providence do spring from our ignorance and short and imperfect view of things whereas if we saw the whole design from beginning to end it would appear to be very reasonable and regular Thus my heart was grieved so foolish was I and ignorant and as a beast before thee And in regard to himself he tells us that he saw great reason to acknowledge God's tender care over him in particular and that he could find no security or comfort for himself but in God alone Nevertheless I am continually with thee thou hast holden me by thy right hand Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel and afterwards receive me to glory as if he had said I am sensible of thy constant presence with me and care of me and do entirely depend upon thy guidance and direction not doubting but that my present troubles and afflictions will have a happy and glorious issue And at last he breaks out into a kind of exultation and triumph for the mighty consolation which he found in the firm belief of the Being and Providence of God as the great stay and support of his Soul in the worst condition that could befall him in the words of the Text Whom have I in Heaven but thee and there is none upon Earth that I desire besides thee If a man were to chuse a happiness for himself and were to ransack Heaven and Earth for it after all his search and enquiry he would at last fix upon God as the chief happiness of man and the true and only rest and center of our Souls This then is the plain meaning of the Text That nothing in the world but God can make man happy Whom have I in Heaven but thee and there is none upon Earth that I desire besides thee That Man of himself is not sufficient for his own happiness is evident upon many accounts Because he is liable to so many evils and calamities which he can neither prevent nor remedy He is full of wants which he cannot supply compassed about with infirmities which he can only complain of but is not able to redress He is obnoxious to dangers which he must always fear because he can never sufficiently provide against them Consider Man by himself and from under the conduct and protection of a superior and more powerful Being and he is in a most disconsolate and forlorn condition Secure of nothing that he enjoys and liable to be disappointed of every thing that he hopes for He is apt to grieve for what he cannot help and perhaps the justest cause of his grief is that he cannot help it for if he could instead of grieving for it he would help it He cannot refrain from desiring a great many things which he would fain have but is never likely to obtain because they are out of his power and it troubles him both that they are so and that he cannot help his being troubled at it Thus man walketh in a vain shew and disquieteth himself in vain courting happiness in a thousand shapes and the faster he follows it the swifter it flies from him Almost every thing promiseth happiness to us at a distance such a step of Honour such a pitch of Estate such a Fortune or Match for a Child But when we come nearer to it either we fall short of it or it falls short of our expectation and it is hard to say which of these is the greatest disappointment Our hopes are usually bigger than enjoyment can satisfie and an evil long fear'd besides that it may never come is many times more painful and troublesome than the evil it self when it comes In a word man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards He comes into the world naked and unarm'd and from himself more destitute of the natural means of his security and support than any other Creature whatsoever as it were on purpose to shew that he is more peculiarly the care of a Superior Providence And as man of all the Creatures of this lower World is only made to own and acknowledge a Deity so God in great Wisdom hath so order'd things that none of the other Creatures should have so much need of Him and so much reason to acknowledge their necessary dependance upon him So that the words of David are the very sense and voice of Nature declaring to us that Mankind is born into the World upon terms of greater dependence upon the Providence of God than other Creatures Thou art he says David there to God that tookest me out of the womb thou madest me to hope or thou didst keep me in safety when I was upon my mother's breasts I was cast upon thee from the womb thou art my God from my mother's belly Be not far from me for trouble is near Trouble is always near to us and therefore it is happy for us that God is never far from any of us For in Him we live and move and have our being And when we are grown up we are liable to a great many mischiefs and dangers every moment of our lives and without the Providence of God continually insecure not only of the good things of this life but even of life it self So that when we come to be men we cannot but wonder how ever we arriv'd at that state and how we have continued in it so long considering the infinite difficulties and dangers which have continually attended us That in running the gantlope of a long life when so many hands have been lifted up against us and so many strokes levell'd at us we have escaped so free and with so few marks and scars upon us That when we are besieged with so many dangers and so many arrows of death are perpetually flying about us to which we do so many ways lie open we should yet hold out twenty forty sixty years and some of us perhaps longer and do still stand at the mark untouch'd at least not dangerously wounded by any of them And considering likewise this fearful and wonderful frame of a humane Body this infinitely complicated Engine in which to the due performance of the several functions and offices of life so many strings and springs so many receptacles and channels are necessary and all in their right frame and order and in which besides the infinite imperceptible and secret ways of mortality there are so many sluces and flood-gates to let Death in and Life out that it is next to a
an instant and with the greatest ease and no created Power can put any difficulty in his way much less make any effectual resistance because Omnipotency can check and countermand and bear down before it all other Powers So that if God be on our side who can be against us We may safely commit our Souls into his hands for he is able to keep that which is committed to him He can give us all good things and deliver us from all evil for his is the Kingdom and the glorious Power Though all Creatures should fail us we may rely upon God and live upon his All-sufficiency for our supply and may say with the Prophet Though the Fig-tree should not blossom neither Fruit be in the Vine though the labour of the Olive should fail and the Fields should yield no meat though the Flock should be cut off from the Fold and there should be no Herd in the Stalls yet would I rejoice in the Lord and joy in the God of my Salvation Secondly As God is an All-sufficient Good so He is perfect Goodness He is willing to communicate happiness to us and to employ his Power and Wisdom for our good He made us that he might make us happy and nothing can hinder us from being so but our selves Such is his goodness that he would have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth And when we have provoked him by our sins he is long-suffering to us-ward not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance For he delighteth not in the death of a sinner but rather that he should turn from his wickedness and live So that if any of us be miserable it is our own choice if we perish our destruction is of our selves For as the Wiseman in one of the Apocryphal Books says excellently God made not death neither hath he pleasure in the destruction of the living But men seek death in the error of their life and pull destruction upon themselves with the works of their own hands So great is the goodness of God to mankind that he hath omitted nothing that is necessary to our happiness He design'd it for us at first and to that end he hath endowed us with Powers and Faculties whereby we are capable of knowing and loving and obeying and enjoying Him the chief Good And when we had forfeited all this by the wilful transgression and disobedience of the first Parents of mankind and were miserably bruised and maimed by their fall God of his infinite mercy was pleas'd to restore us to a new capacity of happiness by sending his only Son to suffer in our nature and in our stead and thereby to become a Propitiation for the sins of the whole World and the Author of eternal Salvation to them that believe and obey him And he hath likewise promised to give us his Holy Spirit to enable us to that Faith and Obedience which the Gospel requires of us as the necessary conditions of our eternal Salvation Thirdly God is also a firm and unchangeable Good Notwithstanding his infinite Wisdom and Power and Goodness we might be miserable if God were mutable For that cannot be a happiness which depends upon uncertainties and perhaps one of the greatest aggravations of misery is to fall from happiness to have been once happy and afterwards to cease to be so And that would unavoidably happen to us if the cause of our happiness could change and the foundation of it be removed If God could be otherwise than powerful and wise and good all our hopes of happiness would be shaken and would fall to the ground But the Divine nature is not subject to any change As he is the Father of lights and the Author of every good and perfect gift so with him is no variableness neither shadow of turning All the things of this World are mutable and for that reason had they no other imperfection belonging to them cannot make us happy Fourthly God is such a good as none can deprive us of and take away from us If the things of this World were unchangeable in their nature and not liable to any decay yet they cannot make us happy because we may be cheated of them by fraud or robb'd of them by violence But God cannot be taken from us Nothing but our Sins can part God and us Who shall separate us saith the Apostle from the love of God shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword We may be stripp'd of all our worldly Comforts and Enjoyments by the violence of men but none of all these can separate us from God I am persuaded as the Apostle goes on with great triumph that neither death nor life nor Angels nor Principalities nor Powers nor heighth nor depth nor things present nor things to come nor any other Creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Nor any other Creature Here is a sufficient induction of particulars and nothing left out of this Catalogue but one and that is Sin which is none of God's Creatures but our own This indeed deliberately consented to and wilfully continued in will finally part God and us and for ever hinder us from being happy But if we be careful to avoid this which only can separate between God and us nothing can deprive us of Him The aids and influences of his Grace none can intercept and hinder the joys and comforts of his Holy Spirit none can take from us All other things may leave us and forsake us We may be debarr'd of our best friends and banish'd from all our acquaintance but men can send us no whither from the presence of God Our Communication with Heaven cannot be prevented or interrupted Our Prayers and our Souls will always find the way thither from the uttermost parts of the Earth Fifthly God is an eternal God And nothing but what is so can make us happy Man having an immortal Spirit and being design'd for an endless duration must have a happiness proportionable For which reason nothing in this World can make us happy because we shall abide and remain after it When a very few years are past and gone and much sooner for any thing we know all the things of this World will leave us or else we shall be taken away from them But God is from everlasting to everlasting He is the same and his years fail not Therefore well might David fix his happiness upon God alone and say Whom have I in Heaven but thee and there is none upon Earth that I desire besides thee When my heart faileth and my strength faileth God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever Sixthly God is able to support and comfort us in every condition and under all the accidents and adversities of humane Life Outward afflictions may hurt our Body but they cannot reach our